Social Relations, Community Engagement and Potentials: A Qualitative Study Exploring Resident Engagement in a Community-Based Health Promotion Intervention in a Deprived Social Housing Area

Abstract

Emerging evidence points towards a lower quality of life, fragile social relations and suboptimal health behavior and status of residents living in social housing areas characterized by ethnic diversity and socioeconomic deprivation. Community-based health promotion interventions developed in collaboration with the target group and adjusted to the local context can affect the acceptance of and engagement in such interventions. However, few studies have investigated the potential of community-based interventions in deprived social housing areas. This study explores residents’ perspectives on engagement in a community-based health promotion intervention focusing on enhancing social relations. The study builds on qualitative methods including participant observations combined with pre- and post-intervention interviews with a selected group of residents (n = 9). Data were thematically analyzed with focuses on participation in an everyday life context, concepts of othering, and territorial stigmatization. Engagement in the intervention was motivated by the need to establish and enhance social relations, and to explore the world outside the housing area. However, barriers including cultural and language differences among residents, and competing contextual factors, challenged engagement. We conclude that participatory community-based interventions have a potential to enhance social relations in deprived social housing areas. However, adequate support and efforts to overcome the identified barriers are needed.

‘You Are Kind of Like One of Us’: Exploring Researcher Positioning in Studying Community-Based Health Promotion Interventions Among Social Housing Residents of Danish, Turkish and Pakistani Origin

“…Residents in deprived social housing areas are positioned by the Danish Government within a specific set of circumstances that sit outside dominant society (Høghøj, 2019;Larsen, 2014;Srivarathan et al, 2020). As a scholar of Sri Lankan Tamil descent and of working-class background, I often find myself and my perspectives outside the normativity of the privileged, white, upper middle-class academy, yet which I believe puts me in a better informed position from which to understand the experiences of the residents in deprived social housing areas, who continue to be otheredas is similarly exemplified, for instance, by the widespread social exclusion of Romani people in England, or the discourses and political debates about Asian people, also in England, described by Bhopal (2010).…”

“…I conducted nine individual interviews and four focus group discussions with 22 older adults, and approximately 128 hours of participant observation. The second piece of ethnographic research I draw upon in this article was collected as part of my PhD fellowship between February and July 2019 (Srivarathan et al, 2020). This research addressed perspectives on residential engagement in a communitybased health promotion intervention focussing on enhancing social relations through social outings among middle-aged and older adults of Danish and Turkish origin.…”

“…In this article, I provide an ethnographic account of my own research experiences of engaging with middle-aged and older residents of Danish, Turkish and Pakistani origin in a deprived social housing area in Denmark (Srivarathan et al, 2019;Srivarathan et al, 2020). I explore how aspects and characteristics of my social own situation positioned me, and how this led me to understand that my positioning as a researcher was sometimes viewed as contrary to what I expected against the background of insider-outsider positioning.…”

“…I explore how aspects and characteristics of my social own situation positioned me, and how this led me to understand that my positioning as a researcher was sometimes viewed as contrary to what I expected against the background of insider-outsider positioning. I draw on individual interviews, focus group discussions and field notes about community-based health promotion interventions (Srivarathan et al, 2019(Srivarathan et al, , 2020. To nuance current understanding of researcher positioning, I have provided an in-depth exploration of what it means to be a halfie, with its promises and perils in the context of qualitative health research (Abu-Lughod, 1991;Narayan, 1993).…”

Tingbjerg Changing Diabetes: a protocol for a long-term Supersetting initiative to promote health and prevent type 2 diabetes among people living in an ethnically and socioeconomically diverse neighbourhood in Copenhagen, Denmark

“…Reviews on community engagement, recruitment and participation of vulnerable people find that power sharing and collaborative partnerships 24 as well as extended time frames, acknowledgement of higher resourcing costs and long-term partnership operation are key elements to engagement and participation. [25][26][27] However, while consensus exists that intersectoral collaborative action is a beneficial and cost-effective strategy in health promotion, 28 we still lack knowledge on processes and methodologies of sustainable intersectoral collaboration and action among professional practitioners within the local community.…”