Will The Coronavirus Make Us Better People (More Societal)?

Picture of martinbailey2301
green plant

This is the first in a series of posts exploring how the coronavirus and the government’s response to it will affect our society long term. After the Prime Minister put the UK on lockdown on Monday evening, it’s interesting that the response was an increase in people agreeing with this stance. More about this in our second post later this week.

This post explains what we mean by #better people’ and societal.

1. What Do We Mean By ‘Better People’?

We don’t mean not swearing so much or cutting down on smoking / drinking (although these might be good things!). Our portal is all about improving ourselves, but that’s not what we mean here. We used the word ‘societal’, and we hope this word starts to get more use over the next few years.

We’re talking about the greater good.

So, what’s ‘societal’, and how is it different from ‘social’?

What is societal?

Societal means relating to society or social relations. Social is broader and can mean a society, or a family, or can refer to a person who interacts more with other people (rather than a less social person). Is this why ‘societal’ is becoming a bit buzzy again – people want to be clear that they are talking about things pertaining to society as a whole.

Let’s give an example:

Societal marketing is a good example of the difference

Marketing is a good place to start. Traditionally companies (especially publicly listed corporates which need to manage expectations for growth and profit) balance profit and consumer needs to develop a ‘win – win’.

Lobby groups, activists, increased media focus and some government and industry regulation have forced a rethink. More companies are realising they need to be more aware how their products and processes affect overall society. This includes ‘Corporate Social Responsibility’ and green initiatives.

This leads to the ‘societal marketing’ concept, where the idea is that the company puts human welfare and social responsibilities above or alongside shareholder profits to sustain long term success. So the company considers what its customers want, what the company needs and society’s long term interests.

This is completely different to social marketing, which is just a branch of the marketing discipline.

Any examples of companies using societal marketing?

Examples of companies taking this approach have been around for a while:

  • Body Shop have campaigned against animal cruelty since 1989
  • Avon launched a breast cancer awareness campaign in 1993 in partnership with NABCO selling pink ribbons and they have raised billions of dollars – they also trained 45,000 of their reps in the US to discuss breast cancer early detection
  • Patagonia are an outdoor and sports clothing company, and they focus on sustainability and pollution
  • Ariel the Proctor and Gamble detergent run a special fund raising campaign mainly for developing countries, and work in conjunction with WWF
  • Danone focus on green issues and health
  • • Coca-Cola has more than 3,1000 sustainability projects around the world. One is ‘Every bottle has a story’ which allows people to tell their own stories – this one is from an Australian cane farmer trying to save the Great Barrier Reef.

What do societal adverts look like?

These adverts are making a point which has a beneficial effect on society as a whole. That may be attacking a widely held prejudice, or looking at some important ecological issues, or changing people’s views to a more positive one. Here are some examples.

A great example is Kia’s ‘Hero’s Journey’ commercial with Melissa McCarthy for their Niro. It pokes fun but has a series of ecologcal themes.

https://youtu.be/KeVHmLY7YZchttps://youtu.be/tuAPPeRg3Nw

Channel 5 did an advert on ‘Meet The Superhumans’ for the 2012 Paralypics which helped change our perceptions of disability significantly and hopefully forever. TV coverage peaked at 11.6 million for the opening ceremony and 87% of people who saw the campaign went on to watch the paralympics.

Budweiser used the Super Bowl in 2017 to show their ‘Born The Hard Way’ advert, showing how the company was started by its immigrant founder  It was intended to make a point only about the “pursuit, the effort, the passion, the drive, the hard work, the ambition” of immigrants.

https://youtu.be/IZaQQvfIfPQhttps://youtu.be/KagSgWKaE_8

This is the Honda Grrr advert from some time ago – it focussed on getting people to think about the environment.  It has some nice ecological messages and is a well made little cartoon.

Lean Cuisine did an advert encouraging people to change their priorities called ‘Weigh This’. It looked at many valuable things that couldn’t be weighed, including seeing different cultures, being a single mother and being happily married (among others).

https://youtu.be/h1I_hFwzOYA

But is this just marketing??

The next post will explore people’s attitudes and why this is becoming more important.
Then we’ll look at what’s changed recently in society, before putting it all together to see whether the coronavirus and our social isolation will make us change some attitudes and become better people.

YouDrive thinks…

Although some of the examples are dated, they show there is a good case for thinking about the right things – making society more sustainable and societal.

Dare we say…. Greta Thunberg is very much in the public consciousness with a sustainable message. Similar lines with a different theme.

The coronavirus has made this much more immediate and ‘in our faces’!

The next post looks at our attitudes and vales and how these can change.

IF YOU WANT TO LEAVE A COMMENT, SCROLL DOWN TO THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE!

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Telegram
WhatsApp

Leave a Reply

All areas of health are interlinked

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

Find your initial focus

You might think that physical, financial and mental health are quite separate, and for some people they are. However, often a problem in one area has a knock-on effect on others. Losing your job can lead to anxiety and depression, which can turn you to drink and impact your health.

You might have a severe issue in one area but that can lead to problems in other areas, and the people treating you for the first problem won’t be equipped to deal with these linked issues.

For example, doctors and nurses can treat you for a physical problem but can’t advise you about your job or finances.  Nor for the anxiety that comes with it, apart from prescribing some drugs, which might or might not be the best solution.

We encourage you to take a holistic view – we look at all areas and offer support across the whole spectrum.

health areas interlinked

Even this view of health is simplistic, as you’ll discover later if you go down that route.  You might want to consider overall health, or wellness or wellbeing, which include additional types of health, such as occupational health (how you are in your job).   Then there’s happiness and quality of life – how do these fit?

If you’re interested in that, click the link here to see more information.

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Health Areas in Domains

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

Domains

We break down the overall concept of health or wellness into ‘bite-sized chunks’ that we can actually do something about.  The first level we call health domains. 

We like the Life of Wellness site and we have chosen the following domains.

1. Emotional Wellness: Awareness and acceptance of feelings
2. Spiritual Wellness: A search for meaning and purpose
3. Intellectual Wellness: Recognition of your creativity, knowledge and skills
4. Physical Wellness: Need for physical activity and balanced nutrition
5. Environmental Wellness: Positive awareness and impact on your environment
6. Financial Wellness: Debt reduction, cash flow balance or financial future planning
7. Occupational Wellness: Personal achievement and enrichment from your career
8. Social Wellness: Contribution to your community

Health Areas

Within each domain, we have included a number of health areas. These are specific issues that you can tackle.  Within each health area, e.g. Depression, we have built additional information and exercises which you can do to help in the area. You can create your own Action Plan to address this area, and see

Emotional: Anxiety, Compassion Fatigue, Depression, Gambling, Laughter, Narcissistic, Personality Disorder, Sleep, Stress

Environmental: Environmental Issues, Greenness

Financial: Debt, Family Finance, Financial Planning, Financial Wellness

Intellectual: IQ, Personality, Procrastination

Occupational: Jobs for Different Personality Types, Retirement Income, Work Life Balance

Physical: Alcohol, Disabilities, Dizziness, Drugs, Fitness, Food Preferences, General Health, Healthy Ageing, Illness, Nutrition, Sleep Apnea, Smoking

Social: Communication Skills, Communication Styles, Domestic Abuse, Emotional Abuse, Love Partnerships, Mental Abuse, Parenting Styles, Sexual Addiction

Spiritual: Are You Sensitive, Mystical Guidance, Spirituality

Each health area has supporting information and its own questionnaire.

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Understand Health

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

Physical, financial and mental health

One definition of health is:

Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. 

The NHS define health as: ‘We use a broad definition of health that encompasses both physical and mental health, as well as wellbeing. This means we are not only interested in whether or not people are ill or have a health condition, but also in how healthy and well they are.’

We believe we also have to consider financial health, as this can easily impact physical and mental health. Click the button to see an example of how these are connected.

 It gets more complicated…

running physical health
See linkages between physical, financial and mental health

What is Health? How about Wellness, Wellbeing or Happiness?

The Active Wellbeing Society (TAWS) define Health as a state of the overall mental and physical state of a person; the absence of disease. They define Wellbeing or wellness as a way of life that aims to enhance well-being and refers to a more holistic whole-of-life experience which also includes emotional and spiritual aspects of life.  We expand on this definition of health to include financial health and mental health, to make it synonymous with wellbeing or wellness.  

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Health domains

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

We break down the overall concept of health or wellness into ‘bite-sized chunks’ that we can actually do something about.  The first level we call health domains.

We like the Life of Wellness site and we have chosen the following domains.

1. Emotional Wellness: Awareness and acceptance of feelings
2. Spiritual Wellness: A search for meaning and purpose
3. Intellectual Wellness: Recognition of your creativity, knowledge and skills
4. Physical Wellness: Need for physical activity and balanced nutrition
5. Environmental Wellness: Positive awareness and impact on your environment
6. Financial Wellness: Debt reduction, cash flow balance or financial future planning
7. Occupational Wellness: Personal achievement and enrichment from your career
8. Social Wellness: Contribution to your community

wellness wheel

Health Areas

Within each domain, we have included a number of health areas. These are specific issues that you can tackle.  Within each health area, e.g. Depression, once you have subscribed we have built additional information and exercises which you can do to help in the area.

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

See which domains you should address

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

Having established that we use 8 domains, you need to understand which you should concentrate on.

The 8 are:

  • Emotional
  • Environmental
  • Financial
  • Intellectual
  • Occupational
  • Physical
  • Social
  • Spiritual

 

You can take a questionnaire, which scores you in each domain.  You can decide which domains you are strong in, and which you need to improve.

Another analysis shows which domains you should look at, but also which domains you want to look at.

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Locus of Control

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

  • We want to help people in all aspects of their health  – physical, financial and mental. We also provide detailed explanations of how overall health (or well-being) is measured.
  • We believe these things are often linked, so we try and address health holistically. We are building templates, questionnaires and exercises to help you identify what’s important to you.
  • We think people should try and take responsibility for  of their own health as much as they can.  See below for what that means.

People look at things differently.  Some people believe things happen to them, while others believe they can influence what happens to them. Technically this is called the ‘locus of control’.  People can have an Internal or external Locus of Control

So how do you see things?

Psychology Today have a 15 minute test which gives you a summary of your position you can buy the detailed results if you want to.

My Personality Test have a 10 minute test which gives you a summary.

People tend to take more responsibility (locus gets more internal) as they get older.  However, external isn’t always bad – for example if you are physically unable to do some things you can accept it and focus on the things you can do.  This American video explains the concept and gives examples of how this can affect relationships.

locus of control

Internal

  • More likely to take responsibility for actions
  • Tend to be less influenced by others

External

  • Blame outside forces for what happens
  • Don’t believe they can change their situation themselves

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Add your attitude to change - see how you view changes in your life

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

Do you need to change?

No matter how healthy you are at the moment, the chances are that there are some areas you could improve. It may be that you have a real problem in one or more areas, and you would like to make some improvements.

At YouDrive we accept that there are many different degrees of ‘not wellness’ in a large number of different health areas, ranging from physical illness such as covid-19 through mental illness such as anxiety through to financial problems like debt.  We try and help where the problem ranges from ‘slight’ to quite bad’ – after this expert help and intervention may be needed.

However, especially in these times, we have to try and make these changes ourselves, possibly with some help from others, whether remotely or face to face.

The thing is, to make an improvement we have to change some things.

This involves changing our behaviour in some respects, and that’s not always easy.

Henry Ford, the creator of the assembly line, is quoted as saying “if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got”.  

henry ford

Another way of looking at this: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.” – attributed to Albert Einstein.

Consequently we need to make some changes.  The problem is that we have already developed a lot of habits, some of which we need to break and replace by better ones.  Some of our bad habits have become entrenched, and the bad results they create in turn engender further bad habits to develop – in effect the bad habits can feed on themselves.

We need to understand how we can make changes and stick to them, and that’s what this part of your health profile is about.

It will involve some learning, through reading, some videos and some additional information and also seeing how you react to change currently.

It will also ask you to consider whether you feel you are in charge of your future, or whether you feel it’s all fate.

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Assess your overall health using a health questionnaire

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

At YouDrive we try and help people improve their health. We use ‘health’ but we understand there are other terms such as wellbeing or even happiness that reflect how we are doing in our lives – if you’re interested in the different definitions and ideas see our page on the subject.

We want to help whether you have a particular problem – physical, financial or mental – or if you just want to improve some specific part of your life or just make some improvements overall.

You’d be surprised, but there has been a serious amount of scientific work done in this area over the last twenty years.

So first we allow you to assess your current health (or wellbeing, or happiness).  We do this by questionnaire.  Which one is determined by the type of person you are:

  1. You understand yourself well and want a quick overview of your health and wellness, and will drill down in any areas needing work
  2. You want to do a more detailed assessment and then focus on areas you’re already aware of
  3. You want to look at the whole situation in more detail across all the health domains.

By the way, we take your privacy seriously – we collect information that you choose to provide but we de-identify it as much as possible and will never share it with anyone without your explicit consent.

You can then drill down into some specific areas and there are more questionnaires to see your situation in these particular areas.  We provide you with specific information and refer you to other potential aspects of help. Our next step is to build a personalised action plan – for now we will make a suggestion for you to develop your own plan and then after a time you can see whether this has had a positive impact by retaking the test.

In future we will be engaging with medical and behavioural specialists to devise action plans for individual people with specific situations.

We have an overall questionnaire which you can complete which will assess your current state.

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

Values, Attitudes and Beliefs

You need to scroll down to see all the info in this popup – sorry for going on so much!

We all have our beliefs, attitudes and values – these have developed throughout our life based on who we are and what we have done. Let’s look at what these are.

The University of Reading explain: “People’s values, beliefs and attitudes are formed and bonded over time through the influences of family, friends, society and life experiences. So, by the time you’re an adult, you can hold very definite views on just about everything with a sense of “no one is going to change my mind”.

The combination of your personal values, beliefs and attitudes are your moral principles that guide you in life and affect your behaviour. However, your views can wildly differ to others and in an institution such as a school, these beliefs may be counter to the values of the school, child development or indeed the law.” 

Let’s look more closely at the differences between beliefs, attitudes and values.

Beliefs

These come from real experiences – we think our beliefs are based on reality, but in fact our beliefs colour our experiences; also, an original experience e.g. when we were a child is not the same as what’s happening now. Beliefs can be moral, religious or cultural and reflect who we are. They can be rational (‘it gets colder in winter’) or irrational (‘I am never going to make something of myself’).

Attitudes

This is an immediate belief or disposition about something specific. It is a recurring group of beliefs and behaviours aimed at specific groups, people, ideas or objects. They will normally be positive or negative and we will always behave that way to the target group. Examples of attitudes include confidence (I can or can’t do something), grateful (I an entitled to / grateful for XXX) and cheerful (I am generally happy / miserable).

Values

These are things (principles or qualities) that we hold in high regard or consider to be worthwhile or right / wrong. They are formed by a belief related to the worth of something – an idea or behaviour. Some values are common (e.g. family comes first, the value of friendship) or cultural (which the whole community have – see video at Study.com here)

The theory

Links to Wikipedia

Expectancy Value Theory suggests you balance your beliefs about something with the value you attach to it. The Theory of Reasoned Action suggests that beliefs and evaluation about behavioural outcomes determine attitudes, and intentions lead directly to behaviour.

Beliefs

Expressions of confidence – can change over time

Attitudes

Learned predispositions to something – are subject to change

Values

Ideals that guide our behaviour – Generally long lasting and often need life changing experience to change

Iceberg demonstrating implicit and explicit bias – from Owlcation

To close this box and go back click the X at the top or just click outside the box

A Butterfly Life: 4 Keys to More Happiness, Better Health and Letting Your True Self Shine

Times of change can be a challenge, no doubt! Whether it’s a relationship breakup, job loss, or being diagnosed with a serious health issue. Or you may WANT things to be different, but it feels a little scary or overwhelming. The butterfly reminds us change can be beautiful, even necessary, in order to realize our full potential and live our best life.

Go to Amazon