Soc 248 Midterm Exam PDF

Midterm - open book - 1 long and short answer question - online exam What's sociological imagination? -​ how their personal experiences relate to broader social and historical forces. Biomedical - How the body performs, physical aspects of human bio. Social model - How did this illness come t...

Midterm - open book - 1 long and short answer question - online exam What's sociological imagination? -​ how their personal experiences relate to broader social and historical forces. Biomedical - How the body performs, physical aspects of human bio. Social model - How did this illness come to be in the first place? Are individuals to blame for their condition or are the choices made by certain people or groups - e.g: Covid-19. What is Medicalization? How to apply this concept in society? -​ Is the process (not happens all at once) by which non-medical problems become defined and treated as medical problems, usually in terms of illnesses or disorders. (Conrad, 1992). -​ Categorize a problem in the form of illness or disorder. -​ Social model of health not the biomedical model which is more detailed with info of meds. 3 ways to think of medicalization: 1.​ Medicalization of deviance (going against social norms): Mental illness, alcoholism, etc. not deviance by society but is. Turning a deviance into a medical issue. 3 ways to see medicalizations areas to think: -​ Medicalization of natural life processes. (if u live long u experience this). -​ Medicalization is mostly aimed at women like medical meds, ads, etc. due to their hormones, period, pregnancy, anxiety, stress, etc. Females are devianted due to info above also bc their voice was not heard, their body and problems they go through became research area. (Medical field dominated by men). -​ The power of medicine: from physical to higher up like: what is right/wrong, laws, how ppl think about themselves or act, difficulty in becoming pregnant, shyness, stress, daily difficulties - into medical problems if the disease uses medical solution meds, etc. Can also lead to - Healthy ppl changing themselves like surgeries of hair, facial, lip fillers, etc. -​ Changes how we think and act about ourselves. Overall to conclude all 3 points for medicalization: Shapes what we do. Turns deviance into medical issues. 2.​ Hyperkinesis (later ADHD): Turning social problems into medical problems.  3.​ Psychiatry and homosexuality: Past known to be a mental disorder. Dr. H. Anonymous - psychiatrist said to be gay (shocking in the past not so now). -​ Law defined homosexuality as crime -​ The Church sees it as sin. -​ Meds see homo as a mental illness. This changed back in 1969 not long ago. What’s medicalization as a form of social control? -​ Sociological medicalization is not about saying what's right or wrong, but more of what are the consequences of medicalization or diving deeper into each concept and term. -​ Medicalization is a way to control deviance. Pros and cons medicalization seen as sociologist: -​ Positive aspects of medicalization: nothing is wrong with you but most of you are not medically alright it can be treated. (e.g: alcoholism, drug addiction, ADHD - not seen as a crime but more of a medical condition.) -​ Negative aspects of medicalization: medicalization ignores school pressure, stress, etc. Surgeries unnecessary making you feel you have to do to feel better, look better. Meds for periods once per 4 years - make u feel better, yourself, making it seem you are not ok with it, it is not normal. But can be treated with inexpensive meds or surgeries like celebrities do. To look good or live longer. Biomedicalization: Continues expansion of medicalization (has been around for long). Not a replacement for medicalization. While medicalization looks at brother aspects in society and individuals. Biomedicalization is more individual bio e.g: diseases, illnesses. Two main ways look at Biomed: -​ How biomedicalization has deeper reach - Certain behaviours can be seen and targeted by bio medicalization, how our physical bodies are made of. Less of behaviour and more of physical aspects. - Biomed can be through biotech, computer tech, etc. 5 key processes of biomedicine: 1.​ Growth of the private sector: more opportunity to access government funded healthcare. 2.​ Focus on risk, health and surveillance: Smartwatches operate as surveillance, e.g: tracking health - heartbeat, what kind of sleep u getting, how many calories u burning, etc. 3.​ The technoscientization of biomed:How human genetics is improved or changed - treating disease before a baby is born - changing eye color - etc.  4.​ Transformation and distribution of knowledge: info about health, etc is out there no need doc to treat - can be self treated like videos, knowledge out there. 5.​ Transformations of bodies and identities: Can be a way to express oneself and create an alternative identity. None expert medicalization: (like on media, ur ideas of health) Lay knowledge: knowledge we gain from experiences of health and illness in everyday life. Ideas and perspectives of common people, NOT docs or nurses. Why study illness experience? 1.​ Rescuing the lifeworld from medical objectification - is a kind of suffering - to reduce their suffering, trying to experience ppls suffering in ways that are not just through medicine. -​ Sociologists want to understand how people talk about and experience health and illness. (sociologists want to know the language and understand e.g: docs/nurses talking about something u dont understand due to medical knowledge they have, using strange words u dont understand.) -​ Lay knowledge is also the knowledge we provide the docs/nurses as they try to figure out and help give meds, etc. 2.​ Lay experiences are consequential (e.g - ur experience can give u knowledge more in depth then if u read it in diagrams like docs, nurses. E.g: covid-19 isolation, disorders, alcoholism - docs can't understand it as much as the person with experience.) -​ Biographical disruption Sociological perspectives on health and media Why do medical sociologists study media? -​ How sociologists study media -​ Studies of representation -​ Studies of production -​ Studies of reception 1. A main source of everyday medical knowledge: -​ Media provides us with language, images. Media shapes how ppl understand the causes and salutations to health problems and inequities (lack of fairness or justice). -​ Media is blaming you for your sicknesses and discussions you make - e.g: alcohol, drugs, etc. Media don't look at social issues like not your fault ur not healthy sometimes, ur facing wealth inequality. HOWEVER, if you keep seeing the same  thing in the media about stuff being ur fault as an individual then it gets to u, slowly u believe it. 2. Informs medical decision making -​ Provides us with resources, to learn what causes illness, what policies, how we should behave, how university or hospital or banks are. Sociologists think of the media as a way to gain knowledge about the world. -​ Canada with free healthcare BUT not enough docs, long lines. Make ppl turn away from free med and privatize them. It is being pushed to become privatized - costy. 3. Reproduces power relations -​ Media can silence some big issues e.g: stories like long lines - first-come-first-served, in snowstorm - doc appointment. Studies on media representation: AND how to look at these to answer them -​ Studies of media messages themselves How to look at this: and answer Examine how media products and messages are made -​ Discursive analyses How to look at this and answer: May analyze how media producers work or deepen understandings of the environment of media organisations -​ Can show language, imagery, forms of reasoning that everyday people have available to them in order to make sense of health issues. (what is the media offering to its audience to make sense of what they are trying to get out there). How to look at this and answer: Study how outside interests influence those who produce media -​ Investigate the effect that media messages have on audiences and the ways audiences interact with media -​ Challenging to conduct Stigma and Health:  -​ Stigma is ok to have but the social aspects such as; refers to negative attitudes, beliefs, and stereotypes people may hold towards those who experience mental health conditions. Makes stigma bad. -​ Silence = Death: with triangle post is for gay people who have been abused and also incloved nazzies Germans - To protest the U.S. government's silence about AIDS. Symbolic interactionism: -​ How people make sense of the world around them, how they focus on everyday interactions. -invites questions about how society operates. - How people share connections and meaning through objects like the flag of afghanistan. - For connecting symbolic interactionism to medical health, and or stigma. How the silence = death triangle - gay ppl how they interact, how they are being ashamed or abused, etc. from society for being gay. - How people construct meaning about medical disease. - Illness is much more than just physical impact on the body - symbolic interactionist see and connect - the experience of having a disease. Gives idea of what's disease Vs. and an illness. - “Illness is what the patient feels when they go to a doctor (telling their experience from their illness explaining to doc), this directs doc attention to some type of disease that they have on the way home” (by Cassell 1976: 53). - “An attribute that is deeply discrediting.” by Goffman, 1963. Mean –- a characteristic or quality of a person that is so negatively perceived by society that it significantly damages their reputation and reduces them to a "tainted" or "discounted" status. - Micro level (close person to person) interactions: attributes can be physical like body size, color. Or non-visible like criminal records, etc. - ex: drug use, if you are told ur addict once or bad words thats stigma but when 2 or more ppl do that makes u feel like ur a criminal a wrong act, etc. This separates you from society or to try and reach for help. U feel criminal or unwanted. Due to stigma even for those going to medical health for help they are treated differently sometimes due to the bad reputation around them. Stigma: -​ Aggravates health problems -​ Delays ppl’s health seeking activities -​ Can diminish the quality care ppl receive (explained above). Sigma health, and health care: Healing house HIV+ spa by casey house. -​ U get massages and spa services - for ppl with HIV+ - direct way to show how our interaction and a simple touch can support and help ppl with HIV+. —- this is the direct way showing like the silence = death poster of gays to this. -​ Ways to change stigma is to change ppl’s thinking around issues like HIV patience. Stigma is a social problem, not just an individual one. -​ How is stigma used by the ppl in power to reproduce stigma? -​ Stigma is not just an individual attitude, it is a broader issue. Social determination of health (SDH) -​ The economic, social, environmental, cultural, and political conditions that influence the health of populations. -​ It has to do with more of the above info, then of doctors, health care system, population, etc. The place u live is it safe, ur work gives u time, proper income, educational we talk about these - (having stable work, sense of community, conditions of childhood, neighborhood, exposure to racism), opportunities. SDH research programs (contextualizing risk factors) - Your concern about Social economic conditions, with how wealth and resources are divided in society, how the associated forms of inequality shape our health status. - how income, statues, change our health. -​ Perfect way to think about this is through Proximal (individual risk factors that can affect our health, e.g: eat healthy, exercise, think positive, etc.) vs. distal (resources that help individuals to keep away from diseases, distance) causes. -​ Causes and consequences of these outcomes which are directly linked to death, health issues, etc. -​ contextualizing risk factors - why ppl are exposed to risk factors related to disease in the first place. E.g: safe sex to not get or reduce risk of diseases. HIV (Distal) - low income - poor diet/;acl of exercise - overweight - clogged arteries - heart disease. (proximal). -​ As sociologists we think far from the individual e.g: heart disease - science thinks more of genes, but sociologists think low income leads to no access to organic nutritious food, no access to gym membership. SDH and policy: -​ Vs. biomedicine -​ Health is more than absence of disease (for SDH is more about how much control you are in ur work, does it isolate u from others). -​ The medical care system is not the primary determinant of health populations Vs. health promotion: -​ Focus is not on individuals (talks), but on communities and populations. -​ Look at structural factors that create differences in exposure to health risk. E.g: u have more access to better equipment and coaches when u have certain membership but not for the rest of the community if they don't. Canada toxic chemical valley discussion: In what ways do settler colonialism and environmental racism unfold in the case of the chemical valley? 1.​ Last week Parker and Aggleton encouraged us to understand stigma as a social process: “Stigma “is part of complex struggles for power that lie at the heart of social life. It is deployed by concrete and identifiable social actors seeking to legitimize their own dominant status within existing structures of social inequality” (p.18). With that definition in mind, how do we see stigma operating in the case of the chemical valley? -​ Not just definitions but applying terms and concepts something like this will come in midterm. With parker and aggleton, in industry, forms of resistance,