IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v19y2022i16p9823-d883999.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Meaning of “Hygiene” and Its Linked Practices in a Low-Income Urban Community in Bangladesh

Author

Listed:
  • Rebeca Sultana

    (Copenhagen Center for Disaster Research, Global Health Section, Department of Public Health, University of Copenhagen, 1353 Copenhagen, Denmark
    Institute of Health Economics, University of Dhaka, Dhaka 1000, Bangladesh
    icddr,b, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh)

  • Nazmun Nahar

    (Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Infectious Diseases, University Hospital Düsseldorf, Medical Faculty of Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, 40225 Düsseldorf, Germany)

  • Nadia Ali Rimi

    (icddr,b, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh)

  • Sayeda Tasnuva Swarna

    (icddr,b, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh)

  • Shifat Khan

    (icddr,b, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh)

  • Md. Khaled Saifullah

    (icddr,b, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh)

  • Humayun Kabir

    (icddr,b, Dhaka 1212, Bangladesh)

  • Peter Kjær Mackie Jensen

    (Copenhagen Center for Disaster Research, Global Health Section, Department of Public Health, University of Copenhagen, 1353 Copenhagen, Denmark)

Abstract

Improving hygiene practices is considered to be the single most cost-effective means of reducing the global health burden of infectious diseases. Hygiene promotion and disease prevention interventions often portray and promote “hygiene” from a biomedical perspective, which may not be optimally effective for achieving their goal of changing people’s behaviors. This study aimed to educe the meaning of hygiene for the residents of a low-income community in Bangladesh and how that meaning shapes their personal hygiene practices. We conducted this study in the Tongi township in Dhaka, Bangladesh, from September 2014 to June 2016. The research team purposively selected 24 households. The team conducted day-long observations using the participant observation approach and in-depth interviews with specific members of the 24 households. The concept of “hygiene” had two separate meanings to the study participants: cleanliness and holiness. The participants reported that cleanliness was required to remove odors, grease, hot spices and dirt. The motivation for cleanliness was to feel fresh, avoid heavy feelings, feel light and feel comfortable. To maintain the holiness of the body, bathing and ablution needed to be performed following particular religious rules/rituals. The motivation of holiness was derived from their accountability to God. The participants also reported that the cleansing processes and methods for the body and the home for cleanliness reasons were also different from those for holiness reasons. The notion of “hygiene” was multidimensional for the residents of the low-income urban community in Bangladesh. Our study participants did not explicitly conceptualize a notion of hygiene that was based on the germ theory of diseases but rather a notion that was based on individual physical comfort and cultural belief systems. Future studies on the prevention of hygiene-related diseases should combine and link the biomedical aspect to religious and cultural rituals to promote improved hygiene practices.

Suggested Citation

  • Rebeca Sultana & Nazmun Nahar & Nadia Ali Rimi & Sayeda Tasnuva Swarna & Shifat Khan & Md. Khaled Saifullah & Humayun Kabir & Peter Kjær Mackie Jensen, 2022. "The Meaning of “Hygiene” and Its Linked Practices in a Low-Income Urban Community in Bangladesh," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(16), pages 1-13, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:16:p:9823-:d:883999
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/16/9823/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/16/9823/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dean T. Jamison & Joel G. Breman & Anthony R. Measham & George Alleyne & Mariam Claeson & David B. Evans & Prabhat Jha & Ann Mills & Philip Musgrove, 2006. "Disease Control Priorities in Developing Countries, Second Edition," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 7242.
    2. Curtis, Val & Biran, Adam & Deverell, Katie & Hughes, Clarissa & Bellamy, Kate & Drasar, Bo, 2003. "Hygiene in the home: relating bugs and behaviour," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 57(4), pages 657-672, August.
    3. Rachel D. Stelmach & Thomas Clasen, 2015. "Household Water Quantity and Health: A Systematic Review," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 12(6), pages 1-21, May.
    4. Fahima Chowdhury & Iqbal Ansary Khan & Sweta Patel & Ashraf Uddin Siddiq & Nirod Chandra Saha & Ashraful I Khan & Amit Saha & Alejandro Cravioto & John Clemens & Firdausi Qadri & Mohammad Ali, 2015. "Diarrheal Illness and Healthcare Seeking Behavior among a Population at High Risk for Diarrhea in Dhaka, Bangladesh," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(6), pages 1-14, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Rebeca Sultana & Nazmun Nahar & Stephen P. Luby & Sayeda Tasnuva Swarna & Emily S. Gurley & Charlotte Crim Tamason & Shifat Khan & Nadia Ali Rimi & Humayun Kabir & Md. Khaled Saifullah & Sushil Ranjan, 2022. "Measuring Water Quantity Used for Personal and Domestic Hygiene and Determinants of Water Use in a Low-Income Urban Community," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(23), pages 1-16, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Lucius Caviola & Nadira Faulmüller & Jim. A. C. Everett & Julian Savulescu & Guy Kahane, 2014. "The evaluability bias in charitable giving: Saving administration costs or saving lives?," Judgment and Decision Making, Society for Judgment and Decision Making, vol. 9(4), pages 303-315, July.
    2. Lisa F. Clark, 2018. "Policy conflicts in global food assistance strategies: balancing local procurement and harmonization," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 10(1), pages 211-222, February.
    3. Gianni Tognoni & Alejandro Macchia, 2020. "Health as a Human Right: A Fake News in a Post-human World?," Development, Palgrave Macmillan;Society for International Deveopment, vol. 63(2), pages 270-276, December.
    4. Joseph H. Cook, 2013. "Principles and standards for benefit–cost analysis of public health preparedness and pandemic mitigation programs," Chapters, in: Scott O. Farrow & Richard Zerbe, Jr. (ed.), Principles and Standards for Benefit–Cost Analysis, chapter 3, pages 110-152, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    5. Feyza G. Sahinyazan & Marie‐Ève Rancourt & Vedat Verter, 2021. "Food Aid Modality Selection Problem," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 30(4), pages 965-983, April.
    6. Lê, Gillian & Morgan, Rosemary & Bestall, Janine & Featherstone, Imogen & Veale, Thomas & Ensor, Tim, 2016. "Can service integration work for universal health coverage? Evidence from around the globe," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 120(4), pages 406-419.
    7. United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) South and South-West (ed.), 2012. "Regional Cooperation for Inclusive and Sustainable Development: South and South-West Asia Development Report 2012-2013," SSWA Books and Research Reports, United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) South and South-West Asia Office, number brr4, May.
    8. Johannes Haushofer & Michael Kremer & Ricardo Maertens & Brandon Joel Tan, 2021. "Water Treatment and Child Mortality: Evidence from Kenya," NBER Working Papers 29447, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Nikaj Silda, 2017. "Peer Effects and Youth Smoking in the European Global Youth Tobacco Survey," Review of Economic Perspectives, Sciendo, vol. 17(3), pages 219-238, September.
    10. Shelly Jun & Kelsea Drall & Brittany Matenchuk & Cara McLean & Charlene Nielsen & Chinwe V. Obiakor & Aaron Van der Leek & Anita Kozyrskyj, 2018. "Sanitization of Early Life and Microbial Dysbiosis," Challenges, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-9, December.
    11. Hoa‐Thi‐Minh Nguyen & Tom Kompas & Roslyn I. Hickson, 2014. "Aid and the Control of Tuberculosis in Papua New Guinea: Is Australia's Assistance Cost‐Effective?," Asia and the Pacific Policy Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 1(2), pages 364-378, May.
    12. Md Rezanur Rahaman & Keith Dear & Syed M. Satter & Michael Tong & Adriana Milazzo & Helen Marshall & Blesson M. Varghese & Mahmudur Rahman & Peng Bi, 2023. "Short-Term Effects of Climate Variability on Childhood Diarrhoea in Bangladesh: Multi-Site Time-Series Regression Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(13), pages 1-15, July.
    13. World Bank, 2011. "Community-based Maternal and Child Nutrition and Health Interventions in Nigeria : A Comparative Case Study Analysis on Best Practices," World Bank Publications - Reports 12603, The World Bank Group.
    14. James G Kahn & Nicholas Muraguri & Brian Harris & Eric Lugada & Thomas Clasen & Mark Grabowsky & Jonathan Mermin & Shahnaaz Shariff, 2012. "Integrated HIV Testing, Malaria, and Diarrhea Prevention Campaign in Kenya: Modeled Health Impact and Cost-Effectiveness," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(2), pages 1-9, February.
    15. Yuzi Zhang & Howard H. Chang & Qu Cheng & Philip A. Collender & Ting Li & Jinge He & Justin V. Remais, 2023. "A hierarchical model for analyzing multisite individual‐level disease surveillance data from multiple systems," Biometrics, The International Biometric Society, vol. 79(2), pages 1507-1519, June.
    16. repec:cup:judgdm:v:9:y:2014:i:4:p:303-315 is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Brooke Peterson & Carl Middleton, 2010. "Feeding Southeast Asia: Mekong River Fisheries and Regional Food Security," Working Papers id:2824, eSocialSciences.
    18. Stephanie Bogdewic & Rohit Ramaswamy & David M Goodman & Emmanuel K Srofenyoh & Sebnem Ucer & Medge D Owen, 2020. "The cost-effectiveness of a program to reduce intrapartum and neonatal mortality in a referral hospital in Ghana," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(11), pages 1-18, November.
    19. Habyarimana, James & Jack, William, 2011. "Heckle and Chide: Results of a randomized road safety intervention in Kenya," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(11), pages 1438-1446.
    20. Charles Masulani-Mwale & Felix Kauye & Melissa Gladstone & Don Mathanga, 2019. "Development of a psycho-social intervention for reducing psychological distress among parents of children with intellectual disabilities in Malawi," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(2), pages 1-13, February.
    21. Jürgen Maurer, 2007. "Assessing Horizontal Equity in Medication Treatment Among Elderly Mexicans: Which Socioeconomic Determinants Matter Most?," MEA discussion paper series 07143, Munich Center for the Economics of Aging (MEA) at the Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:16:p:9823-:d:883999. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.