Social Relationships and Health: A Flashpoint for Health Policy
Top Cited Papers
Open Access
- 1 March 2010
- journal article
- review article
- Published by SAGE Publications in Journal of Health and Social Behavior
- Vol. 51 (1_suppl), S54-S66
- https://doi.org/10.1177/0022146510383501
Abstract
Social relationships—both quantity and quality—affect mental health, health behavior, physical health, and mortality risk. Sociologists have played a central role in establishing the link between social relationships and health outcomes, identifying explanations for this link, and discovering social variation (e.g., by gender and race) at the population level. Studies show that social relationships have short- and long-term effects on health, for better and for worse, and that these effects emerge in childhood and cascade throughout life to foster cumulative advantage or disadvantage in health. This article describes key research themes in the study of social relationships and health, and it highlights policy implications suggested by this research.Keywords
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