Projects

New project: “A pilot study to examine reproductive mental health experiences in culturally and linguistically diverse women from an intersectional perspective; and the preparation of an external research grant application to further this research”

There is a tension in current discourse surrounding women’s reproductive mental health between research that focuses primarily on the biological aspects of reproduction, and research that looks more critically at the social and cultural context of these health issues. Although there have been huge accomplishments with regards to acknowledging and responding to factors such as sex, gender, and socio-cultural diversity over the past decade of women’s health research and policy, the approaches that have been taken to date are limited, and many gaps in knowledge still exist.

There is a need for research using an intersectional approach in order to further understand and meaningfully respond to women’s reproductive health issues across the life span. The goal of this project is to follow-on from the systematic review and critical evaluation of different models of women’s reproductive mental health conducted by the group in 2011, to:

1. Collect pilot data on women’s reproductive mental health within culturally and linguistically diverse populations (CALD) in Australia, using an intersectional framework that acknowledges the interaction of ethnicity, social and economic class, sexuality and gender.
2. Coalesce an Evidence Panel with representation from multiple sectors (i.e., researchers, service providers, individuals with lived experience) and from relevant strands (i.e., gender, race, mental health, migration, trauma) who will collaborate to develop the methodology and study aims of the external grant application.
3. Based on the pilot data and the Evidence Panel discussions, to develop a proposal for a collaborative international research project which will be submitted to the Australian Research Council (ARC) and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).

“Theoretical approaches to the study of reproductive mental health: A focus on intersectionality” – Completed Project Summary:

There is a tension in current research on women’s reproductive mental health concerns between research that focuses primarily on the biological aspects of reproduction, and research that looks more critically at the social and cultural meanings attached to labels like premenstrual syndrome and postpartum depression (Ussher, 2010; Ussher & Perz, 2008). Further, there is a need to understand the experiences of marginalized women (including ethnoracial minority women, sexual minority women, disabled women, women of low socioeconomic status, among others) and the impact of social exclusion in relation to reproductive mental health.

For the first initiative of the Reproductive Mental Health Theme Group, we opted to conduct a literature review to describe the current state of research and resources addressing reproductive mental health among marginalized women, and in particular, to examine theoretical perspectives employed in this research.

This review encompassed a total of 415 sources from both academic and grey literature. Taken together, these sources indicate a number of critical gaps in the literature addressing reproductive mental health, specifically with regards to marginalized groups of women.

For some topics related to reproductive mental health (e.g., postpartum depression) research is beginning to address the diverse experiences of different groups of marginalized women through models that consider the determinants of health. However, the majority of research in this field has done so in a limited way, for instance, by looking at one-dimensional correlates of mental health and wellness (i.e. race and health) with the exclusion of the interaction of larger social factors that collectively shape health experiences. Further, menarche and menstruation, adoption, contraception, miscarriage and infertility are all areas that demonstrated significant gaps in knowledge.

In order to more fully understand the determinants of mental health and wellness throughout the lifespan of reproductive experiences, more research is needed in these areas that interrogates how the interactive nature of privilege and oppression and the unequal distribution of resources constrain and enable individuals ability to achieve and maintain control over their health.

The results of this literature review will guide the Reproductive Mental Health Theme Group as we determine the focus of our work for the coming years.

At the May 2011 Critical Inquiries Workshop the project team presented a project poster and handed out project pamphlets that contain the most up to date material currently available on this project.