Social Fragmentation Research Articles

Longitudinal associations of neighbourhood environmental exposures with mental health problems during adolescence: Findings from the TRAILS study

BackgroundCross-sectional studies have found associations between neighbourhood environments and adolescent mental health, but the few longitudinal studies mainly focused on single exposure-based analyses and rarely assessed the mental health associations with environmental changes. ObjectivesWe assessed longitudinal within- and between-person associations of multiple neighbourhood time-varying physical and social environmental exposures with externalising and internalising problems throughout adolescence. MethodsWe used four waves of TRAILS (Tracking Adolescents’ Individual Lives Survey) data on self-reported externalising and internalising problems at ages 11, 13, 16, and 19 among 2,135 adolescents in the Netherlands. We measured residence-based time-varying environmental exposures, including green space, air pollution (fine particulate matter (PM2.5)), noise, deprivation, and social fragmentation. We fitted random-effect within-between regression models to assess the environment-mental health associations. ResultsAt the within-person level, an interquartile range (IQR) increase in PM2.5 was associated with a 0.056 IQR (95% CI: 0.014, 0.099) increase in externalising problems, while an IQR social fragmentation increase was associated with a 0.010 IQR (95% CI: −0.020, −0.001) decrease in externalising problems. Stratification revealed that the association with PM2.5 was significant only for movers, whereas the association with social fragmentation remained only for non-movers. At the between-person level, an IQR higher noise was associated with a 0.100 IQR (95% CI: 0.031, 0.169) more externalising problems, while higher deprivation (β = 0.080; 95% CI: 0.022, 0.138) and lower fragmentation (β = -0.073; 95% CI: −0.128, −0.018) were associated with more internalising problems. We also observed positive between-person associations between PM2.5, noise, and internalising problems, but both associations were unstable due to the high PM2.5-noise correlation. Further, we observed a non-linear between-person PM2.5-externalising problems association turning positive when PM2.5 > 15 µg/m3. Null associations were found for green space. ConclusionOur findings suggested that air pollution, noise, and neighbourhood deprivation are risk factors for adolescent mental health. Not only exposure levels but also exposure changes matter for adolescent mental health.

Implementation and Impact of Language Policy: The Case of Kyrgyz Students

Language policy is crucial to any society's cultural and political fabric, as it shapes how individuals and groups communicate, interact, and identify. Language policy has important implications for nation-building and the creation of national identity. Language policy can also significantly impact university students' sense of belonging. Overt and inclusive policies can provide opportunities for students to develop language skills and cultural competencies, enhancing their academic and professional opportunities. Covert and implicit policies can create barriers to interaction between different language groups, leading to social fragmentation, exclusion, and discrimination. Overt language policies are those that are openly acknowledged and implemented, while covert policies are those that are more subtle and may be hidden. Overt language policies that promote a single national language can unite diverse groups within a nation. However, these policies can also lead to the suppression of linguistic and cultural diversity within a nation, potentially undermining the cultural richness of that society. Covert language policies can also have significant impacts on identity and national unity. For example, language policies not openly acknowledged can lead to confusion or mistrust among different language groups. These policies can reinforce power imbalances between language groups, perpetuating existing inequalities. Considering these concepts, this study aimed to answer the following questions: 1. What LP has been implemented in Kyrgyzstan? 2. How has LP affected university students? Information on the language policy implemented in Kyrgyzstan was necessary to answer the first question, which involved examining laws, banknotes, newspaper titles, and dissertation catalogs. It was necessary to gather data on how the language policy has affected the students to answer the second question. In addition, in-depth interviews with LP experts helped clarify both questions. The collected information was analyzed using textual analysis and statistical methods. Data analysis showed that different models of language policy were implemented in Kyrgyzstan, including multilingualism, bilingualism, and monolingualism. Overt, covert, and vague LP were used to promote these models. These models and methods have formed segregated communities, language discrimination, and different linguistic identities within the same ethnic groups.

Political Performances of Surviving Oppression

Abstract In light of the societal and structural changes that have occurred in Palestine since the signing of the Oslo Agreements in the 1990s, the present work aims to analyse the enhanced role of individuals and individual actions as opposed to actions led by collective and/or top-down organisations in the unarmed resistance of Palestinian people to the State of Israel, both in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) and in 1948 Palestine/Israel. To understand the main tracts, limits, and potential of this contemporary trend I resort to the work and ideas developed by Bayat on social nonmovements. A further aim is to highlight how the resistance of the individuals intersects with individual-right movements, to understand the changing relation between the fight for individual rights and the fight against occupation. Hence, an in-depth analysis of the village realities of al-Walaja and al-Laqiya will be provided, by examining land defense in reaction to illegal acquisition of Palestinian property. Moreover, the results will be confronted with the broad events of May 2021, to better understand how new resistance dynamics have unfolded in different local realities as well as nationwide. Nowadays Palestine is marked by geographical, social, political, and religious fragmentation, together with economic difficulties. In such an environment I suggest that individuals adapted to the new reality of NGOs’ aid and relief and, with the boost of social media and the discourse brought forward by Palestinian women, have taken the lead of the leaderless Palestinian resistance, as proved by the events of the Habba of May 2021. As for the claims over individual rights, I believe this new resistance paradigm has the potential to prompt social and political reform, while the capabilities of individuals to practice such resistance in a sustained manner have to be carefully thought out.

Alienation and Depression: The Duality of Psychic Neurosis in Toni Morrison’s God Help the Child

This research studies alienation and neurosis in Toni Morrison’s God Help the Child. The concepts of alienation and neurosis are going to be applied within the scope of psychoanalysis. These concepts help interpret the characters, namely the female protagonist Lula Ann Bridewell and her parents, and their resistance against people who taunt them for being black. This injustice causes the protagonist and her parents to be alienated from the society; and later they become psychically neurotic. Therefore, the research attempts to demonstrate how the characters’ depression and neurosis are caused by this experience. For this reason, three objectives are going to be achieved: 1) To examine alienation as an unconscious psychic phase which results in social fragmentation in the novel, 2) To investigate depression as an abnormal behavioural phase which causes neurosis when the alienation experience is triggered back, and 3) To analyse neurosis as a psychic disorder and the last conscious culmination of the characters’ psychic plights and marginalization. The research fills the gap concerning the characters’ psychic disorders as impetuses of their alienation and neurosis. The research’s methodology, consequently, relies on the application of Sigmund Freud’s concepts of alienation and neurosis. Thus, the research’s findings lie in the exploration of psychic alienation as a result of the characters’ depression.

Associations Between Childhood Area-Level Social Fragmentation, Maladaptation to School, and Social Functioning Among Healthy Youth and Those at Clinical High Risk for Psychosis.

Although studies have identified social fragmentation as an important risk factor for schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, it is unknown whether it may impact social functioning. This study investigates whether social fragmentation during childhood predicts maladaptation to school as well as social functioning during childhood and adulthood. Data were collected from the North American Prodrome Longitudinal Study. Participants included adults at clinical high risk for psychosis (CHR-P) and healthy comparisons (HC). Maladaptation to school and social functioning during childhood were assessed retrospectively and social functioning in adulthood was assessed at baseline. Greater social fragmentation during childhood was associated with greater maladaptation to school (adjusted β = 0.21; 95% CI: 0.02 to 0.40). Social fragmentation was not associated with social functioning during childhood (unadjusted β = -0.08; 95% CI: -0.31 to 0.15). However, greater social fragmentation during childhood predicted poorer social functioning in adulthood (adjusted β = -0.43; 95% CI: -0.79 to -0.07). Maladaptation to school mediated 15.7% of the association between social fragmentation and social functioning. The association between social fragmentation and social functioning was stronger among adults at CHR-P compared to HC (adjusted β = -0.42; 95% CI: -0.82 to -0.02). This study finds that social fragmentation during childhood is associated with greater maladaptation to school during childhood, which in turn predicts poorer social functioning in adulthood. Further research is needed to disentangle aspects of social fragmentation that may contribute to social deficits, which would have implications for the development of effective interventions at the individual and community levels.

К оценке траекторий трансформаций постсоветских политических систем

Introduction. The article examines the formation and development of political systems in the former eleven republics of the USSR from the standpoint of the institutional transformations taking place there. The struggle for power between various elite groups and citizens’ identities and the dynamics of citizens’ identities were also the basis for comparison. The authors consider the parameters mentioned to make the comparison and typology of the modern post-Soviet states’ development more effective. Methods and Materials. The neoinstitutional, sociological, and political-cultural approaches were used in the research, as were the comparative-historical and comparative-typological methods, which made it possible to scrutinize the available facts and draw respective conclusions. Analysis. It was stated that starting in the 1980s, the transformation of the typical Soviet republics took place in two directions. The first included the formation of the electoral autocracies, institutional design, and social and cultural image, which were determined by the “nucleus” – the president-leader. Such political dynamics turned out to be characteristic of Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, and Belarus. The formation of the “front-end democracies” was the second direction. These democracies are characterized by institutional, social, and identity fragmentation hiding behind the glass cases of democratic structures and practices borrowed from the West. Kirghizia, Georgia, Armenia, Ukraine, and Moldavia have moved in this direction. Results. The authors’ conclusion is that both the first and second directions do not ensure the stable development of new independent states in the foreseeable future. Authors’ contribution. A.V. Abramov formulated the concept of the article, developed the comparison parameters, and studied the post-Soviet elites’ and citizens’ struggle for power and their identity evolution. R.A. Alekseev analyzed the transformation of the political institutions in the post-Soviet political systems in the context of their constitutional reforms.

Mobilising Extremism in Times of Change: Analysing the UK’s Far-Right Online Content During the Pandemic

The growing dissension towards the political handling of COVID-19, widespread job losses, backlash to extended lockdowns, and hesitancy surrounding the vaccine are propagating toxic far-right discourses in the UK. Moreover, the public is increasingly reliant on different social media platforms, including a growing number of participants on the far-right’s fringe online networks, for all pandemic-related news and interactions. Therefore, with the proliferation of harmful far-right narratives and the public’s reliance on these platforms for socialising, the pandemic environment is a breeding ground for radical ideologically-based mobilisation and social fragmentation. However, there remains a gap in understanding how these far-right online communities, during the pandemic, utilise societal insecurities to attract candidates, maintain viewership, and form a collective on social media platforms. The article aims to better understand online far-right mobilisation by examining, via a mixed-methodology qualitative content analysis and netnography, UK-centric content, narratives, and key political figures on the fringe platform, Gab. Through the dual-qualitative coding and analyses of 925 trending posts, the research outlines the platform’s hate-filled media and the toxic nature of its communications. Moreover, the findings illustrate the far-right’s online discursive dynamics, showcasing the dependence on Michael Hogg’s uncertainty-identity mechanisms in the community’s exploitation of societal insecurity. From these results, I propose a far-right mobilisation model termed Collective Anxiety, which illustrates that toxic communication is the foundation for the community’s maintenance and recruitment. These observations set a precedent for hate-filled discourse on the platform and consequently have widespread policy implications that need addressing.

“We have been invaded”: Wind energy sacrifice zones in Åfjord Municipality and their implications for Norway

ABSTRACT Following the “green” growth tradition, the construction of lower carbon energy (renewable energy) infrastructures, such as wind power, has gained prominence in Norway. This has led to indigenous Saami herders confronting pastureland dispossession, some citizens fearing the industrialization of nature, and municipal councils losing formal governance power in favor of national agencies and private-sector project developers—justified by the urgency of the climate crisis. The purpose of the paper is to explore how energy infrastructures aimed at decarbonization have led to social fragmentation and ecological degradation alongside claims of economic revitalization potential in Åfjord. The authors draw upon fieldwork conducted within Saepmie (or Sápmi), the cultural region traditionally inhabited by the Sámi, and investigate the Fosen Vind energy project in the Åfjord Municipality. They find that lower carbon energy infrastructures, such as “wind farms,” have been normalized as unavoidable, and damage to habitat and encroachment on Saami livelihoods are positioned as necessary sacrifices for the greater good of fighting the climate crisis. The authors conclude that avoiding the creation of green sacrifice zones in making low-carbon places requires a more transformative vision than the visions offered by techno-solutionism, such as degrowth.

Post-Colonial Review of V. S. Naipaul's Fiction

V.S Naipaul is acknowledged as one of the most talented writers dealing with postcolonial themes for his fictions. As a Nobel Prize winner author, he has written a number of fictions such as A House for Mr Biswas (1961), A Bend in the River (1979), Miguel Street (1959), An Area of Darkness (1964), In a Free State (1971), The Mimic Men (1967), India: A Million Mutinies Now (1990) and so on. The article presents a review of his postcolonial fictions with a thorough thematic analysis. Naipaul treats the themes of pessimism, identity crisis, social fragmentation, diaspora and internal struggles of immigrants. He also presents the futility of designing a new Westernised identity by discarding old roots. The political, social and cultural upheavals and its critical impact is also illustrated by the author.

408. Associations Between Area-Level Social Fragmentation During Childhood, Discrimination, and Lower Positive Core Schemas in Healthy Controls and Clinical High Risk for Psychosis Participants

408. Associations Between Area-Level Social Fragmentation During Childhood, Discrimination, and Lower Positive Core Schemas in Healthy Controls and Clinical High Risk for Psychosis Participants

Review of Major Social Determinants of Health in Schizophrenia-Spectrum Disorders: II. Assessments.

Social determinants of health (SDoHs) impact the development and course of schizophrenia-spectrum psychotic disorders (SSPDs). Yet, we found no published scholarly reviews of psychometric properties and pragmatic utility of SDoH assessments among people with SSPDs. We aim to review those aspects of SDoH assessments. PsychInfo, PubMed, and Google Scholar databases were examined to obtain data on reliability, validity, administration process, strengths, and limitations of the measures for SDoHs identified in a paired scoping review. SDoHs were assessed using different approaches including self-reports, interviews, rating scales, and review of public databases. Of the major SDoHs, early-life adversities, social disconnection, racism, social fragmentation, and food insecurity had measures with satisfactory psychometric properties. Internal consistency reliabilities-evaluated in the general population for 13 measures of early-life adversities, social disconnection, racism, social fragmentation, and food insecurity-ranged from poor to excellent (0.68-0.96). The number of items varied from 1 to more than 100 and administration time ranged from less than 5 minutes to over an hour. Measures of urbanicity, low socioeconomic status, immigration status, homelessness/housing instability, and incarceration were based on public records or targeted sampling. Although the reported assessments of SDoHs show promise, there is a need to develop and test brief but validated screening measures suitable for clinical application. Novel assessment tools, including objective assessments at individual and community levels utilizing new technology, and sophisticated psychometric evaluations for reliability, validity, and sensitivity to change with effective interventions are recommended, and suggestions for training curricula are offered.

What is democratic socialism in America? left ideology in the age of populism

ABSTRACT This article examines the political ideology of the contemporary US democratic socialist movement. The argument advanced is that this represents a specific form of socialism, which incorporates key features of the ‘populist turn’ recently taken by many left-leaning political movements, while also moving beyond it in significant respects. The result is a constellation of ‘partially decontested’ concepts, holding together a loose constituency through a series of questions, rather than answers, under conditions of high social fragmentation. These ‘partially decontested’ concepts are: socialism, democracy, class, and revolution. In each case, I examine the broad areas of agreement that exist over these concepts’ meanings, as well as the ongoing disagreements they generate. To be a democratic socialist in the USA today, I suggest, is to be involved in these disagreements, without necessarily assuming they can be resolved, either at the individual level, or that of the movement as a whole.

Funerary practices in megalithic tombs during the Argaric Bronze Age in South-Eastern Iberia: The cemetery of Los Eriales

The transition between the Copper Age and the Argaric Bronze Age in south-eastern Iberia has traditionally been understood in an evolutionary framework that would have involved the replacement of some cultural forms by others. The chronology of megalithic societies has changed this assumption, revealing that the continuity of ancestral funerary practices is also a key feature of the Bronze Age. In this context, the new radiocarbon series from Los Eriales discussed in this paper can be considered a key contribution. Three main aspects stand out according to their statistical analysis: i) Los Eriales should be considered the most recent Iberian megalithic cemetery, as ritual activity began in the last centuries of the third millennium cal BC; ii) funerary activity took place during short events of intensive ritual depositions spanning a few decades, mainly in the 21st and 18th centuries; and iii) Los Eriales cemetery was mainly used during the Argaric period, which means the coexistence of two very different funerary practices: collective megalithic rituals and individual intramural inhumations. The continuity of megalithic rituals can be explained in terms of resilience to the social fragmentation that characterised Argaric societies.

Neighbourhood characteristics and the treated incidence rate of borderline personality pathology among young people.

The impact of the wider social environment, such as neighbourhood characteristics, has not been examined in the development of borderline personality disorder. This study aimed to determine whether the treated incidence rate of full-threshold borderline personality disorder and sub-threshold borderline personality disorder, collectively termed borderline personality pathology, was associated with the specific neighbourhood characteristics of social deprivation and social fragmentation. This study included young people, aged 15-24 years, who attended Orygen's Helping Young People Early programme, a specialist early intervention service for young people with borderline personality pathology, from 1 August 2000-1 February 2008. Diagnoses were confirmed using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Personality Disorders, and census data from 2006 were used to determine the at-risk population and to obtain measures of social deprivation and fragmentation. The study included 282 young people, of these 78.0% (n = 220) were female and the mean age was 18.3 years (SD = ±2.7). A total of 42.9% (n = 121) met criteria for full-threshold borderline personality disorder, and 57.1% (n = 161) had sub-threshold borderline personality disorder, defined as having three or four of the nine Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed.; DSM-IV) borderline personality disorder criteria. There was more than a sixfold increase in the treated incidence rate of borderline personality pathology in the neighbourhoods of above average deprivation (Quartile 3) (incidence rate ratio = 6.45, 95% confidence interval: [4.62, 8.98], p < 0.001), and this was consistent in the borderline personality disorder sub-groups. This association was also present in the most socially deprived neighbourhood (Quartile 4) (incidence rate ratio = 1.63, 95% confidence interval: [1.10, 2.44]), however, only for those with sub-threshold borderline personality disorder. The treated incidence of borderline personality pathology increased incrementally with the level of social fragmentation (Quartile 3: incidence rate ratio = 1.93, 95% confidence interval: [1.37, 2.72], Quartile 4: incidence rate ratio = 2.38, 95% confidence interval: [1.77, 3.21]). Borderline personality pathology has a higher treated incidence in the more socially deprived and fragmented neighbourhoods. These findings have implications for funding and location of clinical services for young people with borderline personality pathology. Prospective, longitudinal studies should examine neighbourhood characteristics as potential aetiological factors for borderline personality pathology.

Being a master of metaphors

Being a master of metaphors

Representation of Violence in Yemeni Novel: A Study of Fekriah Shahrah’s ‘The Smile Owner’

This paper focuses on daily violence as the main theme in novel The Smile Owner which was written by Fekriah Shahrah. It depicts the hegemony of Houthi militia in Yemen. It is an analytical study which interprets the novelist’s literary work The Smile Owner. Moreover, as an instrument of data collection an interview with the novelist has been conducted to shed more light on the novel. This study is based on critical analysis of the literary text, which interprets the real context of violence in Yemen. Violence is a global issue between good and evil, and war and love. Shahrah as many of Yemeni novelists depicted the consequences of violence in their literary platform. The novel represents the situation of Yemen in the ongoing war in Yemen. Hence, the war in Yemen, death, abduction, retaliation and social fragmentation are the main themes of written and spoken Yemeni literature. This paper exposes the horrible implications of the coup led by Houthi Militia backed by Iran against the legal government backed by coalition led by Saudi Arabia and Emirates. Therefore, Fekriah Shahrah in the literary platform to portrayed violence in Yemeni society using the narrated text as a tool to convey the awful war consequences.

Routinised practices of community librarians: Daily struggles of Dutch public libraries to be(come) social infrastructures

Next to their traditional role as places for information provision and knowledge transmission, public libraries increasingly also function as important social infrastructures contributing to the everyday life in cities. As such, they can help to address systemic challenges such as social fragmentation, loneliness, exclusion and precarity. However, the library not merely is a social infrastructure, but becomes one each operating day through continuous labour by a network of stakeholders. This paper specifically examines library staff and their routinised practices to provide, perform and maintain the library as social infrastructure. The empirical research was carried out in four public libraries in the Netherlands and focussed on staff members who were in a 1-year post-graduate programme to become a community librarian, and their close colleagues. It consisted of two phases: first librarians were shadowed at work, followed by a focus group interview on the multiple problems librarians encounter to (re)make their library into social infrastructures. These include coping with limited space, collaborating with other institutions, difficulties to reach out to the community, financial struggles and differentiating interpretations of the library’s primary function.

Do sleep disruptions promote social fragmentation?

Sleep changes predate shifts in mood/affect, thought processing, mental and physical health, civic engagement, and contextual circumstances, among other things. Theory predicts that these changes may lead to shifts in political and social beliefs. Do sleep disruptions shape how individuals see the world, the people around them, and themselves in relation to others? In this article, we use daily survey data from the 77 waves (N ≈ 460,000) of the University of California, Los Angeles's 2019-2021 Nationscape Survey-a nationally representative political survey-to examine the effect of an exogenous short-term sleep disruption on measures of political views, polarization, and discriminatory beliefs. Using this data set, we leverage the modest sleep disruption that occurs at the start (and end) of Daylight Saving Time (DST) and employ a regression discontinuity in time design around the precise DST cutoff (which we supplement with event study models). Despite strong theoretical expectations and correlational connection between measures of sleep and many outcomes related to social fragmentation, we find that the DST change has little to no causal effect on citizens' levels of polarization or their discriminatory attitudes. These effects are precise enough to rule out small effects, robust to a host of specification checks, and consistent across potential subgroups of interest. Our work adds to a small but growing body of research on the social and political effects of sleep disruptions.

Coping with Cairo’s Uncertainties

Based on ethnographic fieldwork among young dissidents and affiliates to opposition networks in Cairo after the 2011 revolution, this article shows the relationship of multiple influence factors involved in coping. It documents the conflicts of belonging while trying to cope with enduring uncertainty. It scrutinises which resources they could mobilise, to what aim, and by which means, while positioning themselves along shifting perceptions of belonging and differentiation. I argue that ways of coping are pre-framed by the social fragmentation of the city and access to resources due to one’s social positioning. Therefore, although these strategies often reproduce existing power relations, they also have the potential to question them. Times of uncertainty open the space for new ways of agency, especially for dealing with liminalities. As coping practices interact with expressions of belonging and differentiation, they can affect future positioning.

Las particularidades del derecho a la información en sociedades altamente tecnificadas

The intense technological development in areas of information and communication fostered by new international actors has had a great impact on the behavioral habits of society. From this understanding, the emergence of a new social conformation is glimpsed that responds to principles substantially different from those that governed not long ago. This paper aims to show that technological evolution responds in many cases to the sectarian interests of the dominant groups that promote them, a fact that favors social fragmentation and political conflict, generating fertile ground for the spread of fake news. The research methods used to address the subject will be qualitative, documentary, and bibliographic. In conclusion, it is understood that technological evolution demands new approaches to social conflicts that are not completely new, but that today take another facet. To this end, it is necessary to review some classical concepts – such as sovereignty – and adopt it in a more flexible understanding that allows a cooperative association between the States for the implementation of formal and material political actions aimed at providing an adequate resolution of conflicts, which responds to the needs expressed in the current context.