Behavioral Science and Psychology

This volume provides a multi-disciplinary perspective on grit, its measurement, manifestation and development. Specifically, it provides a comprehensive and balanced response to critiques associated with the construct within the contemporary positive psychological literature. These critiques revolve around the lack of consensus in the conceptualisation, measurement, and management of grit, as well as consensus on its difference from other psychological constructs such as conscientiousness, diligence or determination. Therefore, this volume thoroughly reappraises and consolidates the nature, function, measurement and implications of grit in order to effectively advance the science of achievement. It looks at grit scales developed in various countries and evaluates the concept in various aspects of life, from work performance to sports. Written by a team of multi-disciplinary experts in fields ranging from neuroscience, sociology, and education to human resource management and psychology, this volume firmly positions grit within the discipline of positive psychology’s nomological lexicon.

In the last decade, a great variety and volume of scholarly work has appeared on mind-wandering, a mental process involving a vast range of human life, connected with “first-person perspective” and “personhood”, submental thinking, mental autonomy, etc. While different and emerging features that flow into and out of one another (second field, mental travel, visual imagery, inner speech, unspecific memory, autobiographical memory, fantasies, introspection, etc.) and negative and positive approaches seem to describe mind-wandering, we offer an interdisciplinary theoretical and empirically informed and informative overview on mind-wandering studies and methodologies oriented toward the educational field. The aim is to transform and enrich the debate on mind-wandering but also to show how theoretical arguments and research findings could inform the teaching-learning context.

This groundbreaking book, moves along three representations of developed scientific knowledge: imaginary lines, circles and spirals. The first section, “The Lines”, develops new lines of inquiry on attention (selective and sustained) and mind-wandering, the influence of age and mind-wandering, embodiment, consciousness and experience and mind-wandering. In the second section, the “Circles”, groups of Chapters on the same topic, methodology (tasks and measurement), intervention (auditory beat stimulation and mindfulness practices) and creativity, recreate a dance of interacting parts in which there are always profitable, decisive and retroactive exchanges between the information that each group or author activates. The last section, “The Spirals”, critically discusses the absence of a unified theoretical perspective, in the pedagogical field, attentive both to the processes of emergence and the interactions between parts. 

Child sexual abuse (CSA) is believed to affect one in eight children worldwide (UNICEF, 2020). This authoritative book challenges widely-held problematic beliefs about CSA and discusses societal responses and attitudes to survivors. It brings together multidisciplinary expertise from key researchers and practitioners around the world to better understand CSA in Black and racially minoritised communities and to provide recommendations for improving legal, policy and practical responses. It provides an international overview, covering theory, practice and policy and action-oriented research to determine how countries can individually and collectively work to prevent CSA with specific, vulnerable groups and in general. It also examines how intersectional marginalisation affects experiences of, and responses to, CSA. 

This essential body of work is thoroughly researched and includes first hand testimony which will deepen the understanding of students, academics, policy-makersand professionals including social workers, service staff and activists working at the frontline.

Chapter 7 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

Topics featured in this book include:

• Definition and conceptualization of family.
• Definition and measurement of as well as risk factors for family violence.
• Family violence in various traditional and nontraditional families.
• Prevention strategies as well as Individual and family treatments for perpetrators and victims of family violence.
• Social policy and legal interventions for family violence.

In some criminal cases, it is a difficult challenge to find out what happened. Fact finders will rely on different approaches ranging from intuitive heuristics to scientific insights. With 11 real cases, this book illustrates how professional judges evaluate criminal evidence. Moreover, the legal psychological approach to the same evidence is discussed, as the author served as a psychological expert witness in these cases. Targeted pieces of evidence and related topics include:

•Eyewitness identification

•Eyewitness testimony

•Confession evidence

•Deception

•Memory flaws

•Legal decision making

It is a must-read for practitioners and graduate students in criminal law, forensic psychology, and legal psychology.

The book provides a thorough investigation and overview of the decision making process that individuals may (or may not) go through when proceeding to commit a crime. Drawing on interviews with real offenders and conducted in a novel way, this book includes quotes throughout which make their decision making and emotional processes relatable to the reader. It examines a range of offences from petty theft to murder and includes both male and female offenders. Based on various iterations of the rational choice theories of crime, this book examines the relevance of these theories in real offending situations and the influence of emotion and context on these decisions. Finally, it explores how understanding the decision making process of committing offences can inform criminal justice practice. 

• Sexual violence.
• Domestic violence.
• Intimate partner violence.
• Media Misogyny.
  
• Online trolling.
• Discrimination.
• Sex trafficking and modern slavery.
• Preventative Measures and role of men.
  

International Perspectives on Gender-Based Violence is an essential resource for researchers, clinicians/therapists, and upper-level undergraduate and graduate students in developmental psychology, family policy, forensic psychology, human rights, public health, criminology/criminal justice, and clinical social work as well as all interrelated disciplines.

This book compiles the fieldwork experiences of 55 researchers, addressing the challenges, ethical considerations, and methodologies employed to study 30 diverse populations and phenomena within Criminology and Security Studies. This volume contributes to filling a gap in academic literature by highlighting the often unspoken realities and intricacies of fieldwork.

The book is systematically structured into five thematic sections: The Powerful, The Invisible, The Vulnerable, The Violent, and The Cyber. These categories encompass various aspects and dimensions of fieldwork, including managing emotional distress, negotiating access through gatekeepers, ensuring the protection of informants, and exercising discretion in navigating sensitive issues.

As a scholarly resource, this book is invaluable for academics, practitioners, and students involved in criminology, security studies, anthropology, sociology, and political science. By offering in-depth reflections and insights, this volume enhances the reader’s understanding of the nuances of fieldwork, and informs the development of robust and ethical research practices.

For peace advocates a corollary to Clausewitz’s dictum that “war is politics by other means” might be that other politics could prevent war. By highlighting both individual peace advocates and antiwar/peace organizations from World War I through the wars of the 21st century, the chapters will provide insights into how these individuals and organizations articulated their opposition to and mobilized against specific wars and international/regional conflicts. Organized roughly in chronological order, each chapter will illuminate the socio-historical conditions under which such peace advocacy contested state aggression and armed combat at the national and/or transnational levels. Beyond understanding the specific socio-historical circumstances within which these antiwar and peace advocates and organizations operated and their resultant achievements and failures, the book as a whole will examine the kind of politics that perpetuate war and those that offer a challenge to that perpetuation. Scholars, students, and the general public interested in the history of modern and contemporary wars, peace and conflict studies, and ethical/political perspectives in the 20th and 21st centuries should find much to reflect upon in this book.

This book presents research conducted with children and young people about online harms, with a UK focus, while aiming to stimulate comparative analyses of other countries too. While the chapters vary in how data-driven they are, each will explore conceptualisations of online harm, children and young people’s experiences of online harms, and their perspectives on interventions to educate about and address online harms. While the UK government claimed in 2019 to be introducing ‘tough new measures to make the UK the safest place to be online’, it has been noted that there may be a limited capacity for formal legislation to address the complexities of contemporary digital life for children and young people; instead, tackling online harms has to be part of a broader agenda and must account for the diverse and socially contingent nature of children's and young people’s experiences online, as evidenced by extensive research undertaken with children and young people. 

With the finalisation of legislation surrounding online harms in the UK imminent, the objective of this collection is to shape the implementation of policy in practice settings. To support practice development, the book offers vignette-style pieces that will describe examples of policy and practice models and how these models can support children's and young people’s active participation in understanding online harms. As a result of this, the findings of this book will minimise the disparity between the practice, policy and research through speaking to the interface between these fields in the UK context.

This book investigates the complex interrelationships between neuroscience, arts, technical design, and the spectrum of neurodivergent conditions, introducing the emerging topic of neuroarts. It emphasizes the power of art and technologies as a multisensory tool for helping neurodivergent individuals discover their sensory preferences, and for neurotypical individuals to broaden their understanding of the world by simulating different sensory experiences. Drawing on the enactivism theory, which posits that cognitive processes are inherently shaped through the dynamic interplay between an organism and its environmental context, the authors discuss the applications of emerging technologies and propose a new theory to discuss and identify ‘neurotribes’ based on their relation to sense making or the body.
A timely and well-needed resource for scholars in the fields of neuroaesthetics and neurodiversity, as well as art therapists, clinical psychologists, and medical practitioners specializing in neurodiversity and sensory perception disorders, this book can also serve cultural institutions developing inclusive experiences for a neurodiverse public, and professionals in the tech industry focusing on AI, augmented reality, and sensory technology.

This book argues that whenever we are talking about cancel culture, identity politics, political correctness, antisemitism, conspiracy theories, or the alt-Right, we are dealing with a culture war, which often pits two sides against each other in a split world of good and evil. These political representations rely on a set of unconscious processes best understand through psychoanalysis. As this book argues, if you want to comprehend the rhetoric of the Right, the Left, conservatives, and centrists, it is necessary to see how these ideologies rely on unacknowledged defense mechanisms, fantasies, fears, and desires.  In fact, if we do not employ psychoanalytic concepts to examine our political investments, we will be unable to get to the root causes driving these social productions. Each chapter of this book looks at a specific writer‘s or politician’s take on contemporary culture wars. One of the reoccurring themes concerns the way free speech has been weaponized by different ideological formations, and this battle over free expression is often centered on the role that universities play in balancing the demands among competing social interests. This book will not only clarify what universities should be, but it will also help us to move beyond our polarized political world.

This open access handbook synthesizes the current research about the impacts of digital media on children across development. Drawing on the expertise of scientists and researchers as well as clinicians and practitioners, the book summarizes research through interdisciplinary expert reviews. First, it addresses the cognitive, physical, mental, and psychosocial impacts on infants, children, and adolescents. Next, the book explores how media influences relationships, family, culture, and society. Finally, it examines the impacts of specific digital domains pertinent to youth, including education technology, video gaming, and emerging technologies. Chapters employ a parallel structure, including background on the topic, summary of the current state of the research, future research directions, and recommendations for relevant stakeholders. The volume examines the timely issue of optimal child development in an increasingly digital age, offering innovative approaches to establish a solid and robust scientific foundation for this field of study as well as evidence-based action for adults who support positive youth development.

Key areas of coverage include:

• Cognition and brain development.

• Physical and mental health.

• Problematic uses of the internet.

• Race.

• Gender and sexuality.

• Parenting in the digital age.

• Cyberbullying and digital cruelty.

• Media policy.

The Handbook of Children and Screens is a must-have resource for researchers, professors, and graduate students as well as clinicians, therapists, educators, and related professionals in clinical child, school, and developmental psychology, social work, public health, epidemiology, neuroscience, human development and family studies, social psychology, sociology, and communication.

This is an open access book.

This interdisciplinary volume addresses the progress made regarding mental illness stigma in the realm of higher education while acknowledging how stigma has transformed to present more subtle challenges in this context and how it may be addressed to promote positive campus outcomes. Written by researchers and practitioners who represent

different fields within higher education, it highlights the existence of stigma by focusing on its presence in the curriculum, in policies, and in processes within the university. It discusses both the presence and impact of stigma in undergraduate and graduate studies, athletics, and faculty and staff. The book emphasizes a collaborative approach to involve stakeholder groups across campus by providing practical, preemptive solutions to reduce stigma. This volume can be used as a practical guide for any institution of higher education

wishing to address mental illness stigma on their campus in a strategic, systemic manner. Additionally,it will be helpful for individuals working in higher education as a guide for reflecting on and changing their individual practice.

This book greatly appeals to those who are interested in addressing mental illness stigma systemically.

This handbook provides an accessible and thought-provoking guide to the Meaning of the Child Interview (MotC), a tool for understanding family relationships. It is edited and written by the MotC’s developer, with contributions from leading researchers and practitioners using the MotC in innovative contexts to support families. The MotC uses a semi-structured interview in which parents talk about their child, their relationship with their child, and their parenting. A process of analysis is outlined, including using the method to plan intervention, guide practice, and conduct research. This book offers a practical guide to applying attachment and caregiving research for child welfare and mental health professionals. Prior knowledge is not assumed, and many examples and summaries are used to assist the reader. By focussing upon how parents story their experience, and their child’s, in the context of ongoing challenges, this book facilitates practice based on understanding struggling parenting as a relationship situated in adversity, rather than an individual failing, worthy of blame.