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Knowledge production, communication and utilization in late modern Sweden: Studying biomedical alcohol research Alexandra Bogren, PhD, SoRAD. Outline of the presentation. The biomedical shift Why the alcohol field? The research project: questions and methods Methodological considerations.
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Knowledge production, communication and utilization in late modern Sweden: Studying biomedical alcohol research Alexandra Bogren, PhD, SoRAD
Outline of the presentation • The biomedical shift • Why the alcohol field? • The research project: questions and methods • Methodological considerations
The biomedical shift Current innovations and transformations in biomedical science and technology affect ideas about our bodies, health (e.g., healthy – unhealthy; safe – at risk) and responsibility for health problems (e.g., social – individual responsibility, etc). (Clarke et al 2010, Midanik 2006).
Why the alcohol field? Alcohol policy Biomedical research A tendency to focus the individual’s responsibility for her own health. Reduces individual moral culpability (cf. the disease model). Epigenetics: how lifestyle choices may affect future generations (controversial). • Historically, Swedish alcohol policy has been about collective social responsibility (the welfare state). • Now, a tendency to individualize drinking problems, in the wake of liberalization.
The research project • How do biomedical alcohol researchers produce knowledge about addiction?Which epistemologies, assumptions, and values do they bring to their work, and how do these affect the research outputs? • Ethnography & interviews (research settings), research proposals.
a) How do policymakers and stakeholders understand and use results from biomedical alcohol research? (b) What is the relation between media coverage and policy proposals? • Policy documents & documents from the Medical Products Agency, interviews, longitudinal analysis of newspaper articles and subsequent policy attention & policy action.
How are the results from biomedical alcohol research conceptualized and communicated in the new electronic media, in particular websites and blogs for patient/interest organizations? Analysis of the content and the dissemination patterns of websites and blogs for patient/interest organizations in the alcohol and drug field (e.g., RFHL, RNS, FMN, Swedish Drug Users Union).
Methodological considerations Ethnography: • Daily practiceof researchers (experiments in the lab, discussions at meetings, instructions, computerizedwork, lectures, etc). • Observing practice and “talk-in-interaction” vs interviewing researchers about their practice? • Our solution: both – observing practice & talk result in different types of data compared to interviewing. • In addition, research as described for reviewers at research conuncils (research proposals). Interviews: • Government officials, industry representatives, and NGO representatives views, motives and communication. • Informants vs respondents? • Our solution: informants acting as guides to a process.
Expand the project: the scope of researchers’ attitudes to research practice & communication. • Survey to biomedical alcohol researchers. • National/international? • How to get researchers to reply (time consuming)?
General issues • How to combine the different types of knowledge gained? • Case study (Alvesson & Kärreman 2011). • Friction, breakdowns and “mysteries” as constructive rather than destructive. • Knowledges produced in our project: • Different outlooks on the field (production, consumption, utilization). • Created through a multiperspective approach (situated knowledges; knowledges from the inside & the outside).
