Concept, measurement and use of acculturation in health and disease risk studies

Acculturation, a concept with its root in social science and cultural anthropology, is a process intimately related to health behavior and health status of minority populations in a multicultural society. This paper provides a brief review of the subject of acculturation as it relates to health research, showing that this concept has a potential to identify risk factors that underlie increased prevalence of chronic diseases, particularly in immigrant populations. A proper understanding of this is helpful in designing intervention programs to reduce the burden of such diseases and to increase the quality of life in such populations. The concept is defined with an outline of its history showing its evolution over time. Criteria for measuring acculturation are described to illustrate the need of accommodating its multidimensional features. Drawing examples from health research in US Hispanics, the role of acculturation on health behavior is discussed to document that the discordant findings are at least partially due to either use of incomplete dimensions of the concept, or not accounting for the dynamic aspect of its process. Finally, with illustration of a finding from a study among overweight Mexican American women of South Texas, a model of acculturation study is proposed that may be used in other immigrant populations undergoing the acculturation process.