scholarly journals Missing in Action: Sex and Gender in Substance Use Research

Author(s):  
Lorraine Greaves

Substance use and misuse is a significant global health issue that requires a sex- and gender-based analysis. Substance use patterns and trends are gendered: that is, women and men, girls and boys, and gender-diverse people often exhibit different rates of use of substances, reasons for use, modes of administration, and effects of use. Sex-specific effects and responses to substances are also important, with various substances affecting females and males differentially. Nevertheless, much research and practice in responding to substance use and misuse remains gender blind, ignoring the impacts of sex and gender on this important health issue. This special issue identifies how various aspects of sex and gender matter in substance use, illustrates the application of sex- and gender-based analyses to a range of substances, populations and settings, and assists in progressing sex and gender science in relation to substance use.

2021 ◽  
pp. 001458582199184
Author(s):  
Danila Cannamela

In her debut book Dolore minimo, Giovanna Cristina Vivinetto engages in a reflection on motherhood to recount an autobiographical story of gender self-determination and male to female transition. This article explores Vivinetto’s poetry as the retelling of transformative moments in two mother–daughter relationships, which generate a reshaping of life and language. In the book, these two storylines intersect, blur, and even overlap, creating a poetic discourse in which the maternal acts simultaneously as powerful catalyzer and producer of meanings. In discussing how, in Dolore minimo, the relationship of two atypical mothers becomes the creative site of a new possible symbolic order, my analysis engages an atypical approach: it reads Vivinetto’s queer representation of motherhood via the theorization developed by the women of Diotima—including, in particular, Luisa Muraro, Chiara Zamboni, Diana Sartori, and Ida Dominijanni. These feminist thinkers have been generally criticized for reinforcing binary understandings of sex and gender, based on an essentialist view of the category of woman. Yet, what if the feminism forwarded by Diotima, by positioning the feminine as a creative producer and first-person narrator of change, could still offer a productive avenue for dialogue? The article begins with a discussion of Diotima’s key theorizations, which lays the groundwork for interpreting the maternal poetics of Dolore minimo. The subsequent sections examine in more depth how Vivinetto’s poetry has reinvented the figure of the mother as a teacher and learner of new words, and how, through this reinvention, she has crafted a maternal language that knits together new relations of contiguity and change. Ultimately, by redeploying the figure of the mother beyond cisgender norms, Vivinetto’s poetry is revealing the inexhaustible vitality of this character.


2018 ◽  
Vol 55 (6) ◽  
pp. 787-794 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy L. Gower ◽  
G. Nic Rider ◽  
Camille Brown ◽  
Barbara J. McMorris ◽  
Eli Coleman ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 32-44
Author(s):  
Yvonne Gordon ◽  
Christine Stephens

INTRODUCTION: Methamphetamine (MA) misuse is a recognised health issue in Aotearoa New Zealand, and there is a lack of appropriate treatment available for individuals who are methamphetamine dependent. This exploratory study, undertaken in 2019, sought to gain insight from individuals in Aotearoa who have experienced MA dependence and now identify as being in recovery, to discover which strategies, approaches or treatment appeared helpful in their recovery.METHODS: The participants in the study were seven adults (New Zealand European, Samoan and Māori ethnicity) who had abstained from methamphetamine for six months or more. In-depth interviews were audiotaped and transcribed before being analysed. The data were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis, which has its theoretical origins in phenomenology and hermeneutics.FINDINGS: Four themes emerged to describe the lived experience of recovery from methamphetamine misuse: Getting Away, Support, Personal Sources of Strength, and Treatment. Each theme held importance in the participants’ recovery from MA and provided insight into their journey in abstaining and being in recovery.CONCLUSIONS: These findings may be used to assist others entering recovery. The present findings are limited by the size of the sample; however, they provide valuable information on this important health issue as a basis for further research, which is urgently needed in Aotearoa.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gulya Nazarovna Alimbayeva ◽  
Gulzhan Narimbayevna Chimbayeva

In recent decades, adolescent pregnancy has become an important health issue in a great number of both developed and developing countries.We have investigated the official statistics database of the National Ministry of the Health (MoH) and their #13 Statutory Form (SF) and found the total number of abortions between 2007-2011 in Kazakhstan decreased by 28%. The total number of adolescent (≤15 and 15-18 years of age) abortions decreased by 52.7%. Contrary to this decrease in the total number of adolescent abortions, spontaneous abortions have increased from 23.2% to 45.0%. We found a tendency towards a decrease in the number of adolescents with the first pregnancy among adolescents 15-18 who had abortion between 2007-2011, from 51.3% to 35.8%. This clearly reflects the success of prevention activities among adolescents who have already had an abortion or birth. During the analyzed period, there were two lethal outcomes from abortions among girls 15-18 years old. There are some limitations in the assessment levels and dynamic changes of abortions among adolescents due to the division of age in the official statistical database.


Author(s):  
Callaghan Walter

LAY SUMMARY Taking as a starting point that sex and gender are not the same thing, a principal understanding of Gender-Based Analysis Plus (GBA+), this article reviews research published in 2020 on the health and well-being of Veterans and currently serving members of the Canadian Armed Forces. The purpose of this review was to see how sex and gender were referred to in this published literature. The published research tended not to differentiate between sex and gender, often using the two terms as though they referred to the same thing. Possible reasons for why this has happened are explored, as is the importance of treating sex and gender as fundamentally different things.


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