Understanding digital health: Productive tensions at the intersection of sociology of health and science and technology studies

Abstract

In this editorial introduction, we explore how digital health is being explored at the intersection of sociology of health and science and technology studies (STS). We suggest that socio‐material approaches and practice theories provide a shared space within which productive tensions between sociology of health and STS can continue. These tensions emerge around the long‐standing challenges of avoiding technological determinism while maintaining a clear focus on the materiality and agency of technologies and recognising enduring sets of relations that emerge in new digital health practices while avoiding social determinism. The papers in this Special Issue explore diverse fields of healthcare (e.g. reproductive health, primary care, diabetes management, mental health) within which heterogenous technologies (e.g. health apps, mobile platforms, smart textiles, time‐lapse imaging) are becoming increasingly embedded. By synthesising the main arguments and contributions in each paper, we elaborate on four key dimensions within which digital technologies create ambivalence and (re)configure health practices. First, promissory digital health highlights contradictory virtues within discourses that configure digital health. Second, (re)configuring knowledge outlines ambivalences of navigating new information environments and handling quantified data. Third, (re)configuring connectivity explores the relationships that evolve through digital networks. Fourth, (re)configuring control explores how new forms of power are inscribed and handled within algorithmic decision‐making in health. We argue that these dimensions offer fruitful perspectives along which digital health can be explored across a range of technologies and health practices. We conclude by highlighting applications, methods and dimensions of digital health that require further research.

COVID-19: Technology, Social Connections, Loneliness, and Leisure Activities: An International Study Protocol

“…Scholarly research surrounding the use, benefits and impacts of digital technology in the lives of older citizens, as well as those of younger citizens (Ito et al, 2010;Cotten et al, 2014;Marston, 2019) has been growing over the last 30+ years (Czaja and Barr, 1989). The application of digital technologies in influencing social and psychological well-being have been widely studied with the focus of the types of digital connections and the intensities of using digital technologies among general population (Rosenfeld and Thomas, 2012;Hofstra et al, 2017;Verduyn et al, 2017;Rafalow, 2018;Henwood and Marent, 2019;Shah et al, 2019). The demographic profiles of the users, such as age, gender and education are important factors to understand the accessibility, frequencies and types of digital use in creating and enhancing social connections and support.…”

Everyday curation? Attending to data, records and record keeping in the practices of self-monitoring

“…The paper is based on a UK study involving interviews with people who self-identified as monitoring their blood pressure or BMI/weight. Our engagement with selfmonitoring stemmed from our broader interest in everyday health practices, the use of health technologies in domestic settings and the way these might redistribute health work between the home and the clinic (see Henwood and Marent, 2019;Weiner et al, 2017;Weiner and Will, 2018;Williams et al, 2020, forthcoming). Home blood pressure monitoring and BMI monitoring offer particularly interesting cases in the way they blur the boundary between the clinic and the home.…”

“…Further, the idea of curation helps to link the work of making data with the emotional aspects of self-monitoring and the value of the data. In our analysis, we adopt this lens to develop a socio-materialist account (Henwood and Marent, 2019;Weiner and Will, 2018;Williams et al, 2020, forthcoming) of everyday data practices relating to selfmonitoring, exploring what records people keep, what materials are involved and whether and how records are shared. We suggest that this curatorial approach helps to clarify the relationship between selfmonitoring and the accrual and flow of data.…”

The Cyclic Self: Menstrual Cycle Tracking as Body Politics

“…At first glance, cyclic self-fashioning may be perceived as a reinforcement of biologism; however, I use this concept to explore how selftrackers bring particular "biopossibilities" into being (Willey 2016). My approach is situated in self-tracking scholarship that theorizes the body as a site for interpretation and challenges the singular conception of the neoliberal selftracking subject (Danesi et al 2020;Henwood and Marent 2019;Sharon 2015Sharon , 2016Weiner et al 2020). Consistent with a socio-material practice-based approach that emphasizes the ambivalence and fluidity of users' engagements with technologies, I take investigation of the role of biotemporal mediated entities in everyday life a step further, by focusing on practices that have received little attention in the literature so far.…”