Social Inequalities in Health New Evidence and Policy Implications

At the turn of the 21st century, social inequalities in health remain a key public health problem in advanced societies. The reasons behind these inequalities are more complex. A panel of internationally renowned experts provide new answers to the questions posed by health inequality, evolving mainly from research collaboration in the European Science Foundation Programme on 'Social Variations in Health Expectancy in Europe'. This book explains social inequalities in health within three interrelated frameworks of scientific analysis: 1 A life course approach that models and tests pathways from pregnancy to adult health, 2 A stress-theoretical approach that explores how an adverse psychosocial environment affects physical and mental health, with a special focus on work, coping, and psychobiological stress responses, 3 A macro-sociological approach that deals with health effects of aggregate deprivation and its wider socio-political and economic determinants, including different types of welfare regimes.