Subjective Social Status: Individual and Neighborhood-Level Determinants in Association with Measures of Health and Health Promoting Behaviors

Title	Subjective Social Status: Individual and Neighborhood-Level Determinants in Association with Measures of Health and Health Promoting Behaviors
Author	Cross, Israel
Advisors	Gruber-Baldini, Ann L
Program	Gerontology
UMBC Department	Gerontology
Document Type	dissertation
Sponsors	University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC)
Keywords	Health; Health Behavior; Midlife; Neighborhood; Socioeconomic Status; Subjective Social Status
Date Issued	2010-01-01
Abstract	Several studies have established education, income, and occupational status as indicators of social status. Although these objective markers of social status help situate individuals in social hierarchies, it does not allow the individual to evaluate the relative importance of these three elements of social status with respect to the significance of each marker in the individual's own social context. In three papers, this dissertation examined relative social status using the MacArthur Scale of Subjective Social Status (SSS). This measure assesses individuals' judgments of their place in their social hierarchy which captures the multidimensional nature of social position. In three papers, this examines the associations of SSS with individual and neighborhood-level characteristics, health, and health promoting behaviors. Data were from the baseline measurement of the Healthy Aging in Neighborhoods of Diversity across the Life Span (HANDLS) study, a multidisciplinary, epidemiologic study following a fixed cohort of community-dwelling Black and White adults over a 20-year period. Although sample sizes vary in each of the papers, final recruitment for the HANDLS study was 3,722 individuals. The statistical methods used in this research include correlation matrices, ANOVA, logistic regression, and multiple linear regression models. After adjusting for socioeconomic status (SES) in paper I, Blacks were more likely to place themselves higher on the community SSS scale (R =.069, p<.001). Education was the only objective measure associated with SSS (R =.069, p<.01). There was a direct relationship between neighborhood social cohesion and SSS (R =.069, p<.001). When used as a predictor variable in papers II and III, SSS was associated with an increased risk for severe symptoms of depression (odds ratio, 0.78; 95% CI, 0.73, 0.82) and providing social support to others (R =.11, p<.001). Together, these findings support the utility of using subjective measures of status and underscore the importance of accounting for individual, social, and neighborhood characteristics as they are related to social status. Future studies examining social gradients should consider SSS as an alternative measure of social position as it may provide deeper insight into what criteria are important in individuals' assessment social status.
Identifier	10324
Format	application:pdf
Language	en
Collection	UMBC Thesis and Dissertations
Rights Statement	This item may be protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. It is made available by UMBC for non-commercial research and education. For permission to publish or reproduce, please see http://aok.lib.umbc.edu/specoll/repro.php or contact Special Collections at speccoll(at)umbc.edu.
Source	Cross_umbc_0434D_10324.pdf

Add tags for Subjective Social Status: Individual and Neighborhood-Level Determinants in Association with Measures of Health and Health Promoting Behaviors

View as list | View as tag cloud | report abuse

Post a Comment for Subjective Social Status: Individual and Neighborhood-Level Determinants in Association with Measures of Health and Health Promoting Behaviors

Find results with:

Searching collections:

Home Subjective Social Status: Individual and Neighborhood-Level Determinants in Association with...

Subjective Social Status: Individual and Neighborhood-Level Determinants in Association with Measures of Health and Health Promoting Behaviors

Description

Tags

Comments