The Social Construction of Illness: Key Insights and Policy Implications

Conrad, Peter; Barker, Kristin K.

doi:10.1177/0022146510383495

Cited by 610 publications

(442 citation statements)

References 40 publications

(41 reference statements)

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“…The explanation of changing health practices receives support in medical sociology literature documenting the social and cultural bases of understandings of health (Conrad and Barker 2010). For example, studies have shown that among individuals with similar doctor diagnoses there are systematic differences in how symptoms are perceived and reported across ethnic groups (Zola 1966).…”

Section: Explanations For Health Assimilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assimilation and emerging health disparities among new generations of U.S. children

Hamilton

Cardoso

Hummer³

et al. 2011

DemRes

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Section: Explanations For Health Assimilationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assimilation and emerging health disparities among new generations of U.S. children

Hamilton

Cardoso

Hummer³

et al. 2011

DemRes

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“…Lay epidemiology fits within a social constructivist ontology which considers social phenomena—in this case illness—not as biological or natural ‘givens’ as in objectivist understandings of the social world, but as concepts that emerge from social interactions, which hold different meanings depending on the cultural and historical contexts in which they are produced and experienced 18, 19. For example, social constructivist approaches have critiqued ways in which obesity has been conceptualized as a ‘biological reality’ as opposed to a social phenomenon, and how this has been used to regulate and order people's bodies 20, 21.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Lay epidemiology and the interpretation of low‐risk drinking guidelines by adults in the United Kingdom

et al. 2015

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AimsTo explore how the concept of lay epidemiology can enhance understandings of how drinkers make sense of current UK drinking guidelines.MethodsQualitative study using 12 focus groups in four sites in northern England and four sites in central Scotland. Participants were 66 male and female drinkers, aged between 19 and 65 years, of different socio‐economic backgrounds. Data were analysed thematically using a conceptual framework of lay epidemiology.ResultsCurrent drinking guidelines were perceived as having little relevance to participants' drinking behaviours and were generally disregarded. Daily guidelines were seen as irrelevant by drinkers whose drinking patterns comprised heavy weekend drinking. The amounts given in the guidelines were seen as unrealistic for those motivated to drink for intoxication, and participants measured alcohol intake in numbers of drinks or containers rather than units. Participants reported moderating their drinking, but this was out of a desire to fulfil work and family responsibilities, rather than concerns for their own health. The current Australian and Canadian guidelines were preferred to UK guidelines, as they were seen to address many of the above problems.ConclusionsDrinking guidelines derived from, and framed within, solely epidemiological paradigms lack relevance for adult drinkers who monitor and moderate their alcohol intake according to their own knowledge and risk perceptions derived primarily from experience. Insights from lay epidemiology into how drinkers regulate and monitor their drinking should be used in the construction of drinking guidelines to enhance their credibility and efficacy.

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“…However, this way of framing the relation still lacks a key protagonist of the organisation and provision of health care for the population. A negotiation model is strongly committed to a topic that has been central in the sociology of health: rescuing patients' (and sometimes, also professionals') perspectives in relation to illness (Conrad;Barker, 2010). This important task has had, however, an unexpected consequence: it has prompted an idea that the social dimension of health is exclusively a human affair, relinquishing the materiality of disease as a biomedical issue.…”

Section: The Lay-professional Relationshipmentioning

confidence: 99%

Variations of the social: some reflections on public health, social research and the health-society relation

Rojas

2015

Saude soc.

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The idea of a social dimension of health is widely accepted as unavoidable and relevant for public health. This article proposes a reflection around the notion of the social examining some of the manifold ways in which it might be inherited by researchers, professionals, administrative staff and material settings involved in the practices of public health care. It will be argued that this inheritance has deep consequences for efforts of care inasmuch these different versions of the social characterise, circumscribe and reframe the health-society relation, modifying the scope under which public health issues are tackled or dismissed. To ground this seemingly abstract discussion I will work considering a specific public health problem: the case of frequent attenders in public health. Drawing on two approaches from the Sociology of Health (i.e. illness-behaviour and the user-professional relation) and the field of Science and Technology Studies, I will show how these ways of framing the study of frequent attenders assume and simultaneously promote three different versions of the social. The article aims to explore how social research in these traditions participate in the achievement and promotion of specific health-society relations, in which certain notions of the social operate helping or limiting research and care efforts by creating richer or poorer possibilities for posing, examining and facing the problems of public health. Resumen La idea de una dimensión social de la salud ha sido ampliamente aceptada como inevitable y relevante para la salud pública. Este artículo propone una reflexión en torno a la noción de lo social examinando algunas de las muchas formas en que ésta puede ser heredada por los investigadores, profesionales, personal administrativo y contextos materiales involucrados en las prácticas sanitarias. Se propondrá que esta herencia tiene consecuencias importantes para los esfuerzos de atención en la medida en que distintas versiones de lo social caracterizan, circunscriben y replantean la relación salud-sociedad, modificando el alcance bajo el cual se enfrentan o descartan los problemas de salud pública. Para situar esta discusión, aparentemente abstracta, se trabajará a partir de un problema específico de salud pública: el caso de los pacientes policonsultantes. Tomando elementos de dos aproximaciones de la Sociología de la Salud (el comportamiento de enfermedad y la relación usuario-profesional) y del campo de los Estudios de Ciencia, Tecnología y Sociedad, mostraré cómo estas maneras de dar forma al estudio de los policonsultantes asumen y simultáneamente promueven tres versiones distintas de lo social. El artículo busca explorar cómo la investigación social situada en estas tradiciones participa en el logro y promoción de relaciones específicas entre salud y sociedad, en las cuales ciertas nociones de lo social operan ayudando o limitando los esfuerzos de cuidado e investigación, creado posibilidades más ricas o pobres para plantear, examinar y enfrentar los problemas de la salud ...

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The Social Construction of Illness: Key Insights and Policy Implications

Cited by 610 publications

References 40 publications

Assimilation and emerging health disparities among new generations of U.S. children

Assimilation and emerging health disparities among new generations of U.S. children

Lay epidemiology and the interpretation of low‐risk drinking guidelines by adults in the United Kingdom

Variations of the social: some reflections on public health, social research and the health-society relation

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