All flashcards
Flashcard 1: What is a food desert?
Answer: An area with limited access to affordable, nutritious food. Geographic barrier to healthy eating, often in low-income areas.
Flashcard 2: What is residential segregation as it relates to environmental risk?
Answer: Spatial separation of groups that concentrates hazards and limits resources. Historical policies created unequal exposure to environmental hazards.
Flashcard 3: Which option best describes the NIMBY phenomenon in environmental justice contexts?
Answer: Opposition to local hazards that shifts burdens onto other communities. "Not In My Back Yard" - pushes hazards to less powerful communities.
Flashcard 4: What is the precautionary principle in environmental health decision-making?
Answer: Act to prevent harm despite incomplete scientific certainty. Prioritizes prevention when full evidence of harm is still developing.
Flashcard 5: What is risk perception?
Answer: A person’s subjective judgment of the likelihood and severity of harm. Influenced by personal experience, culture, and trust in institutions.
Flashcard 6: Identify the correct term: combined chemical and social stressors producing greater harm.
Answer: Cumulative risk (cumulative impact). Multiple stressors interact synergistically to worsen health outcomes.
Flashcard 7: What is a health inequity?
Answer: An unfair, avoidable health difference produced by systemic disadvantage. Emphasizes injustice and systemic causes, not just differences.
Flashcard 8: What is environmental racism?
Answer: Disproportionate environmental burdens on racial or ethnic minority groups. Intentional or systemic placement of hazards in minority communities.
Flashcard 9: What is the key difference between equality and equity in environmental health policy?
Answer: Equity allocates resources by need; equality allocates the same to all. Equity addresses existing disparities; equality ignores different starting points.
Flashcard 10: What is a health disparity?
Answer: A preventable health difference tied to social, economic, or environmental disadvantage. Links health differences to modifiable social factors, not just biology.
Flashcard 11: Which framework links health disparities to social conditions like housing and pollution?
Answer: Social determinants of health. Recognizes that health outcomes depend on living conditions and environment.
Flashcard 12: What is environmental justice in public health?
Answer: Fair treatment and meaningful involvement in environmental decisions. Ensures all communities have a voice in environmental policies affecting them.
Flashcard 13: What term describes unequal exposure to environmental hazards by race or class?
Answer: Environmental inequality. Describes systematic differences in hazard exposure based on social factors.
Flashcard 14: What is exposure in environmental epidemiology?
Answer: Contact with an agent over time (e.g., pollutant dose or concentration). Quantifies contact intensity and duration for risk assessment.
Flashcard 15: What is a dose-response relationship?
Answer: Higher dose is associated with greater biological effect or disease risk. Shows proportional increase in harm with increasing exposure levels.
Flashcard 16: What is biomagnification?
Answer: Increasing concentration of a toxin at higher trophic levels. Toxins accumulate up food chains, concentrating in top predators.
Flashcard 17: What is the built environment in relation to health risk exposure?
Answer: Human-made surroundings that shape exposure and behavior (housing, roads, parks). Physical infrastructure influences exposure patterns and health behaviors.
Flashcard 18: Which concept best explains why low-SES groups may have higher pollution impacts at equal exposure?
Answer: Differential susceptibility due to comorbidities, stress, and limited healthcare. Social stressors amplify biological vulnerability to pollutants.
Flashcard 19: What is a common environmental justice health outcome linked to chronic pollution exposure?
Answer: Higher rates of asthma and other cardiopulmonary disease. Air pollution triggers respiratory inflammation and cardiovascular stress.
Flashcard 20: Which term describes increased vulnerability due to combined social and environmental stressors?
Answer: Cumulative risk (or cumulative burden). Multiple stressors compound health risks beyond individual effects.
Flashcard 21: What is “NIMBY” and how can it relate to environmental justice patterns?
Answer: Not In My Back Yard; hazards displaced toward less powerful communities. Wealthy areas reject hazards, concentrating them in poor communities.
Flashcard 22: Identify the study design most used to link neighborhood pollution levels to asthma rates.
Answer: Epidemiologic observational study (often cohort or cross-sectional). Observes natural exposure patterns without experimental manipulation.
Flashcard 23: Which option best represents an environmental justice intervention at the policy level?
Answer: Stricter emission controls and equitable enforcement in high-burden areas. Targets pollution sources and ensures fair regulatory protection.
Flashcard 24: What is meant by disproportionate exposure in environmental health?
Answer: Unequal contact with hazards across groups, often by race or SES. Low-income and minority groups face more environmental hazards than others.
Flashcard 25: What is environmental racism as used in environmental justice discussions?
Answer: Disproportionate environmental burdens on racial or ethnic minority groups. Minority communities bear unfair share of pollution and environmental hazards.
Flashcard 26: What is environmental justice in the context of health risk exposure?
Answer: Fair treatment and meaningful involvement in environmental health policies. Ensures all communities have equal voice in environmental decisions affecting their health.
Flashcard 27: What is the most direct definition of a health disparity?
Answer: Systematic differences in health outcomes across population groups. Reflects preventable, unjust differences in health between groups.
Flashcard 28: What is structural inequality as it relates to environmental justice?
Answer: Institutional policies creating unequal access to resources and protections. Systems and policies perpetuate unequal environmental protections.
Flashcard 29: What is a heat island effect and its key environmental justice implication?
Answer: Urban warming from surfaces; higher heat risk in low-tree, low-income areas. Concrete absorbs heat; poor areas lack cooling green spaces.
Flashcard 30: What is residential segregation and why is it relevant to environmental exposures?
Answer: Spatial separation by race/SES that concentrates hazards in some neighborhoods. Segregation clusters environmental hazards in minority neighborhoods.