Can social cognitive models contribute to the effectiveness of HIV-preventive behavioural interventions? A brief review of the literature and a reply to Joffe (1996; 1997) and Fife-Schaw (1997)

A recent debate in the British Journal of Medical Psychology has considered the role of social cognitive models, such as the theory of reasoned action and the theory of planned behaviour, in understanding HIV-preventive behaviour. In this paper we clarify some of the assumptions involved in applications of social cognitive models. We briefly review available evidence on the capacity of such models to predict HIV-preventive sexual behaviour and outline a number of criteria for judging their predictive success. The importance of behavioural prediction for the development of effective HIV-preventive behavioural interventions is discussed and recent evaluations of interventions based on these models are reviewed. We conclude that the models are effective in predicting HIV-preventive behaviours and provide empirically supported theoretical guidance on psychological changes likely to result in HIV-preventive behaviour change. In addition we argue that, to date, evaluations of theoretically specified interventions are encouraging. Further development and rigorous testing of HIV/AIDS interventions based on social cognitive models is recommended.