Health as a Social Construct

Question 1

What is WHO’s definition of health?

Answer 1

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

Question 2

What is germ theory?

Answer 2

Each disease has a single and specific cause.

Question 3

What is the consequence of germ theory?

Answer 3

Targeting all research and interventions at that single agent (germ, radiation, toxic chemical, gene etc).

Question 4

What is the biomedical model of health?

Answer 4

• Focuses on purely biological factors and excludes psychological, environmental, and social influences.
• Health and illness are different. There is no continuum between the two.

Question 5

List 3 arguments for health being a social construct.

Answer 5

1 - Not everyone experiences symptoms in the same way.

2 - Different societies have different methods of diagnosis and treatment.

3 - Illness is not randomly distributed.

Question 6

What is the consequence of considering health as a social construct?

Answer 6

Health and illness can’t be objective, scientific or absolute facts.

Question 7

What is medicalisation?

Answer 7

The process by which human conditions / problems come to be defined and treated as medical conditions.

Question 8

What is ‘clinical gaze’?

Answer 8

A dehumanising medical separation of the patient’s body from the patient’s person / identity.

Question 9

According to Conrad and Schneider (1980), on which levels can medicalisation occur?

Answer 9

1 - Interactional level.

2 - Conceptual level.

3 - Institutional level.

Question 10

What is disease surveillance / surveillance medicine?

Answer 10

The collection and analysis of data and the provision of information which which leads to action being taken to prevent and control disease.