Attachment--and loss.

The Psychology of Religion and Coping: Theory, Research, Practice

My doctoral research analyses contemporary North American romantic films and the meanings brought to and made from them by socially and economically diverse audiences in London. It does so in the context of a historicised and ideologically alert account of connections between biological, psychoanalytic, anthropological and sociological theorisations of romantic love and its screen depictions. In particular, my audience-led textual analysis of discourses of Euro-American romantic love is driven by an engagement with three claims: First, that neoliberal or late-capitalist individualism has engendered a ‘crisis of romantic love’ which has reshaped the social and personal promises of coupledom and intimacy. Second, that popular film, the prime contemporary medium of representation for romance, cynically portrays this supposed crisis in an effort to capitalise on audience fears; and third, that audiences of these films experience the ‘crisis’, fashioning their romantic identities and practices in its shadow. Methodologically, the study involved a reflexive and recursive textual analysis of five North American films: Blue Valentine, (500) Days of Summer, Don Jon, Her, and Once. Using these films, I carried out 36 group interviews with (87) inhabitants of the multicultural Borough of Hackney, in East London, the results of which then fed into and informed my readings of the films. Subsequent thematic coding of group interviews revealed overlapping areas pertinent to the project: Technology, class, gender and coupledom. Findings include the suggestion that both romantic films and their audiences in Western Europe are currently adapting strategies, practices and ideas of romantic love and relationships to a new environment of precarious intimacy, technological mediation, and anxiety over economic, professional and personal stability.
My analysis concludes that while intersections of class, race and gender continue to inflect audience experience and meaning-making, the current romantic environment that audiences are navigating - and that romantic films purportedly represent - is indeed markedly different from that of the last century. However, claims about the crisis of romantic love are not only greatly exaggerated, but usually also erroneously conflate the pain, anxiety and frailty of contemporary relationships and intimacy with a narcissistic,
ego-centric definition of love as a form of consumption.

Celluloid love : audiences and representations of romantic love in late capitalism

Throughout the psychological literature there has been a vast amount of research examining forgiveness as well as prayer within the context of the discipline of psychology; however these 2 constructs have rarely been examined together. This study examined the relationship between 2 important religious and spiritual constructs: forgiveness and prayer. Recent studies suggest Christians who forgive often use prayer. This intervention study looked to see more specifically what benefit there is to those who specifically use prayer as they seek to forgive an interpersonal offense. Participants consisted of 411 undergraduate students from private Christian colleges across the United States. They were randomly assigned to a prayer group, a devotional attention group or a control group, consisting of a sixteen day intervention. Those who were in the prayer and devotional attention groups were found to have significant changes in state forgiveness. In addition, those in the prayer intervention group showed significant changes in empathy toward their offender. Implications include the importance of exploring forgiveness as a spiritual construct, as well as help clinicians integrate their clients’ Prayer and Forgiveness iv journey towards forgiveness with their clients’ spiritual practices. In addition, these findings can help clinicians educate their clients on the relational benefits of spending daily time with God. Prayer and Forgiveness v Table of

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The effects of a prayer intervention on the process of forgiveness

Objective

This study investigates the efficacy of the 6-hour REACH Forgiveness intervention among culturally diverse undergraduates



Method

Female undergraduates (N = 102) and foreign extraction (462%) and domestic (438%) students in the United States were randomly assigned to immediate treatment or waitlist conditions Treatment efficacy and the effect of culture on treatment response were assessed using measures of emotional and decisional forgiveness across 3 time periods



Results

Students in the treatment condition reported greater improvement in emotional forgiveness, but not decisional forgiveness, relative to those in the waitlist condition Gains were maintained at a 1-week follow-up Although culture did not moderate the effect of treatment, a main effect of culture on emotional forgiveness and marginally significant interaction effect of culture on decisional forgiveness were found



Conclusion

The REACH Forgiveness intervention was efficacious for college students from different cultural backgrounds when conducted in the United States However, some evidence may warrant development of culturally adapted forgiveness interventions

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Efficacy of REACH Forgiveness across cultures.

This research explores the relationship between forgiveness and adult attachment status in close relationships. Two hundred sixty-five undergraduate students were administered a demographic survey, the Experiences in Close Relationships (ECR) inventory to measure adult attachment status (secure, preoccupied, fearful, and dismissing) using dimensions of anxiety and avoidance, and the Conflicts in Close Relationships (CCR) inventory adapted from the forgiveness of self and forgiveness of others scales of the Behavior Assessment System. Lack of forgiveness of self had a positive significant relationship with anxiety; lack of forgiveness of others had a positive significant relationship with avoidance. Significant positive relationships were also found between lack of forgiveness of self and avoidance and between lack of forgiveness of others and anxiety. Significant differences in forgiveness of self and forgiveness of others were found among homogeneous subsets of

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Linda S. Krajewski

Papers

Interpersonal forgiveness in close relationships: An attachment perspective

Intrasexual Mate Competition and Breakups

Intrasexual Mate Competition and Breakups: Who Really Wins?