How older adults recovering from substance use problems experience mattering.

AIM: Mattering (to feel valued and add value to self and others) is a fundamental human experience and mechanism in recovery. In this paper, we concern ourselves with the recovery of older adults with substance problems. This population is on the rise in many Western countries. To offer mattering enhancing programs for this group, more knowledge about later life mattering in service-assisted recovery processes is needed. This study aims to explore experiences of mattering in older adults receiving services to recover from substance use problems. METHODS: A collaborative and deductive reflexive thematic approach was applied in analysing 23 interviews with participants using substance use services. Participants were recovering from different substance use problems: alcohol, medication and illegal substances. The participants were recruited from three different Norwegian social contexts: two urban and one medium size municipality. The age of the sample ranged from 65-80 years, with approximately equal numbers for those aged 60-69 (12 participants) and 70-80 (11 participants). Seven participants were women and 16 men. RESULTS: Three main themes were identified in the analysis: "relational experiences of mattering and not mattering", "service-related experiences of mattering and not mattering" and "recovery and psychological sense of community as interrelated phenomena to experiences of mattering". The findings illustrate various nuanced experiences of mattering and not mattering in later life recovery processes. CONCLUSIONS: Overall, the participants' mattering experiences rested on fair, healthy and positive community relationships and fair and attentive services, where participants could feel valued and also have a chance to add value to others. Experiences of not mattering were precipitated by lack of support, disrespect, devaluation and loss of relationships, and also by being ignored and not receiving fair treatment and help by professionals. Importantly, reciprocal and enhancing relations between mattering, recovery and relational PSOC seem to exist and to be significant for the older adults' access to substance use services. Several practical implications are suggested to promote the therapeutic and preventive potentials of later life mattering in recovery.

Multiple psychological senses of community and community influences on personal recovery processes from substance use problems in later life: a collaborative and deductive reflexive thematic analysis.

PURPOSE: There is a pressing need for substance use services to know more about how to promote recovery from substance use problems, particularly in later life. Psychological sense of community (PSOC) is an important recovery dimension. This study aims to clarify in what ways PSOC and communities influence later life recovery processes. METHOD: A collaborative and deductive reflexive thematic approach was used to analyse 23 interviews with older adults in recovery from different substance use problems. RESULTS: The findings suggest that PSOC and recovery in later life include multiple communities (relational, geographical, substance use-related, ideal and service-related) and affective states (PSOC and NPSOC). Older adults' recovery, moreover, can be described as personal and heterogenic (with respect to community relationships, individual needs, type of substance use problem, age of onset and meaningful activities). CONCLUSIONS: The findings confirm age of onset, type of substance use problem and community memberships as essential to later life recovery. They also supplement prior evidence on community resources and challenges to later life recovery. Importantly, the new findings extend and nuance current understandings of later life recovery. Taken together, the article illustrates MPSOC as a useful concept, with central practical and theoretical implications for later life recovery.

Living in the Era of an Ideological Climate of Globalisation: A Study of Psychological Sense of Community Among Young and Older Adults in Two Cultures (India and Norway). Challenges for Community Psychology and the Applied Social Sciences.

How do people describe the psychological sense of community (PSOC) in the present day ideological climate of globalising neo-liberalism, assuming that people are essentially individualistic, that solidarity, social commitment, and citizenship are not natural dispositions, as we all are the lonely citizen? This issue is addressed by a mixed-methods study using semi-structured interviews with two age groups-young and older people-from two different cultures-India (Mumbai) and Norway (Oslo). This two by two design gives the opportunity to analyse people's meaning systems of PSOC, asking; is there a core meaning system of PSOC shared by people within as well as across cultures? Belongingness and citizenship are continuously formed and negotiated, just at the intersection of two dimensions: culture and historical time. The young and older adult informants often live in different "historical times." The meaning systems of PSOC were explored and compared by language analyses of words used by the informants. Text search queries were made for 69 words. "Help,", "care," "different," "problem," and "family" were identified as central for further in-depth qualitative analyses. The word, "family" demonstrated high frequencies of use across sub-samples. There was nothing more relevant for the groups than the family when thinking of PSOC, revealing almost a "prior to society perspective." PSOC is about being part of families. Simultaneously, we are members of other communities: schools, workplaces, neighborhoods, cities and nations. The informants mentioned such communities, but not often. Feeling part of the family, helping and caring not only the family but also your neighbourhood, local community, or national and global communities are particularly necessary today, as we live in a time where communities, societies, and nations across the world are heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this crisis, it is vital that nobody forgets that we are national and transnational citizens and part of many interrelated social systems. This study points out how community psychology and the applied social sciences can work to strengthen the feelings of connections to other communities, societies, and nations outlining and co-creating transformative multi-level interventions of public policy programmes of inclusion and "we-ness."

Mapping, assessing and promoting multiple psychological senses of community (MPSOC) through clinical pathways for treating substance use problems.

Aim: The recent nationally implemented clinical pathways for the treatment of substance use problems in Norway require mapping and assessing of patients' needs, challenges, and resources. However, there is a lack of tools for systematically mapping and assessing patients' social situations and social networks as part of the national guidelines. The aim of this article is to present a tool developed to map and assess the patient's social situation, and to propose approaches for promoting multiple psychological senses of community (MPSOC) through clinical pathways for treating substance use problems. Methods: The proposed tool and approaches are developed based on findings in a previous in-depth collaborative study of MPSOC and recovery among people with substance use problems who received help and services from Norwegian municipalities. Findings: The findings suggest that multiple communities (geographical, relational and ideal) and senses of communities (within and outside treatment) simultaneously can influence individual recovery processes from problematic substance use in both positive as well as negative ways. As such, these community dimensions are of central importance to include in mapping and assessing of patients' social situations, as well as in the promotion of MPSOC through clinical pathways. Conclusions: The suggested tool and approaches can increase the likelihood of achieving key aims of the national clinical pathways. Most important, mapping, assessing and promoting MPSOC through clinical pathways may promote long-term recovery processes and positive recovery capital for persons with substance use problems.

Multiple senses of community and recovery processes. A pilot study for a national evaluation of the experiences of persons with substance use problems receiving help and services from Norwegian municipalities.

AIMS: This pilot study uses a multifaceted concept of sense of community (SOC)-multiple senses of community (MPSOC)-to understand how the multiple communities of persons with substance use problems, including those with a positive, negative and neutral SOC, influence processes of substance use recovery. METHODS: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 16 informants from different Norwegian municipalities and regions. A collaborative research design and thematic analyses with a peer researcher were applied. RESULTS: The findings confirm prior findings of key ingredients related to recovery. However, they also illustrate that for communities to promote recovery, they need to fulfil individual needs, provide distance from pretreatment status, identity and roles and harmonise with individual meaning systems of an ideal community. CONCLUSION: Experiences of positive and negative community connections within geographical, relational and ideal communities take part in recovery processes. Community participation is suggested to be included in individual outpatient treatment and posttreatment plans.

Globalization, neo-liberalism and community psychology.

A longitudinal analysis (1984-2005) of media language in Norway is presented, demonstrating how the current globalized capitalist market ideology is now permeating this long-established Scandinavian welfare state. This ideological shift carries powerful implications for community psychology, as traditional welfare state values of equal services based on a universalistic principle are set aside, and social and material inequalities are increasingly accepted. The methodology developed in the present study may serve as a "barometer of community changes", to borrow a metaphor used by Sarason (2000).