Promoting Preschoolers’ Moral Reasoning

Young children's moral development and socialization have been of increasing interest to parents, teachers, and researchers as children's social experiences in the preschool years have expanded to include many nonfamilial adults and peers. A Piagetian or structural approach to understanding heteronomous and autonomous moral reasoning in young children is discussed. The roles of cognitive maturation and social interaction with peers and adults are considered. Implications from theory and research are offered to early childhood educators for facilitating preschool children's moral reasoning and development through curriculum activities, classroom policies, and behavior management strategies.     

Knowledge for the good of the individual and society: linking philosophy,disciplinary goals,theory, and practice

Nursing as a profession has a social mandate to contribute to the good of society through knowledge‐based practice. Knowledge is built upon theories, and theories, together with their philosophical bases and disciplinary goals, are the guiding frameworks for practice. This article explores a philosophical perspective of nursing's social mandate, the disciplinary goals for the good of the individual and society, and one approach for translating knowledge into practice through the use of a middle‐range theory. It is anticipated that the integration of the philosophical perspective and model into nursing practice will strengthen the philosophy, disciplinary goal, theory, and practice links and expand knowledge within the discipline. With the focus on humanization, we propose that nursing knowledge for social good will embrace a synthesis of the individual and the common good. This approach converges vital and agency needs described by Hamilton and the primacy of maintaining the heritage of the good within the human species as outlined by Maritain. Further, by embedding knowledge development in a changing social and health care context, nursing focuses on the goals of clinical reasoning and action. McCubbin and Patterson's Double ABCX Model of Family Adaptation was used as an example of a theory that can guide practice at the community and global level. Using the theory‐practice link as a foundation, the Double ABCX model provides practising nurses with one approach to meet the needs of individuals and society. The integration of theory into nursing practice provides a guide to achieve nursing's disciplinary goals of promoting health and preventing illness across the globe. When nursing goals are directed at the synthesis of the good of the individual and society, nursing's social and moral mandate may be achieved.     

Social work,class politics and risk in the moral panic over Baby P

The hostile reaction to social workers following the conviction of the killers of Baby P in November 2008 was unprecedented even by the standards of previous high-profile child abuse deaths, such as Maria Colwell and Victoria Climbié. Media coverage, particularly in the press, was extensive. Reaction to the case has precipitated major reforms across social work at all levels. In this article, I argue that these events need to be understood through critical analysis of the political, ideological and symbolic dimensions of the reaction to Baby P's death. I show that recent developments in critical moral panic theory are useful in providing the basis for such an analysis – particularly the idea of moral panic as ‘an extreme risk discourse’ linked to processes of moral regulation, and as an extreme form of othering. I draw on research involving the qualitative document analysis of press reports about Baby P that were published during the first week of media coverage in November 2008, following the criminal conviction of his killers and the lifting of reporting restrictions. I show how the reaction to the brutality of Baby P's death also reflected deep anxieties about ‘new’ class formations in contemporary Britain, specifically the behaviours of an imagined dangerous, contaminating underclass, and involved the assertion of middle-class identities. In its complex and contradictory constructions of social workers in the case as ‘folk devils’, the moral panic over Baby P revisits profound, unresolved moral disturbance about social work's necessary propinquity to the underclass and its capacity for moral regulation and social control.     

Reflection and moral maturity in a nurse's caring practice: a critical perspective

The likelihood of nurse reflection is examined from the theoretical perspectives of Habermas' Theory of Communicative Action and Moral Action and Sumner's Moral Construct of Caring in Nursing as Communicative Action, through a critical social theory lens. The argument is made that until the nurse reaches the developmental level of post‐conventional moral maturity and/or Benner's Stage 5: expert, he or she is not capable of being inwardly directed reflective on self. The three developmental levels of moral maturity and Benner's stages are presented with discussion on whether or not there can be self‐reflection because of an innate vulnerability that leads to self‐protective behaviours. It is only when the confidence from mastery of practice has been achieved can the nurse be comfortable with reflection that enables him or her to become enlightened, emancipated, and empowered. The influences and constraints of the knowledge power between nurse and patient are acknowledged. The power hierarchy of the institution is recognized as constraining.     

Saviours and satyrs: ambivalence in narrative meanings of sperm provision

This paper reports on the complex representations of sperm providers in the narratives of donors, recipients and offspring involved in donor‐assisted conception. Eighty‐seven volunteers from Australia, Canada, UK, USA and Argentina participated in qualitative narrative research. Sperm provision was perceived to be publicly represented as sexualized, provoking both disgust and hilarity; this is interpreted as arising from its association with masturbation and the metaphorical representation of the donor sperm as cuckolding the recipient's husband. Recipients' representations of providers were found to mix gratitude with resentment, embarrassment, and anxiety; their constructions are strongly influenced by the position of the social father. The complex representation of the provider as a genetic father is considered: providers can be seen as threatening the integrity of parents if they become involved in the life of their offspring and abandoning their offspring to confusion and despair if they do not. The research demonstrates that, in spite of its relative frequency and familiarity, donor insemination is still represented ambivalently, including by those who may be said to benefit from it.     

ILLUMINATING SOCIAL DETERMINANTS OF WOMEN'S HEALTH USING GROUNDED THEORY

Emphasis in health policy has shifted from curative intervention to prevention and health promotion through personal responsibility for lifestyle choices and, most recently, to the social determination of health. These shifts draw attention to and legitimize women's health research that moves beyond biomedical, epidemiological, and subjective knowledge to question previously unquestioned societal norms and structures that influence women's health. The challenge is to avoid relying solely on population-based studies that support relationships between social determinants and indicators of women's health and to find ways to illuminate the processes by which social determinants interact with the health of specific groups of women. Without such research, our knowledge of how social factors that underpin women's health interact will be faceless and will not address the interplay of health and social policy within women's lives. One research method that may be useful for exploring the interplay between such policies and women's health is grounded theory. Grounded theory is a widely used approach in women's health research. The goal of grounded theory is the discovery of dominant social and structural processes that account for most of the variation in behavior in a particular situation. Despite the usefulness of this method for capturing the interaction between social conditions and women's health experiences, many grounded theory researchers restrict themselves to women's subjective experiences as a source of data for theory development. Consequently, the resultant theory's capacity to illuminate the effects of the social determinants of health is limited. The purpose of this article is to discuss how the grounded theory method can be used in a participatory way to theoretically sample structural conditions at many levels. Using examples from completed and ongoing women's health research where data have and have not been collected primarily from women themselves, we outline the benefits and process for using grounded theory to influence health and public policy in women's health.     

Play and theory of mind in early childhood: a Hong Kong perspective

The study seeks to understand the relation between preschool children's mode of participation and negotiation strategies during play and their theory of mind (ToM) development in the Hong Kong context. Forty-two 5-year-old children were recruited. Their emotional and cognitive ToMs were assessed along with expressive language ability. Children's play was observed twice in naturalistic and laboratory settings. Parents completed a questionnaire on their child's emotional and cognitive ToM development, including demographic information and social economic status indexes. The results showed that 5-year-old Hong Kong children mostly engaged in associative and cooperative play and employed two-way, reciprocal strategies in their play. Parent report of emotional ToM predicted children's play strategy in both naturalistic and laboratory settings. Child measure of cognitive ToM predicted their play strategy in the laboratory setting. The study advocates more play time in kindergarten in order to foster an empathetic generation.     

Dangerous knowledge vs. dangerous ignorance: Risk narratives on sex education in the Russian press

The paper is devoted to analysis of the debates on sex education in the Russian press. ‘Risk narrative structure’ of media articles on sex education was determined. This structure represents a system of mutually constituting elements, which include object of risk, risks themselves, solutions to their prevention, solutions opponents, and type of society these solutions presuppose. It is argued that analysis of risks with the aid of ‘risk narrative structures’ can be a useful development of sociocultural theory of risk, as competing risk narratives can be fully grasped only when considered not as discrete claims about different ‘risks’ but as coherent systems of interrelated meanings. On the basis of this structure, competent risk media narratives of proponents and opponents of sex education were reconstructed. In these narratives different definitions of ‘children’ as objects of risk were constructed, and so were types of risks, and types of society. It would be oversimplifying to consider debates on sex education as a battle of ‘enlightened rationality’ against ‘dark irrationality.’ In each risk narrative the solution (introduction or ban of sex education) is a logically following element in the respective risk narrative. While sex education advocates were concerned about negative consequences of children's sexual behaviour and defence of the ‘civilised society's moral boundaries, the opposite side was concerned about retaining children's moral purity and defence of ‘traditional’ moral boundaries.     

Moral work in women's narratives of breastfeeding

Women's narratives of their breastfeeding experiences are sites of construction and reconstruction of self as they undertake moral work in relation to feeding their baby. We engaged Foucault's ‘technologies of the self’ and his notion of ethics (the relationship with self) to examine that moral work (individual actions rather than adherence to universal moral codes) in relation to women's subjectivity constructed in interviews with 49 women from the UK. Four categories of moral work were identified: biographical preservation, biographical repair, altruism and political action. We describe each of these and conclude that women's embodied experience and sense of self are disciplined within current, limited, often punishing discourses by undertaking painful moral work in order to maintain or repair their subjective positions. We suggest the development of new subject positions around infant feeding practices.     

Conceptualizing Prenatal Care: Recent Research and the Application of Tae-Kyo,Korean Traditional Beliefs and Practices

The value of prenatal care has long been recognized by various cultures. The author's purpose in this article is to propose a framework to conceptualize prenatal care using the traditional Korean practice of prenatal care called Tae-Kyo, which means education for the fetus. The philosophy of Tae-Kyo shows the importance of children's development from the very beginning of life and indicates the moral and social responsibilities of pregnant women, family members, and communities in delivering healthy babies. This comprehensive view implies a framework for conceptualizing prenatal care that encompasses multidimensional aspects of prenatal care.     

留守儿童感戴与其领悟社会支持生活满意度的关系

目的考察留守儿童感戴与其领悟社会支持、生活满意度的关系,以期为提升留守儿童生活满意度,进而增进其心理健康水平提供实证依据和支持。方法采用感戴量表、领悟社会支持量表和生活满意度量表对333名留守儿童进行调查。结果留守儿童感戴、领悟社会支持(PSSS)与其生活满意度均显著正相关(r1=0.165,P0.01;r2=0.260,P0.001),领悟社会支持在留守儿童感戴与其生活满意度的关系间起着完全中介作用。结论感戴对留守儿童生活满意度具有显著的促进作用,而这一作用是通过领悟社会支持起作用的。     

Prosocial norms as a positive youth development construct: conceptual bases and implications for curriculum development

Prosocial norms are clear, healthy, ethical standards, beliefs, and behavior guidelines that promote prosocial behavior and minimize health risks. The promotion of prosocial norms like altruism, solidarity, and volunteerism is an important aspect of positive youth development programs. From the literature, it is evident that a prosocial orientation is encouraged in traditional Chinese philosophy. Longitudinal studies have shown that prosocial behavior increases gradually over adolescence, and that the development of prosocial behavior is closely linked to the development of moral reasoning, perspective taking, and regulation of personal distress. It is noteworthy that females have a higher prosocial orientation than males, and peer influence could be a major mediating factor of interventions to foster prosocial norms and behavior during adolescence. This review also analyzes the mechanism underlying prosocial behavior using the cost-reward model, social cognitive theory, and stages of moral development. Role modeling, social reinforcements and evaluations, discussion of moral dilemmas, empathy skills training, and foot-in-the-door procedures are identified as useful strategies for fostering prosocial norms and behavior.     

Promoting Preschoolers' Moral Reasoning

Young children's moral development and socialization have been of increasing interest to parents, teachers, and researchers as children's social experiences in the preschool years have expanded to include many nonfamilial adults and peers. A Piagetian or structural approach to understanding heteronomous and autonomous moral reasoning in young children is discussed. The roles of cognitive maturation and social interaction with peers and adults are considered. Implications from theory and research are offered to early childhood educators for facilitating preschool children's moral reasoning and development through curriculum activities, classroom policies, and behavior management strategies.     

心理健康教育与德育教育的相关性研究

心理健康教育作用越来越受到人们的重视。然而,心理健康教育能否取代传统的德育教育,在学生成长中人格与品德的关系是怎样的,心理健康教育与德育教育工作究竟有什么异同之处,他们之间关系如何,这些都是心理健康教育和德育教育工作者提高工作的科学性和有效性必须明确的问题。文章对上述问题作了理论上的探讨和研究,希望能对当前的心理健康教育与德育教育工作起到一定的指导作用。     

The social utility of community treatment orders: Applying Girard’s mimetic theory to community‐based mandated mental health care

Serious mental illness (SMI) has long posed a dilemma to society. The use of community treatment orders (CTOs), a legal means by which to deliver mandated psychiatric treatment to individuals while they live in the community, is a contemporary technique for managing SMI. CTOs (or a similar legal mechanism) are used in every province in Canada and in many jurisdictions around the world in the care and management of clients with severe and persistent mental illness (most frequently schizophrenia) who have a history of treatment non‐compliance and subsequent relapse. Although there is ongoing controversy around CTOs, their use continues to be on the rise. René Girard's mimetic theory, in which he posits the social utility of the scapegoat mechanism, may shed some light on how established cultural patterns contribute to contemporary responses to SMI: how culture depends on the reproduction of certain narratives, and how these act to shape the identity of those involved. The CTO specifically can be seen to act as a scapegoating mechanism, wherein, by singling out and controlling individuals who appear to threaten social order, social order is restored. This paper reviews Girard's theory, looks at how it has been applied to SMI, and then considers how it may illuminate the social role of the CTO. This examination may provide mental health nurses with insight into the constructed identities of their patients, as well as the role of mental health care within broader cultural narratives.     

Developing preschoolers' social skills through cross-cultural physical education intervention

The purpose of this study was to investigate the changes in children's social skills after their participation in a physical education programme named ESPEC (‘Early Steps’ Physical Education Curriculum). The evaluators of the children's social skills were the trained educators who implemented the curriculum as well as parents of the participating children. This study was conducted in three European countries and was part of a European transnational project. The participants were 286 preschoolers from Cyprus, Greece and Italy. Twelve educators and 286 parents completed the ‘Social Behaviour Instrument’ (SBI) before and after the implementation of the ESPEC. This four months’ physical education curriculum was designed for preschool-aged children and it included 24 lesson units. The results showed an improvement in children's social skills after ESPEC implementation in all three countries. It can be concluded that the implementation of physical education activities for preschool-aged children can be a way to improve preschoolers' social skills.     

ParentLink: A Model of Integration and Support for Parents*

ParentLink represents a collective of Missouri organizations and agencies striving to simplify parents' access to research‐based information, services, and problem‐solving support pertaining to parenting. It is based on systems theory ( von Bertalanffy, 1981 ) and, more specifically, the ecology of human development ( Bronfenbrenner, 1979 ). A comprehensive array of technologies augments ParentLink professionals' outreach to parents and other citizenry. For parents, the access can be as simple as a telephone call to ParentLink's WarmLine professionals. Other doorways for information and support include ParentLink's Web site, other Web applications, media campaigns, and forthcoming neighborhood‐based Parenting Corners. Information gathered from parents and communities about parenting issues will in turn shape future programs and policies.     

When it’s good to be a bad nurse: expanding risk orders theory to explore nurses’ experiences of moral,social and identity risks in obstetrics units

Discourses about health risks can have major implications for individuals and cultures. In this article, we use risk orders theory to examine nurses’ perceptions of patient safety risk in Obstetrics departments of US hospitals. According to risk orders theory, risk discourses can create social worlds that have the capacity to threaten individuals’ social bonds, identity and moral character, and the imaginative potential of entire cultures. Risk orders theory proposes three orders of risk. First-order risks are constructed from claims about tangible dangers that individuals believe result from their actions or inactions. Second-order risks are threats experienced by individuals because of communication about first-order risk, including threats to social relationships or social risks, and threats to the sense of moral character or moral risk. Third-order risks are threats to collective agency and imagination underpinning shared culture. In this article, we draw on data from a survey of obstetric nurses who attended the Association of Women’s Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses conference in 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada. We use a qualitative thematic analysis of 131 obstetrics nurses’ narrative responses on a critical incident survey to refine theoretical constructs of risk orders theory. We identified a third type of second-order risk, identity risks, or threats to the sense of self. We also identified three types of third-order risks: agency-constraining risks threaten members of a culture’s ability to act freely; agent-constraining risks threaten cultural members’ ability to define themselves freely; double-binding risks threaten their ability to make choices freely. We found that second-order and third-order risks did threaten some obstetrics nurses’ social bonds, identity as a nurse, moral character and imaginative potential.