How Social Class Affects The Mental Health Of The Upper Class Essay

Why are higher income and social status associated with better health? If it were just a matter of the poorest and lowest status groups having poor health, the explanation could be things like poor living conditions. But the effect occurs all across the socio-economic spectrum. Considerable research indicates that the degree of control people have over life circumstances,

Socio-economic class or socio-economic status (SES) may refer to mixture of various factors such as poverty, occupation and environment. It is a way of measuring the standard and quality of life of individuals and families in society using social and economic factors that affect health and wellbeing ( Giddens and Sutton, 2013). Cockerham (2007 p75) argues: ‘Social class or socioeconomic status (SES) is the strongest predictor of health, disease causation and longevity in medical sociology.’ Research in the 1990s, (Drever and Whitehead, 1997) found out that people in higher SES are generally healthier, and live longer than those in lower SES.

Social class helps to deter the reasons for individual’s health and ill health. Social classes also help with understanding health and ill health, this is done through the basis of individuals lifestyle class, for example the lower class who work in the worst

Socioeconomic status is ordinarily broken into three classes to portray the three zones a family or an individual may fall into. While setting a family or individual into one of these classes, any or the majority of the three variables can be surveyed. Furthermore, low salary and education have been appeared to be solid indicators of a scope of physical and emotional wellness issues, including respiratory infections, joint pain, coronary illness, and schizophrenia. These issues might be because of natural conditions in their working environment, or, on account of dysfunctional behaviors, might be the whole reason for that individual 's social problem regardless. Education in higher socioeconomic families is ordinarily pushed as a great deal more vital, both inside of the family and additionally the nearby group. In poorer zones, where nourishment and security are need, education can take a secondary lounge.

Different researches do believe that there is a link between social class and health. It is a statistical impression and also it has been argued that there isn’t really a pattern in social class, age and peoples employment that has had an impact on people’s health inequalities.

Low socioeconomic status is often associated with higher prevalence of depression. Depressive disorders which develop in socioeconomically tight situations have lower rates of remission and higher risks of becoming chronic, hence increasing prevalence (Bramesfeld, Platt & Schwartz, 2006). Mental health problems like depression and anxiety have a higher prevalence in

As discussed in class, little advancement has been made in the field of mental health care over the past two decades. Rates of mental illness continue to be high especially among certain subgroups, but progress has been stunted by stigma and social environmental issues. Mental health disparities, like many other health disparities, are embedded within a trend of socioeconomic differences (Miranda, McGuire, Williams, & Wang, 2008). Racial and class disparities exist among those afflicted

Suppressing negative emotions can cause mental health concerns, but individuals with low social power and low social status may use these strategies to avoid conflict (Langner, "Social Hierarchy And Depression: The Role Of Emotion Suppression"). The social hierarchy affects mental health in part through a process of emotion suppression. It also does not help that some scholars suggest that the more individuals aim at climbing the social hierarchy, the more society's hierarchy gets strong (Bardoscia, "The Social Climbing Game"). Pepi Leistyna states in her “Social Class and Entertainment television” article that there are harsh realities that the poor and working class of color face, but television and other media outlets show that the middle class is open to everyone (Leistyna 3). The middle class has not been open to everyone, and the social hierarchy that has been the unwritten law of where an individual is placed in society can explain this. The hierarchy is not only destructive for individuals of color, but even European females and European families who have not came from money. It is a frustrating reality that seems never to be changing and only getting worse. The country is dividing into the two extremes. There is the rich who are getting richer and the poor who are getting poorer. The majority of individuals who are getting poorer are

The Life at the Top in America Isn’t Just Better, It’s Longer news article assigned for this week’s critical writing caught me off guard. I was not expecting a narrative compilation of three individuals’ varying healthcare experiences. The article allowed me to reflect and contemplate the three very differing experiences. Each of these experiences was significantly dissimilar from one another due to each individual’s socioeconomic status. As we have learned and discussed in Chapter three of the text, socioeconomic status (or social class) is an individual’s or group’s standing within a ranked social structure. This socioeconomic status is typically determined by three main variables such as income, occupational prestige, and education. Different models of the social class ladder exist. The five-class model used in the United States is as follows: upper class, upper-middle class, lower-middle class, working class, and lower class. With this in mind and as previously mentioned in our text, “socioeconomic status or social class is the strongest and most consistent predictor of a person’s health and life expectancy across the life course.” In this response paper, I will deliberate and explain my thoughts on each individual’s experience.

This essay will discuss ways in which a person’s socioeconomic class and his/her social situation can have an impact on his/her health, using examples. We believe that there is a direct link between socioeconomic/social class and health (Adler et al. 1994). I will be defining the key terms: socioeconomic and health, social class then proceed to discuss about how poverty, income, employability, environment and housing can impact on a person’s social situation and their health.

This essay will be discussing the extent to which social class and poverty affects health and illness. Firstly, what is social class? Each person’s perception of social class can be different; is social class defined by a person’s accent, the area they live in, or something as simple as their income? Project Britain describes social class as “The grouping of people by occupations and lifestyle”. (Cress, 2014). To find social class Sociologists group people according to common factors, they compare people and various criteria can be conveniently used to place people in social groups or classes. Next we ask the question what determines a person’s health, the NHS defines health as “Physical and mental, it is the absence of disease”. (NHS 2017).

The aim of this essay is to examine the influence that socio-economic status has on an individual’s health.

Socioeconomic status is a predictive measure of health that has been widely used in the literature (Kroenke, 2008). It

Similar to other causality dilemmas, the question of which comes first: poverty, low SES, or mental instability, is discussed when modeling the development of psychological problems in human beings. Low socioeconomic status (SES), a marker dependent on income level, education and occupation, is often used interchangeably to title poor individuals as well as those with psychological health issues. Factors such as stress, negative environment, low quality of living, exposure to noise pollution and violence can all lead to bad health problems and play a role in the development of mental illnesses. Often, it is assumed that a positive family history for mental illness is one of the strongest predictors of the future development of depression and other psychological issues. Yet, we have an understanding that not all individuals with this risk factor later suffer from depression.

The validity of Marxism varies across the classes; based on upbringing, social class and ethnicity opinions vary. Studies have been conducted in an attempt to examine the scheme of Marxism and its correlation to mental disorders and low socioeconomic class rank. The results are interesting, proving both Marx's and Miller's critics erroneous. A cross-sectional study conducted through the Department of Psychology at the University of British Columbia revealed that lower social class rank is inversely related to mental health disorders (Faris & Dunham, 1939; Hollingshead & Redlich, 1958; O'Campo, Salmon & Burke, 2009). Another community study also found links between social class and mental illness siting, "Examination of each type of psychotic disorder shows a true linkage between class position and the rate of treated cases in the population, but the relationship is indirect: The lower the class, the higher the rate" (Hollingshead & Redlich, 1757). Depression, anxiety, schizophrenia, and Antisocial Personality Disorder were common psychiatric disorders found to correlate to middle or lower-class individuals such as Willy Lowman