Browsing by Person "Hepworth, Julie"

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'Just choose the easy option': students talk about alcohol use and social influence
(Taylor & Francis, 2015-08-17) Hepworth, Julie; McVittie, Chris; Schofield, Toni; Lindsay, Jo; Leontini, Rose; Germov, John
Previous research into young people's drinking behaviour has studied how social practices influence their actions and how they negotiate drinking-related identities. Here, adopting the perspective of discursive psychology we examine how, for young people, social influences are bound up with issues of drinking and of identity. We conducted 19 focus groups with undergraduate students in Australia aged between 18 and 24 years. Thematic analysis of participants' accounts for why they drink or do not drink was used to identify passages of talk that referred to social influence, paying particular attention to terms such as 'pressure' and 'choice'. These passages were then analysed in fine-grained detail, using discourse analysis, to study how participants accounted for social influence. Participants treated their behaviour as accountable and produced three forms of account that: (1) minimised the choice available to them, (2) explained drinking as culture and (3) described resisting peer pressure. They also negotiated gendered social dynamics related to drinking. These forms of account allowed the participants to avoid individual responsibility for drinking or not drinking. These findings demonstrate that the effects of social influence on young people's drinking behaviour cannot be assumed, as social influence itself becomes negotiable within local contexts of talk about drinking. 2015 Taylor & Francis
Masculinities and Health: Whose Identities, Whose Constructions?. Whose Identities, Whose Constructions?
(Elsevier, 2017-01-04) McVittie, Chris; Hepworth, Julie; Goodall, Karen
Discursive research focuses on the examination of how individuals negotiate versions of identities, events, and social phenomena in social interaction. The chapter describes the key elements of this approach, in terms of paying close attention to how people ascribe, resist, and rework identities and what these accomplish. Applying the approach to the study of gendered identities and health, the chapter considers in detail the construction of one specific gendered identity, namely that of hegemonic masculinity. This identity recurs commonly in the literature on gender and health but has been overemphasized, often with little regard for the situatedness of gendered identity. Moreover, many studies have tended to equate considerations of health with those of ill health, often paying little attention to the contextual features of the identities in play. Adopting a discursive perspective provides a detailed understanding of how individuals negotiate gender in relation to health and ill health. 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
The Research Interview in Adult Mental Health: Problems and Possibilities for Discourse Studies
(Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2016) Hepworth, Julie; McVittie, Chris
The aim of this chapter is to critically discuss the research interview in adult mental health by examining the ways in which discourse studies can further contribute to the understanding of research practice. Importantly, research practice is conceptualised here as an object of study in itself, in that it produces subjects and has effects. In other words, the practice of using the research interview simultaneously enacts a method of data collection and creates a re-presentation of interviewees' accounts that reproduce, maintain, or transform dominant psychological thinking about humans and health (or adult mental health). The ways we practise as researchers, therefore, are inseparable from the findings that are produced. In this chapter, we explore existing critical considerations about the research interview, several problems and possibilities that discourse studies encounter in health research, and what implications there are for education and research practice to inform the research interview in adult mental health.