Synopsis
Racism is one of the challenges that Aboriginal and Torres Islander populations face in Australia. This is a historical injustice that this communities have face for a long time forcing them to resort to developing stress management mechanisms. Research suggests a close link between racism and smoking since this is a seen as cool way of cushioning the populations from the racist stress (Janevic et al. 2017, p. 412). This study focusses on how racism impacts smoking rates among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years in Sydney. The purpose of the research is to explore the views and opinions of the population on how racism contributes to smoking. The expected outcomes are positive participation from the population to justify the research problem and propose recommendations for intervention.
This study seeks to investigate the link between racism and smoking in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults between 20-25 years in Sydney. The researcher will gather the data through the survey method by interviewing respondents to gather information about their views and opinions on the research topic. Berinsky (2008, p. 19) suggests that the survey design is best suited for this study since it allows the researcher to explore the subject in their settings. The findings from the study will be analysed to draw conclusions on the state of the problem and form a way of finding solutions and suggesting possible policy interventions for the problem. The findings from the study will be generalised to other areas since this sample population will be used as representative of the population.
Before the research study, a pilot study was done to determine the effectiveness of the tool and their ability to yield the expected results. The pilot study entailed interviewing three students from the university about the topic to determine the ability of the research instruments to yield the expected results. According to Dillman et al. (2009, p. 22), the pilot study assist the researcher to test the instruments for reliability. In the pilot study, three students were interviewed for a duration of twenty minutes where the researcher asked specific question guided by the interview guide. The finding of the pilot study indicated that people who are racially discriminated are stressed and will resort to unhealthy behaviours like smoking as a way of making them feel cool. The respondents indicated that they believe there is a close link due to personal experiences and the experiences that they have seen on others?
Background
Racism is a belief in superiority which makes one race more superior than the other. This leads to discrimination and certain behaviour patterns which prejudice or stereotype those who are from the lower race (Bamshad & Olson 2003, p. 79). To overcome such frustrations, those affected resort strategies that make them comfortable within their cocoon (Williams, Priest & Anderson 2016, p. 3; Janevic, et al. 2017, p. 412). Australia is one of the countries with high racial discrimination levels that have been socialized in people forming structural racism.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander have been racially discriminated in all sectors in the country which has created a huge segregation that makes the country polarized along racial lines. (Jones 2012, p. 47). According to Clark et al. (2009, p. 808) racism creates stressful conditions and experiences from discrimination that people experience thus leading to psychological, physiological and behavioural responses that lead to the use of drug use. Drugs are used as an opium to cushion the stressful challenges that these people face. Tobacco is the commonly used drug among the population because it is cheap and easily available to the population (Velez 2018, pp. 4). As the population encounters racist tendencies, they are drawn more to smoking since smoking is a depressant that reduces the pain and stress that they feel out discrimination.
A longitudinal study of young British multiethnic cohorts by Read et al. (2018, p. 2-8) revealed that cigarette childhood experiences like smoking can trigger drug use patterns as a response to the stressors that they feel. The prevalence of smoking was seen to increase between the age of 21-23 years where exposure to smoking in adulthood related to racism. Another study by Shepherd et al. (2017, p. 3-10) which used data on 1239 indigenous children aged between 5-10 years revealed that racism reduces the wellbeing of the individual who makes them resort to drugs when they reach a drug using age. Further, Briggs, Lindorf & Ivers (2015, pp. 31-33) argue that marginalization of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people pushed them to rural areas where they get more access to leaves and native tobacco for smoking.
Matthews-King (2018, pp. 4-9) further reported that in a different study, children who experienced racism were likely to smoke during adulthood, where 80% of the children who had been racially abused smoked at the age of sixteen years. Despite the fact that smoking prevalence has been reducing in the UK populations, less has been reported on the changes that Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islander, little has been reported on smoking reduction levels among this marginalized groups (Dauphine et al. 2013, p. 4; Lane 2015, p. 1860). This means that smoking is a socio-cultural behaviour handed over to children through believes that they feel the habit of smoking fulfils to them.
Most studies done on racism and tobacco smoking have focused on cohort studies where the examined people from different ages and specifically varied sample groups and in most cases children who are followed up as they grow (Mansouri 2009, p. 11). This means that the studies only focussed on cohort groups as they progressed from childhood to adulthood but failed to focus on a specific adult age group to determine how racism affects their smoking patterns. The major gaps in these studies is that they have studied the respondents in their local settings which makes the smoking patterns more rampant due to the nature of smoking that these communities have been doing even before they were colonised. These studies have not adequately addressed the issue of how local or communal settings contribute to smoking. Despite racism being one of the factors of smoking, the studies have failed to determine the magnitude of the racial factor in smoking to Aboriginal populations. Further, development in Australia have led to policy initiatives to reduce racism, the studies have also failed to mention how the smoking patterns caused by racism have evolved with the reducing trends in racism. Further, the studies have been generalised rather focussing on a specific age group like 20-25 years.
Therefore, this study seeks to study the age of 20-25 years and focussing on the respondents who have attained a particular age and can make choices on whether to smoke or not. This study seeks to offer an in-depth analysis on the link between racism and tobacco smoking at an adult age. The findings of this study will add more weight to the existing studies that have been pushing for the need to include racism as one of the social determinants of health in Australia. The expected outcome is to validate the research question and meet the objectives of the study by proving the link between racism and smoking in the chosen population in Sydney. These findings will be generalised to the larger population thus providing insights on what racism presents to other people who are in similar conditions.
According to Lane (2015, p. 279), racism is one of the causes of certain behaviour patterns among marginalized groups like the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, this study offers an overview of how smoking is used as a response to societal issues like racism and how understanding the causes of drug use can form an important basis for addressing societal issues. Therefore, this study explores the link between racism and smoking by determining racial factors that make the selected community to turn to smoke. By surveying the respondents, the study offers an in-depth analysis of the problem to highlight solutions that can be used to address the problem in the selected population (Dillman, Smyth & Christian 2009, p. 24). This study is significant to academic literature since it offers an insight on how racism drives the racially segregated group into adopting the unhealthy behaviours that they display. The findings of the study can form the basis of future research and policy on how the behaviours can be addressed
Research question
How does racism impact smoking rates among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years in Sydney?
Aims
To explore how racism impacts smoking rates among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years in Sydney?
Objectives
- To identify Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years who smoke in Sydney.
- To understand the experiences of racism among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years.
- To explore racial discrimination and smoking among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years.
- To address whether there is any relationship between racism and smoking rates among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults aged 20-25 years in Sydney?
Study design
This is a qualitative study design using interview guides. This study will employ the interview survey design to gather data for the study. Survey design is appropriate for this research because it is an efficient way of gathering data by asking questions that allow the respondents to give their views and opinions about the research topic. The design is the most versatile and productive method of communication and allows the researcher to easily administer questions that are specifically tailored for the phenomena under the study (Berinsky 2008, p. 311). Through the help of an interview guide, the researcher presents questions with a clear purpose to meet the needs of the study. One important element in a survey study is the nature of the respondents that the researcher chooses since they form the basis of accuracy in the findings of the study.
Study setting/Location
The survey study will be done in Sydney city and will specifically target respondents who fall within the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander group. The researcher will specifically target areas in Sydney where most people from the population reside. The target group will be located through local administration that will assist in purposively mapping out specific areas that have the Aboriginals and Torres Islanders. This will rely on available demographic records that will make it easy to map out the specific areas that the researcher will target. The researcher will sample out the population and interview them to determine their experiences and perceptions on the effects of racism to smoking.
Ethical considerations
Ethical considerations were considered to meet the requirements of the study. The first thing was to seek approval from the university to carry out the research. Consent was given from the academic administration department to recruit and carry out the research within the institution. The need to regulate research is the reason why researchers must seek approval from relevant institutions before they carry out research (Georgia Fouka, 2011). Further Nijhawan et al. (2013) suggest that informed consent and confidentiality of the respondents is important. The researcher will only use the responded that have agreed to participate in the study and every information will be protected
Sampling recruitment
Ideally, it is impossible to study the entire population, and no one wants to study the entire population therefore one must settle for a sampling/sample. According to Black and Champion (1976), sample is a portion of elements taken from a population, which is considered to be representative of the population. The respondents for the study will be purposively sampled and then requested to participate in the study. Once the population has been purposively identified, stratified random sampling will be used to determine the number of people who will participate in the study. Stratified random sampling has been used to reduce bias and give each response to the probability of participating (Dillman, Smyth & Christian 2009, p. 9). The participants will be given numbers from 1-100 where each fourth person will be picked thus giving a sample size of 25 people for the study.
Data collection methods/Survey Tool
The study will use interviews (interview guide) as a data collection method since it is the most appropriate tool for surveys. Through the tool, the researcher presents questions with a clear purpose to meet the needs of the study. The interview method allows the researcher to gather, opinion, views and suggestions of the respondents by asking question that relate to the research topic (Dillman, Smyth & Christian 2009, p. 11). The questions will carefully crafted in the interview guide for easy flow of information.
Data Analysis
The researcher will use the grounded analysis method for analysing the data where the researcher will focus on the themes that emerge in the data that the researcher has gathered. To increase the validity and reliability of the themes, the researcher will apply the investigator triangulation where he will work with another researcher to do data analysis separately so that the interpretations are compared to find common themes. The interviews will be recorded and transcribed before they are analysed. The researcher will apply data triangulation to validate the themes that appear in the study through the help of a research assistant who will conduct a separate data analysis and the findings compared. The researcher will code the transcripts by identifying sections that relate to the research topic and then the data will be organised based on sections that relate to each other. The patterns and themes found in the categories will be used to build theory and draw conclusions for the study. The researcher will then synthesis the data to represent the meaning that the participants ascribed to the experiences thus drawing conclusions on the research topic.
The main areas that the researcher will require resources are stationery, computer use, travel expenses and personnel. Stationery will be useful in preparing interview schedules for interviewing the respondents. The researcher will also require travel expenses to move from one location to another and sometimes airtime in case some clarifications are needed from the supervisor. Lastly, there is need for computer use and assistance of the services of a computer expert who will assist the researcher in qualitative analysis of the research findings. Since the researcher is dealing with different people, there may be need for the services of an interpreter just in case the researcher faces language barriers. The research will be done in English and there is no guarantee that all the respondents know English. Lastly, the researcher may need a research assistant who understands the locality well. The individual will act as a guide to the researcher for easy identification of the target population and respondents for the study.
The research pilot will be used in the study by expanding on the interview questions to gather more data on the research topic. Further, the data collected from the pilot study forms the basis of the research since it points to the direction of the research. The data gathered from the pilot sample of three people will not be used in the main research because three questions will be added to the new interview guide. The pilot study was only supposed to act as a point on the direction of the research to give the researcher an overview of what to expect.
In the real study the researcher will interview the respondents and record the audio interview which will then be transcribed for analysis. In the real research the sample used will be bigger as compared to the one in the pilot study to gather more views. According to Dillman, Smyth & Christian (2009) probability sampling reduces biases in the study since it gives all the participants a chance to take part in the study. Further, the researcher purposively selected the three respondents for the study while in the actual research, the research will use purposive sampling to identify the population and then use stratified random sampling to pick the respondents that will participate in the study from the larger sample.
Interviews have several advantages that make them reliable tools for data collection in surveys. Dillman (2014, p. 11) suggests that since surveys mostly seek to verify existing facts, interviews offer an in-depth analysis of the research topic thus allowing the researcher to discover how people think and feel about the topic. Further, Singleton & Straits (2009, P. 15) suggests that the researcher has a deeper interaction with the participants thus clarifying any ambiguities that arise and further, the question can be tailored to the respondent to make it easy for the interviewee to understand. Another advantage that interviews offer is the fact that the respondent is not influenced by the views and responses of other participants thus making the responses more reliable. However, interviews can be costly and time-consuming since they require the researcher to interview participants one at a time. The quality of the data collected can be compromised if the researcher is not a quality interviewer. Therefore, without proper framing of the questions, bias can be created which can influence the responses thus making the data unreliable.
To make the research more appropriate, the researcher will make changes to the pilot interview schedule by adding three more questions to allow more data on the topic for analysis. Berinsky (2008) argues that the researher needs to organise the wordings of the question well to meet the needs of the study. The wording and order of questions will remain since the three questions will be added at the end of the interview guide. The role of the questions is to add more insight on the topic and make it more appropriate. The timing of the interval is not relevant since the research is not affected by any external factors. However, the research has to organise the interview so that the research can be finished within the required timeline.
Conclusion
In this study, the researcher seeks to justify the existence of the research and point out that measures have not been put in place to address the problem. The expected outcomes of the pilot study and the main study is to justify the research question by offering information on the news, opinions and feelings of respondents about the topic that can allow the researcher to make conclusions from the study (Bamshad & Olson 2003, p. 79). The findings of this study form the basis of future research on how the health challenge that the population under study faces and the solutions that can be put in place to address them. Berinsky (2008) argues that the role of any research is to offer new knowledge or add knowledge to existing research to make the recommendations made by other researchers more meaningful. The research will request participants to suggest ways that they think the problem can be addressed and the themes from this research will form the future policy direction for addressing the problem. The recommendations put in place by the researcher will be used to assist in improving the health condition of the population by putting measures in place to address racism and smoking thus keeping the population safe.
References
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