Religiosity at the roadside: memorials,animitas, and shrines on a Chilean highway

ABSTRACT

Roadside memorials devoted to vehicle-related deaths are increasingly common across the globe. Scholars have generally emphasised their commemorative status—as sites where a private memory is publicly displayed—underestimating, however, their religious dimension. This article is based on research which involved the content analysis of photographs taken during multiple visits to the 94 roadside memorials existing in 2015 on Route 78, a major Chilean highway connecting Santiago (Chile’s capital city) and San Antonio (one of the country’s main sea ports). We argue that Chilean roadside memorials are not solely commemorative sites but primarily animitas that have a core (popular) religious component: they are privileged locations where salvific grace is dispensed, acting as mediators between the living and the divinity and connecting the sacred and profane worlds. Furthermore, we suggest that the tragic nature of the deaths they commemorate confers on them a miraculous efficacy which may transform the sites into shrines and the victims into folk saints.     

Worldviews education: cosmopolitan peacebuilding and preventing violent extremism

ABSTRACT

Since the mid-2000s soft power approaches to counter and prevent violent extremism (C/PVE) have increasingly been implemented by civil society, state actors and UN agencies internationally. Education is a critical and previously undervalued component in PVE, as it has only recently begun to attract significant scholarly and policy attention. This article briefly reviews the emerging field of education and PVE, and argues that it could benefit from drawing on insights from research on education about diverse religious and non-religious worldviews and PVE in Australia. Our research indicates that these types of educational initiatives can assist with addressing religious vilification, discrimination and interreligious tensions, and also with building religious literacy and social inclusion of young people, thereby minimising risks of alienation and vulnerability to extremism. We also argue that a critical approach to education about religions can assist young people to identify religions’ ambivalent role in contributing to both cultures of violence – direct and structural – and cultures of peace. We present a case study on learning about diverse worldviews in Victoria, Australia in this article to illustrate our arguments and finally make a series of recommendations regarding religion, education and PVE, and cosmopolitan peacebuilding strategies more broadly.     

Pornography Consumption and Satisfaction: A Meta‐Analysis

A classic question in the communication literature is whether pornography consumption affects consumers' satisfaction. The present paper represents the first attempt to address this question via meta‐analysis. Fifty studies collectively including more than 50,000 participants from 10 countries were located across the interpersonal domains of sexual and relational satisfaction and the intrapersonal domains of body and self satisfaction. Pornography consumption was not related to the intrapersonal satisfaction outcomes that were studied. However, pornography consumption was associated with lower interpersonal satisfaction outcomes in cross‐sectional surveys, longitudinal surveys, and experiments. Associations between pornography consumption and reduced interpersonal satisfaction outcomes were not moderated by their year of release or their publication status. But analyses by sex indicted significant results for men only.     

Mentalizing in Parents after Traumatic Loss. Analysis of Couple Counseling

Abstract

The aim of the study is to explore whether bereaved parents’ capacity to mentalize is related to their progression through grieving and how it changes during couple therapy. The clients’ RF levels were assessed using the Reflective Functioning Scale and Psychotherapy Reflective Functioning Scale Manual. The content of the sessions was analyzed using Thematic Analysis. At the beginning of the therapy, concrete images of the child’s death were more frequent and the parents’ RF was lower than their general RF level. As the therapy progressed these images were gradually supplanted by more mental references to the deceased child.     

Preventing extremism through education: exploring impacts and implications of counter-radicalisation efforts

ABSTRACT

The counter-radicalisation efforts that have swept through much of the world seem to have placed schools and universities at the forefront of global counterterrorism. In this article, we review research to explore the impacts and implications of preventing radicalisation and violent extremism through education. We synthesised themes from the literature in relation to intervention models that differentiate between primary, secondary and tertiary prevention levels, in order to embrace the heterogeneity and complexity of radicalisation issues. Research is at an early stage in trying to make sense of the ‘causes and cures’ of radicalisation in the context of young people and education; yet our review suggests that educators should approach prevention through humanistic, relational and inclusive pedagogics. However, counter-radicalisation efforts tend to result in the use of ‘harder’ prevention strategies, which can have quite negative impacts on education. Although scholarly output is growing, effectiveness evidence on these issues remains weak. More consideration should be given to study how the counter-radicalisation discourse is merged with education, and with what consequences.     

The utility of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) facet and item scores in predicting violent recidivism

There is relatively limited research on psychopathy in non-Caucasian ethnic groups and even less on the utility of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) that focuses on PCL-R facet and item scores in predicting violent recidivism. In this study, we assessed the utility of the PCL-R in prospectively predicting violent versus nonviolent recidivism during an 11-year follow-up window. A high-risk sample of 451 incarcerated Korean male offenders was assessed on the PCL-R at baseline. A total of 445 were reconvicted after release (353 violent and 92 nonviolent recidivists). Psychopathy facet scores were higher in violent compared to nonviolent recidivists. Facet 2 (affective) showed the strongest effect size (Cohen's d = 0.53; Percentage change in odds = 22.6%) in predicting violent recidivism. Analyses of the four items constituting the affective facet indicated that callous/lack of empathy (Percentage change in odds = 134.4%) and failure to accept responsibility (Percentage change in odds = 94.5%) were the strongest predictors of violent recidivism. Findings are to our knowledge the first to document the utility of the PCL-R in distinguishing violent from nonviolent recidivism and highlight the role of affective impairment (particularly lack of empathy) in violent recidivism.     

The interpersonal context of depression and violent behavior: A social psychological interpretation

Depression is a particularly prevalent form of psychopathology affecting millions of individuals worldwide. It is associated with a variety of adverse social and behavioral outcomes. Numerous observational studies have found that depressed individuals have significantly elevated rates of interpersonal violence. As of now, the social mechanisms that explain the association between depression and violence remain understudied and not well understood. Drawing on the aggression and social psychology literatures, we argue that depressed actors suffer skills deficits and exhibit hostile communication styles that provoke grievances and disputes. We suggest that, because of these interpersonal tendencies, depression increases involvement in verbal disputes, and that frequent participation in verbal disputes foments social contexts where interpersonal violence is more common. Findings from a series of regression models based on a nationally representative sample of 2171 respondents offer support for our assumptions. The study suggests a consideration of interpersonal dynamics, particularly verbal disputes, might unlock clues about the association between depression and violence involvement.