scholarly journals Violence, displacement, contact, and attitudes toward hosting refugees

2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 118-133 ◽  
Author(s):  
Faten Ghosn ◽  
Alex Braithwaite ◽  
Tiffany S Chu

How do individuals’ personal experiences with various aspects of political violence affect their attitudes toward hosting conflict refugees? More specifically, how do their personal exposure to violence, their own personal experience of being displaced, and their recent contact with refugees influence these attitudes? To explore answers to these questions, we draw upon a recent survey of 2,400 Lebanese residents where we identify individuals who experienced violence during the Lebanese civil war (1975–90), those forced to flee their homes during that conflict, and those who enjoy recent contact with Syrian immigrant and/or displaced populations. We examine whether these distinct experiences affect respondents’ regard for members of the Syrian refugee population. Results demonstrate that historical exposure to violence and experience of displacement have no discernible impact on individual attitudes toward hosting refugees. We find much stronger evidence that attitudes are associated with whether individual respondents have had contact with Syrians in Lebanon; those with such interactions are significantly more likely to support hosting refugees, to consider hiring a refugee, or to allow one of their children to marry a refugee. Our findings suggest exposure to violence by itself does not correlate to positive sentiments toward refugees, especially over time. Further, finding ways to create positive contact between refugees and native populations may be associated with improving attitudes and relations between the two populations.

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-59
Author(s):  
Tasha R. Dunn ◽  
W. Benjamin Myers

Autoethnography has become legitimized through its ability to connect culture to personal experiences. This legitimization has occurred alongside a titanic shift in communication made possible by digital technology, which has rapidly transformed, multiplied, and mediated the ways through which we engage one another. This essay explores and exemplifies the necessity of autoethnography to evolve in concert with the ways our lives have become inextricably tethered to digital technology. Due to this shift, we propose that contemporary autoethnography is digital autoethnography, a method we propose that relies on personal experience(s) to foreground how meaning is made among people occupying and connected to digital spaces. Digital autoethnography is distinguishable from traditional autoethnography because the cultures analyzed are not primarily physical; they are digital. In short, the work of digital autoethnography is situated within and concerned about digital spaces and the lived experiences, interactions, and meaning-making within and beside these contexts. Embracing digital autoethnography pushes us to consider and reflect upon the ways we have changed over time with the influx of digital technology. Additionally, the method provides a framework to keep autoethnography relevant in spite of the inevitable changes to human experience that will occur as digital connectivity becomes increasingly enmeshed in our everyday lives.


2019 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 545-558 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna O Pechenkina ◽  
Andrew W Bausch ◽  
Kiron K Skinner

State indiscriminate violence against civilians has been viewed as counterproductive for the government. This conclusion hinges on the assumption that indiscriminate violence aggrieves civilians against the government even when the rebels provoke the state by using civilians as human shields. An alternative view suggests that civilians recognize if the rebels exploit them as human shields and blame the rebels if such provocation occurs. We ask: do civilians evaluate all state indiscriminate violence in the same way or do they think of state indiscriminate violence differently when it is provoked by insurgents? Accounting for the covariate differences between individuals with and without personal experience of warfare in the survey data from postwar Ukraine, we find that personal exposure to violence shapes one’s blame attribution for provoked state attacks on civilians. Individuals unexposed to violence tend to take into account whether the government was provoked by the rebels. By contrast, individuals with personal experience of warfare tend to blame the government for indiscriminate attacks regardless of rebel provocation. This finding has implications for counterinsurgency scholarship and policy. It is likely that the difference between unexposed and exposed to violence civilians emerges in geographically isolated conflicts. If so, targeting of civilians may have different effects on the escalation of insurgency in geographically concentrated as opposed to widespread cases of violence.


2014 ◽  
Vol 46 (4) ◽  
pp. 845-859 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sivan Hirsch-Hoefler ◽  
Daphna Canetti ◽  
Carmit Rapaport ◽  
Stevan E. Hobfoll

Does exposure to political violence prompt civilians to support peace? We investigate the determinants of civilian attitudes toward peace during ongoing conflict using two original panel datasets representing Israelis (n=996) and Palestinians in East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza (n=631) (149 communities in total). A multi-group estimation analysis shows that individual-level exposure to terrorism and political violence makes the subject populations less likely to support peace efforts. The findings also confirm psychological distress and threat perceptions as the mechanism that bridges exposure to violence and greater militancy over time. The study breaks ground in showing that individual-level exposure – necessarily accompanied by psychological distress and threat perceptions – is key to understanding civilians’ refusal to compromise in prolonged conflict.


2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Massimo Radin ◽  
Silvia Grazietta Foddai ◽  
Alice Barinotti ◽  
Irene Cecchi ◽  
Elena Rubini ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Antiphospholipid Syndrome (APS) is a rare autoimmune disorder with an estimated prevalence of 40–50 cases per 100.000 persons. Patients suffering from low prevalence diseases are more likely to face diagnostic challenges, given the limited knowledge of most clinicians. The main aim of this study was to investigate the time between symptoms occurrence and the diagnosis of APS patients using the Piedmont and Aosta Valley Rare Disease Registry. Secondly, to evaluate the individual impact of the diagnostic gap by gathering patients’ personal experiences through a self-administered questionnaire. Results Data from the Piedmont and Aosta Valley Rare Disease Registry was used. In addition, personal experiences were analyzed through a self-administered questionnaire. A total of 740 APS patients included in the Piedmont and Aosta Valley Rare Disease Registry were analyzed. Diagnostic delay (as defined by time between symptoms’ occurrence and the diagnosis of APS) was significantly reduced over time. In particular, when comparing the diagnostic delay between patients diagnosed between 1983 and 1999 and patients diagnosed between 2000 and 2015, we found a significant statistical difference (Mann-Whithey U Test; mean rank 1216.6 vs. 1066.9, respectively; p < 0.0001). When analyzing the self-administered questionnaires, patients with a perception of having suffered for a diagnostic delay had a higher prevalence of symptoms suggestive of an autoimmune condition but not highly suggestive of APS (45%), followed by “extra criteria” APS manifestation (30%) and by thrombotic events (25%). The first clinical manifestation of patients who did not have the perception of having suffered a diagnostic delay was thrombotic events (45.5%), followed by autoimmune manifestation not linked to APS (45.5%), and “extra criteria” APS manifestations (9%). Conclusions While the diagnostic delay of APS has been reduced during the last years, the time between symptoms occurrence and the diagnosis of rare diseases still represents a critical issue to be addressed in order to prevent major complications.


1998 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danielle K. Tracey ◽  
Gaye Gleeson

AbstractIn the predominantly sociometric approach used to investigate the social and personal experience of adolescents with ADHD, teachers, parents, peers, or observers rate their perception of the sociol relationships experienced by the adolescent with ADHD.The adolescent's subjective perspective of his or her situation has been largely ignored.The present study examined self-reported peer rejection, peer-related loneliness, coping “strength”, and interpersonal concerns experienced by 84 adolescents: 22 with ADHD Predominantly Inattentive Type (ADHD-PI), 19 with ADHD Predominantly Hyperactive Type (ADHD-PHI), and 43 nondisordered adolescents. The adolescents, from southwest Sydney, attended mainstream schools.Adolescents with ADHD-PI reported significantly less manageability and less concern about others' feelings and about relationships with others than did nondisordered adolescents.Adolescents with either ADHD-PI or ADHD-PHI reported significantly less global sense of coherence and significantly more peer-related loneliness than did nondisordered adolescents. No significant difference was reported between the adolescent groups on measures of comprehensibility, meaningfulness, and concern about being rejected and humiliated. These contrasting self-reported profiles of the social and personal experience of adolescents with ADHD and nondisordered adolescents have implications for researchers and practitioners.


Author(s):  
Smita Kumar

It was my personal experience of intimate partner violence (IPV) that motivated me to undertake my dissertation, but during the process I was haunted by my “IPV survivor” identity. Little did I know that my intellectual pursuit was an invitation into personal healing through heuristic inquiry. During the data collection phase of my dissertation, I unconsciously embarked on the initial engagement phase of heuristic inquiry, but only 2 years after completing my dissertation did I realize I experienced six phases of Moustakas’s (1990) heuristic inquiry. In this article, I share how my dissertation healed me through a retrospective analysis using heuristic inquiry. Through the coresearchers’ narratives, I began the process of embracing my IPV survivor identity—analogous to Kintsugi, the Japanese art of joining broken pottery with gold to form a new version of it. Through this process, I have begun to acknowledge my resiliency and, most importantly, feel empowered to engage with others who have had similar experience, connecting to a collective voice of IPV survivors. Thus, I argue that heuristic inquiry not only transforms the researcher but also has a powerful impact on others (Moustakas, 1990), empowering coresearchers and communities. I conclude with a strong recommendation to foster research of personal experiences, as it has the potential to bridge the gap between theory and practice (hooks, 1994).


BJPsych Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (S1) ◽  
pp. S126-S127
Author(s):  
Jack Blake ◽  
George El-Nimr

AimsStigma towards psychiatry feels rife within medical school and this extends from university life into clinical placements. Mental health remains an unattractive area of medicine and is frequently regarded as subpar by other specialists. Against existing literature, this study compares the authors first hand experiences over the last five years within medical school to evaluate how representative their experiences of stigma in psychiatry are for the wider community and published literature. The study aims to inform the wider discussion on this topic and offer areas where intervention may yield a better perception and hence uptake of this specialism.MethodLiterature review relating to the topic was completed. Studies pertaining to medical students and/or educators views and experiences of psychiatric medical education and clinical placement were included for discussion. A reflection on the first author's specific experiences to date of psychiatry and his intent to pursue psychiatric career was conducted, with careful reference to existing literature. This allowed validating personal experiences in light of shared experience within the medical community in various national and international settings.ResultArguably, some non-psychiatric clinicians do inadvertently set the scene early in medical school for the stigma that is to be thrust upon students. This builds upon prospective students ranking psychiatry low for satisfaction, prestige and stating it to be a ‘pseudoscience’ or words to that effect. The lack of understanding from junior medical students of the role of the psychiatrist sees them associating psychosocial education as equivalent to psychiatry. This reinforces the idea of psychiatry being grounded in sciences other than anatomy, biochemistry, physiology and pharmacology. On clinical placement, there is little cross-speciality support for those students who want to be psychiatrists and sometimes even lost opportunities for those publically aspiring towards psychiatry. Placements in psychiatry give students a better understanding of psychiatry but this does not seem to significantly change their career aspirations and this is rather defined from the admission stages.ConclusionAfter comparing experience with literature, stigma towards psychiatry appears to be universal. It may be important to consider the types of students who are being attracted to medical school as currently students seem to have an intrinsic disinterest in psychiatry despite later becoming better informed through psychiatric placement. Culture is notoriously hard to change, particularly within medicine. This stigma exists both in the lay and medical communities with early potentially inaccurate lay views of psychiatry being validated and reinforced throughout medical school.


Author(s):  
John Patrick Walsh

This book argues that contemporary Haitian literature historicizes the political and environmental problems brought to the surface by the 2010 earthquake by building on texts of earlier generations, notably at the end of the Duvalier era and its aftermath. Haitian writers have made profound contributions to debates about the converging paths of political crises and natural catastrophes, yet their writings on the legacies of colonialism, imperialism, and neoliberalism are often neglected in heated debates about environmental futures. The earthquake only exacerbated this contradiction. Despite the fact that Haitian authors have long treated the connections between political violence, social and economic precariousness, and ecological degradation, in media coverage around the world, the earthquake would have suddenly exposed scandalous conditions on the ground in Haiti. Informed by Haitian studies and models of postcolonial ecocriticism, the book conceives of literature as an “eco-archive,” or a body of texts that depicts ecological change over time and its impact on social and environmental justice. Focusing equally on established and less well-known authors, this study contends that the eco-archive challenges future-oriented, universalizing narratives of the Anthropocene and the global refugee crisis with portrayals of different forms and paths of migration and refuge within Haiti and around the Americas.


Author(s):  
Alireza Doostdar

This chapter examines the place of personal experience in contemporary Iranian spirituality, What is known as “experience” is equivalent to the Persian word tajrobeh (Arabic tajriba). The sense of tajriba is linked as scientific experiment or methodical empirical observation to Spiritism. As a kind of experience associated with cumulative learning and mastery over time, a sense of tajrobeh comes close to the German concept of Erfahrung. This chapter first considers the concept of “heart” before discussing tajrobeh in terms of Erlebnis, experience that is more personal, immediate, intense, and perhaps ineffable than what Erfahrung implies. It then explores the views of Arezu Khanum on heart, Abdol-Karim Soroush on religiosity, and Mostafa Malekiyan on spirituality and religious experience. It also shows that in the twentieth century, the terms tajrobeh and Erlebnis converged in Iranian reformist formulations of “religious experience” inspired by modern European thinkers.


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