Lape Mogaji
Professor Susan Tripathy
Sociology of Health and Healthcare
DUE DATE: October 1st, 2015

“Social Relations and Health: A Flashpoint for Public Policy (Blackboard)

From the moment of birth, babies yearn for love, affection and attention. Parents take care of their children up until college and even -in some generous cases- after graduation. Creating a strong and healthy relationship between caregivers and receivers, positively affects their health and their overall self esteem. Debra Emberson and Jennifer Karas Montez evaluated the pros and cons to social relationships and how it affects the standard of living for individuals. The authors included evidence shows that involvement in social relationships benefits health. Some studies they conducted comes from prospective studies of mortality across industrialized nations. House, Landis and Emberson conducted a social experiment and found that these studies consistently show that individuals with the lowest level of involvement in social relationships are more likely to die than those with greater involvement). For example, Berkman and Syme showed that the risk of death among men and women with the fewest social ties was more than twice as high as the risk for adults with the most social ties. Social ties has also been proven to reduce mortality rates among adults with medical conditions. For instance, several recent review articles provide consistent and compelling evidence linking a low quantity or quality of social ties with a host of conditions, including development and progression of cardiovascular disease, recurrent myocardial infarction, atherosclerosis, autonomic dysregulation, high blood pressure, cancer and delayed cancer recovery, and slower wound healing (Ertel, Glymour, and Berkman 2009; Everson-Rose and
Lewis 2005; Robles and Kiecolt-Glaser 2003; Uchino 2006). Although there are various advantages to have a strong social ties, there can also be predicaments that can harm one’s health While social relationships are the source of emotional support for most people, social relationships can be extremely stressful. Relationship stress undermines health behaviorally, psychosocially, and physiologically. The authors state the underlying effects of relationship stress when they write, “ Stress contributes to psychological distress and physiological arousal (e.g., increased heart rate and blood pressure) that can damage health through cumulative wear and tear on physiological systems, and by leading people of all ages to engage in unhealthy behaviors (e.g., food consumption, heavy drinking, smoking) in an effort to cope with stress and reduce unpleasant arousal (Kassel, Stroud, and Paronis 2003). Stress ,due to social relationships, cause a domino effect of issues that ultimately affect one’s health, success of living and could induce death. The article could be built upon by showing how adolescences, young adults and adults are affected by social relationships. As an only child, I grew up in a home with just my mother and I and ever since I was a child, I never liked being home. I avoid going home because I knew I would not have anybody in my age range to talk to. As a young adult, I experience that same loneliness and that was the reason I ended up working at multiple jobs simultaneously. The more I worked, the more I was out of the house. I was jovial because I was socializing with my peers at work, but it was also very stressful maintaining 2-3 jobs and ended up losing 30 lbs over the course of that summer. Hence, I agree with the points made in this article about social relationships on health.

Question: Among adolescences, young adults and adults, who’s health is more heavily weighted on social relationships?

“The Effects of Widowhood on Mortality by the Causes of Death by Both Spouses” (Blackboard) Similar to the previous article on social relationships, Felix Elwert and Nicholas Christakis conducted a social experiment on the effect of widowhood on mortality by the causes of death by both spouses. Mortality after widowhood is significantly elevated for husbands and wives. To the knowledge of the authors, “this study is the largest nationally representative and longitudinal study of cause specificity in the widowhood effect in the United States. It is also the first such study to investigate variation in the widowhood effect by the causes of death of both spouses, that is, of the precedent spouse and the bereaved partner. “According to the studies conducted by Dr. Elbert and Dr. Christakis, “The death of a wife is associated with an 18% increase in all-cause mortality for men and the death of a husband is associated with a 16% increase in all-cause mortality for women.” The authors go further in details about specific illnesses caused a spike in mortality rates of widows when they say, “ Men’s hazard of death increases by more than 20% if their wives died of lung cancer, infections or sepsis, COPD, other heart or vascular diseases, or diabetes. Men’s hazard of death increases by less than 20% if their wives died of any other causes… Women’s hazard of death increases by more than 20% after widowhood only for 2 of their precedent husbands’ causes of death: COPD and influenza or pneumonia. Women’s hazard of death increases by less than 20% in response to their husbands’ deaths from all other causes. Widowhood increases survivors’ risk of dying from almost all causes, including cancer, but also widowhood increases survivors’ all-cause mortality in response to almost all causes of death of the precedent spouse.” The loss of their spouse affects the precedent spouse physically, mentally and medically and often leads their death. Being alone, especially at that vulnerable stage where you need a caregiver or at least a companion, elders are left alone to take care of themselves. Losing someone can be a very excruciating, indescribable plain. As someone with grandparents, I see ho how much love they have towards each other. I don't think they could possibly even fathom the thought of losing one another. In regards to the article, its unfortunate that the result of losing someone you love is losing your own life. If I could change one thing about this article, I would add more ranges of widowhood- from young marriages (age of low 20’s) until old marriages (as far as it can get) etc. I feel the readers and I would get a better perspective of widowhood as a whole. The effects of social health on widows is an important topic to be aware of just for simple gratitude. Seeing what happened to 373,189 lonely elders will teach us to grow to and appreciate the company of the ones we love as we age.

Question: Is there a way to decrease the mortality rate of widows? If so, how? Is it inevitable?