Personal Friend Research Articles

A trio of teacher education voices: developing professional relationships through co-caring and belonging during the pandemic

PurposeThis research is situated at a metropolitan university in Melbourne (Australia) where the authors work in initial teacher education programs within the same faculty. The purpose of this study is to raise awareness that collegial, collaborative and “co-caring” environments can foster an improved sense of belonging, acceptance and inclusion in the academy. They also argue that communities of practice may foster an improved sense of belonging that enhances empowerment and harmony among all staff in academia in pandemic times and beyond.Design/methodology/approachThe authors draw on case study methodology as a qualitative approach to understand and illuminate the phenomena under study. Case study methodology provides an in-depth understanding of their trifocal voices, as it allows them to voice their stories through collaborative autoethnography. The authors use self-narratives to unpack their sense of belonging in academic spaces. Collaborative autoethnography (CAE) enabled them to work together as a team of women and as a community of researchers.FindingsThe findings foreground the responsibilities of casual staff while concomitantly articulating the challenges faced by both permanent and casual staff to create a “sense of belonging” in the academy. The authors found that social connection engenders a sense of belonging and inclusion within a space that is often beset by neoliberal ideologies of competitiveness and individual achievement. They articulate their stress, pressure and uncertainty as permanent and as casual academics working supportively to develop and maintain identity in very difficult circumstances. They share how they developed professional relationships which bring unforeseen benefits and personal friendship at a time of especially restrictive practices.Research limitations/implicationsThe paper includes three voices, a limitation in itself, thus generalisations cannot be made to other academics or institutions. Employing CAE offers the possibility of delving more deeply into the emotional complexities inherent within this method for further research. They recommend a sense of “co-caring” as a form of pastoral care in the “induction program” for all academics including casual staff. While this may not “strategically” fit in with many because of power imbalances, the journey of co-caring and sharing and building friendships within the academy has a limited presence in the literature and calls for further investigation.Practical implicationsThe authors draw attention to the need for higher education institutes to recognise the role permanent staff play when working with casual academics.Social implicationsThe authors draw attention to the need to be inclusive and collaborative as a way to improve the divide and strengthen connections between permanent and casual academics at university worksites. This is imperative given the shifting demographics within Australia and its workforce. They also highlight issues of race in the academy.Originality/valueThis is an original work carried out by the authors. It raises concerns about a sense of belonging in the academy, job certainty and the place of people of colour as these issues may also be experienced by other full-time and casual academics.

The 1891 International Copyright Act: Lobbying Behind the Scenes

The 1891 International Copyright Act: Lobbying Behind the Scenes

Predictors of Weight Bias in Exercise Science Students and Fitness Professionals: A Scoping Review.

Background Although previous studies have reported weight bias among students and professionals in exercise science, physical education, kinesiology, and fitness instruction, predictors of weight bias in these professions have not been extensively reviewed. Aim The purpose of this scoping review was to explore the available literature on predictors of weight bias in exercise science students and fitness professionals to identify key concepts and research gaps. Methods PubMed and ERIC were searched from January 1990 to May 2019. Eighteen studies were included in this review. A thematic analysis was conducted. Findings. Six main themes were drawn from these studies including beliefs in the personal controllability of weight; sex differences; enrollment in a health sciences-related program; psychosocial and personal factors; knowledge of obesity; lack of personal history, family, or friend with obesity. Our scoping review highlighted diverse predictors of weight bias among exercise science students and professionals that warrant further study and intervention.

Adolescent well-being amid the COVID-19 pandemic: Are girls struggling more than boys?

BackgroundDifferential effects of the coronavirus SARS‐CoV‐2 (COVID‐19) pandemic and associated public restrictions on adolescent girls and boys are emerging but have not been elucidated. This study examined gender differences across broad indicators of adolescent well‐being during the COVID‐19 pandemic in Iceland, and explored potential explanations for these differences.MethodsIn total, 523 youth (56.5% girls) born in Iceland in 2004 completed measures on mental health problems (depressive symptoms, anger and suicide attempts) and measures designed for this study to assess broad indicators of adolescent well‐being (e.g., day‐to‐day life, academic performance, family and peer relationships, and mental and physical health) and behavioral changes during the COVID‐19 pandemic. Mental health problems during the pandemic were compared to expected scores based on nationwide ratings of same‐aged peers in 2018.ResultsAlthough both boys and girls appeared affected, girls reported a greater negative impact across all the broad indicators of well‐being and behavioral change during COVID‐19 than boys, and their depressive symptoms were above and beyond the expected nationwide scores (t(1514) = 4.80, p < .001, Cohen's d = 0.315). Higher depressive symptoms were associated with increased passive social media use and decreased connecting with family members via telephone or social media among girls, and decreased sleeping and increased online gaming alone among boys. Concern about others contracting COVID‐19, changes in daily and school routines, and not seeing friends in person were among the primary contributors to poor mental health identified by youth, particularly girls.ConclusionsAdolescents were broadly negatively affected by the COVID‐19 pandemic and accompanying restrictions; however, this negative impact was more pronounced in girls. The findings suggest that a steady routine and remaining socially connected may help youth cope with the uncertainty and social restrictions associated with a pandemic. Moreover, healthcare providers, teachers, and other professionals should pay close attention to depressive symptoms among girls during a pandemic.

Facing the Threat of Modern Islamic State Insurgence to Increase National Resilience

The threat of insurgency or modern rebellion of Islamic State in Indonesia is strongly influenced by the Southeast Asian regional environment which has a region with religious, ethnic, and cultural diversity. Ethnic, religious, racial, and intergroup conflicts have caused economic, political, and psychological losses. This article aims to describe and analyze using a variety of approaches applied in Indonesia to face the modern insurgency of the Islamic State using qualitative analysis methods. The technique of collecting data and information is through literature study. There are several jihadi organizations and groups that carry out operations, such as Jamaah Islamiyah, the Indonesian Mujahideen Council, and others. The vitality of radical and extremist groups is able to rise to renew leadership in the organizational network structure based on personal closeness, friendship, and family. National resilience as a dynamic condition of the nation and the conception of national development in achieving the goals and ideals of the nation, which is tough and tenacious and capable of developing national strength in dealing with all kinds and forms of threats, challenges, obstacles, and disturbances both coming from within and from within. outside, which threatens and endangers the integrity, identity and survival of the nation and state, especially the threat of modern Islamic State insurgency. Modern insurgency may never develop sufficient military strength to carry out conventional operations and must therefore rely on terrorism and psychological and political means. Therefore, facing the threat of the Islamic State, the Government of Indonesia must map the transformation of ISIS in Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia, so that it is faced with proportional efforts and actions such as dealing with domestic insurgency, regional cooperation, and the involvement of extraregional forces within the ASEAN framework.

On the End of the Conceptual Conflict in the Early Theory of Social Systems: P.A. Sorokin, T. Parsons, and L. von Wiese

The dispute over the construction of a social system theory, which took place in Harvard between P.A. Sorokin (1889–1968) and T. Parsons (1902–1979), is still drawing the attention of historians and theorists of sociology. Both scientists were greatly respected by the scientific community of those times, both had their unique vision on creating a social theory and, of course, each of them claimed priority in the development of their respective system-sociological theory. According to P.A. Sorokin, who in 1951 was promoting his work “Similarities and Dissimilarities Between Two Sociological Systems” among colleagues from his department and beyond it, T. Parsons’ essays on the topic of social system theory are suspiciously similar to P.A. Sorokin’s lectures and essays — an opinion which in turn was refuted by Parsons. In response to Sorokin’s claims, T. Parsons claimed that his theoretical concept had been influenced more by other authors than by P.A. Sorokin. He also pointed to the process of convergence in system theory and highlighted plenty of other differences between their system theories. All researchers noticed the severity of this conflict, but when we look to the circumstances of the end of this conceptual debate, we find that it is not entirely clear whether it was even resolved, and more importantly — how the conflict actually ended. Analysis of this historical case conducted through the lens of Luhmann’s communicative theory helps get a clearer understanding of the problem. It allows for separating the conceptual implications of the dispute from its other aspects – personal, career, psychological, institutional aspects — which ultimately allowed looking into the conceptual essence of the conflict. The use of new and previously little-known German archival documents, copies of sociologists’ personal letters, journal reviews on sociological theory, journal publications about the conflict allowed to establish the importance of the role played by respected German sociologist L. von Wiese (1876–1969), a personal friend of P.A. Sorokin and an expert in theoretical sociology, in deescalating the conflict and ending the dispute in 1952.

Grinnell: America’s Environmental Pioneer and His Restless Drive to Save the West

Mired as we are in many conservation and preservation issues, it can be good to know how it all started. George Bird Grinnell is that reminder. Born in New York in 1849 and dying there in 1938, he straddled the age of the closing of the western frontier and the beginning of the age of now: no frontier, easy travel, and recreational hunting. He saw pristine, and he saw it end, too, with melancholy and sadness. He saw an entire human culture done in and became personal friends with some of the victims. He founded conservation societies and magazines hoping to undergird a hunting culture with ethics and alert the public to what he saw ending. When that was not enough, he leaned on politicians to influence laws. As a naturalist and a hunter, he co-founded the Boone and Crockett Club and founded the Audubon Society. These disparate societies reflected an issue of the time—management through conservation or preservation, which was at the core of the Hetch Hetchy debate, and highlights a tension still present today. This is especially relevant for birds, down 3 billion since 1970 (Rosenberg et al. 2019). and hunted and watched by millions. Grinnell knew both sides; we could use him today.

Professionalism, perfidy and personal circumstance in the life of Marchamont Nedham

Abstract Marchamont Nedham, the English revolutionary journalist, for whom ostentatious side-changing became an occupational hazard, has earned a reputation among both contemporaries and many historians for perfidy and venality. This article proposes another interpretation of his career. A close contextualization of his canon of works and his professional circumstances with the varying political climates shows that his apparent changes of allegiance can be explained by his long-standing attachments to political patrons. Such fidelity is also evident in his duty to his family and in his personal friendships. His career exemplified professionalism, rational pragmatism and loyalty, often in difficult circumstances.

Engaging with ELL Students in Their Personal Writing

I am currently a student teacher at a charter school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. My class is a self-contained 7th and 8th grade ELL classroom, where the cooperating teacher (CT) teaches all content classes. In English Language Arts (ELA) this month, students were assigned to write a personal friendship story. Prior to writing, students were asked to fill out a graphic organizer with three columns: (1) My Friends, (2) Places I have Friends, and (3) Things I like to do with Friends.

Steve Oroszlan: A Personal Perspective.

My memories of Steve go back over 50 years. While precise dates are no longer in my memory bank, circumstances and emotions remain alive and easy to recall. These memories tell the story of a remarkable human being, a true practitioner of his craft always, faithful to the basic principles of scientific pursuit, with integrity, honesty, and enthusiasm well beyond the norm. We had a professional symbiotic relationship that lasted over 20 years, resulting in over 50 publications in scientific journals and meeting abstracts. During that time, our fortunes rose in tandem, and when it was time to go our separate ways, he was more than ready to flourish on his own. Our personal friendship remained constant, and we enjoyed sharing meals and stories with family and friends over the years. In retrospect, I take pride in having played a role in a portion of his remarkable scientific journey. A few key anecdotes will illustrate some aspects of this summary. By way of a disclaimer, this is not a comprehensive review of the vast field of viral oncology and the selection of references is intentionally narrow. No slight is intended to the many outstanding investigators that were our contemporaries and at times collaborators during the period from the early 70s to the mid-80s.

‘Royal diplomacy: British preparations for the State Visit of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth to the United States, June 1939.’

ABSTRACT This article explores the preparation made by the British government, primarily the Foreign Office, for the state visit of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth to the United States three months before the outbreak of the Second World War. It considers the dynamics of the relationship between the officials in Whitehall, the British ambassador in Washington, Sir Ronald Lindsay, the agenda of the Roosevelt administration and the role of the British royal family as ambassadors in their own right. Lindsay’s role was also pivotal because he was a personal friend of the King and was also on much respected and influential figure in Washington. The article does not discuss the course of the state visit, although there is discussion of the literature that relates to it. However, it does reveal that securing a concrete alliance with the United States was not the priority of the British government in the summer of 1939; that the focus of the Foreign Office, in particular, was on the growing diplomatic crisis in Europe. Lastly, the article argues that in the months leading up to the outbreak of the Second World War, the Foreign Office was confident in its own ability to lead the formulation of British foreign policy; that it was not eclipsed by Neville Chamberlain’s very personal involvement in appeasing the fascist dictators.

Karl Marx, Bruno Bauer and the Ends of Classical German Theology

This paper aims to evaluate the political-theological significance of Karl Marx’s early collaborations with his academic mentor and personal friend Bruno Bauer. For much of the twentieth century, and in part due to Marx’s and Engels’s own later reflections on their intellectual development, the dominant interpretations of this so-called ‘Young Hegelian’ moment in Marx’s career tended to characterise it as excessively theoretical and essentially liberal in its orientation. However, more recent historical and contextual scholarship has revealed the limitations of this approach. Building on new political readings of Bauer’s work in particular, and the theoretical polemics of the Vormärz more generally, I explore the radical and revolutionary implications of Marx’s youthful writings. The salient shift in Marx’s position was less from theory and liberalism to practice and communism, I maintain, than it was from a politics of institutional struggle via the coded discourse of political theology to one of mass mobilisation and democratic action.

Changes in adolescent mental health during the Covid pandemic.

Previous pandemics around the world have shown that negative emotions are intensified in individuals when restrictions are imposed on human daily life activities. This study aims to draw attention to the pandemic-specific factors that might be associated with the severity of depression, anxiety, and COVID-19 phobia of high school students. A total of 1431 high school students aged 14 to 18 years were invited to participate in this study using online survey forms. They were asked to fill out a questionnaire about themselves and the changes in their lives during the pandemic. They completed the COVID-19 Phobia Scale (C19P-S) and the Revised Children's Anxiety and Depression Scale (RCADS). Findings showed that being a girl is an increased risk factor for anxiety, depression, and COVID-19 phobia. In addition, following the official daily COVID-19 data and having a healthcare professional in the building of residence are significant risk factors for COVID-19 phobia. Having a psychiatric disorder, having a chronic disease, losing anyone due to COVID-19 infection, undergoing a COVID-19 diagnostic test, and meeting friends in person are increased risk factors for anxiety or depression during the pandemic. Changes in adolescents' lives caused by the COVID-19 pandemic are negatively affecting their mental health. Studies are needed to maintain the mental well-being of adolescents under the conditions of this pandemic.

Особенности поведения российских и американских студентов в социальной сети Facebook

Presented is the analysis of peculiarities of behavior of Russian and American students in the social network Facebook. The focus of the study is on what activities students of the two countries are most often engaged in, as well as on what motives they motivate when adding users to the personal list of friends. The main method of research is a formalized interview (N = 266). Students of two higher educational institutions located in Kaliningrad (Russia) and Philadelphia (USA) were interviewed. In anticipation of the analysis, according to the functionality, the types of activities on Facebook were highlighted, i.e. social, functional and cognitive. Also forms of activity were divided into public and private according to the nature of their manifestation (open or hidden). The motives for making friends were typologized according to the user’s orientation towards the development of “binding” or “connecting” social capital. As a result of the analysis, it was revealed that students from the United States are more likely to engage in public activities on Facebook than students from Russia, which is expressed in more active commenting on posts, publishing content on their personal page and friends’ pages. Russian students prefer private activities (chat and viewing other people’s pages). The functional type of activity, expressed in the use of gaming and non-gaming applications, turned out to be the most unpopular form of pastime on Facebook among students in both countries. It was also found that students at two universities are more focused on the development of “connecting” social capital. At the same time, for Russian students the dating factor in real life does not act as an important motive for adding friends to the list as for American ones. It is suggested that the basis for the differences discovered are the features of the cultural environments in which students live. The Russian environment involves more cautious participation in public life, the American stimulates social activism. Significant gender differences in peculiarities of student behavior in Facebook network could not be identified.

The Keur Farah Pahlavi Project and Iranian-Senegalese Relations in the 1970s

Addressing the scarcity of scholarly literature on Iran’s involvement in Sub-Saharan Africa during the Pahlavi period, this paper demonstrates that throughout the 1970s, as the shah’s international standing rose and Iran’s economy grew, so too did Iran’s political and economic relationships with several African countries, especially Senegal. The article will explore a number of factors that stimulated this relationship, most significantly Senegal’s strategic and symbolic importance, and the personal friendships that developed between the countries’ leaders. The ultimate manifestation of this bilateral relationship was the Keur Farah Pahlavi project; a joint Iranian–Senegalese city to be constructed in Senegal. By exploring this project, the paper aims to demonstrate the strategies through which the Pahlavi state sought to expand its influence worldwide.

Biological yields through agricultural extension activities and services: A case study from Al-Baha region - Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

PurposeThis research determines the extent to which farmers benefit from agricultural extension activities and services through realizing higher biological crop yields in the Al-Baha region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Additionally, the nature of the relationship between the personal, economic and social characteristics of farmers and the degree to which they benefit from agricultural extension activities and services are studied.MethodologyA simple random sample representing the community of 315 farmers was drawn. Data were collected through a personal interview with a pre-tested questionnaire to satisfy the objectives of the study. Data are subjected to analyses and are interpreted in terms of percentages, arithmetic averages, and standard deviations in addition to the simple Pearson correlation coefficients.ResultsThe results show that most of the respondents depend on personal experience, friends, family and neighbors, merchants and sellers of agricultural production supplies as sources of agricultural information for enhanced crop yields. Multiple regression analysis reveals that both the educational status and the agricultural information sources are important factors that increase farmers benefit from extension activities. Farmers receive most benefits from the extension activities and services from bringing in foreign workers, conducting field trips to farms, and identifying problems faced by farmers.Research limitations/implicationsThe outcome of this questionnaire limits generalization of the findings for other parts of the Kingdom due to geographical and natural resources variations.Practical implicationsThe personal and socio-economic characteristics of the surveyed population provide the extension service with insight into their composition – a basis to formulate workable extension programs. For the extension planners of the area, this effort provides a baseline study and may assist with targeting the appropriate farmers and catering the right solutions to the problems. Such a study will help devise meaningful extension programs and save time and resources.Originality/valueLittle previous research on the usefulness of the Extension Service has been conducted in the region.ConclusionsEffective, well-planned extension programs targeting the educated and mature farmers provided more benefits and helped them obtain higher crop yields.

Self-Positivity or Self-Negativity as a Function of the Medial Prefrontal Cortex.

Self and emotions are key motivational factors of a person strivings for health and well-being. Understanding neural mechanisms supporting the relationship between these factors bear far-reaching implications for mental health disorders. Recent work indicates a substantial overlap between self-relevant and emotion information processing and has proposed the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) as one shared neural signature. However, the precise cognitive and neural mechanisms represented by the MPFC in investigations of self- and emotion-related processing are largely unknown. Here we examined whether the neural underpinnings of self-related processing in the MPFC link to positive or negative emotions. We collected fMRI data to test the distinct and shared neural circuits of self- and emotion-related processing while participants performed personal (self, friend, or stranger) and emotion (happy, sad, or neutral) associative matching tasks. By exploiting tight control over the factors that determine the effects of self-relevance and emotions (positive: Happy vs. neutral; negative: Sad vs. neutral), our univariate analysis revealed that the ventral part of the MPFC (vmPFC), which has established involvement in self-prioritisation effects, was not recruited in the negative emotion prioritisation effect. In contrast, there were no differences in brain activity between the effects of positive emotion- and self-prioritisation. These results were replicated by both region of interest (ROI)-based analysis in the vmPFC and the seed- to voxel functional connectivity analysis between the MPFC and the rest of the brain. The results suggest that the prioritisation effects for self and positive emotions are tightly linked together, and the MPFC plays a large role in discriminating between positive and negative emotions in relation to self-relevance.

Caregiver identity in care partners of persons living with mild cognitive impairment.

Research on caregiver identity in the context of memory impairment has focused primarily on more advanced stages of the cognitive impairment trajectory (e.g., dementia caregivers), failing to capture the complex dynamics of early caregiver identity development (e.g., MCI; mild cognitive impairment caregivers). The aim of this study was to develop a nuanced understanding of how caregiver identity develops in family and friends of persons living with MCI. Using constructivist grounded theory (ConGT), this study explored caregiver identity development from 18 in-depth interviews with spouses (n = 13), children (n = 3), and friends (n = 2) of persons recently diagnosed with MCI. The overarching themes influencing MCI caregiver identity development included MCI changes, care-related experiences, “caregiver” interpretation, and approach/avoidance coping. These themes influenced how participants primarily identified, represented as I am a caregiver, I am not a caregiver, or liminality (i.e., between their previous identity and a caregiver identity). Irrespective of their current self-identification, all conveyed thinking about their “future self,” as providing more intensive care. MCI caregiver identity development in family and friends is a fluid and evolving process. Nearly all participants had taken on care tasks, yet the majority of these individuals did not clearly identify as caregivers. Irrespective of how participants identified, they were engaging in care, and would likely benefit from support with navigating these changes and their new, ambiguous, and evolving roles.

Collaborations and Moving Past COVID‐19: The Human Ecology and Applied Ecology Sections

Collaborations and Moving Past COVID‐19: The Human Ecology and Applied Ecology Sections

Religious Life for Our World: Creating Communities of Hope by Maria Cimperman RSCJ

Reviewed by: Religious Life for Our World: Creating Communities of Hope by Maria Cimperman RSCJ Vien V. Nguyen SCJ Religious Life for Our World: Creating Communities of Hope. By Maria Cimperman, RSCJ. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2020. Pp. xxi + 225. $28. Religious communities have a storied history in their response to God's call and specific realities and cries of the people in the world and the Church. Today, religious women and men are being asked once again to be mystics and prophets in the new frontier of gospel calls (19) to "wake up the world," as reminded by Pope Francis. But what are we to do? How are we to create communities of hope that function as a transformative witness of the inbreaking of the Reign of God in the world (xvii)? Cimperman attempts to answer these questions in this book. Through the lenses of call, charism, and vows, C. examines the different dimensions of consecrated life and addresses the different ways religious congregations can create communities of hope, locally and globally, as a response to the cries of the people and the earth. [End Page 124] Creating communities of hope for the twenty-first century requires being attuned to the Spirit's calls for "interior conversion, internal transformation, and external revitalization." C. addresses these calls in two parts. Part One focuses on 1) the current realities in the world, the church, and of consecrated life, 2) the call and gifts of the Spirit to respond to God and the cries around us, personally and communally, and 3) a life of prayer in relationship with God to follow the Risen Christ in missionary discipleship and mysticalprophetic life. In Part Two, C. examines the evangelical counsels of chastity, poverty, and obedience, which are lived out daily in prayer, community, and ministry. Call, charism, vows, prayer, community, and ministry—all are interconnected. Each chapter ends with questions for reflection and discussion to help readers enter a process of conversion, transformation, and revitalization. C. provides a compelling, engaging, balanced, and well-written book, with many things to appreciate. First, international religious communities at the provincial or regional level are rapidly evolving and steadily becoming multicultural as they welcome members and candidates from cultures and nationalities previously known as "mission territories" in Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Because of this, discussions on interculturality have become more and more urgent. To remain relevant in an intercultural Church and world, religious congregations need to actively discern ways to engage community members into intentional intercultural living under the Spirit's direction. Multiculturality is God's gift to us. Commitment to intercultural living is the acknowledgment and acceptance of this gift. But how we address the challenges and complexities of interculturality is an ongoing endeavor that requires continuous openness to listening to and dialoguing with other cultures and peoples. Second, creating communities of hope demands entering the margins and peripheries—where the mystical life and the prophetic life converge—to witness "God's preferences and loves" (117) and "attend to the wounded heart of humanity" (128). The margins and the peripheries are sometimes within, as C. rightly notes. She writes, "Sometimes it is when we respond to those outside our local communities that we realize that the wounds outside are also present inside" (107). Those on the margins and the peripheries in the community are those who have personally experienced some of the cries highlighted in the book: wars, migration, famine, poverty, and hunger for meaning and belonging. Moreover, they are not necessarily those from other cultures, but those whose peculiarities, as well as political and theological ideologies, put them at odds with others. Third, the brief discussion on the importance of friendship inside and outside of one's religious community in chapter 6 ("Living Community: Doors and Destinations") is much needed. Friendship is necessary for living as a religious. Personal friendship that is not exclusive or genital should be viewed [End Page 125] as a gift from God. When friendship is exclusive, it poses a threat to the spirit and integrity of the call, the charism, and the vows of consecrated life. The book is a valuable resource for those committed to delving deeply into the...