In the face of the growing gap in health within and between populations, health promotion models have focused on the healthcare system, and more recently the social determinants of health. A less explored idea is the effect of empowerment/self-determination on health. Using published cross-country data and the “general-to-specific” (GETS) algorithm implemented in PcGets (Hendry and Krolzig, 2001), this study found that one standard deviation increase in the level of empowerment is associated with a 0.17 standard deviation increase in all life expectancy, a 0.61 standard deviation increase in female life expectancy, a 0.14 standard deviation decrease in infant mortality, and a 0.09 standard deviation decrease in under 5 mortality; and one standard deviation increase in the level of empowerment is associated with a 0.18 standard deviation increase in all life expectancy, a 0.67 standard deviation increase in female life expectancy, a 0.16 standard deviation increase in male life expectancy, and a 0.2 standard deviation decrease in infant mortality (using political rights and civil liberties freedom respectively) while controlling for wealth, education and income inequality (p ≤ 0.05).
Zircon - This is a contributing Drupal Theme Design by WeebPal.
