‘Attachment research gave some indication where we could start in trying to parent our seriously unwell daughter’

Robbie Duschinsky (University of Cambridge) reflects on parenting a profoundly unwell and disabled child whilst undertaking research and writing about attachment.

01 August 2025


Ibegan conducting research addressing child-caregiver attachment relationships in 2012. A few years later, things settled down for my wife Sophie and I in our jobs, and we felt it was time to start a family. I felt positive about becoming a dad, and reassured by what I had learnt from attachment theory and research. I understood about the importance of being available to offer support for a child when they wanted to explore (a 'secure base'); and to offer them help and comfort when they were distressed (a 'safe haven'). This is what attachment researchers called a 'secure attachment'. I doubted I'd be anything like a perfect parent, but that did not seem to be especially the point. Someone my child could trust – I thought that sounded possible.

The next few years were hard. Sophie and I celebrated the start of three pregnancies, only for each to end in miscarriage. Miscarriage is not so uncommon, and I remained hopeful, though these losses weighed on both of us.

In 2019, following a fourth pregnancy, our daughter A was born. However, it soon became clear that she was seriously unwell. We received news of our daughter's diagnosis of a very rare and serious genetic condition over the phone the day that lockdown began. The severity of the condition can vary. For A it has meant profound intellectual disability, long-term struggles with nutrition, and impairments in communication and mobility. Most immediately, she was in pain 16-20 hours a day for her first few years. Coinciding with the pandemic, lockdowns and huge healthcare backlogs, Sophie and I were largely on our own with our sick daughter, with limited access to help.

In 2021, A began having seizures, which did not respond well to medication, and since that time she has needed continuous monitoring day and night. At that time, she lost the ability to vocalise, eat, drink, walk, play with toys, smile, or even routinely recognise us. Now, heading towards her sixth birthday, some of these skills have returned, such as her smile and increasingly her ability to recognise us. Many skills remain partially or wholly lost.

Through A's early years, and still today to an extent, I faced a daily battle with feelings of hopelessness and heartbreak. In this context, something that made a profound difference was my work on attachment theory and research. Thinking about, researching and writing about attachment helped me retain a sense that whilst the situation could feel impossible, it did not mean that it actually was impossible. Sophie and I couldn't stop A being ill. But attachment research gave some indications of where we could start in trying to parent our daughter.

A lot of well-meaning nonsense and hazy generalities are circulated about attachment. Inaccurate information is so much easier to come by than accurate information – it's wild. But attachment theory and research has also generated some recommendations for parents, supported by researcher consensus as well as experimental evidence from attachment-based interventions. My experiences have given me an urgent sense of the value of some of these key messages. I have tried to make these accessible in my books, and especially in one for students and general readers called The Psychology of Attachment, written with my friends and colleagues Pehr Granqvist and Tommie Forslund.

The challenges A faced were extreme and rare. But the recommendations of attachment theory and research still had bearing for Sophie and I, maybe even more so given our daughter's suffering and need for comfort. The focus of this article is on the ideas I found helpful in giving some sense of how to proceed with A's care. I close by bringing the reader up to the present, thinking about what I have learnt from these experiences, and how these lessons have shaped me as a parent to A's little sister, as a co-parent with my wife Sophie, and also as a researcher.
Providing a safe haven

An early and important source of help for Sophie and I as parents was the idea of the caregiver as a 'safe haven'. By this attachment researchers mean that when a child is distressed, they are disposed to seek a familiar caregiver with the expectation of help and protection. Touch and comfort from a familiar adult, these basic things, help an infant to re-find equilibrium. Older children can get the same reassurance by other indications of the caregiver's availability. Even as adults we are still disposed to look for comfort when we are distressed, unless we have learnt that this will backfire.

In being available when a child is distressed, a caregiver gradually helps the child learn to trust, and to cope with difficult feelings (Ainsworth, 1985). The extent of security of each close relationship makes an additional contribution to a child's development in these regards, highlighting the importance of caregivers supporting one another in their provision of safe haven availability to a child (Dagan et al., 2021).

Sophie and I could not protect our daughter from pain. However, we could remain with her through it, holding her, and walking her up and down our little flat for unending hours. We could reassure her that she was not alone. We could try to teach her the expectation that when she was distressed, her mum or I would be completely there with her, even if, to our sorrow, we didn't know how to make things better. We could try to support one another with the grief we were feeling.

Attachment theory suggests that caregivers are most readily able to offer a safe haven to their child when they feel themselves supported by their family, community and society (Supkoff et al., 2013). Due to the pandemic and the severity of A's illness, at times we have felt quite abandoned by community and society, with exceptions. We have found it tremendously difficult to access support from health and social care services, who have often been hell-bent on reducing costs or trying to pass responsibility to other services regardless of what this means for A's safety or our family's ability to cope. Some professionals have gone above and beyond to help us. There's been almost no middle ground. Likewise many friends from before we became parents ran in horror at A's suffering and what our lives looked like. But some friends really stepped up to try to look after us, acting towards A like extended family. And since 2024 A has started attending a specialist primary school, which she absolutely loves, and which has reduced pressure on us too.
Attending to our child's signals

Attachment research has a premise that a lot goes on at the level of behaviour that mostly does not get noticed. On this basis, a second recommendation made by the attachment literature was the idea that caregivers can consider their child's actions as having 'signal value' for their experiences and needs (Ainsworth, 1977). The caregiver can be on the look-out for behaviours and vocalisations that might give relevant clues. This will allow the caregiver to accurately identify the child's motivations, and respond to them appropriately and in a timely way. For instance, being able to distinguish signals of tiredness from hunger or pain can be helpful in ensuring that the caregiver is available as a safe haven when needed.

It was very hard to discern A's experiences and needs. For her first years, other signals were often drowned out by pain. Then, with the seizures, she lost much of what capacity she had to communicate her experiences and needs. At times it felt that A was inaccessible to us, for all that she was physically present and required care.

Yet the idea of the child's actions as having 'signal value' suggested that signal might still be found, even if most of A's means of communicating her experiences and needs had been overloaded, blocked or damaged. We began keeping a moment-to-moment diary of everything we thought might have signal value, day and night: what A seemed to pay attention to, when she was capable of attention; bowel movements; coughs; when she fell asleep and woke up; changes in her breathing. Sophie and I worked together to try to interpret these signals.

This level of attention was, and remains, costly. It is exhausting, and comes at the expense of other things. But over time it has helped build our understanding of A's experiences and needs, allowing us to respond to them. We searched for A in these small signals, and in this way, over time, began to identify critical factors for her care, including triggers for pain and for seizures, and other indicators associated with better days for her. We discovered, for instance, that she loved cheesy '90s pop music (e.g. Spice Girls, Aqua), and given the lack of access to medical care, this was what we had available as pain relief for A for her early years.

Sophie and I feel that A acts like someone who believes that we are trying to interpret her signals and to help. On her better days she reaches out for contact, she smiles, and she rarely resists her medical care; she readily forms new relationships with people who are responsive to her cues. A knows we are listening out for her signals; and Sophie and I know that A's signals can be found and trusted. Despite all that we have to bridge in order to achieve this understanding, this sense of mutual trust makes a huge practical and emotional difference to every day of interaction and care.
Avoidance and Emotional Defence

A third point raised by attachment theory and research is that a child's signals of their experiences and needs can be obstructed by the caregiver's own defences (Main & Hesse, 1992), or when a caregiver feels chronically overwhelmed (Cyr et al., 2010). So when a child signals to us, our defences or feelings of overwhelm can hinder us from recognising or responding to these signals.

Attachment theory is sometimes perceived as about categories, putting people into boxes. That's a stereotype and simplification. In reality, we all have tendencies towards particular kinds of defence or dysregulation, tendencies that will be elicited particularly when we are under stress, and shaped and reshaped by the training our life continues to give us in how to cope. Parents, including those of children with additional needs, have our own histories. For me, A's additional needs have confronted me with the limits of my defences, not least from watching them buckle at times from the pressure placed on them.

A's quality of life is frequently not good. But with the passing years it has been generally getting better, and when she is not in pain or dazed by seizures she is a remarkably happy and resilient little person. Even so, perhaps the hardest challenge for me as a parent, my most pervasive defence, has been to bear to try to see things from A's point of view. Whilst able to cognitively attend minutely to signals of her experience and needs, I nonetheless find it aversive to imagine what A's life might be like for her. To go beyond A's signals and what they mean for what I need to do, and try to fully imagine her mind behind those signals.

Attachment theory and research teaches that avoidance is a strategy, one that can be protective when the alternative would be getting overwhelmed and dysregulated. It isn't bad. But avoidant behaviour by carers is penalised by the contemporary health and social care system: our experience has been that unless you are telling professionals repeatedly that you are not coping, help gets stripped away, even when this is manifestly unsafe. Additionally, attachment research regards avoidance as emotionally impoverishing when it is stuck in place. When we barricade ourselves off from the experience of others, this can help us cope, but also risks leaving us feeling empty (Slade et al., 2023).

Over the years I've given this challenge a lot of thought; I've talked about it with Sophie; I've had counselling through our local children's hospice. Though it is hard, I am learning how to use avoidance more flexibly, and try, where I can, to feel out what A's experience might be. The more I do, the more pleasure and pain I receive in being A's parent. As I do, the more A seems to respond to me and engage, even if her forms of engagement remain limited. This would be in line with the idea from attachment theory that exploration is facilitated when a child feels their caregiver's engagement with their experiences (Fonagy & Target, 1997).
The present

In 2022, Sophie and I had another little girl, L, who has been healthy and hilarious. The weight of past experience and day-to-day pressures of A's care has certainly affected me as a parent. As someone who generally thought of himself as quite silly, I can at times barely recognise myself in my parenting behaviour, which can sometimes be flat and exhausted, lacking playfulness.

I struggle especially with the rough play L enjoys, and requests most days: even faced with our firework of a toddler, my hands expect A's vulnerability, and it requires intense concentration to adjust. But Sophie and I also have an intensified sense of the preciousness of L's communications, and confidence in our capacity for teamwork as parents.

I continue to try to learn from attachment theory and research to inform me as a parent. Indeed, I sometimes talk in my head to the attachment researchers I have read or know about my caregiving responsibilities for A; I find this can help with making sense of it all.

In turn, my experiences as a parent have shaped how I have interpreted and undertaken attachment theory and research, and informed my writing about the topic. This has included a sense of wonder at the power of some of the levers available to caregivers: touch, noticing signals, provision of a secure base. I've also gained greater tenderness in considering the challenges caregivers may face in thinking about the mind of their child.

Experiences as A's parent have also given me additional questions. For instance, whereas attachment researchers generally treat 'safe haven availability' as a single thing, I've been brought to think about its different aspects, such as a caregiver's response to indications of pain, distress, fear and incomprehension. I have also become more critical of the limited way that attachment theory and research have addressed the wider context of family life, even when the data was available to do so. I cannot unlearn what I have learnt as a parent about the power of social isolation and failures of health and social care systems, and this has left a decisive mark on me as a researcher.

In Cornerstones of Attachment Research, written before A was born, I wrote of a sense of affection for attachment theory and its 'genuine insights into the strange, drunk-dialling human heart'. For all that I am more critical of attachment theory and research now, I couldn't have possibly known then how precious some of those insights would prove to me when I became a parent.Dr Robbie Duschinsky is Professor of Social Science and Health and Head of the Applied Social Science Group within the Primary Care Unit.
See also our 'parenting' collection.
Key sources and further reading

Ainsworth, M.D.S. (1977) Social development in the first year of life: Maternal influences on infant-mother attachment. In: J. M. Tanner (Ed.) Developments in Psychiatric Research (pp.1-20). London: Hodder & Stoughton

Ainsworth, M. D. (1985). Attachments across the life span. Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, 61(9), 792-812; Goldberg, S. (2000) Attachment and Development, London: Routledge.

Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J., & van IJzendoorn, M. H. (2025). Attachment in pediatrics: No such thing as a child. In M. H. Bornstein & P. E. Shah (Eds.), APA Handbook of Pediatric Psychology, Developmental-Behavioral Pediatrics, and Developmental Science (pp. 205–226). American Psychological Association.

Cyr, C., Euser, E. M., Bakermans-Kranenburg, M. J., & Van IJzendoorn, M. H. (2010). Attachment security and disorganization in maltreating and high-risk families: A series of meta-analyses. Development & Psychopathology, 22(1), 87-108.

Dagan, O., Schuengel, C., Verhage, M. L., et al. (2021). Configurations of mother‐child and father‐child attachment as predictors of internalizing and externalizing behavioral problems: An individual participant data (IPD) meta‐analysis. New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2021(180), 67-94.

Doodeman, T. W., Schuengel, C., & Sterkenburg, P. S. (2023). Effects of the Attune & Stimulate‐checklist for caregivers of people with severe and profound intellectual disabilities: A randomised controlled trial. Journal of Applied Research in Intellectual Disabilities, 36(5), 1136-1149

Dozier, M., & Bernard, K. (2019). Coaching Parents of Vulnerable Infants: The attachment and biobehavioral catch-up approach. New York: Guilford Publications

Duschinsky, R. (2020) Cornerstones of Attachment Research, Oxford: Oxford University Press – free to download from the Oxford University Press website

Duschinsky, R., Granqvist, P., & Forslund, T. (2023). The Psychology of Attachment. London: Routledge.

Duschinsky, R. (2025) Developments in Attachment Research, Oxford: Oxford University Press – free to download from the Oxford University Press website

Fonagy, P. & Target, M. (1997). Attachment and reflective function: Their role in self-organization. Development and psychopathology, 9(4), 679-700

Foster, S.L., Schofield, G., Geoghegan, L., Hood, R., Sagi-Schwartz, A … Duschinsky, R. (2025) Attachment theory and research: What should be on the core curriculum for child and family social workers?. Social Work Education, forthcoming.

Main, M. & Hesse, E. ([1992] 2021). Disorganized/disoriented infant behaviour in the Strange Situation, lapses in the monitoring of reasoning and discourse during the parent's Adult Attachment Interview, and dissociative states. In Tommie Forslund & Robbie Duschinsky (Eds.) Attachment Theory and Research: A Reader (pp.108-132), NY: Wiley.

Mucha, L. (2025). Please Find Attached: How Attachment Theory Explains Our Relationships, London: Bloomsbury

Schuengel, C., & Oosterman, M. (2019). Parenting self-efficacy. In Bornstein M. H. (Ed.), Handbook of parenting: Being and becoming a parent (654–680). London: Routledge

Slade, A (2009). Mentalizing the unmentalizable: Parenting children on the spectrum. Journal of Infant, Child, and Adolescent Psychotherapy, 8(1), 7-21.

Slade, A, Sadler, L. S., Eaves, T., & Webb, D. L. (2023). Enhancing attachment and reflective parenting in clinical practice. Guilford Publications.

Supkoff, L., Puig, J., & Sroufe, L.A (2013). Situating resilience in developmental context. In M. Ungar, The Social Ecology of Resilience. (pp. 127-142). New York: Springer

Berástegui, A, & Pitillas, C. (2024). The family keyworker as a critical element for attachment resilience in the face of adversity. Journal of Family Theory & Review, 16(1), 106-123.

Vandesande, S., Bosmans, G., & Maes, B. (2019). Can I be your safe haven and secure base? A parental perspective on parent-child attachment in young children with a severe or profound intellectual disability. Research in developmental disabilities, 93, 103452.

SOURCE:

https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/attachment-research-gave-some-indication-where-we-could-start-trying-parent-our(accessed 30.9.25)

Feeling accepted versus tolerated

A recent study finds that embracing differences, rather than being ‘identity-blind’, leaves LGBT+ people feeling more truly accepted in the workplace.

16 September 2025

By Emily Reynolds


Diversity and inclusion have become central priorities for many organisations, with a wide range of strategies emerging to guide how differences are recognised and valued in the workplace. Yet we know less about the subtle, lived nuances of more complex experiences — such as the experience of feeling 'tolerated' in these contexts, a state that goes beyond exclusion, but falls slightly short of feeling like real acceptance.

In the British Journal of Social Psychology, Kshitij Mor and colleagues explore these feelings, asking how different diversity approaches can shape the experiences of LGBT+ people at work. They find that 'identity-blind' approaches, where everyone is treated the same without highlighting differences, are more likely to cause feelings of being 'put up with', rather than truly accepted.

For the first study, the team looked at data from 462 LGBT+ adults collected for a previous investigation. The characteristics of these participants were quite varied, though the vast majority were White. Participants were randomly assigned to read a diversity statement from a fictional company, either framed in an identity-blind way (downplaying differences and emphasising similarities) or an identity-conscious way (highlighting and valuing differences). They were then asked how much they agreed with the statement "I anticipate being tolerated at this company, meaning that people will not really approve of my identity but rather will endure and put up with me at work."

Overall, those in the identity-blind condition anticipated feeling more tolerated; around 30% moreso than those in the identity-conscious condition. In other words, more of those who read that the company encouraged employees to embrace their similarities rather than their differences felt they would only be put up with rather than approved of.

After an additional analysis looking specifically at demographics, the team also found that multiple marginalisation increased concerns about being tolerated overall. In both conditions, transgender participants reported about 19% higher anticipated tolerance than cisgender participants, for example, and non-White participants 16% higher.

Next, 445 participants answered a range of questions about their own workplace, including how diversity was approached by both their organisation generally and their direct supervisor specifically, whether they felt tolerated at work, and whether they had any intention to leave their job.

Similar to the lab experiment, when actual organisations and leaders took an identity-conscious approach, employees reported feeling less tolerated than identity-blind ones: on average, for every 10% increase in how identity-conscious an organisation or leader was reported to be, perceptions of being tolerated fell by around 5%. Unlike the first study, there were no significant differences between White and non-White employees, though transgender employees reported around 30% higher feelings of being tolerated than cisgender employees, suggesting that multiple marginalisation still played a part.

Leadership was also important, with employees of identity-conscious leaders felt less put-up-with regardless of how their wider organisation was perceived. The strongest effect, however, emerged when leaders and organisations aligned. In workplaces where both leaders and organisations took an identity-conscious approach, employees reported the lowest levels of feeling just tolerated, suggesting that consistent messaging can make a big difference to marginalised employees.

As ever, there are some limitations to this investigation. In particular, the team notes that their single-item measure of tolerance may not have captured the complexity of the experience, and that future research could look at its nuances: whether tolerance means acceptance under certain conditions, subtle exclusion, or something else. Capturing emotional factors which influence the feeling of just being tolerated could also have been useful, including wider mental health measures or motivation at work, as well as looking at a more racially-diverse sample.

Overall, the findings suggest that approaches that downplay differences, even when well-meaning, can leave LGBT+ people feeling as if they are not really accepted for who they are. To ensure that employees are genuinely benefitting from workplace diversity initiatives, organisations need to invest not only in their policies, but also their leadership, ensuring that workplaces move beyond tolerance and cultivate a real culture of acceptance and inclusion.

Read the paper in full:
Mor, K., Seval Gündemir, & van. (2025). "Are they just putting up with me"? How diversity approaches impact LGBTQ+ employees' sense of being tolerated at work. British Journal of Social Psychology, 64(4). https://doi.org/10.1111/bjso.70006

SOURCE:

https://www.bps.org.uk/research-digest/feeling-accepted-versus-tolerated(accessed 24.9.25)

Kindness

 (part one)

https://megjohnandjustin.com/relationships/kindness/

This time on the podcast we discussed kindness. Here on our free feed you can listen to our overview of what kindness is and why it’s so important. Then please check out our Patreon to listen to the rest of our conversation about how to be kind.


Listen here in the embedded player, or go here, or download the soundcloud app, or simply find us in your podcast app on your phone.

Our jumping off point for the conversation was these two quotes.

Kate Bornstein: ‘Your dreams are not dangerous. Your desires are not damned. Do whatever it takes to make your life more worth living. Anything at all. There’s only one rule to follow to make that kind of blanket permission work. Don’t. Be. Mean.’

Michael Brooks: ‘Be ruthless against institutions but be kind and forgiving towards individuals.’

In the podcast we wanted to reflect on what being kind – or not being mean – actually looks like in practice, and also on how we can be kind with individuals while being ruthless with unkind systems.
Watch our video here
Why now?

We see starkly the degree of meanness and cruelty in our wider world right now: the hatred and fear of difference, the desire to keep safe by policing and building walls against the most marginalised people – excluding them or imprisoning them. The pandemic and the #BlackLivesMatter uprising have both shocked people into greater awareness of all of our complicity in the current state: our histories steeped in colonisation, genocide, slavery, and exploitation, and the long shadows these cast over our current situation.


The question becomes ever more urgent of how we can find kindness for each other in our own communities, networks, and close relationships. This could provide some buffer against a wider world which feels mean and cruel. If we can find some different ways of being we might be able to invite others into this, or offer it outwards: another way of being where one person’s safety and comfort doesn’t rely on another person’s pain and alienation. Where people of all bodies, lives and labours can really be equally valued.
Kindness as praxis

Capitalist systems – particularly neoliberal capitalism rather than social democratic capitalism – are built on the idea that humans are fundamentally unkind and need regulation. The philosopher Hobbes’s model of the Leviathan was the idea that humans needed a monster to keep them behaving well. This is echoed in the popular book Lord of the Flies.

This can be juxtaposed with Rousseau’s idea that humans are fundamentally decent, cooperative, and friendly. Rutger Bregman’s recent book Humankind considers the evidence to support this idea that humans have capacity for kindness and it is the systems we’re in which make it very hard for us to be kind with ourselves and others. One part of the book involves finding the ‘real’ Lord of the Flies and noting that the shipwrecked boys actually developed practices and systems of kindness.

To act kindly and expect kindness in return (even if we don’t get it) is radical. It’s anti-capitalist. As philosophies from Buddhism to intersectional feminism have emphasised, kindness is essential because we’re fundamentally all interconnected.
Niceness or kindness?

Kindness can’t just be a veneer of ‘niceness’ or ‘harmony’ which covers over people’s pain, fear and rage, tone-policing all the difficult feelings away.

We distinguished between niceness and kindness on the podcast. Niceness responses often come from wanting to appear kind, but may not actually involve acting in the kindest way in a situation.

Author of Fucking Law, Victoria Brooks, talks about how real kindness requires work and effort. She distinguishes between talk about ethics (in research, law, medicine, etc.) which is often really about avoiding complaints or protecting ourselves or our institutions, and real ethics which is about asking what’s best or kindest for everyone involved.

Sarah Ahmed talks about how institutions often hire an individual – or bring in a trainer – to address diversity or sexual harassment as a way of looking like they are tackling racism or sexual violence, but actually leaving the systems and structures which enable those unaddressed.

Niceness could be seen as something like these examples: the veneer of kindness which actually enables cruelty to continue – on whatever level.

We finished this part of the podcast reflecting on how this happens in much sex and relationship advice. ‘Nice’ sex and relationships advice imagines we could tweak our current way of doing sex and relationship to be kinder, more consensual, and better for people. ‘Kind’ sex and relationships advice – in our view – recognises the impossibility of kind, consensual, fulfilling sex and relationship under the current – normative – cultural system, and endeavours to offer alternatives to that system and its way of doing sex and relationships. This is both why our sex advice book is so good, and why it doesn’t sell very well!

Sign up to our Patreon to listen to the rest of this conversation about kindness. There is gold! There may or may not be blow-job tips at the end.

© Meg-John Barker and Justin Hancock, 2020

SOURCE:

https://megjohnandjustin.com/relationships/kindness/(accessed 22.9.25)

Sleep

Dream database aims to answer burning questions

New paper describes an organisational effort to reduce the variability of methods used in dream research — an approach which could supercharge investigations.

12 September 2025

By Emma Young



Why do some people wake up every morning with detailed memories of their dreams, while others can't remember dreaming at all? Why do so few people have 'lucid dreams', which they can control? And, more fundamentally, by looking at brain activity alone, how can we spot when someone is dreaming?

Despite decades of research into dreams, we still don't have answers to these big questions. That's partly down to the inconsistent methods and, because of the high costs involved, the often small numbers of participants included in experiments, write a team led by William Wong at Monash University, Australia, in Nature Communications. In a bid to overcome these two stumbling blocks, the team has now established the DREAM database — a new and expanding collection of standardised datasets of both measures of brain activity during sleep and accompanying dream reports.

The initial database, described in their paper, consists of 20 datasets on 505 participants, and includes measures of electrical activity in these participants' brains just prior to 2,463 awakenings, after which they were questioned about whether they'd been dreaming.

In earlier dream studies, these subjective reports have been categorised in all kinds of different ways, making comparisons between studies difficult. In this database, they are allocated to one of three main categories. One is 'experience' — having a specific memory of having any kind of conscious experience, which could mean a complex dream, or a simpler sensory impression, which the team also classify as being a dream. Then there's 'experience without recall' — the participant was sure they had just been dreaming but couldn't remember any detail. The final category is 'no experience' — no awareness of having any conscious experience just before they were woken.

The team also established minimum technical standards for the EEG aspect of studies that can be included in the database — with at least 20 seconds of continuous sleep recorded up until the moment of an awakening, for example.

In a bid to demonstrate that the database could be useful for research, the team analysed their combined EEG and dream report data. They concluded that, as expected from earlier research, dreams happened in both REM (rapid eye movement) and non-REM sleep. They also found that, during both REM and non-REM sleep, there were clear differences in the EEG pattern for someone who reported an 'experience' rather than 'no experience'. "These results demonstrate that the DREAM database can be exploited to effectively investigate the neural correlates of dreaming," the authors write.

In theory, this new database may help researchers to get a better understanding of the neural underpinnings of dreams, and provide a more solid footing by which to answer outstanding questions about both dreaming and consciousness. For example, if we can learn how to identify instances of conscious experience (ie. a dream of some sort) in a sleeping person based on brain activity alone, this may allow us to spot consciousness in other situations in which a person is unable to communicate, the team writes. At the moment, it's not possible to be certain that in these situations, the individual is not conscious at all. "By contrasting dreamless, unconscious sleep with dreamful, conscious sleep, the distinction between levels of consciousness within the same brain state becomes possible," the team writes.

It will, however, take more contributions for the database to grow into a truly robust resource. If you're a researcher interested in learning more, the database (which is supported by volunteers) can be found at https://monash.edu/dream-database, and is open to contributions from labs worldwide.

Read the paper in full:
Wong, W., Herzog, R., Andrade, K. C., Andrillon, T., Barros, D., Arnulf, I., Somayeh Ataei, Giulia Avvenuti, Baird, B., Bellesi, M., Bergamo, D., Bernardi, G., Blagrove, M., Decat, N., Çağatay Demirel, Dresler, M., Eichenlaub, J.-B., Elce, V., Steffen Gais, & Gennaro, L. D. (2025). A dream EEG and mentation database. Nature Communications, 16(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-61945-1

SOURCE:

https://www.bps.org.uk/research-digest/dream-database-aims-answer-burning-questions(accessed 19.09.25)

Η επιστήμη πίσω από το γιατί μας αρέσουν τα παιχνίδια ρίσκου

Childit.gr
10 Σεπτεμβρίου 2025




Μάθε πώς εξελικτική ιστορία, χημεία εγκεφάλου και κοινωνικές αλληλεπιδράσεις συνεργάζονται ώστε τα παιχνίδια ρίσκου να γίνονται συναρπαστικά, και πώς να παίζεις υπεύθυνα.


Οι περισσότεροι άνθρωποι θυμούνται την πρώτη φορά που ένιωσαν την καρδιά τους να χτυπά πιο γρήγορα μπροστά σε ένα ρίσκο, είτε ήταν μια βόλτα σε λούνα παρκ είτε το γύρισμα ενός τροχού τύχης. Το έντονο συναίσθημα εκείνης της στιγμής μοιάζει να τραβά την προσοχή του εγκεφάλου και να ζητά επανάληψη. Το γενναιόδωρο μπόνους καζίνο συχνά οδηγεί τους παίκτες να δοκιμάσουν τα νέα ελληνικά online καζίνο, που θυμίζουν κλασικά φρουτάκια της παλιάς εποχής και κρατούν ζωντανή την επιθυμία για μια ακόμη δοκιμή. Παράλληλα, όταν ένα online casino δεν προσφέρει αρκετή ποικιλία, πολλοί στρέφονται στα Ξένα καζίνο για Έλληνες, αναζητώντας εμπειρίες ζωντανών παιχνιδιών που ανεβάζουν την αδρεναλίνη και χαρίζουν ιστορίες για διηγήσεις σε φίλους. Από τα επιτραπέζια παιχνίδια μέχρι τα αθλήματα και τα ψηφιακά καζίνο, η έλξη του ρίσκου φαίνεται καθολική. Τι κρύβεται όμως πίσω από αυτή την ευχαρίστηση; Η επιστήμη δίνει απαντήσεις που συνδυάζουν χημεία, ψυχολογία και κοινωνικούς παράγοντες με τρόπους που ίσως δεν περιμέναμε.

Γιατί το ρίσκο είναι τόσο ελκυστικό

Οι ειδικοί συμφωνούν ότι ο ανθρώπινος εγκέφαλος έχει εξελιχθεί για να ανταμείβει τη συμπεριφορά που οδηγεί σε κάτι νέο και ενδεχομένως ωφέλιμο. Σε αρχαίες κοινότητες, το να ρισκάρει κάποιος για να βρει φρέσκο φαγητό ή ασφαλέστερη φωλιά αύξανε τις πιθανότητες επιβίωσης. Έτσι, η αίσθηση περιπέτειας γράφτηκε βαθιά στο νευρικό σύστημα. Σήμερα, αντί για κυνηγετικές εξορμήσεις, υπάρχουν ζάρια, κάρτες και ψηφιακοί τροχοί. Το μοτίβο παραμένει: ένα αβέβαιο αποτέλεσμα μπορεί να οδηγήσει σε μεγάλη ανταμοιβή. Ακόμη κι όταν η ανταμοιβή είναι μικρή, ο ενθουσιασμός της προσμονής αρκεί για να κάνει την εμπειρία ευχάριστη. Οι ερευνητές το ονομάζουν «προσαύξηση προσμονής» και το μετρούν με αισθητήρες καρδιακών παλμών και ιδρώτα. Όταν η πιθανότητα νίκης είναι περίπου 50%, η διέγερση φτάνει στο ζενίθ. Ουσιαστικά, το ρίσκο μετατρέπει τις καθημερινές αποφάσεις σε μικρά αφηγήματα με ήρωα τον ίδιο τον παίκτη. Αυτή η ιστορία, γεμάτη σασπένς και πιθανό επίλογο ευτυχίας, είναι που τραβά τόσο πολύ το ενδιαφέρον.
Ντοπαμίνη: Η χημική ανταμοιβή

Κάθε φορά που ένας άνθρωπος ρισκάρει και κερδίζει, ο εγκέφαλος απελευθερώνει ντοπαμίνη, έναν νευροδιαβιβαστή που συνδέεται στενά με την ευχαρίστηση. Το ίδιο μόριο ενεργοποιείται όταν τρώμε σοκολάτα ή ακούμε το αγαπημένο μας τραγούδι, όμως σε παιχνίδια ρίσκου η απελευθέρωση γίνεται κατά κύματα. Εντυπωσιακό είναι ότι η ντοπαμίνη αρχίζει να ρέει όχι μετά τη νίκη, αλλά πριν, τη στιγμή που ο τροχός ξεκινά ή το ζάρι μένει στον αέρα. Αυτό το «προκαταβολικό» κύμα κρατά τους παίκτες σε διαρκή αγωνία. Τα εργαστηριακά πειράματα δείχνουν ότι οι διακυμάνσεις ντοπαμίνης είναι εντονότερες όταν το αποτέλεσμα είναι αβέβαιο. Έτσι, ο εγκέφαλος μαθαίνει να αποζητά καταστάσεις όπου η πιθανότητα κέρδους δεν είναι ούτε πολύ χαμηλή ούτε πλήρως εγγυημένη. Με άλλα λόγια, η χημεία μας προγραμματίζει για να αναζητούμε την ισορροπία ανάμεσα σε ασφάλεια και κίνδυνο. Αν το ρίσκο εξαφανιζόταν, ο μηχανισμός θα έπεφτε σε αδράνεια και η εμπειρία θα γινόταν απλώς βαρετή. Για αυτό, ένα μικρό σκαμπανέβασμα αρκεί για να ανάψει ξανά τη σπίθα.

Ο κοινωνικός παράγοντας

H απόλαυση του ρίσκου δεν είναι μόνο προσωπική υπόθεση. Οι άνθρωποι συχνά συγκεντρώνονται γύρω από ένα τραπέζι με τράπουλα ή σχολιάζουν σε ζωντανή μετάδοση μια περιστροφή ρουλέτας. Η κοινή εμπειρία μεγαλώνει το συναίσθημα, γιατί ο ανθρώπινος εγκέφαλος ανταποκρίνεται σε γέλια, επιφωνήματα και χειροκροτήματα των άλλων. Κοινωνικοί ψυχολόγοι μιλούν για το «φαύλο» ή «ευγενικό» κύκλο επιρροής: όταν κάποιος κερδίζει, οι γύρω ενθουσιάζονται και έτσι ο νικητής αισθάνεται ακόμη καλύτερα. Αντίστοιχα, μια ήττα γίνεται πιο ήπια όταν μοιράζεται. Επιπλέον, το ρίσκο λειτουργεί ως αφορμή για ιστορίες. Το να αφηγηθεί κάποιος πώς γύρισε ένα παιχνίδι από ήττα σε θρίαμβο ενισχύει την κοινωνική του εικόνα, ένα φαινόμενο που οι εξελικτικοί βιολόγοι συνδέουν με την ανάγκη για κύρος μέσα στην ομάδα. Στις ψηφιακές πλατφόρμες, τα σχόλια και τα emojis παίρνουν τον ρόλο του κοινού, δημιουργώντας σχεδόν το ίδιο κοινωνικό καύσιμο. Χωρίς αυτή τη διάδραση, πολλοί θα σταματούσαν πιο γρήγορα να παίζουν. Ακόμη και ένα απλό «καλή τύχη» από άγνωστο χρήστη αυξάνει τη δέσμευση. Η παρουσία κοινού λειτουργεί σαν ενισχυτής ήχου για το ήδη ισχυρό μήνυμα του εγκεφάλου.


Ισορροπία μεταξύ διασκέδασης και ευθύνης

Η ίδια επιστήμη που εξηγεί γιατί οι άνθρωποι απολαμβάνουν το ρίσκο υπενθυμίζει και τα όρια. Όταν η ντοπαμίνη εκτοξεύεται συχνά, ο εγκέφαλος μπορεί να συνηθίσει το «ύψος» της και να ζητά όλο και μεγαλύτερα ερεθίσματα. Αυτό ονομάζεται ανοχή και συνδέεται με την υπερβολική ενασχόληση. Οι ειδικοί προτείνουν πρακτικές λύσεις που είναι εύκολο να θυμάται ακόμη και ένα παιδί: καθορισμός χρονικού ορίου, συγκεκριμένο ποσό χρημάτων και συχνά διαλείμματα. Όπως σε κάθε χόμπι, η απόσταση βοηθά στην ανανέωση του ενδιαφέροντος. Επιπλέον, η εναλλακτική δραστηριότητα, όπως η βόλτα ή ένα επιτραπέζιο με φίλους, επαναφέρει την ισορροπία. Η σύγχρονη τεχνολογία προσφέρει εργαλεία αυτο-ελέγχου, από χρονόμετρα μέχρι αυτόματους περιορισμούς λογαριασμού. Όταν κάποιος γνωρίζει τους μηχανισμούς που τον σπρώχνουν να συνεχίσει, αποκτά δύναμη να επιλέξει συνειδητά. Έτσι, το ρίσκο παραμένει πηγή διασκέδασης χωρίς να μετατρέπεται σε βάρος. Σε τελική ανάλυση, το παιχνίδι έχει αξία μόνο όταν συνοδεύεται από χαμόγελα και αναμνήσεις, όχι από άγχος. Ένα απλό σχέδιο δράσης κάνει τη διαφορά στη διάρκεια και κρατά την εμπειρία διασκεδαστική και ασφαλή για όλους.

ΠΗΓΗ:

https://childit.gr/106299/%ce%b7-%ce%b5%cf%80%ce%b9%cf%83%cf%84%ce%ae%ce%bc%ce%b7-%cf%80%ce%af%cf%83%cf%89-%ce%b1%cf%80%cf%8c-%cf%84%ce%bf-%ce%b3%ce%b9%ce%b1%cf%84%ce%af-%ce%bc%ce%b1%cf%82-%ce%b1%cf%81%ce%ad%cf%83%ce%bf%cf%85/(accessed 12.9.25)

Who is your neighbour?

Tariq Bashir, Mike Fitter and Anna Potts introduce an organisation that has been facilitating troubling conversations…

08 September 2025


This is our story of discovery and learning. It's about an evolving group of people, the challenges we have faced along the way, and how we sought to overcome them. At its heart is how Psychology can help in facilitating troubling conversations which might just change the world.



First, let's introduce ourselves. Who is Your Neighbour? (WiYN?) provides and facilitates spaces in which people – white people in less well-off areas in particular – can speak about their experiences of living where they do, and listen to others do the same. We welcome subjects that people can feel 'shut down' for raising – like race, immigration, culture. The changes taking place in our world.



Tariq Bashir, our Director, is a Londoner. About 20 years ago, he moved to Yorkshire. He is good at making a decent cup of tea and doing dialogue – conversations in which people work at listening, hearing and understanding each other. Mike Fitter, a trustee and founder, is a Chartered Psychologist with a background in organisational psychology and a focus on supporting social cohesion and community development. Anna Potts leads on the communications aspects of our work and is also an integrative counsellor / psychotherapist.



The training that WiYN? delivers includes sessions in which we invite people to explore how they would respond if they heard statements such as these:



'I'm not racist, but we're just full. There's not enough room for any more.'

'In public you shouldn't speak a different language… only English.'

'I'm sick of immigrants sponging off us who pay our taxes.'

'I hope they all drown… even the children'



We invite you to do just that as well: take a pause now, and consider how you would respond.






Our three principles

Perhaps you'll best get a feel for how we might respond through our guiding principles. In the words of Tariq:

Better out than in

It's better to say a thing than not say it.

When we started WiYN? there was a lot of 'You can't say that'. You could say it with your mates, with your family, in private. But outside, in public, there were things you couldn't say, you'd get shut down.

Feeling that you are being shut down about things that bother you, when you feel the world is changing – that causes frustration and resentment. Being able to say what worries you is really important.

Most people are alright

Most people are sincere, good-hearted and well-intentioned. But there are organised groups whose purpose is to blame minorities, and make their lives difficult.

Who gains when people are feeling shut down and resentful? They do, the groups that are trying to stir up trouble. They take advantage of people who are feeling anxious, worried and frustrated.

Those groups that are stirring things up, they are not most people. People who take part in the conversations that we hold are just people. They have an opportunity in the conversation to talk openly about the things that matter to them.

There will be things that get said that might be difficult to hear. But it's people saying what's on their mind, in their gut. There's got to be a space for people to be able to do that. If we can help to foster spaces where people get to be sincere and good-hearted, if someone does say something that does cause some hurt, they've not set out to do that. There's not the malice.

Curiosity is good

The thing we are trying to achieve in WiYN? is people being curious, asking questions, wanting to know stuff.

So, in every conversation we hold, what we are looking for is everyone coming out with more questions than when they went in – wanting to know more things. And that includes us: "I've heard something in that conversation that really got me thinking."

That's everyone in the room, including our facilitators, wanting to know more, wanting to understand more.

What we are not trying to achieve is – "I want you to think like I do, or have the same opinion as I've got".


A beginning in faith communities

Perhaps we're getting ahead of ourselves in the story. Let's revisit our origins.



Starting in 2004, faith leaders in Sheffield published public statements each year in advance of local, General and European elections. The statement expressed concern about increased polarisation in communities because of targeting of minorities. At this time the British National Party (BNP) was doing increasingly well in local and European elections.



By 2010, this was recognised as too remote. Faith Leaders sought a way to engage directly with people in South Yorkshire drawn to the BNP. Mike Fitter was a member of the Sheffield Faith Leaders group and has been involved with WiYN? since the original idea.



At this time, mainstream politicians seemed not to know how to engage with white voters who were drawn to the message that the BNP were putting out – other than to tell them they had wrong views. This meant that the BNP had free rein. They listened to people's concerns, took them seriously, and offered their solutions. 'BNP is the Labour Party your Grandad voted for', proclaimed their flyers.



A working group of Faith Leaders came up with an alternative that seemed worth trying – to talk with small groups of people concerned about immigration, Muslims, change in their or neighbouring communities.



We developed a proposal that was funded for three years by the Equality and Human Rights Commission. Our focus was communities in South Yorkshire where 1) the BNP was doing well in local elections and 2) someone invited us to work with a local group because of concerns they had about views expressed by their community members.



Over the first three years, requests tended to come from ministers of Christian churches in predominantly less well-off white areas (small towns and villages near larger urban conurbations).



Initially WiYN? had a project manager and a team of group facilitators – mostly recruits from Mediation Sheffield, a local charity commissioned to help develop the methodology. After two years, when Tariq joined us, developments became in-house.


Early research findings and methodology development

At the outset a social sciences PhD researcher (Richard Slade) was contracted to research and evaluate this initial phase, working closely with the development team. The methodology was described as 'safe space' intra-community dialogue (see Slade & Steels, 2016).



In 2017, findings from a laboratory study were published which demonstrated that when high quality listening skills were used (non-judgemental, empathic, respectful), speakers' attitude structure can be changed (see Itzchakov et al., 2017). This was affirming for us, because at the heart of our method is the view that empathy leads to empathy. People being heard, being taken seriously, their experience being valued, is a basis for them being able to be empathetic towards others – including the 'other' who they are speaking about in our facilitated dialogue.



Later, we ceased describing our groups as offering a 'safe space' because the term was shifting its meaning: one meaning that became widely known and was used pejoratively of institutions described as 'woke' ,such as universities, was that of excluding those with different views.



The WiYN? development team and the researcher worked together to develop the group work methodology. Facilitators worked in pairs, chosen from a pool, choice influenced by the characteristics of the specific dialogue session.



A key learning in the first three years was that the time and work that was required between the initial contact with a local group and the readiness for group facilitation could be substantial – sometimes six months of relationship building from the time of initial contact. We recognised the importance of going slowly. Building relationships was key, and this is still the case 12 years later.

Because of the need for slow and careful development we recruited community development workers. Their role was to promote our offer, work with local individuals and groups, then brief and hand over to facilitators when the group was ready. This led usually to two or three sessions of an hour and a half each. The development worker and researcher would follow up. This might lead to further collaboration guided by the development worker, the nature of which came out of the group conversations and next steps. For example, in a group that was very critical of Muslims but acknowledged that they had never met one, we facilitated a meeting with members of a local mosque who were interested in contact. The aim was simply to meet and chat, over tea and cake. If they wished to continue meeting, we would encourage that, but not provide further facilitation, unless there was an exceptional need.



As our work progressed, we developed partnership working with local groups and organisations who would pick up the continuing element of social contact. Our focus remained on creating the conditions for being interested and ready for this step – building curiosity. We also developed partnerships that brought other specialised practices that complement our work, for example community organising.



We next recognised the need for an Operations Manager to ensure our activities were co-ordinated and delivered. (All our roles are part-time). As the Operations Manager role evolved it also held responsibility for evaluation and learning, feeding into strategic development.


The 'absent other' in dialogues

What at first seems important in the groups that WiYN? facilitates is that they talk about the 'absent other' – and they also talk about themselves and what matters to them. They do this in a way that differs from what is likely in an everyday context. This is explained later in this article, and is also illustrated by particular places and times…



Leicestershire in the 1960s. For us, one of the most relevant field research studies was led by Norbert Elias. It was the 1960s in Leicestershire, when new housing estates were built and people moved from cities which had experienced WW2 bombing. They were the migrant new arrivals. The study was republished as a book in 1994, The Established and the Outsiders, with a new introductory chapter that summarises the findings and theory.



Their field work describes group dynamics that occur when there is a substantial number of new arrivals, 'the outsiders', that leads to a reaction in 'the established community'. These two communities were indistinguishable in terms of social class, education, employment, religion, race and ethnicity. This research therefore strips bare and reveals the power dynamics of group stigmatising vs. individual prejudice. Difference is reduced to one factor – the duration of living in an area. Thus stigmatisation and scapegoating are described and understood distinct from the dynamics of economic or social inequality, racial or religious discrimination.



The Leicestershire study found that there was a substantial power differential between the two communities – which was entirely due to differences in the degree of organisation of the people. The established community had high internal cohesion and communal control, which was maintained by established families going back two or three generations, social institutions (societies, church, clubs), and gossip (praise of own community, denigration of the newcomers/outsiders). The newcomers were strangers not only in relation to the established residents but also to each other. 'Exclusion and stigmatisation of the outsiders by the established group,' the authors wrote, 'were thus powerful weapons used by the latter to maintain their identity, to assert their superiority, keeping others firmly in their place.'



One way that the power differential was maintained was by the established group ascribing to the whole of the outsider group the bad characteristics of its worst section. By contrast, its self-image was of the good characteristics of its best members. Thus, there was always evidence to show that their group was good and the other group bad.



Regarding the members of the village (the established community) as prejudiced does not adequately address the situation. The dynamic was maintained by group stigmatisation. 'Thus one misses the key to the problem usually discussed under headings such as "social prejudice", if one looks for it solely in the personality structure of individual people. One can find it only if one considers the figuration formed by the two (or more) groups concerned, or in other words, the nature of their interdependence.'



This is maintained by the imbalance of power and the tensions inherent in it. One group can only effectively stigmatise another group as long as it is well established in positions of power from which the stigmatised group is excluded.



South Yorkshire in the 21st century. Do these findings and conclusions drawn from 1960s Leicestershire apply to 21st century South Yorkshire? There is more ethnic diversity now, which means some perceived 'outsiders' more clearly stand out due to appearance and culture, whereas in 1960s Leicestershire the distinguishing characteristics of 'outsiders' were less apparent. That said, one of WiYN?'s facilitators Brad, notes that being 'from Sheffield' can make one definitely 'other' in South Yorkshire villages.



A significant difference is that the established community in the 1960s was relatively stable and had the resources to self-organise. Contemporary South Yorkshire, especially away from the cities, has been ravaged by economic decline, and defeat. The Miners' strike of the 1980s is still having its impact.



Some of the rioting in the summer of 2024 was outside the asylum hotel near Rotherham, and led to the police being angrily attacked. The police were there to keep order, and to defend the hotel and its occupants. The sense in communities of being overlooked is experienced painfully when the media and some politicians say the State is more committed to migrants than its established communities. People respond with anger, with a sense of betrayal.



The summer of 2024 was also the 40th anniversary of the Battle of Orgreave – regarded as the key event in the defeat of the Miners' Strike. Its significance is expressed in the documentary film 'Strike: an uncivil war', now available on Netflix. Unresolved trauma does not fade unless processed. The Home Secretary recently announced a long-sought inquiry into the Miners' Strike, violence at Orgreave, and its aftermath (to be chaired by the Bishop of Sheffield). This may help. (95 miners were prosecuted for riot and unlawful assembly and were found not guilty – police had fabricated evidence).


Peace Studies and the 'Succinct moment'

We have also found that a grounding in peace studies and its methodologies is helpful – for example the work of John Paul Lederach, particularly his 2005 book The Moral Imagination: the Art and Soul of Building Peace.



Our approach to research and development, and indeed to this article, draws on a principle stated by Lederach in the opening chapter of his book:



The academic community, unlike the artistic community, often begins its interaction with a journey into the world by stating a problem that defines both the journey and the interaction.



The artistic community, it seems to me, starts with experience in the world and then creates a journey toward expressing something that captures the wholeness of that feeling in a succinct moment.



The two communities share this in common: Ultimately, at some moment in time, they both rely on intuition. While I have never been a big fan of problem stating, I have come to appreciate the art of posing a good question.



The question this book poses is simple and endlessly complex: How do we transcend the cycles of violence that bewitch our human community while still living in them? I could call this the statement of the problem.



We recognise the 'succinct moment' referred to by Lederach as potentially a transformative moment, at which a shift occurs in a facilitated group. 'Transformation views the presenting issues as an expression of the larger system of relationship patterns. It moves beyond the "episodic" expression of the conflict and focuses on the relational and historical patterns in which the conflict is rooted.'



If and when this 'succinct moment' occurs, it is a point which our facilitators dwell on, draw attention to. Here are a few examples from our facilitated groups, which also serve to showcase our work more broadly:

Members of a Catholic Church, concerned about new arrivals from West Africa, recognised their own collective history of migration (grandparents and great-grandparents) – of being Irish miners who had come to South Yorkshire to work in the mine. They had direct experience of racism and exclusion. Some of the older members recounted (a few from direct memory) that during WW2, they had invited Italian prisoners of war from a nearby camp into their church for Sunday services, 'because they were good singers'.
Another succinct moment arose when the history of anti-Irish feeling was recalled, leading to an expression of empathy towards Muslims and other minorities.
A moment of learning for us – local people said 'We built this place'. (The church, literally, stone by stone.) 'We know migration, it's part of our history… but we expect new people to accept that we made this place, and to respect that.'
A story of anger about gypsy travellers being violent, the conversation building momentum against them. The facilitator invites participants to share their experience of violence in their own communities: 'Who do you know that would as soon knock you out as look at you?' This led to recounting of male violence in those communities, which was a moment of change. A young women observed, 'We thought we were talking about gypsies, but actually we're talking about men being violent.'
A group of women met regularly in a community centre. Two of our female facilitators explored 'prejudice' with them. Although they recognised their own prejudices in some contexts, they were adamant that their strong negative feelings about Muslim women who wore the niqab (full veil) was not a prejudice.

At the end of the session the group was keen to have a further session. The facilitators made a plan. At the beginning of the next session they introduced to the group a female colleague who is of Muslim Arab heritage. She spoke to the women and after a while left the room. Shortly after this a woman in a black niqab came in. Immediately the room went quiet, and there were hushed tones. This person then spoke to them and they realised she was the facilitator who had left the room. There was relief and some excitement. The facilitator then took off the niqab and invited the women to examine it. They were very interested and asked questions about how it felt wearing it – some tried it on when given the opportunity.

Their experiences related to exotic views – on an Arabian charger crossing the desert, and feeling more feminine. It was interesting that the initial prejudice transformed from personal anger and resentment to a sense of allying with the niqab wearer, but from the perspective of a dominant cultural belief – an indication of our collective colonial history, described by Edward Said in his book Orientalism.


Developing our offer nationally

Over the past four years we have further developed our organisation. We made a significant decision to develop our communications strategy and a website; and later, with further funding, we recruited our national development manager. This is enabling us to offer our work nationally. In particular we now offer:

Training in responding to troubling conversations – how to respond to things that are difficult to hear in everyday situations. The challenging statements we shared at the start of this article are examples of ones we can use to explore participants' feelings and reactions; along with the options they have in response, which can include not responding. In this way we learn together the effects of different types of response.

Training in facilitating groups based on our three principles – for groups and organisations who wish to apply our methodology in their own context.

Consultancy and support for partner organisations who wish to learn and apply our methodology.



This is not competency training… skills are important, but equally vital is the empathic, collaborative mindset and framework when 'hard to hear' things are being said. This needs to be embedded in partner organisations, and in their facilitators, their values and beliefs.



We choose our partners carefully.


New research questions, and an invitation

In 2025 we have been awarded a £200,000 grant over four years by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation to develop our work, and our national offer in particular. We intend to explore some assumptions that underpin our work, formulated as five questions.

To what extent does being heard, taken seriously, and heard with empathy lead to empathy for others and the confidence to question peer consensus, leading to attitude change?

Do we need to ask different questions in different ways to have confidence in our assumptions?

Do external changes – mainstreaming of anti-migrant narrative by politicians, the riots in the summer of 2024, stories of migrant threat that spread rapidly and the ability to mobilise quickly for serious violence – undermine our assumptions?

We also assume that people being able to work through their own identity, individual and collective, helps to build a positive sense of identity without blaming others. This helps undermine anti-minority stories which use perceived threats to identity as a way of blaming others. We haven't developed a way of testing that assumption. How do we do so?

The assumption underlying our national work is that we share our approach, so it is embedded in the work of other organisations/networks. If this is sufficiently widespread and in-depth, will it help lead to reduced hostility and more welcome for migrants? How do we test this?


SOURCE:

https://www.bps.org.uk/psychologist/who-your-neighbour(accessed 9.9.25)