Life Story Interviews Research Articles

Autobiographical Reasoning and Severity of Personality Dysfunction

Narrative identity is defined as a personal life story that integrates an understanding of the past and an envisioned future to provide life with a sense of meaning, unity and purpose. The key process through the construction of narrative identity is autobiographical reasoning, which can be understood from the perspective of three indicators: exploratory narrative processing, meaning-making, and self-event connections. The relationship between narrative identity and personality disorders has been examined extensively over the last decade. According to the latest literature, autobiographical reasoning could be a crucial narrative indicator of the severity of personality dysfunction. However, there was no research to verify this hypothesis. The main goal of the presented research was to examine relationships between autobiographical reasoning and the severity of personality dysfunction. The analysis includes data collected from 11 volunteers using a questionnaire (Self and Interpersonal Functioning Scale [SIFS]) and Life Story Interview (Critical Events). Each statement was treated separately (N = 88) in order to enable statistical analysis. The preliminary results show that the indicators of autobiographical reasoning are negatively correlated with some of the aspects of the severity of personality dysfunction. The results support the reasonability of the approach followed in this research, and contribute to academic discussion about relationships between narrative identity and personality disorders.

Growing up with Congenital Heart Disease: A Qualitative Research Study of Parents’ and Clinicians’ Experiences and Perspectives

BackgroundFamilies of children with congenital heart disease (CHD) may experience a range of challenges, such as interactions with the medical system, parental stress, and the child’s physical activity (PA) participation. The aim of this study is to explore how those with CHD and their families experience childhood based on parents’ and clinicians’ experiences and perspectives. The ultimate goal is to identify lacking supports (if any), and when children and their parents may be most amendable to receive them. MethodsWe recruited parents/guardians of children with CHD, and clinicians involved in care provision for children with CHD. Participants completed life story interviews, with key events from parent/guardian interviews mapped to a timeline. Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. ResultsTwelve parents of 11 children with CHD with diagnoses spanning from mild to complex, and 12 clinicians (42% pediatric cardiologists, 33% nurses, 25% other) were interviewed. Three themes were identified: 1) Overwhelmed – The Relationship Between Parents and the Healthcare System, 2) Trauma and Resilience - The Emotional Side to Raising a Child with CHD, and 3) P More Than Just Fun. Sub-themes explored challenges of education, communication, and living away from the hospital, traumatic experiences, the need for parental support, different approaches to PA counseling, providing role models, barriers to successful PA promotion, and tools for improvement. ConclusionsThis study highlights the need for changes to how and when information is communicated to families of children with CHD, and an increase in the number and types of support mechanisms available.

Selkea! Memories of Eating Non-Kosher Food among the Spanish–Moroccan Jewish Diaspora in Israel

Drawing on life-story interviews and ethnography conducted in Israel from 2009 to 2023, this article examines how members of the Spanish-speaking Moroccan–Jewish diaspora in Israel recalled their habits of eating non-kosher food in Morocco. We explore how these memories emerged in response to commonplace discourses that depict Moroccan Jews as a distinctly religious-traditional ethnic group, untouched by European secular influences, and dichotomous to modern secular cultures in Israel. Contrary to this image, members of the community whom we interviewed highlighted a Jewish Moroccan life that was deeply connected to Spanish colonialism and the broader Hispanic and Sephardi worlds. We focus specifically on the concept of selkear, a Haketia (Judeo-Spanish) term meaning to let something go, make an exception, or turn a blind eye. Our analysis of our participants’ memories provides a nuanced understanding of Jewish religiosity in the context of colonialism and of how Mizrahi–Sephardi immigrants in Israel reclaimed their Judaism. Highlighting the practice of eating non-kosher food is thus a strategy used to challenge dominant notions of rigid religious commitment within the Sephardi diaspora and their interpretation in Israel.

Family and personal identity among Roma students in Colleges for Advanced Studies: Identity preservation and change

AbstractDuring their studies, Roma university students enter into a milieu different from their family environment and this can affect their identity. In our research, we used life story interviews (N = 108) to study Roma university students who attended Roma College for Advanced Studies (RCAS). We were interested in how their identities were formed and what role their family Roma identity strategy and the RCAS played in it. In our analysis, we divided the Roma students into five categories (separated, integrated, assimilated, negative, marginalized) and these identity strategies were also used to determine the respondents' family identity. In the sample, the largest proportion consisted of those who had an integrated personal and family Roma identity strategy. The majority of the respondents had not changed identity strategies and also interpreted their personal identity according to the family pattern. Some of the Roma university students went to RCAS specifically to strengthen their Roma identity. Overall, it can be said that the family Roma identity strategy can be linked to the development of personal identity, and the RCAS can have a role in preserving and strengthening the Roma identity of university students.

Rural Murle Age-Set Men Tackling Elites in South Sudan

The Murle age system is often presented in a negative light in the South Sudan conflict reporting, which links age-set activities to communal violence, cattle rustling, and the abduction of women and children. Such assessments by outsiders overlook the positive effects of age-sets on interethnic relations in rural areas, where young people follow the Murle tradition and navigate the complex influence networks of Murle society. We focus on pastoral Murle youth in Pibor born in the 1980s and 1990s—that is, the laŋo age-set. By drawing on in-depth life-story interviews, this article studies how Murle laŋo masculinity is constructed, embodied, and negotiated. The analysis of our ethnographic data exemplifies how early childhood emotional bonds with caregivers, conflicts, and marginalisation impact the life trajectory of one Murle man. Our results show the connectedness of political orientation, tradition, and masculinity to intergenerational conflict and competition for political and societal power in Murle society. The study increases our understanding of Murle laŋo men’s survival strategies. Specifically, it shows that these rural marginalised Murle youth build alliances beyond kinship and ethnic ties, defend land, advance the goal of peace with neighbours, volunteer for unpaid community work to fight idleness, and act as a counter force to prevent manipulation by political and military leaders. Zɔɔz Zɔɔz nici ɔp bayiz ci ɔl o maac een murle abaak Murla, ki gɔl ci bayizo, ki gɔl ci ganonto been culanɛ ci kobɛkɛ ɔl kaal. Gi ci titiny bayize ceen murlen nɛɛn, buluwa kibeen kerenɛ ogi o murle gɔɔn anya bayiz o gɛɛr gɔɔn aruwɔn ɔl, ma kɔran tiin moda ma kagaman ŋai ki dɔɔl ci modo. Mazin liŋliŋɔnti nici aŋamnek kaal o abon agɔɔn bulowa o abaak murla loce o ɔl o kolik een junup ŋawo azɔɔzi kaal o bayiz uneŋ murlo. Ma golowa ci kaŋamneka kalyanit o bayiz o een murlen, ayelza rɔŋrɔŋanɔnɛt ci arɔrɔŋanɔn nigi ki, gɔɔl ci adiŋdiŋani Jowanɛ o adilyai, gɔl ci siaso, ki kɛranɛ, ki kaal ci akati ŋayetin ki jorɛnɛɛn zɛɛ been ŋɛrɔn ci aŋɛrɔɔn alata o murlo aŋɛrɛ sias giye ci arɔɔŋi rum o. Bayizi ween aturuwen aroŋnyi, ayelzai bule o kazi lango, agamta nigi bayiz ci aromɛn niŋgi dook kodoye, ma arican ganɔɔn ma buk ɔp calaŋ aŋɛɛr nɔgɔ siasa karabɔŋ een zɔɔz ci takirzetu. Keywords: masculinity, laŋo, life story, tradition, elites, Murle, South Sudan

"Daddy Issues" and Diagnoses: Gendered Weaponization of Mental Health in Intimate Relationships.

Through life story interviews with victims of psychological abuse, we offer new empirical evidence for a tactic of coercive control: mental health weaponization. Shaped by structural vulnerabilities, mental health weaponization involves three key features: gendered accusations that victims are "crazy" and emotionally unstable; leveraging victims' past traumas against them, particularly that they form "bad" attachments to men; mobilizing victims' mental health diagnoses or symptoms against them to cast them as noncredible. This article enhances our understanding of controlling and abusive tactics in intimate relationships by showing how they are rooted in social inequalities at the intersection of gender and mental health status.

Multiplicities and fluidity in the networked relationships of migrant academics in Britain

AbstractIncreasing internationalization and marketization of higher education, global research collaboration, and staff mobility place academics' networking practices at the centre of higher education systems. Migrant academics are conceptualized with different network types including personal, local and transnational family and friendship networks. However, this research aims to understand the boundaries between different types of participants' networked relationships. The data of this paper comes from a larger research project on transnational family relationships of migrant academics conducted between 2018 and 2022. Life story interviews with 45 migrant academics from 27 different national backgrounds working at British universities were conducted. Additionally, sociogram maps are used as embedded in qualitative interviews. Migration background (as European or non‐European countries); gender; age; the length of the stay in the UK; academic position/contract type; annual income level and marital/relationship status were considered while forming the sample. The findings reveal that network forms and structures do not determine the resources and benefits of relationships; rather, individuals' actions over a time period and the meanings they attribute shape the positions of an alter (other actors that the focal person have connection with) within the personal network structure. As such, actions and meanings regarding those actions can bring one forward or backward in the personal network hierarchy. The boundaries regarding the content of these networks are usually blurred in relation to time, relationality and human agency attributing specific sets of meanings to certain relationships. The findings of this research translate into specific contributions to the discussions in migration and social network research. That is, research findings emphasized that different types of networks shaping participants' lives and migratory experiences are far from being stable and fixed, rather, they are characterized by being transmissive and dynamic. It is revealed that none of the network categories are homogenous, stable and fixed in terms of the content of the relationships. This adds to Emirbayer and Goodwin's (1994) discussions around the ‘form’ and the ‘content’ of networks. This paper underscores the significance of the historical settings, dynamism and the content of each relationship in understanding individual networks.

"A mini home far away from home." The Thai temple and women's sense of safety in Finland.

This article explores the significance of the Thai Buddhist temple for Thai women's sense of safety in Finland. Despite the growing popularity of Buddhism in the country, research literature and media have largely ignored the religiosity of Thai women, focusing instead on negative stereotypes. The article highlights the importance of Buddhism and the temple in the lives of Thai women who have migrated to European countries and challenges biased portrayals of Thai women in previous research. Based on ethnographic research at the Thai temples in Finland and life story interviews with twelve Thai women. The article argues that the temple plays a crucial role in promoting a sense of safety among Thai women by providing a sense of home, belonging, and meaning. The temple's material and symbolic characteristics, in addition to its communality and relationality, work together to connect individuals with the temple's religious significance, contributing to the women's sense of security. These findings speak for the fact that when facing the challenges of Thai women or other religious and ethical minorities, it is necessary to also look to their religion as a source of mental and spiritual well-being.

«Jeg vil bli en å regne med»

AbstractYoung men’s desistance from gangs involved in crime is a pressing social issue in the Nordic countries. Drawing from a larger study comprising life story interviews with previously incarcerated men across different life stages, this article elaborates the narration of desistance among three young men who desisted from gang-related crime in their early twenties. By telling their stories of involvement in crime and their desistance process as career shift narratives, continuity in their »real me« is emphasised. Their stories make them come across as rational agents concerned with independence, ambition and a goal-oriented agency proving their capacity and willingness to take responsibility through hard work in the construction industry. This narrative identity can be understood as the young men’s ideals of masculinity, which intertwine their earlier values and previous experiences with a new maturity gained by social relations to role models in the labour market and significant others. In line with this, ideals of masculinity may be seen as a narrative resource which may shape and enhance possibilities for secondary and tertiary desistance in early adulthood.

The Influence of Crucibles of Experience in Moral Development & Psychology of Public Relations Exemplars

ABSTRACT This study conducted life story interviews with 40 members of the PRSA College of Fellows to examine the influence of crucibles (i.e. trials, challenges or growth opportunities) in the moral development and psychology of public relations exemplars. The outcomes were the development of an illustration of their moral and leader development journey drawing on Rest’s four-component model of ethical decision making, and a moral psychology profile of the key characteristics of public relations exemplars. The profile that emerged is that of leaders who exemplify moral courage, resilience, generosity, genuine care about others and are willing to listen and learn. When they faced trials, they emerged stronger and stayed true to their values and character.

Beyond dichotomies: contesting cultural stereotypes through the lived experience of sexuality among Turkish-Dutch women

This article offers a critique of the dominant secular/sexual paradigm in the Netherlands by focusing on everyday experiences of sexuality among Turkish-Dutch women. A secular approach towards sexuality rests on the fictive duality of a sexually liberated, progressive majority Dutch and a conservative cultural ‘Other’. This paper argues that despite scholarly work challenging the secular/framework within which minoritised women’s sexuality is problematised, cultural stereotypes continue to persist in Dutch populist discourse and everyday life. Based on life story interviews conducted with eight women, it illustrates the specific ways in which normative expectations are imposed on minoritised women based on perceived religious or cultural differences. These expectations constitute a ‘script’ that is imbued with cultural stereotypes. Dissonant moments emerge when my interlocutors fail to conform to the ‘script’. In contrast, when their choices validate these expectations, they are interpreted as a reflection of their ‘cultural background’ instead of being seen as instances of agentic behaviour. These processes further reify dichotomies in the form of sexually liberated and oppressed as the choices these women make are never seen as individual expressions of sexuality unless they openly contest these expectations.

Career Metaphors and Significant Childhood Experiences in Social Entrepreneurs’ Career Choice

This article examines the role of childhood experiences and metaphors in social entrepreneurs’ (SEs) career choice processes through a psychoanalytic lens. Metaphors are a unique projective tool to explore SEs’ subconscious processes. A total of 104 in-depth semi-structured interviews and 24 in-depth life-story interviews with SEs were conducted based on psychoanalytic theories emphasising family dynamics, childhood experiences and mental processes. The SEs were asked about significant childhood experiences and for a metaphor that describes their occupation. The metaphors they chose were justice fighter, caregiver, creator, leader and martyr. Thematic analysis showed specific recurrent significant negative childhood experiences, especially loneliness, family crisis and abuse and feeling lost, among others. Analysis revealed strong correspondence between specific metaphors and childhood experiences. Interpreted through a psychoanalytic lens, these findings denote compensation processes that underlie career choices and offer a deeper understanding of how and why SEs choose, develop and narrate their careers. In conclusion, using such psychoanalytical tools is recommended in SEs’ career training.

Transgenerational Return Migration to Galicia, Spain: Discourses of Identity and Belonging

This article explores transgenerational return migration to Galicia in north-west Spain. Specifically, it focuses on a scholarship programme within Galicia’s Return Strategy 2020 – a policy aimed at incentivising return migration to Galicia to ameliorate the demographic crisis that it is experiencing due to an aging population. Drawing on 27 life-story interviews with descendants of Galician emigrants to Latin America, and discursive analysis of newspaper articles and promotional materials related to the initiative, the article argues that studying transgenerational return migration can help challenge deeply engrained notions about identity and belonging, and advance theoretical understandings of return migration.

“You don’t get resilience overnight”: a grounded theory framework of the A-R-C sporting resilience development

Resilience in sport is growing as a topic of investigation but comparatively less focus is placed on how resilience develops in athletes. This study explored sporting resilience development in elite athletes over time using grounded theory. Participants included 10 competitive-elite athletes (5 men and women) who scored high, competing in individual/team sports from diverse cultural contexts. Experiential life-story interviews on sporting resilience development over time was conducted. Grounded theory was employed across ideation, data collection and analysis with structured methodological quality criteria to ensure rigour. Findings are synthesised into A-R-C Development Model of sporting resilience indicating that antecedent protective factors (A) enable the engine of sporting resilience (R) which through metacognition-emotion-behaviour produces consequences (C) of positive adaptation or critical adaptation failure. The emergent theory is the first comprehensive outline providing an understanding of how sporting resilience develops over time in competitive-elite athletes. Implications for developing athlete resilience for performance and mental health are discussed.

Attributions of Loneliness-Life Story Interviews with Older Mental Health Service Users.

There is growing evidence on the prevalence and impact of loneliness, particularly among older people. However, much less is known about the personal origins of loneliness and how it persists, or not, over an individual's life course. This study aimed to increase understanding of the personal experiences of loneliness among older adults across the life course. Central to this study was giving voice to the participants and allowing them to define loneliness, what it meant to them, and how it affected them throughout their lives. This qualitative study employed 18 life story interviews with older adults attending a mental health service. We explored their personal experiences of loneliness and the situations and factors associated with loneliness across the life course. We identified three distinct typologies of loneliness: those who experienced (1) chronic loneliness since childhood, (2) chronic loneliness after a life-changing event in midlife, and (3) loneliness which remained situational/transitional, never becoming chronic. This study found the seeds of chronic life course loneliness are often determined in childhood. Early detection and intervention may prevent situational loneliness from becoming chronic. More research is needed from a life course approach to help understand and address the causes and consequences of loneliness.

Biographies of uncertainty regulation in the labor market and extension of working life in Chile

Abstract Despite lacking policies targeting the extension of working life, Chile is the Latin American country that has exhibited the largest increase in the labor force participation rate of people aged 65+ in the last two decades. In this research, following an analytical framework on regulation of endogenous uncertainty and relying on rich qualitative data (life story interviews of 90 older workers aged 60–86, across 21 cities and 6 regions), we approached the complexity of extended working lives in Chile by addressing an unexplored dimension. Specifically, we explore individuals’ agency over their employment trajectories (i.e., both in adulthood and old age) among those who remained active in the labor market after the legal retirement age. Our findings provide strong evidence that extended working lives not only result from precarious social conditions, but are also shaped by complex processes involving both expansive and adaptive individual agency in which people engaged throughout their life course. Therefore, the high exogenous uncertainty in the labor market should not merely be interpreted from the perspective of “precarity,” but also as a scenario that encouraged individuals to behave in a way that led them to engage in the labor force across their lives in accordance with their preferred level of endogenous uncertainty.

Women and shame: narratives of recovery from alcohol dependence

Objective Existing literature indicates distinct pathways and the key role of shame and stigma into alcohol dependence (AD) and recovery for women. Internationally, there is a paucity of research exploring these factors from women’s perspectives. Methods and Measures Taking a critical realist epistemological position, unstructured life story interviews were analysed via narrative analysis to explore how seven women from the UK, storied shame in their recovery from AD. Results Shame followed a common trajectory across participants’ stories, appearing as a reoccurring factor throughout AD and recovery. Participants narrated shame as gendered, contributing to a loss of personal control in defining a valued personal identity. Drinking began as a shame-management strategy but evolved into a source of shame, compounded by fears of being labelled an ‘alcoholic woman’. Recovery involved reclaiming the self through de-shaming a shame-based identity and developing a positive, non-drinking identity. By evaluating ‘shaming’ recovery frameworks, sharing stories and reconstructing their own, participants were able to work through shame, resist pathologising identity labels and internalise esteemed ‘sober’ identities. Conclusion This research provides important insights into the intersection between shame, identity, gender and culture in women’s recovery from AD. Implications for clinical practice, future research and policy are considered.

Engaging with the Qur’an

In this article, I examine what selected Muslim women in Finland and Egypt do with the Qur’an in their daily lives. I shed light on their modes of engagement with the Qur’an (spiritual, emotional, intellectual, communal). I analyse how their relationship with the Qur’an is shaped and changes over the course of their life. I pay attention to the interplay between the women’s daily lives and the ways in which they experience, learn from, grapple with, and interpret the text. My overall aim is twofold: to contribute to research-based understanding of the Qur’an as daily religious practice that in many ways involves learning both about God and about the complex circumstances of personal life, and to unpack the layered and shifting meanings of this practice in the context of the women’s lives. My analysis is informed by life-story interviews with six women in Helsinki and Cairo (three in each country).

“You can be cured, but cancer never leaves you behind”: an interdisciplinary approach into the embodied cancer experiences among adult Colombian childhood/adolescent cancer survivors

Purpose Childhood or adolescent cancer survivors (CACS) are an understudied population in Colombia and, in general, in Central and South America. Worldwide, studies typically focus on high-income settings while approaching CACS’ experiences from a biomedical or psychological perspective. However, both perspectives miss an important aspect of survivorship after childhood or adolescent cancer: the affected individual’s subjective experiences of having a disabled body. This qualitative study aimed to explore the embodied experiences of Colombian adults who survived cancer during their childhood or adolescence to better understand how CACS relate to their altered body and world. Methods By integrating phenomenological insights and conducting comprehensive life-story interviews, we explored the various ways in which survivors’ cancer experiences affect their bodily sense of self—from the acute phase of the disease until well into adulthood. A total of ten life-stories interviews and one focus group were carried out with seven CACS. All participants were survivors of a different type of childhood/adolescent cancer. The results were analyzed thematically, focusing on the embodied aspects of participants’ experiences. Results We developed three main themes regarding the embodied cancer experience among participating CACS: Firstly, participants’ body changes because of the cancer and its treatment, which makes them aware of their body. Secondly, they adapt to this experience in different bodily ways. Finally, they carry bodily traces of their cancer experience in the present as well as into the future. Conclusions The CACS participating in this study report that their experience with cancer has been embodied throughout their lives, changing their sense of their body and how they relate to it, and leaving traces into the present and their imagined future.

"I want to lift my people up": Exploring the psychological correlates of racial themes within the life stories of midlife Black Americans.

This study explores how middle-aged Black Americans talk about race, without prompting, while telling their life stories. Drawing upon a dataset of lengthy Life Story Interviews (N = 70), we first employed a keyword search to identify race-relevant interview scenes for each participant. Next, we conducted a thematic analysis of these scenes to identify salient racial narrative themes. Finally, we coded race-relevant scenes to examine the psychological correlates of racial narrative themes. We identified 460 total racially themed Life Story Interview scenes, with the number of racially themed scenes ranging from 1 to 17 across participants' interviews. Racial narrative themes included Community of Care, Black Cultural Identity, Multiculturalism, Activism, Encounter with Racism, Systemic Racism, and Racial Reckoning. Quantitative analyses highlight a relationship between racial narrative themes and psychological measures of wisdom and generativity. This study offers insight into the ways that race manifests in the life stories of Black Americans and highlights the importance of considering race in the study of narrative identity, and personality, more broadly.