Sojourner Syndrome and Health Disparities in African American Women

Abstract

Despite improvements in many aspects of health, African American women experience early onset of disease and disability and increased mortality because of health disparities. African American women experience stress and health disadvantages because of the interaction and multiplicative effects of race, gender, class, and age. Sojourner Syndrome is an illustrative and symbolic representation that describes the multiple roles and social identities of African American women on the basis of historical referents and adaptive behaviors that fostered survival and resilience under oppressive circumstances. Adaptive behaviors also precipitated health risks due to chronic active coping. Weathering describes the cumulative health impact of persistent stress and chronic active coping that contributes to early health deterioration and increased morbidity, disability, and mortality in African American women. An emancipatory knowing nursing perspective provides a viewpoint from which to examine social injustices that create conditions for the excessive health burdens experienced by African American women and to frame nursing actions that create opportunities to promote health and eliminate health disparities.

Coping Profiles Common to Older African American Cancer Survivors: Relationships With Quality of Life

“…This theory has been used to explain the effects of coping strategies on health outcomes in stressful situations and to identify characteristics of the person and environment that influence these strategies. Among African Americans, the preference to use certain coping strategies over others may be shaped by experiences of racism and oppression, as well as by deeply rooted religious beliefs (8,9). Thus, in the face of a cancer diagnosis and treatment, African American cancer survivors may engage in a variety of coping strategies that affect a range of health outcomes.…”

Gender role orientation is associated with health-related quality of life differently among African-American, Hispanic, and White youth

“…White girls, both nationally and within this sample, are more likely to come from higher SES households in which having orientations toward caring and empathy may be more normative and do not generally result in pressures to neglect their own health [25]. This may partly explain why female and androgynous GROs are associated with higher HRQOL in those groups.…”

“…African-American young men endorse more masculine norms than Whites and Latinos [13]. African-American girls are expected to prioritize their families and communities over their own health to the point of ignoring signals of illness and delaying treatment until crises begin [22,25]. Hispanic adolescents emphasize relationships and family ties more strongly than other demographic groups [11] and have greater restrictions based on traditional gender roles compared to the normative culture in the USA [41,54].…”

The Mediating Role of Social Support, Cognitive Appraisal, and Quality Health Care in Black Mothers’ Stress-Resilience Process Following Loss to Gun Violence

“…The bereavement experiences of women in this study amplifies the need for using qualitative methodology to advance understanding of how the complex intersection of immigration, acculturation, identity, social role, culture, and class influence mental health outcomes, namely resilience, stress, and coping when bereaving a child to gun violence. Although some of the reviewed health studies (e.g., Jackson & Mustillo, 2001;Lekan, 2009;Oliver & Muntaner, 2005;Zauszniewski, Picot, Roberts, Debanne, & Wykle, 2005) generally link the experience of poverty and lower socioeconomic status to chronic stress and poor health outcomes experienced in some Black populations, there is limited critical exploration detailing how these conditions aggravate negative psychosocial experiences such as gun-related child loss explored in this study.…”