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Title:
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Disentangling the link between health and social capital: A comparison of immigrant and native-born populations in Spain
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Author:
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Stoyanova, Alexandrina Petrova; Díaz Serrano, Lluís
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Other authors:
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Universitat Rovira i Virgili. Departament d'Economia; Universitat Rovira i Virgili. Centre de Recerca en Economia Industrial i Economia Pública |
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Abstract:
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An increasing body of research has pointed to the relevance of social capital in studying a great
variety of socio-economic phenomena, ranging from economics growth and development to educational
attainment and public health. Conceptually, our paper is framed within the debates about the possible
links between health and social capital, on one hand, and within the hypotheses regarding the importance
of social and community networks in all stages of the dynamics of international migration, on the other
hand. Our primary objective is to explore the ways social relations contribute to health differences
between the immigrants and the native-born population of Spain. We also try to reveal differences in the
nature of the social networks of foreign-born, as compared to that of the native-born persons.
The empirical analysis is based on an individual-level data coming from the 2006 Spanish Health Survey,
which contains a representative sample of the immigrant population. To assess the relationship between
various health indicators (self-assessed health, chronic conditions and long-term illness) and social
capital, controlling for other covariates, we estimate multilevel models separately for the two population
groups of interest. In the estimates we distinguish between individual and community-level social capital.
While the Health Survey contains information that allows us to define individual social capital measures,
the collective indicators come from other official sources. In particular, for the subsample of immigrants,
we proxy community-level networks and relationships by variables contained in the Spanish National
Survey of Immigrants 2007. The results obtained so far point to the relevance of social capital as a
covariate in the health equation, although, the significance varies according to the specific health
indicator used. Additionally, and contrary to what is expected, immigrants’ social networks seem to be
inferior to those of the native-born population in many aspects; and they also affect immigrant’s health to
a lesser extent. Policy implications of the findings are discussed.
Keywords: health status, social capital, immigration, Spain |
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Publication date:
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2013 |
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Subject (UDC):
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338 - Situació econòmica. Política econòmica. Gestió, control i planificació de l'economia. Producció. Serveis. Turisme. Preus |
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Subject(s):
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Estatus social
Salut pública
Capital social
Emigració i immigració
Espanya |
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Rights:
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L'accés als continguts d'aquest document queda condicionat a l'acceptació de les condicions d'ús establertes per la següent llicència Creative Commons: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/
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Pages:
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31 p. |
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Document type:
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Working Paper |
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Published by:
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Universitat Rovira i Virgili. Departament d'Economia
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Collection:
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Documents de treball del Departament d'Economia;2013-31
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