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This article focuses on converts to Islam in Poland, taking into account the specific socio-cultural, political, and historical contexts and new trends that have emerged with the gradual growth of the Muslim population. We draw attention to the unique patterns of practices related to Islam and patterns of belonging. Eastern European Islam remains relatively under-researched and, as a consequence, there is little clarity whether processes identified in relation to Western European Islam are mirrored in Eastern Europe. In line with the current literature, we propose the concept of "Polish Islam" as an analytical tool. Based on 16 interviews with Polish female converts, this article traces the way meanings of religious teachings and practices are negotiated and integrated into daily social interactions. We analyse participants’ views regarding the fit between Islam and the national culture. Expanding on the finding that Polish converts to Islam in our sample do not consider themselves to be outsiders, we explore the implications of this pragmatic stance and discuss that the majority of our respondents choose to amalgamate Polish cultural practices with their new religion and renegotiate the meanings of these practices.

This article addresses the question of how the racial habitus of Polish White female converts (PWFCs) to Islam is performed in different social settings. We draw from in-depth interviews with 35 PWFCs living in Poland and the United Kingdom. While the notion of habitus has been used to analyze socialization into Islam, racial habitus has not been analyzed in relation to White converts to Islam. We argue that White habitus is an important concept that elucidates racial positioning among White converts in multiracial Muslim settings. Whiteness, often indexed in the data as “Europeanness,” is foundational for the PWFC identity. Furthermore, we extend the understanding of how Whiteness operates in Eastern Europe through the analysis of the White habitus among those who occupy non-normative places in racial and religious hierarchies. Thus, this article contributes to a growing body of scholarship on decentering Whiteness in Eastern Europe.

Compared to Muslim communities in Western Europe, in Poland there are Muslims of migrant origin and two different groups of autochthones - the Tatars and new Muslims. The chapter examines the evolution of new Muslims in the Islamic leadership and their position within the framework of Islamic governance in contemporary Poland. It focuses on the role of new Muslims within the two dominant Muslim organisations (Muslim Religious Union and the Muslim League) and the Association of Islamic Unity - an officially registered Shia Islamic community which was established and managed predominantly by converts. The chapter argues that the change of institutional landscape of the formal Islamic leadership in Poland has influenced the way in which new Muslims position themselves within Islamic organisation.

This article explores the conversion processes of Polish women of Catholic background to Islam. Data from participant observation of mosque-based, women-only weekend gatherings for converts and in-depth interviews with 29 Polish female converts to Islam are presented to illustrate the dialectic between the persistence and transformation of religious habitus. Our analysis demonstrates that in the conversion process, Catholic habitus remains pervasive, and shapes converts’ engagement with the new religion; however, some elements of it become reflexive and change. We make a case for extending the discussion on habitus transformation by drawing attention to what we term a “translation” of religious beliefs and practices. Women in our study translate the system of Islamic practices and beliefs into a specific Catholic logic that is more intelligible to them and, in the process, recognize some of the power dynamics inherent in the religious field.

In this paper we explore how young Polish Catholic mothers navigate the dominant discourses on abortion in light of the recent tightening of legislation in Poland. We draw on theoretical considerations about the relationships between norms, subjectivity, agency and resistance and propose "maternal knowledge" as a central concept for our analysis. Our data consists of twentyeight in-depth interviews conducted with mothers who self-identify as Catholics. We demonstrate how individual women engage with the three authoritative knowledges on abortion, namely the legal framework, the teaching of the Catholic Church and the medical knowledge, and accept, reject or revise their main premises by mobilising the lived maternal knowledge. The results of our analysis challenge the widely shared identification of the Catholic faith with the "pro-life" orientation and reveal the complexities and contradictions of individual stances, which are often inconsistent with the official teaching of the Church.

In academic and popular discourses, Poland has been consistently described as a “Catholic country”. However, the level of identification with the Catholic Church in Poland has been gradually declining in the last three decades. In this paper, we explore the recent wave of civil protests which began in October 2020 as a reaction to the new restrictions on legal access to abortion. Thousands of people took to the streets to participate in what became known as “the Women’s Strike”. The protesters not only rejected the government but also dissented from the Catholic Church and its strong influence over the Polish state. The case study presented here focuses on the events that took place in Kraków, particularly the protests around the famous “Pope’s window”. We identify the symbolic tools used by the protesters and explore the connection between “Women’s Strike”, the emergent discourses on the poor handling of the sexual abuse problems in the Catholic Church by John Paul II and his close associates, and the growing contestation of Church’s position towards LGBTQ+. We employ the notion of crisis to discuss the implications of the mass protests to the transformation of the Catholic landscape in Poland.

Public health guidelines implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic have changed the way many people practice religion. In the realm of Islam, practices from the margins—attending online mosques and prayer groups, or praying alone—suddenly became commonplace. This paper addresses the question: What religious processes have become more evident among pluralist Muslim women during the pandemic? Based on 34 open-ended online surveys completed by pluralist Muslim women living chiefly in the USA and the UK, our analysis evidences the existence of four narratives that reflect fluctuations in the intensity and type of religious practice. The first and most prominent narrative in our dataset conveys enthusiastic embrace of social-distanced practices, the second describes a profound sense of aberration impossible to overcome in spiritual ways. The third highlights that for some Muslims, the pandemic brought no changes, as they continued to be isolated from their communities. The fourth is focused on an affirmation of a “remote” sociality experienced online. While some respondents acknowledge the increased individuation in their religious practice, they also find fulfilment in collective, if transformed, sociality. The changes in social interaction have led to a re-evaluation of salient aspects of their religious identity or, alternatively, highlighted longstanding modalities of exclusion.

Background Deinstitutionalisation in Europe has led to the development of community-based accommodation for people with mental health problems. The type, setting, and intensity of support provided vary and the costs are substantial. Yet, despite the large investment in these services, there is little clarity on their aims and outcomes or how they are regarded by staff and the clients. Methods We interviewed 30 staff and 30 clients from the three main types of supported accommodation in England (residential care, supported housing, floating outreach) to explore their perspectives on the purpose of these services, and the components of care considered most helpful. The interviews were coded and analysed using thematic analysis. Results There were generally consistent understandings amongst clients and staff across service types on the goals and purposes of supported accommodation services as: building independence and confidence; supporting people with their mental health; and providing safety and stability. We also noted a competing theme of anxiety about the continuity of support when clients move on from a service. Themes on the experience of what aided effective practice centred on: the supportive presence of others; incremental steps to progress; working together to avoid deskilling and dependency; feeling known and personally understood; tailoring support for social and community engagement; and building confidence through encouragement. Conclusions The findings provide an understanding of the commonalities in service approach, and goals of clients in these services, as well as the facilitators of goal attainment. However, they also highlight a common tension between providing safe and supportive living environments, whilst also promoting independence and facilitating rehabilitative change.

BackgroundAround 60 000 people in England live in mental health supported accommodation. There are three main types: residential care, supported housing and floating outreach. Supported housing and floating outreach aim to support service users in moving on to more independent accommodation within 2 years, but there has been little research investigating their effectiveness.AimsA 30-month prospective cohort study investigating outcomes for users of mental health supported accommodation.MethodWe used random sampling, accounting for relevant geographical variation factors, to recruit 87 services (22 residential care, 35 supported housing and 30 floating outreach) and 619 service users (residential care 159, supported housing 251, floating outreach 209) across England. We contacted services every 3 months to investigate the proportion of service users who successfully moved on to more independent accommodation. Multilevel modelling was used to estimate how much of the outcome and cost variations were due to service type and quality, after accounting for service-user characteristics.ResultsOverall 243/586 participants successfully moved on (residential care 15/146, supported housing 96/244, floating outreach 132/196). This was most likely for floating outreach service users (versus residential care: odds ratio 7.96, 95% CI 2.92–21.69, P < 0.001; versus supported housing: odds ratio 2.74, 95% CI 1.01–7.41, P < 0.001) and was associated with reduced costs of care and two aspects of service quality: promotion of human rights and recovery-based practice.ConclusionsMost people do not move on from supported accommodation within the expected time frame. Greater focus on human rights and recovery-based practice may increase service effectiveness.

Background: Mental health supported accommodation services are implemented across England, usually organised into a ‘step-down’ care pathway that requires the individual to repeatedly move as they gain skills and confidence for more independent living. There have been no trials comparing the effectiveness of different types of supported accommodation, but two widely used models (supported housing and floating outreach) have been found to provide similar support. We aimed to assess the feasibility of conducting a large-scale trial comparing these two models. Methods: Individually randomised, parallel group feasibility trial in three regions of England (North London, East London, and Cheltenham and Gloucestershire). We aimed to recruit 60 participants in 15 months, referred to supported accommodation, randomly allocated on an equal basis to receive either a local supported housing or floating outreach service. We assessed referrals to the trial, participants recruited, attrition, time from recruitment to moving into either type of supported accommodation, and feasibility of masking. We conducted a process evaluation to examine our results further. Results: We screened 1,432 potential participants, of whom 17 consented to participate, with 8 agreeing to randomisation (of whom 1 was lost to attrition) and 9 participating in naturalistic follow-up. Our process evaluation indicated that the main obstacle to recruitment was staff and service user preferences for certain types of supported accommodation or for specific services. Staff also felt that randomisation compromised their professional judgement. Conclusions: Our results do not support investment in a large-scale trial in England at this time. Trial registration: UK CRN Portfolio database, Trial ID: ISRCTN19689576. Trial funding: National Institute of Health Research (RP-PG-0707-10093).

Inconsistent terminology and variation in service models have made synthesis of the supported accommodation literature challenging. To overcome this, we developed a brief, categorical taxonomy that aimed to capture the defining features of different supported accommodation models: the simple taxonomy for supported accommodation (STAX-SA). Data from a previous review of existing classification systems were used to develop the taxonomy structure. After initial testing and amendments, the STAX-SA and an existing taxonomy were applied to 132 supported accommodation service descriptions drawn from two systematic reviews and their performance compared. To assess external validity, the STAX-SA was distributed to a sample of supported accommodation managers in England and they were asked to use it to classify their services. The final version of the STAX-SA comprised of five supported accommodation ‘types’, based on four domains; Staffing location; Level of support; Emphasis on move-on; and Physical setting. The STAX-SA accurately categorized 71.1% (n = 94) of service descriptions, outperforming the comparison tool, and was not affected by publication date or research design. The STAX-SA effectively discriminated between ‘real world’ service models in England and 53.2% (n = 17) of service managers indicated that the taxonomy was ‘Very effective’ or ‘Extremely effective’ in capturing key characteristics of their service. The STAX-SA is an effective tool for classifying supported accommodation models and represents a promising approach to synthesizing the extant effectiveness literature. The authors recommend the development of reporting guidelines for future supported accommodation publications to facilitate comparison between models.

This chapter discusses the role of religion in the construction of public and political responses to the refugee crisis by taking a closer look at the migration discourse in Polish weekly magazines credited with a major role in shaping public opinion. Presenting a critical discourse analysis based on material published since 2015, Joanna Krotofil and Dominika Motak compare discursive practices in three leading weekly magazines associated with both the "left" and the "right" ends of the political spectrum: a conservative Catholic-oriented magazine and two explicitly Catholic periodicals. They argue that religion plays a crucial role in the public discourse on migrants. While the official standpoint of the Catholic Church in Poland stresses the duty of every Christian to shelter and support refugees, the right-wing political milieu (including the ruling national-conservative party) presents the refugees as a threat to the national identity of Poland. Their construction of Polish identity is inextricably intertwined with Catholicism as it revives the historical concept of Poland as the rampart of Christianity. This rhetoric, Krotofil and Motak conclude, displays a semantic continuity with traditional folk religiosity, but at the same time has some features characteristic of the fundamentalist polarization of the social world into in-group and out-group.

Specialist supported accommodation services have become a key component of most community - based mental healthcare systems. While mental health policies highlight the importance of service user involvement in service development and care planning, there are no comprehensive literature reviews synthesising services users’ perspectives on, or experiences of, supported accommodation services. This systematic review was under taken to fill this gap. We searched electronic databases (January 2015, updated June 2017), conducted hand searches and used forward- backward snowballing to identify 13,678 papers. We inspected the full- text of 110 papers and included 50 of these in the final review. Data extraction and quality assessments were conducted. We used narra- tive synthesis to develop a conceptual model of service users’ experiences that included structural, process, relational and contextual factors, such as the characteristics of the service, relationships with staff and other service users, the intensity and nature of support, the physical environment, and social and community integration. The review highlights the complex interplay of individual, service- level and community factors in shaping the lived experience of service users and their impact on personal identity and recovery. Our approach addressed some of the widely reported limitations of the quantitative research in this field, providing a conceptual model relevant to service user experiences across supported accommodation service types, population groups and countries.

The advancement of the Dialogiacal Self Theory (DST) in the last two decades has been stimulated by vigorous developments in DST-based research methods recognizing dialogicality as a salient characteristic of the self. This chapter will present the combination of the Personal Position Repertoire (PPR), a method for studying the content and organization of the self, conceived as a dynamic multiplicity of I-positions, with a focus group. This integrated method gives insight into the construction and negotiation of meaning in the dialogue with others and sheds some light on interpersonal processes shaping the content and structure of the self. The chapter is divided into four parts focusing on: (a) the theoretical basis of the PPR method in Dialogical Self Theory, (b) description of the method, including an overview of different possible ways to analyse personal repertoires, (c) two case studies illustrating the application of the PPR method in combination with a focus group discussion, and (d) conclusions discussing the advantages and limitations of the integrated PPR Focus Group method (PPR-FG).

Summary Background Little research has been done into the effectiveness of mental health supported accommodation services. We did a national survey to investigate provision and costs of services and assess service user quality of life and outcomes across England. Methods We randomly sampled three types of services from 14 nationally representative regions—residential care, supported housing, and floating outreach—and recruited up to ten service users per service. Service quality and costs and service users' quality of life, autonomy, and satisfaction with care were assessed in a standardised manner with validated tools and compared by multilevel modelling. Findings 619 service users were recruited from 22 residential care, 35 supported housing, and 30 floating outreach services. Those in residential care and supported housing had more severe mental health problems than those in floating outreach. 348 (57%) were assessed as being at risk of severe self-neglect and 229 (37%) as being vulnerable to exploitation in the previous 2 years. Residential care was most expensive but provided for people with the greatest needs. The mean annual budget was £466 687 for residential care (range £276 000–777 920), compared with £365 452 for supported housing (£174 877–818 000), and £172 114 for floating outreach (£17 126–491 692). Quality of care was best in supported housing. People in supported housing and floating outreach were more socially included but experienced more crime than those in residential care. After adjustment for service quality and service user sociodemographic and clinical factors, quality of life was similar for service users in residential care and supported housing (mean difference −0·138, 95% CI −0·402 to 0·126, p=0·306) and lower for those in floating outreach than in residential care (−0·424, −0·734 to −0·114, p=0·007). However, autonomy was greater for those in supported housing than for those in residential care (0·145, 0·010 to 0·279, p=0.035). Satisfaction with care was similar across services. Interpretation Supported housing might be cost-effective, but the benefits need to be weighed against the risks associated with increased autonomy. Funding National Institute for Health Research.

Background No standardised tools for assessing the quality of specialist mental health supported accommodation services exist. To address this, we adapted the Quality Indicator for Rehabilitative care-QuIRC-that was originally developed to assess the quality of longer term inpatient and community based mental health facilities. The QuIRC, which is completed by the service manager and gives ratings of seven domains of care, has good psychometric properties. Methods Focus groups with staff of the three main types of supported accommodation in the UK (residential care, supported housing and floating outreach services) were carried out to identify potential amendments to the QuIRC. Additional advice was gained from consultation with three expert panels, two of which comprised service users with lived experience of mental health and supported accommodation services. The amended QuIRC (QuIRC-SA) was piloted with a manager of each of the three service types. Item response variance, inter-rater reliability and internal consistency were assessed in a random sample of 52 services. Factorial structure and discriminant validity were assessed in a larger random sample of 87 services. Results The QuIRC-SA comprised 143 items of which only 18 items showed a narrow range of response and five items had poor inter-rater reliability. The tool showed good discriminant validity, with supported housing services generally scoring higher than the other two types of supported accommodation on most domains. Exploratory factor analysis showed that the QuIRC-SA items loaded onto the domains to which they had been allocated. Conclusions The QuIRC-SA is the first standardised tool for quality assessment of specialist mental health supported accommodation services. Its psychometric properties mean that it has potential for use in research as well as audit and quality improvement programmes. A web based application is being developed to make it more accessible which will produce a printable report for the service manager about the performance of their service, comparison data for similar services and suggestions on how to improve service quality. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12888-016-0799-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Background Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) are important for evaluating mental health services. Yet, no specific PROM exists for the large and diverse mental health supported accommodation sector. We aimed to produce and validate a PROM specifically for supported accommodation services, by adapting the Client’s Assessment of Treatment Scale (CAT) and assessing its psychometric properties in a large sample. Methods Focus groups with service users in the three main types of mental health supported accommodation services in the United Kingdom (residential care, supported housing and floating outreach) were conducted to adapt the contents of the original CAT items and assess the acceptability of the modified scale (CAT-SA). The CAT-SA was then administered in a survey to service users across England. Internal consistency was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha. Convergent validity was tested through correlations with subjective quality of life and satisfaction with accommodation, as measured by the Manchester Short Assessment of Quality of Life (MANSA). Results All seven original items of the CAT were regarded as relevant to appraisals of mental health supported accommodation services, with only slight modifications to the wording required. In the survey, data were obtained from 618 clients. The internal consistency of the CAT-SA items was 0.89. Mean CAT-SA scores were correlated with the specific accommodation item on the MANSA (rs = 0.37, p˂.001). Conclusions The content of the CAT-SA has relevance to service users living in mental health supported accommodation. The findings from our large survey show that the CAT-SA is acceptable across different types of supported accommodation and suggest good psychometric properties. The CAT-SA appears a valid and easy to use PROM for service users in mental health supported accommodation services. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12888-016-0755-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Background Forensic mental health services have largely ignored examining patients’ views on the nature of the services offered to them. A structured communication approach (DIALOG) has been developed with the aim of placing the patient’s perspective on their care at the heart of the discussions between patients and clinicians. The effectiveness of the structured communication approach in community mental health services has been demonstrated, but no trial has taken place in a secure psychiatric setting. This pilot study is evaluating a 6-month intervention combining DIALOG with principles of solution-focused therapy on quality of life in medium-secure settings. Methods and design A cluster randomized controlled trial design is being employed to conduct a 36-month pilot study. Participants are recruited from six medium-secure inpatient services, with 48 patients in the intervention group and 48 in the control group. The intervention uses a structured communication approach. It comprises six meetings between patient and nurse held monthly over a 6-month period. During each meeting, patients rate their satisfaction with a range of life and treatment domains with responses displayed on a tablet. The rating is followed by a discussion of how to improve the current situation in those domains identified by the patient. Assessments take place prior to the intervention (baseline), at 6 months (postintervention) and at 12 months (follow-up). The primary outcome is the patient’s self-reported quality of life. Discussion This study aims to (1) establish the feasibility of the trial design as the basis for determining the viability of a large full-scale trial, (2) determine the variability of the outcomes of interest (quality of life, levels of satisfaction, disturbance, ward climate and engagement with services), (3) estimate the costs of the intervention and (4) refine the intervention following the outcome of the study based upon the experiences of the nurses and patients. The intervention allows patients to have a greater say in how they are treated and targets care in areas that patients identify as important to them. It is intended to establish systems that support meaningful patient and caregiver involvement and participation. Trial registration Current Controlled Trials, ISRCTN34145189