National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, College of Health & Medicine, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia.
School of Anthropology and Museum Ethnography, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
Int J Equity Health. 2022 Aug 17;21(1):109. doi: 10.1186/s12939-022-01710-8.
For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, culture is foundational to health and wellbeing. However, its inherent conceptual complexity and diversity across and within different Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural groups means that it has rarely been explored in depth by epidemiological research. As a result, there are very few measures which adequately represent the heterogeneity and importance of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures for health and wellbeing. Tools grounded in the social determinants of health are mostly based on European academic opinion about what constitutes culture and wellbeing, and the views of Indigenous peoples are rarely included. Mayi Kuwayu, the National Study of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Wellbeing, developed a new survey tool based on health and wellbeing as perceived by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. This paper describes several of the key processes used to identify cultural domains and develop questionnaire items for the survey tool, reflecting the importance of culture to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
Focus groups were conducted at community organisations and conferences with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. These sessions were aimed at identifying key cultural domains to be addressed by the Mayi Kuwayu questionnaire and to field test drafts of the questionnaire, which were then modified according to focus group feedback and expert input.
Extensive community consultations allowed us to identify key cultural domains, generate questionnaire items, and test initial content validity. The six overarching cultural domains identified during the development of the Mayi Kuwayu questionnaire were: Connection to Country; Beliefs and knowledge; Language; Family, kinship, and community; Cultural expression and continuity; and Self-determination and leadership.
The processes used by Mayi Kuwayu have generated meaningful cultural items for use in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and wellbeing research. Further assessment of these processes, including a comparison with best practice guidelines and psychometric testing of the items and scales developed, will be conducted in a future program of work.
对于澳大利亚原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民而言，文化是健康和幸福的基础。然而，由于其在不同的原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民文化群体中具有内在的概念复杂性和多样性，因此流行病学研究很少对其进行深入探讨。因此，几乎没有任何措施能够充分体现原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民文化对健康和幸福的多样性和重要性。以健康决定因素为基础的工具主要基于欧洲学术界对文化和幸福感的看法，以及对原住民观点的看法很少被包括在内。“美亚库尤”（Mayi Kuwayu），即国家原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民健康研究，开发了一种新的调查工具，该工具基于原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民对健康和幸福的看法。本文描述了用于确定文化领域并为调查工具开发问卷条目的几个关键过程，这些过程反映了文化对澳大利亚原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民的重要性。
在社区组织和会议上与原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民进行了焦点小组讨论。这些会议旨在确定“美亚库尤”问卷要解决的关键文化领域，并对问卷草稿进行现场测试，然后根据焦点小组的反馈和专家意见进行修改。
广泛的社区咨询使我们能够确定关键的文化领域，生成问卷条目的内容，并检验初步的内容有效性。在“美亚库尤”问卷的开发过程中确定的六个总体文化领域包括：与国家的联系；信仰和知识；语言；家庭、亲属关系和社区；文化表达和连续性；以及自决和领导力。
“美亚库尤”使用的方法为原住民和托雷斯海峡岛民健康和幸福研究生成了有意义的文化条目。未来的工作计划将进一步评估这些过程，包括与最佳实践指南进行比较，以及对所开发的条目和量表进行心理测量学测试。
