This paper explains how sociologists the associations between main social variables of race, class, gender and health. It further expounds how the intersection of race, gender, and class can assist humans to predict associated health outcomes. Besides, the paper offers health dimensions such as conditions and disease, loss of functioning, disability and even death as being impacted by class, gender, and race. Last, it highlights policy issues proposed towards the intervention as result of class, race, and gender on health results in the United States.
Influence of Race and Gender on Health Outcomes
There is much indication of the persistent presence of segregation due to race in health with many magnitudes as well as trends in those inequalities. Further, the differences are in life expectancy for both men and women at birth since 1950. Gender is categorized under essential social status and thus requires recognition on the way health is concentrated by several social status groups concurrently. In health, the racial gap is large as well as constant. The whites outlived the blacks by 7.4 years as well as 9.3 years correspondingly in 1950. Nonetheless, the expectancy of life has gone up for all clusters throughout the last half a century. In 2006, the white men survived six years longer compared to African American while white women were four years above the blacks. The trends are gendered. In health, racial gap is larger for men compared to women. There have also been great reductions of life expectancy for women compared to men in racial gap. This suggests that out of the four racial alongside gender clusters, black women have recorded the highest advantages in expectancy of life since 1950 through to 2006. From 1970, gender variation in expectancy of life has been greater for blacks compared to whites, and the women of African-American origin are having a higher level of expectancy of life compared to white men.
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In further studies, Native Americans and African Americans experience high age-particular rates of death compared to whites starting from birth to retirement. Latinos/Hispanics have more rates of certain primary death causes, for instance, hypertension, diabetes, homicide, and liver cirrhosis. Furthermore, the increased rate of disease alongside death for marginalized likened to whites show the historical start of the illness, higher acuteness of infection as well as poorer existence. Africans Americans have a considerable prognosis worse than those of the whites even they have low incidences of illness compared to whites.
Influence of Race and Class on Health Outcomes
A sociological study has investigated the roles of social stratification alongside social structure as the main cause of health. Societal structure is the persistent trend of social life intended to shape a person's beliefs and attitudes, actions, and behavior as well as material alongside psychological resources. Out of the social structures explored in sociology, social class, mostly used as social, economic status (SES), has been specifically reliable for understanding disparities of race in health. Thus, in health status, SES thus remains the recognized determinant of variations.
Social work regarding class enlightens the research of segregation in health since the race is highly interconnected with SES. Differences in SES between the races, justify for a significant composition of the ethnic/racial disparities in health. Although, sociologist have stressed that SES and race are two linked but not substitutable schemes of social arrangement that together result in vulnerability to health. Therefore, consideration should be provided to race-centered alongside class-centered features that under restraining racial health differences (Williams et al. 2016).
Sociological effort regarding class has as well contributed to the consideration of inequalities in the race by emphasizing the SES indicators from a multidimensional point. Sociologists have noted that sociological work needs evaluating the several measurements to SES to feature its influence to racial prejudice in health altogether. Further, the entire pointers of SES are non-equivalent throughout the race. For instance, blacks and certain minorities have incomes that are lower compared to the whites at every educational level, less wealth at every income level; high unemployment rates at all educational levels, higher hazardous exposure due to occupations. Also, they have less power of purchasing due to high costs of goods as well as services.
The sociological study has as well shown the function of SES at levels of a community as identified by community level makers of societal disorder, intense disadvantage, and economic hardship. Certain sociological studies have called for consideration to large ethnic/racial disparities in affluence. Besides, they have published that the gaps show partly, the historical injustice of institutional discrimination. Whereas income shows economic resources including household wages, wealth shows the assets of an economy that are indicated in household equity, savings and other assets of finance. As indicated in the national data, each dollar of wealth a white person has, blacks possess nine cents while Hispanics twelve cents. These challenging differences are present at each income level. For instance, for each dollar of riches, a poor white individual in the bottom class of earnings possess, low earning blacks possess a penny whereas low earning Latinos possess only two pennies (Williams et al. 2016).
Influence of Race on Health Outcomes
The sociological study has highlighted how features associated with race result to racial disparities in health. There are several different ways in which racial disparities have initiated and maintained health prejudice. This excerpt draws on multiple sociological pieces of literature on racism and ideologies it as a construct of multilevel, entailing individual and institutional disparities, racial discrimination and stereotypes alongside internalized racism. At the levels of institutions, a sociological study has emphasized the duty of housing racial prejudice as the main instrument of an institution of segregation and the main reason for racial segregation in health. This has assisted in shaping federal and local policies. Sociologists have published how racism results in poverty, social isolation, and social disorder alongside creating pathogenic situations in residential settings.
Sociologists have as well established many ways through which racism can severely impact on health. First, racism limits SES attainment by restricting access to quality elementary alongside education in school, higher education preparation and opportunities for jobs. Second, the condition of residential of concentrated poverty as well as a social disorder as a result of racism makes it challenging for inhabitants to exercise regularly, eat nutritiously while avoiding promoting for tobacco coupled with alcohol. For instance, lacking recreation amenities and personal safety concerns can dishearten vacation time for physical exercises. Third, high level of poverty can result in exposure to intensified stress due to finance alongside hardship as well as other chronic coupled with severe stressors at a personal level. Fourth, the weakened neighborhood infrastructure and community in prejudiced areas can severely affect interpersonal relations and trust among fellow citizen. Fifth, the institutional disinvestment or neglect of poor, prejudiced communities results to high levels of vulnerability to environmental toxins, criminal victimization, and housing of poor quality. Finally, prejudice severely impacts both access to care together with the quality of care. There is a high risk of illness resulting to death due to racial prejudice in health which is associated with residential disparities.
Obesity due to Race, Class, and Gender
The annex between gender, race, and obesity alongside physical activity among women of African American leads to higher risks of contracting preventable conditions of health including heart disease and diabetes. Physical practice is essential to preventing the health conditions whereas environmental and social factors disallow women from involving themselves in regular activities irrespective of them recognizing the importance of upholding good health (Caprio, et. al., 2008).
The composition by a race of the neighborhood is instrumental in shaping the physical activity in a different way for varied groups. Physical activity is high in rich neighborhoods where there are low rates of crimes and safe streets. Besides, physical activity is high across gender groups and race excluding black men. Black men who live in white settings only exercise less due to the trend for those who pass by to outlaw their presence on the basis of the color. Wise decisions are only made when they perform exercises such as marking themselves to fit in a non-threatening order (Caprio, et. al., 2008). In a majority of blacks’ surroundings, black men have a less conspicuous feeling; thus they are comfortable in exercising frequently. However, black women rarely exercise since they are worried of their sexuality and safety that they cannot exercise in public as men will watch them. Also, a number of settings lack exercise facilities of women only. Moreover, single mothers lack adequate time for exercise since their lives are based on their children’s needs.
The majority of black women adopt the idea of genetic determinism by assuming that the weight of their body is biologically pre-determined. Besides, black women rather than other racial categories of women are more likely to undervalue their own body sizes. Therefore, seeing their bodies as normal and predetermined genetically, they may not consider the need to exercise. Nonetheless, doctors do not share on body weight issues with black women patients due to the assumption that black women are genetically predetermined to be overweight, and they do not care about their bodies (Caprio, et. al., 2008).
Policy Proposal on How U.S Government Can Reduce the Effect of Gender, Race, and Class on Health Consequences
SES variances in health are characteristically greater than social ones. Health condition disparities by SES are rarely reported and occasionally do statistics on health condition offered by race alongside SES. Furthermore, surprising variations are apparent by sex. Provided the trend of social disparities and the necessity to increase awareness of the community together with policy architects of the size of these differences alongside their social contributors, there is a need for health information to be frequently gathered, analyzed and later presented at alongside gender, race, and SES (Kim, & Noh, 2014). The process will ensure that main influence of SES on the health of the state, to racial differences in health. Failure to regularly present statistics by stratifying the data by SES in groups of race can deter the social issues that impact health alongside reinforcing adverse stereotypes of race.
The incorporation of gender should be supplemented by an investigation that is intended to recognize how aspects of biology are connected to sex and social aspects associated with gender. Further identification should establish how they link to one another and merge with race alongside SES to develop new characters at the union of many social conditions that forecast variances right to use resources of society. The incorporation of gender should be supplemented by investigation seeking to find how biological features associated with sex and social and social features associated with gender, connect to one another and associate with race alongside SES to establish new identities when multiple social conditions emerge to predict varied access to resources of society.
Race and SES merge in numerous ways to influence health. It is, therefore, advisable that race-particular approaches required enhancing results for the racial groups who are disadvantaged. Besides, more study and policy intervention should be geared towards establishing and executing individual and more so institutional involvements that are likely to be efficient in decreasing the consequences and levels of societal racism. For example, federal or state level policies intended to increase the stock of established and safe, low salary alongside diverse income housing. Also, financing for section eight is likely to upturn access to greater opportunity in the neighborhood. Alternatively, a robust enforcement of financial and housing laws could assist control predatory lending as well as discrimination on housing practices among underserved or minority neighborhoods.
Appropriate interventions are those that target both internal processes of biology and seek to enhance life quality in those areas where Americans spend more time such as workplaces, homes, neighborhoods, schools and areas of worship. For instance, incentive policies for Farmer's Market as well as fully servicing stores of grocery and strict laws on liquor stores and fast food to increase the availability of affordable foodstuffs in those areas that are underserved. Other possible interventions are land use restructuring and zoning policies to reduce high risks of environmental degradation.
Conclusion
The intersection of gender, class, and race has played a major role in promoting health-related results. Furthermore, the sociologist view of the associations between the variables of a class, gender, race, and health has resulted in a health issue such conditions and disease, loss of functioning, disability, and even death. This effect can only be mitigated by through policies which work towards reducing such impacts of gender, class, and race intersection in the United States.
References
Caprio, S. et. al. (2008). Influence of Race, Ethnicity, and Culture on Childhood Obesity: Implications for Prevention and Treatment. Diabetes Care 31 (11), 2211–2221.
Kim, I. H., & Noh, S. (2014). Ethnic and gender differences in the association between discrimination and depressive symptoms among five immigrant groups. Journal of immigrant and minority health , 16 (6), 1167-1175.
Williams, D. R., Priest, N., & Anderson, N. B. (2016). Understanding associations among race, socioeconomic status, and health: Patterns and prospects. Health Psychology , 35 (4), 407.
