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Gesundheit im Alter: Subjektive Deutung in unterschiedlichen Lebenswelten
Abstract In this chapter, health is considered primarily from the perspective of individual health behaviour as well as the individual view of personal and social factors influencing health; in addition, these two interpretations are placed in relation to social-structural characteristics. The chapter begins with an anthropological view of health, concentrating on contributions which delineate a comprehensive understanding of the person and his or her life relations. In addition, basic statements on prevention are made to illustrate how legislators and different health disciplines interpret the preventive potential in the different phases of the life course. The subsequent steps are empirically driven. Different forms of health behaviour as well as the interpretation of personal and social factors influencing health are differentiated – also on the basis of cluster analyses. These different forms not only make it clear that people deal with their health (in health-promotion and preventive care as well as in medical-therapeutic and rehabilitative aspects) in very different ways, but also interpret very differently the extent to which their health can be influenced. As the analyses further show, patterns of behaviour and interpretation are influenced to a large extent by social-structural variables (such as social class), which can thus also be interpreted in terms of the (narrower or wider) “scope for action” that they open up.
Keywords Health behaviour, living environment, opportunity structures, potentials in old age, prevention
