Recognizing Relational Interactions with Social Institutions in Refugee Children's Experiences of Intertwining Vulnerability and Agency.

In this paper, we examine relational interactions between refugee children and social institutions, building the case for the recognition of the co-occurrence and intertwining of vulnerability and agency in children's experiences in diverse refugee situations. This developmental relational approach offers refinement of a general relational worldview by specifying how vulnerable and agentic experiences are co-constructed by children and adult individuals and institutions. We analyze the conceptual roots of vulnerable and agentic experiences, and use the concept of co-construction to specify the processes and outcomes of interactive relational experiences. Evidence from example studies of the intertwining of vulnerability and agency in specific refugee situations demonstrates how refugee children contribute to power-oriented experiences. Due recognition of the relational co-construction of intertwining vulnerable and agentic experiences provides a basis for refining generalized relational observations, and a fine-grained basis for developing policies and procedures to dispel ambivalence to refugee children and to change inequitable policies and practices.

Perspectives and feelings of refugee children from Syria and Iraq about places and relations as they resettle in Australia.

Refugee children's experiences are situated in specific places where they interact with significant people. They are not usually asked about their perspectives although they are social agents with distinctive perspectives and feelings about relationships and events. We investigated the perspectives of refugee children on their experiences of places and relations as they resettled in Australia after their families fled from violence in Syria and Iraq and transitioned through Middle Eastern countries. One hundred-and-nine children chose to work with a computer program in either English or Arabic. They sorted feelings associated with home, school, and where they lived before and rated being nurtured at home. Hierarchical cluster analysis revealed five subgroups of children with distinctive patterns in their sorting of eight feelings for three places. Three subgroups had patterns of positive feelings about home and school. Two smaller subgroups had mixed, ambivalent feelings about either school or home. One subgroup was strongly positive, and two others were negative about before settlement. Subgroups identified on their sortings of feelings differed in their experiences of being nurtured, with positive feelings of places related to higher ratings of being nurtured at home. The study points to the importance of children's perspectives and feelings in how they interpret experiences with people and places and argues against assuming that refugee children are homogeneous in their experiences or perspectives.

Ambivalence towards the Protection of Refugee Children: A Developmental Relational Approach.

In this paper we analyze the contemporary ambivalence to child migration identified by Jacqueline Bhabha and propose a developmental relational approach that repositions child refugees as active participants and rights-bearers in society. Ambivalence involves tensions between protection of refugee children and protection of national borders, public services and entrenched images. Unresolved ambivalence supports failures to honor the rights of refugee children according to international law and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. There is failure to protect and include them in national public services and in international coordination of public health and wellbeing. We identify misrepresentations of childhood and refugeeness that lie behind ambivalence and the equitable organization and delivery of public services for health and wellbeing. With illustrative studies, we propose a developmental relational framework for understanding refugee children's contributions in the sociocultural environment. Contrary to the image of passive victims, refugee children interact with other people and institutions in the co-construction of situated encounters. A developmental relational understanding of children's 'co-actions' in the social environment provides a foundation for addressing misrepresentations of childhood and refugeeness that deny refugee children protection and inclusion as rights-bearers. We point to directions in research and practice to recognize their rights to thrive and contribute to society.

Toward a Psychology of Resistance.

Resistance is all around us in contemporary life. It is an everyday phenomenon of personal and cultural life, as the Chaudhary et al. (2017) volume establishes with theoretical analyses and empirical examples from diverse cultural contexts. Resistance functions in the dynamics of person-by-culture encounters when one party takes an opposing position. With the purpose of working towards a unified approach to resistance, the authors in this volume lay down the foundations for a psychology of resistance as an everyday phenomenon. As a basis for analyzing the role of resistance in the dialectical processes of change, the volume presents resistance as: personal and social, oppositional, intentional and future-oriented, transformational and developmental. We see different positions opening up a debate about whether resistance is a particular, intentional and oppositional phenomenon, or is the basic process of all dialectical transformational change. Further resistance to either position is consistent with moving forward in the development of a psychology of resistance.

Three approaches to the disjunction between psychological measurement and psychological persons: methodological and ethical considerations.

In this paper, we take forward Schwarz's (2009) disjunction between measurement-apparatus-questionnaire and measurement-apparatus-man to examine how the crisis in contemporary psychology is related to assumptions about two sets of connections in research: connections between research tools, research behaviours, and psychological phenomena; and connections between researchers and researchees. By setting up a research problem with methodological and ethical implications, we describe three approaches that involve different assumptions and research activities in relation to the ways each makes these connections: Disassociated, Conventionally Connected and Persons in Dialogue Approaches. We argue that a Persons in Dialogue Approach is the most appropriate approach for a 21st Century psychology in crisis.

Patterns of psychosocial adjustment following cardiac surgery.

PURPOSE: The purpose of this research was to document the postoperative experiences of a group of cardiac surgery patients with a view to identifying factors relevant to postsurgical mood and adjustment. METHODS: Forty-six cardiac surgery patients (mean age = 63.6 years, SD = 11.0) were recruited through a cardiac rehabilitation program at a large teaching hospital in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. A semistructured interview (Austin CEP Interview) was used to canvass a broad range of postsurgical issues, and 3 mood questionnaires were administered to provide a quantitative assessment of mood at the time of interview. RESULTS: Three distinct patterns of adjustment and outcome following cardiac surgery were identified and described: "new well me," "new sick me," and "me as always." Undergoing major cardiac surgery per se did not predict mood and adjustment difficulties, whereas the presence of chronic and disabling cardiac symptoms prior to surgery did. Adjustment issues primarily manifested as the extent of change in a patient's identity relating to health and illness perceptions, with age acting as a predictor of the type of adjustment difficulties experienced. CONCLUSION: This study highlights the significance of psychosocial factors for assessing surgical outcomes and the importance of tailoring rehabilitation programs to the specific needs of individual patients.

Psychosocial adjustment following relief of chronic narcolepsy.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: No previous research has examined the psychosocial adjustment of chronic narcolepsy patients following efficacious pharmacotherapy. In contrast, considerable research has examined the process of psychosocial adjustment following surgical relief of chronic epilepsy. This process can manifest as a clinical syndrome, the 'burden of normality', comprising psychological, behavioural, affective and sociological features. The aim of the present study was to characterise the process of psychosocial adjustment of patients with successfully treated narcolepsy and to explore the applicability of the burden of normality. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Thirty-three narcolepsy patients and 31 epilepsy surgery patients were recruited through routine outpatient follow-up at the Austin Hospital in Melbourne. All patients underwent in-depth, qualitative psychosocial assessment using a well-validated semi-structured interview, the Austin CEP Interview. They were also administered quantitative measures of anxiety (State Trait Anxiety Inventory) and depression (Beck Depression Inventory-II). RESULTS: Narcolepsy patients spontaneously reported similar themes of post-treatment adjustment to successfully treated epilepsy patients, including symptoms of the burden of normality. Chi-squared analyses revealed that the two groups differed only on disease-specific factors, reflecting the later diagnosis and treatment of narcolepsy (P<0.05). CONCLUSION: The results support a general model of adjustment following successful treatment of chronic neurological illness, as the patient discards perceptions of illness and behaviours associated with being 'sick' and learns to become 'well'. Recognition of the burden of normality has important clinical implications for maximising the post-treatment care and outcome of narcolepsy patients.

Distributions of caregiving tasks among family members: the place of gender and availability.

To extend family-oriented approaches to caregiving, participants in 2 studies were asked to distribute tasks among a set of adult children, first with information only about gender and then with systematically varied information about commitments to paid work, marriage, and/or parenting. Making the distributions, using a computer-based program, were 2 groups of older adults (ages 60 to 90 years). In Study 1, gender composition was kept constant (2 sons and 2 daughters). In Study 2, it was varied. The results showed several ways in which people combine attention to gender and to availability. The results also pointed to the need to consider both the number and type of tasks allocated. The results are discussed in terms of implications for the way caregiving is regarded, the development of multiple-factor models for variations among family members, and the possible replications and extensions to other circumstances and populations.