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Environmental factors that influence health and development. Environmental factors play a significant role in our health and development. Environmental in this case refers to anything that is not inherited.
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Environmental factors play a significant role in our health and development. • Environmental in this case refers to anything that is not inherited. • There is an extensive list of factors that contribute to health and development but we will just focus on the following: • family and culture • socio-economic status • physical activity • access to health care • physical environment • nutrition
Family and culture • Family is perhaps the most important single relationship most people have. • One of the key functions of the family is to act as a socialisation agent. Families typically help individuals develop socially by engaging in a wide variety of activities within the extended family and the community, thereby giving members the opportunity to learn social skills and learn ways of successfully interacting with others.
Family and culture • Families are particularly important where emotional health and development are concerned. • Providing members with an environment in which they feel loved and which they feel they belong is most important. • If this does not happen, there is the potential for significant negative effects on social and emotional health and development.
Family and culture • The morals, values, attitudes and beliefs held by the family as a part of society are passed on to the children. • If these are positive and healthy qualities they will provide the children with a framework for interacting well with the wider community and will enhance all aspects of development.
Family and culture • The customs and traditions associated with the society in which a person lives combine to form what is known as their culture. • Culture can influence health and development in a number of ways including: • food habits • beliefs • environment where a group of people live • the way people access resources • different beliefs about medicine • genetic predisposition to disease
Socio-economic status • The term socio-economic status is used to refer to a number of factors that have the potential to influence development. • These factors include: • individual or family income • education level • employment status • occupation type
Socio-economic status The interrelationship between key elements of socio-economic status
Physical activity • Engaging in exercise and physical activity is clearly important where physical development is concerned, but there are also associated implications for social, emotional and intellectual development. • Exercise helps promote physical development in a number of ways, such as improving coordination and motor skills.
Physical activity • There are also social and emotional benefits that go along with exercise and physical activity. • Being involved in team sports, meeting new people and developing a positive attitude towards oneself and others are all potential benefits.
Physical activity • Learning new rules and skills, as well as experiencing how the activity can improve health, are all positive intellectual developments.
Access to health care • The types of healthcare available in Australia today are wide ranging – from the latest technological innovations to traditional and alternative medicines. • Whatever the type of service, they share some common problems to do with access and availability
Access to health care • Much of what many people know about available health services is limited to their own experience or knowledge, or that of family members and friends. • It is therefore, important that they are made aware of the range of health related resources available to them.
Access to health care • Depending on where a person lives, there may be many services or very few. • Some population groups, such as Indigenous Australians, experience lower levels of access to health services because they are more likely to live outside urban areas. • Access to health services in rural and remote areas is usually influenced by a low number of GPs, lower rates of bulk billing and less access to specialists and major hospitals.
Physical environment • The physical environment is a term that is used to describe factors in an individual’s surroundings, such as the air they breathe and the water they drink, and has the potential to have a positive and negative impact on health and development. • A physical environment that provides adequate access to clean open spaces and clean water, as well as being free from pollution, while also having access to essential services, can be a positive factor in promoting health and development.
