The Legitimacy of Pain as an Object of Study

  1. Lourdes Biedma-Velázquez 2
  2. María Isabel García-Rodríguez 2
  3. Juan Manuel García-González 1
  4. José Antonio Cerrillo-Vidal 4
  5. Gema Serrano-Gemes 23
  6. Antonio Blanco-Hungría 45
  7. Rafael Serrano-del-Rosal 2
  1. 1 Pablo de Olavide University, Seville, Spain
  2. 2 Institute for Advanced Social Studies (IESA), Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Córdoba, Spain
  3. 3 Maimonides Institute for Biomedical Research of Córdoba, University of Córdoba, Córdoba, Spain
  4. 4 University of Córdoba, Córdoba, Spain
  5. 5 Córdoba-Guadalquivir Healthcare District, Andalusian Healthcare Service, Córdoba, Spain
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Revista:
Advances in Applied Sociology

ISSN: 2165-4328,  2165-4336

Año de publicación: 2022

Volumen: 12

Número: 10

Páginas: 634-643

Tipo: Artículo

DOI: 10.4236/AASOCI.2022.1210044 GOOGLE SCHOLAR lock_openAcceso abierto editor

Otras publicaciones en: Advances in Applied Sociology

Resumen

Pain, as a multidimensional phenomenon, must be tackled from different perspectives. The sociological perspective is one of the less frequent approaches in the bibliography. The main results of a pioneering study about the social legitimacy of pain are set forth in this paper, analyzing citizens’ pain today, the feelings it causes in them, the type of pain they suffer, and how this type of pain has an influence on the perception of their own pain and that of others. A quantitative design was adopted, through a cross-sectional survey of general population living in Spain (n = 1600) conducted online in 2021. The results point out that a high percentage of citizens were in pain when they took the survey, even if they stated that they were in good health. In general, feeling pain means having a worse quality of life. Having pain of a psychological origin involves higher levels of shame or guilt, as well as the feeling of being judged by others, than the other types of pain. The pain caused by cancer is the one with the highest social support, followed by the grief caused by the death of a loved one, while the pain with the lowest support is the one caused by alcoholism or obesity. Feeling that one’s pain is understood and legitimized by others is fundamental to being able to face it, that is why it is important to carry out studies analyzing pain from this perspective.