Discipline | What is studied | Some issues of studies | Some approaches | Sample publication |
---|---|---|---|---|
Medical anthropology | The ways in which culture and society are organized around or influenced by issues of health, health care and related issues | Folk medicine Ethnobotanical knowledge The culture limits of biomedicine | Field research Participant observation | Aggarwal NK, Nicasio AV, DeSilva R, Boiler M, Lewis-Fernández R. “Barriers to implementing the DSM-5 cultural formulation interview: a qualitative study.” Cult Med Psychiatry. 2013 Sep;37(3):505–33 [51] |
Science and technology studies | How social, political, and cultural values affect scientific research and technological innovation | Biotechnology Environmental sustainability Information technology | Science citation index analysis Historical analysis Case comparisons | Obstfelder A, Engeseth KH, Wynn R. “Characteristics of successfully implemented telemedical applications.” Implement Sci. 2007 Jul 27;2:25 [52] |
Sociology of health and illness | Medical organizations and institutions, the production of knowledge and selection of methods, the actions and interactions of healthcare professionals, and the social or cultural (rather than clinical or bodily) effects of medical practice | Experiences of patients Health disparities Interactions between sick people and healthcare practitioners | Qualitative interviewing Demographic analysis Survey research | Timmermans S, Berg M. “The practice of medical technology.” Sociol Health Ilnn. 2003;25:97–114 [53] |
History and philosophy of science | Science, its nature and fundamentals, its origins, and its place in modern politics, culture, and society | How the sciences originated, how they were practiced, how they were developed, and how they were related to their intellectual and social contexts | Archival research Textual analysis Re-enactment of experiments | Richard W,. Wertz and Dorothy C. Wertz. Lying-In: A History of Childbirth in America. 1989, Yale University Press [54] |