Interdisciplinary Research in Public Health: Not quite straightforward (original) (raw)
Related papers
Assumptions, Ambiguities, and Possibilities in Interdisciplinary Population Health Research
Canadian Journal of Public Health, 2004
The rhetoric of "interdisciplinary," "multi-disciplinary," and "transdisciplinary" permeates many population health research projects, funding proposals, and strategic initiatives. Working across, with, and between disciplines is touted as a way to advance knowledge, answer more complex questions, and work more meaningfully with users of research. From our own experiences and involvement in the 2003 CIHR Institute for Public and Population Health's Summer Institute, interdisciplinary population health research (IPHR) remains ambiguously defined and poorly understood. In this commentary, we critically explore some characteristics and ongoing assumptions associated with IPHR and propose questions to ensure a more deliberate research process. It is our hope that population health researchers and the CIHR will consider these questions to help strengthen IPHR. La traduction du résumé se trouve à la fin de l'article.
Perspectives of clinician and biomedical scientists on interdisciplinary health research
Canadian Medical Association Journal, 2009
Interdisciplinary health research is a priority of many funding agencies. We surveyed clinician and biomedical scientists about their views on the value and funding of interdisciplinary health research. We conducted semistructured interviews with 31 biomedical and 30 clinician scientists. The scientists were selected from the 2000-2006 membership lists of peer-review committees of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. We investigated respondents' perspectives on the assumption that collaboration across disciplines adds value to health research. We also investigated their perspectives on funding agencies' growing support of interdisciplinary research. The 61 respondents expressed a wide variety of perspectives on the value of interdisciplinary health research, ranging from full agreement (22) to complete disagreement (11) that it adds value; many presented qualified viewpoints (28). More than one-quarter viewed funding agencies' growing support of interdisciplinary research as appropriate. Most (44) felt that the level of support was unwarranted. Arguments included the belief that current support leads to the creation of artificial teams and that a top-down process of imposing interdisciplinary structures on teams constrains scientists' freedom. On both issues we found contrasting trends between the clinician and the biomedical scientists. Despite having some positive views about the value of interdisciplinary research, scientists, especially biomedical scientists, expressed reservations about the growing support of interdisciplinary research.
Contribution of Social Science Disciplines to make Public Health Interdisciplinary
OIIRJ, 2019
The objective of the article is to explore the contribution of social science disciplines to make public health interdisciplinary. The term interdisciplinary is defined as "the synthesis of two or more disciplines, establishing a new level of discourse and integration of knowledge" (Bernard and Anita, 2006). Social science is the pillar of public health because they have significant role in shaping public health discipline. McKeown (1976), in his famous writing 'The Modern Rise in Population' demonstrated many evidences to show a pivotal role of social factor to enhance health status of the people. Public health as an interdisciplinary subject encompasses a number of social science disciplines like sociology, anthropology, economics, geography, demography, politics, law, along with environmental health, occupational health, epidemiology, biostatistics, nutrition, health education and mental health etc. Many social science disciplines like sociology, anthropology, economics, demography, geography, political science etc. carry a variety of methods and theories in the area of public health discipline and contributed to make public health interdisciplinary. Many developing countries have been experiencing the urbantechno-centric health approach ignoring the socioeconomic status of the rural, poor people. Poor are victims of both communicable as well as non-communicable chronic diseases in recent days. It is essential to make appropriate intervention on this based on scientific research findings.
Note to Readers "Addressing Complex, Societal Challenges through Interdisciplinary Research"
Volume4, issue 2, 2020
The complexity of societal problems drives the need for interdisciplinary research. For example, the current COVID-19 pandemic illustrates the need for various disciplines to address worldwide challenges. Clearly, epidemiologists in a well-funded public health system (Maani and Galea, 2020) are needed to generate the basic science on the disease spread. However, beyond the disciplinary boundaries of epidemiology are the need for public organizations to effectively collect and act on the data, coordinating between elected and appointed officials (Kirlin, 2020). Moreover, disciplines researching budgets and finance and connecting lessons learned across nations provide valued insights in understanding the varied dimensions of responding to the pandemic (Holzer and Newbold, 2020). The Journal of Interdisciplinary Sciences (JIS) welcome submission, offering an opportunity to bring together varied research traditions, across varied disciplines to address complex, dynamic societal problems.
REPAE - Revista de Ensino e Pesquisa em Administração e Engenharia
The corona pandemic has impacted every aspect of human life. It has impacted people on a social, cultural, religious, political, economic, physical, and psychological level. Vaccine research organisations globally are working hard to prepare more and more vaccinations that will help people. Many health institutes are providing medical care to those impacted by the corona. This pandemic poses a threat to everyone. The goal of this work is to emphasise the need of interdisciplinary research during corona pandemics. The current study was conducted using secondary data. The research was purely theoretical. The results of this research depicts that interdisciplinary research is negligible during this pandemic. Medical field is focus point of all in the research view point. Definitely this small attempt will attract the Governments, funding agencies, researchers and specialists from different fields to share a common platform to cope with the corona pandemic. Coronavirus is not just an i...
AIMS Public Health, 2016
The shortcomings of public health research informed by reductionist and fragmented biomedical approaches and the emergence of wicked problems are fueling a renewed interest in ecological approaches in public health. Despite the central role of interdisciplinarity in the context of ecological approaches in public health research, inadequate attention has been given to the specific challenge of doing interdisciplinary research in practice. As a result, important knowledge gaps exist with regards to the practice of interdisciplinary research. We argue that explicit attention towards the challenge of doing interdisciplinary research is critical in order to effectively apply ecological approaches to public health issues. This paper draws on our experiences developing and conducting an interdisciplinary research project exploring the links among climate change, water, and health to highlight five specific insights which we see as relevant to building capacity for interdisciplinary research specifically, and which have particular relevance to addressing the integrative challenges demanded by ecological approaches to address public health issues. These lessons include: (i) the need for frameworks that facilitate integration; (ii) emphasize learning-by-doing; (iii) the benefits of examining issues at multiple scales; (iv) make the implicit, explicit; and (v) the need for reflective practice. By synthesizing and sharing experiences gained by engaging in interdisciplinary inquiries using an ecological approach, this paper responds to a growing need to build interdisciplinary research capacity as a means for advancing the ecological public health agenda more broadly.
Interdisciplinary Research and Pandemics
LIAS Working Paper Series
The Leicester Institute for Advanced Studies (LIAS) was established in 2017 to provide a stimulating and collaborative environment for interdisciplinary research at the University of Leicester, and beyond. The programme of activity in LIAS has been designed to encourage and support researchers from across all academic disciplines to explore new ways of working together, and we have celebrated some amazing successes with interdisciplinary teams over the past three years. With the LIAS vision and values firmly embedded in the university’s research culture, we are always looking for new ways to support interdisciplinary excellence – and 2020 presented a new challenge and opportunity for LIAS in the form of the global COVID-19 pandemic.The COVID-19 crisis is a global challenge that highlights why interdisciplinary research is so important, and it provides LIAS with an exciting opportunity to launch our first thematic programme of activity. The aim of this approach is to catalyse and gal...
Multidisciplinary public health: Leading from the front?
Public Health, 2007
This article argues that public health historically evolved in Britain as a multidisciplinary project. The return to its multidisciplinary roots remains an essential but insufficient condition for its future success. Despites its partemergence from the 'new public health', institutional public health is hampered by short-term strategies and a preoccupation with evidence when it requires a more powerful analysis of contemporary society, a more imaginative engagement with political structures culture and communications, and an embrace of ecological approaches in place of national public health strategies of surrogate consumerism.