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Biosocial Approaches to Health and Environment (EASA conference Barcelona 23–26 July 2024)

Datum
23. Juli – 26. Juli 2024 

Invi­ta­tion to con­tri­bu­tions to the pan­el „Bioso­cial Approach­es to Health and Envi­ron­ment” at the upcom­ing EASA con­fer­ence in Barcelona (23–26 July 2024)


Pan­el „Bioso­cial Approach­es to Health and Environment”

EASA con­fer­ence in Barcelona
Date: 23–26 July 2024
CfP dead­line: 22 Jan­u­ary 2024.

Short Abstract:
This pan­el dis­cuss­es how anthro­pol­o­gists can con­tribute to col­lab­o­ra­tive efforts in study­ing envi­ron­men­tal impacts on (ill)health by com­plex­i­fy­ing ‘the social’ and ask­ing how such col­lab­o­ra­tions might lead to more tractable tar­gets for bioso­cial­ly informed eco­log­i­cal health and pol­i­cy interventions.
Long Abstract:

Increas­ing­ly, social deter­mi­nants and mate­r­i­al ele­ments are being con­sid­ered rel­e­vant forms of expo­sure that have direct impacts on envi­ron­men­tal (ill)health (e.g. in expo­some or urban men­tal health research). This reflects shifts in fields such as epi­demi­ol­o­gy in recog­nis­ing how envi­ron­men­tal con­di­tions are not sim­ply ‘resid­ual’ or ‘con­found­ing’ risk fac­tors but in fact ‘over-arch­ing deter­mi­nants’ of (ill)health (Vineis 2022).

Yet mea­sure­ments and def­i­n­i­tions of ‘the social’ in such research are often con­cep­tu­al­ly sim­plis­tic, empir­i­cal­ly thin and lack an under­stand­ing of the dynam­ic and sit­u­at­ed inter­play of socio-eco­log­i­cal vari­ables (Man­ning 2019; Söder­ström n.d.). While epi­demi­o­log­i­cal stud­ies have iden­ti­fied high-lev­el social vari­ables (SES, eth­nic­i­ty, pop­u­la­tion den­si­ty) asso­ci­at­ed with (ill)health, ethno­graph­ic stud­ies have shown how com­plex envi­ron­men­tal con­di­tions emerge and are dealt with in sit­u­at­ed every­day life (Bis­ter et al. 2016; Rose/Fitzgerald 2022).

There is an urgent need for more effec­tive trans­dis­ci­pli­nary engage­ment that can attend to com­plex­i­ty in exam­in­ing the socio-envi­ron­men­tal (Lappé/Hein 2020) where urban/rural/developing envi­ron­ments, cli­mates and health are inter­act­ing but also con­sid­ers how exact­ly col­lab­o­ra­tion can be part of ‘mak­ing bet­ter num­bers’ (Roberts 2021)

In this pan­el, we will reflect on efforts by anthro­pol­o­gists to devel­op col­lab­o­ra­tive bioso­cial research rel­e­vant to exam­ine the com­plex dynam­ics of health and envi­ron­ment. We will con­sid­er the con­cep­tu­al and method­olog­i­cal con­tri­bu­tion of anthro­pol­o­gy in new­ly evolv­ing bioso­cial epidemiologic/biomedical research on health and envi­ron­ments, what form of inter- and trans­dis­ci­pli­nary approach­es are required, and in what ways these might lead to more tractable tar­gets for bioso­cial­ly informed eco­log­i­cal health and pol­i­cy interventions.

Con­vened by by Patrick Biel­er Tech­ni­cal Uni­ver­si­ty of Munich (Tech­ni­cal Uni­ver­si­ty Miu­nich), Sahra Gib­bon and Rosie Math­ers (Uni­ver­si­ty Col­lege London) 

More info here