The Stranger to Time: What a Collector Stands for in a Hurried Society

City-dwellers who are threatened by the risk of natural or social disasters are in search of safer houses. Each attempt to satisfy their need for safety, however, turns into another version of the security problem; so much so that, escaping from risk itself turns into different (yet nevertheless more powerful) risks. The film 10 to 11 (2009) focuses on the socio-spatial conflict between a stranger and his neighbours who are anxious about a possible earthquake risk in Istanbul. Mithat, the protagonist of the film, is a stranger not only to place but essentially to time. He lives within time and understands place as an essential means loaded by temporal experiences and memories. This paper deals with the multiple dichotomies between time and memory, between risk and fear, between aesthetics and security, and between attachment and profit in the context of urban transformation. The stranger, who is analysed for the first time as a temporal being in this paper, is discussed using Zygmunt Bauman’s concepts of uncertainty and liquid modernity, Richard Sennett’s capitalism, Ulrich Beck’s risk society, Frank Furedi’s culture of fear, Stephen Bertman’s hurried culture, Elias Canetti’s death, Giorgio Agamben’s forgotten and gone, Svetlana Boym’s nostalgia, and Halbwachs, Assmann, Connerton, and Arendt’s memory, as well as around the temporal spaces of museums, bibliopoles, antique shops, and cemeteries.     

Friendship, real-ideal discrepancies, and well-being: gender differences in college students

Do men and women have different ideals for their friendships? What do men and women experience when their actual friendship experiences fall short of their ideals? The authors of the current study investigated gender differences in real-ideal same-sex best friendships and friendship discrepancy scores. Correlates of friendship discrepancies were also examined. For this purpose, a sample of 382 college students completed the McGill Friendship Questionnaire (M. J. Mendelson & F. E. Aboud, 1999), the Friendship Conflict Scale (M. Demir & L. A. Weitekamp, 2007), the Need Satisfaction Scale (J. G. La Guardia, R. M. Ryan, C. E. Couchman, & E. L. Deci, 2000), and the PANAS (D. Watson, L. A. Clark, & A. Tellegen, 1988). Results showed that (a) the real and ideal best friendships of women were higher in quality and lower in conflict when compared to those of men; and (b) men's discrepancy scores for friendship quality were significantly higher when compared to women, whereas no differences were obtained on friendship conflict discrepancy scores. Findings also revealed that for both women and men, discrepancy scores were negatively related to friendship satisfaction, happiness, and satisfaction of basic psychological needs. The authors discuss the findings in light of theory, highlight ways to address relationship discrepancies, and make suggestions for future research.     

Brain lateralization of phonological awareness varies by maternal education

Socioeconomic status (SES) has been shown to influence language skills, with children of lower SES backgrounds performing worse on language assessments compared to their higher SES peers. While there is abundant behavioral research on the effects of SES, whether there are differences in the neural mechanisms used to support language skill is less established. In this study, we examined the relation between maternal education (ME), a component of SES, and neural mechanisms of language. We focused on Kindergarten children, at the beginning of formal reading education, and on a pre‐reading skill, phonological awareness—the ability to distinguish or manipulate the sounds of language. We determined ME‐related differences in neural activity by examining a skill‐matched sample of typically achieving 5‐year‐old children as they performed a rhyme judgment task. We examined brain lateralization in two language processing regions, the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and superior temporal gyrus (STG). In the IFG, lateralization was related to ME but not skill: children with low ME showed bilateral activation compared to children with higher ME who showed leftward lateralization. In the STG, there was a skill by ME interaction on lateralization, such that children with high ME showed a positive relation between rightward lateralization and skill and children with low ME showed a positive relation between leftward lateralization and skill. Thus, we demonstrated ME is related to differences in neural recruitment during language processing, yet this difference in recruitment is not indicative of a deficit in linguistic processing in Kindergarten children.     

Friendship and adjustment among adolescents

This study investigated the relation of friendship and emotional adjustment in adolescents. Both quantitative (popularity, mutual friendships, and number of friends) and qualitative dimensions (perceived positive friendship quality and conflict) of friendship were used. Participants were 618, mostly European American, 8th-, 10th-, and 12th-graders. Structural equation modeling showed that positive friendship quality was the only friendship variable that predicted adjustment. An examination of gender effects indicated that this relation held only for boys. The quantitative aspects of friendship had a small, indirect effect on adjustment through their effects on positive quality. Conflict had a negative effect on positive quality and this effect was stronger for girls than for boys. The role of adolescents' perception in adjustment was highlighted and suggestions for future research were made.     

Turkish adolescents' loneliness

The goal of this study was to characterize loneliness among adolescents with respect to socioeconomic level, sex, and mothers' and fathers' education. General information about the 400 adolescents and their families were obtained. The UCLA Loneliness Scale was administered. Results of a hierarchical multiple regression showed that mothers' educational level explained a slight but statistically significant amount of variance in adolescents' loneliness scores while sex, socioeconomic level and fathers' educational level did not.     

Social skills, friendship and happiness: a cross-cultural investigation

The present study investigated the associations between social skills, friendship quality, and happiness, and tested a mediational model positing that friendship quality would mediate the relationship between social skills and happiness among American and Malaysian college students. Although American students reported significantly higher levels of psychosocial well-being than Malaysian students, the study variables were positively associated with each other in both cultures. More importantly, findings supported the proposed model in both groups. Results suggest that part of the reason why social skills are associated with positive psychological well-being is because of friendship experiences. Overall, the findings of the present study reinforce, extend and cross-culturally generalize the presumed benefits of social skills in positive well-being elaborated by Segrin and Taylor (2007). The authors also provided suggestions for future research.     

Friendship, perceived mattering and happiness: a study of American and Turkish college students

Although it is well established that friendship is a consistent correlate of happiness, less is known about how friendship experiences might promote happiness. The current investigation addressed this gap by testing a mediational model proposing that perceived mattering explains the association of friendship quality with happiness among college students in Turkey and the United States. An alternative model suggesting friendship quality as the mediator was also tested to enhance confidence in the proposed model. SEM analyses revealed that perceived mattering mediated the association of friendship with happiness only in the American sample. In the Turkish sample, friendship quality mediated the association between mattering and happiness. Findings highlight the importance of cross-cultural research and suggest that the underlying processes and psychological mechanisms related to the friendship-happiness link might be different in different cultures.     

Loneliness and Marital Adjustment of Turkish Couples

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between loneliness and marital adjustment in Turkish couples. Some demographic correlates of loneliness and marital adjustment such as gender, age, duration of the marriage, type of marriage, and degree of acquaintance before marriage were also examined. The UCLA Loneliness Scale (D. Russell, L. A. Peplau, & C. E. Cutrona, 1980) and the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (G. B. Spanier, 1976) were administered to 58 heterosexual married couples. The results showed that loneliness was significantly and negatively correlated with marital adjustment. For the demographic correlates, significant results were as follows: Self-selected marriages resulted in lower loneliness scores and higher marital adjustment scores than the arranged type of marriage, and marital adjustment increased parallel to an increase in the degree of acquaintance before marriage. The findings and implications are discussed in the context of practice and research.     

Conflict behaviors toward same-sex and opposite-sex peers among male and female late adolescents

Differences between males and females in regard to conflict behaviors toward same-sex and opposite-sex peers were examined in a sample of 501 undergraduate university students (326 males, 175 females). They completed a one-page questionnaire containing the theoretical definitions of five conflict behaviors identified by Thomas (1976): competing, avoiding, accommodating, compromising, and collaborating. Students were asked to rate the extent to which they exhibit each of these conflict behaviors, on a 5-point Likert-type scale, separately for same-sex and opposite-sex peers. Results revealed that males reported more competing behavior toward same-sex peers than toward opposite-sex peers, and more avoiding behavior toward opposite-sex peers than toward same-sex peers. Males, compared to females, reported more accommodating behavior toward both same-sex and opposite-sex peers. These findings support the view that preferences regarding conflict behaviors are different for males and females, particularly as exhibited toward same-sex and opposite-sex peers.