Many women self-report discomfort, depression, mood changes, and irritability in conjunction with menstruation which has been termed Premenstrual Syndrome (PMS). Prior to the creation of the disease/disorder category PMS, disorders with similar symptoms like “hysteria” and “involutional melancholia” were ascribed to women reporting those types of complaints. These diagnoses were based on archaic claims about women’s anatomy and behavior. Modern medical researchers contend that women’s complaints have a physiological basis, yet they cannot definitively tie PMS to any specific physiological etiological pathway, either hormonal or neurological. This thesis explores the argument that the social norms for women’s roles and their associated behaviors are related to the appearance of a disease/disorder category named PMS in the United Kingdom and the United States. Many of women’s complaints may instead be symptoms of social problems (with social remedies) related to role conflict or role strain.

abstract: This is a project about medicine and the history of a condition called premenstrual syndrome (PMS), its “discovery” and conceptual development at both scientific and socio-cultural levels. Since it was first mentioned in medical literature, PMS has been explored empirically as a medical condition and conceptually as non-somatic cultural phenomenon. Many attempts have been made to produce scientific, empirical evidence to bolster the theory of PMS as a biological disease. Some non-medical perspectives argue that invoking biology as the cause of PMS medicalizes a natural function of the female reproductive system and shallowly interrogates what is actually a complex bio-psycho-social phenomenon. This thesis questions both sides of this debate in order to reveal how criteria for PMS were categorized despite disagreement surrounding its etiology. This thesis illustrates how the concept of PMS developed and was informed by the discovery of hormones and the resulting field of endocrinology that provided a framework for conceptualizing PMS. It displays how the development of the medical diagnostic category of PMS developed in tandem with the emergence of the field of endocrinology and was legitimized and effectively medicalized through this connection. The diagnosis of PMS became established though the diagnostic techniques like questionnaires in spite of persistent disagreement over its definition. The thesis shows how these medical concepts and practices legitimated the category of PMS, and how it has become ubiquitous in contemporary culture. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Biology 2016

In this Master's of Public Issues Anthropology thesis I examine the perceptions of health and healthcare services within a small rural subsistence farming community in South-Western Paraguay from a political ecology of health perspective. Qualitative research data was collected from May to September of 2010 in Lindo Manantial, a subsistence farming village, and Piribebuy, the closest town to Lindo Manantial and the location of the nearest health centre, the Piribebuy Centro de Salud. The primary goals of this research project were to gain an ethnographic understanding of current local health perspectives and concerns, as well as the local frameworks for health provision in Piribebuy. I argue that the introduction of culturally competent healthcare services could greatly improve individual and community health statuses and outcomes in Lindo Manantial and other similar rural subsistence farming communities in Paraguay. / Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC)

This study aimed to collate and analyse academic literature with regards to possible African perspectives on psychological distress. The purpose of conducting the literature review was to explore thirty years of critical arguments supporting and refuting an African perspective on psychopathology. Literature (e.g. Bhugra&Bhui, 1997) appeared to suggest that some of the relatively recent views regarding psychopathology fail to adequately address psychological distress as it presents in Africa. A systematic literature review was selected as the methodology for this study, and the specific method of the review was research synthesis (Gough, 2004; Popay, 2005). Reviewed literature was sourced between the years 1980 and 2010. The theoretical point of departure was integrative theory, thus falling within the postpostmodern framework. As such, literature regarding psychological theory formed a substantial part of the research, including literature relating to psychodynamic theory, cognitive-behavioural theory, postmodernism, phenomenology, existentialism, critical theory, and systemic patterning (Becvar&Becvar, 1996). These theories formed part of the analysis, thereby allowing contextual analysis as the interpretive method. The review’s themes highlighted the following outcomes: current psychiatric nosology employed a universalistic approach to diagnosis and intervention, thus limiting cultural conceptions of mental illness; holistic intervention requires the inclusion of traditional epistemological tenets; collaboration between modern practitioners and traditional healers would probably better meet the patient’s needs; and that culture-fit assessment and treatment often indicated improved prognosis. The outcomes evidenced the operation of an African perspective on psychopathology. In fact, much of the reviewed literature also suggested culture-contextual perspectives on psychopathology. Furthermore, the way in which lack of cultural coherence appears to exist between patients and some clinicians suggested that diagnostic flaws may be a relatively frequent occurrence. Potential benefits of the investigation include increased awareness that culture-related conceptualisation be further explored in the clinical field; that future researchers use the current review as a foundational reference for primary investigations; that contemporary clinical classificatory systems be reviewed in terms of cultural applicability; and that clinicians reconsider the diagnostic process in terms of culture-fit manifestations of psychopathology. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Psychology / unrestricted