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Purpose: There is a pressing need for substance use services to know more about how to promote recovery from substance use problems, particularly in later life. Psychological sense of community (PSOC) is an important recovery dimension. This study aims to clarify in what ways PSOC and communities influence later life recovery processes. Method: A collaborative and deductive reflexive thematic approach was used to analyse 23 interviews with older adults in recovery from different substance use problems. Results: The findings suggest that PSOC and recovery in later life include multiple communities (relational, geographical, substance use-related, ideal and service-related) and affective states (PSOC and NPSOC). Older adults' recovery, moreover, can be described as personal and heterogenic (with respect to community relationships, individual needs, type of substance use problem, age of onset and meaningful activities). Conclusions: The findings confirm age of onset, type of substance use problem and community memberships as essential to later life recovery. They also supplement prior evidence on community resources and challenges to later life recovery. Importantly, the new findings extend and nuance current understandings of later life recovery. Taken together, the article illustrates MPSOC as a useful concept, with central practical and theoretical implications for later life recovery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The influence of neoliberalism on culture and subjectivity is well documented. This paper contributes to understanding of how neoliberal ideology enters into the production of subjectivity. While subject formation takes place in multiple and contradictory ways and across multiple social sites, we focus on the increasingly popular media discourse of self-development, and examine it as a technology of neoliberal subjectification. Drawing on Foucauldian understandings, we analyze data from two different newspapers from two different national contexts, both of which are heavily influenced by neoliberalism. Based on our analysis, we detail four interrelated discourses—rationality, autonomy and responsibility, entrepreneurship, and positivity and self-confidence—demonstrating how these discourses constitute the neoliberal subject in ways consonant with neoliberal governmentality. There is no observable resistance to subject positions offered within these discourses. Self-development discourse instills stronger individualism in society, while constraining collective identity, and thus provides social control and contributes to preserving status quo of neoliberal societies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

ABSTRACT Group boundaries between immigrant minority and majority members are currently undergoing considerable and complex changes in European multicultural societies due to migration. In this paper, we present a descriptive, longitudinal investigation of the usage of linguistic expressions in Norwegian media discourse that describe symbolic boundary developments between immigrant minority and majority members, and their multicultural context. Seventy-two expressions are analyzed, and three temporal usage patterns are described (increasing, decreasing, and 'mountain') as central to understanding current symbolic boundaries and how they may both frame and be shaped by ideologies. Expressions describing immigrant minorities have increasingly focused on their establishment in the Norwegian multicultural society and have also shifted from general boundaries of outsiderness to increasingly specified boundaries of origins, visibility, and immigrant otherness. Norwegian majority expressions have mostly shifted toward a focus on origins. Our analysis suggests that symbolic boundaries in the Norwegian multicultural society have been changing rapidly. They seem to be shaped by complex ideological patterns constructing both similarities and differences, and which simultaneously seem to promote both inclusion and exclusion for certain immigrant minorities. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a brief view of current trends in Norwegian social psychology. The ultimate test of any educational system is the practice of those educated within it. Therefore everyone now rushes to comment upon current research in social psychology in Norway. To make the present review a potentially useful guide, the author first draws a map at the institutional level, indicating where social psychological research is being conducted. The degree to which social psychology in Norway has won the status of an applied social science has been mentioned in the article.

An experimental method for inquiring into the organization of an act of communication is presented, the basic idea being to create an interactional setting where one of the basic prerequisites for successful communication is not satisfied. In this particular design, the subjects interact under the false belief that they are sharing the same `here'. (In mean the subjects interacted more than a quarter of an hour before any doubt or suspicion about the situation was expressed, indicating that our manipulation had been successful.) During the subjects trying (1) to `diagnose' their communicative difficulties, and (2) to apply different `therapeutic tools' in order to improve their communication, one is in a very good position to study the impact from a variety of bask phenomena upon communication. It is argued that this situation `nay well be applied as a `standard experimental method'. And an experiment where this method revealed interesting differences in the communication between couples having and couples not having a schizophrenic offspring is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Very little of the recent research on 'sex and language' has contributed much to our understanding of the actual nature of these phenomena. There has been a failure to adopt a communication perspective, and the impact of the situation has been ignored. This present study assesses the verbal communication of the four possible dyadic sex combinations (male → male; male → female; female → male; female → female) in two apparently similar, but in reality highly different communication situations, in that while the first is simple and straightforward, a communication conflict is induced in the latter. Whereas the traditional stereotypes concerning 'sex and verbal communication' are clearly reflected in the first situation, a radically different pattern is exposed in the conflict situation. The different sex-bound patterns of communication efficiency across situations are discussed within the framework of general communication theory in terms of the participants' confidence (in self and other) and their manner of exerting control. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

As an example of the complicated "language - social reality" relationship, the representation of the sex roles (social reality) in Norwegian (language), is analysed. The main part is devoted to an analysis of "social realities" im plied by the words "mann" (man) and "kvinne" (woman). Various tech niques, varying from dictionaries via word associations to sentence comple tion tasks, were applied in this analysis. The analysis unequivocally re vealed that the perspective(s) and interest(s) represented and expressed in the Norwegian Language, is that of the man at the woman's expense. Taking this analysis as a point of departure, it is shown; (a) How the language resists social change of the type that the women's liberation movement represents, and (b) how our male dominated society is transferred to new generations via the language. Finally, (c) strategies for how language may be changed into a possible ally of the women's liberation movement, are outlined.- Theoretically, the analysis is an illustration of (1) the subtle two-way inter action between language and social reality, and (2) the fact that whenever possibly divergent or rival interests and perspectives may be represented and expressed in the language, the interests and perspectives of the one in power (in our case the man) will dominate at the expence of the weaker one (in our case the woman). [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines social psychology conducted at different types of institution and at various places in Norway. Psychology in Norway is predominantly professionally clinical, traditionally individual-centered and psychoanalytically oriented. However, there have been strong tendencies to adopt more social oriented perspectives and approaches within almost every field of professional psychological activity. Activities conducted by psychologists in Norway which may reasonably be classified as social psychology, thus prove to represent a rich and mixed pattern. Psychology is taught beyond a mere introductory level at the University of Oslo and University of Bergen. Despite the fact that the programmes followed at Oslo and Bergen are different, a reasonable characterization of the social psychologist could be, every psychologist educated in Norway is a social psychologist in the sense that he acquires knowledge about the relevant theories and methods and has been given some training in adopting social psychological perspectives. On the other hand, an equally reasonable characterization could be, no actual social psychologists are educated because there are no systematic and specialized training programmes leading to doctorate level in social psychology.

Aim: The recent nationally implemented clinical pathways for the treatment of substance use problems in Norway require mapping and assessing of patients' needs, challenges, and resources. However, there is a lack of tools for systematically mapping and assessing patients' social situations and social networks as part of the national guidelines. The aim of this article is to present a tool developed to map and assess the patient's social situation, and to propose approaches for promoting multiple psychological senses of community (MPSOC) through clinical pathways for treating substance use problems., Methods: The proposed tool and approaches are developed based on findings in a previous in-depth collaborative study of MPSOC and recovery among people with substance use problems who received help and services from Norwegian municipalities., Findings: The findings suggest that multiple communities (geographical, relational and ideal) and senses of communities (within and outside treatment) simultaneously can influence individual recovery processes from problematic substance use in both positive as well as negative ways. As such, these community dimensions are of central importance to include in mapping and assessing of patients' social situations, as well as in the promotion of MPSOC through clinical pathways., Conclusions: The suggested tool and approaches can increase the likelihood of achieving key aims of the national clinical pathways. Most important, mapping, assessing and promoting MPSOC through clinical pathways may promote long-term recovery processes and positive recovery capital for persons with substance use problems., Competing Interests: Declaration of conflicting interests: The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article., (© The Author(s) 2021.)