In today's media environment, information is not simply passed from producers to consumers, but is mediated by participants of new media cultures, including information on sexual health. In focus groups held in Sydney and regional Australia in 2011, we asked young people aged 16-22 about the potential for sexual health promotion via Facebook and other social media. Our findings point to the complex ways in which young people use social media, and the unlikelihood of traditional take-home sexual health messages having traction in social media spaces. Five key aspects which emerged were: the participatory culture of social network sites; the stigma of sexual health, especially sexually transmitted infections (STIs); young people's careful presentations of self; privacy concerns; and the importance of humour in sexual health messaging. Fears of bullying and gossip (or 'drama') were also likely to prevent the dissemination of sexual health messages in this environment. However, humorous online videos were noted by participants as a significant way to avoid stigma and enable the sharing of sexual health information. The young people in our study were interested in sexual health information, but did not want to access it at the cost of their own sense of comfort and belonging in their social networks. Any sexual health promotion within these sites must be understood as a site-specific intervention.
BackgroundSport as a mechanism to build relationships across cultural boundaries and to build positive interactions among young people has often been promoted in the literature. However, robust evaluation of sport-for-development program impacts is limited. This study reports on an impact evaluation of a sport-for-development program in Australia, Football United®.MethodsA quasi-experimental mixed methods design was employed using treatment partitioning (different groups compared had different levels of exposure to Football United). A survey was undertaken with 142 young people (average age of 14.7 years with 22.5% of the sample comprising girls) in four Australian schools. These schools included two Football United and two Comparison schools where Football United was not operating. The survey instrument was composed of previously validated measures, including emotional symptoms, peer problems and relationships, prosocial behaviour, other-group orientation, feelings of social inclusion and belonging and resilience. Face to face interviews were undertaken with a purposeful sample (n = 79) of those who completed the survey. The participants in the interviews were selected to provide a diversity of age, gender and cultural backgrounds.ResultsYoung people who participated in Football United showed significantly higher levels of other-group orientation than a Comparison Group (who did not participate in the program). The Football United boys had significantly lower scores on the peer problem scale and significantly higher scores on the prosocial scale than boys in the Comparison Group. Treatment partitioning analyses showed positive, linear associations between other-group orientation and total participation in the Football United program. A lower score on peer problems and higher scores on prosocial behaviour in the survey were associated with regularity of attendance at Football United. These quantitative results are supported by qualitative data analysed from interviews.ConclusionsThe study provides evidence of the effects of Football United on key domains of peer and prosocial relationships for boys and other-group orientation for young people in the program sites studied. The effects on girls, and the impacts of the program on the broader school environment and at the community level, require further investigation.
Social isolation and disengagement fragments local communities. Evidence indicates that refugee families are highly vulnerable to social isolation in their countries of resettlement. Research to identify approaches to best address this is needed. Football United is a program that aims to foster social inclusion and cohesion in areas with high refugee settlement in New South Wales, Australia, through skills and leadership development, mentoring, and the creation of links with local community and corporate leaders and organisations. The Social Cohesion through Football study's broad goal is to examine the implementation of a complex health promotion program, and to analyse the processes involved in program implementation. The study will consider program impact on individual health and wellbeing, social inclusion and cohesion, as well as analyse how the program by necessity interacts and adapts to context during implementation, a concept we refer to as plasticity. The proposed study will be the first prospective cohort impact study to our knowledge to assess the impact of a comprehensive integrated program using football as a vehicle for fostering social inclusion and cohesion in communities with high refugee settlement.Methods/designA quasi-experimental cohort study design with treatment partitioning involving four study sites. The study employs a 'dose response' model, comparing those with no involvement in the Football United program with those with lower or higher levels of participation. A range of qualitative and quantitative measures will be used in the study. Study participants' emotional well being, resilience, ethnic identity and other group orientation, feelings of social inclusion and belonging will be measured using a survey instrument complemented by relevant data drawn from in-depth interviews, self reporting measures and participant observation. The views of key informants from the program and the wider community will also be solicited.DiscussionThe complexity of the Football United program poses challenges for measurement, and requires the study design to be responsive to the dynamic nature of the program and context. Assessment of change is needed at multiple levels, drawing on mixed methods and multidisciplinary approaches in implementation and evaluation. Attention to these challenges has underpinned the design and methods in the Social Cohesion through Football study, which will use a unique and innovative combination of measures that have not been applied together previously in social inclusion/cohesion and sport and social inclusion/cohesion program research.
This article explores the sensual world of men who surf. Self-reflexive and fictocritical in tone, it meditates on how many studies of masculinity tend to separate the social and bodily. The article maps a way to pull bodies and feelings back into such studies in a productive manner. Affect theory is used to evidence how doing masculinity is built on feelings and intimacy. In turn, the article grounds gender in the activities of everyday life that function to bring together the sociological, psychological, and biological. Furthermore, the article argues that by researching through bodies, it is possible to complicate traditional tropes of masculinity that position it as stable and unemotional. Most important, the researcher's body is shown to be integral to any imagination of how the surfing culture works.
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