Identity, Religion, and the State: Haredi Politics and Social Change in Israel

This thesis is about religion and the state. The ethnography is based on fieldwork conducted in Israel with Haredi (ultra-orthodox) women, mainly in the performing arts community and in the women’s rights activist groups. The thesis demonstrates that Haredi identity formed as a resistance to secularising forces, and through negotiations with secular power structures and the state became an entwined political-religious identity. I argue that through constant negotiations of religious ethics with secular values and the state of Israel, Haredim are picking apart their political identities from their religious ethics, and these choices insinuate implications for the nature of the role of religion and Jewish identity in the state of Israel in the future. I place women at the centre of this negotiation, and attribute much of these changes to the agency of Haredi women, with a wealth of ethnographic examples. This thesis contributes to understandings of the relationship between the secular state and religion by suggesting that the state may expect a specific type of religious citizen, and that in order for religious minorities like Haredim to resist the state, more stringent observance is produced. I suggest that not only are religious citizens capable of critique, that they critique the state through religious choices, and critique their own societies in ways which are designed to produce more resilient forms of religious ethics and community. The agency which is used is pious in its ethics, but it allows for the inclusion of certain secular forms of knowledge in order to bolster religious life. The thesis also offers an exploration of religious women’s feminism which applies liberal secular feminist goals to parts of life outside the direct dictates of religion, and in doing so curtails the authority of patriarchal religious leaders in a religiously ethical way. Furthermore, this thesis explores the experiences and contributions of Sephardi and Mizrahi Haredim, and discusses them as central to political and social change in the Haredi world

The patterns and predictors of disease disclosure by patients with cancer

Previous qualitative research has identified that disclosing a diagnosis to loved ones, is one of the hardest aspects of having cancer (Hilton et al, 2009). Although there is an extensive literature on disclosure of general information about the self, less is known about the extent to which people go on to talk about their diagnosis and the helpfulness of such disclosure within the specific context of cancer. Therefore the current study aimed to quantify disclosure patterns by measuring the degree of disclosure as well as the perceived helpfulness of disclosure. It also sought to determine the factors associated with disclosure and helpfulness of disclosure. The study was a cross-sectional postal questionnaire survey of 120 patients who had recently received a diagnosis of either lung, colorectal or skin cancer. Results indicated that the majority of patients disclosed to a variety of social targets, and most found it helpful to disclose. ‗Dispositional openness‘ and ‗perceived social support‘ were found to predict the extent of disclosure, as well as the helpfulness of disclosure. The results suggest that individual differences and situational factors may impact on disclosure and that medical professionals may play an important role in the disclosure process. With reference to the limitations, directions for future research are discussed, as well as the implications for clinical practice

Distinguishing the dark triad: evidence from the five-factor model and the Hogan Development Survey

The Dark Triad consists of Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and Psychopathy. The aim was to add to the evidence for their differential validity. A battery including the Hogan Development Survey, the IPIP Big 5 and measures of Empathy, Aggression and the Dark Triad was administered to 241 undergraduate psychology participants at an Australian university. Multivariate regression indicated that the Dark Triad shared significant predictors and the Five Factor Model facets failed to clearly distinguish between them. The results of a principal components analysis indicated considerable overlap among the constructs. Overall, limited evidence for the differential construct validity of the Dark Triad of personality was found. Implications for the psychometric properties of some dominant paradigms in personality research, and applications in organisational settings, are discussed

Physician and Parental Decision—Making Prior to Acute Medical Paediatric Admission

Supplementary Materials: The following are available online at http://www.mdpi.com/2227-9032/6/3/117/s1, Table S1: characteristics of referring clinicians, Table S2: characteristics of receiving clinicians, Table S3: characteristics of parents/caregivers and their child. Funding: This research received no external funding. Acknowledgments: The authors are grateful to the participants for their time.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Development and Initial Validation of the O&M VISSIT for Orientation and Mobility Specialists to Determine Service Intensity

The purpose of this study was to provide initial validation of the Orientation & Mobility Visual Impairment Scale of Service Intensity of Texas (O&M VISSIT) intended for use by orientation and mobility (O&M) specialists to determine a recommended type and amount of O&M services for students on their caseloads based on each student’s identified needs. The validity and reliability of the scale were calculated using a mixed-methods survey research design, with purposive expert sampling. The O&M VISSIT was found to be significantly valid in social and content validity and moderately valid in consequential validity. The O&M VISSIT is a moderately reliable tool to assist determine the appropriate type and amount of O&M services for all students on the O&M specialist’s caseload

ANTIGEN-SPECIFIC T-CELL FACTOR IN CELL COOPERATION: PHYSICAL PROPERTIES AND MAPPING IN THE LEFT-HAND (K) HALF OF H-2

Mouse thymus cells, educated to poly(tyrosyl,glutamyl)-polyDLalanyl--polylysyl [(T,G)-A--L], release an antigen-specific factor on brief culture in vitro. The factor cooperates with bone marrow cells in the antibody response to (T,G)-A--L in irradiated recipients. Its mol wt determined from Sephadex G100 chromatography is in the region of 50,000. The factor is removed by specific antigen-coated columns, but not by anti-immunoglobulin (anti-Fab, anti-µ, anti-Fv) adsorbents. The factor is removed by alloantisera directed against the H-2 haplotype of the strain in which it is produced. Moreover, only antisera with specificity for the K side of H-2 were successful in removing the factor activity

Editorial: From Pedagogic Research to Embedded E-Learning

This Special Issue of Reflecting Education arises from the work of the PREEL project (From Pedagogic Research to Embedded e-Learning) at the Institute of Education from 2006-2008. This project was one of nine HEA/JISC (Higher Education Academy and Joint Information Systems Committee) Pilot Pathfinder Projects and followed on from our involvement in the Pilot Benchmarking of e-Learning Programme. In the benchmarking exercise we identified a lack of coordination between research and practice in e-learning at the IoE as one of our crucial weaknesses, and so our Pilot Pathfinder project concentrated on this theme of building links between e-learning research and practice