This study explores the (characteristics of) social relationships and coping efforts that protect emerging adults from feeling lonely. The research question is ‘what do emerging adults need in order to not feel lonely?’. Semi-structured interviews with university students from the Netherlands (N = 29; 20–26 years) were conducted between November 2021 and February 2022. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. All participants had experiences with loneliness. In order to not feel lonely, participants needed functional, available social relationships with specific others. Quantitative and qualitative characteristics of social relationships were discussed. Furthermore, participants needed to know and accept themselves and to have realistic expectations about others. In terms of coping, participants made active efforts to improve social relationships and altered expectations about others. The results are discussed in line with social discrepancy theory, coping theory, and characteristics of the life phase of emerging adulthood. Implications for loneliness interventions are discussed.
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This study explores the (characteristics of) social relationships and coping efforts that protect emerging adults from feeling lonely. The research question is ‘what do emerging adults need in order to not feel lonely?’. Semi-structured interviews with university students from the Netherlands (N = 29; 20–26 years) were conducted between November 2021 and February 2022. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. All participants had experiences with loneliness. In order to not feel lonely, participants needed functional, available social relationships with specific others. Quantitative and qualitative characteristics of social relationships were discussed. Furthermore, participants needed to know and accept themselves and to have realistic expectations about others. In terms of coping, participants made active efforts to improve social relationships and altered expectations about others. The results are discussed in line with social discrepancy theory, coping theory, and characteristics of the life phase of emerging adulthood. Implications for loneliness interventions are discussed.
LINK
In most models on terrorism, interaction with other radicals is a key factor. However, systematic empirical evidence that radical ties affect behaviour is scarce. Our access to detailed police information allows us to apply Social Network Analysis (SNA) on a Dutch Salafi-Jihadi network and analyse the social relationships and network positions of 80 actors, out of whom 20 turned to terrorist acts. The results suggest that ties to leaders and terrorist offenders, co-attendance of radicalising settings and greater structural embeddedness relate to the likelihood of individual actors turning to acts of terrorism. However, we also find some individual attributes that may offer competing explanations. In this paper we discuss our findings and address how future research may provide further insights into an important issue for agencies involved in countering terrorism: which radical actors, if any, are more likely to turn to acts of terrorism?
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The main aim of the project is to provide new research in the arts by focusing on the concept of the inter-sensorial as an essential text for the creation of art and culture. It is designed to foreground the role of the sensorium as an underpinning source for many aspects of thought and cultural heritage. This project will blend visual arts with applied arts and traditional local traditions, revealing new light on the artistic facets and customs which are usually overlooked.The extended residencies will promote transnational mobility for emerging artists, facilitating international relationships between different artistic and cultural contexts within the EU. This will promote transnational interconnectivity between artists and cultures, creating a resourceful intercultural fertilisation, endorsing cultural diversity, social inclusion and most of all, further research on the intercultural facets.Through the various side-activities to take place during the mobilities of the artists, the project aims to strengthen and develop diverse audiences by producing the necessary elements for a dialogue, illustrating interpretations of rich layers of tangible and intangible heritage and legacies of European countries related to the tradition of sensorial experiences and how they evolved around traditional customs. Furthermore, it also aims to rethink and project new and innovative ways for documenting, preserving and communicating data to different audiences.
Psychosocial problems related to social isolation are a growing issue for wellbeing and health and have become a significant societal problem. This is especially relevant for children and adults with chronic illnesses and disabilities, and those spending extended periods in hospitals or permanently living in assisted living facilities. A lack of social relationships, social connectivity, and the inability to travel freely leads to feelings of isolation and loneliness. Loneliness interventions often use mediated environments to improve the feeling of connectedness. It has been proven that the utilization of haptic technologies enhances realism and the sense of presence in both virtual environments and telepresence in physical places by allowing the user to experience interaction through the sense of touch. However, the technology application is mostly limited to the experiences of serious games in professional environments and for-entertainment-gaming. This project aims to explore how haptic technologies can support the storytelling of semi-scripted experiences in VR to improve participants’ sense of presence and, therefore, the feeling of connectedness. By designing and prototyping the experience, the project aims to obtain insights and offer a better understanding of designing haptic-technology-supported storytelling and its potential to improve connectedness and become a useful tool in isolation interventions. The project will be conducted through the process of participants’ co-creation.
This project researches risk perceptions about data, technology, and digital transformation in society and how to build trust between organisations and users to ensure sustainable data ecologies. The aim is to understand the user role in a tech-driven environment and her perception of the resulting relationships with organisations that offer data-driven services/products. The discourse on digital transformation is productive but does not truly address the user’s attitudes and awareness (Kitchin 2014). Companies are not aware enough of the potential accidents and resulting loss of trust that undermine data ecologies and, consequently, forfeit their beneficial potential. Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica-situation, for instance, led to 42% of US adults deleting their accounts and the company losing billions. Social, political, and economic interactions are increasingly digitalised, which comes with hands-on benefits but also challenges privacy, individual well-being and a fair society. User awareness of organisational practices is of heightened importance, as vulnerabilities for users equal vulnerabilities for data ecologies. Without transparency and a new “social contract” for a digital society, problems are inevitable. Recurring scandals about data leaks and biased algorithms are just two examples that illustrate the urgency of this research. Properly informing users about an organisation’s data policies makes a crucial difference (Accenture 2018) and for them to develop sustainable business models, organisations need to understand what users expect and how to communicate with them. This research project tackles this issue head-on. First, a deeper understanding of users’ risk perception is needed to formulate concrete policy recommendations aiming to educate and build trust. Second, insights about users’ perceptions will inform guidelines. Through empirical research on framing in the data discourse, user types, and trends in organisational practice, the project develops concrete advice - for users and practitioners alike - on building sustainable relationships in a resilient digital society.
