Child maltreatment as a global phenomenon: From trauma to prevention

Past studies have clearly showed the negative impact of neglect and abuse on child development at both the psychological and neurobiological levels. To date, many studies have focused on identifying risk and protective factors occurring at all levels of the ecology. However, more distal‐level variables, such as culture and ethnicity, have not been studied as much as those of more proximal levels; yet studies in Western countries have consistently found an overrepresentation of child maltreatment reports among ethnic minority groups. In this commentary, we reflect on a series of articles examining maltreatment from a crosscultural perspective and using samples of diverse countries. Taken together, studies in this special section document the terrible fact that maltreatment is a global phenomenon. Through a summary of these studies’ main findings and concerns, we highlight four key points that we believe are important to consider for future research and intervention efforts.     

What is the key to culturally competent care: Reducing bias or cultural tailoring?

Objective: To gain a better understanding as to whether disparities in patient–provider relationships arise from ethnic minority patients being treated differently than European American patients while they would prefer to be treated the same, or whether disparities arise when ethnic minority patients are treated the same as European American patients while they would prefer to be treated differently.

Method: African-American, Latina/Latino and European American community members were recruited to participate in one of 27 focus group discussions. Topics included what made a good or bad relationship with a doctor and what led one to trust a doctor. A thematic analysis was conducted using NVivo 10.

Results: Patients of all groups described experiences that reflected the concepts of patient-centred care, such as wanting a clinician who is attentive to patients’ needs. African-American patients reported experiences they viewed as discriminatory. Some African-American patients felt it was appropriate to racially/ethnically contextualise their care, and most Latina/Latino patients preferred language/culturally concordant clinicians.

Conclusion: Health care disparities might be reduced through a patient-centred approach to cultural competency training, general knowledge of the cultural context of clinicians’ patient population, and attention to the effects of racial bias and discrimination among both clinicians and non-clinical staff.     

Food,faith, social service and institution building: the Annamrita programme of the Hare Krishna movement in India

Based on fieldwork with the Annamrita programme, a food-based social service of ISKCON or the Hare Krishna movement in India, I look at the intricate connection between food, faith, social service and institution building. Formally known as the ISKCON Food Relief Foundation, the Annamrita programme has partnered with the government’s midday meal scheme for school children. From the point of view of sociology of food and sociology of religion, I propose that food is a cultural, moral and emotional investment for ISKCON. I describe how a faith-based social service through the instrument of food becomes a mode of bridging and institution building. The governmentality of this food service and the sacred public–private partnership is a specific kind of cultural and macroeconomic intervention in a resource-limited setting such as India. Camouflaged and embedded in this programme is an element of cultural hegemony and a Krishna consciousness-governed nationalism, with the ideas of the nation as a sacred land. Krishna is considered as the vanguard of sacralisation and the faith messages of ISKCON inevitably accompany the service package.     

Creating inclusive identity narratives through participatory action research

This paper describes the process and outcomes of Voices, a participatory action research project aimed to disrupt divisive ethnic identity narratives among youth living amidst protracted ethnic conflict. The project took place in the Garo Hills region of Northeast India, a site of protracted ethnic conflict. Moving away from crisis‐based approaches, this paper explores the conflict transformative potential of participatory action research, specifically its effectiveness in facilitating civic engagement across ethnic lines. The findings indicate that young people's involvement in the project afforded them an opportunity to engage with local community concerns outside of polarized ethnic identity narratives. This involvement facilitated three critical outcomes: engagement in social critique, reconfiguration of a more inclusive researcher identity, and adoption of a language of possibility. Based on these findings, it is argued that opportunities for critical community engagement could interrupt divisive ethnic identity narratives and provide turning points for youth to reimagine inclusive social identities.     

Do Jews Feel Like Outsiders in America? The Impact of Anti‐Semitism,Friendships, and Religious Geography

While once the archetypical outsiders, most Jews today do not feel like outsiders in the United States. Using the 2001 National Jewish Population Survey, we examine the factors that differentiate those who feel like outsiders from those who do not. We find that feeling like an outsider is largely associated with having experienced anti‐Semitism, the number of Jews living nearby, the proportion of a respondent's friends’ that are Jewish, and whether Jews identify with some branch of Judaism versus those who identify as ethnic Jews. Although the effects of discrimination on feeling like an outsider are unsurprising, the smaller but persistent effect of geographic context deserves more attention. Jews feel less like outsiders when they live in places where they can and do have more contact with other Jews. The increased within‐group ties that are possible in areas of greater Jewish concentration appear to facilitate psychological integration into the larger community.     

民族宗教学的创立

民族宗教学是民族学与宗教学的交叉学科,是一门新兴的人文学科,其主轴是研究民族与宗教的互动关系,其核心理念是:"族教和谐,多元互补"。近些年在中央民族大学"985工程"推动下,课题组开展了民族宗教学的学理的系统研究,推出《民族宗教学导论》专著,初步搭建了民族宗教学的理论框架。本文主要围绕着民族宗教学的研究对象、范围、方法、主要概念和理论体系展开论述,从发生学、历史学、社会学、文化学、政治学等多学科角度介绍民族宗教学的基本议题和思路,并阐述中国宗教生态模式。     

民族与种族社会化的概念、预测因素及理论模型

民族与种族社会化是美国少数民族家庭教养的核心成分, 是父母向子女传递种族和民族特征等信息, 促进子女社会适应的过程。子女的年龄、性别、父母与子女的受歧视经历等影响着父母对子女的民族与种族社会化的内容和时机。目前, 民族与种族社会化运作机制模型的建构, 使民族与种族社会化和青少年的民族认同、自尊、心理健康、学业表现等许多研究得以整合到一个研究范畴之下, 反映出民族与种族社会化研究的重要进展。     

个体化用药--医药治疗的革命

遗传药理学和药物基因组学的发展,促进了药物反应种族差异的发现及其机制的阐明,使药物治疗模式开始由过去的诊断导向治疗向根据个体的遗传机构实行基因导向性治疗的新模式转换.     

Risk and resilience: Dual effects of perceptions of group disadvantage among Latinos

Several decades of research on the psychology of minority status has yielded highly discrepant findings. Substantial research suggests that perceptions of discrimination are linked to inferior self-regard and poor mental health, whereas other studies indicate that perceptions of discrimination are protective of global self-esteem. We tested a theoretical model of the combined (negative/positive) effects of perceived group disadvantage on self-esteem among Latinos. Structural equation modeling analyses indicated that perceptions of group disadvantage were indirectly related to self-esteem through two principal pathways. The total (direct and indirect) effect on self-esteem was not significant, suggesting that, among Latinos, the deleterious consequences of perceived belonging to a devalued and disadvantaged group were fully counterbalanced by the positive effects of intervening variables. More complex models may be needed to characterize fully the self-protective and detrimental consequences of perceived group disadvantage among Latinos.     

Broadening the individual differences lens on party support and voting behavior: Cynicism and prejudice as relevant attitudes referring to modern-day political alignments

Social-cultural and economic-hierarchical ideological attitudes have long been used to explain variation in political partisanship. We propose two additional, stable attitudes (political cynicism and ethnic prejudice) that may help in explaining contemporary political alignments. In a Belgian (N = 509) and Dutch sample (N = 628), we showed that party support can be segmented into four broad families: left, libertarian, traditionalist, and far-right parties. Both studies revealed that social-cultural and economic-hierarchical right-wing attitudes were negatively related to left party support and positively to libertarian, traditionalist and far-right support. Importantly, additional variance was consistently explained by political cynicism (lower libertarian and traditionalist support), ethnic prejudice (lower left support), or both (higher far-right support). Study 2 additionally demonstrated these patterns for self-reported voting.