socialclassissues - Tumblr blog

[socialclassissues]

Conclusion (5/5)

My 4 previous blog posts have given a sliver of the unfortunate inequality that exists between social classes. What is even more unfortunate is that this all falls into a horrible chain reaction. Coming from a family with a low SES, don’t always get the opportunities that other children get. For example, they often don’t get to participate in sports or physical activities the same way that other children do, if at all.  The hardship doesn’t end there, it has barely started. In addition to not being able to play sports and getting to participate in physical activities like children need to, coming from a low social class family can make it hard to succeed in school and can prevent students from getting a degree. Sometimes there is even a struggle to obtain a high school diploma. Without higher education, finding a job becomes increasingly difficult. Without a job, (or a well-paying job), providing for a family then becomes hard and puts you and your own family in the lower class, which will result in your children having the same hardships that you had growing up because you came from a low class family. This cycle seems to be on a never-ending loop. One can only hope that a solution for this social class inequality is soon found and this vicious cycle is broken.

[224]

[socialclassissues]

Social Class and Education (4/5)

It should come to no surprise at this point that just like sports and health, social class has its effect on education too. This effect takes place both as a cause and effect of low socioeconomic status. What I mean by that is by coming from a low-class home, it may be harder to succeed in school and will make it less likely to earn a higher education degree. That serves as the effect part of the equation. The cause part of the equation is that without a degree, it becomes hard to get a job which makes it nearly impossible to escape the low SES life. Nathan Berger and Jennifer Archer (2016) did a study where they “surveyed the academic and social achievement goal orientations of 16–17 year old students (n = 130) attending two schools with markedly different socioeconomic profiles” (Berger & Archer, 2016, p 175). They noticed that there was tons of research being done on the influence of race and gender of academic achievement, but not much being done on the influence of SES (Berger & Archer, 2016). Their findings showed that, “high SES students reported higher scores on all scales than low SES students” (Berger & Archer, 2016, p 187). In addition, they interestingly discovered that, “students who did not intend to complete senior school, but were legally compelled to remain in school, had significantly lower academic achievement goals. Furthermore, these students were more oriented towards performance goals than mastery goals” (Berger & Archer, 2016, p 188). So essentially, not only does social class effect a person’s academic achievement, but it also influences one’s motivation and attitude towards school. I personally love how they end their entire article by saying, “explaining the multiplicity of factors that affect differential life outcomes should help to produce more equitable outcomes for people from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds” (Berger & Archer, 2016, p 190). It is so important for these inequality issues to be discussed and shared, because without knowing about the issue, a solution will never be discovered.

Berger, N., & Archer, J. (2016). School socio-economic status and student socio-academic achievement goals in upper secondary contexts. Social Psychology of Education, 19(1), 175–194. https://doi-org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1007/s11218-015-9324-8

[340]

[socialclassissues]

Social Class and Health (3/5)

Let’s discuss the impact that social class has on healthcare. A group of researchers, (Hoffmann et al., 2019, ) used interview data that was collected by Sharelife, in which “contains information on health and SES at the time of the interview, and detailed retrospective information on events and changes in health and SES” (Hoffmann et al., 2019, p1347). These three researched had 3 goals in mind while they were interpreting the data, “we study ( 1) whether social causation or health selection is more important for overall health inequalities, ( 2) whether this differs between stages of the life course, and ( 3) between measures of SES” (Hoffmann et al., 2019 p 1341). The section that is most relevant to the impact of social class is the third section, whether or not there is a difference in health inequalities based on measures of SES (social economic status).  “For the mere relation between health and SES, differences between dimensions of SES have been found in earlier research (e.g. Elgar et al. 2016). Warren (2009) has looked at social causation versus health selection, testing different health measures” (Hoffmann et al., 2019, p 1344). In other words, previous findings prove that there is definite relationship between SES and health. Hoffmann (et al., 2019)  “add[s] to this literature by comparing material factors and occupation as two dimensions of SES, and a latent variable for SES, to see how this affects the results for causation versus selection, which has not been done before” ( Hoffmann et al., 2019, p 1344).  Their results proved that there is still an impact on health based on SES and that, “material wealth shows two slight deviations from the overall pattern, which is a confirmation of previous findings and our assumption that income reacts more to health than occupational position. However, the size of these differences between measures is small” (Hoffmann et al., 2019, p 1360). This study is valuable because it shows that previous research proves that there was an issue with SES’s impact on health, and current research, such as this one, proves that the unfortunate relationship still exists.

Hoffmann, R., Kröger, H., & Geyer, S. (2019). Social Causation Versus Health Selection in the Life Course: Does Their Relative Importance Differ by Dimension of SES? Social Indicators Research, 141(3), 1341–1367. https://doi-org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1007/s11205-018-1871-x

[351]

[socialclassissues]

Social Class and Sports (2/5)

In my intro post, I mentioned that social class influences most areas of life. Sports is one of those areas that are influenced. A study done by Philip White and William McTeer (2012) took a look at the potential relationship that socioeconomic statuses might have with participation in sports and physical activities of children of different age groups in Canada. “Social scientists are mindful that opportunities for involvement are not distributed equally across the population. Socioeconomic status (SES), for example, has a profound influence on sport and physical activity” (White & McTeer, 2012, p.187). In this paper, an experiment was conducted using a survey that was able to give insight into how much time children spend participating in physical activities and sports. This survey was sent to different age groups and different families of different socioeconomic statuses. The survey questions varied depending on the age group because the age group was an additional independent variable in the experiment. The results of this study found that the socioeconomic status of families had a large effect on younger children and their time spent in physical activities. In contrast, it seems that socioeconomic status had less of an effect on older children. White and McTeer (2012) offer multiple interpretations of their findings, but to summarize what they say, there is a definite impact and relationship between a family’s socioeconomic status and their children’s amount of participation in sports and physical activity. Their results prove that the relationship is “more complex than what once was thought” (White & McTeer, 2012, p. 205). It is upsetting that children must suffer from social class and socioeconomic status too. Most people just assume that being able to play sports is expected, but its not, its more of a privilege that people realize. Unfortunately, social class does have an influence on children’s participation in sports.

White, P., & McTeer, W. (2012). Socioeconomic Status and Sport Participation at Different Developmental Stages During Childhood and Youth: Multivariate Analyses Using Canadian National Survey Data. Sociology of Sport Journal, 29(2), 186–209. https://doi-org.ezproxy.hacc.edu/10.1123/ssj.29.2.186

[307]

[socialclassissues]

Introduction (1/5)

What does social class refer to? In the textbook, You May Ask Yourself, Dalton Conley wrote that “[Karl] Marx believed that it was primarily the conflicts between classes that drove social change throughout history” (Conley, 2021, p.25). The differences in social classes contain many concerning issues that result in inequality. But how is social class measured in order to be able to say who belongs to what class? “Sociologists often use the phrase socioeconomic status to describe an individual’s position in a stratified social order. When sociologists talk about socioeconomic status, they are referring to any measure that attempts to classify groups, individuals, families, or households in terms of indicators such as occupation, income, wealth, and education” (Conley 2021, p.280). In other words, social class is ‘measured’ and divided in accordance to socioeconomic status. Social class influences many areas of life, such as criminal justice, the work force, and even the media. These influences can be good for some people, but harmful for others. It is completely devastating to understand that people suffer just because of the hand they were delt in life. Therefore, there needs to be more awareness of the inequality that is a result of social class. In this blog, by elaborating on how social class intersects with sports, healthcare, and education, there will be more people in the world who have more of an awareness of some the inequality in the world.

Conley, D. (2021). You may ask yourself: An introduction to thinking like a sociologist. W.W. Norton.

[238]