Session 2 Lecture 2 - Adapting And Coping With Long Tern Conditions

Question 1

What is chronic illness ?

Answer 1

• encompasses wide range of conditions
• long term
• co-morbidity
• manifestations may vary greatly day to day
• controlled but not cured
• LTCs will increase with ageing pop but not only older people live with LTCs

Question 2

What are the two theories of experience of illness ?

Answer 2

• functional

- interpretive

Question 3

What does the functional theory of experience of illness entail?

Answer 3

• Talcott Parsons ‘sick role’ 1951
• relationship between society and individual
• not acknowledging role of the body

Question 4

What does the interpretive theory of experience of illness entail ?

Answer 4

• Erving Goffman ‘stigma’ 1963
• Michael Bury ‘biographical disruption’ 1982
• illness narratives
• how individuals make sense of their illness, drawing on their physical experience and social understanding
• how individual rebuild their identity and sense of self

Question 5

What is the Parsons ‘sick role’?

Answer 5

Sick role is a temporary, medically sanctioned form of deviant behaviour - functional/mechanistic

• the sick person is expected to seek professional advice and to adhere to treatments in order to be excused their usual duties and to be considered not to be responsible for their condition
• medical practitioners are able to sanction their temporary absence from work and family duties as well as to absolve them of blame

Question 6

Limitations of the ‘sick role’

Answer 6

• not all illnesses are temporary
• does not acknowledge the difference between people
• does not acknowledge individual agency in defining and coping with illness - not involving the medical profession

Question 7

What are “the 5 works” of chronic illness?

Answer 7

• illness work
• everyday life work
• emotional work
• biographical work
• identity work