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Using Ethnographic Methods in the Selection of Post-Disaster, Mental Health Interventions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 June 2012

Paul Bolton  and
Alice M. Tang
Paul Bolton*
Affiliation:
Center for International Health and Development, Boston University School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Alice M. Tang
Affiliation:
Department of Family Medicine and Community Health, Tufts School of Medicine, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
*
Center for International Health and Development, Boston University School of Public Health, 715 Albany Street, T-4 West Boston, MA 02118USA E-mail: pbolton@bu.edu
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Abstract

This paper describes a short, ethnographic study approach for understanding how people from non-Western cultures think about mental health and mental health problems, and the rationale for using such an approach in designing and implementing mental health interventions during and after disasters. It describes how the resulting data can contribute to interventions that are more acceptable to local people, and therefore, more effective and sustainable through improved community support.

Keywords

assessmentcross-culturalcultureethnographicinterventionsmental healthqualitative
Type
Special Reports
Information
Prehospital and Disaster Medicine , Volume 19 , Special Issue 1: Psychosocial Themes , March 2004 , pp. 97 - 101
Copyright
Copyright © World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine 2004

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