Social Perceptions of Health in Urban and Rural Indonesia

Abstract

Differences in social, cultural, and service contexts between urban and rural areas in Indonesia shape variations in how health is socially perceived. This article aims to examine how social perceptions of health are constructed in urban and rural communities and to identify the factors influencing these differences. A qualitative approach employing a structured narrative literature review was applied to twenty scholarly articles published over the past decade, which were analyzed through thematic synthesis. The main findings indicate that urban communities tend to conceptualize health within a rational and biomedical, individual-oriented framework, whereas rural communities interpret health in a more communal and context-sensitive manner, influenced by cultural values, social relations, and local authority. Distinctions are also observed in access to health information, perceptions of disease risk, patterns of preventive behavior, and the strength of social norms. This study concludes that health perception is a socially constructed phenomenon shaped by the interaction of structural conditions, cultural orientations, and social capital. The findings imply that health promotion and intervention strategies should be context-sensitive and tailored to the social characteristics of each setting to achieve sustainable outcomes