Social Causes of Health and Disease / Edition 2

by William C. Cockerham

Overview

This stimulating book has become a go-to text for understanding the role that social factors play in the experience of health and many diseases. This extensively revised and updated third edition offers the most compelling case yet that stress, poverty, unhealthy lifestyles, and unpleasant living and working conditions can all be directly associated with illness.

The book continues to build on the paradigm shift that has been emerging in twenty-first-century medical sociology, which looks beyond individual explanations for health and disease. As the field has headed toward a fundamentally different orientation, William Cockerham’s work has been at the forefront of these changes, and he here marshals evidence and theory for those seeking a clear and authoritative guide to the realities of the social determinants of health. Of particular note in the latest edition is new material on the relationship between gender and health, implications of the life course for health behavior,  the health effects of social capital, and the emergence of COVID-19.

This engaging introduction to social epidemiology will be indispensable reading for all students and scholars of medical sociology, especially those with the courage to confront the possibility that society really does make people sick.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780745661193
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	03/25/2013
Edition description:	2nd Revised ed.
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

William C. Cockerham is Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Chair Emeritus at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and Research Scholar of Sociology at the College of William & Mary in Virginia.

Table of Contents

Figures and Tables vi

Preface vii

1 The Social Causation of Health and Disease 1

2 Theorizing about Health and Disease 32

3 Health Lifestyles 61

4 The Power of Class 90

5 Class and Health: Explaining the Relationship 116

6 Age 139

7 Gender 151

8 Race and Ethnicity 167

9 Living Conditions and Neighborhood Disadvantage 182

10 Health and Social Capital 195

Concluding Remarks 211

References 220

Name Index 259

Subject Index 266

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“William Cockerham has written a thorough and comprehensive book elucidating the wide range of social causation of disease. Rather than taking a biomedical disease-by-disease approach, Cockerham emphasizes how particular sociological factors produce disease and illness. Established health researchers and neophytes alike will find great value in this volume.”
Peter Conrad, Brandeis University

“Organized around a remarkably broad and cogent theoretical framework, this book is an outstanding resource for medical sociologists in their research and teaching. The empirical and theoretical insights also are deeply relevant for public health professionals and policymakers as they struggle to identify ways to improve the health of communities around the world.”
Eric Wright, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis

“Professor Cockerham provides a lively and compelling vindication of the sociological enterprise with respect to understanding the social aetiology of modern health problems. Showing how race, class, and gender matter, this publication is a major contribution to both sociological analysis and policy formation.”
Bryan S. Turner, The Graduate Center CUNY

“In this revised edition William Cockerham develops a strong and challenging case for the role of social factors in health and disease. Drawing on the latest and most important research, Social Causes of Health and Disease will stimulate debate and discussion in equal measure – essential reading for students and researchers alike.”
Michael Bury, Royal Holloway, University of London

“This second edition of William Cockerham's acclaimed book updates his argument about the social causes of disease, drawing on the latest research from both the US and UK. His argument about the direct causal effects of social factors on health and disease is compelling and will be of considerable interest to students and researchers of both sides of the Atlantic.”
Jonathan Gabe, Royal Holloway, University of London