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- Convenors:
-
Sahra Gibbon
(University College London (UCL))
Carrie Ryan (University College London)
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- Format:
- Panel
- Sessions:
- Friday 21 January, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract:
The Covid-19 pandemic is undoubtedly a biosocial phenomenon. This panel reflect on how biosocial medical anthropology and related cross-disciplinary engagements might best align concepts, tools and methods that are responsive to these changing social and biological dynamics.
Long Abstract:
The Covid-19 pandemic is undoubtedly a biosocial phenomenon that requires a much more meaningful alignment between the biological and social that can address, understand and intervene on these complex interactions and also develop appropriate interventions. This is apparent as much in the growing relevance of the Anthropocene in the emergence of the coronavirus and its likely zoonotic origin, as it is in the co-evolution of social lives and new variants. But it is also evident in how the pandemic (and effects to mitigate it )has unmasked and underlined the uneven embodied effects of social inequalities such as gender, race, income and age. Yet despite the emerging biosocial reality of the pandemic there are significant challenges in developing cross disciplinary dialogue, methods and research that can address and examine these dynamics.
In this panel we invite contributors to reflect on how biosocial medical anthropology and related cross-disciplinary engagements might better align specific concepts, tools, methods and methodological designs that are responsive to the lived changing social and biological realities of the pandemic. Papers might for example consider the following questions: What is the place of ethnography in pandemic focused biosocial research? How can evolutionary and ethnographic perspectives be aligned? How can archival and longitudinal data be better integrated into biosocial medical anthropology research on the pandemic? What are the potentials and pitfalls of translating knowledge and understanding across different disciplinary vernaculars?
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Friday 21 January, 2022, -Paper short abstract:
Biosocial research provides unique cross-disciplinary insights into COVID-19, presenting opportunities and challenges to COVID policymaking. This study reviews biosocial studies included in COVID policy to identify comparative lessons between biosocial research and multi-source evidence for policy
Paper long abstract:
Biosocial medical anthropological research provides unique insights into the multi-dimensional nature of COVID-19, drawing in cross-disciplinary approaches to understand underlying complexities and inequalities leading to differentiated health outcomes. Alongside a suite of concepts, tools, methods and methodological designs, biosocial medical anthropological studies provide outputs that can speak to debates within and between alternative fields of study. These cross-disciplinary engagements present simultaneous opportunities and challenges to policymaking in response to COVID; as the pandemic continues, governments must continuously evaluate emerging sources of evidence to improve the design and evaluation their responses, yet their capacities to do so are constrained by experience, expertise, and resources.
This paper explores the relationships between biosocial medical anthropological research and UK policymaking for COVID-19. Starting with a case study review of how biosocial anthropological studies are included (and excluded) as evidence in policy processes, this paper develops a core argument by identifying comparative lessons between biosocial engagements with cross- and trans-disciplinary research, and the challenges of using multi-source evidence to inform policy. Building on contemporary by authors such as Bardosh et al. (2020) on the inclusion of social research in preparedness and response, this study identifies the challenges posed by ‘disciplinary primacies’ and the siloing of knowledge as common to both biosocial anthropological research and policymaking in complex health emergencies.
Paper short abstract:
The declarative mapping sentence offers a comprehensive framework for integrating disparate forms of research in a way that doesn't distort the intent or content of each distinctive type of information. Furthermore it allows for a greater understanding of the information integration as a whole.
Paper long abstract:
Covid-19 has numerous facets and variables, namely the aspects of transmission, morbidity, mortality, recovery, peoples’ reactions, and intervention strategies. The ways in which countries and regions have attempted to address and mitigate its effects are similarly multivariate and complex. Furthermore, the responses of individuals and social groups are also intricate with few specific aspects of the virus or responses to the infection having clear and isolatable effects. In order to better understand the human interrelationship and consequences of Covid-19 we propose that multiple sources of information must be combined in a manner that respects the integrity of each information form whilst attempting to develop a greater understanding of the pandemic as a whole.
The declarative mapping sentence (DMS) provides a reflexive framework that responds to input from a wide variety of sources. It doesn't impose a structure upon data but the responsive framework is transportable from one situation and data source to another, reacting to each by allowing modifications. The DMS forms an initial structure for designing and conducting research and its adapted form may represent the outcome.
The flexible template of the DMS stimulates cumulative knowledge development, avoiding the imposition of assumptions present in a more rigid design and analysis system: The DMS creates the space necessary for knowledge emergence. Employing an adaptive and trustworthy research framework is imperative when translating knowledge across different disciplinary vernaculars and may be pivotal in aligning ethnographic and evolutionary perspectives within the anthropocene epoch and moreover the ever transforming biosocial medical anthropological sphere.
Paper short abstract:
Using data from a longitudinal online social network survey of postnatal UK mothers, we illustrate ways quantitative and qualitative research methods, along with insights from evolutionary theory, can be combined to provide insights into social support and postnatal depression during COVID-19.
Paper long abstract:
Postnatal depression (PND) had a pre-COVID-19 estimated prevalence ranging up to 23% in Europe. Low social support is a key risk factor for developing PND; this is perhaps unsurprising, as humans evolved as cooperative childrearers, reliant on social support. Social restrictions designed to limit viral transmission have created unprecedented alterations to maternal support access.
Using data from an ongoing longitudinal online social network survey (May 2020 – September 2021) of UK mothers, we illustrate ways quantitative and qualitative research methods, in conjunction with insights from evolutionary theory, can be combined to provide insights into maternal wellbeing at this time.
Rates of PND were high: 47.5% (May-June 2020), 32.8% (July 2020), 51.3% (late 2020), 54.0% (February 2021), 38.2% (September 2021). Regression modelling found that the number of network members seen in-person, and remote communication with a higher proportion of those not seen, was negatively associated with PND. However, contact with a higher proportion of relatives was positively associated, suggesting kin risked seeing mothers in need. The more hours of childcare per week a mother received from her network, the lower her symptoms. Thematic qualitative analysis of open text responses found that mothers experienced a burden of constant mothering, inadequacy of virtual contact, and sadness and worries about lost social opportunities, while support from partners facilitated family bonding.
While Western childrearing norms focus on intensive parenting, and fathers are key caregivers, our results highlight that it still “takes a village” to raise children and UK mothers are struggling in its absence.