Ch 4 quiz - Lecture notes 4 PDF

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Study guide for Quiz 4, covering Lecture 4 and Chapter 4 of the textbook Social Problems by Joel Best. SOC 1020 is taught by Professor Lijun Song....

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Chapter 4: Experts as Claimsmakers (& Zola) - Experts - Medicalization - Role of science - Evidence, interests, advocacy - Officials as claimsmakers - Expert claimsmakers in the social problems process Case studies - Expertise and opioids (p, 129-132 in Best) - Body imperfection, getting fat, PMS (Silver ch. 3, 6, 13) Whom do we consider to be experts? What role can they play in claimsmaking? Example: Anthony Fauci → chief medical advisor to the president Experts as claimsmakers - Individuals who are believed to have specialized/authoritative knowledge about a particular subject, such that others defer to them about this topic or closely related topics - Some are insider claimsmakers Religious frame: deadly sins - Lust, gluttony, anger, sloth Medicalization: process of defining and treating non-medical troubling conditions as medical problems, usually in terms of illnesses or disorders - Examples: binge drinking → drunkards vs. alcoholics - Academic performance: intelligence/laziness vs. learning disability & ADHD Medical Frame: medicalizing produces a familiar frame → medical model for thinking about issues - In recent century, many social issues have changed from being thought of under a religious frame to being thought of under a medical frame - Box 4.1 decriminalizing disease → HIV: medical, criminal, moral, religious frames Religious frame → medical frame - Lust → sexual addiction - Gluttony → food addiction/compulsive eating - Anger → anger management problems - Sloth → chronic fatigue syndrome Medicalizing opposition by using label ‘phobia’ - Phobia: irrational fear - Psychiatrists - New labels - Function: discredit position of opponents

Zola: Medicine as an Institution of Social Control (1972) Historical Background Public Health Psychiatry: Witch trial (1450s-1770s) - Box 4.1: Criminalizing Disease Mechanisms - Relevance of daily life to medicine - Absolute control through technical procedures - Exclusive license to examine and treat bodies and minds - Ex: aging, pregnancy, drug addiction, alcoholism - Expansion of medicine into life practice - The most powerful of all ‘the medicalizing of society’ process - The use of medical rhetoric and evidence in the arguments to advance any cause Control in the name of health? - New York City soda ban - Tobacco-free campuses Growing medicalization & medical authority: professional standards, quality of care, advances in medical science Expansion of medical authority into a broader domain of social problems - Psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, licensed clinical social workers, professional “ex” (recovered drug users, etc) - DSM-5: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Often medicalization consists of only adopting a medical vocab - Ex: alcoholism → program of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) Ownership - Benefits - Pediatric radiologists and child abuse - Box 4.2: it isn’t just medicalization → economilization - Defend and expand domain of ownership - Pediatrics De-/Re-medicalization (Conrad 2007) Masturbation - Medicalized in late 19th century - Demedicalized since 1960s → Kinsey/sexologists Homosexuality - 1860s criminalization - 1880s medicalization - 1950s DSM I/II - Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders

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1970s Demedicalization - Social movements “healthy homosexual” 1993 Science “gay genes” → remedicalization?

Why should medicalization concern us? - Individuals given medical diagnoses are perceived as less responsible for their actions - Medical model frame cedes ownership of these problems to medical experts and organizations - Constructs troubling conditions as individual troubles and overlooks social patterns in the larger society...