Eastern Societies Research Articles

Autonomy is equally important across East and West: Testing the cross-cultural universality of self-determination theory

IntroductionSelf-determination theory (SDT) posits the importance of three basic psychological needs (i.e., relatedness, autonomy, and competence) in promoting achievement. However, some cross-cultural researchers have cast doubt on the generalizability of the theory to non-Western cultures. The primary aim of the study was to test whether provision of support for relatedness, autonomy, and competence would be associated with achievement across both Western and Eastern cultures. MethodWe drew on a subsample of students from the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) (n = 92,325 students from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, UK, and USA (Western societies); and Hong Kong SAR, Japan, Macau SAR, Shanghai, South Korea, and Taipei (Eastern societies); 46,006 were females and 46,319 were males, with a mean age of 15.77 (SD = 0.29) years). We used multi-group confirmatory factor analysis (MG-CFA) and multi-group structural equation modeling (MG-SEM) to analyze the data. ResultsProvision of the three basic needs correlated positively with achievement across cultures, providing broad support for the cross-cultural universality of SDT. MG-SEM indicated that relatedness and autonomy support were equally important for student achievement in both Western and Eastern cultures, whereas competence support was found to be more important to students in the West than in the East. ConclusionFindings support the cross-cultural relevance of SDT while at the same time highlighting important cultural variations such as greater importance of competence support in the West, suggesting the need to be cognizant of both cross-cultural universality and variability in motivational theorizing.

Middle Eastern and North African Societies in the Interwar Period, written by Ebru Boyar, Kate Fleet

Middle Eastern and North African Societies in the Interwar Period, written by Ebru Boyar, Kate Fleet

Quality Matters: A Global Discussion in Qatar.

The International Biobanking Conference titled "Quality Matters: A Global Discussion in Qatar" was held on March 25-27, 2019, in the vibrant city of Doha, Qatar. The 3-day event was organized and hosted by the Qatar Biobank (QBB) and the European, Middle Eastern and African Society for Biopreservation and Biobanking (ESBB), with supporting collaboration from the International Society for Biological and Environmental Repositories (ISBER) and the Biobanking and BioMolecular Resources Research Infrastructure-European Research Infrastructure Consortium (BBMRI-ERIC). The aim was to highlight the role of biobanking in medical research and advancing health care, as well as improving clinical outcomes. The conference convened experts from across the globe to discuss continuing efforts to harmonize biobanking-related processes to achieve high-quality standards and to support international advancements in medical research for our diverse populations. The scientific agenda drew more than 1000 scientists, researchers, industry experts, and health professionals from five continents. The conference focused on the quality aspect of biobanking through seven sessions over 3 days. Researchers, scientists, and experts from around the world were invited to present, and included special presentations from QBB demonstrating their standing as a leading clinical biobank innovator in support of population and genomic medicine. The 3-day conference concluded with a session on Best Practices and Standards, a topic much in discussion with today's context.

Sociological Theory from Dialogic Democracy

Despite the long dialogical tradition both in Eastern and Western societies, in recent years the social dialogical turn is more and more evident in many domains of life. Citizens increasingly demand to have a saying in the seeking of solutions for their problematics, and advocate for a more democratic approach to science that fosters the inclusion of all voices and enhances the agency of citizens in social transformation. Therefore, global scientific research is progressively more oriented towards co-creation as a means to ensure social impact. In this context, social theory can provide the theoretical foundations to better address the societal challenges of concern, as well as the mechanisms to properly design research oriented to produce social impact, such as communicative methodology, and to monitor and evaluate such impact. Social theory would then serve its ultimate goal: to contribute to the improvement of societies. Sociology was born as part of the democracies to provide citizens with elements of analysis that would make it possible for them to make their decisions with the prior evidence of the consequences of each option. After a process of democratization, we return to the original sense, but now in a more democratic situation.

Achievements of the HERACLES Project on Cystic Echinococcosis

The FP7 project 'Human Cystic Echinococcosis ReseArch in CentraL and Eastern Societies' (HERACLES), developed between 2013 and 2018 by nine partners in five countries, is one of the largest projects on cystic echinococcosis. Here we present the core HERACLES achievements, which should help to foster the translation of scientific investigations on health policies.

Revisiting ‘honor’ through migrant vulnerabilities in Turkey

ABSTRACTThis essay revisits the trope of honour and takes stock of its critiques by foregrounding the elusive bodies of undocumented migrant women in Turkey. Specifically, I engage with the extent to which the legal normalization of the culture of honour results in routinized sexual violence against undocumented migrant women and in impunity for the perpetrators. On the one hand, I pursue the critique of honour as an essentalized, generalized and timeless notion about Middle Eastern and Mediterranean societies. On the other hand, I ponder whether our efforts to battle such stereotypical explanations may occasionally result in giving short shrift to the reality of sexual violence as experienced by those who bear the brunt of it. In avoiding culturalizing honour and yet recognizing its continuing cultural power, I take my inspiration from the concept of ethnographic refusal to navigate a potentially lethal terrain in which migrants, activists, and academics enact, with converging and discrepant stakes, deliberate or unwitting engagements with the demands of ‘honor’. I suggest that being cognizant of the kinds of ethnographic refusals we undertake to foreground or avoid the discomfiting aspects of honour as a gendered norm can aid us in our pursuit towards yet thicker ethnographies of exactly where and when honour continues to matter.

The Employment of Public Mural Design in Serving Feminist Issues in the Egyptian Society: an Educational and Practical Experiment With a Group of Students From the 4TH Level at the Mural Painting Section in 2018/2019; Exhibition: Graffiti… No for FGM

The Employment of Public Mural Design in Serving Feminist Issues in the Egyptian Society: an Educational and Practical Experiment With a Group of Students From the 4TH Level at the Mural Painting Section in 2018/2019; Exhibition: Graffiti… No for FGM

Cognition and Participation: Classroom Reform in the Arab World

Pressures build in Middle Eastern and Arabic-speaking societies to diversify economies and democratize social relations. Educators and scholars, contributing to these shifts, have experimented with...

The Art of the Diviner in the Ancient Near East: Reading the Signs of Heaven and Earth

The Art of the Diviner in the Ancient Near East: Reading the Signs of Heaven and Earth

Divergence in Cultural Trajectories: The Power of the Traditional within the Early Modern

Most societies, including pre-industrial Europe, were constrained in their ability to innovate because of the power of traditional authorities: temporal, religious, and literary. These were eroded in Europe between 1500 and 1700 by the emergence of skepticism, empiricism and rationalist philosophy. Together, these allowed Europe to make the exceptional jump of overcoming the power and prestige of these traditional authorities, and to make progress through innovation in a way that Asian and Middle Eastern societies never could

P1561An elevated risk of heart failure and stroke events in octogenarian Japanese patients with acute myocardial infarction who received percutaneous coronary intervention

Abstract Background The proportion of the octogenarian population is expanding especially in Eastern society. Due to the clustering of risk factors, acute myocardial infarction (AMI) represents a major cardiovascular complication in octogenarian subjects. This suggests the need to further optimize their therapeutic management to prevent future cardiac events after AMI. However, analysis of clinical characteristics and cardiovascular outcomes in octogenarian subjects with AMI who received the current established medical therapies is limited. Purpose To investigate clinical features and prognosis in octogenarian AMI subjects treated with percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Methods We analyzed 1547 AMI subjects underwent PCI between 2007 and 2017. Baseline characteristics and the occurrence of composite major adverse cardiovascular events (cardiac death, non-fatal MI, revascularization, heart failure and stroke) were compared in octogenarian and non-octogenarian subjects. Results 22.0% (340/1547) of study subjects was octogenarian. They were more likely to have chronic kidney disease (CKD) and a lower level of LDL-C on admission (Table). Moreover, a higher prevalence of severer Killip class and LVEF <30% were observed in octogenarians (Table). However, they were not optimally treated with the established medical therapies at discharge (Table). During the observational period (median=3.1 years), the composite of cardiovascular events more frequently occurred in octogenarian subjects. Of note, they exhibited a 2.15-fold and 3.01-fold increased risk for heart failure and stroke events, respectively (Figure). Table 1 Non-Octogenarian (n=1207) Octogenarian (n=340) P-value CKD* (%) 33.8 63.2 <0.0001 LVEF <30% (%) 5.7 10.3 0.02 Killip class 1.33±0.03 1.55±0.05 <0.0001 LDL-C (mmol/L) 3.20±0.03 2.80±0.05 <0.0001 Statin (%) 86.3 78.2 0.0006 Beta-blocker (%) 74.0 65.8 0.005 ACE-I/ARB (%) 87.3 76.6 <0.0001 DAPT (%) 86.0 88.6 0.42 *CKD is defined as estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) <60 ml/min/1.73 m2. Figure 1 Conclusions Octogenarian subjects with AMI were high-risk group associated with heart failure and stroke events. Their distinct clinical backgrounds may affect the adoption of optimal medical therapies, potentially resulting in worse cardiovascular outcomes. Further intensified management should be applied to octogenarian subjects with AMI.

Parental psychological control and academic functioning in Chinese high school students: A short-term longitudinal study.

The present study aimed to examine the reciprocal relationship between parental psychological control and students' academic functioning in urban China. Participants were 731 Chinese high school students in grade 10 (356 boys; Mage =15.64years, SD=0.68). Two waves of 1-year longitudinal data were collected using student reports of parental psychological control and academic-related beliefs, strategies, and behaviours. Results showed that parental psychological control at Time 1 significantly triggered an increase in students' maladaptive academic functioning at Time 2; and students' adaptive academic functioning at Time 1 significantly predicted parental psychological control at Time 2. Limitations of the present study and implications for practice are discussed. Statement of contribution What is already known on this subject? According to self-determination theory, parental psychological control has been found to be harmful on students' academic learning in Western societies. We know little about the relation between parental psychological control and academic functioning (adaptive vs. maladaptive) in Eastern societies such as China. What does this study add? Parental psychological control increased maladaptive academic functioning, and adaptive academic functioning decreased parental psychological control, suggesting a more fluid, dynamic parenting-child interaction over time. The predicted relations between parental psychological control and academic functioning of high school students hold across gender. More urbanized adolescents had a high tendency to perceive their parents as psychological controlling, suggesting a change in culture regarding the importance of personal autonomy for more urbanized adolescents.

Algerian youth and the political struggle for dignity: evolution, trends and new forms of mobilisation

ABSTRACT Since the popular protests of 2011, young people in Middle Eastern and North African societies have been at the core of a plethora of research and studies. Eight years later, in early 2019, Algerian youth-led protests again surprised the world, highlighting the need to better understand the social and political commitments of young people in fast changing societies. Traditional forms of mobilisation and mediation with state authorities such as political parties, trade unions and civil society organisations seem to be losing ground with regard to channelling youth anger and frustration, and new independent forms of mobilisation have emerged, sometimes ephemerally. Young Algerians are no exception. The path they have taken to challenge the established order explores new methods and contents. The traditional commitment to civil society organisations and trade unions is not as appealing as it used to be and organisations created in the 1990s have found it difficult to make the handover to the next generation. The human and women’s rights organisations, trade unions and other civil society organisations that once led the struggle for democracy and human rights are no longer able to attract the young generation. The purpose of the paper is twofold: it provides an analysis of why young people are turning away from traditional forms of engagement related to the defence of human rights, whether political, economic and social or gender rights; and it examines the new paths and trends determining Algerian youth engagement in the context of the broader human rights agenda.

Insects as interactants in artists’ minds: Symbols and anti-symbols

Les insectes sont l'un des groupes animaux aux interactions diverses avec les humains, qu'elles soient positives ou negatives. Les representations qu’ils inspirent aux artistes refletent la facon singuliere dont ils sont percus par les societes et le rapport complexe que ces dernieres entretiennent avec eux. Cette relation a deja ete analysee pour les principaux groupes d'insectes dits "typiques". Les plus visibles d’entre eux ou ceux disposant d'une metamorphose complete – abeilles, coleopteres, papillons, mouches – ont toujours fascine et intrigue les humains. Mais qu’en est-il des insectes infiniment petits et moins seduisants a priori ? Avec les pucerons pour exemples, nous montrerons qu’ils ont egalement nourri l’imaginaire artistique a differentes epoques et que, paradoxalement, leur invisibilite est le vecteur meme de l’interet qu’on leur porte. Je me propose de dresser un rapide panorama des relations reciproques entre scientifiques et artistes sur le motif du puceron. De la Grece antique a internet, d’Aristote a Debord en passant par Brueghel, Bonnet, Delacroix, Hugo, Beauvoir ou Vian, il s’agit d’interroger la variete des propositions esthetiques et symboliques que ce groupe d’insectes a pu engendrer.

Traditionalism, as a factor in the development of Central Asian society (XIX-early XX centuries.)

After Uzbekistan gained state independence, one of the priorities of the national historical science was the task of re-creating the true history of the Uzbek people and their statehood at various stages of historical development. In the process of implementing this task, the introduction into scientific circulation and the objective interpretation of a new source material has become important. These include an extensive body of research devoted to a wide range of issues related to the development of the history of Central Asian society in different literature on its periodization. One of the important theoretical questions of our time is the question of the level of enlightenment and cultural development in the Central Asian states in the XIX - early XX centuries. In the European oriental studies of that period, the theory of “underdevelopment and stagnation” of Eastern societies became widespread. This position was dominant in the historical literature not only in the XIX - early XX centuries, but also of the whole subsequent time up to the beginning of the 90s. Proponents of the theory of underdevelopment and backwardness of Eastern society, one of the arguments in its favor said that it was their traditionalism. Probably it was because of ignorance or unwillingness to know more deeply the essence of relationships within this society made a mistake. After all, traditionalism, being a truly specific feature of Eastern society, was the force that preserved its achievements in the sphere of production and culture, spiritual values. Traditionalism was the source of continuity between generations. Thanks to him, architecture, literature, poetry, music, calligraphy, ornamentalism, etc., continued to live, for traditionalism never excluded the creative development of content within the traditional form. And it was precisely because of tradition that the successfully found solution was necessarily passed on to the next generation. Thus, the thesis that treats traditionalism as a factor constraining the development of Eastern society is wrong. It is possible to make an unequivocal conclusion about what to call ignorant a society in which lively trade was conducted, there was a well-organized system of Muslim education, excellent experts in various fields of human activity, for centuries formed traditions both in the industrial and spiritual-moral spheres, means to go to cut with the historical truth.

The relationship between systemic sclerosis and hypertension and ecocardiographıc findings

Aims: The aim of this study was to evaluate the basic demographic and clinical features of systemic sclerosis in our patient group and to determine the relationship between the duration of disease and the development of hypertension in scleroderma patients. Settings and Design: Systemic sclerosis is a rare, autoimmune disease with a limited or widespread involvement of connective tissue of different organs. In the literature, it is recommended that each center following the scleroderma population remove their patient data. Methods and Material: Patients who were followed up with the diagnosis of systemic sclerosis were included in our study. The duration of the disease, the accompanying diseases, basic demographic characteristics, inflammation markers and echocardiographic characteristics of the patients were evaluated. A total of 150 patients were included in the study (87.3% female, mean age 47.7). The duration of the disease was 5.41 years. Results: 37% of the patients had hypertension. There was a positive correlation between disease duration and hypertension (r: 0.278, p: 0.001). Echocardiographic evaluation revealed pulmonary hypertension in 10 patients. Hypertension was more prevalent in this disease group than the population with the same characteristics. As the disease duration increased, the incidence of systemic hypertension increased. Conclusions: The first of the striking findings in our study was that the rate of pulmonary hypertension due to scleroderma was found to be similar to that in other Middle Eastern societies. In the second important finding, peripheral connective tissue involvement of scleroderma was found to be important in the development of systemic hypertension.

Educational Resilience Among Asian Children in Challenging Family Environment

Given that most of the resilient literature tends to focus on Western contexts, and the western-based research may have limited applications for policy and preventions in Asia, this issue attempts to examine educational resilience in Asian or Eastern societies to complement the wealth of research in the western-based research. In Asia, a large number of children live in challenging family environments such as poverty, increasing labor migration, increased divorced and associated factors. Investigating the pathways to educational resilience, particularly focusing on the protective factors that can buffer the negative effects of low socio-economic status or dysfunctional family environments or migrant family environments on Asian children’s educational outcomes has significant implications. In this research, we found that, in Asia, education is a key vehicle for individual’s social mobility, and factors from the school, home, and community may increase students’ chances of success by buffering the effect of some of the stressors from family on academic and personal success. This issue adds an empirical support from the East to Ungar’s (2012) social ecology framing of resilience. This paper also provides evidence that suggests efforts by educators to promote resilience should be tailored to the unique risks to which a sub-population of children and youth is exposed.

Cultural and Religious Barriers Influencing the Participation of Women in Research: A Study from Jordan.

To assess the general attitude toward women's participation in research studies in Jordan and determine the various cultural and religious issues that could impact the rate of inclusion of Arab and Muslim women in research studies. A descriptive cross-sectional questionnaire-based survey study was conducted among Jordanian university students using a 17-item opinion questionnaire. A total of 1265 students from different professional disciplines completed the questionnaire. The majority of the respondents (69.1%) believed that females in Jordan do not have the full autonomy to make their decision to participate in research studies. Study findings also showed that females are more likely to avoid the participation in research studies that require staying outside home or involve direct interaction between researcher and study participants. Females would prefer to deal with female research assistants when participating in research studies. More efforts are required to encourage and enhance the rate of participation in research studies among women in Jordan and, probably, other Middle Eastern societies. When designing and conducting research studies in these countries, researchers should seriously consider the cultural and religious beliefs.

Culture Change and Affectionate Communication in China and the United States: Evidence From Google Digitized Books 1960-2008.

Humans are born with the ability and the need for affection, but communicating affection as a social behavior is historically bound. Based on the digitized books of Google Ngram Viewer from 1960 through 2008, the present research investigated affectionate communication (AC) in China and the United States, and its changing landscape along with social changes from collectivist to individualistic environments. In particular, we analyzed the frequency in terms of verbal affection (e.g., love you, like you), non-verbal affection (e.g., hug, kiss), and individualism (indicated by the use of first-person singular pronouns such as I, me, and myself) in Chinese and American books. The results revealed an increasing trend for AC in recent decades, although the frequency of affection words was lower in Chinese than in American books. Further, individualism was positively related to the frequency of affection words in both Chinese and American books. These results demonstrate the effect of cultural changes on AC, in that affection exchange becomes popular in adaptation to individualistic urban environments. These findings exemplify a cross-cultural difference in the expression of love and the cultural universality of social change in Eastern and Western societies.

Robotic Gastric Cancer Surgery: What Happened Last Year?

This following review aims to evaluate the role of robotic surgery in gastric cancer, comparison with open and laparoscopic alternatives, based on the articles published last year. Robotic gastric surgery is a promising and developing platform in the surgical era and its perioperative or oncological results after gastric cancer surgery are still under evaluation. Besides this, the approaches of eastern and western societies in robotic gastric surgery are also different as in open surgery, in some ways. Robotic gastric surgery seems to be more advantageous to use in early-stage gastric cancers, it causes less bleeding and provides technical advantage to the surgeon. The high cost and the long operation time are still the biggest problems. There is no difference in terms of oncological results compared to other methods. It is feasible and safe alternative to other methods.