Gender and ethnicity

Question 1

Define key terms: sex, gender, gender identify, transgender

Answer 1

Sex: biological and physiological characteristics that are used to categorise people as male or female

Gender: Socially constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society considers appropriate for males and females

Heteronormativity​: society’s assumption that relationships between the opposite binary sex individuals (heterosexuality) are the norm or default

Gender identity: internal sense of one’s own gender ( so society puts a gender on you and you put a gender on you, the gender you feel is your gender identity - angela feeling she is a boy)

Transgender: umbrella term for people whose gender identify differs from the sex/gender they were assigned at birth ( transnonbinary = you dont wish to be considered as male or female)

Question 2

Outline sex differences in health.

Outline gender differences in health.

Answer 2

What can explain Biological differences: HICI ( hickey)

hormonal,Infant mortality, cadiovascular reactivity, immune

• Boys more vulnerable in infancy ( “male disadvantage” when both at a low birthweight, boys seem to have a higher mortality rate)
• Immune system differences
• Some hormone differences ( oestorgen protective against cardiovascular disease till menopause)
• Cardiovascular reactivity (Cardiovascular system’s response to stress.. worse in men)

What can explain gender differences in health?

1.Differences in health behaviour:

Men : smoke more, drink more, have more alcohol related accidents

2.Gender roles and exposures: How social roles shape health

1. Women have lower SEP ( seen as acceptible gen.role?) –> SEP affects health = women less healthy
   
   • gender pay gap still exists
   • Slightly higher rates of poverty ( lone mothers, pensioners)
2. Men’s gender role is not to worry about thier health .. influences health behaviour thus men might not have as many positive health behaviours as women becasue not masculin​e.
3. exposures: Women in more caring jobs, men tend to take up riskier jobs that adversely affect thier health.

3.Access to health services :

Men less likely to visit the doctor than women (could be because they have been less exposed to it visiting the doctors than females ( due to sexual health reasons?) )

4.Other reasons ( psychological shortcuts, systemic failures ( reasearch)

1. Health professionals are less likely to diagnose and treat women with cardiovascular disease becasue it is seen as a man’s disease and it kills more men than women (proble is it is still killing a sig proportion of woment).
   * there are sex differences in symptom presentation in men and women for CVD amoungst other illnesses. However since the reasearch has been done primarily on men, women struggle to properly identify symptoms of MI and thus seek help. ( less likely to experience crushing chest pain - tend to get jaw pain, back pain etc..)

NB**The fact than men get prostate cancer and women get breast cancer are gender diffs not inequalities.

Question 3

Define the terms race ethnicity

Answer 3

Race

• Historically term used to argue for the existence of inherent biological differences between populations
• Observed differences used to support argument that some populations were superior to others and used to justify subjugation of some populations
• Populations are physically and genetically more similar than different
• Discredited term

Ethnicity

• Is the preferred term to race
• refers to ancestry,geographical ancestry, cultural differences/traditions
• Not about otherness

Question 4

1. What is the link between ethnicity and health ?
2. How do you explain these differences?

genetic, health inequality

Answer 4

Ethnic minorities tend to have poorer health outcomes. This is not uniform across all minorities but generally

Examples:

• Infant mortality rates in minority ethnic groups are higher in England
• South asians 6x more liekly to have type 2 diabetes
• African/carabeeans 3x more liekly to have type 2 diabetes

2. Can be genetic.. like heamoglobinopathies

cultural health behaviours:

1. The type of food that they tend to eat can correlate to the type of diseases they get
   * ex.

high ghee diets = coronary heart disease

low nuitrient diets = rickets

** but this isn’t necessarily true.. speculation

2. Smoking increases in non white ethnic groups but some are higher then others and there are added gender differences across these
3. Migrants - health declines when they migrate, mental health problems increase
4. social deprivation - can see a differences across ethnicity and thus you see the indirect correlation again.

• More likely to live in deprived areas
• less access to higher paying jobs
• unemployment rates are higher

5. Racism

Social exclusion has a negative impact on health

mental health, stress = poorer health outcomes

types of racism :

Direct : directly and deliberatley hurting someone of another ethnic group

Indirect : When people are unaware that thier actions are undermining people of another ethnic group (unconcious biases)

Institutional: can be both and omission and comission

• omission: failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their ethnic origin.
• comission: processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethic people

They can all result in poorer health outcomes

failure to porvide adequate services for a particular ethnicity, resulting in them having deteriorated health outcomes.

•Ethnic inequalities in health mirror the wider social inequalities faced by ethnic minority groups