Building Leadership,Capacity, and Power to Advance Health Equity and Justice through Community‐Engaged Research in the Midwest

The Health Equity Advancement Lab (HEAL) at the University of Iowa College of Public Health began in 2012 to support students, researchers, and community members interested in tackling persistent health inequities through a community‐based participatory research (CBPR) approach. Using concepts from critical consciousness theory, we developed an approach to building students’, faculty members’, and community partners’ capacity to engage in CBPR to promote health equity that involved immersion in developing CBPR projects. Our paper describes the evolution of HEAL as a facilitating structure that provides a support network and engages diverse stakeholders in critical reflection as they participate in research to advance health equity, and resulting political efficacy and social action. We describe one HEAL‐affiliated research project that employs a CBPR approach and has a strong focus on providing transformative learning experiences for students, faculty, and community members. We highlight challenges, successes, and lessons learned in the application of critical consciousness as a framework that engages diverse academic and community partners seeking to promote health equity. We argue that critical consciousness is a relevant theoretical framework to promote transformative learning among students, faculty, and community partners to promote health equity research in diverse communities.     

Timing of early warning stages in a multi stage collision warning system: Drivers’ evaluation depending on situational influences

By means of car2x communication technologies (car2x) driver warnings can be presented to drivers quite early. However, due to their early timing they could be misunderstood by drivers, distract or even disturb them. These problems arise if, at the moment of the warning, the safety–critical situation is not yet perceivable or critical. In order to examine, when drivers want to receive early warnings as a function of the situation criticality, a driving simulator study was conducted using the two early warning stages of a multi stage collision warning system (first stage: informing the driver; second stage: prewarning the driver). The optimum timing to activate these two early warning stages was derived by examining the drivers’ evaluation of these timings concerning their appropriateness and usefulness. As situational variation, drivers traveling at about 100 km/h were confronted with slow moving traffic either driving at 25 km/h or 50 km/h at the end of a rural road.In total, 24 participants were tested in a within-subjects design (12 female, 12 male; M = 26.6 years, SD = 7.2 years). For both stages, drivers preferred an earlier timing when approaching slow moving traffic traveling at 25 km/h (first stage: 447 m, second stage: 249 m ahead of the lead vehicle) compared to 50 km/h (first stage: 338 m, second stage: 186 m ahead of the lead vehicle). The drivers’ usefulness rating also varied with the timing, spanning a range of 8 s for driver-accepted timing variations and showed correspondence to the drivers’ appropriateness ratings. Based on these results and those of a previous study, a timing function for each of the two early warning stages depending on the speed difference between the safety–critical object and the host vehicle is presented. Indirectly, similar adaptations are already implemented in current collision warning systems, which use the time-to-collision to give drivers acute warnings in a later stage, when an immediate reaction of the driver may still prevent a collision. However, this study showed that drivers also favor this kind of adaptation for earlier warning stages (information and prewarning). Thus, adapting the timing according to the drivers’ preferences will contribute to a better acceptance of these collision warning systems.     

Critical reflections on teaching challenging content: do some students shoot the (white) messenger?

Racism is an enduring reality in Australian society for Indigenous Australians, reflecting the experiences of Indigenous peoples in colonized countries worldwide. While social work services delivered by Indigenous Australians might be the preferred option, the graduation rate of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students from Australian social work training is low and non-Indigenous social workers provide most service delivery. As a non-Indigenous social work educator at an Australian university, I recognize that teaching culturally relevant curricula, in order to produce antiracist social work graduates who recognize racism and privilege, is crucial but challenging. The purpose of this article is to share my ongoing critical reflections, particularly with regard to student dissatisfaction and possible disengagement with difficult content, and my actions for improved teaching and learning, in order to graduate work-ready social workers.     

Critical Approaches to Education in the Work of Lorenzo Milani and Paulo Freire

Paulo Freire and Lorenzo Milani are considered as key figures in a number of Southern European countries for providing signposts for a critical approach to education. In this paper I will view their ideas and biographical trajectories comparatively to glean some important insights for a critical pedagogy. The common theme throughout this comparative analysis is that of education for social justice based on critical literacy. The paper also deals with such themes as the relationship between education and politics, the relationship between education and life, the collective dimension of learning and the ability to read as well as write the word and the world.

承认与蔑视——霍耐特的社会批判理论评析

在诊断和批判当代晚期资本主义社会的现实问题方面,哈贝马斯的交往行为理论曾发挥了重要的作用,但由于其缺乏现实性和社会性,难以适应时代变化和解释西方社会一些新运动的产生及其承认问题的实践需求,因而日趋走向保守和无力。面对这个困境,哈贝马斯的后继者阿克塞尔·霍耐特(AxelHonneth)重新回到黑格尔的主体间性理论,并以此为基础提出“为承认而斗争”的社会道德冲突模式,力图实现批判理论的“承认理论转向”。     

Playing Church: Toward Critically Creative Pastoral Practices

The author develops theory and practices that contribute to psychological health and well-being in pastoral ministry. Drawing on experiences in congregational ministry and clinical pastoral learning environments, the author argues for the benefit of a playful pastoral education method informed by the critical pedagogy of Paulo Freire and the theological worldview of Jurgen Moltmann. Attention is given to explication of core principles and practical application that foster soul-filled creativity in pastoral ministry.     

Toward kuleana (responsibility): A case study of a contextually grounded intervention for Native Hawaiian youth and young adults

As a minority ethnic group, Native Hawaiian youth and young adults face an array of issues associated with colonization, such as persistent structural discrimination and the loss of land and indigenous ways of knowing. They are also at risk for a wide range of negative behaviors, including interpersonal violence, suicide, substance use, and juvenile delinquency. This article explores how community youth development, critical pedagogies, and Hawaiian epistemology can help Native Hawaiian young adults cope with such issues. It begins with a brief discussion of critiques on conventional youth violence prevention programs. To address these critiques, three bodies of literature are introduced: 1) community youth development, 2) critical pedagogy, and 3) community epistemology. Data were derived from a single case study of a community-based youth program. The program, located in an impoverished, rural community in Hawai'i, entailed running an organic farm. Seventeen participants were involved in the study. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data. Utilizing critical indigenous qualitative research, a content analysis of the interviews was conducted to build a working conceptual model. Preliminary findings suggest that a program with key processes of community youth development, critical pedagogies, and Hawaiian epistemology may serve as a vehicle for health and wellness, thus preventing a host of negative behaviors, such as violence. Based on the findings, a critical contextually based approach to violence prevention that focuses on providing opportunities for Native Hawaiian young adults to take an active participatory role in promoting health is proposed.     

Liberating and Empowering Effects of Critical Reflection on Collective Action in LGBT and Cisgender Heterosexual Individuals

Critical consciousness represents the transformation from a passive target of oppression to an active actor with an increased capacity to analyze and negotiate conditions of oppression. It is considered as an antidote for oppression that can liberate people from oppressive ideologies and empower them to resist social injustice. Building on the theory of critical consciousness and the Social Identity Model of Collective Action, this paper examined the liberating and empowering effects of critical reflection on collective action for minority rights. Results of a cross-sectional study in 1,050 LGBT individuals (Study 1) showed that critical reflection was associated with lower levels of internalized oppression and higher levels of collective efficacy, which in turn were associated with greater intentions to undertake collective action for LGBT rights. Findings from a prospective longitudinal study in 428 cisgender heterosexual individuals (Study 2) indicated that critical reflection was associated with lower levels of internalized domination and heightened levels of efficacious beliefs, which positively predicted actual participation in collective action at a subsequent wave. The findings supported the effects of critical reflection on collective action mobilization and offered leads for future research and praxis on how to orient different sectors of society to work toward social equity.