Embodied scarcity: An interpretative phenomenological inquiry into food insecurity and mental health wellness among women residing in environmentally vulnerable southwest coastal Bangladesh.

BACKGROUND

Food insecurity in climate-vulnerable coastal settings extends beyond limited food access or availability; it is lived as a gendered, embodied, and psychosocial experience. Guided by Psychological Stress Theory, the stress process model, and gendered embodiment, we use "embodied scarcity" to describe how inadequate and uncertain food access becomes bodily, emotional, moral, and relational suffering as women absorb household deprivation through hunger, nutritional self-denial, caregiving responsibility, shame, and constrained coping. This study explores how women in southwest coastal Bangladesh interpret and embody food insecurity and its psychosocial consequences.

METHODS

This qualitative study used Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). Thirty-seven women were purposively selected for one-on-one, in-depth interviews using an open-ended guide. Data were analyzed inductively through an iterative IPA process to identify experiential meanings and superordinate themes.

RESULTS

Three interrelated superordinate themes were identified: food insecurity as chronic psychosocial stress; embodied gender burdens of maternal sacrifice and shame; and faith, informal support, and constrained coping. Women experienced scarcity through hunger, nutritional self-denial, sleeplessness, anxiety, maternal guilt, social judgment, and emotional exhaustion. These findings show how material deprivation becomes embodied as psychosocial suffering.

CONCLUSION

Embodied scarcity links food insecurity to women's mental distress by showing how deprivation is internalized through bodies, emotions, caregiving identities, and social relations. Multilevel interventions should integrate livelihood support, food security programs, gender-transformative approaches, shared caregiving, and community-based mental health care in environmentally vulnerable settings.