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Social Science: Health-Risk Vulnerability Analysis

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Social Science: Health-Risk Vulnerability Analysis

Vulnerability is considered multifaceted, multidimensional, and complex compact since

no consensual measurement or definition exists. In social science, vulnerability is associated with

economic, physical, social, and political susceptibility, which shows the probability of a

population being impacted by a destabilizing or external phenomenon or issue which may be

natural or anthropogenic. If the problems are unmediated, the impact can intensify to more

critical poverty or exclusion. Vulnerability is multidimensional and multifaceted because when

analyzing the economic, social, political, and physical factors that shape the environment and

people’s lives, the analysis takes different shapes where the impact on the population is derived

by considering the effects on individual people. All people are vulnerable to health risks

differently. Therefore, analyzing individuals' susceptibility, incapacity when facing health risks,

and the potential inability to recover from the risks make the field more complex.

To a greater extent, social science approaches are significant in measurement and health

risk analysis. The approach forms the basis of collecting vital information about the patient’s

medical history, health status, and any other vital information that may be needed. However,

there exist some challenges related to the approaches. One of the main challenges is the

researcher-participant partnership. In this challenge, there may be differences in researcher-

participant priorities, with participants refusing to answer some of the questions or being

ignorant to participate in the research. Also, the challenge may take the form of differences in

personal norms and language barriers or misunderstanding or mistrust of the research. Another

challenge concerns the scientific quality and data interpretation. This challenge occurs in forms

such as participants giving different information to researchers and nurses, missing medical

records for the participants, or biases in sampling due to referrals by the nurses and medical
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practitioners. Participant characteristics may also hinder social science data collection. This

challenge manifests itself through participants’ contending health and life demands or the

participants having psychosocial, perceptual, and cognitive limitations. Lastly, there is a

challenge to research specifications and procedures. This challenge includes issues such as

unclear inclusion criteria, difficulties in participant recruitment and identification, or gatekeeping

by medical practitioners. Another way this challenge manifests itself is through conflicts in

compensation and mistrusts of the privacy and confidentiality of information about participants.

To overcome these challenges and achieve a more dependable and reliable health-risks

vulnerability analysis and assessment, some strategies can be implemented to overcome them. To

ensure a limited chance of mistrust, a researcher should be transparent and utilize a buy-in

strategy. In this strategy, the researcher should ensure the participant understands the study’s

purpose and assure confidentiality and privacy of the information given. Also, the researcher

should emphasize that participants are experts on themselves and how essential it is to work

together. Another method to overcome the challenges is to be accommodative and explain the

purpose of the compensation. Participants have their schedules, and the researcher should

accommodate that and also accommodate any question asked by the researcher. Also, clearly

state the purpose of the compensation and any possible delays in its release.

In conclusion, the social science approaches have a great extent in helping the analysis of

risk-related vulnerabilities of a population. However, there are some challenges, and mitigation

measures ensure a more holistic measurement and analysis of the vulnerabilities.

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References

García, A. P., Mateos, P., & Giralt, C. H. (2018). A theoretical and methodological essay on the

concept of vulnerability. CONTEXTO. Revista de la Facultad de Arquitectura de la

Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, 12(17).

https://www.redalyc.org/journal/3536/353659380009/html/

Goodman, Z. T., Stamatis, C. A., Stoler, J., Emrich, C. T., & Llabre, M. M. (2021).

Methodological challenges to confirmatory latent variable models of social

vulnerability. Natural Hazards, 106(3), 2731-2749.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7882037/

Holden, R. J., McDougald Scott, A. M., Hoonakker, P. L., Hundt, A. S., & Carayon, P. (2015).

Data collection challenges in community settings: insights from two field studies of

patients with chronic disease. Quality of Life Research, 24(5), 1043-1055.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4342308/

Moret, W. (2017). Vulnerability assessment methodologies: A review of the

literature. Washington, DC: FHI, 360.

https://www.alnap.org/system/files/content/resource/files/main/Vulnerability

%20Assessment%20Literature%20Review.pdf