1. Write a brief paragraph discussing what social determinants are most relevant to your area of research and why. Consider both structural stratifiers (e.g. income, education, etc) and intermediary determinants such as material and psychosocial circumstances, as described in the WHO reading. Explain why you chose the factors (might use Braveman article from last week to provide justification. The association could be reported in published research or it could be your hypothesized relationship. Consider whether how these factors might function over the lifecourse and/or intergenerationally.
My work has been focused on looking at social policies related to income transfers/ food stamps/ health insurance being provided to lower income households with the motive to improve their health outcomes or incentivize them to continue to work. So, the most relevant structural social determinants in my research area are Socioeconomic and Political Context; Income. At the same time, intermediary determinants could be health system for insurance; food availability for food coupons. I have also ended up looking at the differential effects of these social policies related to racism.
For income – we just used the current income levels. For Race – we just did sub-group analyses.
2. Write a brief paragraph describing the extent to which an socioecological framework incorporating issues related to social determinants has been applied to your area of research. Are there opportunities for improving our understanding of or approach to disparities in your area with a greater emphasis on a socioecological framework?
I hope I am understanding the question right. The socioecological frameworks applied in our research is specific to the question. In most of the cases, I do not see all the domains of the framework covered like interpersonal, organizational and neighborhood are often ignored. This is mostly driven by the data limitations. In social policies evaluation, the most common domains covered are public policies, state level regional effects, and individual issues.