Joyce Grace Kapela
Unit 10: Sociological Perspectives
Assignment Title: Can inequality make us ill?
Date: 26/05/2023
In this report, I will be using two different social groups, ethnicity and gender, and a
health setting, St Mary’s Hospital, to evaluate the impact social inequality,
demographic change, and trends and patterns have when trying to provide a health
care service in society and the importance of trying to tackle this inequality.
When there is social inequality, it means there is an unequal amount of resources
being distributed and unequal access to opportunities in society, which can “result in
disparities across gender, race / ethnicity, class and other important social markers”
(Pennsylvania State University, 2015). There is a range of negative outcomes, such
as a lower life expectancy and poor health for certain groups in society, when social
inequality occurs, which is why it is important for us to find solutions to abolishing this
inequality for a better society. Also, negative attitudes - stereotypes, labelling,
discrimination, marginalisation - contribute to different groups in society experiencing
social inequality.
When looking at how social inequality can affect race / ethnicity, there are sometimes
difficulties when measuring health inequalities due to different reasons. For instance,
there are different ways to define a person's race or ethnicity, and the majority of
people from minority ethnic groups tend to live in areas where there are high levels
of deprivation. In addition, those from minority ethnic groups may have issues with
accessing health services, which may be due to racism, language and cultural
barriers. Therefore, these factors make it difficult to understand if there is a link
between someone’s race and illness, as it could be argued that their socio-economic
background is their cause for poor health. However, there is much evidence in the
UK that supports the idea that there is a high amount of health inequalities amongst
different ethnicities and races, as it is clear that white people tend to be the most
privileged or at advantage in terms of their health. For instance, “Black and minority
ethnic (BME) groups generally have worse health than the overall population”
(Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2007). According to Huskinsson
(2023), black women are nearly four times more likely to die: this may be due to how
black women have constantly been stereotyped as being very ‘strong’ and
‘aggressive’. These types of stereotypes and negative attitudes are examples of
racism, which can be linked to Functionalism, which is a theory where sociologists
believe that everyone in society has their own roles and purpose in society. As
Functionalists believe everyone has their own role in society, “in the views of
Functionalism, racial and ethnic inequalities must have served an important function
, in order to exist as long as they have”(Openstax, 2021). People who have a mindset
of a Functionalist may believe that racist attitudes have a positive impact on society,
despite the fact that it only positively impacts White people. This could be why there
are harmful stereotypes like Black women being able to handle more pain as in the
eyes of a Functionalist, the role of a Black person is to be ‘strong’, which puts their
health at risk because of stereotypes which are not always true. This illustrates why
Functionalism is important in society, as if this perspective holds strong beliefs on
how certain people should behave in order for society to be in harmony, it can
actually cause damage to people's health as people in society would be viewed as a
group rather than individuals. In addition, how people receive treatment from health
professionals varies depending on their ethnicity. As stated by Parliamentary Office
of Science and Technology (2007), those from a minority ethnic group, especially
those of Black African or Caribbean descent, would be more likely to enter
psychiatric care through the criminal justice system instead of through health
services, which is bad as it feeds into the prejudice of black people being labelled as
thugs. By holding these negative stereotypes and attitudes in society for black
people, it can result in black individuals having their pain and feelings dismissed
when wanting to receive help, so therefore health professionals may fail to provide
effective medical treatment to those who are black or from a minority ethnic group.
This clearly illustrates how racism has played a vital role in creating this health
disparity. Because of this, people from ethnic minority groups may not seek medical
help due to fears of racism, which could be one of the main reasons for long term
illnesses being much higher amongst ‘BAME’ groups in comparison to White British
people in the UK.
Social inequality can also affect gender: there is a clear health inequality between
women and men, where women are put at a disadvantage and receive poorer
healthcare. Even though feminism has allowed women to live much better now than
compared to how women would have lived in the past, many women today are still
facing gender inequality in many different ways like unequal pay, not being able to
access education, and experiencing more violence. When gender inequality occurs,
harmful stereotypes and discrimination towards women can be perpetuated, which
has a negative impact on women’s health. For instance, “despite living longer than
men, women spend a great proportion of their lives in ill health and disability”
(Dorries, 2021). The reason for this happening could be due to society expecting
women to carry out more of the domestic household chores, as well as meeting the
emotional needs of their whole family even if they are working too, due to the
stereotypes of women such as them being more ‘caring’, ‘nurturing’ and ‘loving’.
When society continues to have these expectations and try to make it the norm for
women to have a caring role, it increases the likelihood of women getting physical
health problems or mental health issues, like dementia and depression. Along with
these expectations, women are also expected to be more responsible than men for
their sexual health. According to a research conducted by YouGov UK(2021), 56% of
people in Britain believed that women held more responsibility for making sure
Unit 10: Sociological Perspectives
Assignment Title: Can inequality make us ill?
Date: 26/05/2023
In this report, I will be using two different social groups, ethnicity and gender, and a
health setting, St Mary’s Hospital, to evaluate the impact social inequality,
demographic change, and trends and patterns have when trying to provide a health
care service in society and the importance of trying to tackle this inequality.
When there is social inequality, it means there is an unequal amount of resources
being distributed and unequal access to opportunities in society, which can “result in
disparities across gender, race / ethnicity, class and other important social markers”
(Pennsylvania State University, 2015). There is a range of negative outcomes, such
as a lower life expectancy and poor health for certain groups in society, when social
inequality occurs, which is why it is important for us to find solutions to abolishing this
inequality for a better society. Also, negative attitudes - stereotypes, labelling,
discrimination, marginalisation - contribute to different groups in society experiencing
social inequality.
When looking at how social inequality can affect race / ethnicity, there are sometimes
difficulties when measuring health inequalities due to different reasons. For instance,
there are different ways to define a person's race or ethnicity, and the majority of
people from minority ethnic groups tend to live in areas where there are high levels
of deprivation. In addition, those from minority ethnic groups may have issues with
accessing health services, which may be due to racism, language and cultural
barriers. Therefore, these factors make it difficult to understand if there is a link
between someone’s race and illness, as it could be argued that their socio-economic
background is their cause for poor health. However, there is much evidence in the
UK that supports the idea that there is a high amount of health inequalities amongst
different ethnicities and races, as it is clear that white people tend to be the most
privileged or at advantage in terms of their health. For instance, “Black and minority
ethnic (BME) groups generally have worse health than the overall population”
(Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, 2007). According to Huskinsson
(2023), black women are nearly four times more likely to die: this may be due to how
black women have constantly been stereotyped as being very ‘strong’ and
‘aggressive’. These types of stereotypes and negative attitudes are examples of
racism, which can be linked to Functionalism, which is a theory where sociologists
believe that everyone in society has their own roles and purpose in society. As
Functionalists believe everyone has their own role in society, “in the views of
Functionalism, racial and ethnic inequalities must have served an important function
, in order to exist as long as they have”(Openstax, 2021). People who have a mindset
of a Functionalist may believe that racist attitudes have a positive impact on society,
despite the fact that it only positively impacts White people. This could be why there
are harmful stereotypes like Black women being able to handle more pain as in the
eyes of a Functionalist, the role of a Black person is to be ‘strong’, which puts their
health at risk because of stereotypes which are not always true. This illustrates why
Functionalism is important in society, as if this perspective holds strong beliefs on
how certain people should behave in order for society to be in harmony, it can
actually cause damage to people's health as people in society would be viewed as a
group rather than individuals. In addition, how people receive treatment from health
professionals varies depending on their ethnicity. As stated by Parliamentary Office
of Science and Technology (2007), those from a minority ethnic group, especially
those of Black African or Caribbean descent, would be more likely to enter
psychiatric care through the criminal justice system instead of through health
services, which is bad as it feeds into the prejudice of black people being labelled as
thugs. By holding these negative stereotypes and attitudes in society for black
people, it can result in black individuals having their pain and feelings dismissed
when wanting to receive help, so therefore health professionals may fail to provide
effective medical treatment to those who are black or from a minority ethnic group.
This clearly illustrates how racism has played a vital role in creating this health
disparity. Because of this, people from ethnic minority groups may not seek medical
help due to fears of racism, which could be one of the main reasons for long term
illnesses being much higher amongst ‘BAME’ groups in comparison to White British
people in the UK.
Social inequality can also affect gender: there is a clear health inequality between
women and men, where women are put at a disadvantage and receive poorer
healthcare. Even though feminism has allowed women to live much better now than
compared to how women would have lived in the past, many women today are still
facing gender inequality in many different ways like unequal pay, not being able to
access education, and experiencing more violence. When gender inequality occurs,
harmful stereotypes and discrimination towards women can be perpetuated, which
has a negative impact on women’s health. For instance, “despite living longer than
men, women spend a great proportion of their lives in ill health and disability”
(Dorries, 2021). The reason for this happening could be due to society expecting
women to carry out more of the domestic household chores, as well as meeting the
emotional needs of their whole family even if they are working too, due to the
stereotypes of women such as them being more ‘caring’, ‘nurturing’ and ‘loving’.
When society continues to have these expectations and try to make it the norm for
women to have a caring role, it increases the likelihood of women getting physical
health problems or mental health issues, like dementia and depression. Along with
these expectations, women are also expected to be more responsible than men for
their sexual health. According to a research conducted by YouGov UK(2021), 56% of
people in Britain believed that women held more responsibility for making sure
