Deck 7: Illness,health and the Pursuit of Wellbeing

Question 1

Which of the following is associated with the growing appeal of alternative medicines?

A)A focus on consumer choice
B)Lower costs
C)The opinion of the Australian Medical Association
D)Health policy

Answer 1

A

Question 2

Which of the following is a human condition that has come under the remit of the medical profession yet does not have a medical cure?

A)Alcoholism
B)Kidney disease
C)Heart disease
D)Migraine headaches

Answer 2

A

Question 3

Which of the following is an example medicalization; i.e.the redefining of normal human bodily experiences as a medical problem?

A)Emergence of alternative medicine
B)Patriarchal culture
C)Fitness industry
D)Regulation of childbirth

Answer 3

D

Question 4

Which of the following describes an approach to health from complementary and alternative medicine?

A)Disease is defined according to a particular part of the body
B)Therapy needs to destroy or suppress disease
C)Health is the balance of opposing forces within the body
D)Health is the absence of disease

Question 5

Which sociologist(s)argued that contemporary attitudes to obesity and overweight are akin to a moral panic?

A)Porwal & Verma (2013)
B)Ball and Crawford (2000)
C)Gilman (2008)
D)Laws and Sullivan (2005)

Question 6

Make a list of short sentences that provide at least five examples of social reforms that were crucial to the increased life expectancy of the Australian population in the past 100 years.

Question 7

Foucault argues that medicine has replaced religion,in particular,as a source of ideas about the management of bodies.Explain what this means and use examples from popular culture to support your explanation.

Question 8

Using Foucault's notion of the clinical gaze,show the ways that the medical profession constructs a discourse of normalcy (health)versus deviance (illness).

Question 9

Which of the following describes the health of the Australian population today rather than 100 years ago?

A)A lack of antiseptics,analgesics and antibiotics means people's everyday lives are dangerous
B)Physical labour is the norm and injuries and accidents are common
C)People suffer from an epidemic of chronic conditions such as diabetes and hypertension
D)Everyday life in Australia is dangerous and filled with continuous pain for most

Question 10

In less than 500 words,explain the four features of biomedicine.

Question 11

Which argument did Coulter and Willis (2004)put forward to suggest the reason that complementary and alternative health therapies have become so popular?

A)It is a result of the growth of individualism and the interest in health promotion
B)The interest is linked to the rise of the Internet which means that more information about health is available
C)It is a consequence of the heightened interest in environmentalism and the desire to treat the body as naturally as possible
D)Some people do not have health insurance and this offers them an alternative

Question 12

What is the Australian Bureau of Statistics' Socio-economic Index for Areas (SEIFA)?

A)A statistical measure of health
B)A statistical measure that indicates obesity
C)A statistical measure of medical intervention
D)A statistical measure that indicates social position

Question 13

Sociological analysis of biomedicine argues which of the following?

A)The development of the biomedical system was purely accidental
B)Rational scientific beliefs have overcome the existence of myths about health in contemporary societies
C)Western medicine believes good health is achieved through the balancing of intimately linked systems
D)Biomedicine sees illnesses as observable and measurable according to data collected about the body

Question 14

Which of the following population groups born between 2005 and 2007 has the lowest life expectancy?

A)Indigenous males
B)non-Indigenous females
C)non-Indigenous males
D)Indigenous females

Question 15

Which of the following is NOT a reason for the link between obesity and class?

A)The poor are concerned about the cost of food
B)The poor do not understand health
C)The poor pay less attention to health authorities
D)The poor eat more traditional food

Question 16

Which of the following is not correlated to improvements in life expectancy in the Australian population?

A)Reliable food sources
B)Sanitation systems
C)Vaccination
D)Makeover shows

Question 17

What percentage of the population does the World Health Organization maintain needs immunisation to prevent a measles outbreak?

A)100 per cent
B)93-95 per cent
C)40 per cent
D)88-92 per cent

Question 18

Which of the following shows the life expectancy of females born in Australia in 1910 and 2010?

A)62 and 78
B)59 and 83
C)44 and 86
D)65 and 75

Question 19

The statistical measures provided by epidemiological research of health across the population help to establish:

A)The big picture
B)The norm
C)The problem
D)The solution

Question 20

Michel Foucault theorises that:

A)Religion is responsible for shaping medical ideas about the management of bodies
B)Institutional power is the key element shaping medical discourse
C)Disorders such as menopause and obesity are medical problems that need to be solved
D)Medicalisation is a useful process for improving a population's health

Question 21

Which of the following best describes victim blaming as defined by Germov (2002)?

A)The process by which social inequality is explained in terms of individuals being solely responsible for what happens to them
B)The process by which doctors claim that other doctors have been responsible for prior incorrect diagnosis that leads to later medical problems
C)The process by which the health insurance industry refuses to make payments to those with avoidable health problems
D)The process by which nurses and other allied health professionals consider that their roles have been diminished by the authority of doctors

Question 22

Research shows that inequitable distribution of power,money and resources has no direct affect on health.

Question 23

Which of the following is an economic rationale for the patient being responsible for paying part of the medical fee?

A)Making patients pay part of the fee reduces administration of large sums of money from federal to state level,thus making the bureaucratic system more efficient
B)Making patients pay part of the cost reduces demand for the service,so the cost to the state is also decreased
C)Patients traditionally have paid professionals directly,and continuing to do so maintains a relationship with their doctor
D)The fee paid by the patient goes directly to running costs of the medical practice and the money is immediately available for the practice to spend

Question 24

Briefly list the incentives that have been offered by health insurance companies or the government to encourage people to take out private medical insurance.What are the reasons that individuals might not take out private medical insurance?

Question 25

Environmental risks and lifestyle factors are implicated in individual's health prospects across the life-course.In view of these factors,draw on previous sociological research to suggest three ways to improve individual health outcomes,with reference to particular demographic groups if applicable.