The Social Causes of Health and Disease

This masterful guide to the social determinants of health has become a go-to text for understanding the role that social factors play in the experience of health and many diseases. In this updated edition, preeminent medical sociologist William C. Cockerham offers the most compelling case yet that stress, poverty, unhealthy lifestyles, and adverse living and working conditions can all be directly associated with illness.

Looking beyond individual explanations for health and disease, Cocker...