New Materialist Approaches to Digital Health

This chapter challenges the conventional anthropocentrism of much social scientific study of digital health, highlighting the interconnectedness of human and non-human elements. This new materialist and posthuman approach is of particular value when exploring technologies like health apps and artificial intelligence tools used in healthcare and social settings. A new materialist ontology frames digital health technologies (DHTs) as assemblages that produce both intended and unintended consequences for users and society at large. To establish a new materialist methodology for investigating DHTs, the chapter introduces Deleuze’s ethological toolkit, encompassing affects, assemblages, capacities, and micropolitics. Furthermore, a new materialist approach provides insights into the broader social, economic, and political implications of DHTs, offering a radical micropolitical perspective on power and resistance within digital capitalism. Employing this ethological framework, the chapter investigates how DHTs become entangled in the dynamics of capitalist production and consumption. This analysis sheds light on the multifaceted relationships between technology, society, and economics, ultimately offering a novel perspective on the evolving landscape of digital health.