Dal contesto mi sembra di capire che in questo caso caratteri si riferisce ad aspetti del contesto sociale.
Io tradurrei come "Aspect of social status...should be considered"

I would use "characteristics" here. It seems to be the closest word relevant in this case.

Concordo con l'interpretazione di Ross..solo che mi sono ricordata di aver visto spesso anche il termine "dimensions" (che infatti a volte traduco in italiano con "aspetti"..)

Dimensions of social inequality in the health of women in England ...
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www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11218179
Using path analysis, data from the Health Survey for England (1993) are used to
demonstrate how different dimensions of social position (working conditions, ...

http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/dimens...
Aspect; element: "He's a good newsman, and he has that extra dimension" (William S. Paley).

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Note added at 6 hrs (2013-03-21 00:35:48 GMT)
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The strength of two indicators of social position on oral health ...
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www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16468465 - Simili
OBJECTIVE: The objective of the present study is to analyze how two dimensions
of social position, education and social class, are associated with oral health ...
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Social inequalities in health by individual and household measures ...
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jech.bmj.com/content/57/1/56.full - Simili
Different dimensions of social position may have different underlying causal ...
Sacker et al7 found that different dimensions of social position had distinct ...