Journal Reflection #3: What topic are you exploring in your literature searches?

 

What topic are you exploring in your literature searches?

My proposed dissertation topic is familial support for adolescent cancer patients with alopecia and the family’s effect on adolescent self-esteem.  So far, I’ve been using the ProQuest Dissertation & Theses Global database.  My keywords are “alopecia and cancer.”  I also looked up a dissertation authored by a TWU student, which Dr. Dutton recommended.  That was found under alopecia AND adv (Brock).  Brock was the dissertation advisor.  So, I have a total of four dissertations that were authored between 2016 and 2024 that are closely related to my topic of interest.  I noticed that one dissertation was done at an online university, so I don’t know how much of the process was done online or in person.  I guess I would have to read the whole dissertation from front to back to form an educated opinion.

I also hope to conduct some more new literature searches this week.  A few professors' research studies within Family Studies seem interesting to me!  If you are a professor or even a student, how do you come up with all these cool ideas??  Kudos to my colleague Georgia Maxey for studying fashion psychology.  I will be the first one to read and comment on your new work to come.

How is it going?  What have you learned so far?

This search is going well because I have a good foundation to build on, not too little or too many in my opinion.  Before my search for articles, I was going to do a purely quantitative study.  Then, I went to the gym today and talked to my friend Julie, and we had a discussion that maybe a qualitative interview-type study or a hybrid study would be better.  The reasoning is that the participants might get more out of an interview rather than merely a survey, but I would still like to see the numbers.  Following all my predecessors, Buchanan (2016), Blair (2024), Wynter (2023), and Clements (2017), I would like to do an interview.  Following some of them, I would like to do a thematic analysis of the interviews.  I am not sure what an appropriate sample size is.

I have read all the abstracts.  Buchanan is studying something a little different called alopecia areata, which is an autoimmune disease that strips the patient of all their hair.  Her dissertation is unique however because she uses family systems theory as a framework for seeing how the disease affects the family as well.

Blair’s dissertation was unique for the population that she studied.  She notes while older women, adolescents, and men were studied, college-age women had not.  I will delve into my interest in her study in the next section.  Next, Wynter’s dissertation looks at the need for study in younger age women and women of color in the U.K. In this study, participants sought support from friends, family, and community groups, and their breast cancer experiences were mediated by their individual contexts.  Finally, I looked at Clements.

Clinicians might consider asking about chemotherapy-induced alopecia throughout chemotherapy several times—"both because it could help patients cope with the side effects and because it may generate dialogue related to other important concerns late-stage cancer patients may feel are too trivial to mention in clinical discussions. Women’s social and familial roles may be impacted by alopecia and chemotherapy in unique ways that deserve additional study” (Clements, 2017).

Why are you interested in this topic?

I am interested in this topic because I was directly affected by it.  I am an adolescent cancer survivor.  I had Burkitt’s lymphoma, which is a non-Hodgkin’s type of lymphoma when I was sixteen years old. I had seven rounds of chemotherapy and lost all my hair.  Although I waited anxiously, it took a long time for me to regain my hair back.  I was diagnosed with cancer in my junior year of high school.  I didn’t get a decent amount of hair back until I was a sophomore in college.  I made my journey to the University of Texas at Austin.  As this is a big school, it was hard enough to go to school, but even harder because I was self-conscious a lot of the time.  This was a difficult transition for me.  It may have just been my imagination, but I felt that I was ugly.  When I went in to take the SATs, the proctor was looking for a “Michael” not a “Michelle.”  She mistook me for a male, which made me sad and want to cry.  This was a pivotal moment in my journey to recovery.  So, I appreciate Blair (2024)’s dissertation on college-age women.  However, I am choosing to study the adolescent population because of their niche in Erik Erikson’s theory of Self-Identity vs. Role Confusion.

 

References

 

Blair, C. (2024).  The lived experience of stigmatization due to chemotherapy-induced hair loss for young women with cancer who attend college (Publication No. 31334462) [Doctoral dissertation, Walden University].  ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.

Buchanan, B.A. (2016).  The family system and alopecia areata: A phenomenological study of family members’ lived experiences (Publication No. 10136715) [Doctoral dissertation, Texas Woman’s University].  ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.

Clements, M.L. (2017).  Chemotherapy-induced alopecia and quality-of-life: Ovarian and uterine cancer patients and aesthetics of disease (Publication No. 10603614) [Doctoral dissertation, University of South Florida].  ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.

Wynter, E. (2023).  Female breast cancer in the UK: Understanding the process of familial disclosure and considering hair loss experiences.  (Publication No. 30832089) [Doctoral dissertation, The University of Liverpool (United Kingdom)].  ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global.