CO-WORKER SOCIAL SUPPORT IN A WORKSITE SMOKING CONTROL PROGRAM

We evaluated the effects of adding a social support component to a worksite controlled smoking treatment program. Twenty-four participants were randomly assigned to either a controlled smoking or a controlled smoking plus partner support condition. Within a multiple baseline across behaviors design, smokers in both conditions made efforts to achieve sequential 50% reductions in: (a) nicotine content of brand smoked, (b) number of cigarettes smoked per day, and (c) percentage of each cigarette smoked. Self-monitoring records, laboratory analyses of spent cigarette butts, and carbon monoxide determinations indicated that both conditions were effective in producing significant reductions in each of the three target behaviors and in carbon monoxide levels. All participants who quit smoking during the program maintained their abstinence at a 6-month follow-up, and those who did not quit were smoking less at follow-up than they had at pretest on all dependent variables. However, few differences were observed between controlled smoking and controlled smoking plus partner support conditions either during treatment or at the 6-month follow-up. Results are discussed with regard to previous worksite studies, future directions for research on social support, and variables that may have mediated treatment outcome.     

Social Activism's Possibility through Perspectives of Gloria Anzaldúa,Walter Benjamin and C. G. Jung1

This paper explores the vertices of Jung's, Anzaldúa's and Benjamin's distinct ontologies and the way in which they connect in the shared recognition that what has been estranged in human history is enigmatically lodged in the world's fabric today. Cultural distress, in other words, is the outcome of what has become repudiated in the self and the collective across time. From this perspective, the paper argues that we have a collective responsibility to listen to the claims of the dead laid bare in moments of contemporary real-world danger and it elaborates the psychical dimensions of being that are cultivated in times of danger. The author contends that these psychical presences are the dead of human history including our ancestral heritage that linger and possibly may penetrate our awareness. They haunt and hold a potential to animate our movement towards a sublimatory process that can be seen as a precursor to social responsiveness and action. The author explores this through her own experience with an example of the spawning of spiritual activism within the socio-political maelstrom of AIDS.     

Dreaming for the World: A Jungian Study of Dreams During the COVID-19 Pandemic1

This project explores what dreams might reveal about the collective psyche’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic in its first year, before the development of vaccines. A brief survey, distributed to Jungian colleagues and organizations, and to various social media sites, invited people to submit online a dream related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Four hundred and thirty-six dreams were submitted. Forty additional Russian dreams were collected and submitted by Russian colleagues. Using qualitative research methods based on phenomenological hermeneutics, the researchers categorized and counted the range of COVID imagery. In addition, the researchers describe a range of psychic responses to the pandemic, including horror, grief, sickness, social discord, and violence, but also images of healing and transformation, increased sense of community, and spiritual renewal. Several healing nightmares are presented. Healing alchemical and anima/animus imagery is described. Twelve dreams are introduced and presented. It is concluded that the collective psyche, rooted in the Self, is a healing resource for social and cultural trauma. This project supports Beradt’s (1968) inspirational study of dreaming in Nazi Germany, as well as recent studies of COVID-related dreams and recent publications on the social nature of dreaming.     

Stylistic appearances and linguistic diversity

Philosophy is beginning to pay problems of linguistic justice the attention they deserve in today's heavily interconnected and migrant world. Contemporary philosophy itself, however, has a particular problem of linguistic justice that deserves metaphilosophical attention. At least in the philosophical tradition that is mainstream in much of the world today, viz., analytic philosophy, methodological and sociological mechanisms make it the case that the voices of non-(native) Anglophone philosophers are substantially less heard. Among the mechanisms responsible for this situation, argues this paper, is the emphasis given by influential philosophical institutions to linguistic style and appearances as signs of clarity, precision, and rigour in the treatment of philosophical problems. Such an emphasis is not justifiable, in part because it deprives philosophy of a wider variety of perspectives. The paper concludes by presenting and motivating a recent initiative that aims to foster greater linguistic and cultural diversity within the profession.     

Australia Day or Invasion Day? Perspectives on the Continuing Impact of Colonialism Underlies Public Contestations Around Australia's National Day

The ways in which collective memories are constructed in the present is important in explaining how people choose to commemorate their nation's history. The present research focused on the context of Australia Day, a controversial national holiday that falls on January 26, which is a date that marks the beginning of colonization. We conducted field surveys of community members participating in an Invasion Day protest pushing for Indigenous rights (n = 219) and community members enjoying the public holiday in a public park (n = 174). We found that greater recognition of colonial history explained protesters' (vs. nonprotesters') greater support for changing the date of Australia Day. Further, protesters' lower levels of perceived continuity and higher levels of desired continuity of First Australian culture was linked to greater support for changing the date of Australia Day compared to the nonprotesters. These findings suggest that creating consensus over contested collective memories of a nation's history requires greater recognition of the ongoing impact of past atrocities.     

Political Extremism and a Generalized Propensity to Discriminate Among Values

Research exploring the psychological differences between people supporting extreme versus moderate ideologies is growing. However, this research has rarely examined the domain of values. Here, we explore this domain by assessing the possibility that political extremists discriminate more among values compared to moderates, namely, that extremists exhibit strong commitment toward some values at the expense of other values, whereas moderates would acknowledge a multiplicity of values as equally important. First, we propose a model positing that a value discriminability parameter captures a general tendency to discriminate among values. Second, we test empirically the prediction that, compared to moderates, political extremists exhibit a higher discriminability parameter. This prediction is supported by four studies (including one based on the European Social Survey where representative samples from 29 European countries are examined) where participants reported their ideological orientation and rated the importance of basic human values (we focused on basic values because these transcend the political domain, thus highlighting general effects). Specifically, in all studies we observed a positive correlation between political extremism and residual variability in ratings, a hallmark of a higher discriminability parameter. These findings highlight the value domain as critical to understanding differences between political extremists and moderates.     

Finding voice in a year of collective trauma: Case study of an online photovoice project with youth

In this article, we share findings from a qualitative case study of a virtual youth photovoice program implemented across three regions of the United States. The purpose of the program was to engage youth in research on a social issue relevant to them during an unprecedented year marked by two public health crises, COVID-19 and anti-Black racial violence. Results of an analysis of curriculum and archival program materials lend support for online strategies for youth engagement including individualized support and online audiovisual presentations with avatars. Racial justice and trauma-informed adaptations were designed to be responsive to youth needs for flexible programming and safe spaces. Themes captured in the first online gallery of youth photos include (1) tools for mental health, (2) meaningful connection, and (3) community advocacy, bringing attention to structural issues as well as family and community strengths. Findings suggest photovoice can be thoughtfully adapted for youth researchers and support individual and group storytelling in response to collective trauma.     

Ideological Contestation on Twitter Over Diversity: Constructions of Diversity as Clashing Projects

The problematic of diversity today circulates a discourse on human differences and similarities which is also taken up by actors with controversial political agendas, notably right-wing populist and neoconservative movements. Focusing on contestation over the meaning of “diversity” by lay actors in social media, we suggest here that different constructions of diversity may be seen as clashing projects largely shaping each other through their emphasis on differences or similarities among people. In a qualitative analysis on the tweets mentioning diversity in Greek over a year, constructions of diversity were mirror images of each other across two independent ideological tensions, with distinct social stakes. Individualist constructions of diversity praising individuals' differences clashed over the legitimation of power with majoritarianist constructions emphasizing social homogeneity, and universalist constructions of diversity advocating the fundamental similarities of individuals clashed over the legitimation of social identities with particularist constructions praising cultural differences. Those constructions converse with basic social psychological models of diversity, suggesting that the emphasis on difference or similarity across people may stem from a dynamic context of political confrontation. The findings also suggest that right-wing populist representations may be channeled by the content of contestation and the positions held by the other side.