The intersectionality imperative: Calling in stigma and health research.

Abstract

In drawing attention to the power, privilege, and inequities embedded in multiple interconnected social categories like gender, race, and class, intersectionality is a critical theory and approach well-suited to stigma and health research. With deep historical roots in 19th century Black feminism, intersectionality has traveled generatively across diverse disciplines. Like stigma, intersectionality is fundamentally about the power conferred by our social context. Like stigma research, intersectional research ultimately aims to rectify inequities and promote the well-being of members of stigmatized or marginalized groups. Using an intersectional approach in stigma and health can guide research aims; prompt new questions, and reframe, reconceptualize, or discover psychological phenomena or processes, as well as empower members of stigmatized groups and address disparities and inequities. It can be deployed to think innovatively about differences, similarities, connections, and coalitions among intersectional groups, or to analyze how institutions perpetuate disparities. Acknowledging the important contributions made by stigma and health research within an intersectional approach, we call in stigma and health researchers who either question intersectionality's relevance to their work or want to explore its applicability or feasibility. Reflecting on some of the debates within intersectionality scholarship around what intersectionality is, who it is for, and how it can be implemented, we also point to future directions for research. We affirm the intersectional imperative to identify and rectify inequities and disparities that construct and result from intersecting systems of oppression, while acknowledging a diversity of interpretations and methods that embrace that guiding principle.

Quitting smoking after a cancer diagnosis is associated with reductions in stigma and anxiety: A longitudinal mediation analysis.

“…First, the participants were recruited from two comprehensive cancer centers and were predominantly non-Hispanic White. Stigma is intersectional in nature and is experienced differently based on a variety of identity and background characteristics, including race and ethnicity (Else-Quest et al, 2022). Future research is needed to understand cancer stigma at the intersections of other patient characteristics, including minoritized race and ethnicity.…”

Discrimination and Adverse Perinatal Health Outcomes: A Latent Class Analysis

“…Existing literature assessing the impact of discrimination on health has been limited by a focus on discrimination based on a single dimension, most commonly race-based discrimination (9). A focus exclusively on racial discrimination may mask complexities in the maternal discrimination experience and potentially underestimates the overall impact of discrimination on perinatal health (10). Adopting an intersectionality framework recognizes that individuals simultaneously occupy multiple interconnected social identities (eg, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status) that confer privilege or disadvantage (11,12).…”

“…A focus exclusively on racial discrimination may mask complexities in the maternal discrimination experience and potentially underestimates the overall impact of discrimination on perinatal health ( 10 ). Adopting an intersectionality framework recognizes that individuals simultaneously occupy multiple interconnected social identities (eg, race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status) that confer privilege or disadvantage ( 11 , 12 ). Latent class analysis (LCA) offers one method to apply an intersectional approach in quantitative analysis ( 13 ).…”

Stigma and the intersection of ethnicity, gender, romantic relationships, and serious mental illness: Perspectives from Latinxs with schizophrenia and their family members.

“…As a critical lens, intersectionality clarifies complex experiences of marginalization to facilitate greater understanding and guide more holistic solutions to address structural inequality (Abrams et al, 2020). As an analytic tool, it can be used to assess individual and structural or group factors and examine the axes of multiple social categories and linked identities to understand experiences and social processes (Collins & Bilge, 2016;Else-Quest et al, 2022;Torres et al, 2018).…”