Behavioral health is the scientific or knowledge-based study of the emotions, feelings, way of behaviors, and biology relating to a person’s mental health, which have the ability to perform the function of everyday life.
Behavioral health is a term that is referred to as the person who is struggling with his/her behavioral issues and they lead with the component of stress, anxiety, depression, and interpersonal relations.
Behavioral Health leads to stress, mood swings disorders, disabilities of learning, addiction counseling, or psychological concerns.
Therapists, physicians, psychologists, life coaches, and nurses help to manage behavioral health with treatment (such as therapy, counseling, and sometimes with medications).
In other words, Behavioral Health is best explained as it is the link between behaviors and health of the body, spirit, and person’s mind (mental level).
Difference between behavioral health and mental health
There are some differences between both behavioral and mental health. Basically, Behavioral Health is how your habits influence your physical as well as mental well-being.
It includes the factor of eating, drinking, addiction, emotions, attention, and any type of phobia which impacts your behavior pattern, while Mental Health is the condition of well-being in which the person is surviving with stress and depression.
The habits of an individual are impacted by their mental health. Bipolar disorder and schizophrenia are examples of mental disorders and it is not directly a result of behavior, even though few mental health disorders are related to behavioral health disorders such as anxiety.
What are the types of Behavioral Health disorders?
Behavioral Health disorders are also known as disruptive behavioral disorders. These are the most common in adults. If this disorder remains untreated in childhood, it negatively impacts a person’s capabilities to do anything (such as maintaining a relationship and holding a job).
Behavioral Health disorders can break down into a few types, these are:
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
This Behavioral Disorder is mostly diagnosed in childhood and the children with this disorder have trouble paying attention because of differences in brain activity that badly affects self-control.
This disorder is usually common in boys rather than girls. The etiology of this disorder is still not clear but usually, it is inherited by their parents. ADHD disorder is treated by the support of school teachers, parent counseling, behavioral therapy, and sometimes with medications.
Dysthymic disorder
Dysthymic disorder is classified as a type of Persistent depressive disorder (PDD) which is also named “mood swing disorder” and it is mostly diagnosed in teenagers and adults.
The symptoms of this disorder appear with a severe type of stress with guilty feelings, hopelessness, fatigue, irritability, sleeping difficulty, mood swings, and loss of interest in daily life activities.
The actual etiology of this disorder is also not known but the main high-risk factors of this disorder are the chemistry of the brain, environmental factors, and genetics. It can be treated by two main therapies, Interpersonal Therapy (ITP) and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT).
Anxiety disorder
All people have to face anxiety in their daily life. It is a normal emotion of an individual, but for some people, the level of anxiety goes at its peak which disturbs their daily life. This disorder is characterized in many types, these are:
i. Social Anxiety Disorder:
An individual who has social media phobia faces this anxiety disorder because they are self-conscious about everyday social media updates. They become fixated and dependent on others’ judgments.
ii. Panic Disorder:
During a panic situation, the person feels terror and also has sweat with a fast heartbeat and they also feel the symptoms of a heart attack.
iii. Generalized Anxiety Disorder: In this anxiety disorder, you may feel useless depression with or without any reason and face unrealistic worries.
iv. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: The person experiences this type of disorder after any surgery or traumatic condition and they feel uncomfortable and restless.
v. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: This disorder is characterized by irrational thoughts that lead to obsession. The person who has OCD, engages with compulsions with negative consequences and unreasonable fears.
Emotional behavior disorder
Emotional behavior disorder is referred to as a condition exhibiting more than one characteristic over a long period of time and adversely affects a child’s educational performance with an inability to learn, inability to maintain relationships, rude behavior, and altered mood. The possible cause of emotional disorder might be stress, diet issues, hereditary, and self-confidence.
Eating disorder
Eating disorder is a type of behavioral illness in which the person has an irregular eating pattern and is also conscious about their weight and fitness.
Eating disorder is also categorized into many types such as:
i. Bulimia Nervosa: This is categorized by compensation of over-eating followed by behavior with forcible vomiting. An individual has a fear of weight gaining and he/she always feels unsatisfied because of his/her body shape. The person with this disorder experiences guilt, and shame.
ii. Anorexia Nervosa: This is categorized as an obsessive fear of gaining body weight. People with this disorder assume themselves as overweight, while they are underweight because of limited consumption of food.
Etiology of Eating disorder is unclear but the combination of biological, environmental, and psychological factors become the cause of eating disorder.
Learning disorder
This disorder is usually diagnosed in childhood and children face difficulties in reading words properly and it impacts the intelligence or motivation skills of the child. The symptoms of learning disorder is to face difficulty in recognizing words, letters, and patterns, inability of coordination, and excess struggle in completing tasks.
Obstructive sleep apnea
It is referred to as something that blocks your upper airway area when you are sleeping and your chest muscles have worked hard to open the airway and the person usually breathes loudly and finds difficulty in sleeping. The symptoms of OSA are headache, dry mouth, snoring, and high blood pressure.
Behavioral disorder in children
As we all know children can be naughty, impulsive, emotional, and defiant from time to time and this all is normal, but some children have challenging behavior, which means they do not behave normally.
The common disorders in children are:
Oppositional defiant disorder
One in ten children under the age of 10-12 years have to face oppositional defiant disorder. They experienced typical behavior including:
- Lose of temper
- Low self-esteem
- Frustration with agitated behavior
- Annoying, easily angered
Conduct disorder
Five percent of ten year have diagnosed the conduct disorder and approx one-third of CD children have to face typical type of behavior with symptoms like:
- Truanting (repeatedly)
- Absent-minded
- Lack of sympathy
- Addiction of cigarette, and alcohol
- Impatience of physical fighting
- Sexual abusement
- Suicidal desired
- Desired of runaway from homes
What risk factors influence Child’s Behavioral health?
The following risk factors effect on the behavioral health of children, these are:
i. Gender: It might not be a clear cause, but mostly boys suffer more than girls from behavioral disorders.
ii. Family background: Behavioral disorder is mostly due to the dysfunction of family life or disturbance in interpersonal relationships, poverty, poor parenting skills, and violence.
iii. Difficulty in learning: Children with this risk factor face difficulty in reading, writing, and the ability to recall.
iv. Gestation: Premature birth also contributes to behavioral disorders.
v. Brain development: The part of the brain which controls the main function of our body is disturbed or damaged.
Behavioral Health Therapies
For the various range of behavioral health conditions or disorder there are many types of behavioral therapies available and these therapies also facilitate the mental health issues which help to live a normal life without hesitation, lacking confidence, learning disorders, depression, eating pattern, etc. These therapies are:
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Cognitive behavioral therapy generally involves therapies that work with patients to manage problematic behavior, emotions, feelings, and habits.
Example of this behavioral therapy is persistent nail-biting or anger management, while the fears and phobias are also some common examples. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy works well on its own.
Psychoanalytic Therapy
In this therapy, the therapist just listens to patient’s issues, often referred to as “talk therapy”, and it involves the therapist listening to patient’s talk and then developing the set of emotional and behavioral patterns to find out the cause of his/her mood swing’s behavior. This therapy also helps to give strength to modern time. Psychoanalytic therapy is also called talk therapy.
Child Therapy
Child therapy has a unique niche of behavioral health issues of children. The main role of this therapy is to maintain or handle life situations, while the term of child therapy is not a specific type of therapy, it covers a wide variety of behavioral tools. Another important role of this therapy is to express and enhance the feelings, develop the ability to communicate, and the ability to memorize things easily. According to previous studies, this therapy utilizes an interesting truth.
Addiction Therapy
Addiction therapy is also an important part of behavioral therapy today. This therapy is used for the requirement of Andy drugs, alcohol, and cigarette addictions to get away from human habits for living a happy and better life. This therapy works with behavioral therapy which may include motivational therapy, management approaches, family therapy, and more. This therapy also helps to treat countless numbers of suffering conditions that weaken the person.
Behavioral health Professionals
Specialists in behavioral health provide complete guidance and counseling to people with challenges (like self-confidence, physical limitation, mental problems, and addiction). An individual who specializes in behavioral health mostly works with a team to provide guidance, suggestion for emotional and behavioral care and they also work as healthcare providers to recommend what is best for patients. The behavioral profession includes
Behavioral Therapists
Behavioral therapists give their patients with medicinal therapeutic treatment to get rid of behavioral disorders and to live a normal healthy life.
Addiction Psychiatrists
Addiction psychiatrists are doctors who are well trained to help the patients who experience misuse of drugs. Addiction psychiatrists have knowledge of underlying factors that engage in researches.
Clinical Health Psychologists
Clinical Health psychologists have specialization to manage the social, cultural, biological, and psychological factors that badly affect and disturb the life of an individual, and they also address the tobacco use, managing serious diseases, and weight management of patients.
School Psychologists
School psychologists help the students to manage their issues regarding behavioral and mental health. They also play an important role for the children who are suffering from any learning, memorization, writing, speaking disabilities, and build confidence in them. School psychologists also learn how to act or behave in positive manners.
Substance Abuse Counselor
They work to recover the addicted people and try to manage soberness in an individual and also cope with depressions, stress, avoid triggers, and again realize their responsibilities.
Mental health counselors
Mental health counselors give psychological care to patients, dealing with their miss perceptions, fake assumptions, depression, anxiety disorder, and other life challenges.
Good To Know
Behavioral health issues are common in this present era because of social media phobias, interpersonal relationships, poverty, lacking self-confidence, etc. Behavioral health is a term in which an individual struggles with lots of problems regarding their behavior and mental disorder and this issue is based on emotions, stress, and anxiety, and the behavioral specialists provide complete guidance or counseling to people to help them live a better life. Behavioral issues are often common in childhood, while there isn’t any clear cause of behavioral disorders but the risk factors are affected on the behavior of an individual is family background, interpersonal relations, sexual desires, gender, disability of learning, and sometimes it is inherited. But the good news is that it can easily be treated by doing some behavioral therapy sessions.
If you find out your future in a medical-related field behavioral health specialists is the best career pathway for your future. To become a good behavioral health counselor you should have sympathy, caring, complete knowledge, and also be enthusiastic about health care. You may also require advanced and modern training, and also earn a master, MD or Ph.D. degree to enhance your knowledge and skills.