Embodying the Social: re-thinking inequalities in the era of the ‘exposome’

Social Science Plus Pilot Project 2023-24

Medical Anthropology + Psychiatric and Social Epidemiology + Sociology
Embodying the Social: re-thinking inequalities in the era of the ‘exposome’
This proposal will examine how novel biosocial ways of understanding social inequalities and social determinants of health focused on exposures across the life course (the ‘exposome’) are being taken up and used in consideration of urban and mental health, focusing on violence and social exclusion in London. It will consider how social science can contribute to richer and more nuanced understandings of health data in exposome related research and in what ways transdisciplinary approaches might lead to more tractable targets in biosocially informed public health and policy interventions.

Project’s aims and objectives
Our research has several aims and objectives related to three key areas:

1. Interdisciplinary dialogue and exchange

To consider how social science knowledge and expertise can contribute to richer and more nuanced understandings of social inequalities and social determinants of health in exposome research
To establish concrete social science research strategies in emerging fields of exposome analysis related to urban mental health, experiences of violence, and social exclusion
To publish an open access report on how the ‘social’ is being mobilised in exposome research in urban mental health
To lay the groundwork for a large multi-country grant application that can expand the scope of transdisciplinary exposome related research and urban mental health

2. Pilot ‘bioethnography’ of urban space and violence

To examine the scope of social science ethnographic research (using ‘mental maps’ and ‘go-along’ interviews) in exploring the lived and daily embodied experience of violence in one London borough, Peckham
To better align social science and epidemiological ‘mapping’ activities of violence and social exclusion

3. Early Career training

To understand the needs for PG’s and early career researchers engaged with ‘biosocial’ approaches related to social inequalities and the exposome
To propose infrastructures for providing training and mentorship that can extend cross-disciplinary dialogue, expertise and exchange around social inequalities and the exposome, building on ECR’s activities in UCL’s Soc-B ESRC Doctoral Training, the Biosocial Birth Cohort Research network and Biosocial Medical Anthropology

Research Team
Principal Investigator
Professor Sahra Gibbon, Professor of Medical Anthropology, Anthropology, Social & Historical Sciences, UCL

Non-Social Science Co-Investigator
Professor James Kirkbride, Professor of Psychiatric and Social Epidemiology, Division of Psychiatry, Brain Sciences, UCL

Second Co-Investigator
Professor Nikolas Rose, Honorary Professor, Institute of Advanced Study, Social & Historical Sciences, UCL

Early Career Researcher
Rosie Mathers, PhD student, Anthropology, Social & Historical Sciences, UCL