Conceptualizations of Social Ecologies

Question 1

Main challenges in community psychology

Answer 1

• Interested in groups, organizations, communities, etc.
• We want to understand how environments and social systems block or promote health, if we figure this out we can apply it everywhere
• Very difficult to understand and conceptualize their relationships to the people who occupy them

Question 2

Key assumptions of community psychology

Answer 2

• Views problems in living in terms of person environment fit: B = f(P,E)
• Some environments are a good fit for some but not all
• We are affected by environment from the moment we are in utero

Question 3

Social Ecologie

Answer 3

• Things change and we need to adapt our behaviour

Question 3

Social-Ecological Systems

Answer 3

• Complex systems that connect people and nature
• We are embedded in environments and social networks that are always changing

Question 4

Behaviour setting

Answer 4

• Defined by time and space boundaries and by a standing pattern of behaviour
• Ex: classroom, sporting event, church service
• Have place, time, and a pattern of behaviour
• The people in these settings are largely interchangeable

Question 5

Patterns of behaviour in Barker’s behaviour setting

Answer 5

• Guided by explicit and implicit rules
• Explicit: Clearly stated rules
• Implicit: Understood without being stated
• Basically we read the room and are forced to follow

Question 6

Synomorphic

Answer 6

• A match between physical setting and behaviour setting
• It’s like some environments will fight against what we want our behaviour to be
• Ex: group work may be difficult in our classroom

Question 7

Goal in Barker’s behaviour setting

Answer 7

• Identify behaviour settings and to understand the physical features and social rules that maintain them

Question 8

Baker’s Staffing Theory/Population Theory

Answer 8

• Ration of roles in a behaviour setting and the number of people available to play them. Ex: managers vs normal staff
• Overpopulated settings
• Underpopulated settings
• Optimally populated settings

Question 9

Overpopulated settings

Answer 9

• More people than roles
• Ex: Schools with 1000+ kids

Question 10

Underpopulated settings

Answer 10

• More roles than participants
• Ex: Schools with 100 kids

Question 11

Optimally populated settings

Answer 11

• Have as many or more participants than roles
• There should always be more people than roles to make sure we get the best people for each role
• Ex: School with 500-600 students

Question 12

Brofenbrenner’s Ecological Model

Answer 12

• Focuses on the ecological levels that influence the developing individual
• Support an understanding of how individual behaviour may be influenced by forces at multiple levels
• Proximal and Distal influences

Question 13

Proximal influences

Answer 13

• Systems that are closest to the individual, and involve direct contact
• Microsystem and Mesosystem

Question 14

Distal Influences

Answer 14

• Systems that are less immediate and that have general effects on more proximal systems
• Exosystem and Macrosystem

Question 15

Microsystem

Answer 15

• Activities, roles, relations in a setting containing the person
• The person directly participates and has a direct influence on behaviour
• Ex: home, work, organization

Question 16

Mesosystem

Answer 16

• Interrelations among two or more microsystems in which a person participates
• Ex: Family work mesosystem or family school mesosystem. Our family has an impact on what we do/feel at work or school

Question 17

Exosystem

Answer 17

• One or more settings not involving a person directly but which affects them
• Ex: Friends of friends, university senate, city counsel, etc.

Question 18

Macrosystem

Answer 18

• Overarching patterns of culture or sub-culture/consistencies in the form of lower order systems (micro, meso, exo) that exist
• We can’t really effect these but they effect our lives
• Ex: Rate of unemployment, gender roles, economy

Question 19

James Kelly’s Ecological Principles

Answer 19

• Thinking about social systems, such as communities or organizations, as though they were ecosystems
• Identified four principles for thinking about and intervening in community level problems
• Doesn’t look at broader systemic levels like Brofenbrenner
• Think of how they all work together, impact one another, and how they will be impacted generationally

Question 20

James Kelly and interdependence

Answer 20

• A consideration of how in any system there are multiple inter-related parts
• Actions or changes in part of a system have implications for all others (some anticipated, some unanticipated)
• Our behaviours are connected when we are in groups (Ex: family’s change when kids want more independence)
• Changes in systems are often unpredictable (Ex: We created safe shoot up places but drugs now have shorter lives, so people have to use more because the effects don’t last)

Question 21

James Kelly and cycling of resources

Answer 21

• A consideration of how resources are identified, developed, used, and allocated in a system (Ex: Money, information, etc.) - some get cycled and others not
• A consideration of untapped resources in a system (Ex: What ressources do they have? Who uses them? Ho do we get to more people, etc.)

Question 22

James Kelly and adaptation

Answer 22

• A consideration of how individuals adapt/cope to changing environment and how environments adapt to their environments
• Every environment demands different skills
• Previous behaviours may harm us in new settings
• We’re constantly being asked to adapt
• Niche: habitat within a given creature can survive
• Niche Breadth: The range or size of habitats in which a population can survive
• What niches are people well adapted to?

Question 23

James Kelly and succession

Answer 23

• A consideration of how ecologies change over time; a historical perspective on settings or communities
• Different populations may be more successful in a particular at different times
• Ex: No sidewalks may have been good in the 60s, but not now

Question 24

Why look at environments

Answer 24

- They can affect health and individual well being - Social justice and collective well being - Potential relationships to well being like risk factors, protective factors, and promotion factors

Question 25

The effects of neighbourhoods

Answer 25

- Distal risk processes: neighbourhood characteristics associated with individual problems. Ex: At risk about a situation, not a person - Proximal environmental risk: Pollution, traffic noise, lead exposure, lack resource access, neighbourhood state. Affect health, relationships, use of resources - Protective processes: Social processes (social ties, sense of community, safety). Interpersonal (parenting styles, mentoring)

Question 26

Ecological model and principles of practice in community psychology

Answer 26

- Individual and community problems are framed in terms of a systemic analysis - Change goals are identified at multiple levels or in multiple components of a system (we don't want to fix one problem to create another) - Process of intervention is participatory and collaborative - System change will have side effects that can not be anticipated (requires vigilance) - Change agents must be creative, flexible and adaptive and build constructive working relationships with multiple groups or partners - Build on or create capacity in a setting, system, or community to create future change - Requires long term perspective, and likely a considerable time commitment