Comparative Sociological Study of Cancer Tobyo-ki:Interaction between Individuals and Society in Narratives of Illness

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 17K04160
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Sociology
• Research Institution: Japan Women's University
• Principal Investigator: KADOBAYASHI Michiko 日本女子大学, 人間社会学部, 研究員 (70424299)
• Project Period (FY): 2017-04-01 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: がん闘病記 / 比較社会学的研究 / 闘病 / 肯定的変化 / 相互作用 / 再構築 / 自己成長 / ナラティヴ

Outline of Final Research Achievements

I conducted this qualitative survey of 100 volumes of cancer patients’ tobyoki for the purpose of clarifying the chronological changes of contents and the interactions between individuals and society by comparing them with tobyoki before 2005, which I presented as the master narratives. Currently in the era of “post-open awareness”, one’s own death is foreseeable, and there are a lot of tobyoki in which authors try to see their medical situations as accurately as possible. They have a sense of mission to help others become “smart patients” and urge the proactive involvement. They seem to summarize their lives individually, so it is not an exaggeration to say that their tobyoki is that of the age of “creating death”. I clarified “benefit finding”, “resilience” and the characteristics of the AYA generation’s tobyoki. I investigated the word “tobyo”. Though it is usually used as an idiom, the word often has its own meaning, so how to use “tobyo” is extremely ambiguous.

Free Research Field

医療社会学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

昨今、教育場面、またケアに活用するために看護学分野での闘病記を対象にした研究は増加しつつあるが、社会学ではまだあまり見当たらない。闘病記の研究は、「診断された病いの状況を生きるのがどういうことか、個人的なものが社会的な文脈の中でどのように認識されるか」に繋がることからも社会学的意義がある。社会の枠組みの変容との対応や「闘病」の意味内容にまで質的な分析へと射程を広げた本研究は、臨床分野への応用も含めて社会学の採りうる方法論と実践のひとつの提示でもあり、「闘病記」を取り巻く日本の社会文化的側面を国際学会などで発表し伝えていくことの意義もあると考えている。