yHEART PDX, Vol. I: YPAR on Local Social Determinants of Health

Overview

yHEART—youth Health Equity and Action Research Training—trains youth residents of N/NE Portland (PDX) as public health researchers, integrating social epidemiology and YPAR—and using information and communication technologies (ICTs) to enhance research processes. The first yHEART PDX project examines neighborhood SDH.

In collaboration with Self Enhancement Inc. (SEI) in NE Portland, community artist and art professor Sharita Towne, and graduate researcher Lulú González, the activities under this project have three interrelated research and training objectives:

  1. Pilot a curriculum for training local youth on health equity, SDH, and participatory research

  2. Guide youth through a participatory research project to identify and map local SDH concerns

  3. Use youth research data to generate a series of research and creative arts products that can be used to inform and guide LHD and city planning practices/strategies related to SDH

The purpose of this project is to understand experiences and perceptions of local SDH among youth of color in N/NE Portland. Youth researchers use four participatory methods to identify, characterize, and map their place-based experiences/perceptions of local SDH. They then generate creative arts research products (based on their data) to use in a series of planned community exhibits/research dissemination events, most recently their youth-led presentation at the 2020 Youth. Tech. Health Live conference.

The goal of this project is to identify specific places where these SDH are located, and work with youth to understand how they affect health opportunities in N/NE Portland. In other words, we want to collaboratively map out important SDH locations and experiences. And we want to generate local SDH data, maps, and arts products that can be used to improve community health opportunities from a youth perspective.

 
 

A selection of works based on yHEART PDX, Vol.I

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The People’s Social Epi Project: PDX

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yHEART PDX, Vol.II: Spatializing Intergenerational Experiences of Racial Exclusion/Inclusion + Health