<p>Denna uppsats behandlar frågan kring fördomar, muslimer och interaktion. Undersökningen sker genom en intervjuundersökning där respondenterna får svara på frågor som berör deras syn på muslimer utifrån deras interaktionsnivå. Tidigare forskning säger att den socialt konstruerade bilden av muslimer är negativ, och att den upprätthålls av samhället, däribland filmindustrin. Som ramverk för att undersöka detta används socialkonstruktivismen och kontaktteorin. Kontaktteorin, som introduceras av Gordon Allport, säger att interaktion mellan grupper minskar fördomar genom att grupperna interagerar som jämbördiga och med gemensamma mål. Dessa grupper beskrivs som ingroup och outgroup. Uppsatsen behandlar således om interaktionen hos respondenterna påverkar perceptionen de har av muslimer i Sverige. Slutsatsen är att interaktionen hos respondenterna påverkar uppfattningen de har av muslimer. De respondenter som hade regelbunden kontakt med muslimer, uppfattade inte gruppen i negativa termer.</p>

This thesis examines the factors which impact societal willingness to integrate in a post conflict, post power sharing agreement environment. Utilizing the Northern Ireland case, this study analyzes variance in willingness to integrate between Protestant and Catholic groups. Analysis of the Northern Ireland Life and Times survey data illustrates the shifting relationship between political trust and ingroup/outgroup frustrations on levels of willingness to integrate since the Good Friday Agreement. Statistical analyses indicate confirmation of ingroup attachment and elite political trust hypotheses, and reduced impact of outgroup benefit perceptions on willingness to integrate since the Good Friday Agreement.

<p>North West University is a creation of one of many mergers between previous universities in South Africa. The process is partly thought to integrate previous advantaged and disadvantaged universities, often also previous white or black dominated universities.</p><p>Even though the merger of NWU has been perceived as successful by many, there are still problems and tensions between the campuses. This report will describe the integration process at NWU as well as handle people’s perceptions towards it and towards the changes brought by the merger. The study has been done through thematic open interviews by staff, management and students at two of the three campuses in the merger of NWU, Mafikeng and Potchefstroom. In our report we have found six clusters which we examine; responses to the merger, within and outside group, differences, history, social status, and within and outside process.</p><p>All through the report the traces from history and Apartheid are still visible in people’s minds and in the clashes between the groups. History also affects the social status of the groups, affects that today create problems for integration.</p><p>The merger was opposed by both parts, however inevitable. People from Mafikeng were found more critical to the merger, highlighting the different power relations between the campuses and fear of being swallowed by Potchefstroom. Potchefstroom in general did not see many changes and white people seem to be more worried about their individual future.</p><p>Once united as one university there is still a low grade of integration or interaction between the campuses and between the groups within them. There have been initiatives to enhance integration at an organizational level, this has though not affected the social level in a significant way. One reason to the lack of integration might be the domination of one culture group at each campus, at Potchefstroom Afrikaans, and at Mafikeng SeTswana. This domination has shown to hinder integration since minority groups either feel left out or have to assimilate to fit in. Differences between the groups also create misunderstandings and clashes in the integration process. However we have seen that the persons within the merger process tend to be more positive than the people outside of it. This might be due to increased interaction, better information and a possibility to affect the outcome that makes the people involved more positive then the ones not involved.</p>

abstract: The prison classroom offers a transformative educational opportunity for incarcerated and non-incarcerated students alike. The current study uses place-conscious educational theories and the intergroup contact theory to examine how a prison education program can offer deeply impactful experiences for students. Using a pre/post-intervention survey design, this thesis analyzes differences in attitudes, beliefs, and perceptions about crime and criminal justice between and within groups of incarcerated (n=24) and university (n=20) students participating in two semester-long prison-based criminal justice courses in Arizona. Results show that prior to participating in the Inside-Out Prison Exchange programs, inside students had less favorable views about the criminal justice system compared to outside students, and outside students had less favorable attitudes about people who are incarcerated. Throughout the course, positive attitudes toward the criminal justice system increased for inside students and positive attitudes about incarcerated people increased among outside students, such that at the end of the course, the differences in attitudes between the two groups were no longer significant. Additionally, outside students’ punitive attitudes decreased throughout their participation in the course. Overall, the magnitude of the changes experienced by each student group were different, such that outside students experienced more significant changes in attitudes and beliefs about crime and criminal justice than did inside students. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Criminology and Criminal Justice 2018

In recent times traditional justice processes have become increasingly adapted to serve as transitional justice tools in post-conflict societies. The healing potential of traditional justice is becoming more recognized, nevertheless there is still little known about its impact on collective trauma and especially about the causal mechanisms behind it. To contribute to this research field, this study is guided by the following research question: Why do some traditional justice processes generate the healing of collective trauma after conflict more than others?The developed theoretical framework argues that bottom-up, locally-led traditional justice processes foster voluntary community engagement which enhances collective trauma healing. Top-down, institutionalized processes, on the other hand, are theorized to produce involuntary contact which leads to lower levels of collective healing. It is thus hypothesized that locally-led traditional justice processes are more likely to generate healing of collective trauma than institutionalized traditional justice processes. An in-depth comparative case study which uses Structured Focused Comparison, analyzes the Rwandan Gacaca trials and the traditional justice processes in Acholiland. The empirical findings lend support to the hypothesis and provide modest support to the proposed causal mechanism.

North West University is a creation of one of many mergers between previous universities in South Africa. The process is partly thought to integrate previous advantaged and disadvantaged universities, often also previous white or black dominated universities. Even though the merger of NWU has been perceived as successful by many, there are still problems and tensions between the campuses. This report will describe the integration process at NWU as well as handle people’s perceptions towards it and towards the changes brought by the merger. The study has been done through thematic open interviews by staff, management and students at two of the three campuses in the merger of NWU, Mafikeng and Potchefstroom. In our report we have found six clusters which we examine; responses to the merger, within and outside group, differences, history, social status, and within and outside process. All through the report the traces from history and Apartheid are still visible in people’s minds and in the clashes between the groups. History also affects the social status of the groups, affects that today create problems for integration. The merger was opposed by both parts, however inevitable. People from Mafikeng were found more critical to the merger, highlighting the different power relations between the campuses and fear of being swallowed by Potchefstroom. Potchefstroom in general did not see many changes and white people seem to be more worried about their individual future. Once united as one university there is still a low grade of integration or interaction between the campuses and between the groups within them. There have been initiatives to enhance integration at an organizational level, this has though not affected the social level in a significant way. One reason to the lack of integration might be the domination of one culture group at each campus, at Potchefstroom Afrikaans, and at Mafikeng SeTswana. This domination has shown to hinder integration since minority groups either feel left out or have to assimilate to fit in. Differences between the groups also create misunderstandings and clashes in the integration process. However we have seen that the persons within the merger process tend to be more positive than the people outside of it. This might be due to increased interaction, better information and a possibility to affect the outcome that makes the people involved more positive then the ones not involved.

The following study explored the secondary transfer effect (STE) through minimal, online intergroup contact, with a positive and negative dimension of contact through acceptance from outgroup and the rejection from ingroup peers. An experiment was conducted where the participants played an economic game with fictional players. The manipulation in the experimental condition involved minimal contact in the form of rejection from two (fictional) ingroup members combined with acceptance from one (fictional) outgroup member. This was compared to a control condition, in which participants received no feedback nor contact with other players. The dependent variable comprised measures of prejudice against three groups: immigrants, Muslims and old people. Results showed significantly lower prejudice towards immigrants in the experimental condition compared to the control condition, which is consistent with previous research and contact theory. Secondary transfer effects did occur, but not towards the expected groups.

Nurses are expected to work collaboratively with other health professionals after graduation; however, most have not been taught to work in teams and are ill-prepared to work in collaborative relationships. Interprofessional Education (IPE) may better prepare nursing students for teamwork. The purpose of this study was to investigate the efficacy of pre-licensure clinical IPE for nursing students. It was hypothesized that nursing students who participate in clinical IPE have more positive attitudes toward health care teams than nursing students who do not participate in clinical IPE as evidenced by higher scores on the Attitudes Toward Health Care Teams Scale (ATHCTS), Quality of Care/Process subscale and by lower scores on the ATHCTS, Physician Centrality subscale. The theoretical framework for this study was Pettigrew’s intergroup contact theory. A quasi-experimental, nonequivalent control group, after-only design was used for this study. Archived data (ATHCTS) for nursing students who had participated in clinical IPE was used for the intervention group. The ATHCTS was administered to nursing students in control group universities. An independent t test was used to compare group mean scores. There was no significant difference in Quality of Care/Process subscales between groups. Students participating in clinical IPE had lower scores on the Physician Centrality subscale than the control group. Nursing students participating in clinical IPE favored shared leadership while non-IPE participants supported physician authority. Clinical IPE did not improve student attitudes toward quality of care given by teams. However, all participants had relatively high attitudes toward quality of care provided by teams.

Using social contact and social identity theories, I seek to show how attitudes of mainstream American society toward individuals of Middle-Eastern descent (Arabs) have changed eight years after September 11, 2001 when compared to similar data from shortly after the terrorist attacks. I use data gathered from nationally representative opinion polls and the theoretical constructs of social contact theory and social identity theory to understand how attitudes have changed in the eight-year period. I first provide a firm grounding in the social contact and social identity literature, analyze the race/attitudinal data, and finally show how both social identity and social contact theories are useful when looking at attitudes toward Arabs post September 11, 2001. Initially, I expect that an inverse reaction to social contact will be observed leading to negative attitudes. At the same time, I expect that shared social identity will increase over time and positively affect attitudes toward Arabs. The results suggest that greater contact does not necessarily lead to positive attitudes about an out-group (in this case the Arab minority). In addition, the results show social identity's ability to affect attitudes decreases over time. I conclude that the ability to change attitudes is dependent on an individual developing greater understanding and knowledge of the out-group thereby expanding social identity. I argue that this is a useful method to decrease out-group prejudice. I conclude the two theories are useful as they both can inform public policy campaigns and public perception.

Students with disabilities represent a group of the population subject to “othering” (Kalymon et al., 2010); that is, being set apart from neurotypical students because of their disabilities. Within the realm of instrumental music, this treatment has followed the pattern of prejudice noted by Allport (1954). Band directors have resisted inclusion (Haywood, 2006; Hourigan, 2007a; McKee, 2011) and used tactics designed to discourage students with disabilities from continuing in band programs (Hammel & Hourigan, 2017). Lack of preparation to teach students with disabilities in a musical setting has been noted in the research as one factor inhibiting inclusion (Heller, 1994; Linsenmeier, 2004; McCord & Watts, 2010; VanWeelden & Whipple, 2014b). Viewed through the lens of Allport’s (1954) work on prejudice, though, the patterns of inconsistent inclusion in the music room may be explained by a subconscious mentality in which the instructor is “othering” a student with special needs, rendering them less teachable than students who present as typical musicians. Allport’s contact theory is used to provide a deeper understanding of the possible reasons behind these educational inequalities. This study used the Attitudes Towards Intellectual Disabilities (Morin et al., 2019a) protocol to assess the attitudes of Texan band directors (N = 49) towards people with intellectual disabilities. Allport’s (1954) contact theory was then used as a lens to investigate the formation of these attitudes. In open-ended interviews, six band directors shared their stories about their teaching, their preparation, and the people in their lives who shaped their attitudes about people with intellectual disabilities. Contact with people with intellectual disabilities was noted as a factor in the formation of their attitudes towards their own students with disabilities. These music educators discussed creating inclusive environments and fostering equity among all students in their programs. Four university professors shared their own stories, and how they have built programs to not only prepare future music educators, but to provide them the opportunity to experience contact with students with disabilities before graduation. Looking to close the gaps in education noted in the research, these professors have sought to change the nature of music education by changing the perception of who can learn music. Incorporating direct instruction and meaningful contact with students with disabilities, these professors have found success in increasing a positive attitude towards people with intellectual disabilities in their graduating students.