Premium
Studying Knowledge, Culture, and Behavior in Applied Medical Anthropology
Author(s) -
Pelto Pertti J.,
Pelto Gretel H.
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
medical anthropology quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.855
H-Index - 55
eISSN - 1548-1387
pISSN - 0745-5194
DOI - 10.1525/maq.1997.11.2.147
Subject(s) - ethnography , ethnomedicine , perspective (graphical) , sociology , medical anthropology , health care , epistemology , anthropology , engineering ethics , psychology , social science , medicine , political science , computer science , medicinal plants , philosophy , artificial intelligence , law , engineering , traditional medicine
In this article we argue that the concept of knowledge, as utilized by public health professionals, is best regarded as cultural belief as defined in anthropology. The implications of this position are explored, particularly as it relates to the development of a decision‐making approach to the understanding and analysis of health care behavior. The methodological challenges posed by the new theoretical perspective that has emerged from the emphasis on decision making is discussed from the perspective of applied research. The role of focused ethnographic studies is examined and contrasted with ethnomedicine and survey approaches. Some main features of focused ethnographic methods are described and illustrated with a case example of acute respiratory infection (ARI) in Gambia. [knowledge and cultural beliefs, decision‐making approaches, health behavior, focused ethnographic studies]