Blake Poland
Biographic Data
| ID | 150800 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Blake Poland |
| GIVEN NAMES | Blake |
| FAMILY NAME | Poland |
| SIGNATURE | POLAND B |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Toronto |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-3774-9758 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 68 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 583 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 68 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1990 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 13 |
Embracing emergence: Reframing and Reimagining the Visionary Communities Project
Nutritional Criminology: Why the Emerging Research on Ultra-Processed Food Matters to Health and Justice
There is mounting concern over the potential harms associated with ultra-processed foods, including poor mental health and antisocial behavior. Cutting-edge research provides an enhanced understanding of biophysiological mechanisms, including microbiome pathways, and invites a historical reexamination of earlier work that investigated the relationship between nutrition and criminal behavior. Here, in this perspective article, we explore how this …
Transformative learning at the community-university-land interface: A political ecology of knowledge, education and health
As awareness grows of the catastrophic implications of global environmental change, multiple scholarly fields addressing health-environment relationships have advocated 'transformative' educational strategies. Holistic Indigenous health-environment models inspire and inform many such efforts, but related land-based learning initiatives involving universities are often impeded by the competitive processes of academia. In this article we report on …
Relationships are everything: The underpinnings of grassroots community action in the Covid-19 pandemic in Toronto
Wellbeing as an emergent property of social practice
Wellbeing in buildings is often approached by practitioners and researchers as the aggregate result of individual interactions between building occupants and building features. This sum-of-the-parts approach, however, ignores the ways in which broader social (i.e. sense of ownership and belonging) and symbolic (i.e. what it means to be ‘well’ in a specific culture at a particular place and time) components of wellbeing influence occupant experien…
A Realist Approach to Analysis in a Participatory Research Project
This article describes the realist approach to analysis and the changes that were made to enable a mixed team of community leaders and academics to generate overall statements of impact. This is a novel approach to qualitative data analysis, with a range of implications for the use of this technique in participatory research
Cop26: What is the message for public health
Project Earthrise: Proceedings of the Ninth Annual Conference of inVivo Planetary Health
The "Earthrise" photograph, taken on the 1968 Apollo 8 mission, became one of the most significant images of the 20th Century. It triggered a profound shift in environmental awareness and the potential for human unity-inspiring the first Earth Day in 1970. Taking inspiration from these events 50 years later, we initiated Project Earthrise at our 2020 annual conference of in VIVO Planetary Health. This builds on the emergent concept of planetary h…
Psychosocial adaptation to climate change in High River, Alberta: Implications for policy and practice
Neighbourhood climate resilience: Lessons from the Lighthouse Project
Many lenses for planetary health: Seeding citizen engagement for sustainable futures visioning with new ways of seeing
Stop ringing the alarm; it is time to get out of the building
Eighth Annual Conference of inVivo Planetary Health: From Challenges to Opportunities
inVIVO Planetary Health (inVIVO) is a progressive scientific movement providing evidence, advocacy, and inspiration to align the interests and vitality of people, place, and planet. Our goal is to transform personal and planetary health through awareness, attitudes, and actions, and a deeper understanding of how all systems are interconnected and interdependent. Here, we present the abstracts and proceedings of our 8th annual conference, held in …
We’re all brave pioneers on this road’: A Bourdieusian analysis of field creation for public health adaptation to climate change in Ontario, Canada
Despite significant engagement with new and emerging issues in public health practice, the public health literature has few theoretical explanations for how new practices emerge, take root, and become institutionalized. In this contribution, we utilize Pierre Bourdieu’s sociological concepts of field, habitus and capital, and in-depth interviews with public health practitioners to document and describe the emerging field of public health adaptati…
Preparing for the future of public health: Ecological determinants of health and the call for an eco-social approach to public health education
As a collective organized to address the education implications of calls for public health engagement on the ecological determinants of health, we, the Ecological Determinants Group on Education (cpha.ca/EDGE), urge the health community to properly understand and address the importance of the ecological determinants of the public's health, consistent with long-standing calls from many quarters-including Indigenous communities-and as part of an ec…
Taking account of context in population health intervention research: Guidance for producers, users and funders of research
Population health intervention research (PHIR) seeks to develop and evaluate policies, programmes and other types of interventions that may affect population health and health equity. Such interventions are strongly influenced by context – taken to refer to any feature of the circumstances in which an intervention is conceived, developed, implemented and evaluated. Understanding how interventions relate to context is critical to understanding how…
Critical social science with public health: Agonism, critique and engagement
This article is about a mode of scholarly practice we call critical social science with public health. The article responds to our dissatisfaction with established approaches to social science engagement with public health that have developed out of Straus’ early distinction between sociology in and of medicine. By critical social science with public health we mean a set of research practices that orients to epistemological and political differen…
Adaptation of a structured story-dialogue method for action research with social movement activists
Dialogue and story-telling are essential elements of many qualitative methodologies and action research itself, reflecting the constructivist paradigm in which qualitative research (QR) and action research (AR) are grounded, and the co-construction of knowledge that takes place amongst research participants (in group settings) and researchers. This paper reports on the adaptation of a structured story-dialogue method for research with social move…
Relationships in healthcare and homelessness: Exploring solidarity
Background: People experiencing homelessness have some of the highest morbidity rates and lowest age of mortality in Canada yet face many barriers to care, in particular the attitudes of healthcare providers.Objectives: In this critical ethnographic study, power within client–provider relationships in health care with people experiencing homelessness is explored.Methods: Multiple qualitative methods of document analysis, participant observation, …
Environmental justice in the environmental non‐governmental organization landscape of Toronto (Canada)
Key Messages Energy policy in Toronto needs to be sensitive to residents' different social and economic positions. The study's findings highlight the extent to which ENGOs are adopting environmental justice in Toronto. In Toronto's neoliberal context, ENGOs have a bridging role between the state and communities
Can reflexivity be learned? An experience with tobacco control practitioners in Canada
To explore an example of a reflexive intervention with health professionals working in tobacco control (TC). This study reports the perceived intervention effects regarding: (i) participants' understanding of reflexivity and personal learning and (ii) conditions needed in order to integrate reflexivity into professional and organizational practices. This is a qualitative study using an interpretative evaluation framework to assess the perceived e…
A survey of food bank operations in five Canadian cities
Despite their extensive history, food banks in Canada remain dependent on donations and volunteers, with available resources quickly exhausted in the face of agencies' efforts to more fully meet clients' needs. Food banks have limited capacity to respond to the needs of those who seek assistance
Out of our inner city backyards: Re-scaling urban environmental health inequity assessment
Creating the socially marginalised youth smoker: The Role of Tobacco Control
We discuss how the tobacco control discourse on youth smoking in Canada appears to be producing and constituting socially marginalised smokers. We analyse material from a study on social inequalities in Canadian youth smoking. Individual interviews were conducted in 2007 and 2008 with tobacco control practitioners specialising in youth smoking prevention in British Columbia and Quebec. We found that the discourse on youth smoking is creating a se…
Securing 'supportive environments' for health in the face of ecosystem collapse: Meeting the triple threat with a sociology of creative transformation
In this paper, we reflect on and explore what remains to be done to make the concept of supportive environments--one of the Ottawa Charter's five core action areas--a reality in the context of growing uncertainty about the future and accelerated pace of change. We pay particular attention to the physical environment, while underscoring the inextricable links between physical and social environments, and particularly the need to link social and en…
Family, friend or foe? Critical reflections on the relevance and role of social capital in health promotion and community development
Transcription Quality as an Aspect of Rigor in Qualitative Research
The importance of ensuring that interview or focus group transcripts are close to "verbatim" accounts of what transpired is widely acknowledged, but seems more often a tacit assumption than an empirically verified assertion. In fact, there appears to have been rather little discussion in the literature regarding the need to routinely review the quality of transcripts before undertaking the analysis of textual data in qualitative research. Establi…
Reading Between the Lines: Interpreting Silences in Qualitative Research
Although speech is often the focus of qualitative research, what is not said may be as revealing as what is said, particularly since what is left out ordinarily far exceeds what is put in. The authors explore several potential interpretations of silence, beginning with a focus on silences embedded in interview transcripts, and how these are perceived and managed by researchers and participants. However, the limitations of interview tran scripts b…
The personal significance of home: Habitus and the Experience of Receiving Long-Term Home Care
The physical, symbolic and experiential aspects of receiving long-term care are examined in this paper using Bourdieu's concepts of habitus and field. We draw on data from an ethnographic study of home care in 16 homes in urban, rural and remote locations in Ontario, Canada. Across all cases, data about domestic and caregiving routines were gathered through observation, interviews with clients and/or the primary family caregiver, interviews with …
Wealth, equity and health care: A Critique of a "Population Health" Perspective on the Determinants of Health
Exclusion, ‘risk’, and social control—reflections on community policing and public health
Towards a critical social science perspective on health promotion research
As part of our on-going efforts to formulate an alternative paradigm for health promotion research, we discuss an approach that we have called a 'critical social science perspective' (CSSP). This perspective consists of a set of 'reflexive' questions concerning the implicit assumptions and ideology underlying the research process, and the role of power, contradiction and dialectical relationships in theory and research practice. The paper briefly…
Becoming a 'real' smoker: Cultural Capital in Young Women's Accounts of Smoking and Other Substance Use
This paper draws from a qualitative study of tobacco use by young women in Toronto, Canada. Narrative interviews were used to understand the multiple roles and functions of smoking within the everyday lives of female adolescents. Guided by a Bourdieusian theoretical framework this study employed the core construct of cultural capital in order to position tobacco and other substance use as field-specific capital that young women accumulate while n…
"Focus group research and "the patient's view
Assumptions and Values of Community Health Psychology
There is a need to widen the practice of health psychologists to include the theories and methods of community psychology and an awareness of contemporary issues in community health. The aim of such a community health psychology would be both to deepen our understanding of the aetiology of health and illness in society and to develop strategies that will contribute to a reduction in human suffering and an improvement in quality of life. The aim o…
Building capacity in community health action research: Towards a praxis framework for graduate education
Community-based action research has received increased attention in health research as an important vehicle for both knowledge creation and community capacity-building. This approach to research is value-driven, attuned to power issues, committed to stakeholder participation, and action-oriented. Efforts to build capacity within the health research community to engage collaboratively with communities in action research projects must be predicated…
Quality of internet access: Barrier Behind Internet Use Statistics
Creating the socially marginalised youth smoker: The Role of Tobacco Control
We discuss how the tobacco control discourse on youth smoking in Canada appears to be producing and constituting socially marginalised smokers. We analyse material from a study on social inequalities in Canadian youth smoking. Individual interviews were conducted in 2007 and 2008 with tobacco control practitioners specialising in youth smoking prevention in British Columbia and Quebec. We found that the discourse on youth smoking is creating a se…
Out of our inner city backyards: Re-scaling urban environmental health inequity assessment
Environmental health and vulnerable populations in Canada: Mapping an integrated equity‐focused research agenda
The uneven distribution of environmental hazards across space and in vulnerable populations reflects underlying societal inequities. Fragmented research has led to gaps in comprehensive understanding of and action on environmental health inequities in Canada and there is a need to gain a better picture of the research landscape in order to integrate future research. This paper provides an initial assessment of the state of the environmental healt…
Health Psychology and Social Action
This article reviews the main epistemological approaches within health psychology. It considers the approach based on critical realism and various strategies for linking health psychology with social action. It argues that critical health psychology has a distinct contribution to make in promoting public health as part of the broader movement for social justice and health
Interactions Between Smokers and Non-Smokers in Public Places: A Qualitative Study
Preparing for the future of public health: Ecological determinants of health and the call for an eco-social approach to public health education
As a collective organized to address the education implications of calls for public health engagement on the ecological determinants of health, we, the Ecological Determinants Group on Education (cpha.ca/EDGE), urge the health community to properly understand and address the importance of the ecological determinants of the public's health, consistent with long-standing calls from many quarters-including Indigenous communities-and as part of an ec…
Designing a better place for patients: Professional struggles surrounding satellite and mobile dialysis units
Involving Street Youth in Peer Harm Reduction Education: The Challenges of Evaluation
Knowledge About Tobacco and Attitudes Toward Tobacco Control: How Different are Smokers and Nonsmokers
Displacement and Emplacement of Health Technology: Making Satellite and Mobile Dialysis Units Closer to Patients
The provision of "closer-to-patient" services has increased in most industrialized countries. However, the migration of services in non-traditional health care settings implies redefining the role of technical and human entities and transforming the nature and use of technologies and places. Drawing on various scholarly efforts to conceptualize space, place, and technology, this paper compares and contrasts satellite and mobile dialysis units imp…
Playing on Shifting Sand”: Reflections on the Impact of Political Shifts on Community Action and Public Health
The ecology of health services utilization in Grenada, West Indies
Reported versus recorded health service utilization in Grenada, West Indies
The ecology of health services utilization in Grenada, West Indies
Reported versus recorded health service utilization in Grenada, West Indies
Transcription Quality as an Aspect of Rigor in Qualitative Research
The importance of ensuring that interview or focus group transcripts are close to "verbatim" accounts of what transpired is widely acknowledged, but seems more often a tacit assumption than an empirically verified assertion. In fact, there appears to have been rather little discussion in the literature regarding the need to routinely review the quality of transcripts before undertaking the analysis of textual data in qualitative research. Establi…
Knowledge development and evaluation in, of and for Healthy Community initiatives. Part II: Potential content foci
In this second paper of a two-part series, several options for evaluation and knowledge development in, of and for Healthy Communities (HC) are reviewed, through an examination of the different bases upon which it might be structured. The dimensions reviewed include using the following as potential yardsticks for evaluation: (i) results of community visioning exercises; (ii) HC principles, concepts and strategies; (iii) barriers and facilitating …
Knowledge development and evaluation in, of and for Healthy Community initiatives. Part I: Guiding principles
With over 375 participating communities worldwide, well-established networks in many parts of Europe, North America and Australia, and with initiatives in many developing countries, the Healthy Cities movement is widespread and, in many jurisdictions, continuing to expand. As the movement matures, interest in the evaluation of its successes and potential limitations has grown. But as yet there has been little systematic assessment of evaluation s…
Towards a critical social science perspective on health promotion research
As part of our on-going efforts to formulate an alternative paradigm for health promotion research, we discuss an approach that we have called a 'critical social science perspective' (CSSP). This perspective consists of a set of 'reflexive' questions concerning the implicit assumptions and ideology underlying the research process, and the role of power, contradiction and dialectical relationships in theory and research practice. The paper briefly…
Smoking in the home: Changing attitudes and current practices
OBJECTIVES: Trends in attitudes and current practices concerning smoking in the home were examined. METHODS: Data from population-based surveys of adults in Ontario, Canada, were analyzed. RESULTS: Between 1992 and 1996, the percentage of respondents who agreed that parents spending time at home with small children should not smoke increased from 51% to 70%. In 1996, 34% of the homes surveyed were smoke-free. Smoke-free homes were associated with…
Exclusion, ‘risk’, and social control—reflections on community policing and public health
Wealth, equity and health care: A Critique of a "Population Health" Perspective on the Determinants of Health
Reading Between the Lines: Interpreting Silences in Qualitative Research
Although speech is often the focus of qualitative research, what is not said may be as revealing as what is said, particularly since what is left out ordinarily far exceeds what is put in. The authors explore several potential interpretations of silence, beginning with a focus on silences embedded in interview transcripts, and how these are perceived and managed by researchers and participants. However, the limitations of interview tran scripts b…
Interactions Between Smokers and Non-Smokers in Public Places: A Qualitative Study
Heterogeneity among smokers and non-smokers in attitudes and behaviour regarding smoking and smoking restrictions
Recognition and consideration of the types of smokers and non-smokers in the population and their distinguishing characteristics could inform the development of tobacco control policies and programmes and suggest strategies to assist implementation
The ‘considerate’ smoker in public space: The micro-politics and political economy of ‘doing the right thing’
Knowledge About Tobacco and Attitudes Toward Tobacco Control: How Different are Smokers and Nonsmokers
Transcription Quality
Playing on Shifting Sand”: Reflections on the Impact of Political Shifts on Community Action and Public Health
Community Action Success in Public Health: Are We Using a Ruler to Measure a Sphere
Involving Street Youth in Peer Harm Reduction Education: The Challenges of Evaluation
Support for Tobacco Control Policies: How Congruent are the Attitudes of Legislators and the Public
Quality of internet access: Barrier Behind Internet Use Statistics
Drug use, risk and urban order: Examining supervised injection sites (SISs) as ‘governmentality’
Building capacity in community health action research: Towards a praxis framework for graduate education
Community-based action research has received increased attention in health research as an important vehicle for both knowledge creation and community capacity-building. This approach to research is value-driven, attuned to power issues, committed to stakeholder participation, and action-oriented. Efforts to build capacity within the health research community to engage collaboratively with communities in action research projects must be predicated…
Assumptions and Values of Community Health Psychology
There is a need to widen the practice of health psychologists to include the theories and methods of community psychology and an awareness of contemporary issues in community health. The aim of such a community health psychology would be both to deepen our understanding of the aetiology of health and illness in society and to develop strategies that will contribute to a reduction in human suffering and an improvement in quality of life. The aim o…
How place matters: Unpacking technology and power in health and social care
The devolution of care into nontraditional community-based settings has led to a proliferation of sites for health and social care. Despite recent (re)formulations of 'evidence-based' approaches that stress the importance of optimizing interventions to best practice by taking into account the uniqueness of place, there is relatively little guidance in the literature and few attempts to systematically 'unpack' key dimensions of settings most relev…
Working at the margins' or 'leading from behind: A Canadian study of hospital-community collaboration
Collaboration between hospitals and community organisations has been promoted over the past 20 years by various levels of government, hospital associations, health promotion advocates, and others at the state/province, national and international levels as a way to improve the 'efficiency of the system', reduce duplication, enhance effectiveness and service coordination, improve continuity of care, and enhance community capacity to address complex…
Sociology (52 works) · Political science (43 works) · Medicine (42 works) · Psychology (37 works) · Public relations (25 works) · Public health (23 works) · Social science (23 works) · Geography (20 works) · Nursing (19 works) · Environmental health (18 works)