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4S 2019 Innovations, Interruptions, Regenerations: Society for the Social Studies of Science New Orleans

2 October 2019

4S 2019 Innovations, Interruptions, Regenerations: Society for the Social Studies of Science held in New Orleans, USA. On 7 September, Kate and Catherine presented their paper titled, ‘Relating with data: stories of self-monitoring with care‘.

View the full conference programme.

The paper came from the project, drawing on qualitative research with individuals and couples engaged in monitoring Body Mass Index, weight or blood pressure in the UK with devices acquired independently of the clinic. Kate and Catherine reflected on the factors that disrupt or interrupt the anticipated flow of data from these practices towards the clinic or commercial digital health platforms, and shift the meaning of self-monitoring as a practice.

In analysing narratives of care-full (and some care-less) negotiations of monitoring, the paper sought to complicate accounts of the dataification of health in everyday life and of the individual focus of self-monitoring, showing these technologies to be embedded in domestic life and relations with close others.