Women In Process Research Articles

Some Patterns and Processes of Women's Faith Development

Drawing on Fowler's faith development theory and feminist theological and psychological studies of women's faith, as well as feminist research principles, open-ended interviews were used to explore the faith lives of 30 Christian or post-Christian women. Findings are presented in terms of two main categories. First, six processes of faithing are identified: these are strategies by which the women discerned and embodied shape, pattern and meaning in their life experience. Second, three major generative themes are identified which, it is suggested, represent key patterns in the women's faith. The three themes of paralysis, awakenings and relationality are described and discussed. The findings challenge Fowler's claim to provide a normative account of faith development, and reveal aspects of women's experience which require fuller attention in future research.

Rape by Acquiescence

In this article, the author examines women's processes of acquiescence to unwanted sex in marriage. Through analyses of 41 interviews with women who have experienced some form of unwanted sex in a marital or long-term intimate relationship, the author uncovers five types of acquiescence to unwanted sex and discusses the conditions under which women adopt a given type. This research extends Finkelhor and Yllo's nonphysical types of coercion to better understand the contexts in which women experience unwanted sex in marriage. It is argued that the processes and consequences of “giving in” to unwanted sex with an intimate have not been given as much scholarly attention as other forms of forced sex that have traditionally been identified as rape.

Effect of Mood and Food Cues on Information Processing in Women with Bulimia Nervosa and Controls

Information-processing speed and cue reactivity were evaluated in women with bulimia nervosa and controls in response to neutral, mood, and food cues in isolation, and mood and food cues in combination. Significant differences were consistently observed between women with bulimia nervosa and control women on information-processing speed for food/body-related words, but not for words unrelated to food/body concerns. As expected, women with bulimia nervosa demonstrated slower processing of information related to food/body concerns. In addition, the presentation of mood and food cues affected speed of information processing. Especially for women with bulimia nervosa, information processing was slowest when either mood or food cues were presented in isolation. Significant cue reactivity was also observed, again especially for women with bulimia nervosa. In conclusion, both transient and more enduring subject characteristics affected information-processing speed. Moreover, the way transient factors were presented significantly affected speed of information processing. This suggests a more complex relationship between cue presentation and information processing than was anticipated.

(Re)Defining My Self: Women's Process of Recovery from Depression

This grounded theory study examined the process of recovery for women who have been depressed. Twenty-one women who identified themselves as having recovered from depression were recruited through a snowball sampling approach. Women described a basic social psychological process involved in recovery from depression as (Re)Defining My Self, a process that consists of six phases. The women were interviewed and the interviews were audiotaped and transcribed for analysis. The data were analyzed through the constant comparison grounded theory method as developed by Glaser and Strauss and refined by Glaser and Stern. This research builds on existing research by expanding our understanding of the concept of recovery from depression. The study augments our understanding of women's experience with depression by enabling us to better understand the context and the meanings that link the variables that have been studied but remain elusive.

Orchestrating health

Middle-aged women's definition of health was explored using grounded theory methodology. Seven middle-aged women were interviewed regarding their definition of health and what they did to achieve health. Interviews were analyzed using the constant comparison method. The core variable of "orchestrating health" became evident as women's process of living health. These middle-aged women orchestrated the physical, emotional, and spiritual aspects of their lives in the environment (orchestral pit) and in relationship with others (audience, patrons). Nurses need to become aware of the process of living health undertaken by middle-aged women and to include spiritual, physical, emotional, environmental, and relational components in their assessment and understanding of women's health.

Women in Exile and Their Children

The article gives examples of interactions during psychological consultations with exiled mothers and their children. They exemplify different coping styles to problems of traumatic loss and separation from old families and social networks, loss of cultural and professional roles, and problems of identity and self-esteem. The observations are discussed in relation to the women's personality test profiles and their anamnestic material. Three typical styles of transactional defense in relation to their children are defined. These styles-"binding," "delegation," and "expulsion"-are also related to the risk of associated typical behaviors in the second generation, such as gang behavior and certain types of criminality. The usefulness of the Exner Rorschach in evaluating the (often overlooked) resourcefulness of analphabetic peasant women is touched upon. Finally suggestions are given regarding factors and treatment modalities that could facilitate the exiled women's process of working through their trauma and establishing new coping styles and networks that could provide fertile soil for constructive development in themselves and their children.

Victims of violence: aspects of the "victim-to-patient" process in women.

This paper is an overview of aspects of the victim-to-patient process which reflects the interrelationship between mental health and mental disorder, particularly of women who suffer the sexual assault, sexual abuse, or wife assault. Knowledge of the psychological processes and symptoms aids diagnosis, modifies treatment and the process of recovery following acts of violence.

The Expression of Experience: Code's critique of Gilligan's abortion study

Abstract It is not clear how women's experiences and theories based on them can best be used to redress social inequality on the basis of sex difference. Appropriations of Gilligan's attempt to define women's process of moral reasoning in terms of difference risk being interpreted as accounts of female deficiency. However, Code's critique of an important aspect of Gilligan's research, the abortion study, on the grounds that abortion is only experienced by women, fails to fully recognise how abortion can be read as a socially constructed experience. Using a post‐structuralist theory of language, I locate the experience of abortion as a site of contested meaning that plays itself out historically and socially in an attempt to find ways to think and theorise about experiences that do not collapse into essentialism.

Velocity of the Fashion Process in Women's Formal Evening Dress, 1789-1980

This study tests the proposition that the fashion process is accelerating by utilizing quantitative data and time series analysis. Metrical measurements of persistent features of women's formal evening dress (skirt length, skirt width, waist length, waist width, decolletage length, decolletage width) are taken from high fashion magazines and averaged to create yearly means, thereby creating a time series of 192 years. A methodology is described which deals with the magnitude of change from one year to the next in the means of each of the dress features. The velocity of the fashion process is found to be not accelerating in women's formal evening dress but rather is highly variable and episodic. What does exhibit a significant increase through time is the within-year variance of the variables.

Overview: the "wife-beater's wife" reconsidered.

Although not a new phenomenon, wife-beating has been largely ignored by mental health professionals. The author describes a context in which the physical abuse of women as wives can be understood and suggests alternative theoretical constructs to traditional theories of masochism as explanations of why women stay in violent marital relationships. She discusses the societal attitudes that normalize the use of family violence as well as attitudes about women, men, and sex roles that leave women vulnerable to assault; summarizes the research on abused wives; identifies a specific stress response syndrome caused by violent abuse; and elaborates on the problems posed for clinicians working with abused women.

Early sexual experience and prostitution.

The authors compared several aspects of early sexual experience found in two earlier studies of prostitutes with results of research on "normal" women. The prostitutes had in common many negative experiences not found or found less often in other populations of young women. These include incestuous and/or coerced sex, lack parental guidance, intercouse at a young age, and few or no meaningful relationships with males. These women had discovered that sex could lead to a kind of status, even though that status is negatively labeled by the wider culture. In a society that values women on the basis of their sexuality, a woman who views herself as "debased" may see prostitution as a viable alternative--perhaps the only alternative.