Teaching and learning guide for: Imagined intergroup contact: Theory, paradigm, and practice

A goal shared enthusiastically amongst many social psychologists is the improvement of intergroup relations. Conflict between groups is usually related to distinct, and in many cases opposing, identities, based on (for example) ethnicity, nationality, and religion, but also gender, age, sexual orientation and political or individual preferences. Our research has developed a new intervention for improving intergroup relations based on an integration of theory and empirical work on social cognition and intergroup relations. We've called the technique Imagined Contact because it is based on the mental simulation of intergroup contact experiences. Collectively, our research has focused on refining and evaluating imagined contact as an effective tool for the enhancement of intergroup relations. Our article in Social and Personality Psychology Compass provides a summary of the basic theory underlying imagined contact, a review of empirical findings to date, and a framework for developing practical applications of the intervention (in particular as a school-based intervention). We wanted to offer a teaching and learning guide for this article because we believe that the imagined contact task provides a flexible, effective, and easy-to-use tool for teachers, seminar leaders, students, and practitioners. The task can be used as a basis for encouraging more positive and open attitudes towards other groups, a way of preparing people for future intergroup encounters, a stimulus for discussions about the value in experiencing social diversity, and a way of illustrating the power of mental processes in forming and challenging attitudes about others

Families and work: revisiting barriers to employment

"In recent years, considerable effort has been put into supporting parents to make the transition into work. This study was commissioned by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to explore whether these incentives were helping parents to overcome the barriers known to impede their engagement in the formal labour market. The report is based on fieldwork conducted in 2009. However, the concluding chapter considers the significance of the findings in light of proposals for the introduction of the Universal Credit and other reforms of the tax and benefit systems proposed by the Coalition Government." - Page 1

'Watch like a grown up ... Enjoy like a child': Exhibition, authenticity, and film audiences at the Prince Charles Cinema

It is tempting to view the rise of event-led cinema as a symptom of shifting audience preferences – the inevitable result of cinemagoers increasingly seeking out ‘immersive’, ‘participatory’ and ‘experiential’ film screenings. The research presented within this particular article aimed to explore the appeal of such screenings by focusing on audiences at the Prince Charles Cinema (PCC) in London – a venue that is widely known for hosting sing-alongs, quote-alongs, and other participatory events. Our results, however, were surprising. Respondents to our questionnaire readily subscribed to a form of cinephilia that embraces a wide variety of tastes, but largely rejects participatory aspects of event-led cinema in favour of what they deemed to be a more authentic cinematic experience. Audiences repeatedly emphasised the superiority of the silent, reverential film screening, and many felt that the PCC’s greatest quality was the way in which it reminded them of how cinemas used to be, not what they might one day become. Ultimately, the article demonstrates that cinematic events are by no means the only option available to audiences who crave alternatives to ‘mainstream’ cinemas. We call for a reconsideration of the immersive and experiential dimensions of traditional cinemagoing, and a greater emphasis on the viewing conditions that facilitate an affective bond between audience and film. To us, the search for alternative cinema experiences seems to be more about the desire for cinema to get better at what it already does, not for it to change into something entirely different

Young people and UK labour market policy : a critique of "employability" as a tool for understanding youth unemployment

This paper presents a critical analysis of the contemporary policy focus on promoting employability among young people in the UK. Drawing on analysis of UK policy approaches to tackling youth unemployment since the late 1970s, we suggest existing critiques of employability as 'supply-side orthodoxy' fail to capture fully its evolving meaning and function. Under the UK Coalition Government, it became increasingly colonised as a targeted tool of urban governance to legitimise ever more punitive forms of conditional welfare. We argue that this colonisation undermines the value of the notion of employability as an academic tool for understanding the reasons why young people face difficulties in entering the labour market. The paper suggests that the notion of youth transitions offers more potential for understanding youth unemployment, and that more clearly linking this body of research to policy could provide a fruitful avenue for future research. Such a shift requires a longer term, spatially informed perspective as well as greater emphasis on the changing power relations that mediate young people's experiences of wider social and economic transformations. The paper concludes that promoting employment among urban young people requires a marked shift to address the historically and geographically inadequate knowledge and assumptions on which policies are based

Examining the complexity of wellbeing profiles in a large cross-national community sample

The existence of multiple wellbeing indicators reflecting Psychological, Subjective and Social Wellbeing domains is widely reported. However, there is limited examination of the wellbeing profiles individuals report across multiple indicators. The current paper utilises a latent profile framework to examine the extent individuals report different wellbeing profiles. Participants (n = 42, 038) were from the European Social Survey (ESS), a large multi-national study who completed the ESS wellbeing module. Profiles analyses identified no complexity in the experiences of groups of individuals across different wellbeing indicators; individuals who scored high (or low) on one indicator scored high (or low) on the other indicators. Similarly, analysis of higher-order wellbeing dimensions were consistent, no complexity was reported. Different profile classes simply reflected groups of individuals who generally scored at consistent levels across multiple wellbeing indicators