Well-being
refers to “a good
or satisfactory
condition of existence; a state characterized
by health, happiness, and prosperity” (Dictionary.com
Unabridged, 2014). In today’s society, more people are
starting to be more aware of their overall health and well-being, but does a lower
income affect a person’s overall well-being? For example, people of lower socioeconomic
status tend to have worse social and physical conditions than those who have
the opportunities to have a higher socioeconomic status, like the ability to
purchase healthier options of food, joining a gym, where a person may live,
size of family that they support, what sort of job a person may have, or even
their biological genes. So the question is does being in a low socioeconomic
status and not having money to be able to live a healthier lifestyle affect
someone’s overall health and well-being? (CDC, 2014)
Low
socioeconomic status has a huge influence on not being able to have a healthier
lifestyle. An example of being in a low socioeconomic status is the location in
which one lives. People who have a low socioeconomic status tend to live in
more of a “poverty” type setting where pollution is high, the streets are
dirty, and the stores that surround them are not the best choice. If people live in these types of settings,
there is no way that they can lead a healthy lifestyle. People who live in
poverty usually live around factories which produce a ton of pollution, and
being surrounded by it 24/7 can do damaging affects to people’s health. It can
affect people’s overall health, which “Numerous
scientific studies have linked particle pollution exposure to a variety of
problems, including: premature death in people with heart or lung disease, nonfatal
heart attacks, irregular heartbeat, aggravated asthma, etc” (EPA, 2014).
If
the location of where you live does affect health; then imagine not having the
money to support yourself and a family. People who are financially unstable
will experience emotional stress. Take for example; if a single mom or a
married couple have to support and feed one or more child, and their income is
low it can be very stressful trying to support others. As Melanie Greenburg, a Clinical
Psychologist, states “Our brains are wired for survival, not happiness”. When
we feel a negative emotion like stress from not having enough money, we
suddenly push aside all other feelings that are positive and worry about how we
are going to make ends meet or what are we going to do to make sure I can
survive. Suddenly it becomes all about us and it end up making people become
very ill or even in a depressed state.
When you have a positive state of mind and succeed in
your field of your career, your emotional well-being becomes healthier, but
what if you do not have a good career? A major social condition that relates to
socioeconomic status is that of what type of career one has. If someone has a
good career, they will be able to shop at health stores like Whole Foods or
other organic stores because they can afford the cost of the groceries provided
there. Also people that have a very good career can also pay for other
miscellaneous things like healthcare for when they are sick or injured (and have
medical care through their career), they can pay for things like a gym
membership or personal trainers, or for counseling if the person has a drug or
alcohol addiction. People who earn
enough money tend not to worry about how they are going to make ends meet which
usually result in someone being emotionally healthier, but does money actually
buy happiness?
Take
someone that does not have a stable job or even have a degree to have a good
career, they usually worry about how they will pay for certain things and are
struggling financially each month. They cannot support themselves (or even a
family if they need to) and their health can start to deteriorate if they
cannot afford healthcare or even if their job does not give them healthcare, so
when they are sick they tend to stress
more because they cannot afford to see a doctor. A main reason I see that can
be detrimental to someone’s health is if they do not own a gym membership or do
not have the tools to go workout. The argument I may get is that they can go
out for a run or watch workout videos. Yes, they can go out for a run or watch
those videos, but however not many people will have the motivation or drive to
work out or that they physically cannot because they are not physically fit. That
deals a lot with how people’s minds function and what motivates them to work
out and be healthy.
It
is not all about social conditions though; there are physical conditions that
play a factor on health and income. Biological factors can affect your health
and income. A biological factor is determined as “Anything which affects the function
and behavior
of a living organism.
Internally, this factor can be a physical, physiological, chemical,
neurological, or genetic condition which causes a psychological effect.
Biological factors are seen as the primary determinants of human behavior” (Psychology
Dictionary, 2014). For
example, if you’re a female you will not be able to get the same salary as man
would or if you are not a certain race that also plays a role on what your
income would be like. This physical
condition plays a huge role on how much money you will be able to accumulate to
live a fulfilling life.
There
is one more biological condition that plays a factor which ties directly to your
health; it is how you are born healthy or unhealthy. What I mean by this is
what the mother consumes during pregnancy to either make the baby healthy or
unhealthy. For example, mothers who have poor diets
while pregnant may increase their baby's risk of high blood pressure as a child
(Sara Ipatenco, 2014). This goes back to what I said in previous paragraphs, if
you do not have healthy eating habits and you do not have the money to pamper
yourself in that way, it can affect your life, the life of others around you,
and if you are a female the life of a child.
In
a psychological aspect, the stress of not having money may cause malign affects
to your health and those around you. When people are in financial ruts, they
start to think about how they will pay for day to day things or worry about
what may come and not be financially prepared for it, so this will make them
become emotionally and physically unhealthy.
Now
imagine this scenario: you have a phenomenal career and are supporting only
yourself; you have more than enough money to pay for rent, buy yourself healthy
food, being able to go to the bar and party with friends whenever you wanted,
and everything just seems to be going right for you; until one day you lose
your job because they let you go. So now you lost your job and you do not have
enough in your savings to provide for yourself to pay rent, buy substantial
food, or the little things that made you happy like going out and partying it
up with friends. So now what? Maybe you start to stress out because you are
trying to figure out how to make ends meet; you start to become physically ill,
you start to lose friends because you cannot hang out anymore, and suddenly you
cannot pay for food so no substantial nutrition is coming your way. That’s why when people are financially stable
majority of them remain positive because they have good income and can remain
healthy.
So
what happens when you do not have a good income to help maintain your health and
well-being? Your brain is not wired to make you feel happiness, it’s wired for
survival. When you have a lower income and a lower socioeconomic status your
health and happiness seem to go down to; so does money really buy happiness? Or
is it all about your brain and how you handle your emotions when it comes to a
stressful situation or how you live your life?
Bibliography
CDC.
(2014, March 21). Retrieved from
http://www.cdc.gov/socialdeterminants/faq.html
EPA.
(2014, May 6). Retrieved from http://www.epa.gov/pm/health.html
Fred C. Pampel, P. M. (2010, August). U.S National
Library of Medicine. Retrieved from
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3169799/
Greenburg, M. (2013, March 26). Psychology Today.
Retrieved from
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-mindful-self-express/201303/why-we-cant-just-get-rid-anxiety-distress
Ipatenco, S. (2014, February 3). Livestrong.
Retrieved from
http://www.livestrong.com/article/393389-what-can-happen-if-you-dont-eat-healthy-during-pregnancy/
Pam. (2014). Psychology Dictionary. Retrieved
from http://psychologydictionary.org/biological-factor/
Well-being. (n.d.). Dictionary.com
Unabridged. Retrieved November 16, 2014, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/well-being
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