Suchergebnisse

This article discusses sociotechnical challenges of technology-based interventions to address loneliness in later life. We bring together participatory and multidisciplinary research conducted in Canada and Australia to explore the limits of digital technologies to help tackle loneliness among frail older people (aged 65+). Drawing on three case studies, we focus on instances when technology-based interventions, such as communication apps, were limiting or failed, seeming to enhance rather than lessen loneliness. We also unpack instances where the technologies being considered did not match participants' social needs and expectations, preventing adoption, use, and the intended outcomes. To better grasp the negative unintended consequences of these technological interventions, we combine a relational sociological approach to loneliness with the Strong Structuration Theory developed by sociologist Rob Stones. This combined lens highlights the connection between sociotechnical factors and their agentic and structural contexts, facilitating a rich understanding of why and when technologies fail and limit.

This edited collection provides a comprehensive overview of ethical issues associated with visual research methods. Considering the work of researchers across a range of disciplines using visual methods in research, it offers practical and thoughtful discussions of emerging methodological and ethical dilemmas in innovative projects using visual methods, either in combination with other methods or as a stand-alone method to answer new kinds of research questions. Both synthesizing central themes and addressing ethical issues particularly relevant to specific research topics, in various settings and from various disciplinary perspectives, it considers how researchers navigate and conceptualise ethical issues. With contributions discussing research conducted in Australia, Argentina, Canada, India, Korea, Norway and the United Kingdom, the book's international scope, disciplinary breadth and the range of methods and research contexts addressed will notably appeal to those seeking to understand the value, and potential ethical risks, of visual methodologies for social research

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to examine how pregnant women with type 1 diabetes integrate new information technology (IT) into their health management activities, using activity theory as an analytical framework.Design/methodology/approach– The research is a multiple case design, based on interviews with 15 women with type 1 diabetes who were pregnant, considering pregnancy, or had recently given birth. A thematic analysis, sensitised by activity theory, was used to analyse the data.Findings– Health management in this setting involves negotiations and contradictions across boundaries of interacting activities. Participants play an active role in managing their health and using new IT tools in particular ways to support their health management. Using new technologies creates both opportunities and challenges. IT-enabled healthcare devices and other information systems open up new treatment possibilities, but also generate new contradictions between interacting activity systems.Research limitations/implications– The research was conducted with a small sample in a specific context of health management. Further research is needed to extend the findings to other contexts.Practical implications– Healthcare providers need to accommodate a bottom-up approach to the adoption and use of new technologies in settings where empowered patients play an active role in managing their health.Originality/value– The findings highlight opportunities to further develop activity theory to accommodate the central role that individuals play in resolving inherent contradictions and achieving alignment between multiple interacting activity systems when incorporating new IT tools into health management activities.