What Is a Chronic Illness?

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Self-efficacy is a person's belief they are capable in performing behaviors needed to meet goals.

Chronic illness can negatively affect self-efficacy.

Self-efficacy is a learned skill that can be built.

Using the self-efficacy checklist can help with improving self-efficacy.

Psychologist Albert Bandura developed his self-efficacy theory in the late 1970s. Bandura defined self-efficacy as “a person’s beliefs about how capable he or she is in performing the behaviors needed to bring about a desired outcome (Bonsaksen, Lerdal, & Fagermoen, 2012)." In the context of chronic illness, self-efficacy matters.

First, the stress of illness is likely to negatively affect a person’s self-efficacy (Bonsaksen, Lerdal, & Fagermoen, 2012). Illness can dramatically change a person’s capabilities, such that she loses capacities she had as a healthy person. Further, the uncertainties of chronic illness — particularly the ebb and flow of symptoms and energy levels — can impede a person’s belief in her own competence. This drop in self-efficacy can lead to hopelessness and helplessness (Heslin & Klehe, 2006). We know that improving self-efficacy in chronically ill people leads to better clinical outcomes and improved quality of life (Achury-Saldana, De-Villalobos, & Fuentes-Ramirez, 2025).

Self-Efficacy Inventory

Self-efficacy varies across tasks or domains. That is, an individual can feel a strong sense of self-efficacy with respect to some tasks and little to no self-efficacy with respect to others. For example, I have a strong sense of self-efficacy when it comes to........

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