Bad outcomes in black babies: race or racism?
Bad outcomes in black babies: race or racism?
复制标题
黑人婴儿的不良后果：种族还是种族主义？
作者：
David Rj;Collins Jw
在过去的三十年里，美国黑人和白人婴儿死亡率之间的差距越来越大。调查人员进行的流行病学和医学研究试图了解和扭转这一不利趋势，但没有成功。研究人员一直在寻找在黑人中更常见的社会和环境风险因素的组合，因此无法解释这个群体的低生育结果。隐含的替代假设是黑人和白人之间的基因差异。事实上，社会经济地位较高的黑人母亲和白人母亲之间的差距比没有社会经济分层的整体黑人和白人比率之间的差距更大。然而，遗传理论的另一种解释是，基于社会风险因素来解释这些结果，由于所研究的社会中普遍存在歧视，这些因素只适用于黑人。这些因素是种族主义的影响，而不是种族本身。种族主义对围产期结果的影响还需要进行多方面的研究，包括对种族歧视的心理生理反应和种族群体在应对机制、社会支持和物质环境方面的差异。对过去37年趋势的分析表明，在种族差距缩小之前，白人（和整个美国）婴儿死亡率的改善是无法预期的。
The gap between black and white infant death rates in the United States has grown over the last three decades. Epidemiologic and medical studies by investigators seeking to understand and reverse this adverse trend have been unsuccessful. Researchers have looked in vain for the combination of social and environmental risk factors that are more common among blacks and would therefore explain this group's poor reproductive outcomes. The implicit alternate hypothesis is genetic differences between blacks and whites. In fact, there is more of a gap between black and white mothers of higher socioeconomic position than between overall black and white rates without socioeconomic stratification. An alternative to the genetic theory explains these results, however, on the basis of social risk factors that, because of the presence of widespread discrimination in the society under study, apply only to blacks. Such factors are the effects of racism, not race per se. Several lines of research are needed to investigate the effects of racism on perinatal outcomes, including studies on psychophysiological reactions to racial discrimination and on ethnic group differences in coping mechanisms, social supports, and physical environment. Analysis of trends over the past 37 years indicates that improvements in white (and total US) infant mortality rates cannot be anticipated until the racial gap is closed.