A recent study indicates that they must be considered jointly when researching the causes of disparities across racial groups and questions implicit assumptions concerning associations between social disadvantages, health behaviors and mental health.94 A sociotypic history is an attempt to understand the totality of developmental experience—”to step into the patient’s shoes”—that Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical determines reactions, responses, and obstacles to self-management. FOR THE FUTURE It is clear that many of the factors detailed in Tables 1 and ​and22 do not lend themselves readily to quantification, especially with regard to relationships,

and it may not be possible to give a global find protocol sociotype score. The point is that for any given patient there will be relevant issues that have to be assessed separately Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical in each of the three domains. Future projects will identify both biomarkers40 and questionnaires that are relevant to the challenge of typing the sociotype (as examples: for family function, family Apgar score,95 stress,96,97 quality of life,98 and social adaptability99). Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical This means that in its strong form sociotypic analysis will require establishing rigorous methods to investigate and quantify its effects.40,75 In its weak form sociotypic analysis is a way to highlight those psycho-social and environmental factors relevant

to health and illness. Both approaches should prove to be a robust way of broadening health professionals’ vision of realities Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical in health care, which will then enable appropriate

individual, community, or national interventions for disease prevention and chronic disease management. Such knowledge could then inform policy and practice to improve public health. The expectation is that the greater the consideration of the sociotype, the better will be the treatment outcome and the patient’s self-management. To test this hypothesis Inhibitors,research,lifescience,medical is the future challenge. The comprehensiveness of the sociotype requires that its analysis be approached in a graded manner; the role of nutrition in its development throughout life would seem to be a suitable first step. CONCLUSIONS This paper has indicated how nutrition in its widest sense has a major influence on the development of the sociotype from throughout the life cycle. This was anticipated at the individual level by Brillat-Savarin (1755–1826) in his well-known saying: “Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are.” We may broaden this construct to the level of relationships: “Tell me how a family eats, and I will tell you how it functions.” And finally, the extension of sociotypic analysis and nutrition to the level of the environment: “Tell me how a nation eats, and I will tell you its values”—do, for example, children go to bed hungry? (Food security). The sociotype determines how an individual adjusts to life in general and disease in particular.