This protocol is based on the Endocrine Disruption Tracker Tool (EDTT), a speculative instrument that uses disrupted emotions as an index of chemical disruption. Focusing on a group of chemicals known as endocrine-disrupting chemicals, the protocol invites participants to experience and reflect on the far-reaching effects these chemicals have on their emotions. The aim is to affirm emotions disrupted by chemicals and to harness and mobilize these emotions for action.

whom is this protocol for?

The protocol is designed for small to medium groups of participants (four to twelve people). One participant will assume the role of facilitator, or participants can take turns acting as the facilitator.

what materials are needed to carry out the protocol?

The materials required for the protocol are a pen and printed copy of the EDTT for each participant, a whiteboard or large sheets of paper, markers, and tape.

how long does it take?

The protocol consists of two sessions, each lasting three to four hours, spaced approximately ten days apart. Between the two sessions, participants will individually make observations and note them on the EDTT sheet, which will take about ten to fifteen minutes per day.

instructions

Step 1: Introductory meeting in which participants discuss chemical exposures

In step 1, the session facilitator welcomes the participants, provides housekeeping details for the venue, and introduces the topic—chronic exposure to environmental chemicals, its public (in)visibility, and the effects of these chemicals on our emotions. If participants are not well-acquainted, a brief round of introductions takes place. During the introductions, participants may mention why they are interested in either topic (exposure to chemicals or emotional health). Following this, participants are given copies of the EDTT and are briefed about endocrine-disrupting chemicals.

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs) are industrially manufactured substances capable of interfering with the way the body’s hormones work. Similar to physiologically produced hormones, chemical endocrine disruptors act as chemical messengers, circulating through the bloodstream and influencing the functions of organs and tissues. Developmental and lifetime exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals via environmental pathways increases susceptibility to a wide range of pathologies in humans and animals. Exposure to them has been linked to hormone-sensitive cancers, lower sperm counts, infertility, endometriosis, early puberty, autoimmune diseases, diabetes, obesity, osteoporosis, cardiovascular issues, growth disorders, and neurological and learning disabilities. This protocol focuses on the effects on neurodevelopment and brain function, and thus also on our thoughts, feelings, and motivations.

Common endocrine disruptors include BPA found in plastic bottles, food containers, and liners of metal food cans; phthalates and parabens in cosmetics; detergents in household cleaners; and flame retardants in furniture and electronics. Beyond their presence in everyday consumer products, endocrine-disrupting chemicals are prevalent in industrial processes, including polychlorinated biphenyls used as industrial lubricants and coolants, chemicals released during oil and gas extraction, and pesticides used to protect crops from weeds, insects, rodents, and fungi. Additionally, industrial wastewaters and livestock waste are major sources of endocrine disruptors.

The session proceeds with discussions in smaller groups of two to four people. Participants engage in discussions revolving around the following questions:

How much do you believe environmental chemicals may affect your life? In what ways?

The amounts of anthropogenic chemicals in the environment are increasing. Do you agree?

What anxieties and fears associated with chemical risks do you experience

What measures do you take to mitigate exposure to chemicals?

What are the established, presumed, or perceived consequences of chemical exposure that you encounter?

What are the established, presumed, or perceived consequences of chemical exposure experienced by individuals you are acquainted with?

What prompts you to be attentive to the presence of chemicals in the environment and the risks that they may pose?

Following forty to sixty minutes of small-group discussion, the findings are exchanged among participants from various groups and recorded on a whiteboard or paper sheets.

Concluding the introductory segment of the protocol, the facilitator furnishes participants with details about the EDTT and instructions on its utilization.

The Endocrine Disruption Tracker Tool (EDTT) functions as a means to detect the presence of endocrine-disrupting chemicals by focusing on their impact on our emotions. While the effects of physiological hormones on cognitive, emotional, and sensory changes have long been recognized, the examination of emotional symptoms related to endocrine disruption remains unexplored. The EDTT considers symptoms such as anxiety, irritability, mood swings, difficulty concentrating, and fatigue, commonly associated with hormonal fluctuations, in the context of endocrine disruption.

The EDTT is adapted from a Premenstrual Symptom Tracker (IAPD 2021), which tracks emotional symptoms caused by the fluctuation of hormones during the menstrual cycle. It is modeled on the 2021 variant of a Premenstrual Symptom Tracker developed by the International Association for Premenstrual Disorders.

The EDTT retains the same set of ten emotional symptoms while excluding the only physical symptom on the list. Significantly, the EDTT broadens its scope to encompass emotional symptoms caused by the production and interplay of both hormones and hormone-mimicking chemicals.

Participants engage in a ten-day review, during which they assess the emotional symptoms listed. Each day, they reflect on their experiences and observations of these emotions, recording them in the chart. They consider emotions both as they are personally experienced and as they are shared with or observed in others. Participants describe the emotion and the context in which it occurred, reflecting on its impact on their daily life and well-being. Additionally, they consider the potential influence of chemical exposure on the intensity and onset of these emotions.

Step 2: Review of disrupted emotions using the EDTT

Throughout the ten-day duration constituting step 2, participants engage in the EDTT review. During this phase, they are tasked with scrutinizing the list of emotional symptoms, making individual observations, and recording emotions in the EDTT chart.

Step 3: Follow-up session in which participants discuss the possible influence of chemical exposure on their emotional health

The follow-up session of step 3 commences with participants sharing insights gained from their emotional review, both from personal experiences and observations of others. Collaborating with the session facilitator, participants record these observations on the same whiteboard or sheet of paper utilized in the previous session to explore chemical exposures.

The session proceeds with participant-driven discussions in smaller groups of two to four individuals, where they further explore the topics of exposures and emotions. Participants engage in conversations guided by the following questions:

To what extent do your 'negative' emotions impact your daily life and well-being, as well as the daily lives and well-being of others? In what ways?

How do 'negative' emotions of those around you affect your life and well-being?

Do you agree that feelings of anger, irritation, frustration, and sadness are common occurrences among people today?

How do you experience and express your 'negative' emotions?

How do others react to your expressions of 'negative' emotions?

What steps do you take to prevent the emergence of 'negative' emotions?

Who do you talk to about your feelings of anger, irritation, frustration, and sadness?

What kind of response do you receive when you share these emotions?

Who shows concern for your feelings of anger, irritation, frustration, and sadness?

Do you respond with care when others express their anger, irritation, frustration, and sadness?

Do you understand the causes of your anger, irritation, frustration, and sadness, or do these emotions sometimes appear unexpectedly, out of nowhere?

Do you think environmental chemicals could influence or modulate your emotions?

After forty to sixty minutes of small-group discussion, the results are shared among all participants and noted on a whiteboard or sheets of paper.

The main topic of the follow-up session is the possibility of tracking and affirming emotions as they are affected by chemical exposure. The session facilitator briefs participants on this topic:

Exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals impacts our emotions. However, distinguishing the influence of chemical endocrine disruptors from naturally produced hormones and other hormonally active agents, such as pharmaceutical hormones, is challenging. Endocrine-disrupting chemicals penetrate our bodies and interfere with our endocrine systems to an unknown extent. Consequently, it’s difficult to assess how much these disruptors influence our emotions. Given their ubiquity, it is likely that they impact our emotions, but just how extensive this influence is and whether it is implicitly harmful, giving rise to emotions that we consider 'negative,' unpleasant or unhappy, cannot be conclusively established. Within the context of the complex interplay of intra-acting components, nonlinear dynamics, and the spontaneous emergence of new phenomena, we must approach the impact of endocrine disruptors with caution. The mutual co-constitution of material and social phenomena, shaped by the possibilities of a given situation, means that their effects cannot be predicted in advance but unfold within concrete, situated processes of performative becoming. What makes chemical endocrine disruptors toxic may not ultimately be solely their biochemical properties, but also their origins in unethical, profit-driven industrial practices and the involuntary nature of our exposure to them.

The EDTT is not designed to provide conclusive answers about endocrine disruption. Instead, it aims to raise awareness of our entanglement with global infrastructures of human-made chemicals. By locating the effects of endocrine disruption in our anxiety, sadness, sleeplessness, irritability, and inability to concentrate, the EDTT foregrounds our shared—albeit unevenly—fragility and vulnerability vis-à-vis the chemical transformation of the planet. Reflecting upon the mobility and interactivity of chemical endocrine disruptors, and the porosity of the body as it absorbs and excretes chemicals, unsettles the atomistic conception of humans as bounded individuals, who are divorced from the broader collectivity of nonhuman life in a shared environment.

By focusing on the diverse—and not necessarily always harmful—effects of exposure to endocrine disruptors in our lives, we can achieve a richer and more politically generative understanding of our collective becoming with global networks of industrial chemicals. Contemplating and experiencing the far-reaching effects of endocrine-disrupting chemicals on our emotions can help us address the challenges of our chemically altered lives and foster responsive care relations. Thinking with, and acting upon, the anger, irritability, anxiety, or depression caused and modulated by involuntary chemical exposure paves the way for an embodied, experientially, and materially grounded politics of anti-toxic action.

The session continues with small-group discussions of two to four people. In these groups, participants explore the likely influence of endocrine-disrupting chemicals on their emotions and the potential role these emotions play in addressing the hidden, slow-moving, and emerging realities of a chemicalized life. Questions participants may discuss in their groups include:

How can our emotions influenced by chemical endocrine disruptors help us understand the hidden, slow-moving, and emerging realities of chemicalized life?

How can these emotions help us confront the uncertainties and ambiguities of our chemicalized existence?

How can we experience and express these emotions to foster and exercise solidarities with a view to opposing involuntary chronic exposure to environmentally ubiquitous endocrine disrupting chemicals?

What might the affective politics of anti-toxic action look like?

After twenty to forty minutes of small-group discussion, the results are shared among the groups and noted on the whiteboard or sheets of paper. A new list, map, or diagram is created to outline affective strategies of resistance. Comments, questions, and suggestions are added to this new section to elaborate on the pre-existing threads. In addition to developing and adding new concerns, participants identify and mark emerging connections and intersections within the working arrangement. At the end of the session, the facilitator photographs the research results. These photos are used to start a shared working document that all participants can access and continue to expand.

Learn more about the workshops in my article Getting Angry with Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals.

The Sadness of the Anthropocene, 2023, short film inroduction to the topic of chemical endocrine disruptors affecting emotions

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