Why don’t Americans take better care of ourselves?

Think of how many conversations you’ve personally had with struggling spouses, family members, friends and colleagues who say “I don’t know,” when you ask them why they don’t take better care of themselves. “I don’t know” is a mantra we hear too often when we ask hard questions about personal health and wellbeing. Maybe we do it ourselves when in reality we’re concerned about our health.

Are you concerned about yourself? Concerned about emotional and mood imbalances? Maybe you’re concerned about taking too many prescription drugs, or drinking too much alcohol, or mixing the two. Or losing weight, exercising and eating better. Maybe you’re worried that you’re always depressed, anxious or angry. Maybe you’re concerned about unhealthy behaviors. Maybe you’re worried about warning signs of chronic ill health. Maybe you’re wondering why your hair is falling out. Or why you’re always constipated with a bloated belly. Or why you’re always in the dentist’s chair, or why you’re tired all the time.

If the answer is always—I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know—what you’re really hearing is psychological resistance.

Luckily, there’s a lot of useful information on the topic of deliberate ignorance—particularly about not wanting to know about your own health, and about behaviors you may be doing every day that increase your risk of chronic illnesses, including mental health disorders. The information takes us pretty quickly into some deep body psychology.

For example, we know from studies of psychological resistance that many people at high risk of Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s disease, cancer, diabetes and heart disease cope with the threat by choosing to remain ignorant of their susceptibility. There’s a good article on this topic that reviews some of these studies entitled “Responding to Psychological Threats with Deliberate Ignorance.”

The article sheds some light on why people reject information that could help them be more well. And why they seemingly lose their ability to be curious, to process information, to reason clearly and find their emotional bearings, and to, well...know.

Turns out, the reason people deliberately remain ignorant is because the knowledge staring them in the face may threaten the security of their cherished beliefs. Or it may threaten their behavioral security—their ability to behave as they choose. Or it may threaten their emotional security. People show greater resistance when they anticipate that the information will make them feel bad or sad or angry or scared. When they anticipate feeling bad, some people choose to avoid learning their risks, and what they can do to reduce them.

Interestingly, there was one key difference between people who took in information and made healthy changes and people who exhibited information avoidance and psychological resistance and didn’t change. That difference was the belief that they could influence their own health and wellbeing. Studies showed that the more empowered you feel about controlling your health, the more you believe you can impact your own health, the more information you can process to help you actually do so.

So when people in your life ask you why you don’t take better care of yourself, and you’re worried too, start with changing your belief system about preventive self-care. If you believe that you can change, heal, and take better care of yourself, then you can. Once you believe it, the knowledge that you need to do so—knowledge that is there right now—will be easily within reach.