Under the Skin and into the Social: Examining the Neuroscience of Social Problems and Inequality (2017)
Tolwinski, Kasia Eve (Author)
Hilgartner, Stephen (Advisor)
Cornell University
Hilgartner, Stephen
Physical Details: 222 pp.
Language: English
This dissertation examines how and why neuroscience has entered the field of social problems research. A subset of neuroscientists I studied is now doing research with the explicit purpose of addressing poverty, adversity, and inequality. Their foundational claim is that experiences in the world and interactions with other people – an “environment of relationships” – are integral in shaping brain development. I investigate how neuroscientists and policymakers produce scientific knowledge about the developing brain, and put forward a new sociotechnical vision for governance. Those involved in this project understand themselves as using science to advocate for a more just society that takes responsibility for the health and well being of its most vulnerable and disadvantaged citizens. Despite these good intentions, my neuroscientist interviewees found themselves at the center of controversy during their early careers. Critics from within the scientific community were worried that the research was based upon eugenicist and racist assumptions. The neuroscience community eventually accepted the work, and the controversy subsided. More recently, however, the studies have gotten wider coverage, and a similar strand of criticism, albeit from outside of the scientific community, has resurfaced. Through ethnographic methods, I studied the knowledge production and policymaking practices of this group, as well as the controversy that ensued and how my participants react to it. I pay close attention to the science-policy relationship, and show that building neuroscience-based policy requires extensive negotiation amongst actors, where they must contend with both social and scientific concerns. The production of a new narrative called the “Brain Story” exemplifies this process. I found that neuroscience brings new attention to age-old problems, and positions itself as a powerful new voice in the arena of early childhood development by pulling together discourses of science, economics, and our moral responsibility to children. I argue that the research is at once a reflection and repudiation of biomedical modes of analysis. Though this approach values biomedical evidence about the individual, scientists I interviewed believe that the best way to solve social problems is by intervening at the level of the social. Though well-intentioned, the research may produce unintended consequences.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Nelson, Jennifer;
(2014)
“Breaking the Chain of Poverty”: Family Planning, Community Involvement, and the Population Council--Office of Economic Opportunity Alliance
Article
Souza, Juliana Teixeira;
(2011)
Carne podre, café com milho e leite com água: disputas de autoridade e fiscalização do comércio de gêneros na Corte imperial, 1840--1889
Book
David Michaels;
(2020)
The Triumph of Doubt: Dark Money and the Science of Deception.
Chapter
Henry, Emmanuel;
(2013)
“License to Expose?” Occupational Exposure Limits, Scientific Expertise and State in Contemporary France
Chapter
Boudia, Soraya;
(2013)
From Threshold to Risk: Exposure to Low Doses of Radiation and Its Effects on Toxicants Regulation
Book
Fox, Daniel M.;
(2010)
The Convergence of Science and Governance: Research, Health Policy, and American States
Book
Hüntelmann, Axel C.;
Schneider, Michael C.;
(2010)
Jenseits von Humboldt: Wissenschaft im Staat 1850--1990
Article
Breyfogle, Nicholas B.;
Brooke, John L.;
Otter, Christopher J.;
(2013)
The State and the Epidemiological Transition: An Introduction
Article
Victoria Pitts-Taylor;
(2019)
Neurobiologically Poor? Brain Phenotypes, Inequality, and Biosocial Determinism
Article
Kasia Tolwinski;
(2019)
Fraught claims at the intersection of biology and sociality: Managing controversy in the neuroscience of poverty and adversity
Article
Daniel Newman;
(June 2017)
Automobiles and Socioeconomic Sustainability: Do We Need a Mobility Bill of Rights?
Book
O'Connor, Alice;
(2001)
Poverty Knowledge: Social Science, Social Policy, and the Poor in Twentieth-Century U.S. History
Article
Sharpe, Pamela;
(2012)
Explaining the Short Stature of the Poor: Chronic Childhood Disease and Growth in Nineteenth-Century England
Chapter
Kevin Siena;
(2020)
Poor bodies and disease
Article
King, Steven;
(2005)
“Stop This Overwhelming Torment of Destiny”: Negotiating Financial Aid at Times of Sickness under the English Old Poor Law, 1800--1840
Book
Mayhew, Henry;
Sabbagh, Karl;
(2011)
Voices of Victorian London: In Sickness and in Health
Article
Arnold, David J.;
(2012)
The Medicalization of Poverty in Colonial India
Article
Miller, Edgar;
(2013)
“Pauper Lunatics and their Treatment,” by Joshua Harrison Stallard (1870)
Article
Levene, Alysa;
Siena, Kevin;
(2013)
Reporting Dirt and Disease: Child Ill-health in Eighteenth-Century England
Chapter
Danielle Abdon;
(2020)
Architecture in relief: Hospitals for the poor in Venice and Lisbon
Be the first to comment!