Journal of Social Issues最新文献

Lowering barriers between polarized groups and the identity silos they inhabit can be challenging in times of crisis and uncertainty. This article overviews uncertainty-identity theory’s analysis of the motivational role played by self-uncertainty in group identification and group/intergroup behavior, and focuses on how self-uncertainty can motivate zealous identification with “extremist” groups and identities. People need a clear sense of who they are to understand the world and their place within it, and to plan action and anticipate others’ behavior. They strive to reduce self-uncertainty, and can achieve this by identifying with distinctive groups that have unambiguously defined social identities. Tumultuous social change can create identity threat, self-uncertainty, and alienation from and marginalization in society. To reduce self-uncertainty people zealously identify with ethnocentric, populist and xenophobic groups that are intolerant of dissent and have autocratic leaders—effectively building identity silos and walls between hyper-polarized groups. Under these circumstances breaking down walls to reconcile polarized and hostile groups and identities is a challenge. I close by outlining intergroup leadership theory, and its implications for building harmony between polarized identities—a particular form of leadership and identity messaging plays a key role.

The stigma concept has been tremendously successful one. Before Goffman's influential book only a handful of papers used the term in the abstract or title of a paper—in 2020 there were 3464. While the reason for stigma's dramatic growth is likely over determined two possibilities are suggested. The first is the usefulness that the concept carries for understanding the shame, social awkwardness, rejection, misunderstanding, and exclusion that people frequently experience across so many stigmatizing circumstances. The second is that the complexity of the stigma experience provides an enormous number of research puzzles in need of investigation as there are so many different stigmatizing circumstances that are affected at multiple levels across multiple outcomes. The current special issue addresses this complexity by focusing on the particularly important domain of social relationships but at the same allows complexity in the types of stigmatizing circumstances considered and the levels at which they are investigated. In what might be a model for the stigma field as it faces its tremendous growth, Doyle and Barreto (2023) use the multiple contributions to the special issue to develop thematic questions that will guide future research into stigma and social relationships.

Disclosure of a concealable stigmatized identity is perhaps one of the most difficult obstacles facing individuals who live with “discreditable” attributes. Although previous research suggests that antecedent goals, or the reasons why individuals disclose their stigma to others, have a fundamental influence on disclosure events and their subsequent outcomes, much of this work has focused on the perspective of the discloser, with little attention paid to the perspective of the confidant. The current experiment used the Actor-Partner Interdependence Model to test the hypothesis that more salient compassionate, as opposed to self-image-focused, goals would be associated with more positive disclosure experiences, for both dyad members, as reflected in their self-reports of improved affect, greater interpersonal closeness, reduced anticipated stigma, bolstered social support, and increased trust. Results indicated that, although focusing on compassionate goals during disclosure can foster feelings of interpersonal closeness and perceived trust, prioritizing the needs of one's confidant in conjunction with one's own needs may, at times, have ironic negative effects, including diminished positive affect. Overall, findings highlight the continued need to examine reciprocal influence processes in interpersonal disclosure contexts to better understand when, why, and for whom revealing a concealable stigma will yield benefit, rather than harm.

In this concluding article, the authors use a global, intersectional feminist political economy lens to reconceptualize disaster response policy and practices that center women's lives. They extend this issue's discussion of the COVID-19 pandemic's impact on women's health and safety in ways that have exposed and expanded gender inequalities, and differently for different groups of women, to the discourse of how disaster responses have not only failed women, but have also been used opportunistically by elites to enhance racial and gendered capitalism. In the first half of the article, the authors discuss how the previous feminist literature on the gendering of disasters, with important exceptions, largely misses a critique of the ways the crisis of neoliberalism and the role of racial and gendered global capitalism sets the stage for women to be targets for disaster opportunism. At the same time, critical scholars who have taken on the analysis of disaster capitalism often ignore the well-established feminist social science on disasters. In the second half of the article, the authors bridge these two literatures and provide an intersectional gendered analysis of what they call the political economy of “racialized patriarchal disaster capitalism” as applied to select cases from the COVID crisis as illustrations. Finally, the authors discuss the theoretical implications of their analysis for feminist conceptualizations of disaster opportunism, as well as practical implications for global public health advocates, policy makers, NGOs, and feminist health activists.

The dual pandemic (racial discrimination and COVID-19) has contributed to mental health disparities across various social identities. Black mothers, in particular, have shouldered the heightened stresses of being Black and female during a time of immense anti-Black racism and societal pressures to assume caretaking roles at the expense of, or in addition to, other financial obligations. Thus, this study examines the relationship between COVID-19 related financial difficulties, racial discrimination, and the protective role of stable income on Black mothers’ (N = 949) mental wellbeing (i.e., anxiety, depression, loneliness, and stress). Using regression analyses, we find that financial difficulties and experiences of racial discrimination along with related concerns for children are associated with higher rates of anxiety, depression, loneliness, and stress. Moderation analyses suggest that at the highest level of financial difficulties, stable income can serve as a protective factor for anxiety. However, the study found no significant interactions between financial difficulties and experiences of racial discrimination or related concern for children. Implications for short-and long-term social policies are discussed.

We propose that individuals low (vs. high) in socioeconomic status (SES) are vulnerable to impaired relationship functioning through two different mutually reinforcing paths that both directly implicate perceptions of control and relational devaluation. The first of these involves chronic exposure to relational devaluation as a function of factors such as stigmatization in broader society that serves to undermine low SES individuals’ perceptions of control. The second involves enhanced reactivity to relationally devaluing experiences such as discrimination and ostracism as a function of this limited reserve of perceived control. We present a perceived control-relationally devaluing experiences model of low SES vulnerability to impaired relationship functioning that incorporates these predictions and further specifies how low SES individuals’ reduced perceptions of control may help account for documented associations between low SES and negative interpersonal outcomes such as hostility, aggression, and reduced relationship quality. We conclude by considering implications for intervention as well as potential alternative and complementary mechanisms.

Research on the relational effects of stigma must move beyond the intergroup context and, most importantly, focus upon the ways in which stigma itself shapes social relationships. In order to more deeply investigate the relational consequences of social stigma, researchers interested in this topic need to consider the potential contributions of relationship science. Drawing upon past theory, we pose four overarching questions that may help bridge research on social stigma with relationship science: (1) What types of relationships are relevant to understanding the social consequences of stigma? (2) How do relationships operate when partners are faced with social stigma? (3) What psychosocial tendencies do people whose identities are stigmatized bring to their relationships? (4) How does the broader social context affect relationships for members of stigmatized groups? We also consider methodological advances from relationship science, broadly defined, that may progress research in this area. Finally, we highlight the importance of eliminating discriminatory policy as well as introducing policy aimed at remediating social inequalities to ensuring equity in social health between members of stigmatized and dominant groups. It is our aim to point toward a framework for scholars to further push the boundaries in understanding the social consequences of stigma.

Sexual harassment is a serious and widespread social issue affecting numerous young people across the globe. Sexual harassment is prevalent in many everyday situations and contexts, not least in school. In recent years, public discussions emerging from the seminal #MeToomovement, have put the adversities of sexual harassment in the academic spotlight. This special issue presents cutting-edge research on sexual harassment among young people from international scholars spanning a variety of perspectives, methodological approaches, and demographic samples. The special issue organizes the individual contributions into four sections, focusing on (1) developmental aspects on sexual harassment, (2) contexts of sexual harassment, (3) sexual harassment among diverse groups of young people, and (4) policies and legislation around sexual harassment. All contributions outline social policy and social intervention implications of their findings. Hopefully, the special issue will inspire future efforts to study and combat sexual harassment among young people.

This paper explores findings from a study with 150 young people (aged 12-21) across England, which employed qualitative focus groups and arts-based methods to investigate young people's experiences of digital image-sharing practices. In this paper, we explore how gendered pressures to send nudes experienced by girls is a form of Image-Based Sexual Harassment (IBSH) and how pressures upon boys to secure nudes and prove they have them by sharing them non-consensually is Image-Based Sexual Abuse (IBSA). In addition, we argue boys’ sending nudes (dick pics) non-consensually is a form of image based sexual harassment, which can be compounded by harassment of girls to send nudes back. We look at the gendered nature of combined practices of Image-Based Sexual Harassment and Abuse (IBSHA) and how sexual double standards create sexual shaming and victim blaming for girls who experience IBSHA. We also explore young people's perspectives on their digital sex and relationship education and their suggestions for improvement. We conclude by arguing that schooling policies and practices would benefit from adopting the conceptual framework of IBSHA. We suggest this would be a good first step in better supporting young people in managing and negotiating digital gendered and sexualized consent, harms, and risks.

Same-sex couples continue to experience social stigma, which can have negative consequences for the quality of their relationships. The current study combined minority stress theory with closeness discrepancy theory in an examination of how the production of disjunctures between actual and ideal experiences of closeness (i.e., closeness discrepancies) accounts for an indirect association between stigma and relationship quality. Data were obtained from a longitudinal study of same-sex couples in the United States who were surveyed twice, 1 year apart (N = 552 individuals, 276 couples). Participants completed measures of stigma, closeness discrepancies, and relationship satisfaction (as an outcome of relationship quality) at each Wave. Results from Actor Partner Interdependence Models demonstrated that increases in experiences of stigma over 1 year were associated with increases in closeness discrepancies, which were, in turn, associated with decreases in relationship satisfaction. This indirect pathway was observed for the association between stigma and one's own relationship satisfaction, but not with one's partner's relationship satisfaction. This research extends previous research on stigma and relational well-being among same-sex couples by offering a potential explanation for how stigma “gets in between” partners in same-sex couples thereby diminishing the quality of their romantic relationships.