Alireza Moula

Can a psychosocial intervention programme teaching coping strategies improve the quality of life of Iranian women? A non-randomised quasi-experimental study

Objectives To assess whether a psychosocial intervention teaching coping strategies to women can improve quality of life (QOL) in groups of Iranian women exposed to social pressures. Design Quasi-experimental non-randomised group design involving two categories of Iranian women, each category represented by non-equivalent intervention and comparison groups. Setting A large urban area in Iran. Participants 44 women; 25 single mothers and 19 newly married women. Interventions Seventh-month psychosocial intervention aimed at providing coping strategies. Primary outcome measures Effect sizes in four specific health-related domains and two overall perceptions of QOL and health measured by the WHOQOL-BREF instrument. Results Large effect sizes were observed among the women exposed to the intervention in the WHOQOL-BREF subdomains measuring physical health (r=0.68; p<0.001), psychological health (r=0.72; p<0.001), social relationships (r=0.52; p<0.01), environmental health (r=0.55; p<0.01) and in the overall perception of QOL (r=0.72; p<0.001); the effect size regarding overall perception of health was between small and medium (r=0.20; not significant). Small and not statistically significant effect sizes were observed in the women provided with traditional social welfare services. Conclusions Teaching coping strategies can improve the QOL of women in societies where gender discrimination is prevalent. The findings require reproduction in studies with a more rigorous design before the intervention model can be recommended for widespread distribution.

Empowering newly married women in Iran : A new method of social work intervention that uses a client-directed problem-solving model in both group and individual sessions

We set out to assess the processes by which a personal empowerment-oriented intervention based on learning spaces and the Rahyab problem-solving model can help newly married women in Iran to gain more control over their life situations. Learning to use the problem-solving model independently was an important component of this seven months’ educational program. A descriptive field study design based on qualitative methods was employed for data collection and analysis. The analysis of these processes showed how, through group and individual interventions, these women could influence their intimate relationships by altering their thoughts, their management of emotions, and their overt behavior. We invite more research on how empowerment-oriented interventions can be used to support newly married women as a part of family educational programs.

A Neuropragmatist Framework for Childhood Education : Integrating Pragmatism and Neuroscience to Actualize Article 29 of the UN Child Convention

A 9-year-old Swedish girl, Milla Martin, was watching TV with her mother when she saw a film about starving African children. She became very sad and angry and asked, ‘Why don’t we do something to help these children?’ Together with some other children, Milla and her mother decided to bake cakes and sell them in order to collect money to support the starving African children. Their responsible social action inspired other children and youth in Sweden who did the same thing. They succeeded in collecting hundreds of thousands of Swedish kroner for this human cause. As a result, Milla Martin was chosen as one of the few persons nominated as ‘Swedish heroes of the year.’ Consequently in 2011, on a popular nationwide TV program involving the Swedish prime minister, she received her prize: travelling with her family to Tanzania in a ‘study-travel’ to find out how her ‘cake-baking-movement’ could help these less fortunate children.1

Reflective Integration of Conclusions for Theory Building

This chapter reflects on the results with a theoretical “dress” and constructs six accounts that will be used to construct the new theory: 1. The first account is to operationalize Article 29 of the Child Convention regarding every child’s right to achieve her or his optimal mental development and schools’ obligation to prepare pupils to have social responsibility. 2. Neuroscience can help us to be more specific about mental development. The capacity of the prefrontal cortex to organize thoughts, feelings, and action can be operationalized through the systematic use of the problem-solving model. 3. Pragmatist educational philosophy gives us some specific principles for creating a classroom context. 4. Interactionist-developmentalist learning within the context of the three-level pedagogy develops each individual’s capacity for mental development as well as each pupil’s capacity to cooperate in groups. Individual development and social development have a proper chance to develop harmoniously. 5. Social problem solving is the content of the interactionist-developmentalist learning. It is both the aim and the method (pedagogy) of that learning. Learning and mastering the use of a problem-solving model is vital in this process. 6. By presenting many different kinds of problems, we engage pupils in understanding local as well as global problems and encourage discussions about possible solutions. This can prepare pupils for ameliorative preadaptation to the world.

Open Research and Philosophical Reflections

This chapter provides a philosophical overview of this book. In line with many philosophers and scientists, I believe that even the most “strictly” social scientific research benefits from philosophical reflections. Philosophy can contribute to constructing the big picture and help to avoid getting lost in the details of empirical inquiries. The qualitative methodologist, Maxwell (Qualitative research design: An interactive approach. Sage, Los Angeles, p. 42, 2013), stated that although participants in the methodological “paradigm wars” in the social sciences each focused on the philosophical beliefs and assumptions of their own methodological communities, most of them saw the “philosophical positions as foundational” for research practices. Maxwell added that examples of such philosophical positions are positivism, constructivism, realism, postmodernism, and pragmatism. I choose pragmatism not only because this philosophy is very proper for experimental (intervention) research but also because of its emphasis on amelioration and change. In the Need for Recovery of Philosophy, Dewey (Creative intelligence: Essays in the pragmatic attitude. Henry Holy and Company, New York, 1917), one of the most well-known pragmatists, encouraged philosophers to be more than intellectuals who interpret past and present. Philosophy can work as effective equipment for a better life. “Philosophy does this by creating theories with meanings amenable to testing by application to human practices.” (Hildebrand in Beginners guides on Dewey. Oneworld, Oxford, p. 207, 2008).

Results Based on Multiple Evidence

This chapter presents the results of the intervention, which reached 12 conclusions. These 12 conclusions are then summarized into three broad conclusions: 1. According to the Child Convention, schools have an obligation to (a) provide the context for realization of all pupils’ mental development, and (b) prepare them to perform social responsibility. This intervention research suggests that pupils should get the chance to develop both these capacities. This research has also emphasized that it is important to recognize neuroscientific insights into the role of the prefrontal cortex in developing these capacities. 2. These capacities can be developed through learning to (fictively) solve social problems. This means that pupils can learn to think systematically, that is, according to a problem-solving model. 3. Pupils can develop/use these capacities to both improve their school studies and prepare themselves for responsible adult life.

Intervention in the Classroom: The Teacher’s Description

This chapter describes the intervention in the classroom, which was based on a three-level (and three-moment) pedagogical context and a model for social problem-solving. The model is presented in the first week and the steps are illustrated through examples. In the following weeks, a paper describing a problem together with the problem-solving model is distributed among the pupils. For the first 15 min, pupils are given private time to imagine the problem and write down their thoughts by following the steps of the problem-solving model. The purpose of this time is to enhance each pupil’s capacity to define a problem, imagine a desire to change the problematic situation, use their imagination to find several options for solving the problem, and develop the capacity to choose the best alternative. After the individual time, the class is divided into 4–5 groups of pupils sitting together for 30 min. They listen to each other’s ideas and find out the pluralistic nature of understanding social problems and solving them. Then all groups get together and each group has a few minutes to present what they have discussed and their solutions. This time is important for pupils to learn how to present an idea in front of the whole class. Finally, a common discussion takes place where everyone in the class can contribute to the discussion.

An Evolving Theory for Social Problem-Solving Literacy

This chapter attempts to build a new theory that is based on Child Convention or what should be done, insights from neuroscience or what could be done, and pragmatist educational philosophy or how to do it. On the basis of sensitizing concepts, review of extant theoretical propositions and collected data, an evolving theory that can be used for social problem-solving literacy is formulated in a single sentence. This new theory is called Neuropsychosocial Preparation Theory and can be described in the following words: Using insights from neuroscience and guiding principles from the Child Convention, schools can create contexts so that pupils can learn social problem solving in preparation for ameliorative preadaptation to the world.

Applying the New Theory in Other Subprojects

The aim of the first subproject was to create a new theory for a new literacy. Judgment of the seriousness of the first subproject, at least partly, depends on whether it has continued in other projects. Therefore, it is important that the readers get a picture of the second subproject. Aims of subproject II: Through a series of design experiments (intervention research subprojects in schools), develop a program for social problem-solving literacy. This includes Understanding how pupils can learn that an individual should not rush to choose the first option that comes to mind to solve a problem, but they can stop and think to find the best available option. Finding out if pupils can master the use of a model to solve social problems (points 1 and 2 were common to both the first and second subprojects). Testing the theory that evolved from the first subproject in the second subproject.

Building a Framework for Sensitizing Concepts

Pring (Philosophy of educational research. Continuum, London, 2004, p. 23) presents a holistic and philosophical approach to educational research and warns us that complexity of concepts and their relationship to each other should not push us toward reductionism. One way to take Pring’s warning seriously is to take some concepts and put them under explicit theoretical and empirical scrutiny. These should be basic concepts and abstract enough to allow space for reflection and development. Blumer (What is wrong with social theory. Sociological methods. Butterworth, London, pp. 84–95, 1970, p. 91) invented the term sensitizing concepts to distinguish them from definite concepts. “Whereas definite concepts provide prescription of what to see, sensitizing concepts merely suggest direction along which to look.” Social researchers tend to use sensitizing concepts as an interpretive tool and as a starting point for a qualitative study (Bowen in Int J Q Methods 5(3):12–23, 2006). Therefore, sensitizing concepts are a target for empirical inquiry and can be refined (Blumer in What is wrong with social theory. Sociological methods. Butterworth, London, pp. 84–95, 1970). The conceptual framework presented here includes sensitizing concepts that are based on (1) our previous studies (colleagues and I) aimed at creating a neuropsychosocial framework for youth studies, (2) observations mentioned in the introduction, (3) the Child Convention, (4) pragmatist educational philosophy, and (5) knowledge of neuroscience about mental capacity. These concepts are capacity, being, becoming, authority, and responsible citizenship. Together they help to create an intervention package suitable for creating a new literacy in schools.