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Dreams reflect nocturnal sleep-dependent processes: They are continuous in early-night sleep, and emotional and hyperassociative in late-night sleep
No full textContributions of specific sleep stages to cognitive processes are increasingly understood. For instance, non-rapid eye movement (non-REM) sleep is particularly implicated in episodic memory consolidation, whilst rapid eye movement (REM) sleep preferentially consolidates and regulates emotional information. Dream content has been shown to transparently reflect these processes: non-REM dreams are more likely to picture episodic memories than REM dreams, and REM dreams are more emotional than non-REM dreams. REM sleep also gives rise to creativity and insight into problem solving, and this is reflected in the heightened levels of bizarreness in REM compared to non-REM dreams. However, across-the-night differences in the memory sources of dream content, as opposed to sleep stage differences, are less well understood. In the present study, 68 participants were awoken from their sleep in the early night and the late night, recorded their dreams and waking-life activities, and answered questions about them. It was found that early-night dreams were more clearly relatable to (or continuous with) waking life than late-night dreams, but late-night dreams were more emotional-important, more time orientation varied, and more hyperassociative, than early-night dreams. These findings have important implications for across-the-night alternating sleep-dependent cognitive processes, and illustrate underlying subjective mental content that accompanies sleep processes such as memory consolidation, emotion-processing, and creativity
The internalization of social stigma among minor-attracted persons: implications for treatment
No full textIn this paper, we sought to build on existing stigmatization research by examining the extent to which internalized stigmatization (i.e., the personal adoption and incorporation of social views, operationalized as thought suppression – an avoidant coping strategy – and low psychological wellbeing) among minor-attracted persons (MAPs) may impact upon help-seeking behaviors and their avoidance of children. We adopted a cross-sectional anonymous survey design to recruit a sample of self-identified MAPs (N = 183) from prominent online support fora. We found that increased levels of suppression and lower levels of psychological wellbeing were associated with lower levels of hope about the future, but higher levels of both shame and guilt about having a sexual interest in minors. Thought suppression was not significantly associated with outcomes related to help-seeking behaviors, but did significantly higher rates of actively avoiding children, even after controlling for psychological wellbeing and other emotional variables. Independently, lower levels of self-reported psychological wellbeing was associated with a desire for more support and higher rates of actively avoiding children. We explore the potential implications of our data in relation to treating and supporting MAPs within the community, increasing their wellbeing, and encouraging help-seeking behavior. A freely available preprint of this paper is available at https://psyarxiv.com/8dr69/
Christianity, Kiribati, and climate change induced migration
No full textThis chapter examines the perceived socio-cultural impacts of relocation to Fiji through the lens of target communities in Kiribati. Findings based on the perceptions of Kiribati communities reveal that relocation is the last ‘adaptation resort’ to escape and offset individual losses caused by climate change. It is viewed as an option that will compromise their socio-cultural practices and values in the long term. This study indicates that attention should not be focused only on factors that drive human relocation but should also prioritize justifications of those who choose not to relocate. This approach will better serve community expectations for in-country climate change adaptation and help shape future strategies and/or policies on climate change driven relocation. Finally, policies and adaptation initiatives should be holistically framed; integrating values that are important to grassroots level such as socio-cultural values; and spiritual and mobility concerns for informed decision making at all levels
Monsters and posttraumatic stress: an experiential-processing model of monster imagery in psychological therapy, film and television
No full textTrauma survivors may see images of monsters in nightmares and visions when experiencing posttraumatic stress. However, there has been little commentary on the significance and meaning of this imagery and the wider relationship between monster imagery and posttraumatic stress. Applying an integrated experiential-processing approach to working with trauma in Counselling and Psychotherapy, emphasis is placed on facilitating ‘processing’ or making sense of the trauma, psychologically, emotionally, existentially and culturally. Examining the interplay of these elements, this paper explores monsters as symbol and metaphor for unspoken or unprocessed personal and cultural trauma, vessels for symbolically representing underlying, unacknowledged fears and experience. This paper discusses how encounters with the monster onscreen, in mental imagery or metaphor, may be allegorical to the individual’s internal struggle with post-traumatic stress. The model presented is applied within an analysis of the symbolic representation of the trauma of cancer, cancer treatment and traumatic loss in survival horror movie The Shallows (Collet-Serra (dir) (2016). The Shallows. Columbia Pictures). Jungian ideas are integrated to consider monsters as emergent symbolisation of unspoken ‘shadow’ fears, such as those surrounding cancer. In an experientialprocessing account of trauma, incongruence between self-concept (our beliefs about self and world) and our actual experience of traumatic events is viewed as a source of psychological distress, prompting a breakdown and reorganisation of the self-structure. It is proposed that trauma experience confronts us with our mortality and fragility, bringing us into contact with the sense of ‘abject’ horror represented by monster imagery. Creeds (2007. The monstrous feminine: film, feminism, psychoanalysis. Routledge, London and New York) description of the abject as the ‘place where meaning collapses’ is applied to an understanding of psychological trauma, given that encounters with existential threats may render the everyday meaningless, engendering a need for meaning-making. Monster imagery psychologically represents the collapsing border between our ideas about self and world, and the destabilising experience of the shattering of pre-trauma assumptions. In this account monsters are located within a wider, adaptive evolutionary drive towards the reduction of trauma-related psychological distress, through symbolising experience into awareness for processing and meaning making. In this way monsters may play a complex role in a human struggle to come to terms with overwhelming events
Ongoing policy reform in Thailand's initial teacher education curriculum: incomplete policy borrow
No full textThis article reports on a review of Initial Teacher Education in Thailand’s Rajabhat universities conducted in 2016/17 and the subsequent national initial teacher education curriculum reform drawing on the review’s findings and recommendations. The research was conducted in three interconnected phases. The first included a review of secondary data made available by the sample Rajabhat universities (n=5) and the Thai Ministry of Education. Phase two included a period of fieldwork in Thailand during which the research team collected data from officers of the Ministry of Education (n=6), university senior managers (n=38), initial teacher education course leaders and academic staff (n=54) and student teachers’ (n~125). During the final phase of the research the research team liaised with a series of Thai stakeholders (e.g. the Teacher’s Council of Thailand) to confirm maters of accuracy and disentangle local custom and practice from national policy. A key recommendation of the research was to consider reducing the length of the undergraduate route into teaching and ensure trainee teachers spent time in school in each on the four years of their course. Since the report policy changes have been implemented across Thailand’s initial teacher education landscape including the recommended reduction in initial teacher education course length from five to four years in March 2019
Care farming, learning and young people: An exploration into the possible contribution of care farming to young people’s engagement with learning.
No full textThe aim of this study was to explore the possible contribution of care farming to young people’s engagement with learning. Firstly, the perceptions and experiences of young people accessing alternative curriculum on three care farms were gathered through a methodological approach underpinned by aspects of ethnography. Secondly, care farm providers and school support staff were consulted with to provide an understanding as to why young people attend care farms in England and to ascertain if they felt there were any perceived benefits to their learning.
The study positions its research within three care farm sites across England, all of whom offer alternative curriculum opportunities. Data were captured longitudinally during typical farming practices such as collecting eggs, sheep shearing and fencing to capture any naturally occurring evidence. Unstructured interviews, photo elicitation and semi-structured interviews were all triangulated with observational fieldwork notes.
Data yielded in this study found that care farms provide a nurturing and enabling learning environment for young people to self-discover and be free from the humiliation and frustration experienced, by some, in the traditional schooling system. The most significant finding was the compelling interplay between the care farm context, the natural environment and the values of informal education. The informal relational discourse, evident through triangulated data, synergised with the nature-based pedagogy and the multitude of learning contexts on a care farm. This, therefore, provided a catalyst for young people to learn practically, socially and introspectively
I do feel good because my stomach is full of good hotcakes?: Comfort food, home, and the USAAF in East Anglia during the Second World War
No full textThis article analyses the important role that food played in providing ?comfort? to the service personnel of the United States Army Air Force (USAAF) serving in East Anglia during the Second World War. Current theories on comfort food will be discussed before an examination of letters, diaries, and memoirs held by the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library (2ADML), Norwich, UK. It is clear that food played an important role in maintaining morale. Certain foods had the ability to evoke nostalgic thoughts of home. Not only did the food provide solace, it also reminded the troops of what they were fighting for. This article also demonstrates that USAAF personnel in East Anglia had a wide selection of foods from which they could gain comfort
LAR-D (Learning About Religions through Dialogue) Final Report
No full textThis report summarises the Learning About Religions through Dialogue (LAR-D) project that was carried out in Lincolnshire schools between September 2019 and December 2020. Faith practitioners were linked to specific schools for an extended period, so that they could develop friendships and support the Religious Education in the school. The engagement was effective in strengthening RE in all participating schools, with many schools and faith practitioners wanting to continue the links even after the project was finished
Conceptualising place in historical fact and creative fiction: rural communities and regional landscapes in Bernard Samuel Gilbert’s ‘Old England’, c. 1910-1920
No full textThe theme of place guides much exploration in rural history and local history. Attempts have been made to create definitions and typologies of place, but these have had to contend with the diverse, complex, and dynamic realities of historical pattern and process, local and regional. Nonetheless, historians and those in other disciplines have evolved different approaches to the concept. This study considers how these can inform the investigation of places existing in historical fact in particular periods in the past, and can do similarly for those places located contemporaneously in fictional constructions. Reference is made to various academic writings on place, including by the local historian, David Dymond. The analysis takes the work of the author of fiction, Bernard Samuel Gilbert. Gilbert, although relatively obscure now, incorporated a feature of special note into his later literary output, and one meriting greater attention. This was his personalised, reflective and explicitly articulated approach to forming and expressing place. Moreover, Gilbert’s ‘Old England’, with its imaginary district of 'Bly', can be recognised as corresponding with landscapes and communities existing more broadly in the years up to and through the First World War, and with creations by other authors of regional fiction
Modern foreign languages: decision-making, motivation and 14-19 schools
No full textThis article reports on an exploratory study comparing motivation and student choice in modern foreign language lessons in secondary schools (11-16 or 11-18) and schools for 14-19 year olds in England. The study uses data gathered from 634 Year 10 students (aged 14-15), and uses self-determination theory to compare motivation amongst students in the two types of schools. It finds that student motivation differed significantly in each, with students in 14-19 schools displaying more autonomous motivation. Students in schools in this category were less likely to have been given a choice as to whether or not to take the subject than their peers, suggesting that they may feel autonomous in ways not governed by subject choice. Possible reasons for the differences in motivation in the two kinds of school are discussed and directions for future study proposed