Inequalities in health: evidence from Denmark of the interaction of circumstances and health-related behaviour

Abstract

It is well known that the experience of poor health depends on adverse social and material circumstances and on unhealthy behaviour. In 1990 a British study asserted that privileged people gain more health benefit from a healthy lifestyle than do deprived people. In the present study this assertion was taken as a hypothesis, assuming statistical interaction between circumstances and health behaviour. The combined effect of these variables was studied in Denmark. Data was obtained from a 1987 national Health and Morbidity Survey; variables were selected to correspond closely with those in the earlier British study. The analysis included a multivariate analysis of variance. The results show that health-related behaviour has a positive effect on health both for those who are deprived and those who are not deprived, which is at variance with the findings of the British study. It confirms earlier analyses of Danish and Dutch data.