The Russian Orthodox Church as moral norm entrepreneur

Conflicts over religious symbols in the public sphere, gay marriage, abortion or gender equality have shown their disruptive potential across many societies in the world. They have also become the subject of political and legal debates in international institutions. These conflicts emerge out of different worldviews and normative conceptions of the good, and they are frequently framed in terms of competing interpretations of human rights. One newcomer voice in conflicts over rights and values in the international sphere is the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), which in recent years has become an active promoter of ‘traditional values’ both inside Russia and internationally. This article studies the ideational prerequisites and dynamics of Russian Orthodox ‘norm protagonism’ in the international arena.     

‘Who am I?’

The dreams and existential questions of those, who came into being in order to replace a dead person, pivot around a central cry: ‘Who am I?’ If conceived, born or designated as a replacement child, such an individual may suffer—even as an adult—from a rarely recognized unconscious confusion of identity, compounded by grief and survivors’ guilt. From before the child is born, the archetypal forces of death and life are joined in a fateful constellation; the soul of the replacement child bears the shadow of death from the very beginning of life. Hope for the replacement child lies in an emergence of true self as soul recreates original life. Analysis can help the replacement child experience a ‘rebirth into true life’, not as ‘the one who returned’, but as a psychologically newborn individual; the path of individuation countering the replacement child‘s identification with the dead. Jungian analysis offers unique concepts for understanding and healing the replacement child; C.G. Jung himself was born after two stillborn babies and an infant that lived only five days.     

Construction and evaluation of a self rating scale for stress‐induced Exhaustion Disorder,the Karolinska Exhaustion Disorder Scale

Prolonged stress (≥ six months) may cause a condition which has been named exhaustion disorder (ED) with ICD‐10 code F43.8. ED is characterised by exhaustion, cognitive problems, poor sleep and reduced tolerance to further stress. ED can cause long term disability and depressive symptoms may develop. The aim was to construct and evaluate a self‐rating scale, the Karolinska Exhaustion Disorder Scale (KEDS), for the assessment of ED symptoms. A second aim was to examine the relationship between self‐rated symptoms of ED, depression, and anxiety using KEDS and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HAD). Items were selected based on their correspondence to criteria for ED as formulated by the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare (NBHW), with seven response alternatives in a Likert‐format. Self‐ratings performed by 317 clinically assessed participants were used to analyse the scale's psychometric properties. KEDS consists of nine items with a scale range of 0–54. Receiver operating characteristics analysis demonstrated that a cut‐off score of 19 was accompanied by high sensitivity and specificity (each above 95%) in the discrimination between healthy subjects and patients with ED. Reliability was satisfactory and confirmatory factor analysis revealed that ED, depression and anxiety are best regarded as different phenomena. KEDS may be a useful tool in the assessment of symptoms of Exhaustion Disorder in clinical as well as research settings. There is evidence that the symptom clusters of ED, anxiety and depression, respectively, reflect three different underlying dimensions.     

A Case-Series of Reflective Family Play: Therapeutic Process,Feasibility, and Referral Characteristics

Evidence-based interventions for infants and preschoolers, and their families, have largely focused on the mother-child dyad. In response to the increasing need to diversify treatment approaches in the under six population and include the whole family system, we have developed a new treatment approach called Reflective Family Play (RFP). A manualized, whole-family therapy, RFP allows for the involvement of two parents and siblings when working with infants or young children. In this case-series, we used a qualitative chart review to examine the therapeutic process, acceptability, and feasibility of RFP for 22 families with children ages 0–6, who participated in RFP. We also sought to better understand the referral characteristics of those families who participated in RFP by comparing them to families who were referred to and participated in an established dyadic approach during the same time-period. Session-by-session coding of clinician chart notes revealed evidence of positive shifts throughout the RFP process, including more whole-family play, improvements in coparenting, and better parental mentalization. Parents reported improvements in presenting concerns in all but one case. Improvements in coparenting, sibling relationships, and family alliance were also reported by parents after RFP. Clinical implications and directions for future research are discussed.     

The Validation of a Five-Item Screening Scale for Personality Disorders in Dutch-Speaking Community Adolescents and Adults

In Section III of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – fifth edition (DSM-5), an Alternative Model for Personality Disorders (AMPD) is proposed, including a criterion for personality functioning impairment (Criterion A) to assess severity of personality pathology. The present study examined the structure, reliability, and convergent validity of the Dutch version of a five-item screening scale for Criterion A—the Five-Item Screening Scale for Personality Disorders (FISSPD; Skodol et al., in Personality Disorders: Theory, Research, and Treatment, 2, 4-22, 2011)—in a community sample of 1,477 adolescents and 546 adults. To assess convergent validity, identity and personality (pathology) questionnaires were completed by adolescents and adults. Confirmatory factor analysis yielded a single factor structure for the FISSPD, which proved to be (partially) invariant across age and gender. Adequate reliability coefficients were obtained for the FISSPD. In both the adolescent and adult sample, significant correlations were found between the FISSPD and consolidated identity (negative) and disturbed identity/lack of identity (positive). In the adult sample, the FISSPD showed significant correlations with several personality disorders (and especially with the borderline personality disorder), maladaptive personality traits (Criterion B of the AMPD), and general personality impairment. In the adolescent sample, the FISSPD was positively correlated with borderline personality disorder characteristics. Furthermore, significant correlations were found with the Big-Five personality traits in the adolescent sample: the FISSPD correlated significantly positive with neuroticism, and negative with extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. In sum, the present study supports the reliability and validity of the FISSPD to screen for (severity of) personality pathology.

     

Disseminating a sun safety program to zoological parks: the effects of tailoring.

Previous research found that a sun safety program for visitors at 1 zoo increased sun safety behaviors. This randomized study compared the effects of tailored dissemination materials plus 2 brief follow-up phone calls (tailored group) versus generic materials (basic group) on implementation by other zoos of the previously evaluated sun safety program. Education directors of 126 zoos completed surveys several months following initial dissemination and 1 year later. During Summer 1, 40% of tailored group zoos and 24% of basic group zoos offered visitors at least 1 sun safety activity (odds ratio=2.2, 95% confidence interval=1.0-4.8). During Summer 2, these rates were 34% and 44%, respectively (ns). The pattern of findings suggests that tailoring had no incremental long-term impact and that the generic materials produced a good level of dissemination.     

A Prospective Study of High-School Adolescent Sexting Behavior and Psychological Distress

Abstract

Relying on conceptualization of sexting as a deviant behavior, which appear to be related with mental health problems, we examined the relationship between sexting and psychological distress. A one-year longitudinal study was performed among 216 girls and 143 boys, aged from 15 to 17?years (M?=?16.32, SD = .64). Participants completed the Sexting Behavior Questionnaire and the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale at both time points of the study. The results showed that the prevalence for receiving sexts between the two time points was around 30%, and for sending sexts around 60%. The prevalence rates of receiving and sending sexually explicit context were quite stable over time, though they varied significantly across gender. Participants usually had sexted with a current or (ex)partner or friends. The number of person with whom participants exchange sexts did not exceed five. Anxiety and stress symptoms were more prevalent among sexters who receive sexts at the baseline than follow-up study (p < .05). Stress has been found to be significant predictors of sending sext at the baseline study (p < .05), while depression of receiving and sending at the follow-up study (p < .001). This study confirms that sexting is common among youth, and appears to be associated with negative consequences.     

From Pussy Riot’s ‘punk prayer’ to Matilda: Orthodox believers,critique, and religious freedom in Russia

ABSTRACT

This article analyses the configurations of belief, critique, and religious freedom in Russia since the performance of the Russian group Pussy Riot in 2012. The ‘punk prayer’ and its legal and political aftermath are interpreted as an incidence of the contestation of the boundary between the secular and the religious in the Russian legal and social sphere. The authors show that the outcome of this contestation has had a decisive impact on the way in which religion, critique, and the human right of religious freedom have been defined in the present Russian context. In response to Pussy Riot, the Russian legislator turned offending religious feelings into a crime. The article investigates two more recent cases where offended feelings of believers were involved, the opera “Tannhäuser” in Ekaterinburg in 2015 and the movie Matilda in 2017, and analyses how the initial power-conforming configuration that emerged as a reply to the ‘punk prayer’ has revealed a ‘power-disturbing’ potential as conservative Orthodox groups have started to challenge the authority of the State and the Church leadership. The article is based on primary sources from Russian debates surrounding Pussy Riot, Matilda, and “Tannhäuser” and on theoretical literature on the religious–secular boundary and human rights.