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Title: One Trend Fits All?: Combining Multiple-Hierarchy Stratification and Life Course Perspectives to Understand BMI Trajectories
Resulting in 1 citation.
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Hargrove, Taylor |
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One Trend Fits All?: Combining Multiple-Hierarchy Stratification and Life Course Perspectives to Understand BMI Trajectories Presented: Seattle WA, American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 2016 Cohort(s): NLSY97 Publisher: American Sociological Association Keyword(s): Body Mass Index (BMI); Ethnic Differences; Life Course; Racial Differences; Transition, Adulthood Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher. Prior research on health disparities has typically employed unidimensional or additive approaches to understanding the social stratification of health. These approaches assume that social statuses are autonomous structures of inequality that have independent effects on life chances. This assumption, however, overlooks the unique and simultaneous positions of power and disadvantage within which individuals are situated, and potentially leads to inaccurate conclusions regarding the nature of health inequality. This study combines multiple-hierarchy stratification and life course perspectives to evaluate how race/ethnicity, gender, and SES intersect to shape BMI trajectories between adolescence and young adulthood. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY) 1997 cohort and growth curve models, this paper examines the extent to which racial/ethnic inequalities in BMI are gendered and/or classed, and whether the intersectional effects of race/ethnicity, gender, and SES result in widening, narrowing, or persistent gaps across age among whites, blacks, and Hispanics. Results suggest that racial/ethnic inequality in BMI is greatest among women, with black women experiencing the highest BMI, and greatest increases in BMI with age. Additionally, findings indicate that socioeconomic resources are less protective for blacks and Hispanics compared to their white counterparts. Overall, these results are broadly consistent with intersectionality and cumulative disadvantage hypotheses. Examining trends in BMI during key stages of the life course (e.g. adolescence, the transition to adulthood, early adulthood) sheds light on the particular life stages during which inequalities in BMI emerge, peak, and possibly begin to wane, thereby helping to identity relevant points of intervention. |
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Bibliography Citation
Hargrove, Taylor. "One Trend Fits All?: Combining Multiple-Hierarchy Stratification and Life Course Perspectives to Understand BMI Trajectories." Presented: Seattle WA, American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 2016. |