Tensions in caring for chronic patients' medication adherence: A qualitative study in Cyprus.

Medication adherence (MA) to recommended treatment is a multi-faceted problem and an ongoing challenge for healthcare providers (HCPs) to monitor. This qualitative study with 10 HCPs in Cyprus aims to explore HCPs' perceptions and strategies used on addressing medication non-adherence (MNA) in patients with chronic conditions. Two main themes emerged from the analysis reflecting the ways that HCPs described their reactions to MNA of their patients: (1) "Relying on information provision to improve MA" and (2) "Trying to understand patients' perspective." HCPs reported empathizing with patients and engaging in discussions to understand patients' perspective and reasons for MNA, so as to explore alternative solutions. Simultaneously, some HCPs reflected that the techniques used to improve MA are solely centered around information on medication and side-effects. HCPs experienced an internal conflict between providing patient-centered care versus using directive approaches to improve MA. Findings suggest how HCPs could thoroughly address patients' individual barriers.

Depression as an Embodied Experience: Identifying the Central Role of the Body in Meaning-Making and Identity Processes.

Α significant part of the psychological research on mental health and illness is interested in how the body can impact one's mental health. This impact is primarily explored using a biomedical framework, in studies that examine the body's role in the emergence of a mental illness, the ways it can signify the presence of an illness (i.e. physical symptoms) and, finally, its role in the treatment process. Within this literature, the body is conceptualised as an object that can be diagnosed and treated. The current study approaches the body as a subject in the experience of depression. Specifically, it demonstrates that the experience of depression is embodied and that the body mediates meaning-making and identity processes. Using qualitative findings from eight interviews with Greek-Cypriot adults diagnosed with depression, we demonstrate that participants make sense of depression through their bodies, as a painful, uncomfortable and agonising experience. Further, we discuss how the struggle to regain control over the body, experienced as hijacked by depression, leads to a disrupted relation with the self and the world that expands beyond the idea of the loss of self, as described in the literature. Theoretical and clinical implications are examined.

Constructions of difference in lay talk about diversity: Ideological dilemmas, antiracism and implications for identity.

Dilemmas around differences among people may encapsulate ideological assumptions deep-rooted in modernity, according to work on ideological dilemmas. In this article, we suggest that ideological struggles such as the one between racism and antiracism may further ingrain ideological dilemmas around difference and put certain identities at stake. In a qualitative study addressing constructions of difference in lay talk about diversity, lay people in Greece argued about the meaningfulness, value, and public character of difference, deploying two lines of argumentation: an 'objectivist' line affirming categorical differences and hierarchies; and a 'subjectivist' argumentative line which deprived categorical differences of any importance and simultaneously celebrated differences assuming that differences only lie in individuals' minds. For this latter line of argumentation, constructions of difference appeared to perform a non-racist identity, making systematic comparisons to racists' alleged constructions of differences. Such comparisons were far less important for the objectivist argumentative line. These findings suggest that constructions of difference may be nested in ideological struggles, selectively reflecting the categorizations of the social world - and associated identities - advanced by ideological projects such as antiracism. The discussion points to theoretical implications for historical accounts of social categorization and social implications for current inclusive perspectives centred on diversity.

'Guilty as charged': Intersectionality and accountability in lay talk on discrimination and violence.

Although intersectionality is gaining ground in social psychological research, most approaches fail to capture the historically and interactionally contingent nature of intersecting identities and the implications of their mobilization. This study, aiming at addressing this lacuna, focuses on the intersection of identities as lay actors' resource, used to account for the murder of Zak Kostopoulos, a young LGBTQI+ activist in Greece. Data are derived from 4 focus group discussions in which 25 young people, aged between 19 and 25 years old, participated. Using concepts provided by discursive/rhetorical psychology, analysis indicated that the rhetorical occasioning of intersecting identities is oriented to social accountability concerns and accomplishes important positioning work for the speakers. Specifically, by underscoring the intersecting (sexual/class) identities of the victim, speakers accentuated the moral charge against the perpetrators, distancing themselves from the (constructed as prototypically Greek) image of the un-enlightened and servile bigot. However, although participants explained ZK's murder through recourse to his intersecting identities, they grounded claims for justice on a common human identity (independent of class and sexuality). Findings are discussed in relation to the need to advance a critical agenda for social psychology research on intersectionality and to processes of ideological reproduction in the context of LGBTQΙ+ politics.

Between medicalisation and normalisation: Antithetical representations of depression in the Greek-Cypriot press in times of financial crisis.

Media offer people ways of understanding mental health and illness, shaping their attitudes and behaviour towards it. Yet, the literature on media representations of depression is limited and fails to illuminate sufficiently the content of representations. In times of financial crisis, the prevalence of depression is increased and the particular meanings associated with depression are widely diffused. To unpack these meanings, we focused on the Greek-Cypriot press during the financial crisis of 2013. Two-hundred and three articles from seven widely circulating newspapers were thematically analysed. Two antithetical themes of representations of depression were identified: Biomedical Depression, which constructed depression as a biologically grounded illness treated through medical/pharmaceutical means, and Everyday Depression, which portrayed depression as something normal, encountered in anyone, attributed to psychosocial factors (e.g. the financial crisis), and treated through self-management. Biomedical Depression reflects a widespread medical and deterministic understanding of depression. Nevertheless, this understanding has not overridden, as the literature suggests, references to individual agency, which are present in the Everyday Depression and the more normalising understanding of depression it expresses. We argue, however, that both themes promote an individualistic understanding of depression, placing individuals in a tense position of being responsible for a condition perceived to be outside their control.

Exploring the relationship between lay theories of gender and attitudes to abortion in the context of a national referendum on abortion policy.

The relationship between lay theories of gender and attitudes to abortion policy has received minimal empirical attention. An ongoing theoretical debate in the psychological essentialism literature queries whether biological attributions causally influence social attitudes or primarily function to justify existing attitudinal commitments. The current research used the context of a national referendum on abortion in Ireland to investigate whether endorsement of certain gender theories is contingent on their rhetorical construction as supporting particular attitudes to abortion. Two experimental studies were conducted online in the three weeks preceding the Irish abortion referendum. The studies tested whether participants would adapt their causal gender beliefs after reading that biological (Study 1; N = 348) or social (Study 2; N = 241) accounts of gender supported or conflicted with their intended vote in the referendum. Both studies showed the opposite effect: causal gender theories presented as conflicting with participants' voting intentions subsequently showed elevated support, relative to theories that purportedly aligned with participants' voting intentions. While results confirm that lay theories of gender are mutable, the direction of effects does not support the proposition that gender theories are selectively endorsed to support existing socio-political attitudes to abortion. Potential mechanisms for the results observed are discussed.

How does psychiatric diagnosis affect young people's self-concept and social identity? A systematic review and synthesis of the qualitative literature.

Receiving a psychiatric diagnosis in childhood or adolescence can have numerous social, emotional and practical repercussions. Among the most important of these are the implications for a young person's self-concept and social identity. To ensure diagnoses are communicated and managed in a way that optimally benefits mental health trajectories, understanding young people's first-hand experience of living with a diagnosis is paramount. This systematic review collates, evaluates and synthesises the qualitative research that has explored how psychiatric diagnosis interacts with young people's self-concept and social identity. A search of 10 electronic databases identified 3892 citations, 38 of which met inclusion criteria. The 38 studies were generally evaluated as moderate-to-high quality research. Thematic synthesis of their findings highlighted the multifaceted ways diagnosis affects young people's self-concept and social identity. Diagnosis can sometimes threaten and devalue young people's self-concept, but can also facilitate self-understanding, self-legitimation and self-enhancement. A diagnosis can lead to social alienation, invalidation and stigmatisation, yet can also promote social identification and acceptance. Further research is needed to clarify which self and identity outcomes can be expected in a given set of circumstances, and to establish how self and identity effects interact with diagnoses' other clinical, practical, social and emotional consequences.

Correction: Symbolic universes between present and future of Europe. First results of the map of European societies' cultural milieu.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0189885.].

Symbolic universes between present and future of Europe. First results of the map of European societies' cultural milieu.

This paper reports the framework, method and main findings of an analysis of cultural milieus in 4 European countries (Estonia, Greece, Italy, and UK). The analysis is based on a questionnaire applied to a sample built through a two-step procedure of post-hoc random selection from a broader dataset based on an online survey. Responses to the questionnaire were subjected to multidimensional analysis-a combination of Multiple Correspondence Analysis and Cluster Analysis. We identified 5 symbolic universes, that correspond to basic, embodied, affect-laden, generalized worldviews. People in this study see the world as either a) an ordered universe; b) a matter of interpersonal bond; c) a caring society; d) consisting of a niche of belongingness; e) a hostile place (others' world). These symbolic universes were also interpreted as semiotic capital: they reflect the capacity of a place to foster social and civic development. Moreover, the distribution of the symbolic universes, and therefore social and civic engagement, is demonstrated to be variable across the 4 countries in the analysis. Finally, we develop a retrospective reconstruction of the distribution of symbolic universes as well as the interplay between their current state and past, present and future socio-institutional scenarios.

Alterity and the transformation of social representations: a sociocultural account.

This article uses sociocultural theories of self-reflection to theorize how social representations are transformed. While there are several ways in which social representations change, we focus on one way that entails interactions with alterity, that is, other people, groups and representations. We use sociocultural psychology to explore how social representations can shift from being the medium of thought and action to becoming the object of thought and action. This process, we argue, entails alternative representations becoming the new medium of thought and action. Although this account relies upon the psychological process of self-reflection, it avoids psychological reductionism, because the psychological process is based on social and sociological processes. Self-reflection, however, is more of an exception than a rule, and the ways in which self-reflection is blocked are also examined. Future research, it is argued, should examine the ways in which self-reflection arises through the interaction of representations within situated contexts, thus forging a third way between psychological and sociological reductionism.