Colonising the future: temporal perceptions and health‐relevant behaviours across the adult lifecourse

Health promotion is premised upon a proactive approach to health and its management, one that requires a future‐orientated outlook, in which the threats of (future) ill‐health can be anticipated and thereby mitigated. Despite this, little is known about the extent to which concerns about morbidity and mortality actually feature in people's present and future perceptions of self, and whether such perceptions have any influence upon their present health‐relevant behaviours. By drawing upon interviews with 55 people aged 26–81, this article highlights the central role that embodiment plays in the mediation of health promotion messages. The embodied experience of ill‐health, it will be shown, is an important, underlying prerequisite for perceiving a future in which (further) ill‐health is anticipated. This pivotal finding will be used to illuminate the observation that, when lifestyles are changed to concur with professional recommendations, these changes tend to be reactive in nature.