Process Of Disengagement Research Articles

Stressors and Turning Points in High School and Dropout

High school dropout is commonly seen as the result of a long-term process of failure and disengagement. As useful as it is, this view has obscured the heterogeneity of pathways leading to dropout. Research suggests, for instance, that some students leave school not as a result of protracted difficulties but in response to situations that emerge late in their schooling careers, such as health problems or severe peer victimization. Conversely, others with a history of early difficulties persevere when their circumstances improve during high school. Thus, an adequate understanding of why and when students drop out requires a consideration of both long-term vulnerabilities and proximal disruptive events and contingencies. The goal of this review is to integrate long-term and immediate determinants of dropout by proposing a stress process, life course model of dropout. This model is also helpful for understanding how the determinants of dropout vary across socioeconomic conditions and geographical and historical contexts.

Women's Health Identities in the Transition From Military Member to Service Veteran

As servicewomen leave behind their military rank and status to become veterans, they must learn to effectively navigate a fragmented structure of care and communicate their health care needs. This study proposes a culture-centered approach to understanding how structural changes contribute to a reduction in positive health perception and behavior as active duty servicewomen transition to a veteran status. Results suggest during the process of disengagement from military cultural norms, women veterans’ health care prevention service utilization decreases, and their physical and mental health decreases through the transition. These findings highlight the need for widely available and culturally appropriate programs to meet the needs of this unique patient population.

Hanging up the shirt: an autoethnographic account of disengaging from a social rugby culture

Violent practices are a common feature of homosocial sporting environments. The objective of the current paper is to explore how one individual disengaged from a sporting community characterized by such practices. An autoethnographic approach involving recollection and interactional exchanges is used to create a realist narrative account which offers insight into the process of disengagement. The narrative focuses on the: (1) ongoing nature of cultural participation; (2) agency and the restriction of ways of being in sports teams and (3) the durable nature of personal characteristics that are learned in sporting environments. These issues are discussed in light of cultural learning theory and specifically, the analytic concept, ‘becoming’. The paper concludes with methodological reflections and a consideration of directions for future research.

Leaving the World of Hate

The topic of hate group membership and radicalization toward extremist ideologies has received substantial attention in recent years; however, relatively less is known about the process of disengagement and deradicalization. This is troubling because the number of hate groups in the United States has increased and some are known to engage in a variety of violent and criminal behavior. This exploratory study relies on life history interviews with 34 former white supremacists, one of the oldest types of hate groups in the United States, to examine the process of exit from these groups. Findings suggest that exiting is a multifaceted process with a variety of factors that influence a person’s decision to leave. The results also highlight a number of difficulties associated with exiting such as ongoing emotions of guilt, ideological relapse, and maintaining social ties with current members of the white supremacist movement.

“A Gift with Strings Attached”: Parents’ Experiences of Teenagers’ Mobile Phone Text Messaging

While the rapid adoption of mobile technology became global, the rate at which young people adopted it was even bigger. Most studies focussed on the experiences of the teenagers. In this study the aim of the study was to explore parents’ experiences of their teenagers’ text messages. A qualitative exploratory research design was adopted. The population was parents/guardians (males and females) of teenagers (boys and girls) attending high schools in Cape Town South Africa. Available and snowball sampling were used. All participants were recruited in the Southern Suburbs and Cape Flats of the Cape Metropolitan Area. In total 11 parents were interviewed using an interview guideline. The interviews were transcribed, independently coded and thematically analysed. The results show that mobile phones are no ordinary gifts. They are given with strings attached. Once in teenagers’ hands, the devices serve both communication and monitoring purposes. It comes with a set of given or negotiated rules and new expectations. The study also emphasises the importance of a trusting relationship with teenagers, respecting their privacy, and the disengagement process from their parents. The importance of positive relationships and open communication as well as negotiated rules in the management of the mobile phone is recommended.

Editorial: Community Development through Family Well-Being

Editorial: Community Development through Family Well-Being

Affection, désaffection et défection chez deux jeunes Frères musulmans en Égypte

The young Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood bloggers who began to raise their voice in 2006 represent an interesting case to analyze the affective dimension of disengagement process. Despite their adoption of a dissident stance – clearly related to their ideological defection as well as to their insertion into new activist networks – they did not immediately leave the Brotherhood. They continued to be dependent upon this organization which is known for its all-encompassing character. Comparing two trajectories which mix loyalty and disengagement allows one to draw connections between (rather than separate) the processes whereby one remains with or leaves the group. I argue that the paradoxical loyalty of dissidents is to be explained by the Brotherhood’s capacity as an organization to produce powerful emotional attachment – ukhuwa (fraternity). But the various ways in which the dissidents experience these intense affective states determine whether they pursue their commitment or withdraw. Indeed, ukhuwa is a double-edged feeling: while it is at the basis of the Brotherhood’s appeal, and while it is the core of the members’ loyalty, it can also be a source of exclusion and make relations turn violent. The article shows how this ambivalence characterizes the internal relations which structure the group. &#9632

The Process of Responsibility, Decoupling Point, and Disengagement of Moral and Social Responsibility in Supply Chains: Empirical Findings and Prescriptive Thoughts

The aim of the paper is to explore and assess the process of responsibility, decoupling point, and disengagement of moral responsibility, in combination with business sustainability (BSus) in suppl ...

Girls, Gangs, and Getting Out

This study draws from role exit theory and feminist criminology to examine whether the catalysts and consequences of gang disengagement differ between males and females. We analyze data on 143 individuals interviewed about their status as former gang members in Los Angeles, CA, and Phoenix, AZ, and assess whether there are gender differences across three interrelated components of disengaging from gangs: (1) the motivations for leaving the gang, (2) sources of support in the exit process, and (3) real and perceived residual concerns and consequences in transitioning out of the gang. Very few differences in the gang disengagement process were found between females and males. Females reported continued concerns about threats to their family, while males reported continued police harassment after leaving the gang. Overall, findings suggest that group processes shape disengagement experiences regardless of gender.

The pedagogy of controversy in the field of China Studies: Teaching the Cultural Revolution

How can we as educators address complex and controversial topics in the social sciences without encouraging simplistic responses and self-reproducing binary oppositions? Drawing upon an ethnographic analysis of a first-year writing seminar on the history of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, this article proposes novel approaches to overcome instinctive reactions to contentious topics. Arguing that the experience of controversy produces self-reinforcing binary oppositions that become autopoetically abstracted from the actual topic of discussion, I build upon specific seminar experiences to propose two novel and practical concepts for the pedagogy of controversy: (1) deidentification, which refers to a process of disengagement from the binaries and thus identities that structure and reproduce controversy, and (2) humanisation, which refers to a process of moving beyond abstractions to reidentify with the fundamentally human experience of contentious historical moments. The pedagogy of controversy, I argue, must teach against our conventional identificatory responses to controversy to promote a more nuanced understanding of inherently complex issues.

La déstabilisation des stables :

Depuis les annees 1990 et l’avenement d’un regime d’accumulation tire par la finance, les entreprises sont en proie a des restructurations financieres qui destabilisent les relations d’emploi. Loin d’etre reductibles aux licenciements economiques collectifs, les effets des restructurations financieres portent aussi sur les conditions et les vecus du travail. A partir d’entretiens conduits avec des salaries ayant connu une rupture de leur contrat de travail (subie ou « choisie ») dans un contexte de restructuration financiere, cette contribution met en lumiere un vecu partage du processus qui conduit a la rupture (un travail devenu insoutenable) mais des modalites de rupture (licenciement pour motif economique ou pour motif personnel, demission) qui sont contingentes. Dans ces contextes, la rupture est souvent vecue comme une epreuve susceptible de transformer durablement le rapport au travail et a l’emploi.

Bringing them into the tent – student association and the neutered academy

Following the trend of many comparable countries, Australian universities are now part of a massified system which is a significant contributor to the national economy. The commercial university is solicitous as to its product and its position in the market, but must also navigate the regulatory environment. Uncontrollable aspects of the university, including staff and student organisations, can threaten the marketable image of the university corporation and its relationship with government. This paper considers the creation and regulation of student organisations in Australia. In Australia's federal system some state legislation accorded student organisations a legitimate place in university governance; most universities accepted the role of student organisations as beneficial to both students and the university itself. Since the 1980s, however, the financial leverage of the federal government purchased increasing intervention in universities, and this extended to the rearticulation of the role of the student organisations in 2006. The reorientation of the university sector has been facilitated by a reconfiguration of important relationships in the sector – between universities and students on the one hand, and universities and student organisations on the other. The contractualisation of relationships in the sector enables the modelling of the university on the commercial enterprise, creating other techniques of control, within a wider regulatory system steered by funding arrangements. The resulting depoliticisation of student organisations is part of a wider process of disengagement of universities from public critique and its embrace of commercial forms of governance generally.

Moral Disengagement in Harmful but Cherished Food Practices? An Exploration into the Case of Meat

Harmful but culturally cherished practices often endure in spite of the damages they cause. Meat consumption is increasingly becoming one of such cases and may provide an opportunity from which to observe these phenomena. Growing evidence indicates that current and projected production and consumption patterns are important contributors to significant environmental problems, public health degradation, and animal suffering. Our aim is to contribute to a further understanding of the psychological factors that may hinder or promote personal disposition to change food habits to benefit each of these domains. Drawing from previous evidence, this study explores the proposition that some consumers are motivated to resort to moral disengagement strategies when called upon to consider the impacts of their food habits. Data were collected from six semi-structured focus groups with a sample of 40 participants. Although affirming personal duties towards preserving the environment, promoting public health, and safeguarding animal welfare, participants did not show personal disposition to change their meat consumption habits. Several patterns of response that resonate with the principles of moral disengagement theory (i.e. reconstrual of the harmful conduct; obscuring personal responsibility; disregard for the negative consequences; active avoidance and dissociation) were observed while discussing impacts and the possibility of change. Results seem to support the proposition that the process of moral disengagement may play a role in hindering openness to change food habits for the benefit of the environment, public health, and animals, and point towards the relevance of further exploring this approach.

Transient boiling phenomena of high-temperature clod of grains in low boiling point liquid

Vapor explosion is thought to occur under liquid-liquid contact condition. In addition, it is reported that a mass of grains and water also cause the transient boiling phenomena. However, it is not clearly defined that the phenomena with the grains are vapor explosion. Thus we focused on the transient boiling phenomena with clod of grains. The objective of the present study is to clarify the behavior and specific quality of transient boiling phenomena with the clod. We heat the clod which consist of grains less than 100 μm and inject it into the tank filled with water. The boiling behavior and pressure data were obtained by a high speed camera and a pressure transducer. From experimental results, it is confirmed that the vapor explosion similar to the liquid-liquid condition occurred by the clod. In addition, it is clarified that the vapor film holding time increased as the water temperature increased. Furthermore, it is also clarified that the occurrence condition of vapor explosion can be estimated by TIZ (Thermal Interaction Zone) which is used to define the occurrence condition of vapor explosion in liquid-liquid condition. In contrast, we found that the occurrence of vapor explosion with the clods is influenced by the hardness of the clods which is the characteristics of the clod of grains. From these results, it is also clarified that the process of disengagement of the grains is the trigger mechanism of vapor explosion with the clod. These results indicate that the vapor explosion with solid-liquid contact condition which is not assumed in the previous work can occur.

Keberhasilan Semu Deradikalisasi di Indonesia

This paper researches the claim made by the Indonesian government regarding the deradicalization program that it ran to deradicalize militants. The Indonesian government claimed that the deradicalization program had been very successful and effective in countering religious extremism. This paper will examine the effects of the de-radicalisation program and will argue that the program has not been as effective as has been claimed. This paper highlights researches which indicate that the program doesn't have a clear structure and the facts that it has been used by terrorist suspects to leave prison through using rewards received after joining the program and rather than being 'de-radicalised' have returned to their terrorist networks and involvement in serious terrorist activities and planning. Whilst the effectiveness of deradicalization program had been claimed by the Indonesian government, this paper argues that the current weak structure of the Indonesian prison system has contributed to the ineffectiveness of the disengagement and deradicalization process. This paper also looks at how the deradicalization program had been used primarily as the purpose of data gathering. Finally this paper will end by proposing recommendation for improving and strengthening the prison system in Indonesia to strengthen disengagement process.

Mexican Immigrant Students' Schooling Experiences and the Construction of Disengagement in Mathematics Learning Contexts

Through an ethnographic and narrative inquiry approach, this study draws attention to the plight of 4 Mexican immigrant high school students and their pursuit of education and mathematics learning. Their elementary school stories and experiences show a deep relationship between the learning contexts in which these students largely do school (i.e., an English learner context) and the nature of students' relationships (or lack thereof) with teachers and their process of disengagement from mathematics learning and school. Doing school is used to convey a key distinction from simply attending school. Attending school assumes uniformity/neutrality in how students might experience schooling and is a passive way of describing student participation in school. Doing school implies that students make sense of and respond to their schooling experiences in different ways and accounts for how these experiences are shaped and/or influenced by other forces (e.g., structural forces, social forces) in and out of school.

Subjects or Citizens? India, Pakistan and the 1948 British Nationality Act

Independence in the case of British India occurred at relatively short notice in August 1947, but tying up the loose ends of empire stretched over years. Under these circumstances, the realignment of subjecthood and citizenship necessitated by decolonisation was protracted, and raised complex questions about identity in both the new states of India and Pakistan and the former imperial power itself. This article thus takes as its focus the drawn-out process of disengagement that followed formal independence in relation to one case study: the various ways in which Britain sought to square the working of its 1948 Nationality Act with Indian and Pakistani citizenship legislation that took shape in the 1950s. India and Pakistan faced the common challenge of establishing who now belonged within their new borders. Britain likewise was forced to recalibrate its ideas about nationality and think afresh about the rights of its subjects in view of the new sets of relationships that now linked colonies, old dominions and the ‘mother country’ within the Commonwealth. In practice, applying the 1948 Act's provisions in relation to India and Pakistan became infused with anxieties about ‘race’, which surfaced repeatedly as British officials in London, Delhi, Karachi and consulates around the world sought to manage its operation to suit British interests.

Late-Career Work Disengagement: The Role of Proximity to Retirement and Career Experiences

Even though in retirement and career theories reference is made to a preretirement work disengagement process among older workers, quantitative empirical knowledge about this process is limited. The aim of this study is to improve our understanding of work disengagement in the preretirement period, by examining the impact of proximity to planned retirement (anticipated future) and work, educational, and health experiences (lived past) on changes of work disengagement during late careers. Using two-wave panel data collected in 2001 and 2006-2007 among Dutch older workers (N = 596), a scale was developed to measure work investments, activities, and motivation during late careers. We estimated conditional change models to examine changes of these scale scores (i.e., disengagement or re-engagement) over the studied period. In line with the preretirement work disengagement process hypothesis, this study shows that many older employees disengage more from work when getting closer to their planned retirement age. Making promotion slows down the disengagement process. Declining health, in contrast, accelerates the process. For achieving a comprehensive understanding of the retirement process, not only the lived past but also the anticipated future (i.e., expected time-left in the current state) should be taken into account.

Successful transition to retirement in Australia

The transitions of old age include many changes in appearance, hormonal changes such as the menopause, changes in family structures such as children leaving home, and changes in work patterns such as retirement. The study of such transitions has grown rapidly in recent years. In the 1970s there were 203 peer-reviewed articles containing the keyword retirement, according to PsycINFO. By the 2000s this had risen to 1,804 (Shultz & Wang, 2011). Conceptualising retirement, Ekerdt noted, “The designation of retirement status is famously ambiguous because there are multiple overlapping criteria by which someone might be called retired, including career cessation, reduced work effort, pension receipt, or self-report” (p. 70) (Ekerdt, 2010). This study measures retirement via self-report. Although Australians no longer face a compulsory retirement age, at which they are no longer considered useful to the workforce, retirement is still an important transition for individuals, their families, and for the wider society. Based on estimates from the 2006 census and the 2007 Survey of Employment Arrangements, Retirement and Superannuation - the most recent for which such data are available - an estimated 7.7 million Australians were aged 45 years or over. Of these, 3.1 million people were retired (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2009). As is evident, the likelihood of being retired increases with age. In 2007, there were more retired women (1.8 million) than retired men (1.3 million). The average age at retirement for women is 47, compared with 58 for men. For all age groups over 45 years, more men than women intend never to retire (16.7% and 11.9% respectively) (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2009). Of those retirees who had worked in the last 20 years, the most common main reason for retiring is the retiree's health. This is a more common reason for retired men (38%) than retired women (25%). Other common reasons for retirement for men include financial reasons (20%) and being retrenched or made redundant (10%). While financial considerations are more likely to influence men, women are more likely to make their decision based on family considerations. Common reasons for women to retire include caring responsibilities (15%) and to spend more time with their family or partner (13%) (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2009). It is relatively easy to find advice about financial preparation for retirement, compared to successfully navigating the cognitive, emotional, or social aspects of the transition. What does retirement mean to those approaching it? Stokes found that it means the end of work and the loss of identity in response to a society that has a negative perception of old age (Stokes, 1992). This is consistent with the disengagement theory of aging in which aging is seen as a process of disengagement from other people (Cumming et al, 1961). On the other hand, the street protests seen in France in October 2010, in response to the French government’s proposal to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62, could be interpreted as some people looking forward to retirement as a release from the burden of employment. In a study examining retirement experiences, three main groups of people who could be delineated on the basis of their experience were identified (Kloep & Hendry, 2006).

Brief report: Does exposure to violent video games increase moral disengagement among adolescents?

Several studies have repeatedly shown that violent/action video games increase aggressive tendencies. The present study provides preliminary evidence that exposure to these games also affects the process of moral disengagement. High school students (N = 385) were recruited, and the impact of both recency and frequency of their exposure to the video game Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA; 2008) on moral disengagement was explored. Results showed that exposure to GTA predicted higher levels of moral disengagement. Recency of exposure had a primary impact on the considered mechanisms of moral disengagement. These findings provide insights into a relevant detrimental effect of exposure to video games, to our knowledge not explored yet. Future research is needed to provide evidence of the causal link in the observed relationships.