18 Oct Understanding Social and Behavioral Associations in Epidemiology

Understanding Social and Behavioral Associations in Epidemiology

Discussions are designed to promote dialogue between faculty and students, and students and their peers. In the discussions, students should

demonstrate an understanding of the concepts for the module;

integrate professional resources;

engage in meaningful and respectful dialogue with classmates; and

express thoughts clearly and logically.

Course Outcomes

This discussion provides documentation of student ability to meet the following course outcomes:

CO1: Develop correct use of advanced biostatistical methods and discipline specific epidemiological terminology as related to public health programs.

CO2: Apply advanced quantitative biostatistical procedures and qualitative biostatistical procedures to relevant public health data sets to identify associations between causative factors and outcomes.

CO4: Analyze the results from statistical computing packages reporting results accurately and within context to the given public health data sets.

CO5: Analyze epidemiological methods and the use of qualitative and quantitative statistical methods in relation to current public health trends.

CO9: Develop an epidemiological study using the correct qualitative or quantitative study design as well as corresponding statistical analysis.

Social and behavioral epidemiology can show associations that are far reaching, indeed many of these can be upstream determinates to several poor health outcomes.

For this discussion, you need to pick one of the following prompts and complete your own research through the literature. Make sure that you find support for your theories and that your purpose is backed by credible sources. When you respond to others, respond to someone that selected a different prompt than you did.

Select one of the following prompts for your discussion:

Describe how the diet–heart hypothesis represents a multifactorial model for the etiology of coronary heart disease. In what way is the diet–heart hypothesis inconsistent with the epidemiologic triangle?

Discuss how social environment contributes to the worldwide DALYs for childhood malnutrition and poor water quality.

What are some of the possible associations that have been identified between personality and smoking? Using your own ideas, describe and compare study designs that might be used to investigate these hypothesized associations.