Publication year: 2011
Source: Social Science & Medicine, In Press, Accepted Manuscript, Available online 29 July 2011
Elizabeth M., Miller
There is a strong link between maternal knowledge and child well-being in many populations worldwide. Fewer studies have investigated the links between indigenous systems of medical knowledge and infant outcomes in non-Western societies, such as the Ariaal people of northern Kenya. This study has four goals. First, it defines culture-specific domains of health knowledge in Ariaal mothers using the cultural consensus method, a statistical model that measures knowledge shared by a set of informants. Second, it identifies factors that predict maternal health knowledge. Third, it investigates associations between maternal health knowledge and treatment-seeking behaviors. Finally, it associates health knowledge with…
Highlights: ► Cultural consensus can be used to determine domains of health knowledge in populations with little formal education. ► Ariaal mothers integrate both Western and indigenous knowledge in their understanding of health and medicine. ► Women with greater knowledge of traditional medicine are somewhat more likely to treat their infant’s illness at a clinic. ► Ariaal mothers’ knowledge of traditional medicine is associated with lower likelihood of infant illness