Chinese, Mandarin

Spanish

English

Hindi

Arabic

Portuguese

Bengali

Russian

Japanese

Punjabi

German

Javanese

Malay

Telugu

Vietnamese

Korean

French

Marathi

Tamil

Urdu

Turkish

Italian

Chinese, Yue / Cantonese

Thai

Gujarati

Chinese, Jin

Chinese, Min Nan

Persian, Dari

Persian, Western

Polish

Pashto

Kannada

Chinese, Xiang

Malayalam

Sundanese

Hausa

Odia

Burmese

Chinese, Hakka

Ukrainian

Bihari, Bhojpuri

Tagalog

Yoruba

Bihari, Maithili

Uzbek

Sindhi

Amharic

Fula

Romanian

Oromo

Igbo

Azerbaijani

Chinese, Gan

Dutch

Kurdish, Central

Kurdish, Northern

Kurdish, Southern

Malagasy

Lahnda, Saraiki

Nepali

Sinhalese

Chittagonian

Zhuang

Khmer

Turkmen

Assamese

Madurese

Somali

Marwari

Bihari, Magahi

Haryanvi

Hungarian

Chhattisgarhi

Greek, Modern

Chewa

Dakhini

Akan, Twi

Akan, Fante

Kazakh

Chinese, Min Bei

Sylheti

Zulu

Czech

Kinyarwanda

Marwari, Dhundhari

Haitian Creole

Chinese, Min Dong

Ilocano

Quechua

Kirundi

Swedish

Hmong

Shona

Uyghur

Hiligaynon

Mossi

Xhosa

Belarusian

Balochi

Sociology

<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Women are affected adversely both by unequal access to and institutionalized sexism in the healthcare industry. According to a recent report from the Kaiser Family Foundation, women experienced a decline in their ability to see needed specialists between 2001 and 2008. In 2008, one quarter of women questioned the quality of their healthcare (Ranji and Salganico 2011). Quality is partially indicated by access and cost. In 2018, roughly one in four (26%) women—compared to one in five (19%) men—reported delaying healthcare or letting conditions go untreated due to cost. Because of costs, approximately one in five women postponed preventive care, skipped a recommended test or treatment, or reduced their use of medication due to cost (Kaiser Family Foundation 2018).
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	We can see an example of institutionalized sexism in the way that women are more likely than men to be diagnosed with certain kinds of mental disorders. Psychologist Dana Becker notes that 75 percent of all diagnoses of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) are for women according to the <OpenstaxEm>Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders</OpenstaxEm>. This diagnosis is characterized by instability of identity, of mood, and of behavior, and Becker argues that it has been used as a catch-all diagnosis for too many women. She further decries the pejorative connotation of the diagnosis, saying that it predisposes many people, both within and outside of the profession of psychotherapy, against women who have been so diagnosed (Becker).
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxParagraph>
	Many critics also point to the medicalization of women’s issues as an example of institutionalized sexism. <OpenstaxTerm>Medicalization</OpenstaxTerm> refers to the process by which previously normal aspects of life are redefined as deviant and needing medical attention to remedy. Historically and contemporaneously, many aspects of women’s lives have been medicalized, including menstruation, premenstrual syndrome, pregnancy, childbirth, and menopause. The medicalization of pregnancy and childbirth has been particularly contentious in recent decades, with many women opting against the medical process and choosing a more natural childbirth. Fox and Worts (1999) find that all women experience pain and anxiety during the birth process, but that social support relieves both as effectively as medical support. In other words, medical interventions are no more effective than social ones at helping with the difficulties of pain and childbirth. Fox and Worts further found that women with supportive partners ended up with less medical intervention and fewer cases of postpartum depression. Of course, access to quality birth care outside the standard medical models may not be readily available to women of all social classes.
</OpenstaxParagraph>
<OpenstaxNote>
	<OpenstaxNoteTitle> Sociology in the Real World </OpenstaxNoteTitle> <OpenstaxH3> Medicalization of Sleeplessness </OpenstaxH3><OpenstaxFigure id="import-auto-id1306346" src="https://openstax.org/apps/archive/20240226.174525/resources/c3b6c2bd8be76d6271d28ab670e2dd84fb02490d" alt="A child asleep at his desk is shown here." mediaType="image/jpg" width="1000" height="750" />
	<OpenstaxFigureText width="1000">
		<strong>Figure 19.4</strong> Many people fail to get enough sleep. But is insomnia a disease that should be cured with medication? (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)
	</OpenstaxFigureText>
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		How is your “sleep hygiene?” Sleep hygiene refers to the lifestyle and sleep habits that contribute to sleeplessness. Bad habits that can lead to sleeplessness include inconsistent bedtimes, lack of exercise, late-night employment, napping during the day, and sleep environments that include noise, lights, or screen time (National Institutes of Health 2011a).
	</OpenstaxParagraph>
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		According to the National Institute of Health, examining sleep hygiene is the first step in trying to solve a problem with sleeplessness.
	</OpenstaxParagraph>
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		For many people in the United States, however, making changes in sleep hygiene does not seem to be enough. According to a 2006 report from the Institute of Medicine, sleeplessness is an underrecognized public health problem affecting up to 70 million people. It is interesting to note that in the months (or years) after this report was released, advertising by the pharmaceutical companies behind Ambien, Lunesta, and Sepracor (three sleep aids) averaged $188 million weekly promoting these drugs (Gellene 2009).
	</OpenstaxParagraph>
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		According to a study in the <OpenstaxEm>American Journal of Public Health</OpenstaxEm> (2011), prescriptions for sleep medications increased dramatically from 1993 to 2007. While complaints of sleeplessness during doctor’s office visits more than doubled during this time, insomnia diagnoses increased more than sevenfold, from about 840,000 to 6.1 million. The authors of the study conclude that sleeplessness has been medicalized as insomnia, and that “insomnia may be a public health concern, but potential overtreatment with marginally effective, expensive medications with nontrivial side effects raises definite population health concerns” (Moloney, Konrad, and Zimmer 2011). Indeed, a study published in 2004 in the <OpenstaxEm>Archives of Internal Medicine</OpenstaxEm> shows that cognitive behavioral therapy, not medication, was the most effective sleep intervention (Jacobs, Pace-Schott, Stickgold, and Otto 2004).
	</OpenstaxParagraph>
	<OpenstaxParagraph>
		A century ago, people who couldn’t sleep were told to count sheep. Now they pop a pill, and all those pills add up to a very lucrative market for the pharmaceutical industry. Is this industry behind the medicalization of sleeplessness, or is it just responding to a need?
	</OpenstaxParagraph>
</OpenstaxNote>

19.3.3 Health by Gender

1 An Introduction to Sociology

1.1 What Is Sociology?

1.1.1 What Are Society and Culture?

1.1.2 Studying Patterns: How Sociologists View Society

1.1.3 Studying Part and Whole: How Sociologists View Social Structures

1.2 The History of Sociology

1.2.1 Creating a Discipline: European Theorists

1.2.2 Applying the Discipline: American Theorists and Practitioners

1.3 Theoretical Perspectives in Sociology

1.3.1 Functionalism

1.3.2 Conflict Theory

1.3.3 Symbolic Interactionist Theory

1.3.4 Sociological Theory Today

1.4 Why Study Sociology?

1.4.1 Sociology and a Better Society

1.4.2 Sociology in the Workplace

2 Sociological Research

2.1 Approaches to Sociological Research

2.1.1 The Scientific Method

2.1.2 Interpretive Framework

2.1.3 Critical Sociology

2.2 Research Methods

2.2.1 Surveys

2.2.2 Field Research

2.2.3 Experiments

2.2.4 Secondary Data Analysis

2.3 Ethical Concerns

3 Culture

3.1 What Is Culture?

3.1.1 Cultural Universals

3.1.2 Ethnocentrism and Cultural Relativism

3.2 Elements of Culture

3.2.1 Values and Beliefs

3.2.2 Norms

3.2.3 Symbols and Culture

3.2.4 Language and Symbols

3.2.5 Language and Culture

3.3 High, Low, Pop, Sub, Counter-culture and Cultural Change

3.3.1 High, Low, and Popular Culture

3.3.2 Subculture and Counterculture

3.3.3 Cultural Change

3.4 Theoretical Perspectives on Culture

4 Society and Social Interaction

4.1 Types of Societies

4.1.1 Preindustrial Societies

4.1.2 Industrial Society

4.1.3 Postindustrial Society

4.2 Theoretical Perspectives on Society

4.2.1 Émile Durkheim and Functionalism

4.2.2 Karl Marx and Conflict Theory

4.2.3 Max Weber and Symbolic Interactionism

4.3 Social Constructions of Reality

4.3.1 Roles and Status

4.3.2 Presentation of Self

5 Socialization

5.1 Theories of Self-Development

5.1.1 Psychological Perspectives on Self-Development

5.1.2 Sociological Theories of Self-Development

5.2 Why Socialization Matters

5.2.1 Nature versus Nurture

5.3 Agents of Socialization

5.3.1 Social Group Agents

5.3.2 Institutional Agents

5.4 Socialization Across the Life Course

5.4.1 Resocialization

6 Groups and Organization

6.1 Types of Groups

6.1.1 Defining a Group

6.1.2 Types of Groups

6.1.3 In-Groups and Out-Groups

6.1.4 Reference Groups

6.2 Group Size and Structure

6.2.1 Dyads, Triads, and Large Groups

6.2.2 Group Leadership

6.2.3 Conformity

6.2.4 The Bystander Effect and Diffusion of Responsibility

6.3 Formal Organizations

6.3.1 Types of Formal Organizations

6.3.2 The McDonaldization of Society

7 Deviance, Crime, and Social Control

7.1 Deviance and Control

7.1.1 Deviance, Crime, and Society

7.1.2 Social Control

7.2 Theoretical Perspectives on Deviance and Crime

7.2.1 Functionalism

7.2.2 Conflict Theory

7.2.3 Symbolic Interactionism

7.3 Crime and the Law

7.3.1 Types of Crimes

7.3.2 Crime Statistics

7.3.3 Public Perception of Crime

7.3.4 The U.S. Criminal Justice System

8 Media and Technology

8.1 Technology Today

8.1.1 What Is Technology?

8.2 Media and Technology in Society

8.2.1 Categorizing Technology

8.2.2 Types of Media and Technology

8.2.3 Product Advertising and the Attention Economy