The practice of medicine is rapidly more biomedicalized: highly scientific and technological, with enhanced access to increased amounts of new medications. The changes are not strictly medical. Biomedicalized treatment has also created and entrenched cultural messages focused on reducing risks and optimizing health. Social science research has shown that this new style of medicine can significantly influence behavior, both inside and outside the clinical setting. Findings from research on biomedicalized treatment have led to new questions, such as whether or not pharmaceutical use affects cultural practices. The research supported by this award will explore such questions through the lens of addiction treatment. This project, which trains a graduate in methods of rigorous, empirically-grounded scientific fieldwork, examines whether addiction treatment and addiction pharmaceutical use influences mothering practices and identities. In addition to providing funding for the training of a graduate student in anthropology, findings will be disseminated to organizations and individuals involved in optimal health care delivery.
Kelley Kampman, under the supervision of Dr. Lee Hoffer of Case Western University, will explore what influence biomedicalized addiction treatment has on mothering practices. Scientific advances in addiction medicine have led to the creation of new pharmaceuticals, such as Suboxone, and new methodologies such as medication-assisted treatment (MAT). These new medications are framed as a way to both treat their disease and improve their mothering practices. Despite discourses that link the use of addiction medications and the enhancement of mothering practices, there is little understanding of how mothers respond to these messages. The objectives of the project are (1) to understand how pregnant women seeking undergoing addiction treatment understand and respond to an addiction treatment program, and (2) to examine if and how current addiction treatment program practices influence mothering practices. Situated in Northeast Ohio, at the center of the current opioid epidemic, the researcher will conduct 16 months of fieldwork among a purposive sample of program patients (n=40) in a MAT program and program staff. Data will be collected using a mix of social science methods including interviews with both patients and their healthcare providers, surveys, case studies, and participant observation in the treatment program and outside the program in the women's daily lives. Findings from this research will improve our understanding of how people interact with pharmaceuticals, how pharmaceuticals influence cultural behaviors and concepts of self, and provide information on the lived experiences of pregnancy and addiction which has largely been absent in research and public policy discussions.
