Aberg Yngwe Monica, Fritzell Johan, Lundberg Olle, Diderichsen Finn, Burström Bo
Centre for Health Equity Studies, Stockholm University, Karolinska Institutet, 10691 Stockholm, Sweden.
Soc Sci Med. 2003 Oct;57(8):1463-73. doi: 10.1016/s0277-9536(02)00541-5.
During the last decade there has been a growing interest in the relation between income and health. The discussion has mostly focused on the individual's relative standing in the income distribution with the implicit understanding that the absolute level of income is not as relevant when the individual's basic needs are fulfilled. This study hypothesises relative deprivation to be a mechanism in the relation between income and health in Sweden: being relatively deprived in comparison to a reference group causes a stressful situation, which might affect self-rated health. Reference groups were formed by combining indicators of social class, age and living region, resulting in 40 reference groups. Within each of these groups a mean income level was calculated and individuals with an income below 70% of the mean income level in the reference group were considered as being relatively deprived. The results showed that more women than men were relatively deprived, but the effect of relative deprivation on self-rated health was more pronounced among men than among women. In order to estimate the importance of the effect of relative income versus the effect of absolute income, some analyses on the effect of relative deprivation on self-rated health were also carried out within different absolute income levels. When restricting the analysis to the lowest 40% of the income span the effect of relative deprivation almost disappeared. Relative deprivation may have a significant relation to health among men. However, for the 40% with the lowest income in the population the effect of relative deprivation on health is considerably reduced, possibly due to the more prominent relation between low absolute income and poor health.
在过去十年中，人们对收入与健康之间的关系越来越感兴趣。讨论大多集中在个人在收入分配中的相对地位，隐含的理解是，当个人的基本需求得到满足时，收入的绝对水平就不那么重要了。本研究假设相对剥夺是瑞典收入与健康关系中的一种机制：与参照群体相比处于相对剥夺状态会导致压力情境，这可能会影响自评健康。通过结合社会阶层、年龄和居住地区的指标形成参照群体，共产生40个参照群体。在每个群体中计算平均收入水平，收入低于参照群体平均收入水平70%的个体被视为相对剥夺。结果表明，相对剥夺的女性比男性多，但相对剥夺对自评健康的影响在男性中比在女性中更明显。为了估计相对收入效应与绝对收入效应的重要性，还在不同的绝对收入水平内对相对剥夺对自评健康的影响进行了一些分析。当将分析限制在收入范围最低的40%时，相对剥夺的影响几乎消失。相对剥夺可能与男性的健康有显著关系。然而，对于人口中收入最低的40%来说，相对剥夺对健康的影响大大降低，这可能是由于低绝对收入与健康不佳之间的关系更为突出。
