Gang membership is a global phenomenon and a problem affecting a multitude of official and unofficial agencies, often reported by the media and causing overwhelming financial strain, as well as increasing fear of crime in communities. Whilst research on gangs has enjoyed popularity for almost a century now, this was mostly based on a criminological perspective, which did not provide a holistic picture for practitioners. Specifically, little is known about the psychology of gang membership, as such research is still in its infancy. Moreover, calls for understanding the social psychological motives for gang membership - such as gang members' perceptions of group processes, and how these influence individuals - have been present for the last 50 years but development in the area has been limited. The aim of this thesis was to address some of this crucial gap in our knowledge of gang membership, to help enrich theoretical understanding, as well as prevention and rehabilitation strategies, so that these can be appropriately developed. In order for this to happen, it is key to understand which group processes lie behind gang membership based on gang members' subjective experiences, in different types of gang members, and how these relate to members' decisions to join and remain with a gang. The core assumption of gangs - that they are groups - has been largely neglected by research. The studies in this thesis provide the first holistic picture of the relevance of group processes in gang membership. The first, qualitative study, identified that group processes regularly manifesting in groups do, indeed, also manifest in gangs. It was also found that such group processes are understood by gang members in a manner specific to them. Further, the perceived group processes manifested differently at different stages of membership - when joining a gang and when remaining in a gang. The large quantitative studies that follow revealed that gangs differ from non-gang delinquent groups, and that different types of gang members differ in their perception of how group processes manifest. It was found that different types of groups and gangs were characterised by a specific set of perceived group processes. Further, these group process clusters differed, based on the stage of an individual's membership. This thesis therefore uncovered that the area of social cognition based on group processes is important. The main conclusions drawn from the studies presented in this PhD are: 1) Group processes manifest in gangs and are perceived in a specific manner. 2) The perception of group processes differ in gangs and other delinquent groups, and between different types of gang members. 3) There are specific clusters of perceived group processes which characterise specific types of groups and at different stages of membership - group processes should not be dealt with in isolation. 4) The findings show that how gang members perceive group processes should be a key consideration in future research and any intervention strategies designed for gang members.

There are three main theories of shame and guilt, each of which ascribe differing levels of social content to each emotion: the internal/external view, for example, posits that guilt is more internally located than shame, the act/person views posits the opposite, while the reciprocal/hierarchical view posits that these two emotions are both inherently social. A difficult challenge for these theories is that shame and guilt are both often felt in response to individual self-control failure. Six studies examined the relationship between self-report measures of shame and guilt, and self-control failure (e.g., studying, dieting, and self-nominated goal failure), testing the assumptions of the three aforementioned theoretical distinctions. Overall, the internal/external theory was supported: shame was shown to be less internalised than guilt, which was shown to be characterised by two independent forms of internalised concerns. Remarkably, one of these internalised forms of guilt was characterised by relational concerns: participants, for example, would "feel betrayed" or "cheated" if they failed at their dieting (or other self-selected dilemmas). This hinted at the possibility of a social, albeit distal, form of guilt, that perhaps reflected an internalisation of social relationships. To address this latter idea more directly, three studies examined the social nature of guilt (controlling for shame) in more objectively social contexts, involving harm related concerns. In support of the reciprocal/hierarchical theory, guilt was shown to be associated with interpersonal concerns while shame, consistent with the earlier six studies, was shown to be less internalised and associated with concerns relating to negative social comparisons. In addition to the internal/external and reciprocal/hierarchical theories, some support was also found for the act/person theory. A nested model of shame and guilt was proposed to integrate these apparently disparate theories of shame and guilt: specifically, the internal/external theory was suggested to be a good proximal explanation of shame and guilt in self-control; the act/person theory was suggested to be a good explanation for the outcomes of shame and guilt; and the reciprocal/hierarchical theory was suggested to be a good ultimate explanation of shame and guilt overall.

This thesis focuses on the communication of unpleasant information in six experimental studies. Specifically, the experimental studies investigate how withholding and/or disclosing unpleasant information is appraised by the communicator in three various ways (degree of severity, concern for one's self-image and concern for one's social-image in the eyes of others), how these appraisals relate to three core feelings (felt rejection, felt inferiority and felt shame), and how these explain two main motivations (wanting to distance oneself from the other, wanting to repair the social bond with the other) across various social bonds (both private and professional). In the two first studies it was found that disclosing unpleasant information caused the communicator to report significantly less distress (lower levels of appraisals, feelings and motivations) compared to when the communicator withheld the unpleasant information. In studies three to six, it was found that, when communicators disclosed the unpleasant information, the prototypical communication strategy of being person-centred caused the communicator to feel significantly less distress (lower levels of appraisals, feelings and responses) than if two other prototypical ways of communicating were used (the fully direct strategy and the fully indirect strategy). In all six studies, I found that the motivation of wanting to distance oneself from the other was explained by a "concern for one's social-image → felt rejection" pathway, while the motivation to repair the social bond with the other was explained by a "concern for one's self-image → felt shame" pathway. The thesis argues the importance of disclosing the unpleasant information and of disclosing it in a person-centred way.

Deliberate firesetting has huge emotional, social, and economic impact. Traditionally, firesetting research has focussed on apprehended populations in prisons or secure psychiatric settings. In contrast, the literature relating to un-apprehended populations is extremely scarce; there has only been one study assessing un-apprehended firesetters living in the UK (Gannon & Barrowcliffe, 2012). The purpose of this thesis is to fill the research gap, and evaluate the prevalence and psychological characteristics of un-apprehended deliberate firesetters living in the UK. Five studies were conducted: Study 1 examined the prevalence and characteristics of un-apprehended deliberate firesetters living in a high firesetting prevalent community in Kent. Study 2 specifically focussed on the psychological characteristics of un-apprehended deliberate firesetters. Studies 1 and 2 identified that firesetting tends to occur in adolescence rather than adulthood. However, the age of participants ranged from 18 to 72 years in Studies 1 and 2 and it was apparent that participants may be unable to fully recollect their adolescent behaviour. Therefore, in order to reduce recollection failures, younger participants (aged 18 to 23) were recruited for Study 3a with the aim of assessing the psychological characteristics of individuals who ignited fires in adolescence. Across Studies 1 to 3a there was an 11.5% to 25% prevalence rate of un-apprehended deliberate firesetters living in the UK and some common psychological characteristics were evident. For example, relative to non-firesetters, un-apprehended deliberate firesetters were male, exhibited higher fire interest, reported experimenting with fire before the age of 10, and having a family history of firesetting. Study 3b compared the offence characteristics and psychological characteristics of un-apprehended firesetters (aged 18 to 23) reporting single firesetting incidences and multiple firesetting incidences. Few notable differences were found, however, relative to single episode firesetters, recidivistic firesetters engaged in more criminal behaviour such as underage drinking and robbery. Studies 1 to 3b utilised self report measures (e.g., questionnaires) to assess psychological characteristics. In contrast, an implicit measure, a lexical decision task, was employed in Study 4 to identify the existence of any of the five implicit theories hypothesised as being relevant to deliberate firesetting (e.g., Dangerous World, Normalisation of Violence, Fire is Fascinating or Exciting, Fire is a Powerful Tool, and Fire is Controllable; Ó Ciardha & Gannon, 2012). Relative to non-firesetters, un-apprehended firesetters were significantly faster at identifying letter strings as words which supported the Dangerous World implicit theory but slower at classifying words supporting the Fire is Fascinating or Exciting implicit theory. This research is the first of its kind to evaluate the psychological characteristics and implicit theories of un-apprehended deliberate firesetters. The new data associated with the studies reported in this thesis offers an insight into the psychological characteristics of un-apprehended firesetters, and details future research directions with the aim of reducing the incidences and devastating consequences of deliberate firesetting.

During the visual processing of sexual content, pupillary responses have been positively associated with observers' sexual orientation. The question of whether this measure also reflects age-specific sexual preferences, however, is rarely considered. This is remarkable given the potential applied value of pupillary responses for directly measuring unhealthy and inappropriate sexual desires in clinical and forensic settings. The experiments in this thesis addressed this question with a series of tasks whereby observers' viewed images of adults and children while their eye movements and pupil responses were recorded. These results were then compared with sexual appeal ratings for these images and self-report questionnaires relating to sexual interests and experiences. The main findings indicate that pupil dilation is a measure of sexual orientation that is particularly robust and consistent for male participants (Chapters 2 to 4). Furthermore, these experiments provide initial evidence that pupil dilation could also be used as an age-specific measure of sexual interest in males and females (Chapters 2 and 3). Additionally, this thesis explored the influence of low-level stimulus artefacts within the scenes on pupillary patterns (Chapter 2). Findings provide further evidence that the pupillary responses obtained in these experiments are driven by the person content in the scenes. These findings are discussed in relation to existing research on eye-tracking and other current measurements of sexual interest.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether or not new and significant developments for the Hindu and Jewish faiths, and the relationship that exists between them, can be demonstrated from the results of the Hindu-Jewish Leadership Summits of 2007 and 2008 in Delhi and Jerusalem. I argue that new and significant developments can be observed with this Hindu-Jewish encounter with regards to official rulings of Halacha (Jewish law), proper understandings of sacred symbols of Hinduism, and even improved Islamic-Jewish relations. After analyzing the approaches, themes, and unique framework found within this encounter, it is clear that the Hindu-Jewish leadership summits mark new and significant developments in inter-religious dialogue between the two traditions, culminating in the redefinition of Hinduism as a monotheistic religion.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / In this paper I discuss two key works written by Søren Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling and Practice in Christianity, under the pseudonyms Johannes de Silentio and Anti-Climacus respectively. I focus on three questions: what is Johannes view of faith, what is Anti-Climacus’ view of faith and how are these Kierkegaard’s conclusions? I argue that stemming from Johannes’ and Anti-Climacus’ points of view, Kierkegaard’s view of faith is the aligning of the self in a trusting relationship with the God-man. One outside of faith can perceive faith to be a paradox or find faith offensive; one must have faith to avoid offense and overcome the paradox. Chapter 1 focuses on the connection between Kierkegaard and his pseudonyms using his work The Point of View. In this chapter I map out Kierkegaard’s method of communication and the purpose for his use of pseudonyms. Chapter 2 focuses on Johannes’ view of faith in Fear and Trembling. Johannes says that faith is formed through a private relationship with God. One with faith is silent about this relationship from the point of view of one who is in the ethical. Johannes understands faith dialectically. Faith is a paradox to Johannes because he does not understand the justification for Abraham’s action. Chapter 3 focuses on Anti-Climacus’ view of faith in Practice in Christianity. Anti-Climacus presents a rigorous account of faith. He says faith is being a contemporary of the God-man and meeting the requirements of believing the God-man’s words. When one becomes a contemporary with the God-man one can become offended by the God-man because the God-man is in collision with the established order, he, as man, claims to be God, he, as God, appears to be man, or the God-man speaks indirectly. Chapter 4 focuses on explaining how Johannes’ and Anti-Climacus’ view complement each other. Out of these two points of view Kierkegaard’s view of faith is the aligning of the self in a trusting relationship with the God-man. One outside of faith can perceive faith to be a paradox or find faith offensive; one must have faith to avoid offense and overcome the paradox.

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This thesis critically examines the cases of Vatican intervention with the Leadership Conference for Women Religious (LCWR) and Charles Curran to explore the question of whether legitimate dissent is possible as an act of conscience. The Doctrinal Assessment of the Leadership Conference for Women Religious released by the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, as well as the exchange between Sr. Pat Farrell, then-president of the LCWR, and Bishop Blair, the one who conducted the investigation on the LCWR, on “Fresh Air,” a radio show on National Public Radio raise questions about how the Church is to understand truth, obedience, and conscience. This event also raises questions about why this controversy occurs at this point in history. To critically examine the differing perspectives of dissent and conscience, I analyze the case of Charles Curran, a Catholic priest and former professor at Catholic University of America, to exlore how dissent might be understood to be an act of a holistic conscience – one that takes seriously the subjective/ affective elements of human experience as well as the objective pole of morality. By applying the insights of the Curran case analogously to the LCWR case, with the help of Robert K. Vischer’s articulation of the relational dimension of conscience, this thesis articulates how the Church might understand its role in being a venue for consciences to thrive while preserving its claim of authentic teaching authority.