HLTA02H3 Chapter Notes - Chapter 25: Health Promotion, Food Security, Social Epidemiology
Document Summary
Chapter 25- personal and structural determinants of health and illness; lifestyles and life chances. Lifestyles, healthy living, health promotion have emerged as important areas of investigation in medical sociology. Distinction is often made b/w societal factors that are beyond one"s control and influence health, and individual behavioural factors, over which one presumably has control and for which one can make healthy choices. For societal factors, the focus is on the social-structural conditions, including economic and social inequality, that influence health status. In terms of behavioural factors, the approach focuses on overall aggregate patterns of health behaviour and health practices which constitute lifestyles, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, exercise, and diet. It is assumed that lifestyles are matters of individual choice, and that these choices have either positive or negative health consequences. Within this framework, the responsibility for staying healthy is shifted to individuals. One perspective suggests there would be a decrease in mortality if focus was put toward changing lifestyles.
