The theory of reasoned action suggests that effective behavior change requires individuals to have:

Strictly speaking, every behavior involves a choice, even if the choice is between performing or not performing the behavior. In some cases, beliefs about not performing a behavior may largely be mirror images of beliefs about performing it. In this case, we can simply assess the TPB constructs in relation to performing the behavior.

However, sometimes different beliefs are readily accessible in relation to the behavioral alternatives. For example, if we are interested in travel-mode choice, the beliefs that are readily accessible with respect to using public transportation may not simply be mirror images of using one's car. If practical, therefore, it is recommended that in this case the TPB constructs be assessed in relation to both options under consideration.

The answer depends on the nature of the research population and on the objectives of the study. As a rule of thumb, the pilot study should include a sample of 25 to 30 participants representative of the general research population. However, if you are interested in differences among subpopulations [differences based on ethnicity, gender, age, etc.], you should stratify your sample accordingly with a sample size of 25 to 30 participants for each subpopulation.

The preferred method for eliciting accessible beliefs is a free-response format in which individuals are asked to take a few minutes to list, with respect to the behavior of interest, the likely outcomes, normative referents, and control factors that come readily to mind [see Constructing a TPB Questionnaire].

In the TPB, the beliefs that come readily and spontaneously to mind are assumed to be the prevailing determinants of attitude toward the behavior, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control. These may not be the beliefs identified when employing focus groups. By encouraging discussion of ideas brought up by individual group members, focus groups can lead to the selection of beliefs that were not readily accessible for most people.

Composites of readily accessible behavioral, normative, and control belief are NOT indirect measures of attitude [ATT], subjective norm [SN], and perceived behavioral control [PBC] even though this terminology is often used. Instead, they are formative indicators of ATT, SN, and PBC, respectively. Each of these latter constructs is assessed by means of reflective indicators [or "direct" measures]. The correlations between a belief composite and the corresponding measure of ATT, SN, or PBC provides validation of the formative and reflective indicators employed.

There is no requirement of internal consistency [reliability] for behavioral, normative, or control beliefs. If properly elicited and measured, all readily accessible beliefs are retained, even if a given belief does not correlate well with the total set of beliefs.

As formative indicators, readily accessible behavioral, normative, and control beliefs are considered to be the determinants of ATT, SN, and PBC; i.e., they are considered to be causal factors. Their effects on intentions are expected to be mediated by ATT, SN, and PBC.

Not necessarily. Theoretically, attitudes are based on behavioral beliefs, subjective norms on normative beliefs, and perceived behavioral control on control beliefs. However, these propositions are subject to empirical test. The validity of the belief composite measures is typically tested by correlating each composite with the reflective ["direct"] measure of the corresponding construct.

The answer depends on the purpose of your research. If you just want to predict intentions and behavior, the reflective ["direct"] measures of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control are sufficient. Among other things, these measures allow you to examine the theory's predictive validity and to estimate the relative importance of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control. However, if you would like to understand the factors that provide the basis for these variables [perhaps to design an effective behavior change intervention] you also must elicit and assess the accessible behavioral, normative, and control beliefs.

Standard attitude scaling procedures rely on reflective indicators to assess attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control, usually in a relatively direct manner. According to the theory, the composite indices of behavioral, normative, and control beliefs capture, respectively, the underlying determinants of these constructs. The reflective ["direct"] measures should therefore be used to predict intentions.

Generally speaking, we cannot use a measure of intention as a substitute for a measure of behavior. Many factors can prevent people from carrying out their intentions [see question below]. It follows that a measure of intention will not necessarily predict actual behavior, and that a change in intentions will not necessarily be followed by behavior change. How closely linked they are is an empirical question. We may be able to justify using intention as a proxy for behavior if we have independent evidence for a strong intention-behavior correlation with respect to the behavior, population, context, and time period under investigation.

We often observe a discrepancy between expressed intentions and actual behavior. Among the factors that can contribute to the intention-behavior gap are the following.

• Lack of compatibility: The measures of intention and behavior are incompatible in terms of their levels of specificity/generality or in terms of the measurement scales used.
• Restriction of range: There is little variance in the measures of intention and/or behavior.
• Forgetting: People forget to act on their intentions in a timely manner.
• Low control: People lack adequate control over performance of the behavior, despite their favorable intentions.
• Change of mind: New information becomes available that changes previously assessed intentions such that they are no longer predictive of behavior.
• Hypothetical bias: The beliefs that are readily accessible in memory when intentions are assessed differ substantially from the beliefs that are readily accessible in the behavioral context.

It is possible to measure intention and behavior at the same time. For example, we can measure intention to exercise in the next three months and, at the same time, obtain a measure of exercise behavior during the previous three months. Of course, the correlation between these two measures only provides an indication of the extent to which current intentions are consistent with previous behavior. The correlation can be taken as an indication of the intention's predictive validity only if there is independent evidence to suggest that the behavior in question has a high degree of temporal stability. Thus, if it is know that later exercise behavior correlates strongly with prior exercise behavior in the population of interest, then the measure of past behavior can serve as a proxy for a measure of future behavior. However, this correlation may be inflated if participants misremember, misconstrue, or misrepresent their reported past behavior such that it is more consistent with current intentions than it actually was.

The reliability and validity of direct TPB measures are estimated in formative research. First, a TPB questionnaire is constructed in accordance with established guidelines [See Constructing a TPB Questionnaire]. The direct items [reflective indicators] designed to assess the TPB constructs [attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, intention, and behavior] are then tested for convergent and discriminant validity. Confirmatory factor analysis is the preferred method, although many investigators only report Cronbach's alpha for each construct, a measure of internal consistency.

Note that internal consistency is not a requirement of the behavioral, normative, and control belief composites because different accessible beliefs may well be inconsistent with each other. Also, if reliability in the sense of temporal stability is also considered important, the questionnaire must be administered a second time and test-retest correlations are computed.

Evidence for predictive and construct validity is obtained when research using the measures developed by the investigator supports the predictions derived from the theory.

Direct TPB measures should be developed in pilot work to make sure that they have satisfactory psychometric properties. If you have multiple items for each construct, you may be able to drop one or two and thereby increase internal consistency and discriminant validity. When this is not possible, the correct procedure is to start over again, develop adequate measures, and then collect your data.

Theoretically, all readily accessible behavioral beliefs [usually elicited in a free-response format] are important determinants of attitude, all readily accessible normative beliefs are important determinants of subjective norm, and all readily accessible control beliefs are important determinants of perceived behavioral control. Consistent with this, all beliefs are given equal weight in the expectancy-value model. If you use each participant's personal beliefs, therefore, there is no need to identify their relative importance. However, when we use modal accessible beliefs [i.e., when we select the most frequently emitted beliefs in a sample of respondents], not all beliefs are readily accessible for everybody. In this case, multiple regression, structural equation modeling, latent class analysis, or other statistical methods may be used to identify the beliefs that are most important in the research population.

Most investigators working with the TPB use 7-point bipolar adjective scales [e.g., harmful - beneficial], often mistakenly called "Likert" scales. The format of these scales is based on work with the semantic differential which found 7 points to be optimal. However, there is nothing sacred about 7 points and it is at the investigator's discretion to use fewer or more scale points.

In the case of modal accessible beliefs [i.e., the same set of beliefs for all respondents], it is immaterial whether the beliefs are aggregated by summation or averaging. The mean is a simple linear transformation of the sum. Such a transformation has no effect on the correlation of the aggregate measure with any other variable.

Note that different considerations apply to personal accessible beliefs, i.e., beliefs emitted by the participants themselves. Here, it is assumed that the beliefs listed represent a person's total set of accessible beliefs. Unlike modal accessible beliefs which are the same in number for all participants, different individuals may well hold different numbers of personal behavioral beliefs, different numbers of personal normative beliefs, and different numbers of personal control beliefs. According to the theory, the greater the number of favorable beliefs, the more favorable will be the attitude, subjective norm, or perceived behavioral control. Personal accessible beliefs should therefore be summed, not averaged, because computing a mean would eliminate these theoretically meaningful differences between individuals.

Some outcomes associated with a behavior receive uniformly positive or negative evaluations. For example, one of the behavioral beliefs about eating a low-fat diet may be that this behavior "reduces the risk of cardio-vascular disease." When asked to evaluate this outcome on, e.g., a 7-point good - bad scale, virtually all participants will give it a positive evaluation, and having the negative side of the scale may be irritating or confusing. Nevertheless, some people may value the outcome more favorably than others. To capture this variance, and avoid annoying the participants, we can use a unipolar evaluative scale, such as a 7-point scale that ranges from slightly good to extremely good. Alternatively, we could ask participants to rate how important it is for them to reduce the risk of cardio-vascular disease on, e.g., a 7-point not at all important to extremely important scale. Note, however, that importance ratings can be used only when the valence of the outcome [positive or negative] is clearly established because positive as well as negative outcomes can be judged important.

Attitude [ATT], subjective norm [SN], and perceived behavioral control [PBC] are conceptually independent predictors of intentions. However, empirically they are usually found to be intercorrelated because the same information can influence behavioral, normative, and/or control beliefs, the theoretical antecedents of ATT, SN, and PBC, respectively. For example, the information that medical research has established the superiority of an easy to prepare low-fat diet for lowering serum cholesterol may lead to the formation of the behavioral belief that "my eating a low-fat diet will reduce my serum cholesterol level," the normative belief that "my doctor thinks I should eat a low-fat diet," and the control belief that "I have the ability to prepare a low-fat diet."

The relative importance of the three predictors is not measured but, instead, is estimated by means of multiple regression or structural equation analyses. The standardized regression or path coefficients serve as estimates of the relative importance [weights] of the predictors.

Conceptually, there is no difference between perceived behavioral control [PBC] and self-efficacy [SE]. Both refer to people's beliefs that they are capable of performing a given behavior. Operationally, however, PBC and SE are usually assessed in different ways. Research with Bandura's concept of self-efficacy usually defines a graded series of potential obstacles to performance of the behavior, and participants are asked to indicate how likely it is that they could overcome each obstacle. To assess PBC, participants are usually asked to rate the extent to which they have the ability to perform the behavior, how much the behavior is under their control, etc. [see Constructing a TPB Questionnaire]. It would be a mistake to assume that some of these items [e.g., rated ability to perform the behavior] assess SE whereas other items [e.g., the extent to which the behavior is under my control] assess PBC.

Perceived behavioral control [PBC] refers to people's beliefs that they are capable of performing a given behavior. Locus of control [LC] has to do with the generalized belief that events in one's life are caused by internal factors [e.g., ability or motivation] as opposed to external factors [e.g., other people, nature, or luck]. Even domain-specific LC [e.g., health locus of control] has to do with a broad range of behaviors and events, not control over performance of a particular behavior. Moreover, internal control should not be equated with high PBC, nor should external control be equated with low PBC. Perceived lack of ability is an internal causal factor, but it would produce a sense of low PBC. Similarly, performance of a behavior may depend on the cooperation of others [an external factor], but people may believe that they nevertheless have high behavioral control because they are confident of obtaining the needed cooperation.

In the TPB, actual behavioral control [ABC] moderates the effect of intentions on behavior. An essential prerequisite for assessing a person's ABC is a good understanding of the various internal factors [skills, knowledge, physical stamina, intelligence, etc.] and external factors [legal barriers, money, equipment, cooperation by others, etc.] that are needed to perform the behavior or that can interfere with its performance; as well as a way to assess the extent to which the person has or can obtain the requisite resources and overcome potential barriers. Because it is usually much more difficult to measure actual behavioral control than perceived behavioral control [PBC], most studies rely on PBC as a proxy for ABC.

Several factors may be responsible for a relatively low proportion of explained variance in observed intentions or behavior.

• There may be little meaningful variance in the criterion if, for example, most participants in the study intend to, and/or actually engage in the behavior under investigation.
• Events intervening between questionnaire administration and observation of behavior may have produced changes in beliefs, attitudes, and intentions. As a result, the original measures are no longer predictive of the behavior.
• The measures of the theory's constructs, including intention and behavior, may be unreliable, containing a large proportion of error variance.
• The predictors and criteria are incompatible, i.e., they are measured at different levels of specificity or generality.
• The factors included in the TPB are not sufficient. Other factors, such as moral norms or strong habits, may also influence the particular intention or behavior under investigation. It may be possible to measure some of these factors and add them to the theory in order to improve prediction.
• It is, of course, also possible that the TPB, even with the inclusion of additional factors, is unable to provide accurate prediction of the intention or behavior under investigation.

The TPB is, in principle, open to the inclusion of additional predictors. However, for the sake of parsimony, additional predictors should be proposed and included in the theory with caution, and only after careful deliberation and empirical exploration. Among the criteria that should be met by any proposed addition are the following.

• Like the theory's existing predictors [attitude toward the behavior, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, and intention], the proposed variable should be behavior-specific, conforming to the principle of compatibility. That is, it should be possible to define and measure the proposed factor in terms of the target, action, context, and time elements that describe the behavioral criterion.
• It should be possible to conceive of the proposed variable as a causal factor determining intention or action.
• Proposed additions should be conceptually independent of the theory's existing predictors, rather than be redundant with them.
• The factor considered should potentially be applicable to a wide range of behaviors studied by social scientists.

Personality traits, intelligence, demographic variables, values, and other variables of this kind are considered "background factors" in the TPB. They are not neglected but assumed to influence intentions and behavior indirectly by affecting behavioral, normative, and/or control beliefs. That is, the components of the TPB are assumed to mediate the effects of background factors on intentions and actions. The theory acknowledges that background factors can provide valuable information about possible precursors of behavioral, normative, and control beliefs, information not provided by the theory itself. Conversely, with the aid of the TPB it becomes possible to examine why a given background factor influences or fails to influence behavior by tracing its effects via the more proximal antecedents of the behavior.

No, there is nothing in the theory to suggest that attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control will each make a significant contribution to the prediction of intention. The relative importance of these three factors is likely to vary from one behavior to another and from one population to another. In some cases, one or another of the three factors will be found to have no significant effect on intention. Assuming that the factors were measured with equal reliability, lack of predictive validity merely indicates that for this particular behavior and population, the factor in question is not an important consideration in the formation of intention.

No, investigators define their behavioral criteria at a level of specificity or generality suitable for their purposes, typically at an intermediate level [e.g., donating blood or exercising on a regular basis]. The details [mostly context and time] specified in an implementation intention are usually of no interest to the investigator. When forming an implementation intention, participants are asked to indicate when, where, and how they plan to implement their [goal] intentions to increase the likelihood that the intention will be carried out, not because of any inherent interest in these details. The behavioral criterion remains the more general goal intention.

Furthermore, even when the goal intention of interest to the investigator is relatively specific [e.g., exercising every weekday in the gym during lunch hour], implementation intentions -- although also very specific as to place, time, and modality -- can be formulated only for positive goal intentions. Thus, it makes little sense to ask where, when, and how you plan to exercise if you have not formed an intention to engage in this behavior.

Knowledge, or correct factual information, plays no direct role in the TPB. Although information in the form of behavior-relevant beliefs is a central component of the theory, whether that information is correct or incorrect is immaterial. What matters is whether the information works for or against performance of the behavior.

Consider, for example, a woman's belief that breast self-examination allows her to distinguish between benign lumps and malignant tumors. Although factually wrong, this item of "knowledge" would tend to support performing BSE. Thus, we cannot expect a direct correlation between amount of correct factual information on one hand and attitudes, intentions, and behavior on the other.

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