The purpose of this project was to use a social constructivist approach to understand the perception of risk by mothers making the choice to give birth at home in Missoula, Montana. Social constructivism assumes that knowledge about risk is filtered through social and cultural frameworks of understanding (Lupton and Tulloch 2002, 321). The information gained from participants in this study was interpreted as a representation of the individuals culture, including their beliefs, values and upbringing, as well as the influences of the individuals social network which can include family members, spouses, friends, and community members. Various phenomena, elements or constructs in society are viewed as realities by social groups whether they exist as reality or not. Social constructs in the United States create a reality around the normalcy of hospital birth and tend to paint a picture of home birth mothers as risk takers (Craven 2005) (Davis-Floyd 1992). However, in developing this study, I predicted that home birth mothers would construct a different type of reality around risk in order to explain their decision to have a home birth. By examining the interpretive repertoires of home birth mothers in Missoula, Montana, one can begin to understand how women interpret their individual risk concerning birth and respond according to their determined level of vulnerability. First, the mothers confronted the dominant social norm that home birth is risky. In response to accusations of making a risky decision, these home birth mothers responded by emphasizing the risks that they see in hospital birth. For home birth mothers, the importance of having minimal medical interventions during the birth of their baby outweighed other potential risks associated with homebirth identified by medical authorities or published studies. Furthermore, many of the women in this study emphasized feeling very positively about their home birth experiences and felt that going through with this decision helped them gain feelings of confidence and empowerment.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:MONTANA/oai:etd.lib.umt.edu:etd-05112008-130518 |
| Date | 06 August 2008 |
| Creators | St. Clair, Laura Ann |
| Contributors | Kimber H. McKay, Gilbert Quintero, Teresa Sobieszczyk |
| Publisher | The University of Montana |
| Source Sets | University of Montana Missoula |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lib.umt.edu/theses/available/etd-05112008-130518/ |
| Rights | unrestricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to University of Montana or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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