SUNScholar - Browsing by Author "Hunt, Xanthe"

Browsing by Author "Hunt, Xanthe"

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Hunger as a driver of depressive symptoms : optimising responses to mental health aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic
(Health & Medical Publishing Group, 2021-07) Hunt, Xanthe; Stein, Dan J.; Spaull, Nic; Tomlinson, Mark
The COVID-19 pandemic has had major implications for mental health, and much has been written about clinical interventions and health policy to address this. In South Africa (SA) and other low- and middle-income countries, this mental health burden may have unique aspects. In the international literature, symptoms of depression may be driven by experiences of food insecurity and hunger. In the context of the pandemic, in which food insecurity and hunger are on the rise, hunger as a driver of poor mental health in the pandemic warrants further discussion.
The meaning of participation : reflections on our study
(Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2021) Hunt, Xanthe; Swartz, Leslie, 1955-; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Carew, Mark T.; Chiwaula, Mussa; Rohleder, Poul
In Chapter 1 we provided a discussion of participatory research as a method for doing research, and provided an outline of what we did in the research project upon which this book is based. In this final chapter, we reflect back on our experiences of doing a participatory research project of this kind.
Paid staff or volunteers – does it make a difference? The impact of staffing on child outcomes for children attending community based programmes in South Africa and Malawi
(Taylor & Francis Open, 2017) Tomlinson, Mark; Sherr, Lorraine; Macedo, Ana; Hunt, Xanthe; Skeen, Sarah
Background: Globally, and in low and middle income countries (LMIC) specifically, there is a critical shortage of workers. The use of volunteers to support such care delivery systems has been examined, there is scant literature on the impact of volunteers on child outcome in high human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-affected communities. Objectives: To examine the differential impact of paid versus volunteer workforce in Community Based Organisations (CBOs) providing care to children and families affected by the HIV epidemic in South Africa and Malawi on child outcomes over time. Methods: This study compared child outcomes for 989 consecutive children attending CBOs (0.7% refusal) at baseline and 854 at follow-up (86.3% response rate). Results: Children attending CBOs with paid staff had higher self-esteem, fewer emotional/ behavioural problems and less perceived stigma. Likewise, children attending CBOs with paid staff had fewer educational risks, and 20 heightened cognitive performance, and the digitspan memory test. After controlling for outcome at baseline, gender, age, HIV status, and disability, attending a CBO with paid staff remained a significant independent predictor of higher self-esteem scores, less perceived stigma, as well as fewer educational risks and better performance on the drawing test. We found no associations between CBO attendance – paid or volunteer – and children’s depressive and trauma symptoms. Conclusions: Our findings show that in order to most optimally impact on child outcome 30 community-based workers (CBWs) should ideally be paid with trained staff. Specialised input for more severe child difficulties is needed.
Physical disability and femininity : an intersection of identities
(Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2021) Hunt, Xanthe; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Rohleder, Poul
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In this chapter, we will explore the intersections of physical disability and femininity. We look at how societies’ ideas about disability influence the way women with physical disabilities are viewed and view themselves as sexual beings. Using a combination of background literature and qualitative data from our photovoice study, we explore how social representations of femininity and expectations for women may negatively affect women with physical disabilities’ sense of themselves. We include pictures, written texts, and stories produced by some of the female participants from the project.
Predictors of negative beliefs toward the sexual rights and perceived sexual healthcare needs of people with physical disabilities in South Africa
(Taylor and Francis, 2019-05) Carew, Mark T.; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Hunt, Xanthe; Swartz, Leslie; Rohleder, Poul
Background: Although sexuality is a ubiquitous human need, recent empirical research has shown that people without disabilities attribute fewer sexual rights and perceive sexual healthcare to benefit fewer people with disabilities, compared to non-disabled people. Within a global context, such misperceptions have tangible, deleterious consequences for people with disabilities (e.g., exclusion from sexual healthcare), creating an urgent need for effective strategies to change misperceptions. Methods: To lay the groundwork for developing such strategies, we examined predictors of the recognition of sexual rights of people with physical disabilities within the South African context, derived from three key social psychological literatures (prejudice, social dominance orientation and intergroup contact), as well as the relationship between sexual rights and beliefs about sexual healthcare. Data were obtained through a cross-sectional survey, given to non-disabled South Africans (N = 1989). Results: Findings indicated that lack of recognition of the sexual rights for physically disabled people predicted less positive beliefs about the benefits of sexual healthcare. In turn, high levels of prejudice (both cognitive and affective) toward disabled sexuality predicted less recognition of their sexual rights, while prejudice (both forms) was predicted by prior contact with disabled people and possessing a social dominance orientation (cognitive prejudice only). Evidence was also obtained for an indirect relationship of contact and social dominance orientation on sexual healthcare beliefs through prejudice, although these effects were extremely small. Conclusion: Results are discussed in terms of their implications for rehabilitation, as well as national-level strategies to tackle negative perceptions of disabled sexuality, particularly in contexts affected by HIV.
(Re)presenting the self : questions raised by a photovoice project with people with physical disabilities in South Africa
(Routledge, 2019-08-29) Hunt, Xanthe; Swartz, Leslie; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Jordan, Cleone; Rohleder, Poul
Photovoice is presented here as an emancipatory, participatory research method with the potential to put minority subjects in charge of their own representation. Drawing on research with disabled people conducted in South Africa, we argue that the meaning of images is often hostage to interpretations which reify untruths about the subject. We consider how photovoice projects may give rise to images that perpetuate the subjugation of their subjects, but could also facilitate an emancipatory politics of self-representation through photography, constituting a challenge and not only the discursive regimes and ideologies which underlie dominant aesthetics.
Sexual and reproductive health : layers of (in)access
(Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2021) Hunt, Xanthe; Swartz, Leslie; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Rohleder, Poul
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In this chapter, we investigate some of the social (e.g. negative attitudes about sexuality and parenthood) and structural (e.g. inaccessible health care facilities) barriers that people with physical disabilities face when trying to lead a pleasurable, safe, and healthy sexual life. We do this by presenting an accessible review of the existing research literature, a summary of relevant survey evidence, and use of the personal stories of the participants.
The sexual lives of people with disabilities within low- and middle-income countries : a scoping study of studies published in English
(Taylor & Francis Open, 2017-07-05) Carew, Mark T.; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Swartz, Leslie; Hunt, Xanthe; Rohleder, Poul
Background: Although approximately 80% of the global population of people with disabilities reside in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), very little is known about their sexual lives due to a lack of empirical data. We aimed to provide a scoping review of English- language research conducted on disability and sexuality in LMICs. Objective: Our research questions concerned what topics in disability and sexuality have (and have not) been investigated, where this research has been carried out, and how this research has been conducted. Methods: A scoping review was conducted to examine the published English-language research literature on disability and sexuality within LMICs. We searched three electronic databases (PsycINFO, Web of Science, and PsycARTICLES) for research meeting these criteria published between 2000 and 2016 (inclusive). Through this search, we identified 103 articles. Results: It is concluded that: (a) disability and sexuality research in African countries has focused predominantly on sexual abuse and violence or HIV, (b) the sexuality of people with disabilities within many LMICs has received little or no empirical investigation, and (c) there have been very few experimental studies on disability and sexuality conducted in LMICs in general. Conclusions: Much remains unknown about the sexual health and sexual lives of the majority of people with disabilities, globally. Moreover, what has been done in certain contexts has tended to focus predominantly on vulnerabilities rather than emancipatory practices. Thus, urgent action is needed within LMICs on is
Some background, and a South African study on sexuality
(Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2021) Hunt, Xanthe; Swartz, Leslie; Braathen, Stine Hellum; Carew, Mark T.; Chiwaula, Mussa; Rohleder, Poul
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: In this chapter, we introduce central concepts and theories relevant to thinking about disability and sexuality in the global South. We discuss what we mean by physical disability, sexuality, gender, and embodiment, and provide a brief description of the research study on which this book is based. Here, too, we provide a rationale and outline for the book.
Thinking about the environment and theorising change : how could life history strategy theory inform mHealth interventions in low- and middleincome countries
(Taylor & Francis Open, 2017) Morgan, Barak; Hunt, Xanthe; Tomlinson, Mark
Background: There is a growing body of literature outlining the promise of mobile information and communication technologies to improve healthcare in resource-constrained contexts. Methods: We reviewed the literature related to mobile information and communication technologies which aim to improve healthcare in resource-constrained contexts, in order to glean general observations regarding the state of mHealth in high-income countries (HIC) and low- and middle-income countries (LMIC). Results: mHealth interventions in LMIC often differ substantively from those in HIC, with the former being simpler, delivered through a single digital component (an SMS as opposed to a mobile phone application, or ‘app’), and, as a result, targeting only one of the many factors which impact on the activation (or deactivation) of the target behaviour. Almost as a rule, LMIC mHealth interventions lack an explicit theory of change. Conclusion: We highlight the necessity, when designing mHealth interventions, of having a theory of change that encompasses multiple salient perspectives pertaining to human behaviour. To address this need, we explore whether the concept of Life History Strategy could provide the mHealth field with a useful theory of change. Life History Strategy Theory may be particularly useful in understanding some of the problems, paradoxes, and limitations of mHealth interventions found in LMIC. Specifically, this theory illuminates questions regarding ‘light-weight’ programmes which solely provide information, reminders, and other virtual ‘nudges’ that may have limited impact on behaviours governed by extrinsic structural factors.
Through a different lens: examining commonality and divergence in constructions and depictions of the sexuality of persons with physical disabilities in South Africa
(Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2018-12) Hunt, Xanthe; Swartz, Leslie; Stellenbosch University. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Psychology.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Historically, people with disabilities have been held in contempt or pitied by the non-disabled members of the communities in which they live, and by society as a whole. One area in which people with disabilities have been excluded and discriminated against is that of sexuality. Sexuality has been deemed the purview of the non-disabled. The societal inability, or disinclination, to reconcile sexuality and disability has had damaging consequences for people with disabilities who have variously been infantilised, and treated as asexual. The international literature suggests that this stereotype of asexuality has been more widely applied to individuals with physical disabilities than to those with other disabilities. In low- and middle-income countries there is a gap in the state of knowledge concerning a. the attitudes of non-disabled people towards the sexuality of people with physical disabilities; and b. the experiences of sexuality (including sexual and reproductive health, relationships and sexual activity) of people with physical disabilities. In this dissertation, I survey the attitudes of some South Africans, from different backgrounds, with different levels of education, knowledge about, and exposure to, people with physical disabilities, towards the sexuality of people with physical disabilities. Secondly, I present and discuss accounts of lived experience – as gathered in a photovoice study – of sexuality and of sexual and reproductive health care amongst people with physical disabilities. I propose photovoice and self-representation as means by which the narratives illuminated in answer the second question, may be presented and made “real”. In the survey segment of the study, I found that non-disabled South Africans perceive people with physical disabilities to be less sexual than they are. This appears to be underpinned not only by a belief that people with physical disabilities are less sexual than non-disabled people, but also by non-disabled people’s active desexualisation of people with physical disabilities in interactions, and negation of the gender of people with physical disabilities. In the photovoice segment of the study, I found that a sample of South Africans with physical disabilities were concerned with their sexual fitness – their suitability as sexual subjects. This originated in their ideas about how non-disabled people might view their different-than-average embodiment, or how they viewed their embodiment as measured against internalized non-disabled norms. I reflect on the value of photovoice as methodology, and the value of self-generated images of the sexuality of people with physical disabilities in challenging societal representations. These images go some way to right the wrong of past misrepresentation which parallels and perpetuates the exclusion of people with physical disabilities from sexual life. I discuss future directions for inquiry into physical disability and sexuality, with a special interest in the global south context.
A web of gaps : a discussion of research strands concerning Global South families with a disabled child
(Taylor & Francis Open, 2017) Hunt, Xanthe; Watermeyer, Brian
Background: In low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), limited access to a range of supports means that families often carry primary responsibility for the care of a disabled child. The impact of this responsibility is poorly understood. Objective: To present a selective review, critique, and comparison of the prominent areas of research aimed at understanding families with disabled children in the Global South. Design: We compare and critically discuss prominent bodies of literature concerning the family-disability-poverty nexus in LMICs. Results: Three prominent bodies of literature concerned with families with a disabled child in LMICs are reviewed. These were selected based on their relative prevalence in a large review of the literature, and comprise (1) work concerning quality of life (FQOL) of families with a disabled child; (2) interventions aimed at supporting families with a disabled child in LMICs; and (3) the ways in which culture mediates the families’ experience of disability. FQOL research points to poverty as a primary source of family distress, and directs our focus towards families’ own expertise in coping with their circumstances. Intervention literature from LMICs highlights the family as the unit of analysis and praxis concerning disabled children, and reminds us of the contextual factors which must be considered when working with their families. Conclusions: Culturally oriented research on poverty, disability, and the family nuances our understanding of the locally-determined priorities of families with a disabled child in LMICs. All three research strands carry benefits, limitations and gaps. The complexity of understanding families with a disabled child in LMICs comes to the fore, directing us away from narrow application of any single theoretical or research framework. Future researchers may draw on insights provided here in creating a more integrated approach.

Browsing by Author "Hunt, Xanthe"

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