Skin infection, housing and social circumstances in children living in remote Indigenous communities: testing conceptual and methodological approaches

BACKGROUND: Poor housing conditions in remote Indigenous communities in Australia are a major underlying factor in poor child health, including high rates of skin infections. The aim of this study is to test approaches to data collection, analysis and feedback for a follow-up study of the impact of housing conditions on child health. METHODS: Participation was negotiated in three communities with community councils and individual participants. Data were collected by survey of dwelling condition, interviews, and audit health centre records of children aged under seven years. Community feedback comprised immediate report of items requiring urgent repair followed by a summary descriptive report. Multivariate models were developed to calculate adjusted incidence rate ratios (IRR) for skin infections and their association with aspects of household infrastructure. RESULTS: There was a high level of participation in all communities. Health centre records were inadequate for audit in one community. The records of 138 children were available for development of multivariate analytic models. Rates of skin infection in dwellings that lacked functioning facilities for removing faeces or which had concrete floors may be up to twice as high as for other dwellings, and the latter association appears to be exacerbated by crowding. Younger children living in older dwellings may also be at approximately two-fold higher risk. A number of socioeconomic and socio-demographic variables also appear to be directly associated with high rates of skin infections. CONCLUSION: The methods used in the pilot study were generally feasible, and the analytic approach provides meaningful results. The study provides some evidence that new and modern housing is contributing to a reduction in skin infections in Aboriginal children in remote communities, particularly when this housing leads to a reduction in crowding and the effective removal of human waste

“The world around me”: The environment and single women

The “environment” has often been taken as a backdrop for feminist research and theory, as a setting within which issues of feminist concern are played out. This environment, however, is not a neutral setting; rather, research over the past 15 years has evidenced the assumptions about “a woman's place” as a man's wife literally built into women's worlds. Space speaks, and the stories it tells center around particular and identifiable assumptions about gender and where a woman “should” be, when, and with whom. Unmarried women are in a unique position in this environment: they are subjected not only to the economic disadvantages and social subjugation of being a woman, but also to the social and economic drawbacks of being single in a couple-oriented society and in an environment they see as not built for them. Although research exists on the sexism in the physical environment, on women's economic and social position, and on singlehood, a need exists to bridge these areas to explore how single women experience their singlehood, their womanhood, and the environment in their everyday lives and decision making. I conducted in-depth interviews with 25 single women, 23 white and 2 African-American women, about their experiences of living single. This article, based on the results of those interviews and a series of focus group discussions, examines how single women negotiate and respond to their necessary environmental decisions about housing, transportation, and leisure activities in an environment not likely to be conducive to their ways of life.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/45605/1/11199_2005_Article_BF01544591.pd

Conceptualising and Measuring Social Capital as a Sustainable Development Strategy in Mewat Region, Haryana

This paper attempts to conceptualize and measure social capital as a sustainable development strategy in Mewat region, Haryana. Social capital resides in relations of the people that they can use for their benefits. Social capital here is reconceptualised as an instrumental use of social relations for the mutual benefit of the communities. Social capital is contextual and is best captured as a multidimensional variable. For lack of secondary data, this study relies on a primary field survey of ten sample Panchayat Villages in Mewat, Haryana. Sample Panchayats are identified through cluster random sampling and use measures of associatedness (economic, social and political), relations of production, institutions, social cohesion, and social pathologies as a set of variables. A mixed methods approach is used to analyze the variables. The empirical results show that socio-cultural activity has the highest level of associatedness followed by economic and political activities. The results show that self-help groups are an important source of social capital along with associatedness in socio-cultural activities, increase in mutually beneficial production relations, vibrant institutions and strong social cohesion. The paper concludes that social capital along with economic capital can be employed as a strategy of sustainable development in Mewat region, Haryana