Journal Article

Socioeconomic Position and Health: The Differential Effects of Education versus Income on the Onset versus Progression of Health Problems

House, James S., Herd, Pamela, Goesling, Brian

2007

Overview

This article seeks to elucidate the relationship between socioeconomic position and health by showing how different facets of socioeconomic position (education and income) affect different stages (onset vs. progression) of health problems. The biomedical literature has generally treated socioeconomic position as a unitary construct. Likewise, the social science literature has tended to treat health as a unitary construct. To advance our understanding of the relationship between socioeconomic position and health, and ultimately to foster appropriate policies and practices to improve population health, a more nuanced approach is required—one that differentiates theoretically and empirically among dimensions of both socioeconomic position and health. Using data from the Americans' Changing Lives Study (1986 through 2001/2002), we show that education is more predictive than income of the onset of both functional limitations and chronic conditions, while income is more strongly associated than education with the progression of both.

• Publisher: American Sociological Association,SAGE Publications
• Subject: Academic achievement / Adult / Analysis. Health state / Attrition (Research Studies) / Behavior / Behavioral Research / Biological and medical sciences / Biomedical research / Biomedicine / Chronic Disease / Chronic diseases / Chronic illnesses / Communicable Diseases / Correlation / Death / Disease prevention / Disease Progression / Education / Education policy / Educational Attainment / Educational Policy / Educational Status / Epidemiology / Female / Functional impairment / General aspects / Health / Health Problems / Health Promotion / Health services / Health Status / Human capital / Humans / Income / Infectious diseases / Interviews as Topic / Literature / Longitudinal Studies / Male / Medical conditions / Medical sciences / Middle Aged / Mortality / Obesity / Population policy / Prediction / Psychology / Psychology, Social / Public health. Hygiene / Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine / Public Policy / Risk factors / Science / Scientific Research / Social behavior / Social Change / Social Class / Social Sciences / Social Status and Health / Socioeconomic factors / Socioeconomic Status / Socioeconomics / Tobacco smoke / United States