Factors Affecting HealthIn Middle Adulthood

PSY 1170

By: Nichole Giokas

December 2, 2015

Figure 1.

Health and Wellness

There are many things that work together to affect our health

Despite us thinking we’re living a healthy lifestyle, there are

risk factors to our health that we don’t always think about

Including factors like personality, gender, ethnicity and

socioeconomic class

Figure 2.

Risk Factors for Heart Disease

and Cancer

Smoking

Blood pressure

Weight

High cholesterol

Inactivity

Diet

Alcohol

Heredity

Figure 3.

Figure 4.

Personality Personality has been thought to

contribute to heart disease

Meyer Friedman and Ray

Rosenman noticed many of their

patients that had heart disease

possessed many other similar

characteristics with one another

These characteristics included

things like sense of urgency,

hostility and aggressiveness,

striving for achievement and

competitiveness.

These are characteristics common

with type A personality

Figure 5.

Personality

Friedman and Rosenman

hypothesized that a type A

personality was linked to

higher levels of cholesterol,

therefore an increased risk of

CVD

It is also found that those that

have a type D personality

(distress) have an even higher

risk of CVD Figure 6.

Gender

In early adulthood some

women’s health issues can be

explained by association with

child bearing

Women are more likely to

have chronic, nonfatal

conditions like arthritis

In middle age, men have a

much higher risk of CVD

Men also have less of a

chance of surviving the

disease

Figure 7.

* It is found that women

live longer than men, but

have more diseases

throughout their lifetime

Gender

It is thought that women’s heart muscles are better at adapting to stresses

After a heart attack women tend to recover with a higher level of functioning than men

Women are more likely to seek medical attention and go for regular checkups than men, which could contribute to their greater life expectancy

Figure 8.

Socioeconomic Class In middle adulthood, job status and education collaborate to

affect health

Those with higher paying jobs will be able to afford better

health care and benefits and therefore may be more healthy

Figure 9.

It has also been shown that

between a man with a high-

status occupation and a man

with a low status occupation

that both believe that health

care is “unmanly”, the man

with the high-status

occupation will be less likely

to visit the doctor and

therefore may be less healthy

overall.

Socioeconomic Class

A high-status job often comes with more stress and responsibility and stress is a big risk factor for disease

While these higher class individuals may have better access to healthcare, they could be more unhealthy due to their lifestyle

Lower class individuals are more likely to live in undesirable conditions and have more dangerous jobs

Those in the lower class may also not be able to afford to have a healthy diet

Figure 10.

Ethnicity

It is believed that African

Americans have a shorter life

expectancy than Caucasian

Americans.

African Americans, Native

Americans and Mexican Americans

are more likely to possess risk

factors of cardiovascular disease.

These ethnicities also have higher

rates of diabetes and

complications from diabetes.

Figure 11.Highest rate of…

Prostate, colon, lung and breast

cancer: African Americans

Liver cancer: Asian Americans

Kidney cancer: Native Americans

Ethnicity

75% of Mexican American women, 80% of African

American women, and 58% of White Americans women

are overweight (NCHS 2010) which is a risk factor for

cardiovascular disease.

15% of White and Mexican men, and 27% of African

American men have high blood pressure (NCHS 2010).

Minorities often have less access to health care and are

less likely to seek care and medical interventions.

Cognitive Functioning Warner Schaie found that

people that have coronary heart disease or hypertension showed earlier and more significant declines on intellectual tests compared to those who were disease-free

This could be related to the decline in physical activity in those with cardiovascular disease

It is possible that exercise is an important factor in middle adulthood cognitive functioning

Figure 12.

How is This Information Relevant

to Me? I think that it is important to know what puts your at risk for

certain diseases

By knowing the risk factors for particular diseases I can

change the factors that are modifiable or be aware of the

factors that are unmodifiable

I know that because I’m a woman I may live longer but I’m

also at a higher risk for chronic disease throughout my

lifetime and could take steps to prevent certain diseases

I could include more physical activity into my life, knowing

that it not only could reduce my chance of disease but also

prevent the decline of my cognitive functioning

How Can I Use This Information in My

Professional Life? As a bachelor of nursing student, my career will

be revolved around the health and wellness of

other people

Knowing risk factors can help me to teach my

patients about prevention as well as explain to

them what could have put them at risk for a

disease they already have

For example, if I had a patient that has a very

obvious type A personality, I could explain to

them how their personality can correspond with

their health and possibly teach them how to live

a more low stress life and prevent

cardiovascular disease.

Many patients don’t know about risk factors like

ethnicity and gender and it is part of my job to

educate them about what contributes to their

overall health

Figure 13.

Figure 14.

References

Boyd, D., Johnson P., Bee, H. (2015) Lifespan Development. (5th Canadian Ed.) Toronto, ON: Prentice Hall Canada Inc.

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nursing-profession/

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