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The impact of religious identity on intergroup encounters.
No full textIn recent decades, social cohesion in Western societies has been progressively undermined, leading to increased polarisation and fragmentation. Efforts to counteract this trend have included organising intergroup activities to restore trust and foster ‘bridge-building’ between different communities. While social psychology has extensively explored the dynamics of intergroup encounters, particularly in terms of their ability to promote successful community bridging, the role of religious identity in these encounters remains underexplored. Through an integrative literature review, this article aims to investigate the influence of participants’ religious identity on the outcomes of these bridging activities. A systematic literature search was conducted across various academic databases, utilising combinations of search terms such as ‘intergroup encounters’ and ‘religion’. In the search, both forward and backward snowballing techniques were added to ensure a comprehensive selection of relevant literature. Our analysis reveals that two central aspects of religious identity – religious truth claims and the perception of religious identity as a voluntary choice – pose significant challenges to bridging initiatives. In addition, minority versus majority status and self-uncertainty further complicate the effectiveness of these encounters. While interfaith interventions are often presented as mechanisms for enhancing bridging social capital, the findings suggest that they may inadvertently lead to increased bonding within religious groups, reinforcing existing divisions rather than fostering broader social cohesion. The implications of these findings for community-building initiatives are discussed
Improving Quality of Life of Families Headed by Parents With Intellectual Disabilities and Their Children by Means of Assistive Social Robotics
No full textBackground: Families of parents with intellectual disabilities still face discrimination, stigma and inadequate support, placing them in vulnerable positions. Social assistive robotics offers promising support. This study investigates the possible impact of social assistive robotics on family quality of life (FQoL). Method: An inclusive, iterative and qualitative research design was used, involving a co-researcher with an intellectual disability. Four families, headed by parents with an intellectual disability and children under 12, interacted with a robot at home. Prior to and after the interaction, visually supported semi-structured interviews on FQoL were conducted. Results: The robot had a positive impact on FQoL, particularly in family relationships, work and leisure, as the robot was integrated in the families' daily routines. Other domains were impacted less. Conclusions: Social assistive robotics has the potential to enhance FQoL and support vulnerable families, complementing existing systems. Further research and development are needed
Feasibility, Acceptability and Clinical Utility of the Bereavement and Grief Cultural Formulation Interview for Prolonged Grief Disorder
No full textProlonged grief disorder (PGD) is a new diagnostic category included in global diagnostic classification systems for mental disorders. However, PGD can only be diagnosed if the severity and duration exceed socio-cultural norms. Here, we present a new supplementary module to the DSM-5 Cultural Formulation Interview: the Bereavement and Grief Cultural Formulation Interview (BG-CFI). The BG-CFI was developed to help clinicians provide a culturally informed diagnosis and guide treatment planning.We investigated the feasibility, acceptability, and clinical utility of the BG-CFI. Two participant groups (11 refugees, asylum seekers or migrants experiencing bereavement and 3 clinicians) took part in the study and were interviewed using open-ended questions on measures of feasibility, acceptability, and clinical utility. A step-by-step procedure was followed: (1) Clinicians and/or researchers conducted the BG-CFI with participants; (2) Debriefing interviews were conducted separately with clinicians and with bereaved participants.The BG-CFI was found to be a feasible, acceptable, and clinically useful tool for both bereaved participants and clinicians. Where clinicians found the interview difficult to conduct (i.e. lack of conceptual clarity or triggering emotional distress) specific changes were made to the interview format such as prompts for further questioning or recommendations for withholding or adapting questions. The BG-CFI would offer a useful complement for a reliable assessment of PGD in clinical settings working with cultural incongruity.</p
Rethinking emulation: Why Zagzebski’s account of admiration qua exemplarism falls short as a moral developmental theory
No full textIf cultivating phronesis – broadly understood as excellence in ethical decision making – and the related moral virtues is a central aim of neo-Aristotelian character education, then, in this context, it follows that the aim of a moral developmental theory is to explain, step-by-step, how one acquires phronesis and moral virtue from infancy to moral maturity. Emulation has become an increasingly prominent way of acquiring said traits, with scholars championing it as a, maybe even the, primary method of virtuous character development. Yet there remains some debate as to precisely what emulation is, conceptually speaking, and how it might work as a methodological process, and in this theoretical quagmire Linda Zagzebski’s account – which focuses on the admiration of exemplars – has reigned strong. Despite its various merits, in this paper, I challenge its continued status as an overarching moral developmental theory of emulation. I argue that it is time for the philosophical tide to (re-)turn to emulation qua role modelling as a moral developmental method and reconsider its overreliance on Zagzebski’s theory of admiration qua exemplarism, which arguably misses the mark in explaining how we acquire the full spectrum of moral virtue and phronesis. Specifically, I suggest that as a moral developmental method Zagzebski’s theory of admiration falls short on three important grounds – philosophical rigour, psychological realism and developmental adequacy – and subsequently advance three related objections. These concern, first, that Zagzebski’s understanding of admiration is philosophically incomplete because it rests on a misinterpretation of Aristotle’s account of zẽlos in Rhetoric; second, that her position is psychologically unrealistic, because even if one accepts her account of the so called ‘emotion’ of admiration, alone it is motivationally too simple to explain how learners acquire the full spectrum of moral virtue; and third, that – drawing upon the empirically supported neo-Aristotelian Phronesis Model which demonstrates the salience of phronesis to moral decision making –Zagzebski’s theory of admiration is developmentally inadequate because, by omitting phronesis from its ethical repertoire, it cannot provide an account of how it develops. In response to these objections, I then propose a solution in the form of my own theory of emulation qua role modelling – a two-step psycho-moral process involving a new concept, entangled phronesis
‘Leave the Thorn, Enjoy the Rose’:Identiteitsvorming van Personen met Afasie in Beeld in de Vroege Revalidatiefase
No full textTraining Future Speech Therapists in Life Storytelling for Aphasia: An International Educational Initiative in Speech Therapy
No full textWhere to aim with multispecies climate justice?:A critical realist account
No full textClimate justice has become a key concept in addressing normative challenges in climate change and related policies. However, most applications of the term have remained anthropocentric. The multispecies justice perspective seeks to remedy this anthropocentrism, through focusing on relationality between and among human and non-human actors in climate justice. We engage with three points where this perspective remains to be developed further: the scope of ‘subjects of justice’, the meaning of ‘justice’ and institutional applications of multispecies justice. We argue that the reliance in multispecies justice literature upon hybridist ontologies of nature and society hampers advancement in these three aspects. We, therefore, propose an alternative ontological foundation, based on critical realism, that can resolve these limitations in current approaches to multispecies justice, contributing to further development of the concept