Social Determinants of Health and Education: Understanding Intersectionalities During Childhood

Abstract

This chapter explores the conceptual understandings of health and learning, as well as the health benefits of learning, to address the social factors that determine existing inequalities in these outcomes. Inequalities in health and learning start in early life, are transmitted intergenerationally, and are fuelled by the intersectionality of disadvantage into which children are born. To provide a more comprehensive understanding of the channels by which social determinants reproduce inequalities, the chapter builds on the ecological model developed by Feinstein and colleagues (2008) to make explicit the conditions, forces and systems, that impact the formation and persistence of inequalities. The chapter concludes with the importance of addressing the social factors and processes that cause the reproduction of existing inequalities in health and learning, which are situated within specific contexts, in order to promote a more equitable social agenda.