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Original article| Volume 22, ISSUE 1, e91-e98, January 2012

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Can We Capture the Intersections? Older Black Women, Education, and Health

Published:October 10, 2011DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.whi.2011.08.002

      Abstract

      Background

      Race/ethnicity, gender, and socioeconomic status are the three most prominent factors to predict health outcomes. Despite the fact that persistent health inequalities are found between groups, we know little about how the interrelatedness of these social positions influences the health of older adults.

      Purpose

      In this study, we apply a feminist intersectional approach to the study of health inequalities, treating social variables as multiplicative rather than additive to capture the mutually constitutive dimensions of race/ethnicity, gender, and education.

      Methods

      This paper makes use of data from the National Social Life, Health and Aging Project, a nationally representative sample of 3,005 community-dwelling U.S. adults aged 57 to 85 years old, to explore intersections of race, gender, and education. We use a combination of stratified analysis with an interaction term to test multiplicative effects.

      Results

      First, our findings confirm that Black women with less than a high school education have the poorest self-rated health. Second, at the bivariate level, we find highly educated White men are not the converse of lower educated Black women. Third, at the multivariate level, we find being Black and female has an effect on health beyond those already accounted for by race and gender.

      Conclusion

      This research demonstrates the explanatory power of an intersectionality approach to deepen understanding of the overlapping, simultaneous production of health inequalities by race, class, and gender.
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      Biography

      Susan W. Hinze, PhD, is Associate Professor of Sociology and Director of Women's and Gender Studies at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH. Her research interests include the influence of patient race/ethnicity, social class and gender on physician decision-making, and the gendered career and family paths of physicians.

      Biography

      Jielu Lin, MS, is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Sociology at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH. Her main area of interest is age and the life course, with a focus on how cumulative dis/advantage processes shape the pattern of individual health trajectories.

      Biography

      Tanetta Andersson, MA, is a doctoral candidate and instructor in the Department of Sociology at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH. Her research interests are rooted in the nexus between race, class, and gender statuses, inequality, and life chances (education and health).