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09.27.2002

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Women's Wellness: Lifestage vs. Lifestyle

This issue of HartBeat is excerpted from a recent N|sight Magazine, The Hartman Group's bi-annual publication exploring the dynamics of the health and wellness arena.

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Women's Wellness: what Drives Wellness Shopping Behavior - Part One

From nearly any angle, and as found in both our quantitative and qualitative research, women drive not only the majority of purchase and use in nearly every wellness sector and behavior, but they also drive those around them to purchase and use halth e and wellness products and services. In this, the first of a three-part series on women's wellness, we will look at how women influence and are influenced in the wellness arena.

Women undertake the activity of shopping at least once per week if not every day in order to obtain goods for themselves as well as for the people that they are responsible for and care for. Routine shopping represents a fairly mundane repeat experience that is largely unreflective, making it difficult for women to articulate why it is they shop where they do and choose the products that they do for their family's and their own health and well being. In order to better understand the social and cultural influences that drive women's behavior in wellness, we employ sociocultural anthropological methods. We spend time observing and talking with women in their homes and workplaces, shopping with them at their favorite stores, interacting with their social networks, and analyzing their responses to the outside world.

In looking at what drives shopping behavior in women's wellness, we begin with the individual. It is clear that women aim to satisfy certain individual needs and desires for their own health and well being. These needs and desires are often based on lifestage (a time of a woman's life) such as pregnancy, menopause or post-menopause. Shifts in behavior as a result of a health trigger, whether deep or superficial, also influence what a woman will do at the store. Some key drivers that produce a change in wellness behavior include:

Treating an illness by changing lifestyle (eating habits, exercise)
Eating differently to lose weight
Starting to read about their bodies and/or health
Taking a class about women's health
Experiencing illness of a friend or family member
Joining a yoga class, gym, dance class
Changing habits/awareness during lifestage (pregnancy, menopause)

While a woman's lifestage certainly presents a wide range of health triggers (i.e., weight gain, hot flashes, etc.) that result in changes in behavior, we have found that general attitudes (influenced by society and culture) toward health and wellness also serve as drivers for change. For example, in our conversations with women we frequently hear the following general attitudes:

Concern with living well and living long
Desire to create daily health so they feel good every day
Discovery that conventional approaches to health are not enough
Desire to think positively and proactively about their health and well being
Feeling of being tired of apologizing for not being thin enough, pretty enough or strong enough
Belief that taking care of one's own health and wellness reflects self-respect and self-approval
Tendency to be the primary caregivers in their family and as such find that time for themselves is scarce
Belief that taking care of themselves is the first step in taking better care of others
Search for a "sense of balance," which is defined differently depending upon a woman's lifestage or lifestyle.

Personal and physical conditions are the easiest to discuss when describing reasons why or how women become interested and involved in their health and wellness. Underlying physical reasons - to be healthy, to control weight, to have more energy - are emotional motivations. These motivations are the threads that weave through a variety of health concerns and provide insight into the shifting philosophical and psychological elements of evolving into a wellness lifestyle. Women get involved and stay involved in their health to move away from emotions and ideas that inhibit wellness and towards feelings that coincide with wellness.

In addition to psychological, emotional, and individual needs, it is clear that the decisions women make about how to take care of themselves are heavily influenced by their social networks (friends, family, co-workers), healthcare providers, books, magazines and the media. What is most difficult to see is that women are also influenced by society and culture. Cultural trends occur due to a combination of societal factors such as:

Stay tuned for Part II: Women's Wellness: Cultural Trends & Societal Factors.

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