Health outcomes and vulnerability tend to follow a social gradient, with which pattern?

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Health outcomes and vulnerability change across social strata; a social gradient means that as socioeconomic status decreases, health tends to worsen and vulnerability increases. This pattern reflects social determinants of health—income, education, housing, neighborhood, stress, and access to care—that shape nearly all health outcomes. In many populations you’ll see differences in life expectancy, chronic disease burden, and other outcomes that align with where someone sits on the socioeconomic ladder, rather than being fixed by biology alone or being identical across groups. So the idea that poorer people experience poorer health best captures this gradient.