HERCULES Publication: Defining the Exposome Using Popular Education and Concept Mapping With Communities in Atlanta, Georgia

The exposome concept provides a framework to better incorporate the environment into the study of health and disease and has been defined by academics to encompass all lifetime exposures including toxicants, diet, and lifestyle choices. However, initial applications of the exposome concept have been less apt at measuring social determinants of health, focusing primarily on conventional environmental exposures and lifestyle choices that do not reflect the complex lived experience of many communities. To bring community voice into the exposome concept, the HERCULES Exposome Research Center and its Stakeholder Advisory Board co-developed the Exposome Roadshow. This paper presents and discusses the resulting community-exposome definition to inform and improve exposome research.

Citation:

Lebow-Skelley E, Young L, Noibi Y, Blaginin K, Hooker M, Williamson D, et al. Defining the Exposome Using Popular Education and Concept Mapping With Communities in Atlanta, Georgia. Frontiers in Public Health (2022) 10. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.842539.

Figure 2. Final Concept Maps by Community. The cluster rating maps depict the final concept map chosen by each community (A: Community A; B: Community B; C: Community C; and D: Community D). Clusters in close proximity are more closely related than distant clusters. In (C), the Aesthetic cluster represents a single statement that the community did not perceive as belonging with any of the other clusters and so chose to leave separate.