Origins of heath inequalities: The case for allostatic load

Citation

Robertson T (2016) Origins of heath inequalities: The case for allostatic load. Commentary on: Delpierre C, Barboza-Solis C, Torrisani J, Darnaudery M, Bartley M, Blane D, Kelly-Irving M (2016) Allostatic load as a measure of social embodiment: conceptual and empirical considerations. Longitudinal and Life Course Studies, 7 (1), pp. 80-85.. Longitudinal and Life Course Studies, 7 (1), pp. 92-96. http://www.llcsjournal.org/index.php/llcs/issue/view/34; https://doi.org/10.14301/llcs.v7i1.325

Keywords
allostatic load; health; measurement; life course; embodiment; biomarkers

Notes
In an opening paper Cyrille Delpierre, Cristina Barbosa-Solis, Jerome Torrisani, Muriel Darnaudery, Melanie Bartley, David Blane and Michelle Kelly-Irving explore the concept of Allostatic Load as a way of examining health inequalities. The impact of the environment on our biological systems is summarised by the concept of embodiment. The biological embedding of social conditions could therefore be a relevant mechanism to partly explain the social gradient in health. A key issue is how to measure the ‘physiological reality’, the biological expression of embodiment at individual and population levels. Allostatic load (AL) has been proposed as a measure of the overall cost of adapting to the environment, and may be a relevant tool or concept for measuring the way we have embodied our environment. The points they raise are then debated in commentaries by Linn Getz and Margret Olafia Tomasdottir, Tony Robertson and Per Gustafson. These commentaries are followed by a response from the authors of the opening paper. Output Type: Commentary

Journal
Longitudinal and Life Course Studies: Volume 7, Issue 1