Lymer-etal-2014

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Lymer-etal-2014
BibType ARTICLE
Key Lymer-etal-2014
Author(s) Gustav Lymer, Jonas Ivarsson, Hans Rystedt, Åse A. Johnsson, Sara Asplund, Magnus Båth
Title Situated abstraction: From the particular to the general in second-order diagnostic work
Editor(s)
Tag(s) EMCA, Medical EMCA, Diagnosis
Publisher
Year 2014
Language
City
Month
Journal Discourse Studies
Volume 16
Number 2
Pages 185–215
URL Link
DOI 10.1177/1461445613514674
ISBN
Organization
Institution
School
Type
Edition
Series
Howpublished
Book title
Chapter

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Abstract

The present study examines the work of a group of medical scientists as they identify interpretative ‘pitfalls’ – recurrent sources of error – in the use of a new radiographic technique, formulate suggestions on how these pitfalls can be avoided and communicate their findings in the form of a scientific publication. The analysis focuses on a session in which previously diagnosed cases are discussed, and demonstrates the ways in which a certain source of diagnostic error gradually emerges as a taken-for-granted in the interaction. An increased sense of recognition, recurrence and typicality is discernible in the treatment of the cases. Talk characterized by expansions and elaborations, displays of understanding in the form of reformulations, understanding checks, and so on, leave room for brief typifications and reifications of interpretative difficulties in characteristics of the imaging technique. Topical treatment of perception and interpretation, as well as embodied engagement, become decreasingly salient. It is argued that the abstracted formulations in the published text rely on the case-by-case working up of generality from particularity; from individualized accounts of why ‘I’ interpreted the image in a certain way to proffered generalizations achieved through articulated perceptions of a generalized ‘one’. If these proffers are ratified, a potential ground is established for the consensual formulation of a pitfall. The formulation of novel instructions is consequently made relevant, projecting a re-instructed diagnostic practice.

Notes