Drugs and double binds: racial identification and pharmacogenomics in a system of binary race logic.

People respond to drugs in different ways depending on their genotype. Some geneticists and medical researchers have suggested using race as a substitute for genotype in prescribing medication. Overall, individuals resist the prescription of medication based on race, but some minority individuals, although indicating resistance and suspicion, ultimately choose race-based medication. This can be explained by the operation of Burkean identification in a system of binary race logic. Although individuals resist race-based medication and recognize race is not a legitimate genetic category, their identification with a racial-ethnic group places them in a double bind between choosing race-based medication or denying their racial identification.

Lay people's understanding of and preference against the word "mutation".

Lay understandings of the term "mutation" are explored using three methodologies and three population bases. A community based sample (n = 848) employing a written survey to assess knowledge and understanding indicated good lay understanding of the basic concept of mutation. However, lay people associated mutation with reproductive outcomes, but not with changes in genes across the life span. A student sample (n = 241) employed a written survey to assess connotations of the term mutation. It showed a strong negative response to mutation. A community based sample (n = 120) employing focus groups also showed strong negative reactions to the term mutation and rejection of use of the term mutation in public service announcements (PSAs). The term variation had better response and is recommended as an alternative in genetic counseling and public media.

The role of "genetics" in popular understandings of race in the United States.

The increase in public representation of the science-based concept "genetics" in the mass media might be expected to have a major impact on public understanding of the concept of "race." A model of lay understandings of the role of genetics in the contemporary United States is offered based on focus group research, random digit dial surveys, and community based surveys. That model indicates that lay people identify are primarily by physical features, but these identifications are categorized into a variety of groupings that may be regional, national, or linguistic. Although they believe that physical appearance is caused largely by genetics, and therefore that race has a genetic basis, they do not uniformly conclude, however, that all perceived racial characteristics are genetically based. Instead, they vary in the extent to which they attribute differences to cultural, personal, and genetic factors.

Lay understandings of race: cultural and genetic definitions.

OBJECTIVE: To examine lay understandings of race. METHOD: Fifteen focus groups were held in the southeastern United States from July to October of 2001. RESULTS: The lay understanding of race is multifactorial, conceptualizing race as defined in part by genetics and in part by culture. CONCLUSIONS: The multifactorial understanding of race used by lay people is important to geneticists for two reasons. First, within the multifactorial definition of race, genetic variation is interpreted as phenotypic differences among individuals. Second, racial differences are apparent in understandings of race. African-American participants held a more fluid understanding of race that included ideas of self-definition and culture, while European-Americans were more likely to rely on physical characteristics to understand race.

Informed lay preferences for delivery of racially varied pharmacogenomics.

OBJECTIVES: To understand public perceptions and opinions of three options for prescribing medicine: individualized genetic testing, race-based prescription, and traditional prescription. METHODS: Focus groups in urban, suburban, and rural communities over-sampled for minority groups conducted from February through April, 2001 in Georgia. RESULTS: Group members (N = 102) identified individualized genetic testing as providing the best quality of care (60% of talk turns; 75% in postdiscussion anonymous survey), but stipulated the need for protection from the invasion of privacy, discrimination, and prohibitive cost. Most individuals chose genetic testing because it provided individualized attention, and African-Americans indicated they would choose genetic testing even if the costs were high. Overall, individuals were suspicious of race-based prescription. Analyses for degree of suspicion revealed a main effect for race and an interaction effect for race and gender. CONCLUSIONS: If issues of cost, discrimination, and privacy are addressed, lay individuals prefer genetic testing as the basis for prescription of medicines that exhibit racially patterned response variation.