Lifestyle as a choice of necessity: Young women, health and obesity

Abstract

Sociologists of health have regularly called into question strictly knowledge-based health promotion approaches that focus on individual lifestyle change, claiming preference for collective actions on social determinants of health. These critiques have more recently been directed towards the issue of obesity. Although there is a growing body of work that shows the connection between poverty, obesity and ill health, few studies have focused on the concerns for health and lifestyle of vulnerable populations. In this qualitative study, 15 in-depth interviews were conducted with young underprivileged women in order to capture their dispositions towards health practices by outlining sociocultural factors that do (or do not) incline them to pursue a health regimen and weight control strategies. By drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus, practical sense and ‘choice of the necessary’, the results suggest that inclinations to follow normative health guidelines are strongly influenced by family and financial responsibilities and by pressing health concerns rather than a calculation of how the prescribed risk avoidance behaviours will improve personal health and/or prevent illness for one’s own sake. In conclusion, this study highlights the limits of prescribed ‘solutions’ to health improvement that have little to no consideration of embodied social knowledge and lived experiences.