James (1994) discusses the intersection of psychology and health. He reviews the role of behaviour in morbidity and premature mortality, the rising costs and dubious benefits of curative medicine, the role of behaviour in preventing and alleviating chronic disease, and the importance of behavioural outcomes in health and disease. While James makes a good case for these points, his conclusion, that psychologists' response to these major health‐care issues should be to disseminate psychological knowledge to healthcare workers, can be questioned. Like many apparently convincing arguments, this one makes its point by adopting an artificially limited perspective. James' article takes a limited perspective on psychology, on health, and on how psychology may influence societ