ORCID

0000-0003-2436-5461 (Brown), 0009-0000-8428-6015 (Patel), 0000-0002-7996-4763 (Sarino)

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2026

DOI

10.1155/adph/7561003

Publication Title

Advances in Public Health

Volume

2026

Issue

1

Pages

7561003 (19 pp.)

Abstract

Background

The continued reliance on single-category self-reported demographic data (e.g., race/ethnicity) reflects conceptual limitations that hinder the study and understanding of health outcomes research. There is a pressing need for more precise measures of social privilege that conceptualize privilege and oppression while enabling the examination of their effects on health outcomes in the United States (US) healthcare system.

Objective

The purpose of this scoping review was to review the literature, determine how researchers have measured aspects of privilege and oppression, and develop a conceptual framework to study patients' social privilege in the US healthcare system and public health research.

Methods

Authors used Arksey and O'Malley's Methodological Framework for Scoping Reviews and the SPIDER (Sample, Phenomenon of Interest, Design, Evaluation, Research type) Framework to identify relevant studies. In August 2024, we searched seven databases using key phrases such as "social privilege," "intersectional privilege," and "structural privilege" paired with "measures," "surveys," "psychometrics," and other like terms. Studies were included if they were peer-reviewed, published in the English language, conducted in the US, and included adult populations. Studies were excluded if they measured adverse childhood experiences (ACE), systemic or structural racism, and/or color blindness.

Results

Our scoping review resulted in a final sample of seven articles published between 2003 and 2024. The majority of research studies measured race/racism, white privilege, or racial identity (n = 6), gender or sexism (n = 5), and/or sexual orientation or heterosexism (n = 5). Based on the results, we offer a preliminary definition of social privilege and a conceptual framework to begin studying social privilege in public health research and potentially primary care.

Conclusions

These studies aimed to make various types of privilege more visible in psychology and counseling. Thinking innovatively, public health and health services researchers could build on our preliminary definition, domains, and conceptual framework to develop a reliable and validated social privilege index (SPI). This measure would include privileges associated with policy and politics, power and influence, social identity, intersectionality, access and opportunities, etc. that produce a social privilege score and determine its relationship to the likelihood of poor health outcomes.

Rights

© 2026 Elizabeth A. Brown et al. 

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Data Availability

Data Availability Statement: "Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no data were analyzed in this study."

Original Publication Citation

Brown, E. A., Patel, P., Sarino, E. M. B., Markovic, V., & Muntaner, C. (2026). A scoping review to conceptualize social privilege for studying patients' health outcomes and health disparities. Advances in Public Health, 2026(1), Article 7561003. https://doi.org/10.1155/adph/7561003

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