Commentary Piece Research Articles

Algorithmic folk theories and peer review: on the importance of valuing participant expertise (commentary)

ABSTRACT Through this brief commentary piece, I discuss the challenges and opportunities of submitting academic work on hidden forms of content moderation such as shadowbanning and malicious flagging, and the difficulty of balancing dated notions of academic rigour with investigating an issue that is often connected with an absence of data from powerful stakeholders. In doing so, I address how peer review can inadvertently reinforce the inequalities of content moderation, aiding platform companies in the discrediting, victim-blaming and gaslighting of their users by replicating unequal and patriarchal behaviours adopted by various authorities when victims come forward to report violence and injustice, while also rejecting the benefits of taking user experience into account when designing and governing social media.

On Pandemics Being Productive

ABSTRACT: How can and do pandemic events become productive for everyday human experiences of death and dying? This social thought and commentary piece’s central argument examines the productive potential of pandemics, specifically COVID-19, by focusing on the early impact of the coronavirus in 2020 and its longer-term ripple effects. By grounding this personal essay in these early reflections on an extremely intense period of both personal and global chaos, it is possible to begin discussing what future historians, anthropologists, and academics in related fields might glimpse when looking backward. It is also important to begin understanding how future pandemic response plans will emerge, building on the failures of 2020, in order to manage yet unknown global pandemics. One key takeaway for this planning work is to avoid defaulting into the essay’s core theoretical point, a concept I call virological determinism, where societal inequalities amplifying pandemic-related effects are entirely blamed on a virus and not the underlying social conditions caused by government negligence. By reflecting on the productive possibilities created by pandemics, it is also then possible to begin understanding how many more people died during the early years of COVID-19 than ever needed to.

‘Behind bars, beyond borders’: solidarity in the face of the criminalisation of a social work human rights defender

This commentary piece is written by Bilal Yildiz, a social worker in Turkey and a human rights defender. It tells the story of his arrest on trumped-up charges and the continuing threat to his freedom as a result of his social work activities. Bilal graduated from Istanbul University, Department of Social Work, and continues his master’s programme in human rights law at Istanbul Bilgi University. He has been working as a social worker at the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey since 2016. In addition to his professional work, he has been active in many professional and human rights organisations. He is currently a board member of the Association of Social Workers, a member of the Human Rights Association, a member of the Kurdish Studies Association and a founding member of the Migration Monitoring Association.

A framework for understanding the Horn of Africa

This commentary piece offers a framework for understanding the situations encountered in the Horn of Africa sub-region. It offers something of a ‘framework within a framework’ by highlighting a series of issues and factors that must be unpacked to understand better the context of the Horn and the situations encountered therein, which we believe would aid leadership theorists and practitioners

Imaging in Type 1 Diabetes, Current Perspectives and Directions.

Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is characterized by the autoimmune-mediated attack of insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, leading to reliance on exogenous insulin to control a patient's blood glucose levels. As progress is being made in understanding the pathophysiology of the disease and how to better develop therapies to treat it, there is an increasing need for monitoring technologies to quantify beta cell mass and function throughout T1D progression and beta cell replacement therapy. Molecular imaging techniques offer a possible solution through both radiologic and non-radiologic means including positron emission tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, electron paramagnetic resonance imaging, and spatial omics. This commentary piece outlines the role of molecular imaging in T1D research and highlights the need for further applications of such methodologies in T1D.

Urban inequality – methods, flows and state processes

As DeVerteuil asserts, urban studies should engage anew with matters of inequality and social justice. In this commentary piece, additional perspectives on this task are offered, drawing on research on community action and austerity. These include the importance of paying attention to the importance of ‘small’ practices, feelings and affects as constitutive of urban politics, which can be accessed via ethnography; attending to the digital as it remakes city fabrics and communities; and new explorations of state processes drawing on feminist and psycho-social approaches.

Data on Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC)-Owned Businesses: What's Out There and What Can Be Done?

Decades into the digital era, publicly available data on Black, indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) owned businesses are still remarkably lacking. In this commentary piece, the authors cover recent literature on the importance of BIPOC-owned businesses for equitable growth and BIPOC wealth-building. The authors then examine the sources of data that are available – public and private – for tracking the success or failure of such businesses. A BIPOC business database was constructed from a variety of sources and used by the authors to examine the potential pitfalls of such exercises. The authors close with a call for better data collection on BIPOC businesses.

Paved with good intentions: How our systems intersect to create health disparities for multiply marginalized youth.

Youth who hold multiply marginalized identities often experience barriers in accessing care following psychiatric hospitalization METHODOLOGY: The following commentary piece shares a case amalgamation from a multidisciplinary gender clinic in a tertiary care children's hospital which illustrates the myriad of ways that our current mental healthcare systems fail to connect youth efficiently and effectively to the evidence-based, culturally relevant, and affirming care that they require, particularly youth experiencing overlapping systems of discrimination and disadvantage. This piece highlights the inaccessibility of dialectical behavior therapy for multiply marginalized youth, and outlines suggestions for improving access to high-quality care for minoritized youth engaging in suicidal behavior.

Rural nutrition and dietetics research-Future directions.

The aim of this study was to summarise key evidence from recent Australian rural nutrition research and provide recommendations for future nutrition and dietetics research with rural communities. Clear evidence demonstrates that diet plays a role in the health gap between rural and metropolitan Australia. Despite the opportunity to address the health of rural Australians through better nutrition, alarmingly low investment in nutrition and dietetics research has occurred historically, and over the past decade. A review of the evidence was undertaken by rural nutrition and dietetics leaders to provide a commentary piece to inform future rural nutrition research efforts. Establishing strong, collaborative place-based nutrition and dietetics research teams are necessary to combat the significant gaps in the scientific knowledge of solutions to improve nutrition in rural Australia. Further, dieticians and nutritionists who live in and understand the rural contexts are yet to be fully harnessed in research, and better engaging with these professionals will have the best chance of successfully addressing the nutrition-related disease disparity between rural and metropolitan Australia.

Perspectives on the scientific legacy of J. Philip Grime

Abstract Perhaps as much as any other scientist in the 20th century, J.P. Grime transformed the study of plant ecology and helped shepherd the field toward international prominence as a nexus of ideas related to global environmental change. Editors at the Journal of Ecology asked a group of senior plant ecologists to comment on Grime's scientific legacy. This commentary piece includes individual responses of 14 scientists from around the world attesting to Grime's foundational role in plant functional ecology, including his knack for sparking controversy, his unique approach to theory formulation involving clever experiments and standardized trait measurements of large numbers of species, and the continued impact of his work on ecological science and policy.

Food insecurity among Asian Americans: A scoping review protocol.

Food insecurity is prevalent in the U.S. and is associated with deleterious health, behavioral, and social consequences. Food insecurity is currently addressed largely through public and private food assistance programs (e.g., the Supplementary Nutrition Assistance Program, and food pantries). A body of research has explored racial and ethnic disparities and differences in food insecurity and coping strategies. However, limited literature has explored these experiences among Asian Americans and Asian origin groups in the United States. The aim of this review is to establish what is known about the experience of food insecurity and nutrition program participation in the Asian American population and among Asian origin groups and to suggest further research and policy action to better address food insecurity in this population. Our review is guided by the methodological framework proposed by Arksey and O'Malley and refined and outlined by Levac and colleagues and the Joanna Briggs Institute. We will search key terms related to food insecurity and Asian Americans in Medline (Ovid), the Cochrane Library (Wiley), CINAHL Plus with Full Text (Ebsco), PsycINFO (Ebsco), and Scopus (Elsevier). An article will be included if it was published in the English language; is a peer reviewed research manuscript and reports primary research findings from analyses; and describes food insecurity or strategies to cope with food insecurity among individuals of Asian origins living in the U.S. An article will be excluded if it is a book, conference proceedings, or grey literature (e.g., thesis or dissertation); is a commentary, editorial, or opinion piece without primary research data; contains only research conducted outside of the U.S.; includes Asians in the sample but does not provide separate data on food insecurity or strategies to cope with food insecurity among Asians; and describes only dietary changes or patterns but not food insecurity. Two or more reviewers will participate in the study screening and selection process. We will record information from the final articles chosen to be included in the review in a data table template and will also prepare a summary narrative with key findings. Results will be disseminated through peer-reviewed publications and conference presentations. The findings from this review will be of interest to researchers and practitioners and inform further research and policy to better address food insecurity among this population.

Towards a More Critical Public Health Understanding of Vaccine Hesitancy: Key Insights from a Decade of Research.

Vaccine hesitancy has gained renewed attention as an important public health concern worldwide. Against this backdrop, over the last decade, we have conducted various qualitative, social science studies with the broad shared aim of better understanding this complex phenomenon. This has included various Cochrane systematic reviews of qualitative research globally, systematic reviews of qualitative research in Africa, and primary research studies in South Africa. These studies have also explored vaccine hesitancy for various vaccines, including routine childhood vaccination, HPV vaccination and other routine vaccinations for adolescents, and, most recently, COVID-19 vaccination. In this reflective and critical commentary piece we reflect on seven key overarching insights we feel we have gained about this complex phenomenon from the varying studies we have conducted over the past decade. These insights comprise the following: (1) the relationship between vaccine knowledge and hesitancy is complex and may operate in multiple directions; (2) vaccine hesitancy is driven by multiple socio-political forces; (3) vaccine hesitancy may be many things, rather than a single phenomenon; (4) vaccine hesitancy may be an ongoing 'process', rather than a fixed 'stance'; (5) vaccine hesitancy may sometimes be about a 'striving', rather than a 'resisting'; (6) 'distrust' as a driver of vaccine hesitancy needs to be better contextualized and disaggregated; and (7) the 'demand-side' versus 'supply/access-side' distinction of the drivers of suboptimal vaccination may be misleading and unhelpful. In unpacking these insights, we problematize some of the common assumptions within the vaccine hesitancy literature and flag topics that we think could benefit from further scrutiny and debate. Our hope is that this can provide a platform for further engagement on these issues and ultimately contribute towards fostering a more critical public health understanding of vaccine hesitancy.

Global South Perspectives on Youth

Abstract Young lives in the Global South are shaped by myriad dynamics of colonialism, economic inequalities, race, class, caste, and gendered and generational inequalities. In particular, the colonial legacies and contemporary capitalist inequalities within the global order have powerfully redefined what youth lives are in many countries of the Global South today. In this commentary piece, I argue that there is great value in thinking about youth through empirical, historical, and relational perspectives from the Global South, primarily for analytical sophistication but also to enrich mainstream youth sociology itself. This commentary piece also opens a dialogue between “youth sociology” and “connected sociologies” in order to produce some decolonial Global South perspectives on youth. Through focusing on changing youth cultures in India and South Africa, this commentary explores how neocolonial and neoliberal processes shape youth cultures and the many global relationalities, connections, and inequalities that emerge from thinking comparatively.

Affects After Finitude

ABSTRACT: This essay approaches current anxieties about climate catastrophe by differentiating between a philosophy of the end and a social theory of settler late liberalism that is situated after the end. In order to suggest such a social theory, I begin with two examples of moods and dispositions cultivated in my birth family and among my Karrabing colleagues. Instead of what moods should be fostered at the end—optimism, hope, panic, anxiety, despair—I ask what moods and dispositions have been cultivated in spaces long living after the end? I outline some resonances and differences between these two worlds, both of which sat within a cascade of violent endings, in order to turn to the question of whether optimism should characterize our approach at the end—or to the end? Across my discussion I differentiate between affects and moods on the one hand and dispositions and dispositifs on other hand. I conclude by asking why affects and dispositions become the question in the shadow of the end. As s social thought and commentary piece, I am taking liberties in terms of the depth with which I'll pursue all and any of this—instead I hope merely to open up some new directions.

People who use drugs in hospital settings: 'Moving towards a person-centred harm reduction model'.

People who use drugs often continue to use drugs while in hospital. However, health-care systems often expect abstinence from drugs as a condition of engagement in various services. This commentary piece proposes that this approach is inconsistent with the principles of person-centred care. A harm reduction-based approach in conjunction with collaboration of people who use drugs is proposed as a model for providing person-centred care to people who use drugs during hospital-based treatment.

Unmet Needs of Oral Cancer Survivors in India: A Perspective

AbstractOral cancer is one of the predominant forms of cancer that alters the livelihood of survivors. They can have many unmet needs. However, very little research has been done on this topic, especially in India. This commentary piece discusses what unmet needs could mean, how the disease culminates differently and creates different realities, how the research and policymaking have been done and how it could be improved.

Use of a novel smartphone-based application tool for enrolment and randomisation in pre-hospital clinical trials

The effective recruitment and randomisation of patients in pre-hospital clinical trials presents unique challenges. Owing to the time critical nature of many pre-hospital emergencies and limited resourcing, the use of traditional methods of randomisation that may include centralised telephone or web-based systems are often not practicable or feasible. Previous technological limitations have necessitated that pre-hospital trialists strike a compromise between implementing pragmatic, deliverable study designs, with robust enrolment and randomisation methodologies. In this commentary piece, we present a novel smartphone-based solution that has the potential to align pre-hospital clinical trial recruitment processes to that of best-in-practice in-hospital and ambulatory care based studies.

Click, click, buy: The market for novel synthetic peptide hormones on mainstream e-commerce platforms in the UK

In recent years there has been an increasing focus on the potential public health risks attached to human enhancement drugs (HEDs). While much work has explored the use and supply of HEDs, the market for these compounds is constantly evolving, with new substances being created and sold, and access becoming increasingly simplified through digital platforms. However, one area that has yet to receive scholarly attention is the availability of ‘grey market’ novel synthetic peptide hormones (SPH) through sellers on the mainstream e-commerce platforms Amazon, eBay, and Alibaba. This commentary piece therefore sets out to uncover this burgeoning corner of the broader HEDs trade in the UK market.Findings indicate that SPH are readily accessible over these e-commerce sites, with sellers evading restrictions by claiming that the substances are ‘not for human consumption’ or ‘for research only’, while simultaneously advertising their products as wellbeing supplements. Labelling practices are further identified as a point of concern, since packaging is not necessarily reflective of product quality or true location of origin. Finally, discussion centres on the enhanced legitimacy offered by selling through mainstream sites like Amazon, the capacity for counterfeiting and misrepresentation, and the public health implications of this substantial grey market.

Rebirth of CuInS2 as hole transport material for perovskite solar cells

AbstractCopper indium sulfide, CuInS2 (CIS), has entered the field of photovoltaic cells for about three decades but somehow, they have not met their theoretically predicted efficiency as an absorber material. However, it is being employed as a hole transport layer in conjunction with organic–inorganic perovskite solar cells, which offer improved environmental stability at a reduced production cost. This commentary piece aims to draw researchers' attention to the use of CIS as hole transport layers in organic‐inorganic perovskite solar cells, with the expectation that further study and efficiency improvements will propel perovskite solar cells into the commercialization race.

The structural power of workers in influencing energy transitions: Examples of the Green Bans (Australia) and the Lucas Plan (United Kingdom)

Energy transitions represent a process of economic restructuring that will change regional economies and patterns of employment. In many countries, this process is occurring in a context of industrial action, cost-of-living crises, and concerns about jobs being left ‘stranded’ by decarbonisation. This commentary piece follows recent scholarship to illuminate the importance of work and workers in contemporary energy transitions. There is a need to make space for those pushing for better working conditions and to find new areas of overlap between such demands and wider policies of decarbonisation. To do so, this piece stresses the importance of the structural power of workers in building links between the labour movement and those calling for energy transitions. It details two historical cases of worker action in the 1970s. First, the Green Bans movement in New South Wales, Australia, demonstrates how labour might be withdrawn at key points of pollution or environmental destruction. Second, the Lucas Plan in the United Kingdom, illustrates how workers can devise new forms of work. Whilst grounded in specific historical contexts, such episodes provide important examples of how those calling for energy transitions might amplify the narratives and role of workers in decarbonisation.