Health as a Social Construction

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Health as a Social Construction In my essay, I aim to find out why social construction affects the health of our society. Ill health may be defined as 'a bodily or mental state that is deemed undesirable'. This means that health is the condition of the body both physically and mentally. Social construction of health refers to the way health varies from one society to another. Social construction refers to the statistics like the morbidity and mortality rate of our society. Our gender, class, ethnicity, religion and even education construct society, these all determine our experience of reality. An example of how sociologists have tried to deconstruct health in society is looking at the theories of sociologists like Leslie (1980). She developed the '3 Fold model of Health'. She researched and developed her concept by looking at health in different countries/cultures. The first model, 'Mechanistic Model', is a concept identifying the body as a machine and was applied to the Western society. The 'Bio Medical Model' is also linked with the mechanistic model, where illness is seen as a nuisance and causes the 'machine' to break down and even stop working completely. Through Helman's study we can see that although we know how we catch a cold i.e. germs, lay perceptions still exist despite the Bio Medical model. Helman's study demonstrates that variations of health still exist within our society. Two types of illnesses related to this are chronic illness (lasting/terminal) and acute illness (minor e.g. the flu). Criticism of the mechanistic model is that it is slightly simplistic and may not always apply because the body cannot always be repaired. The second model is the 'Naturalistic Model', which refers to the notion of equilibrium. In order for the body to remain healthy, there must be a balance. Chinese medicine relies greatly on this notion i.e. Yin (cold) and Yang (hot). This notion is often used in alternative medicine. The third model is the 'Ethical Model' which states that illness is sent by a divine force, like a punishment for the persons wrong doings

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