Sociology for Nurses

Elaine Denny, Sarah Earle, Alistair Hewison, Elaine Denny, Sarah Earle, Alistair Hewison

• Publisher: Polity
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781509505449
• Edition: 3
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Nursing

Sociology for Nurses has become a leading textbook and an invaluable companion for students wishing to get to grips with how sociology can positively transform professional nursing practice. This thoroughly revised new edition maintains its commitment to providing jargon-free explanations of sociological theories and evidence to show how studying sociology can be useful in all branches of nursing. Readers will develop a clear understanding of what sociology is and why it is essential to practice, gain deeper awareness of social issues such as gender, ethnicity, class and the life course, and become more familiar with the social contexts of health policy and nursing as a profession. With updates in every chapter, the third edition includes a new chapter on research methods, a reorganized collection of chapters on health policy, extended coverage of long-term illness and disability, as well as contemporary case studies on topical healthcare issues such as dementia, the 'obesity epidemic' and recent attempts to integrate health and social care. In addition, the book provides clearly defined learning aims, a useful glossary of sociological concepts, structured activities and questions for discussion, and annotated suggestions for further reading. The editors and contributing authors to the book have a wealth of experience teaching sociology to nurses at diploma and degree pre-registration and post-registration levels. Their book will continue to spark interest and debate among all student nurses, particularly those approaching sociology for the first time. Please visit the accompanying website at: http://www.politybooks.com/sociologyfornurses.

Part I
Nursing and the Sociology of Health and Health Care

Sociology is exciting and can transform the way you think about the world, but is not always easy to understand – even for sociology students – and its relevance to nursing, and nurses, is not readily apparent. There is considerable controversy regarding whether nurses should study sociology and we have attempted to reflect this within Part I of this book. Some commentators have suggested that sociology should not be included in the nursing curriculum, arguing that it can add no value to nurse education and training. Others have suggested that sociology is vital to nurse education and to the future of nursing as a profession!

Student nurses often ask: ‘Why do we have to do sociology?’ It is as a response to this question that we have written this book and, more specifically, chosen to include the chapters in this section. Each of these chapters examines key concepts and debates in relation to nursing, and the sociology of health and health care.

The first chapter, ‘What is Sociology?’, introduces you to key sociological approaches, concepts and theories. With this in mind, some of you may find it useful to start with this chapter, whereas others of you may wish to come back to it after reading the later chapters within this section. This first chapter begins by outlining the distinction between sociological knowledge and other forms of knowledge, and considers the role of sociology within society. Sociology is often criticized as just ‘common sense’ and this chapter addresses this distinction. The chapter then moves on to examine the distinction between social ‘structure’ and social ‘action’, outlining key sociological theories and their relevance to our understanding of health and health care. The chapter concludes by encouraging you to think about how sociologists might theorize mental health.

The second chapter specifically addresses the question of ‘Why Should Nurses Study Sociology?’, and explores the role of sociological knowledge within nursing practice. Following on from the discussion begun in Chapter 1, this chapter examines how, far from being just ‘common sense’, sociology can help to develop a range of thinking skills which are vital to contemporary nursing. This chapter highlights the problem of the ‘theory–practice gap’ and focuses on the sociology of nursing as well as the role of sociology in nursing. By drawing on a variety of empirical studies, this chapter explores the value of sociological knowledge to nurses. The chapter also explores the importance of sociological research methods as both a tool for carrying out research and as a resource for evaluating published research. At the end of the chapter there is a special focus on why sociology is relevant to experiences of diabetes.

Nurses are involved in caring for people who are ill or dying, as well as promoting health and well-being. Whichever is the case, understanding what being ‘healthy’ means is important – although it is a challenging task, to say the least. In Chapter 3, ‘What is Health?’, we consider the range of ways that health has been defined, looking at ‘official’ definitions of health, as well as the distinction between professional and lay definitions. Models of health are also explored and, here, we contrast the biomedical model, which has been influential within medicine and health care, with the social model, which focuses on the social causes of disease. In this chapter we also consider the social construction of health and illness, examining how normal healthy processes become medicalized, and discuss the iatrogenic effects of medicalization on individuals and on society. Here we focus on obesity and the sociological debates on the medicalization of fatness. This chapter also considers a more holistic approach to care within nursing and offers some sociological reflections on this.

Chapter 4, ‘Nursing as an Occupation’, provides a brief historical overview of nursing, mapping the development of nursing and nurse registration from the nineteenth century and beyond. Just as other chapters within this section consider issues of definition, this chapter explores the debates which attempt to define what nursing is – is it an art or a science? In this chapter we consider the process of becoming a nurse and the socialization of students into nursing. Following on from the debate identified in Chapter 3, this chapter further highlights the tension of the ‘theory–practice gap’ within the socialization of student nurses. The gendered nature of nursing is also considered, and the role and status of men within nursing. Power relations are explored, and elitism within nursing and the relationships between nurses and other health-care workers are considered. Drawing on the concept of emotion work, relationships between nurses and patients are also discussed and the challenge of dementia for nursing as an occupation is considered.

In the final chapter of Part I, methodological approaches and some of the research methods commonly used by sociologists to explore health and illness are explored. In particular, the chapter focuses on the distinction between quantitative and qualitative methods, exploring when and why different research methods would be used. The chapter encourages critical reflection on the use of different research methods, outlining the key strengths and limitations of different methods of data collection. At the end of the chapter, the principles of research discussed are applied to the case of coronary heart disease.

CHAPTER 1
What is Sociology?

Sarah Earle

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KEY ISSUES IN THIS CHAPTER:

• The nature of sociological inquiry.
• Sociology, ‘common sense’ and lay reasoning.
• The role of sociology in society and in nursing.
• An introduction to sociological theory.
• Theorizing mental health and illness.

BY THE END OF THIS CHAPTER YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO:

• Understand the nature of sociological inquiry.
• Recognize the distinction between sociology, ‘common sense’ and lay reasoning.
• Engage in some of the debates concerning the role of sociology within society and nursing.
• Discuss different sociological theories.
• Apply sociological theories to the issue of mental health and illness.

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1 Introduction

Sociology is concerned, in the broadest sense, with the study of human society. As this implies, its scope is almost limitless: it is possible, in principle, to have a sociology of any activity in which human beings engage. Inevitably the sorts of activities that have concerned sociologists have changed somewhat over time. The principal concerns of sociologists writing in the nineteenth century, when sociology was just beginning as an academic discipline, were the major social, political and economic changes which had taken place across Europe since the late Middle Ages. Early sociol...