SOC101: Introduction to Sociology (2020.A.01)

Cultural Meaning of Illness, Social Construction of Illness, and Social Construction of Medical Knowledge:

Cultural Meaning of Illness: Refers to how different cultures attribute meanings to various health conditions. For example, some cultures may view mental health issues as a sign of weakness, while others see them as medical conditions.

Social Construction of Illness: Involves understanding how societal factors contribute to the perception of certain conditions. For instance, the stigmatization of HIV/AIDS in the past was influenced by societal attitudes and prejudices.

Social Construction of Medical Knowledge: Focuses on how medical knowledge is shaped by social, economic, and political factors. For instance, the historical exclusion of women from medical research impacted the understanding and treatment of women's health issues.

Health Disparities:

Gender: Women may face disparities in access to reproductive health services and may be more likely to experience autoimmune diseases.

Socioeconomic Status: Individuals with lower socioeconomic status may have limited access to quality healthcare, leading to disparities in health outcomes.

Race and Ethnicity: Minorities may experience disparities in healthcare access, leading to higher rates of certain health conditions like diabetes or hypertension.

Environmental Racism Examples:Flint Water Crisis: Residents, predominantly African American, were exposed to lead-contaminated water due to inadequate environmental regulations.

Landfills in Minority Communities: Locating landfills in minority neighborhoods, exposing residents to environmental hazards.

**Greatest Urban Growth Rate:

One might expect to find the greatest urban growth rate in developing countries, particularly in regions of Africa and Asia, where rapid urbanization is occurring due to population growth and rural-to-urban migration.

Effects of Migration from Rural to Urban Areas in the United States:

Urbanization: Increased population density in urban centers.

Infrastructure Strain: Pressure on urban services like housing, transportation, and healthcare.

- *Economic Opportunities: Job prospects and access to diverse services attract migrants.

Cultural Changes: Shifts in lifestyle and cultural practices.

Forms of Collective Behavior:

Riots: Large-scale public disturbances like protests turning violent.

Rumors: Spread of unverified information causing collective anxiety.

Crowds: Temporary gatherings with a common focus or emotion.

Technology, Social Institutions, Population, and Environment in Social Change:

Technology: Advances can lead to societal shifts, e.g., the internet transforming communication.

Social Institutions: Changes in family structures or education systems impact society.

Population: Demographic shifts, such as aging populations, alter societal needs.

Environment: Environmental concerns (e.g., climate change) can drive social change, fostering environmental awareness and activism.

SOC101 Introduction to Sociology – Unit 5 Social Change and Social Issues Discussion Forum 5

By Elvia Luisa Guerra

Cultural meaning of illness is a sociological concept that states that illnesses have two biological and an experiential component that are independent from each other. Biological predisposition to illnesses does not dictate stigmatization, but culture. It is our culture that makes us believe which illness is a disability, which are contestable, and how these illnesses stigmas restrain us from integrating into society. The social construction of illness, on another hand, is based in the belief that reality is a social construction hence a long-term illness can affect people in different ways or depending on the culture because for some people there is no objective reality.  The social construction of medical knowledge is also believed to be socially constructed, and therefore, it can create and ramify inequalities in gender, social class, and ethnicity. Social construction explains why behavior regarding medical conditions vary so much throughout time and its evolving discoveries (Griffiths & Keirns, n.d.).  

So, all three, cultural meaning of illness, social construction of illness, and social construction of medical knowledge coincide in that illness is a social construction or the result of culture and attitudes before biological illness occurrences. The primary difference relies on while cultural meaning of illness assigns social stigmas learned in society and directly influence people’s behavior, the social construction of illness speaks more of to what extent people is affected in society by these stigmas. Ultimately, the social construction of medical knowledge points out the different ramifications and consequences of illness under the loop of social inequalities (Griffiths & Keirns, n.d.).  

Disparities in the distribution of health services occur in the U.S.A. among ethnic groups, social classes, and gender. From the ethnic point of view, there is clear variation in the form medical services are provided to different groups, being the white people more privileged than African American, native Indian, Latin, or Asians. Predominant illnesses also occur in consistent patterns to these groups. For example, white people most common illnesses are diabetes, cancer, and heart diseases while native Americans and Mexicans are more prone to get sick than white Americans. Similarly, life expectancy is higher in white Americans than African Americans. Social classes along with level of education also have marked differences where ethnic minorities are poorer than non-Hispanic whites affecting directly rate of morbidity and mortality. A well-educated person will have a different attitude and behavior towards illnesses and their treatments. Gender also causes variations in the appearance of illnesses, and women are more frequently diagnosed with mental illnesses and depression by the American health centers than what men are. Medicalization of women’s normal functions linked to reproduction is a reality as well (Griffiths & Keirns, n.d.).

Real examples of environmental racism are another phenomenon that can be observed and points out how big enterprises manage to select neighborhoods or low-income countries to dump their garbage, chemical waste, or hazardous materials affecting life quality of inhabitants in those areas. It does not happen with high income neighborhoods or influential developed countries. An example that illustrates this environmental racism is how electronic producer countries ship their e-waste to developing countries in Africa and Asia causing workers that recycle this trash to be exposed to deadly toxins and potentially harming their environment, their natural resources such as soil, water, air, and all types of lives present in those spaces. Another example is how companies like the gigantic Coca Cola takes 300 billion liters of water a year for its production of goods from places with populations that generally face shortage of water (Griffiths & Keirns, n.d.b). 

The greatest urban growth in the world often occurs in zones where there is enough resources and geographical conditions that guarantee the supply of services and production of goods, so societies can develop, regions with preconditions that facilitate transportation and communication, and the development of technologies and growth of the economy. There are four demographic theories that explains sociological thoughts about population patterns: Malthusian theory formulated by Thomas Malthus (1766 – 1834), Zero Population Growth (ZPG) which is neo-Malthusian research by Paul Erlich, Cornucopian theory, and Demographic Transition theory.    On another hand, the effect of migration which is the movement of population from rural areas with less opportunities for development to urban centers in the United States, can trigger urbanization in different ways. Urbanization is the result of the relationship between economic and political aspects with social aspects. This relationship often obeys to resources like fresh water and favorable climate, sewage control, food supply, transportation efficiency, housing prices, advanced technology access, and more opportunities for work that ensure social stability and stable economy (Griffiths & Keirns, n.d.b).

When people migrate from rural areas to urban centers, cities grow more crowded, and resources and life conditions become more impoverished and costly causing the migration phenomenon to occur in reverse. However, people that leave the cities don’t go back to their rural areas. Instead, this part of the population in the majority have jobs and moves nearby to adjacent cities less crowded but with easiness for commute called suburbs. With the passing of time, problems of traffic congestion occur as well. Interestingly, distances continue to increase driving people farther and farther from the cities, and new cities are formed called exurbs. The main cities are now known as metropolitan areas (Griffiths & Keirns, n.d.b).

Collective behavior is any people’ group’s actions that are neither mandated nor regulated by any authority or institution. There are three types of collective behavior: the crowd, the mass, and the public. The crowd is as fair large number of people. Crowds can be casual crowds when people coincide in the same place but are not interacting. Example is people doing the line to pay for groceries in a supermarket. Crowds can be conventional crowds when people come together for events that occur regularly. Example is groups that attend church on Sundays. Expressive crowds are group of people that gather to transmit emotions and feelings. Example is a funeral or a wedding. And acting crowds that describes a number of people that focus and concur to achieve a goal such as a protest movement against a war. The mass is relatively large number of people that are from each other but coincide in the same space with same interests as a social media group or game. Contrarily, the public is an unorganized group of people similar to the mass that share ideas instead, such as a political party (Griffiths & Keirn, n.d.c).  

According to the sociological perspective, social change is driven by four agents of change such as technology, social institutions, population, and the environment. Technology is the greater force that triggered change through the globalization phenomenon, first with the creation of horsepower and wind power in military expansion, second with the globalization of the economy since ancient times, and finally, with the globalization of technology, specifically with the invention of the internet. Technology not only can help social change for good but cause negative behaviors such as the cyberbullying and digital divide phenomenon. An example how technology can drive social change is how medical technology can help women that were barren to bear children. Social institutions affect potentially social change. For example, the phenomenon of industrialization can cause the change in just one organization influencing and pushing the rest of similar companies to change as well. Such is the change that happened in the farm industry with the mechanization of labor causing farmers to be obliged to prepare themselves with new skills and further education in order to keep up with the new levels of technology (Griffiths & Keirn, n.d.c).  

Population is another agent of change that is commonly shaped by levels of education. The more people get equipped with higher education and job opportunities and possibilities to receive promotion, the less these professionals want to have children. This is why births decrease in highly educated countries while significantly increasing in poor countries with more pains to access education. Other aspects that can influence social change in the population aspect is the surge of epidemics, etc. Lastly, the environment is a factor that interact with all of us. As the population growths and cities expands, more vulnerable areas are occupied causing greater possibility for natural disasters, and therefore, causing greater impacts with those natural disasters. The environment better known as the ecosystem receives the retribution of climate change originated in a disorganized industrial development, for example, causing millions of species of life to go extinguished. Human, as part of the ecosystem is directly affected in health and quality life aspects (Griffiths & Keirn, n.d.c).  

Word count: 1,389

References:

Griffiths, H. & Keirns, N. (n.d.). Health and medicine. OpenStax. https://openstax.org/books/introduction-sociology-2e/pages/

Griffiths, H. & Keirns, N. (n.d.b). Chapter 20 Introduction to population, urbanization, and the environment. Heather Griffiths and Nathan Keirns for OpenStax, https://openstax.org/books/introduction-sociology-2e/pages/20-introduction-to-population-urbanization-and-the-environment

Griffiths, H. & Keirns, N. (n.d.c). Social change. OpenStax. https://openstax.org/books/introduction-sociology-2e/pages/

Thank you for the discussion board prompts. I will provide responses to each of the topics you have outlined:

1. Compare and contrast the cultural meaning of illness, the social construction of illness, and the social construction of medical knowledge.

The cultural meaning of illness refers to how different cultures and societies understand, interpret, and respond to illness and disease. This can vary greatly across different cultural contexts. For example, in some cultures, illness may be seen as a punishment from a higher power, while in others it may be viewed as a natural part of life.

The social construction of illness refers to how the definition, diagnosis, and treatment of illness are shaped by social, cultural, and historical factors, rather than solely by biological factors. Sociologists argue that what we consider to be an "illness" is not purely a medical or scientific matter, but is influenced by social norms, power dynamics, and institutional practices.

The social construction of medical knowledge refers to how the medical profession and the production of medical knowledge are shaped by social, cultural, and political forces. This includes factors such as the training and socialization of medical professionals, the influence of pharmaceutical companies, and the role of insurance and healthcare systems in determining what counts as legitimate medical knowledge.

2. What are some disparities of health based on gender, socioeconomic status, race, and ethnicity?

Some examples of health disparities based on these factors include:

- Gender: Women often face higher rates of certain chronic conditions, such as autoimmune diseases and mental health issues, compared to men.

- Socioeconomic status: Individuals with lower socioeconomic status tend to have poorer health outcomes, higher rates of chronic diseases, and less access to quality healthcare.

- Race and ethnicity: Racial and ethnic minorities often experience higher rates of certain diseases, such as diabetes, hypertension, and certain types of cancer, compared to white populations.

These disparities can be attributed to a complex interplay of social, economic, and environmental factors, as well as systemic biases and discrimination within the healthcare system.

3. What are some real-world examples of environmental racism?

Environmental racism refers to the disproportionate exposure of racial and ethnic minority communities to environmental hazards, such as toxic waste, polluted air and water, and lack of access to green spaces. Some examples include:

- The placement of toxic waste facilities and landfills in low-income communities of color, such as the case of the "Cancer Alley" region in Louisiana.

- The contamination of drinking water in Flint, Michigan, which disproportionately affected the city's predominantly Black population.

- The higher rates of air pollution and exposure to industrial emissions in communities of color, such as those near major highways or industrial zones.

- The lack of access to green spaces and recreational areas in urban neighborhoods with high concentrations of racial and ethnic minorities.

These examples demonstrate how environmental burdens are often unequally distributed, with marginalized communities bearing a disproportionate share of the negative impacts.

4. Where do you think one would expect to find the greatest urban growth rate in the world?

Based on current trends, the region with the greatest urban growth rate in the world is expected to be sub-Saharan Africa. Several factors contribute to this:

- High population growth rates: Many sub-Saharan African countries have some of the highest fertility rates in the world, leading to rapid population growth.

- Rural-to-urban migration: Driven by factors such as economic opportunities, conflict, and environmental challenges, there is significant migration from rural to urban areas in the region.

- Urbanization of poverty: Much of the urban growth in sub-Saharan Africa is occurring in informal settlements and slums, as people seek better economic prospects in cities.

Cities like Lagos (Nigeria), Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of the Congo), and Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) are experiencing some of the fastest urban growth rates globally, with their populations expected to continue expanding rapidly in the coming decades.

5. What are some effects of migration from rural areas to urban centers in the United States?

Some of the key effects of rural-to-urban migration in the United States include:

- Strain on urban infrastructure and services: Rapid population growth in cities can overwhelm housing, transportation, healthcare, and other public services, leading to overcrowding and resource scarcity.

- Changes in labor markets and employment: Rural-to-urban migration can lead to labor shortages in agricultural and other rural industries, while also increasing competition for jobs in urban areas.

- Demographic shifts and cultural changes: The influx of rural migrants can alter the demographic composition of cities, leading to changes in cultural norms, language, and community dynamics.

- Challenges for rural communities: The outflow