Doctoral Dissertation Research: Determinants of Scapegoat-selection in Zimbabwe

[0228412] murray / rodlach据估计，津巴布韦有超过25%的成年人感染艾滋病毒，是世界上艾滋病毒感染率最高的国家之一。在追究艾滋病的责任时，人们经常争论他们实际上无法实际控制的流行病的起因（贫穷、他人的阴谋、政治领导人的疏忽等）。相比之下，在艾滋病毒/艾滋病认识和预防领域工作的人强调生物医学原因（性行为、母婴传播和输血）。这种对比是惊人的，也是有问题的。本文的文化人类学研究的目的是记录津巴布韦民间因果解释的方向和内在逻辑，并检验导致社会中不同亚群体援引不同解释的因素的假设。测试五种假设：(1)个人对当前政治越不满，他/她就越会将艾滋病归咎于政治力量；（ii）个人的社会经济地位越低，他/她就越把艾滋病毒/艾滋病归咎于富人；㈢个人越是认为认识和预防艾滋病毒/艾滋病的共同战略是指责受害者，就越倾向于将艾滋病毒/艾滋病归咎于医务人员；（iv）一个人越是经历价值观和信仰与实际实践之间的分裂，他/她就越会把艾滋病归咎于价值观和信仰体系的守护者（上帝和祖先）；(v)一个人所属的社交网络越亲密，他/她越是表达对巫术的信仰，并指出他/她的社交网络中的其他成员是导致艾滋病毒/艾滋病的原因。数据将在津巴布韦一个城镇进行为期12个月的实地研究期间收集（由当地居民和津巴布韦大学社会学教师和学生协助）。该项目将对乡镇居民样本进行访谈，让他们参与焦点小组讨论，对选定的家庭进行深入的民族志调查，分析大众媒体上关于艾滋病预防的信息，并对乡镇的代表性样本进行调查，以收集数据来检验假设。本研究将评估理论概念，以解释南部非洲背景下不良事件的民间解释模型，揭示其跨文化变异性。提高对普遍认为的艾滋病流行原因的认识以及对这些因果归因和替罪羊选择过程的动态解释所产生的更广泛影响，对于设计有效的艾滋病预防和宣传信息的医疗和发展官员具有重要意义。这项研究将使他们能够定制他们的信息和节目，以适应他们的听众，从而提高他们的有效性。该项目还有助于培养一名年轻的社会科学家。

0228412Murray / RodlachWith more than 25% of the adult population estimated to be infected, Zimbabwe has one of the highest rates of HIV-infection in the world. In assigning blame for AIDS, people frequently argue about causes of the epidemic over which they have virtually no pragmatic control (poverty, conspiracies emanating from others, negligence on the part of their political leaders, etc.). In contrast, those working in the field of HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention highlight biomedical causes (sexual behavior, mother-to-child transmission, and blood-transfusions). This contrast is striking and problematic. The objective of this dissertation research in cultural anthropology is to document the direction and inner logic of such folk causal explanations in Zimbabwe and to test hypotheses on the factors leading different subgroups within society to invoke different explanations. Five hypotheses will be tested: (i) the more dissatisfied an individual is with the current politics, the more he/she will blame political forces for HIV/AIDS; (ii) the lower the socio-economic status of the individual, the more he/she blames the wealthy for HIV/AIDS; (iii) the more an individual perceives common strategies for HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention as blaming the victim, the greater will be the tendency to blame the medical profession for HIV/AIDS; (iv) the more an individual is experiencing a split between his/her values and beliefs and their actual practice, the more he/she blames the guardians of the value and belief system (God and the ancestors) for HIV/AIDS; and (v) the more intimate the network to which one belongs, the more he/she expresses belief in sorcery and points at other members of his/her social network as the cause of HIV/AIDS. Data will be collected (assisted by local residents and sociology faculty and students from the University of Zimbabwe) during a 12 month period of field research in an urban township in Zimbabwe. The project will interview samples of township residents, engage them in focus group discussions, do in-depth ethnographic probes of selected households, analyze messages in the mass-media on HIV/AIDS prevention, and survey a representative sample of the township in order to gather date to test the hypotheses. This research will evaluate theoretical concepts to interpret folk-explanatory models for undesirable events for the southern African context, shedding light on their cross-cultural variability. The broader impacts of advancing knowledge about the popularly assumed causes for the AIDS epidemic and the explanation of these dynamics of causal attribution and of processes of scapegoat-selection are their importance for medical and development officers designing effective AIDS prevention and awareness messages. This research will enable them to tailor their messages and programs to fit their audience and consequently improve their effectiveness. The project also contributes to the training of a young social scientist.