Anne-Lise Middelthon

Publications (9)7.73 Total impact

• Article: Seeking balance between the past and the present: Vietnamese refugee parenting practices and adolescent well-being.

  Laila Tingvold, Edvard Hauff, James Allen, Anne-Lise Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: This qualitative study examines the resources that Vietnamese refugee parents use in raising their adolescent youth in exile and how they, and their adolescents, regard their experiences of different parenting styles. The study is based on 55 semi-structured interviews and several focus groups performed with a small sample of Vietnamese refugee parents and their adolescent children. Three main themes from the interviews were identified: the role of the extended family and siblings in bringing up children; language acquisition and cultural continuity and, finally, religion and social support. Our findings suggest extended kin are involved in the raising of adolescent children, providing additional family ties and support. Parents regarded Vietnamese language acquisition by their youth as facilitating both communication with extended kin and cultural transmission. Several parents stressed the importance of religious community to socialising and creating a sense of belonging for their youth. Vietnamese refugee parents seek a balance between Vietnamese values and their close extended family social networks, and the opportunities in Norway to develop autonomy in pursuit of educational and economic goals. Together these parenting practices constituted a mobilization of resources in support of their youth. These findings may have important implications for future research on resiliency and the role of these strategies as protective factors mediating mental health outcomes. They may also have implications for treatment, in terms of the types of resources treatment can access and for prevention strategies that maximize key cultural resources for Vietnamese refugee youth.
  International Journal of Intercultural Relations 07/2012; 36(4):563-574. · 1.14 Impact Factor
• Article: The tale of the hearts: deciding on abortion in Ethiopia.

  Meselu Taye Kebede, Per Kristian Hilden, Anne-Lise Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: In contemporary Ethiopia, abortion decision-making is a challenging process involving moral and/or religious dilemmas, as well as considerations of health and safety. Amidst widespread condemnation of female premarital sex and clear moral sanction against induced abortion, young Ethiopian women are nevertheless sexually active and induced abortions are still sought and performed, with the potential for grave physical harm and social stigmatization. This paper examines young unmarried Ethiopian women's narratives of abortion decision-making. In particular, it identifies and explores the operations of a particular discursive shape from within in such narratives, here described as The tale of the hearts. Analysing The tale of the hearts as a decision-making resource, it is argued, allows us to explore the particular, local, historical and cultural character of Ethiopian women's abortion decision-making dilemmas and the culturally available resources contributing to their resolution.
  Culture Health & Sexuality 01/2012; 14(4):393-405. · 1.55 Impact Factor
• Article: Not at all so hard-to-reach: same-sex attracted men in Dar es Salaam.

  Kåre Moen, Peter Aggleton, Melkizedeck T Leshabari, Anne-Lise Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: Based on research in Tanzania, this paper critically examines the widely circulating notion that African same-sex attracted men are hard-to-reach individuals and populations. Despite expectations to the contrary, it was neither time consuming nor difficult to identify and get to know same-sex attracted men in Dar es Salaam. On the contrary, a large and diverse group of such men could readily be encountered, befriended and involved in HIV-related research. The fieldwork was characterised by communicative openness and the researcher was treated with immense kindliness, hospitality and inclusivity. While we may not be in a position to say that the situation is identical everywhere else, we find reason to caution against accepting and propagating unexplained, unexamined and unverified claims to the effect that same-sex attracted men in Africa cannot be reached. We argue that such claims contribute to stigmatise same-sex attracted men and to hinder much-needed HIV-related research and programming.
  Culture Health & Sexuality 11/2011; 14(2):195-208. · 1.55 Impact Factor
• Article: Mandates of trust in the doctor-patient relationship.

  Helge Skirbekk, Anne-Lise Middelthon, Per Hjortdahl, Arnstein Finset
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  ABSTRACT: We examine the conditions for trust relationships between patients and physicians. A trust relationship is not normally negotiated explicitly, but we wanted to discuss it with both patients and physicians. We therefore relied on a combination of interviews and observations. Sixteen patients and 8 family physicians in Norway participated in the study. We found that trust relationships were negotiated implicitly. Physicians were authorized by patients to exercise their judgment as medical doctors to varying degrees. We called this phenomenon the patient's mandate of trust to the physician. A mandate of trust limited to specific complaints was adequate for many medical procedures, but more open mandates of trust seemed necessary to ensure effective and humane treatment for patients with more complex and diffuse illnesses. More open mandates of trust were given if the physician showed an early interest in the patient, was sensitive, gave time, built alliances, or bracketed normal behavior.
  Qualitative Health Research 04/2011; 21(9):1182-90. · 2.19 Impact Factor
• Article: A room for reflection: self-observation and transformation in participatory HIV prevention work.

  Anne-Lise Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: This article looks at HIV prevention projects in which established stigmatized and stigmatizing roles were actively reversed and manipulated in pursuit of HIV harm reduction. In two Norwegian projects, sex workers and drug users carried out harm-reduction activities with other drug users and sex workers. Although HIV-related harm reduction was the aim of the projects, termination or reduction of drug use or sex work was not. Such changes nevertheless occurred among the sex workers and drug users who took active part in the project. The article considers these changes in order to reflect on the meanings and roles of participation in HIV prevention work. In particular, the discussion theorizes on possible ways in which alteration of roles and subject positions may produce self-reflective effects with transformative potentials.
  Medical Anthropology Quarterly 01/2006; 19(4):419-36. · 1.30 Impact Factor
• Article: [To manage and control own risk].

  Anne-Lise Middelthon
  Tidsskrift for den Norske laegeforening 04/2005; 125(6):763-4.
• Article: [Qualitative methods in medical research--an ethnographic perspective].

  Per Kristian Hilden, Anne-Lise Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: In the social sciences, "method" refers not only to practical techniques of investigation but also to the underlying assumptions regarding how knowledge is generated (epistemology) and to the strategies derived for knowledge accumulation. In order to consider fruitfully the role of qualitative methods in health research, this three-dimensional understanding of method must be kept in mind. Specifically, in order to understand the contribution of ethnography to health research, the foundational epistemological and research strategic assumptions must be clarified. With examples from Norway and other Western countries and from more traditional regions of ethnographic research, the authors discuss how ethnographic research can be carried out and how ethnography might complement other qualitative methodologies as well as epidemiological research.
  Tidsskrift for Den norske legeforening 11/2002; 122(25):2473-6.
• Article: [Young gay men and absence of adequate signs and cultural images].

  Anne-Lise Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: This article is based on a qualitative, exploratory HIV-related study among young gay men in Norway. In addition to generating HIV-related knowledge, the study provided insights into phenomena associated with the general cultural conditions under which young gay men grow up. Those who are not yet members of gay communities or friendship groups have to rely on the public discourse for their acquisition of knowledge and signs relating to sex and sexuality. However, among the signs and images available through this discourse, only a few mediate a homosexual reality. Furthermore, of the few that exist, hardly any can be found that is not derived from the heterosexual domain. In effect this implies that young gay men will have to make sense of their lives and their sexuality through signs and images that basically mediate a reality different from theirs. In encounters between health workers and young gay men, knowledge about and awareness of such processes may be vital.
  Tidsskrift for Den norske legeforening 02/2002; 122(1):82-4.
• Article: Being young and gay in the context of HIV : a qualitive study among young Norwegian gay men /

  Anne-Lise. Middelthon
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  ABSTRACT: Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oslo, 2001. Includes bibliographical references.