[EQ] Psychosocial resources and social health inequalities in France

Psychosocial resources and social health inequalities in France:

Exploratory findings from a general population survey

 

Florence Jusot (IRDES)

Michel Grignon (Departments of Economics and Health, Aging and Society, McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario ; Center for Health Economics and Policy Analysis (CHEPA), McMaster University Associate Researcher (IRDES)

Paul Dourgnon (IRDES)

Institut de recherche et documentation en économie de la santé – France - Septembre 2007

 

Available online as PDF file [28p.]  at : http://www.irdes.fr/EspaceAnglais/Publications/WorkingPapers/DT6PsychosocialSocialHealthFrance.pdf

 

“…..We use a unique general population survey to assess the respective impact on self-assessed health status of subjective perceptions of social capital controlling for standard sociodemographic factors (occupation, income, education, age and gender).

 

The survey is unique for two reasons:
First, we use a variety of measures to describe self-perceived social capital (trust and civic engagement, social support, sense of control, and self-esteem). Second, we can link these measures of social capital to a wealth of descriptors of health status and behaviours.

We find empirical support for the link between the subjective perception of social capital and health. Sense of control at work is the most important determinant of health status. Other important ones are civic engagement and social support. To a lesser extent, sense of being lower in the social hierarchy is associated with poorer health status. On the contrary, relative deprivation does not affect health in our survey. Since access to social capital is not equally distributed in the population, these findings suggest that psychosocial factors can explain a substantial part of social inequalities in health in France…..”  (au)

 

 

 

 

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