Postgraduate Research Projects
Students at the National Centre in HIV Social Research are engaged in a range of postgraduate research projects concerned with the changing social and political aspects of sexuality, drug use and blood-borne virus transmission, both here in Australia and overseas. These projects complement and extend the core work conducted by staff at NCHSR, often addressing under-researched or emerging issues, developing complex and critical analyses, and employing a wide range of research methods and theoretical approaches.
Selected PhD projects
- Factors influencing men’s participation in programs for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV in Tanzania
- An investigation of information needs and information-seeking practices of people with hepatitis C
- The dynamics of shame: implications for the drug and alcohol counsellor when working in residential rehab
- Living with hepatitis C in Auckland and Sydney
- Safe-sex campaigns in Australia and New Zealand
- HIV, sex work and China's human rights
- Kinship practices among gay men who have become parents through commercial surrogacy
- HIV and labour migration in Pakistan
- Exploring identity formation in a hepatitis C membership association
Contacts
For more information please email the Postgraduate Coordinator.
Project descriptions
Factors influencing men’s participation in programs for the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV in Tanzania
This research project explores how differences in modernity and masculinity position and prepare rural Tanzanian men to engage with the technology of prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV. The chosen methodology uses both qualitative and quantitative approaches. In the qualitative section, key informants and male community members are interviewed. A theoretical framework of grounded theory guides this analysis of discourses of disease and masculinity in relation to HIV and PMTCT. In the quantitative section, utilising both bivariate and regression analyses, predictors of HIV knowledge, knowledge of PMTCT and HIV stigma are explored. These results will be synthesised to increase understanding of the response of rural men in Tanzania to PMTCT.
Time frame: 2003–2007
Supervisors: Professor John Kaldor (National Centre in HIV Epidemiology and Clinical Research) and Professor Susan Kippax (NCHSR)
An investigation of information needs and information-seeking practices of people with hepatitis C
This study aims to understand how people with hepatitis C use the internet, in conjunction with other media, to access information. By situating internet use within people's everyday realities, the research will provide insights into the sociocultural conditions that facilitate or impede its use. Particular attention will be paid to the impact on information practices of discrimination and stigma experienced as a result of having hepatitis C. Drawing on theories from sociology and information studies, as well as on findings from public health research, the study will enable an integrated approach to providing appropriate information for this group. Qualitative and quantitative data collection were completed during 2005, data analysis commenced in 2006 and continued throughout 2007.
Time frame: 2003–2009
Supervisors: Dr Carla Treloar and Dr Joanne Bryant (NCHSR)
The dynamics of shame: implications for the drug and alcohol counsellor when working in residential rehab
Using ‘shame’ as an axis, this research aims to explore the relationship between counsellor and client in residential rehab and then how this therapeutic dynamic is affected by the institution. The research will include an analysis of the language used in the promotional material of these services, as well as qualitative data drawn from interviews with counsellors who work in this clinical space.
Time frame: 2006–2010
Supervisors: Dr Robert Reynolds and Dr kylie valentine (NCHSR)
Living with hepatitis C in Auckland and Sydney
This qualitative research project compares the lived experiences of people with hepatitis C in Auckland and Sydney, focusing on issues of social support, stigma, disclosure and treatment options. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 people living with hepatitis C in Auckland in 2004, and with a further 20 living in Sydney in 2006. The project draws upon phenomenological and governmentality approaches to incorporate the lived corporeal experiences of participants with a political analysis of the social structures which inform and mediate these experiences.
Time frame: 2005–2009
Supervisors: Associate Professor Carla Treloar and Dr Asha Persson (NCHSR)
Safe-sex campaigns in Australia and New Zealand
In New South Wales and New Zealand in the mid-1990s, AIDS councils launched two very different safe-sex campaigns aimed at increasing safer sexual practices in gay communities, particularly within gay men’s primary relationships. This qualitative study will research and compare these campaigns by reviewing literature and other materials from or about the campaigns themselves, interviewing key HIV/AIDS prevention workers in New South Wales and New Zealand, and analysing qualitative interview data collected by NCHSR in which gay men were asked about issues that the New South Wales campaign hoped to address. This comparison will be situated in the wider context of social and public health policy and will also attempt to tease out some of the assumptions underlying public health and policy messages and campaigns.
Time frame: 2004–2007
Supervisors: Associate Professor Heather Worth and Dr Robert Reynolds (NCHSR)
HIV, sex work and China's human rights
This study aims to explore the decriminalisation of sex work in China in the context of human rights protection and HIV prevention. Using a combination of legal research methodologies and social science methodologies, this study will assess the impact of China's anti-prostitution law on human rights and HIV prevention. The hypothesis of this study is that the decriminalisation of sex work in China is an appropriate approach to human rights protection and HIV prevention.
Time frame: 2007–2011
Supervisors: Associate Professor Heather Worth (NCHSR) and Professor Daniel Tarantola (The UNSW Initiative for Health and Human Rights)
Kinship practices among gay men who have become parents through commercial surrogacy
This project explores how the use of commercial surrogacy by gay men is changing understandings of parenting and family, as well as providing insights into the legal, biomedical and social aspects of assisted reproductive technologies. Of particular interest are: desire and decision-making about parenthood; understandings of family and kinship; the importance of biogenetic connectedness; and relationships between parents, children, surrogates and egg donors. Data has been collected through interviews in Australia and the United Sates as well as from advertisements on gay and lesbian parenting websites in both countries. Data collection will be completed in early 2008.
Time frame: 2004–2009
Supervisors: Dr Suzanne Fraser and Dr Robert Reynolds (NCHSR)
HIV and labour migration in Pakistan
The aim of this research is to explore the underpinning social, economic and cultural factors considered to increase the risk of HIV transmission among overseas Pakistani migrant workers.
Time frame 2007–2010
Supervisors: Associate Professor Heather Worth and Dr Patrick Rawstorne (NCHSR)
Exploring identity formation in a hepatitis C membership association
Coming to terms with living with an illness like hepatitis C is mediated through one’s identity, which for the purposes of this study comprises ways of self-understanding related to social subjectivity and feelings of belonging. Concerns have been expressed about the ways biomedical discourse and neo-liberalism can mediate identity surrounding living with an illness, as a person’s wider social concerns and reality are often disregarded within these discourse types. Member-based associations like the Hepatitis C Council of New South Wales may be well positioned to help people negotiate or consider these concerns as they relate to formation of identity surrounding living with hepatitis C.
Using interview research methods and critical discourse analysis, the formation of identity among members of the Hepatitis C Council of New South Wales will be examined. Whether and to what extent membership of the council represents engagement in diverse and alternative discourse types, and how this relates to identity formation surrounding living with hepatitis C, will be explored.
Time frame: 2005–2008
Supervisors: Dr kylie valentine and Associate Professor Carla Treloar (NCHSR)
