Journal article
Performing piety in sexual health research: gender, health and evangelical Christianities in a Mexican human papillomavirus (HPV) study
Anthropology & Medicine: The Fragile Medical: The Slippery Terrain between Medicine, Anthropology and Societies, Vol.24(3), pp.334-349
09/02/2017
DOI: 10.1080/13648470.2017.1284999
PMID: 28292201
Abstract
Recent research suggests that health surveillance experiences like clinical trial participation might have unanticipated social consequences. I investigate how evangelical Christians participating in longitudinal, observational sexual health research incorporate that long-term medical surveillance into their religious practice. This exploratory research focuses on Mexican Cristianos' participation in the Cuernavaca arm of the multinational 'Human Papillomavirus in Men' ('HIM') study, which tested men for the common and usually asymptomatic sexually transmitted infection human papillomavirus (HPV) over time. I draw on interviews with heterosexual male research participants and their female partners throughout their medical research involvement, and data from church-based participant observation, to understand how couples framed the HIM study as an arena for performing piety. I argue that evangelical understandings of piety as moral practice encouraged participants to view long-term sexual health surveillance as assistance for living out the health, gender, and marital behaviors promoted by their congregations. This finding suggests that health research designers and ethics committees should consider the health and social outcomes of research participants' agentive incorporation of religious observance into study protocols.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Performing piety in sexual health research: gender, health and evangelical Christianities in a Mexican human papillomavirus (HPV) study
- Creators
- Emily Wentzell - Department of Anthropology, University of Iowa
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Anthropology & Medicine: The Fragile Medical: The Slippery Terrain between Medicine, Anthropology and Societies, Vol.24(3), pp.334-349
- DOI
- 10.1080/13648470.2017.1284999
- PMID
- 28292201
- NLM abbreviation
- Anthropol Med
- ISSN
- 1364-8470
- eISSN
- 1469-2910
- Publisher
- Routledge
- Grant note
- University of Iowa (10.13039/100008893) University of Iowa Old Gold Fellowship
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 09/02/2017
- Academic Unit
- International Studies; Anthropology; Interdisciplinary Programs
- Record Identifier
- 9983983663302771
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