Men’s health and embodiment

This project attempts to understand the complexity of men’s experiences of health and ill health within Aotearoa/New Zealand, using methods informed by critical studies of men. It will attempt to begin mapping some of the social resources used by men in Aotearoa to make sense of their health and rehabilitation, as well as attempting to understand the ways that men are understood and shaped in healthcare environments.

Men’s health research has grown significantly in the last two decades, but continues to be marginalised within policy and a wider health agenda in many countries, particularly in Aotearoa. Men’s experience of rehabilitation provide an opportunity to investigate their health and embodiment more generally, and their specific needs and expectations of rehabilitation practice. Examining men’s rehabilitation and health allows analysis of the ways that healthcare can be implicitly gendered, undermining some features of person-centred care. This project has purposively sampled for a diverse group of men in terms of age, sexuality, class, ethnicity, and type of illness or injury.

Further details

Method chapter

• Braun, V., Clarke, V., Hayfield, N., & Terry, G. (2018). Thematic analysis. In Liamputtong, P. (Eds.) Handbook of Research Methods in Health and Social Sciences. Springer. Uses men’s health data to illustrate process of doing a reflexive TA.

Oral presentation

• Terry, G. & Anstiss, D. (2017). Men in and out of health - Men’s experiences of embodiment within rehabilitative care. International Society of Critical Health Psychologists Biennial Conference, July 9-12, Loughborough, UK.