HLTH 4300 Week 8 Setback Plan Example

Janelle's Setback Plan, Written Before the Bad Week Arrives: Night Shifts, a Sick Child and Early Dark, a Minimum Version of the Routine and the Difference Between a Lapse and a Relapse

Student Name

Walden University

HLTH 4300: Personal Health and Wellness

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

Janelle's Setback Plan, Written Before the Bad Week Arrives: Night Shifts, a Sick Child and Early Dark, a Minimum Version of the Routine and the Difference Between a Lapse and a Relapse

Why Plan for a Bad Week

Our composite dispatcher has been walking the Cedar Park loop after day shifts since early October. Her routine depends on conditions that will not always hold: day shifts, a healthy son and evening light on the path. This plan is written in advance for the week when those conditions fail. Relapse prevention, as developed by Marlatt and colleagues, holds that people trying to change a behavior are most likely to slip in identifiable high-risk situations, and that how a person interprets a slip strongly affects whether it becomes a return to the old pattern (Marlatt & George, 1984). Planning for the slip before it happens is the core of the approach.

The Likeliest Bad Week

Janelle's employer rotates dispatchers to night shifts, 7 p.m. to 5 a.m., for one week every two months. Her son catches colds several times each winter, and when he is ill he stays home with her mother or, if her mother is unavailable, with Janelle. From early November, sunset falls before she reaches the park on her way home. The worst week combines all three: a night-shift rotation in late November, a sick child and darkness at both ends of her waking day.

High-Risk Situations

Table 1

High-Risk Situations and Why Each Threatens the Routine

The last row is not a circumstance but an interpretation, and it is the one most likely to turn a bad week into the end of the routine.

The Minimum Version of the Routine

For each high-risk situation, the plan sets a minimum version: the smallest form of the behavior that keeps the routine alive.

Night-shift week: the prompt shifts from the drive home to waking up. After she wakes at about 1 p.m., she walks 10 minutes around the block before eating, in daylight. Target: three 10-minute walks during the week.

Sick child at home: she walks 10 minutes on the park loop on the way home only if her mother is caring for her son; if she is caring for him herself, the minimum is a 10-minute walk on Saturday with him once he is well, or alone if he is not.

Early darkness: no change, because the park loop is lit. The plan states this explicitly so that darkness does not become a reason to stop.

Any week: one walk of any length counts as keeping the routine. Zero walks for a week triggers the restart rule below.

Minimum versions matter because habits are built by repeating a behavior in a consistent context, and research on habit formation found that missing a single opportunity did not materially affect the process (Lally et al., 2010). A 10-minute walk is less useful for fitness than a 20-minute one, but it keeps the behavior attached to a cue.

Lapse Versus Relapse

Marlatt's model distinguishes a lapse, a single slip such as a missed walk or a missed week, from a relapse, a return to the previous pattern. The step between them is often the person's interpretation of the lapse. If Janelle reads a missed week as proof that she cannot keep the routine, a reaction Marlatt called the abstinence violation effect, she is more likely to stop altogether (Marlatt & George, 1984). If she reads it as an expected result of a high-risk situation she planned for, she is more likely to resume.

The plan therefore includes a sentence for Janelle to read when she misses: "A missed week is a lapse. It was expected and planned for. Restart on the next day shift."

The Restart Rule

After a night-shift week or a week with zero walks, the restart is set in advance: the first day-shift workday back, she takes the Cedar Park exit and walks, even if only for 10 minutes. The restart uses the original prompt, the drive home, rather than waiting for motivation to return. An if-then plan, "If it is my first day shift back, then I take the park exit," links the restart to a specific situation; such plans have improved follow-through on goals across many studies (Gollwitzer & Sheeran, 2006).

Who Else Is Involved

A setback plan for one person still depends on others. Janelle's mother cares for her son on weekday evenings; if her mother is unwell, the sick-child plan applies even when her son is healthy. Her supervisor controls overtime and shift rotations. Janelle has decided to tell her mother about the plan, so that her mother can mention it on difficult weeks, and to ask her supervisor for the night-shift schedule as early as possible, so that the night-week minimum can be planned rather than improvised. Neither conversation guarantees anything, but both turn hidden dependencies into known ones.

How the Plan Will Be Checked

In her Sunday review, Janelle will mark any week in which a high-risk situation occurred and record whether she met the minimum version. After the first night-shift week, she will note whether the 1 p.m. walk worked or needs a different time. The plan is expected to change after it is first used.

Conclusion

Janelle's likeliest bad week combines night shifts, a sick child and early darkness. Her setback plan names each high-risk situation, sets a minimum version of the walk for each, explains that darkness does not affect the lit park loop and treats a missed week as a lapse rather than a failure. The restart rule ties her return to the original cue, so that resuming does not depend on feeling ready.

References

Gollwitzer, P. M., & Sheeran, P. (2006). Implementation intentions and goal achievement: A meta-analysis of effects and processes. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 69-119. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0065-2601(06)38002-1

Lally, P., van Jaarsveld, C. H. M., Potts, H. W. W., & Wardle, J. (2010). How are habits formed: Modelling habit formation in the real world. European Journal of Social Psychology, 40(6), 998-1009. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.674

Marlatt, G. A., & George, W. H. (1984). Relapse prevention: Introduction and overview of the model. British Journal of Addiction, 79(3), 261-273. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-0443.1984.tb00274.x