Poutama 2021: Cultural congruency and attachment, Auckland

The Poutama seminars provide learning steps that embrace Māori knowledge, promote Māori Health and create linkages to the growing diversity of interventions utilised within social and mental health communities in Aotearoa. Poutama are marae-based seminars delivered to provide excellent Māori professional development opportunities for a wide range of health-related disciplines.

For the most part Attachment Theory (AT) has assumed an uncritical position within child welfare services and psychotherapy here in Aotearoa New Zealand. New emerging challenges from Māori health practitioners are questioning the cultural congruency of AT with whānau Māori (Māori families). Tūhono Māori is an indigenous research project that investigated Māori concepts and understandings of healthy attachments. To do this we used Kaupapa Māori an Indigenous research methodology supported by appropriate qualitative methods to include pūrākau as a data collection method. The study set out to develop a contemporary Indigenous theory that will help to inform interventions for traumatised mokopuna Māori while promoting secure whānau relationships. This presentation brings together the design features of the study and key findings. It will include a discussion on the four research imperatives that are fundamental to this distinctively Kaupapa Māori research study to include decolonising, healing, transformative and mobilising agendas.

Presenter