Échelle de stigmatisation familiale dans la maladie d’Alzheimer (ESF-MA) : une adaptation et validation française

According to scientific research, individuals diagnosed with neurodegenerative dementia of the Alzheimer type and their surroundings (family, family caregiver), experience a phenomenon of family stigmatization of which there are many consequences. Not only can they experience emotional reactions such as fear, anxiety, more depressive symptoms, but they can also face discrimination with a sense of care giving burden and be the result of social relationships avoidance. These effects lead to reduce family life quality. At the same time, scientific studies reveal that stigma acts on a personal, associative (family), public and on a structural level. Their joint perception seems necessary to apprehend their synergy and to adapt interventions. However, in the AD context, no tool exists in the French language to measure perceived family stigma on different levels. To fill this gap, we analyzed the construct validity (intra-concept validity), an aspect of the divergent validity, concurrent validity as well as the reliability of the AD family stigma scale (ESF-MA) in the French context. The results of the principal component analysis (n = 263 family caregivers) reveal 10 factors divided into 3 dimensions (intra-personal, public and structural) that explain 57 % of the total variance. The validity of the construct like the reliability represents satisfying results. The measurement of the family stigma by the ESF-MA presents an opportunity to complete clinical observations among family caregivers of people diagnosed with AD.     

Dirty work,dirty worker? Stigmatisation and coping strategies among domestic workers

Domestic work can be perceived to be ‘dirty work’ in several ways: it is associated with dirt handling, low occupational prestige, and domestic workers have a servile relationship to their clients/employers. This stigma may negatively affect domestic workers' sense of self, and thus coping strategies appear to be critical. In this article, we explore the coping strategies that moderate the relation between the stigma of dirty work and domestic workers' sense of self, based on the analyses of 43 interviews with domestic workers in Belgium. By using a social stress approach in which stigma is considered a stressor, our results reveal a range of maladaptive and adaptive coping strategies that contribute to a negative or a more positive sense of self. Four main categories of coping strategies are discussed: confronting or countering perceptions and behaviours, occupational ideologies, social weighting and defensive tactics. The first two categories are adaptive coping strategies; the last two can be adaptive or maladaptive. We also reveal that workers used adaptive and maladaptive coping strategies simultaneously, leading to mixed implications for their sense of self.     

Weight discrimination in helping behavior

IntroductionAlthough obesity stigma is pervasive, relatively little research has examined the extent to which the discrimination obese individuals experience extends to helping behavior.ObjectivesThe purpose of the current set of experiments was to determine whether strangers help heavy individuals less than non-heavy individuals, and to examine the impact that moderating cues (e.g., justifying or suppressing prejudice, Crandall & Eshleman, 2003) of weight-based discrimination and gender might have on helping behavior.Study 1The first study was an experiment conducted online through MTurk. Participants rated their willingness to support a proposed charity event and their perceptions of the event organizer, whose picture was manipulated to be heavy or non-heavy. We found evidence that people were less willing to help and held more negative perceptions of heavy (than non-heavy) individuals.Study 2The second study was a field experiment in which confederates either wearing or not wearing obesity prosthetics solicited help from others on a college campus. Relative to the non-heavy, heavy individuals again were less likely to be helped and received more impolite interpersonal treatment, as rated by observers. Additionally, women were denigrated more than men for being heavy, but cues that suppressed discrimination helped increase the amount of help received and the politeness of strangers.ConclusionThe overt and subtle discrimination overweight individuals experience extends to situations when they are asking for help, and this is especially the case for heavy women. However, displaying stereotype-inconsistent cues benefit overweight individuals by increasing the likelihood of them being helped and treated well.     

Self-dehumanisation in severe alcohol use disorder: Links with self-stigma and environmental satisfaction

Metadehumanisation (i.e., the perception of being considered as less than human by others) is proposed to be widespread in stigmatised populations, such as people with severe alcohol use disorder (SAUD). However, the relations between metadehumanisation, self-dehumanisation (i.e., the self-perception of being less than human), and stigmatisation (i.e., the negative taint applied to some groups) remain unexplored. The aim of this research is thus to investigate the relations between these processes. Metadehumanisation, self-dehumanisation, self-stigma (and its subdimensions) and environmental satisfaction were assessed in 120 inpatients with SAUD and analysed in a mediational model. Stigma awareness was positively associated with metadehumanisation, whereas environmental satisfaction was negatively associated with metadehumanisation. Stigma's application to the self was associated with increased self-dehumanisation. Self-stigma and self-dehumanisation are closely intertwined phenomena. Self-dehumanisation seems to follow a multi-step process suggesting that some steps, such as dehumanisation awareness, are missing from current models of dehumanisation.