BackgroundMalaria remains the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in sub-Saharan Africa despite tools currently available for its control. Making malaria vaccine available for routine use will be a major hallmark, but its acceptance by community members and health professionals within the health system could pose considerable challenge as has been found with the introduction of polio vaccinations in parts of West Africa. Some of these challenges may not be expected since decisions people make are many a time driven by a complex myriad of perceptions. This paper reports knowledge and perceptions of community members in the Kintampo area of Ghana where malaria vaccine trials have been ongoing as part of the drive for the first-ever licensed malaria vaccine in the near future.MethodsBoth qualitative and quantitative methods were used in the data collection processes. Women and men whose children were or were not involved in the malaria vaccine trial were invited to participate in focus group discussions (FGDs). Respondents, made up of heads of religious groupings in the study area, health care providers, traditional healers and traditional birth attendants, were also invited to participate in in-depth interviews (IDIs). A cross-sectional survey was conducted in communities where the malaria vaccine trial (Mal 047RTS,S) was carried out. In total, 12 FGDs, 15 IDIs and 466 household head interviews were conducted.ResultsKnowledge about vaccines was widespread among participants. Respondents would like their children to be vaccinated against all childhood illnesses including malaria. Knowledge of the long existing routine vaccines was relatively high among respondents compared to hepatitis B and Haemophilus influenza type B vaccines that were introduced more recently in 2002. There was no clear religious belief or sociocultural practice that will serve as a possible barrier to the acceptance of a malaria vaccine.ConclusionWith the assumption that a malaria vaccine will be as efficacious as other EPI vaccines, community members in Central Ghana will accept and prefer malaria vaccine to malaria drugs as a malaria control tool. Beliefs and cultural practices as barriers to the acceptance of malaria vaccine were virtually unknown in the communities surveyed.

Mobile telephony has diffused more rapidly than any Indian technology in recent memory, yet systematic studies of its impact are rare, focusing on technological rather than social change. We employ network surveys of separate groups of Kerala residents in 2002 and again in 2007 to examine recent shifts in mobile usage patterns and social relationships. Results show (1) near saturation of mobiles among both the professionals 392 new media & society 13 (3) and nonprofessionals sampled, (2) a decrease in the number of social linkages across tie types and physical locations, and (3) a shift towards friends and family but away from work relationships in the core networks of Malayalis. We interpret these findings as support for the bounded solidarity thesis of remote communication that emphasizes social insulation and network closure as mobiles shield individuals from their wider surroundings.

We examine the ways in which the research process differs in developed and developing areas by focusing on two questions. First, is collaboration associated with productivity? Second, is access to the Internet (specifically use of email) associated with reduced problems of collaboration? Recent analyses by Lee & Bozeman (2005) and Walsh & Maloney (2003) suggest affirmative answers to these questions for US scientists. Based on a comparative analysis of scientists in Ghana, Kenya, and the State of Kerala in south-western India ( N 918), we find that: (1) collaboration is not associated with any general increment in productivity; and (2) while access to email does attenuate research problems, such difficulties are structured more by national and regional context than by the collaborative process itself. The interpretation of these results suggests a paradox that raises issues for future studies: those conditions that unsettle the relationship between collaboration and productivity in developing areas may undermine the collaborative benefits of new information and communication technologies.

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The authors investigated variations in reciprocity and the impact of reciprocity on well-being in a West African society. They hypothesized that household size and income diversity encourage reciprocity, which in turn enhances subjective well-being. In empirical testing of these hypotheses the authors used the data of the Core Welfare Indicators Questionnaire of Ghana, a national sample of household heads (N males = 33,949, N females = 13,900) collected in 2003. A regression analysis showed that remittance facilitates balanced or credited reciprocity, whereas size-related measures (marital status and generational relationships) produce mixed results. Reciprocity clearly strengthens perceived economic security and level of happiness among Ghanaians. This research suggests that extensive reciprocity among kin, rather than household configurations, should be stressed in efforts to understand the structure of familial relationships and its consequences for well-being.Although some scholars suggest that African families provide social and material support to