Doctoral Dissertation Research: Technologically-Assisted Later Motherhood in Israel

在苏珊·麦金农博士的指导下，弗吉尼亚大学的博士生珍妮·c·多伯恩将进行一项研究，研究在许多国家越来越普遍的技术辅助晚育如何影响人们对家庭、代际、科学和民族的普遍理解。这项研究将在以色列进行，那里的女性公民有无与伦比的机会获得辅助生殖技术，使她们能够在高龄（40-51岁）怀孕。杜伯恩将在以色列生育医学中心特拉维夫进行为期12个月的人种学研究。数据收集将包括在生育诊所和医院产科进行参与性观察；与病人、医生和相关专业人员进行半结构化访谈；直接观察医学会议和在线患者支持小组；以及对大众再现在媒体和其他公共资源中的分析。本研究考察了性别、技术、家庭和老龄化之间不断变化的交叉点，这是许多国家妇女推迟生育时出现的公共卫生问题。这项研究特别侧重于晚育，将阐明辅助生殖技术对这种特定文化的亲属关系和家庭概念的更广泛影响。研究人员还将研究在国家建设的背景下，接受风险是如何影响技术的意义的。最后，资助这项研究支持社会科学家的培训。

University of Virginia doctoral student Jennie C. Doberne, supervised by Dr. Susan McKinnon, will undertake research on how technologically-assisted later motherhood, which is increasingly common in many countries, affects commonly accepted understandings of family, generation, science, and nation. The research will be carried out in Israel, where female citizens have unparalleled access to assisted reproductive technologies enabling pregnancy at advanced (40-51 years) maternal age.Doberne will conduct twelve months of ethnographic research in Tel Aviv, the hub of Israeli fertility medicine. Data collection will include participant observation in a fertility clinic and a hospital maternity unit; semi-structured interviews with patients, medical practitioners and relevant professionals; direct observations of medical conferences and online patient support groups; and analysis of popular representations of reproduction in media and other public sources. This research examines the changing intersections of gender, technology, family, and aging, a site of emerging public health issues as women in many countries delay childbearing. By focusing particularly on later motherhood, this study will elucidate the wider effects of assisted reproductive technologies on such culturally-specific concepts of kinship and family. The researcher also will examine how accepting risk for pronatalist goals affects the meaning of technology in the context of nation-building.Finally, funding this research supports the training of a social scientist.