Search
Search Results
-
About the Understanding of Discursive Social Sciences and its Possible Aspects
93-107Views:30This article observes a paradigm shift occurred in several disciplines of social science which
also differs in theoretical and methodological aspects from science pursuing objectivity. The
interpretative social sciences primarily focus on the study of meaning and sets texts and talks
into the centre of understanding. Social facts are taking place in an intersubjective sphere,
namely among each other. In this paper they are consequently called ‘socially meaningful facts’.
Therefore, understanding and meaning of these socially meaningful facts can be study without
snapping social reality by means of different survey techniques, which would also necessarily
reduce the richness of social meanings.
In this paper the vote is given for the transition of discourse approach into a paradigm.
A couple of aspects are introduced in order to make an attempt to prove its scientific significance. On the other hand misunderstandings are also falsified. According to these misconceptions, a
text-based approach and an actual postmodern scientific scheme is nothing else than a literary
project, which also denies the pure existence of reality and only considers all previous knowledge
as relative. Instead of that, this paper states that every single fact of society has meaning which
is mediated through narratives by the language itself. -
Understanding Aspects to the Ethnospecific Researches on the Gypsy Jazz
23-39Views:33The early “research of Gypsies”, romology, then the visible and the hidden processes of
“tziganology” in anthropology included a shift in the state of understanding between the
hillside of critical interpretation studies and that of local group psychology. They also involved
the research of folk tales, dancing, poverty, examining segregation and participatory action
methodology as well as innovation and rebirth of the musicological research of Gypsy music.
The terminological aspect of “us” and “others”, expressing alterity and identity, points towards
the more complex study of (ethnic) “minorities”, moreover knowledge and field studies, and
results of examining narratives (such as tales, dances, visual worksof art, publicity, religion and
community), bring us closer (by way of political and scientific pragmatism) to signalling a new
era of empathic understanding. The aim of the paper is to highlight the ways leading to that
goal, putting the musical aspects of the shift in focus, consisting of stylistic inventions, a worldmusic-based openness towards instruments and performance cultures, which nevertheless still
carries the signs of a new era of projection and knowledge contents, first-person-narrative and
narrative identities. Finding answers to the question “where did it come from” might be aided
by contemplating “where does it go”. This would be both the aim and partially the structure of
my thematic essay. -
Online activities of Alzheimer Cafes in the 6 months preceding and following the coronavirus outbreak
42-64Views:58Alzheimer Cafés may play an important psychosocial supporting role in the life of people living with dementia and of their family caregivers by providing a community of understanding, inclusion, solidarity and mutual support. They can promote policy-, professional- and social discourses, the recognition of dementia as a social reality, and overall awareness of this complex challenge. They can also foster transdisciplinary collaboration among professionals as well as between professionals and lay people affected by dementia based on mutual understanding, catalysing the formation and operation of acting communities and networks of interest.
The active and purposeful presence and activities of Alzheimer Cafés on Internet platforms, in the increasingly prominent channels and fields of social discourse and community life in the 21st century, can be an important tool in the realization of these benefits.
This two-part paper analyses the publicly accessible online footprint and behaviour of Alzheimer Cafés from this perspective as measured by a list of 10 possible functions. It scrutinizes the realisation of possible benefits and advantages offered by Internet platforms between September 2019 and August 2020, with a special focus on technology-based adaptive responses to the coronavirus-outbreak midway through that period.
The first part of the paper (Kucsera – Holpert 2021) briefly overviewed the Alzheimer Café concept and its history in Hungary, presented the methodology of the study and the first half of the research results. This second part of the paper presents the rest of the results, and makes recommendations for making more effective use of the potential of online platforms to realise the goals.
-
Online activities of Alzheimer Cafes in the 6 months preceding and following the coronavirus outbreak
19-41Views:46Alzheimer Cafés may play an important psychosocial supporting role in the life of people living with dementia and of their family caregivers by providing a community of understanding, inclusion, solidarity and mutual support. They can promote policy-, professional- and social discourses, the recognition of dementia as a social reality, and overall awareness of this complex challenge. They can also foster transdisciplinary collaboration among professionals as well as between professionals and lay people affected by dementia based on mutual understanding, catalysing the formation and operation of acting communities and networks of interest.
The active and purposeful presence and activities of Alzheimer Cafés on Internet platforms, in the increasingly prominent channels and fields of social discourse and community life in the 21st century, can be an important tool in the realization of these benefits.
This two-part paper analyses the publicly accessible online footprint and behaviour of Alzheimer Cafés from this perspective as measured by a list of 10 possible functions. It scrutinizes the realisation of possible benefits and advantages offered by Internet platforms between September 2019 and August 2020, with a special focus on technology-based adaptive responses to the coronavirus-outbreak midway through that period.
This first part of the paper, which briefly overviews the Alzheimer Café concept and its history in Hungary, and then presents the methodology of the study and the first half of the research results. The second part of the paper will continue to present the results, and will make recommendations for making more effective use of the potential of online platforms to realise the goals.
-
Environmentalism of university students in relation to their materialism, life satisfaction, views on politics and pandemic
70-97Views:70Recently, an increasing focus has been made on studying environmental problems and the
related social phenomena. Understanding the environmentalism and its influencing factors
in the case of higher education students can greatly help the preparation and identification
of sustainability policies and educational practices in higher education institutions. In this study, we investigated environmental attitudes and pro-environmental behavior of
students at 17 Hungarian universities as a function of a number of hypothesized influencing
factors. These included materialistic values, life satisfaction, political views, and views on the
Covid-19 pandemic. According to our results, these were all related to environmentalism. More
environmentally conscious students were less materialistic, less right-wing in their political
views, more satisfied with their lives, and also differed in their views on pandemic issues. Beside
a weaker impact of environmentalism and political views, life satisfaction was largely influenced
by the relative financial situation perceived by respondents. -
Community is more than just a physical space: Discuss this statement with specific reference to the role of the concept and experience of contemporary community
129-145Views:21What happens if among the members of a society and among the smaller and larger units and groups making up the society trust and confidence seems to be disappearing at once? What happens if confidence reposed into each other fall victim to social differences as well as to the economic / cost-of-living boxing of modern information society? How to stop the crisis symptom that seems to be developing this way and which is shown in the fragmentation of communities?1 With other words, is it possible to “stick again together” a community or even a whole society started to disintegrate? The questions, even if not so characteristically phrased, provide sociologists actually with the scope of understanding our modern, individualistic world (Habermas 1994). Gusfield (1975) depicts dichotomy of community and society in a way that we should interpret community as a pervading, significant contrast. By now literature seems as if it was only be able to picture the changes taking place in the images both of the society and community describing them by even more pronounced, contradictory processes. The changes that send messages on the disintegration of categories and frames becoming insecure instead of the security and integration quasi missed by Habermas. It also seems as if—quasi as an answer given to this process—occlusion/seclusion both on the part of community members and the various communities from the seemingly unknown and insecure changes were more intensive (Légmán 2012). We intend to construe these phenomena on the next pages, but due to extension limits without the need for completeness of social interpretations. We want to do it with the help of mainly one dimension: value preference through the example of a given society, namely the Hungarian one. Thus we get to the stability and the solidarity of the members of the smallest unit of society, one which accepts and expresses various value preferences, the family.
-
My healthy life: a health and skill developing program in the child care services
109-122Views:86We present a health education and skill development program for two groups (N=30) of 7-14 years old children in this paper. The target group of our program were children in the family care system. In their case, primer prevention regarding a healthy lifestyle is an important goal. Their families often have difficult life circumstances thus the “social culture” of their (Wessely 2003) may endanger their healthy personality development. The program aimed the development of their physical, psychic and mental health, focusing on the holistic understanding of the concept of health according to the bio-psychosocial health paradigm. As a result of the program, we experienced positive outcomes among the children like higher level cooperation skills, more cognitive knowledge about health, development of their communication, improved self expression and expression of emotions. In the group of adolescent children we experienced the improvement of tolerance, empathy, adaptation and problem solving skills. We consider their wish for further education, the forming of their future plans and life goals as a great result.
-
Reification, child protection in lock-ups
34-46Views:50This paper examines how the child protection system can address the problems of children and young adults, compensate for childhood disadvantage and promote successful social integration. To what extent are the professional means available within the state structure to achieve all these goals - as declared in the Child Protection Act of 1997. The interpretation of solidarity as a value in child protection is clear, since child protection aims to improve the situation of families affected by child protection problems and to promote their healthy personal development. The study, based on interviews with professionals and experts and a short case study, draws attention to the shortcomings and limitations of the system.
-
Here you can or should stay? Narratives of mobility
87-100.Views:28In this case study that focuses on mobilities’ narratives, we exam the experiences that works against mobility. Thus we are curious how to effect individual experiences (studies, employees), possibly in a larger city or abroad, small mobilities (vacation, office work in a city), how to effect on the duality of city and village as well as on commitment to their village. Involving the experiences of parents complement it and role a significant effect on the youth’s mobility and settlement. The case study is based on some pair of interviews: immobilized youth and parents talk about the causes of settlement, desires, commitment, experiences, and about young adults have chance to stay or to migrate. Understanding immobility is about exam the recent and past family experiences present in the family at the parent’s side, the migration culture of the local community and relatives, the separation of experiences, transmissible fears and hopes. These have to be completed by the young adults’ interview where we found the „immobility potential” towards successful, failures, fears, individual and family experiences.
-
Broader context of bullying: from the aspect of several school level and social level variable
65-79Views:18Bullying is a widespread phenomenon in school communities. Although there are significant differences in prevalence between schools, regions and countries. Bullying is a complex problem that is related to several individual, family, school level and social factors. The data was collected in the last survey (in 2013/2014) of the Health Behaviour in School Aged Children Study (HBSC) that is a WHO coordinated nationally representative study. 4 types of bullying involvement was determined: bully, victim, bully-victim and not involved. The ratio of these types was analysed related to the variables of family affluence, school type and type of school administration (state, religious or other) There are no significant differences in the ratio of bullying involvement according to the school type, but there are significant differences according to type of school administration or cathegories of family affluence. Although social-cultural differences doesn’t seem to be key factors of bullying they might have stong contribution to its understanding and designing effective prevention programs.
-
The weird world of Russian strategic security culture
95-118Views:68The objective of this paper is to explore the Russian interpretation of the concept of security and to question this interpretation. The first part of the essay provides a historical overview of the relationship between NATO and Russia. Although the relationship between NATO and Russia has never been friendly, it has not always been hostile. How did it become so? How did Russian security policy makers come to the conclusion that NATO posed a clear threat to Russia? What is behind Russia’s intransigent stance towards NATO? Is there even a solid basis for this attitude? What does this tell us about the Russian understanding of security? After an overview of the different concepts of security and an examination of the notion of strategic security culture, the second part of the paper attempts to answer these questions. It concludes that Russia’s strategic security culture has imperialist features and points out why, in the longer term, Russia will be the main victim of this.
-
Thomas Hobbes and the dilemmas of the natural state Second chapter: The tipology of the state of nature
3-22Views:40The primary purpose of this paper is to reflect upon four aspects of the Hobbesian state of nature. Firstly, the question is whether we can interpret this original state as a mythical, abstract,
imaginative and timless state, focusing only on the final conclusion of the Hobbesian theory, or
it may contain a well-defined timspan, having its own historical development based on a clear
logical construction. Secondly, this study aims at examining the natural character of man in
the state of nature, and his harmony with his environment in respect with their „naturalness”.
Thirdly, it tries to describe the assumed interpersonal relationships within the „primitve” state.
Fourthly, the paper presents different states of nature reasoned out from a close reading of the
text. All four aspect may help us to get a better understanding of the ambivalent character of the
Hobbesian state of nature. -
The social representation of radicalism among young people
64-78.Views:29In the study, using data from an international research (Myplace), relying on the theory of
social representations, we examined the understanding of radicalism of young people aged 15
to 26 and living in two towns in Hungary (Ózd and Sopron) which differ significantly regarding
their political socialization. In accordance with an empirical method based on the theory,
we analyzed the relationship between young people’s attitudes towards nationalism and the
democratic principles and the representation of radicalism, following the structural and content
characterization of the representation of radicalism through the quantification of associational
responses received in the questionnaire survey conducted in 2012. -
Competitive elections and the challenges of the concept of competitiveness
37-52Views:67The paper relates to the literature on contemporary non-democratic systems with multi-party elections. It aims to prove that electoral competitiveness is a key concept for understanding these systems, but this concept is currently underdeveloped. It first reviews the main approaches of competition and competitiveness, then, using the widely accepted type of competitive authoritarian hybrid regime, argues that the concept developed by its inventors does not provide sufficient support to detect competitiveness, because the factor of uncertainty used by the concept creators to justify its existence is not accompanied by any real indicators. The conclusion of the article is that competitiveness should therefore be derived not from the unidentifiable uncertainty factor, but from the concept of electoral integrity, which indicates the existence or the absence of genuine (competitive) elections, and from the concept and characteristics of electoral manipulations.
-
Reflecions on the society of control – Footnotes to the Delezoguattarian machine
210-228Views:52The present study revolves around the concept of the Deleuzean machine. It undertakes to
introduce the machine from Deleuze’s concept of the societies of control. Thus this paper is not
a presentation of the critique of the Freudian and Lacanian notions of desire that the machine
is introduced as a late capitalist abstract agent, but a genalogy of the machinic mechanism – as
a logic of operation – is outlined from a new perspective. The emphasis of the study is not on
psychoanalises and capitalism, and on schizoanalysis as a critique of them, but ont he operational
logic of the societies of control: the articulation of controlling freedom. Fort he latter, concepcts
such as territory, de- and reterritorialization, as well as the operating principles of cybernetic systems are shed light on. By examining this concept, therefore, the ways of understanding the
social, economic and political processes of ourt time can be shed new light. -
The place and role of field studies in teaching medical sociology
44-55Views:43Introduction: The goals of the subject of Medical sociology are to familiarize and explain the relationships between social environment and health. The theoretical and practical elements of the medical sociology education and the field studies that form a part of practical work serve these goals. During filed studies, we build on the previous knowledge and experience of the
students. Method: The themes of the field studies change from semester to semester. From the series of studies we picked three themes that were connected to and built on each other. We present the role of field studies through their description and the explanation of our experiences. Results: Field studies add empirical skills and experience to the knowledge acquired during the
theoretical and practical training of medical sociology. The field study assignments also serve to strengthen the effects of the “hidden curriculum”, the process of the indirect professional socialization at the medical school. Furthermore, the new knowledge and skills give the students a better understanding of the scientific literature helping them in the interpretation of statistical
and methodological aspects of biomedical results and concepts. Conclusion: Our experiences show that field studies are an efficient teaching method. Its most important outcome is sensitizing medical students towards health related social problems and helping them to understand and handle such problems. -
From Sunday lunch to the ballot box: Political socialisation and political homophily in Hungarian society
8-36Views:153Political socialisation is the process of forming an individual’s political identity, in the course of which the individual’s attitude to politics and political worldview is formed. Political socialisation takes place in different spheres, of which the family and parents are of particular importance. Previous research in Hungary has confirmed that the family is an “incubator” of citizenship. However, there is little data available in Hungary that would allow for a more precise understanding of the transmission of political attitudes. This study investigates political homophily within the family (between parent and child) and the effects of parental political characteristics on the individual in Hungary. Our data are drawn from a nationally representative telephone survey of 2000 respondents sampled in 2023. The results show that in nearly two-thirds of Hungarian families, family members held the same political views during the respondent’s childhood, with the highest proportions of homophily indicators, fathers’ and respondents’ voting activity, and mothers’ and respondents’ conservative-liberal attitudes. The effect of parental characteristics was tested using structural equation modelling (SEM). Parents’ political interests and ideological positions had a strong direct effect on the same child characteristics, but the individual’s political participation and party preference were only indirectly influenced by parents. The success of attitudinal transmission was strongly enhanced if the parents were themselves, homophiles, along with the trait in question. Our results point to the important role of the family as a primary agent in political socialisation and suggest new research directions.
-
The Effects of the 2011 Electoral Reform on the Results of the Hungarian Legislative Elections I. : Theoretical aspects of the reform
195-209Views:43The second wave of democracy after World Wa II, followed by the third wave in the 1970’s and
the 80’s – including the historic democratic transitions in Eastern Europe after the collapse
of the Soviet Empire – led to the expansion of democratic electoral systems around the world.
The design of electoral systems and of the undergoing electoral reforms has become a vital
component of the democratization process. The study of the theory and politics of electoral
reform led to the adoption of new theoretical and methodological approaches in order to cope
with the challenging phenomena.
The main goal of this paper is to interpret the concept of reform, and to unfold some of
theoretical aspects of it in order to identify some of the main components of the concept. With the theoretical approach we can get a better understandic of the reform itself, and we can
demonstrate that electoral reform is a complex process which should not be reduced to a simplistic
model in which a few actors driven by a few motives can fully explain the whole phenomenon.
The theoretical study of the reform can show that some politial events, the established party
system (first and foremost the distribution of power between the various parties), the type of the
actual electoral system (its advantages and disadvantages) as well as some contingents factors
must be taken into consideration in order to have a better understanding of the nature of the
political arena in which reform proposals are promoted and the reform itself takes place. -
Forms of parental control in the case of postadolescent youth
123-141Views:111The present study addresses control factors that emerge during the detachment of young people in the post-adolescent age that may delay or hinder the detachment process of the young adult. It aims to highlight that childhood upbringing, the child-parent relationship, and the communication that takes place between them allow the creation of a new type of typology in which not only parental control tools can be identified but also social control mechanisms can be identified. Most post-adolescence research traces the success or extent of detachment mostly to the financial situation of young people. This paper, however, aims to briefly demonstrate that a deeper understanding of the dimensions of detachment as conceived by László Vaskovics is possible through the study of attachments and bonds.
-
Self-contained child protection – possible ways to open up
178-194Views:107The aim of the research, based on a qualitative methodology, is to gain an understanding of
whether external/affiliated services are provided in child protection system targeting parents or
children and young people with child protection problems. The aim is to examine the extent of a
service focused and innovative approaches in child protection, where is the place and what is the
role of civil services. The study, which based on 15 expert interviews, argues that child protection
is currently characterised by many dysfunctions, as a self-contained and isolated sub-system of
social policy, which not only fails to deliver the basic objectives of child protection in practice, but
in many cases hides structural deficiencies and systemic anomalies. There is a need to explore
new ways of child protection, including the use of volunteering, the services of civil organizations
and broad partnerships. -
Alternatives of how to prepare for the future labor market
146-160Views:42What happens if among the members of a society and among the smaller and larger units and groups making up the society trust and confidence seems to be disappearing at once? What happens if confidence reposed into each other fall victim to social differences as well as to the economic / cost-of-living boxing of modern information society? How to stop the crisis symptom that seems to be developing this way and which is shown in the fragmentation of communities?1 With other words, is it possible to “stick again together” a community or even a whole society started to disintegrate? The questions, even if not so characteristically phrased, provide sociologists actually with the scope of understanding our modern, individualistic world (Habermas 1994). Gusfield (1975) depicts dichotomy of community and society in a way that we should interpret community as a pervading, significant contrast. By now literature seems as if it was only be able to picture the changes taking place in the images both of the society and community describing them by even more pronounced, contradictory processes. The changes that send messages on the disintegration of categories and frames becoming insecure instead of the security and integration quasi missed by Habermas. It also seems as if—quasi as an answer given to this process—occlusion/seclusion both on the part of community members and the various communities from the seemingly unknown and insecure changes were more intensive (Légmán 2012). We intend to construe these phenomena on the next pages, but due to extension limits without the need for completeness of social interpretations. We want to do it with the help of mainly one dimension: value preference through the example of a given society, namely the Hungarian one. Thus we get to the stability and the solidarity of the members of the smallest unit of society, one which accepts and expresses various value preferences, the family.
From time immemorial, one of the crucial questions of mankind has been what the future has in store for us. The future, however, has remained unfathomable up to this day, and even future studies promises only as much as prognosticating what is likely to continue and what will plausibly change in the world. Thus, no wonder, that already the first “real” economists of the 18th century (Adam Smith et al.) considered the creation of the future model of labor economy as a challenge. At the present era of modern labor market, this task is closely connected with the future status of labor market since in a consumer society income acquired by work forms the basis of satisfying needs (Ehrenberg – Smith 2003, Galasi 1994).We are not saying anything new by stating the fact that the demand for labor force is determined by new places of work and that an ideal supply of labor force must be adaptable to the requirements of demand. To meet requirements and to be adaptable is possible only if we are armed with the necessary competencies and capital (Hodges – Burchell 2003, Bourdieu 1998). The question, to what extent students in higher education are prepared for changes in the demand for labor force, arises at this point. What can young people expect on the labor market in this ever changing world? What kind of job opportunities and work conditions are there for them, and how much are they prepared to face these changes?
