Defining Health and Medicine WHO’s definition of Health:

A state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely an absence of disease, or infirmity.

Medicine: “The Greatest Benefit to Mankind”

Hippocrates- “The art has three factors, the disease, the patient, the physician.”

The difference

Medical Sociology is divided into two subfields with some differences:

Sociology of Medicine

Sociology in Medicine

Differentiation

Sociology of Medicine

Sociology in Medicine

Social Epidemiology

Sociology of Health and other subsequent fields

Theoretical Perspectives

Structural Functionalism, Conflict Theory, Feminist and Symbolic Interactionism: Review of basic premises

Functionalism: the influence of the rest of society on individual health patterns and status.

Durkheim and social processes Being constrained by laws and customs

of society. Durkheim’s suicide- handout

Durkheim’s suicide

Egoistic: people are detached from society and are suddenly on their own, overwhelmed by stress

Anomic: people suffer a sudden dislocation of normative systems where their norms and values are no longer relevant

Altruistic: people feel themselves so strongly integrated into a demanding society that their only escape seems to be suicide

Fatalistic: people kills themselves because their situation is hopeless-not developed by Durkheim

Examples for each?

Functionalism cont...

Brenner’s study of heart disease, stoke and kidney failure

Thesis: there are few areas of our lives not intimately affected by the state of economy.

Heart attacks and recession Stress causes exposure to risk factors

associated with these particular health phenomenon.

Rates of employment and mental hospital admissions

The provocation hypothesis and the uncovering hypothesis as explanations for his findings.

Conflict Theory

Text: the unequal social arrangements and racialization present in our society and others.

Power differences present in society and the structures within society.

The main focus is on stratification and power struggles for those who are considered “proletariats.”

Access to medical care and medicine The term medicalization- definition

Medicalization and CapitalismMedicalization: the process that defines a

condition or activity as a disease or an illness; treatment of the conditions is then considered the responsibility of the medical professional.

The notion of social control in Conflict theory and in the process of medicalization

Article “Medicalization and Social Control”The definition of medicalization- too many

variations and no concrete definition available.

The social factors responsible for part of the medicalization process

Factors contributing to Medicalization Secularization The Medical Profession Social Control-

Durkheim, Parsons, and other theorists- an issue of power

Consequences of Medicalization Assumption of medical moral

neutrality Domination by experts Individualization of social problems Depoliticization of behaviour Dislocation of responsibility Using powerful technologies The “exclusion of evil.”

Feminist Theories

The oppression of women in the medical profession

The oppression of women as objects of medical practice

Midwifery a good example

Symbolic Interactionism

Cooley, Thomas and GoffmanMicro level perspective and all focus on

interactions and behaviours of individuals.

The theory of the looking-glass selfThe basic components of the theory:

We see ourselves in our imagination as we think we appear to the other person

We see in our imagination the other person’s judgment of our appearance.

As a result of what we see in our imagination about how we are viewed by the other person, we experience some sort of self-feeling, such as pride or humiliation.

SI Theory Cont...

Thomas and the definition of the situation The same crisis will not produce the same

effect uniformly in all people. Crises lie in the interaction between a

situation and a person’s capacities to meet it. Goffman’s dramaturgical analysis- life as a

theatre We live in worlds of social encounter in which

we act out a line of behaviour- our scripts. The maintenance of face is a condition of

interaction.

Critical Race Theories

The relation to the body being different for those of different races and ethnicities.

The role of differentiation and inequality in medicine for those of different races/ethnicities.

The article “Describing the White Ethnic Group.”

Stark differences in life expectancy and morbidity rates.

Social group differences in terms of support and buffering of stress.

Post-Modernist Thinking

There is no truth to our claims and there is no way to get to truth

All arguments are opinion based and follow rules of discourse to attain truth.

Discourse of Medical profession and the “The Birth of the Clinic”

The Body and medical profession’s labelling of disease

Methodology in Sociology of Medicine Based on the theoretical orientation Functionalists and Conflict theorists can

use either quantitative or qualitative methods.

Same is said for most theoretical frameworks

SI and Post Modernists focus on interactions and use mainly qualitative and content analyses for their methdologies.

Plan

Social theory conflict Social position Types and Modes of Conflict Group conflict, conflict of

interest, class conflict

Social conflict theory is a Marxist-based social theory which argues that individuals and groups (social classes) within society have differing amounts of material and non-material resources (the wealthy vs. the poor) and that the more powerful groups use their power in order to exploit groups with less power. The two methods by which this exploitation is done are through brute force and economics. Earlier social conflict theorists argue that money is the mechanism which creates social disorder. The theory further states that society is created from ongoing social conflict between various groups. There are other theories of deviance, the functionalist theory, the control theory and the structural strain theory. It also refers to various types of negative social interaction that may occur within social relationships.

Social position means a position of an individual in a given society and culture. A given position (for example, the occupation of priest) may belong to many individuals. Social position influences social status. One can have several social positions, but only one social status.

Social positions an individual may hold fall into the categories of occupation (medical doctor, academic lecturer), profession (member of associations and organisations), family (parent, sibling, etc.), hobby (member of various clubs and organisations), among others. An individual is likely to create a personal hierarchy of such positions, where one will be a central position while the rest are perhiperal positions.

Social positions are visible if they require an individual to wear a uniform or some other kind of identifying mark. Often individual clothes or other attributes will advertise what social position one has at the moment. Non-visible social positions are called hidden. A position that is deemed the most important to given individual is called central, others are peripheral. If a sequence of positions is required to obtain a given position, it can be defined as a career, and change of position in this context is a promotion or demotion. Some social positions may make it easier for a given person to obtain others; in other cases, some positions may be restricted based to individuals meeting specific criteria.

Social position together with social role determines individual's place in the social environment and social organisation. A group of social positions will create a social class and a social circle.

A social conflict caused by interference between social positions is called a position conflict.

Social conflict is a conflict or confrontation of social powers.

Social conflict is an important aspect of social power. Sociologists however differ in views whether social conflict is limited to hostile or antagonistic opposition and whether it is a clash of coercive powers or of any opposing social powers.

Types of social conflict:position conflict - conflict involving

social positions role conflict - conflict involving

social roles

Conflict can exist at a variety of levels of analysis: intrapersonal conflict (though this usually just gets

delegated out to psychology) interpersonal conflict emotional conflict group conflict organizational conflict community conflict intra-state conflict (for example: civil wars, election

campaigns) international conflict environmental resources conflict intersocietal conflict intra-societal conflict ideological conflict diplomatic conflict economic conflict military conflict

Group conflict

Group conflicts, or group intrigues, is a manner in which collective social behaviour causes groups of individuals to contradict with each other. This contradiction is often caused by differences in social norms, values, religion, etc. Authoritative individuals within groups tries to imply a [casus belli] upon their out view and actions against contradicting groups for justification. Often demagogically classed arguments is used, but internal collective pressure of one's group most times prevent individuals from disagreeing or critizising their own group.

Class conflict Class conflict is both the friction that accompanies social

relationships between members or groups of different social classes and the underlying tensions or antagonisms which exist in society due to conflicting interests that arise from different social positions. Class conflict is thought to play a pivotal role in history of class societies (such as capitalism and feudalism) by Marxists and anarchists who refer to its overt manifestations as class war, a struggle which today, in their view, is fought most relentlessly and secretly by the capitalist class.

Class conflict can take many different shapes, for example direct violence such as wars fought for resources and cheap labor, policemen beating poor blacks or the workers who try to democratically run their workplaces and economy; indirect violence such as deaths from poverty, starvation or unsafe working conditions; coercion, such as the threat of losing a job or pulling a much needed investment, or ideology, e.g. trying to convince people that the power should be in the hands of the working class or the capitalist class.

It can be open, as with a business lockout aimed at destroying a labor union, or it can be hidden, as with an informal slowdown in production that protests low wages or an excessively fast or dangerous work process.

conflict of interest

A conflict of interest is a situation in which someone in a position of trust, such as a lawyer, a politician, executive or director of a corporation or a medical research scientist or physician, has competing professional or personal interests. Such competing interests can make it difficult to fulfill his or her duties impartially. Even if there is no evidence of improper actions, a conflict of interest can create an appearance of impropriety that can undermine confidence in the ability of that person to use his/her position with proper ethics. A conflict of interest can exist even if no unethical or improper act results from it. This is seen as a "conflict of roles" where the interest of ones self differs from that of others. The conflict can be mitigated by third party verification or third party evaluation noted below - - but it still exists.