Articles
Medical Interpretation and Practice on Teenage Delinquency:
Medicalization Based on the Narratives of Practitioners
2010 Volume 86 Pages 159-178
Details
2010 Volume 86 Pages 159-178
This study examines new medical interventions toward teenage delinquency as a form of “medicalization” of the problem and clarifies the process of medical and non-medical interpretation and practices through interviews with practitioners.
Section 1 reviews previous studies that look critically at the medicalization of delinquency and medical uncertainty. Both medical and non-medical factors appear in medical interpretations and practices. Progress in the medicalization of delinquency depends on how medical uncertainties are used and managed by the practitioners. Therefore, this study objectively analyzes how they function.
Section 2 summarizes the research method which was used in the interview research of 17 practitioners.
Section 3 examines the process through which the medical interpretation has spread in the correctional setting. It clarifies how medical uncertainties are used and managed by practitioners. (1) The new medical diagnosis came into use to explain and interpret delinquency within the correctional setting. However, the practitioners were already dealing with delinquents using medical treatment based on their own experience before the diagnosis was generally known. The medicalization of the problem gradually spread in the correctional setting. (2) Even after the beginning of intervention with medical treatment, non-medical elements still continue to be expressed in practice as medical uncertainties. However, the practitioners give them a positive meaning by emphasizing the educational significance as they work toward the proper use of medical and non-medical treatments in the strategy. Thus, medical uncertainties are used as resources for practices.
Therefore, the concept of medicalization will be partly adopted. It is also necessary to understand the phenomenon of medicalization assuming that it is constructed through interactions among the people who use and manage medical uncertainties.
