Race, Socioeconomic Status, and Health: The Significance of Social Class Discrimination

• In Event: 343 - Section on Medical Sociology Roundtables (one-hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 22. Race, Ethnicity, and Health

Abstract

Recent research has questioned whether the commonly-cited negative association between SES
and health is consistent across racial groups, with some finding that higher SES fails to predict better health among blacks. The purpose of the present study is to examine the health
significance of social class discrimination (SCD) to further understand how SCD may contribute to racial differences in the SES-health relationship. Using data from the Nashville Stress and Health Study (N=1,197), I investigate group differences in a composite measure of physical and mental health. Findings indicate that higher SES predicts lower risk for poor health among whites but not blacks. The experience of SCD negatively impacts health, mediating the SES health association among whites and moderating the association among blacks. These results suggest that SCD is an important factor in the SES-health relationship and that health consequences of SES and SCD vary substantially across racial groups.

Author

• Courtney Sinclair Thomas, Vanderbilt University