Toward community: A third position

This essay addresses the insufficiency of modern science as the solution to the problems of human life. It is a critique of community theory and a constructivist proposal for a synthesis of the individuality and collectivity solutions to the Paradox of the One and the Many—designated as the Third Position. The Third Position is necessary for the postmodern period for there is a need to incorporate the goal of Equality (or Justice) into a paradigm based on Liberty and Fraternity. The Third Position is also called the Just Community. To achieve the development of the new position (paradigm), a location-specific action research center is proposed based on the Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory (Kelly, 1970). Two examples of action research are described: aqualitative project to develop community within a parish that has served to advance the theory of the Just Community, and aquantitative project of community-level change-monitoring of social indicators and the use of dynamic modeling as a way to understand and simulate local community processes. The Society for Community Research and Action is urged to take specific actions to explore the development of a Woods Hole community research laboratory.     

The Effects of Response Repetitions on Sight Word Acquisition for Students with Mild Disabilities

Single response learning trials, defined in terms of the three-term contingency model, were compared with repeated response learning trials. The purpose of Study 1 was to assess the effectiveness and efficiency of single and repeated response learning trials on sight word remediation. In Study 1, one single response learning trial having one response opportunity per word was compared to one repeated response learning trial having five response opportunities. In Study 2, three single response trials were compared to three repeated response trials. In both studies, the training conditions were compared using an alternating treatments design. Measuring the cumulative number of sight words mastered showed the training conditions equally effective. However, measuring (a) the mean duration of training sessions, (b) the cumulative frequency of words mastered per session duration, (c) the mean number of training sessions per word required for mastery, and (d) the training time per mastered word showed that the single response condition was more efficient. Discussion focuses on the need to include training data when determining best practices for teaching.     

Training young parents to identify and report their children's illnesses.

We developed a comprehensive training program to teach young parents what symptoms to look for to judge the severity of their children''s illnesses, what to do at home to comfort their children, and when to consult their children''s physician or take them for emergency treatment. Three pairs of subjects received training that included written handouts, verbal instructions, modeling, positive practice, and verbal reinforcement. Skill acquisition was assessed by a behavioral test in which parents assessed, treated, or reported a simulated illness in a child. Written materials when used alone did not improve the parent''s ability to identify and report children''s illnesses. Modeling and role-playing followed by positive practice were successful in teaching these parents skills that were maintained for 3 months without additional training or instruction.     

ACTIONS AS THE TIES THAT BIND Love, Praxis, and Community in the Thought of Gustavo Gutiérrez

Gustavo Gutiérrez develops an account of human action or praxis that I—borrowing the language of Charles Taylor—label expressivist. Human action must be understood as expressing an underlying potential or impulse that only becomes real through expression in action. Gutiérrez's expressivism is fundamental to his view of the relationship between faith and love, his notion of three dimensions of liberation/salvation, and his understanding of the fundamental option as a yes or no in response to grace. Moreover, it supports a valuable approach to community as defined more by shared actions than a shared tradition or narrative. The final section briefly indicates two limitations to Gutiérrez's vision—especially with regard to the conception of community—and suggests the direction that a constructive appropriation of his thought might take.     

Guestbooks in multifaith spaces as (inter-)religious media

ABSTRACT

In recent years, various forms of multifaith spaces have been emerging in Germany which include so-called Rooms of Silence in hospitals or educational institutions as well as Gardens of Religions. So far, empirical research on these spaces has focused on their establishment or their functions within the surrounding organisations. In this article we will put a focus on the ‘user experience’ of multifaith spaces based on an analysis of guestbooks. These books are a unique source of data for a qualitative in-depth analysis as they offer an opportunity for visitors for commentary including religious references and speech acts. Drawing on two case studies from a Room of Silence within a hospital and a Garden of Religions, we investigate how users experience and appropriate multifaith spaces and how guestbooks may become media of (inter-) religious contact.     

Comment on Björn Sahlberg’s paper

This paper is a comment on Björn Sahlberg’s paper on the function of training analysis in the Swedish psychoanalytic association and discusses some aspects of the candidates’ personal analysis and supervision. The paper further suggests some possible sources for inspiration and perspective on organizational and educational issues, for example taking an interest in the epistemology of professions, in what the concept of ‘reflection-in-action’ could mean in the training situation, or in empirical research about the educational models and the practice of psychoanalysis.     

MEASURING REFLECTIVE SUPERVISION WITHIN HOME VISITING: CHANGES IN SUPERVISORS’ SELF‐PERCEPTION OVER TIME

Despite widespread belief in the early childhood field of the benefits of reflective supervision, there has been limited empirical evidence to support the effectiveness of reflective supervision for home visitors and the children and families they serve. The present study examined the psychometric properties of four adapted self‐report measures assessing supervisors’ reflective supervision capacities; the study also investigated whether these measures captured change in reflective capacity over time as supervisors participated in professional development activities focused on reflective supervision. Results from 33 participants (home visiting supervisors and program managers) suggested that three of the four measures demonstrated acceptable internal consistency, and these three measures were correlated with each other. Two of these measures also captured significant change over time. Finally, there was some evidence that those with less education demonstrated more substantial improvement in their reflective supervision capacities than did those with an advanced degree. Findings provide initial evidence for reliable, efficient, and cost‐effective supervisor self‐report measures that could be used in research and program evaluation to assess change in supervisor reflective capacity over time.     

Commentary on neoliberal ideology in work and organizational psychology

I welcome the paper on Neoliberal ideology in WOP as a valuable critique of Work and Organizational Psychology (WOP) encouraging practitioners and researchers to think carefully about what they are trying to achieve and how they make sense of the world of work.     

Mobile technologies in use by those participating in Lutheran confirmation training in Finland

Abstract

This article focuses on the study of where mobile devices and social media tools are taken into consideration in the Finnish confirmation training entity as a new opportunity to work together. The research is based on the ethnographical method. The data was collected by observation in two confirmation training camp periods and interviewing confirmation training participants. The aim was to find out ways mobile devices were exploited in confirmation training pedagogy, how adolescents reacted to such mobile device use and how adolescents described their personal mobile device use. The research material is analysed by inductive content analysis. The findings are discussed in the theoretical context of the communities of practice (CoPs), originally formed by Lave and Wenger . According to the results, mobile device use, in the confirmation training programme did not seem to be that special for adolescents. At the same time, the youth considered it important to have the possibility to use mobile devices according to their own preferences. Using mobile devices in confirmation training challenged the traditional CoP setting, as adolescents used mobile technology more in their own way, being familiar with it in their earlier virtual communities of practice (VCoPs), instead of the plans of the workers of confirmation training.     

Medicalizing tensions in counselor education?

The aim of this paper is to summarize research into the tensions associated with medicalization in graduate counselor education in a primarily Canadian context. Counselor education, until recently, has largely embraced pluralistic traditions of practice that are potentially at odds with a medicalized approach to practice. Medicalization here refers to a diagnostic and treatment focus most commonly associated with use of DSM5 diagnostic procedures and evidence-based treatment. Tensions, in this study, refer to competing accountabilities encountered in reconciling medicalized with other approaches to practice. Following a review of relevant textbooks, graduate program websites and curricula, Master’s-level counseling students, counselor educators, and profession leaders were surveyed and/or interviewed regarding how medicalization influenced counselor education, and for how they responded to its influence. Data across all sources were analyzed using the mapping procedures of Situational Analysis, a method useful in analyzing contested phenomena and processes. We report our findings as navigable, negotiable, and dilemmatic tensions shaping the experiences of students and other stakeholders in counselor education. We recommend ways to enable students and educators to navigate and negotiate potential dilemmas associated with medicalizing influences on counselor education. We close by discussing the implications of our findings with respect to practice and training in the UK context.