Health and disability (Component 3, Section B option): the social construction of health, illness and disability; the biomedical and social models; inequalities in health and life expectancy by class, gender, ethnicity and region; the medical and social models of disability; the power of the medical profession; and sociological perspectives on health.

What this dot point is asking

Health and disability is one of the four options in Component 3, Section B. You need to understand the social construction of health, illness and disability, contrast the biomedical and social models, explain health inequalities by class, gender, ethnicity and region, distinguish the medical and social models of disability, analyse the power of the medical profession, and apply the perspectives.

The answer

The social construction of health and illness

Inequalities in health

The medical and social models of disability

• The medical model of disability locates the problem in the individual's impairment, to be treated or cured by medicine.
• The social model of disability locates the problem in a society that fails to accommodate impairment: disability is the result of barriers, exclusion and discrimination, not of the impairment itself.

This distinction is central: the social model reframes disability as a form of social oppression and inequality.

The power of the medical profession

The medical profession holds considerable power: it defines what counts as illness, controls the sick role, and acts as a gatekeeper to treatment and resources. Sociologists discuss the medicalisation of more areas of life (bringing them under medical control). Perspectives differ on whether this power serves patients, society or the profession itself.

Perspectives on health

1. Functionalism - medicine maintains a healthy, productive workforce; the sick role manages illness so society functions.
2. Marxism - health care and definitions of illness serve capitalism and reflect class inequality.
3. Feminism - highlights the medicalisation of women's bodies and lives and gendered inequalities in health.
4. Interactionism - focuses on how illness and disability are labelled, defined and experienced in interaction.

Examples in context

Disability as social oppression. The medical model treats a disabled person's difficulties as caused by their impairment, so the solution is to treat or cure the individual. The social model turns this around: a wheelchair user is "disabled" not by their body but by buildings without ramps, by transport that excludes them and by discriminatory attitudes. On this view, disability is produced by society, and the remedy is to remove barriers and discrimination. A strong essay uses this contrast to argue that disability, like health and illness, is substantially socially constructed, while acknowledging the biological reality of impairment, which is the balanced judgement the examiner rewards.

Try this

Q1. What is meant by the social model of disability? [4 marks]

• Cue. Disability is produced by a society that fails to accommodate impairment, through barriers and discrimination, rather than by the impairment itself.

Q2. Explain the materialist explanation of class inequalities in health. [6 marks]

• What the marker wants. Poverty, poor housing, hazardous work and diet among lower social classes cause worse health and shorter life expectancy, the class gradient.

Q3. Evaluate the view that the medical profession has too much power. [16 marks]

• What the marker wants. The profession's power to define illness and act as gatekeeper, the idea of medicalisation, weighed against its benefits, with a supported judgement.