Seminar Series
Title:
Listening to the public to inform academic and policy discourse on social disadvantage
Presenter:
Yukiko Asada, PhD
Adjunct Professor, Department of Health, Aging & Society, McMaster University
Time and Date
12pm – 1pm
Thursday, March 12, 2026
Location
MS Teams: Join the meeting now
Synopsis:
Social disadvantage is an important concept academics use to inform health inequality and inequity research and policy. However, it is unclear whether academic discussions align with lay persons’ views. This project aimed to draw insights from the public about the concept of social disadvantage through community dialogue. We ran nine half-a-day facilitated sessions, four to ten participants per session, using LEGO SERIOUS PLAY (LSP). Across three communities in the state of Maryland in the United States, a total of 72 individuals, most of them with experiences of life hardships, participated in the study between January and May 2025. Participants shared their views on good life and life hardships that prevent a good life by building LEGO models. We analyzed participants’ accounts on their LEGO models using thematic analysis. Our analysis showed that defining characteristics and experiences of life hardships are cascade/domino effects; feeling trapped; and no margin for error. Participants emphasize everyday chronically scarce life resources as well as systemic and social barriers when describing hardships. Our findings point to the importance of understanding how life hardships arise and are experienced rather than identifying disadvantaged characteristics in academic and policy discourse on social disadvantage. Our project also shows the potential of LSP as an attractive, alternative method to conventional, discussion-based methods to explore people’s views on a value-laden concept.
Bio:
Dr. Yukiko Asada is a quantitatively trained population health researcher focusing on ethical issues in population Her program of research articulates the concept of health inequity, advances the measurement of health inequity, and promotes public dialogues on health inequity. Dr. Asada’s research contributes to establish sound foundations of fairness in health systems and the health of populations locally, nationally, and globally. Dr. Asada is currently Adjunct Professor in the Department of Health, Aging & Society at McMaster University. She was a faculty member in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Department of Bioethics and a senior investigator in the NIH intramural research program between 2022 and 2025. Before 2022, she was Professor in the Department of Community Health and Epidemiology, Dalhousie University. She obtained a PhD in Population Health from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.