Exploring the role of the family in the construction of young people's health discourses and dispositions

This paper reports on an exploratory study with low income young people that sought to explore the discourses on which they drew their understandings about health and whether family structure mediated individual agency. Based on an interpretive perspective, the voices of three participants were selected from an inner city secondary school. Drawn from a larger study, participants were interviewed in pairs and asked to elaborate on their understanding and experience of health, fitness and physical activity. The analytical framework was influenced by the work of Bourdieu, recognising the importance of structure and agency. This study suggests that young people were implicated in the reproduction of a healthism discourse, while family was recognised as a social field that shaped their dispositions toward health-related practices. However their ability to enact health dispositions and maintain a healthy lifestyle was constrained by their family structure and the structural social conditions of their lives.