Considering sex and gender in Epidemiology: a challenge beyond terminology. From conceptual analysis to methodological strategies

Abstract

Highlights A pragmatic individual measure of individual gender would correspond to the level at which an individual complies with a set of elements constituting femininity or masculinity in a given population, place and time Comparing outcomes by sex and gender is not sufficient, and even misleading, to understand the mechanisms underlying biological and health differences between men and women Causal analysis framework is a powerful tool for refining hypotheses and identifying the effects that can and should be estimated to meet the objectives Gender could also be measured at the populational-level as an interaction between sex and environment, which would be more compatible with the sociological concept of gender

Keywords

• Gender
• Sex
• Epidemiology
• Health inequality
• Embodiment
• Quantitative methods