title: The domestication of an everyday health technology: A case study of electric toothbrushes.
abstract: Using the electric toothbrush as an example, this article examines the growing acceptability of domestic health technologies that blur the traditional boundaries between health, aesthetics and consumption. By using empirical material from individual and household interviews about people's oral health practices, this research explores the relationships between an everyday artefact, its users and their environments. It investigates the ways in which oral health technologies do, or do not, become domesticated in the home environment. We conclude that the domestication of oral health technologies is not inevitable, with the electric toothbrush often becoming an 'unstable object' in the domestic setting.
authors.affiliation: Department of Sociology, The Open University , Walton Hall, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA, UK.
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Carter
authors.forename: Judith
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Green
authors.forename: Nicki
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Thorogood
keywords: electric toothbrush; household interviews; mundane technologies; oral health; science and technology studies