Search Results (1,031)

Social scientists and scholars of high-tension religious groups (often referred to as new religious movements or emergent religious groups) have spent nearly half a century debunking the social psychological theory of “brainwashing.” But there is now a veritable brainwashing legal renaissance in child protection guidelines in Japan, several US states, and the UK through the concept of “coercive control.” In this exploratory perspective piece, we trace the ideological lineage of mid-century anti-cult rhetoric into twenty-first-century childcare and child protection frameworks. We argue that the legal doctrine and cultural logic of parens patriae, one means by which the state regulates and mandates the construction of care, is increasingly weaponized to regulate parental religious socialization under the guise of psychological safeguarding, building upon Japanese anti-cult educational guidelines and the American OneTaste trafficking legal case precedent. We hope that this brief discussion pushes back on recent international appetite for the suppression of “deviant” religious liberty within the family unit. Full article

Background: Black cisgender women in the United States bear a disproportionate burden of new HIV diagnoses, yet fewer than 1 in 10 women who could benefit from pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) receive a prescription. Religion and spirituality are central to many Black women’s lives and may shape sexual health decision-making in complex ways, but their role in PrEP engagement has been undertheorized. Methods: We conducted a convergent mixed-methods study integrating cross-sectional survey data from the ReachHER study (N = 397 Black cisgender women) with qualitative, semi-structured interviews (different sample of N = 30 Black cisgender women). Three religion/spirituality items—general religiosity, religion in medical decisions, and religion in sexual decisions—were examined in exploratory bivariate analyses with prior PrEP awareness, current PrEP use, HIV testing in the past 12 months, and primary care provider access using Pearson χ² tests. Prior PrEP awareness was assessed before participants received standardized PrEP education. Qualitative data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. A joint display integrated the two datasets. Results: General religious/spiritual identification and religion in medical decisions were associated with current PrEP use in bivariate analyses, and religious/spiritual identification was also associated with HIV testing in the past 12 months. Five qualitative themes emerged: (1) religion as part of a broader belief system; (2) religion as cultural and identity intersection; (3) religion as a barrier to sexual health communication; (4) faith over protection as a driver of PrEP hesitancy and stigma; and (5) religious institutions as trusted intervention spaces. Conclusions: In this mixed-methods study, religion/spirituality functioned as an ambivalent but consequential multidimensional context for PrEP decision-making among Black cisgender women, simultaneously constraining sexual discourse and providing trusted infrastructure for prevention. Faith-partnered, intersectionally tailored PrEP interventions warrant further study. Full article

Historical empathy is a key concept in history and social studies education. It involves understanding how people in the past thought, acted, and experienced the world through engagement with historical context, perspective taking, and affective connections to historical actors. While these competencies are often developed through written sources and historical narratives, visual and interactive media may offer additional opportunities for fostering historical empathy. This article examines whether the historical video game Assassin’s Creed Valhalla may provide affordances for historical empathy for players. Set in Viking Age England and Norway, the game’s representations of Norse and Christian religion form the focus of the analysis. The study combines systematic gameplay analysis with qualitative thematic analysis. The empirical material was analyzed for historical empathy and compared with historical sources. The findings suggest that the game may provide opportunities to support historical empathy by helping players understand how people in the past interpreted and navigated the world through religious and cultural frameworks. However, historical simplifications and gameplay-oriented adaptations may limit this potential unless accompanied by teacher scaffolding and critical reflection. Thus, while Assassins Creed Valhalla may be engaging and pedagogically valuable, it should be approached critically as an entertainment product rather than a straightforward representation of the past. Full article

Background: Children’s resilience is a dynamic, multisystemic process shaped by cultural context, supportive relationships, and family values. In Romania, research on children’s resilience and the role of parental values remains limited. Objective: This study examined the relationship between children’s resilience, socio-demographic factors (parental educational level, economic status, family structure, religious affiliation, and ethnicity), and parental values based on Schwartz’s value model. We hypothesized that socially oriented values (security, conformity, tradition, universalism, and benevolence) would be associated with higher resilience. Method: A cross-sectional correlational study was conducted with 245 children aged 8–15 years (M = 10.58, SD = 1.95) and one parent per child. Children’s resilience was assessed using the Child and Youth Resilience Measure (CYRM-28), parental values using the Short Schwartz’s Value Survey (SSVS), and socio-demographic data through a parental questionnaire. Results: Higher resilience was associated with higher parental educational level and with parental values reflecting conservation and self-transcendence. In the regression model, parental educational level, conservation values, Orthodox religious affiliation, and intact family structure were independently associated with resilience and jointly accounted for 22.6% of the variance. Younger children had higher resilience, but age was not a significant predictor in regression analysis. Conclusions: The findings support the socio-ecological perspective on resilience and provide among the first empirical evidence from Romania that parental values, together with family and cultural resources, are associated with children’s resilience. Full article

Background: Dual-method menstrual hygiene use, defined as the use of both modern menstrual hygiene products (e.g., sanitary pads) and traditional materials (e.g., cloth), remains under-researched among young women in India. While socioeconomic factors are associated with menstrual practices, religious affiliation may also be associated with differences in reported material use. This study examined the association between religious affiliation and dual-method use among women aged 15–24 years using nationally representative survey data supplemented by contextual evidence from the qualitative and contextual literature. Methods: Quantitative analysis used nationally representative National Family Health Survey-V (NFHS-V, 2019–21) data for 240,230 women aged 15–24 years. Survey-weighted bivariate and multivariable logistic regression analyses estimated the prevalence and adjusted odds of reported dual-method use across sociodemographic and religious groups. Seven purposively selected qualitative and contextual sources were used to provide contextual insights into the quantitative findings. Results: Muslim women had the highest prevalence of reported dual-method use (31.7%), compared with 27.5% among Hindu women and 21.6% among other religious groups. The association between religious affiliation and dual-method use was also observed across several demographic subgroups. Among women with improved toilet facilities, dual-method use was higher among Muslim women than Hindu women (32.3% vs. 27.0%). Similarly, among women with higher education, prevalence was 30.1% among Muslim women compared with 23.3% among Hindu women. After adjustment for measured sociodemographic, socioeconomic, structural, and regional characteristics, Muslim women had 36% higher odds of reported dual-method use than Hindu women (AOR 1.36, 95% CI: 1.29–1.43; p < 0.001). The qualitative and contextual literature provided contextual insights into the potential roles of privacy, household expectations, and disposal concerns in menstrual material use. However, NFHS-V cannot establish whether materials were used concurrently or sequentially or identify the specific contexts of use. Conclusions: Religious affiliation was associated with dual-method menstrual hygiene use after adjustment for socioeconomic and demographic characteristics. The findings indicate that menstrual health interventions should address socioeconomic barriers alongside the social and cultural contexts in which menstrual practices occur. Community-informed approaches incorporating privacy, disposal, household norms, and infrastructure may complement product provision and contribute to more equitable menstrual health outcomes. Full article

At the onset of the Lebanese civil war, within a Jesuit-run university in Beirut beside the demarcation line later known as the Green Line, the first academic programme devoted exclusively to Islamic-Christian studies was created in defiance of the surrounding violence. The Département—later to be known as the Institut—d’études islamo-chrétiennes at the Université Saint-Joseph was unique in its commitment to fostering reciprocal understanding between Muslim and Christian scholars. This initiative, spearheaded by a collaborative faculty of two religious traditions, sought to establish an unparalleled level of institutional integration within a Middle Eastern curriculum. The present article is based on four collections of unpublished sources, namely the correspondence of Dominique de Menil with André Scrima (CPS.MEN 1–70) and of Augustin Dupré La Tour with de Menil (CPS.DLT 1–17), the minutes of the governing councils (1977–1988), and the Dupré La Tour–Scrima correspondence (1976–1998). The article employs this material to reconstruct the project’s educational and conceptual architecture, its financing through the Menil Foundation and the Rothko Chapel, and the wartime logistics of couriers and money transfers that sustained it. This article argues that the initiative was a private, spiritually grounded counterpart to the public human-rights diplomacy of the Carter presidency. This convergence was later institutionalised in the Carter–Menil Human Rights Foundation, even as the initiative itself remained critically independent of that public diplomacy, as Scrima’s caustic assessments of “droits de l’homme” rhetoric demonstrate. Full article

Specialists in multilingualism have long debated the role played by religious conceptualisations of linguistic diversity in fostering or hindering specific language practices and policies. With regard to Western societies, the myth of Babel has frequently been associated with the emergence of negative attitudes towards linguistic diversity. Conversely, Islamic civilisation developed a positive theology of language diversity, grounded in Qur’anic hermeneutics and Islamic prophetology, that not only accepted the multiplicity of human tongues as a divine sign but actively justified their adoption as vehicles of knowledge and power. The present contribution investigates the contours of what may be termed an ‘Islamic theology of multilingualism’: the epistemological framework that legitimised the use of multiple languages, including vernaculars bereft of any former written tradition, in education, literary composition, and administration. Drawing on textual passages from the Qur’an, the Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ, al-Fārābī, al-Mubashshir, and Ibn ʿArabī, the article argues that Islamic prophetology—by positing a universal prophecy that adapts to the linguistic and cultural conditions of each human group—provides the theological foundation for a theory of vernacular as locutio naturalis, and that this framework is a key element in the making of the Islamic cosmopolis. Full article

Background: Adolescent boys often lack adequate menstrual education, leaving them susceptible to harmful sociocultural influences and reinforcing discriminatory attitudes. The purpose for this study was to explore adolescent boys’ knowledge, sociocultural beliefs, and attitudes toward menstruation. Methods: A descriptive-phenomenological qualitative study was conducted, involving 25 in-depth interviews with adolescent boys enrolled in senior high school (eligibility age range 14–19 years; achieved sample aged 15–19 years) from five districts in Ghana’s Volta Region. Participants were purposively sampled to ensure diverse perspectives. Semi-structured interviews explored knowledge sources, sociocultural influences, and attitudes toward menstruation. Data were analyzed thematically using Braun and Clarke’s six-phase framework with the aid of MAXQDA software. Results: Adolescent boys’ knowledge of menstruation was fragmented, stemming from family, school, and internet sources. Mothers were frequently cited as key informants, but misconceptions about menstruation persisted. Sociocultural and religious beliefs reinforced menstruation-related taboos, such as restrictions on cooking and entering sacred spaces, shaping discriminatory attitudes. Reactions to menstrual leaks varied from empathy to teasing. Conclusions: The findings highlight the need for inclusive menstrual education targeting boys and their families. Educational programs should include biological, emotional, and social aspects of menstruation to help reduce myths and nurture empathy. Full article

Islamic intellectual history offers little support for a general conflict between the religious sciences (tafsīr, ḥadīth, fiqh, and kalām) and the rational and natural sciences (mathematics, medicine, astronomy, physics, geography, and philosophy): Muslim scholars typically cultivated both, reading the created world as one of God’s signs (āyāt) alongside the revealed text, and a number of the tradition’s most celebrated figures, Ibn Sīnā, al-Fārābī, al-Ghazālī, and Ibn Rushd among them, achieved distinction in both domains at once. This article examines, through the biography and corpus of a single fifteenth-century Ottoman scholar, how religious and scientific learning were institutionally and intellectually intertwined in the early Ottoman period. Mollā ʿAbd al-Wājid al-Kutāhī (d. 838/1435) worked at a high level in both fields at once, leaving a commentary that carried Marāgha-school astronomy into Anatolia, the work for which Western scholarship has chiefly known him, and a major Ḥanafī legal commentary; his career is accordingly a direct case study of the relationship between religion and science. The study traces his two works dedicated to Sultan Murad II, the legal al-Ikhtiyārāt fī Sharḥ al-Nuqāya and the astronomical Sharḥ al-Mulakhkhaṣ fī al-Hayʾa. It proposes a two-stage draft/fair-copy (musawwada/mubayyaḍa) composition model based on a codicological analysis of twenty-four manuscripts of the legal work and a preliminary census of the four known copies of the astronomical commentary. The astronomical work is a commentary on al-Jaghmīnī’s al-Mulakhkhaṣ, the most widely used Ptolemaic textbook in Islamic education; the same base text was also glossed by Qāḋīzāde al-Rūmī from the same Fanārī milieu, linking ʿAbd al-Wājid to the Samarqand school. The article’s central contribution to debates on religion and science comes from an episode preserved in the Mawlawī hagiography Safīna-yi Nafīsa-yi Mawlawīyān: the Mawlawī shaykh Jalāl al-Dīn Ergun, in conversation with ʿAbd al-Wājid, deliberately invokes astronomy and mathematics (hayʾa, riyāḍiyyāt) to teach that these sciences ultimately belong to the category of “māsiwā” (all that is other than God) and that natural philosophy is a stepping stone toward self-knowledge and, through it, knowledge of God. This primary-source testimony documents a hierarchical, integrative model of natural philosophy within fifteenth-century Ottoman intellectual culture rather than an adversarial one, offering historical evidence against the applicability of the conflict thesis in this Ottoman-Islamic context and a regional, biographically documented instance of the broader integrative pattern that characterizes the classical and post-classical Islamic tradition of learning. Full article

Various explanatory factors for perceived happiness have been identified in cross-country comparisons, but their relative importance and causal relationships remain unknown. Associations and causality were studied between 17 societal, economic, and religious variables contributing to happiness scores on the World Happiness Report (WHR) in 147 countries. In a correlation analysis, the strongest association with national happiness scores was observed for the median gross domestic product (GDP)/capita (r squared 0.69), followed by the mean GDP/capita (0.65), tertiary education (0.42), corruption (−0.41), democracy index (0.35), religious non-affiliation (0.31), and consanguinity (−0.25). Bayesian statistical analysis indicated strong causal cascades originating from democracy (a positive effect) and, to a lesser degree, corruption (a negative effect) during the years 1945–1985 to subsequent national happiness levels, with a delay of several decades. The results were confirmed to have good reproducibility with Bootstrap resampling, indicating robust findings. Although the median GDP/capita had the strongest association with happiness in the cross-sectional analysis, it was not identified as a primary causal factor in the Bayesian analysis, in which high levels of democracy and low levels of corruption were entangled with median GDP/capita as apparent prerequisites for perceived happiness. Our results suggest that the median GDP should be used as an indicator of the economic prosperity of citizens instead of the currently established mean GDP when studying the links between economy, democracy, and well-being across countries. Full article

Background: Resilience is an important resource in nursing education, supporting students in adapting to demanding academic and clinical environments. However, evidence regarding the factors associated with resilience among nursing students remains inconsistent. This study aimed to examine the factors associated with resilience among undergraduate nursing students, with particular emphasis on gender, age, academic progression, institutional context, and selected sociodemographic characteristics. Methods: A cross-sectional quantitative study was conducted with 263 undergraduate nursing students from two higher education institutions in Portugal. Data were collected using the Takviriyanun Resilience Factors Scale, adapted and validated for the Portuguese population. Descriptive and inferential statistical analyses were performed to examine the two dimensions of the scale—Personal and Social Support Skills and Problem-Solving Skills—and their associations with sociodemographic and academic variables. Results: Students reported generally favourable levels of resilience-related factors, with higher scores observed in items reflecting personal responsibility and perceived social support. Comparatively lower scores were observed for items related to calmness and patience, confidence, optimism, and perceived social acceptance. A statistically significant gender difference was found in Problem-Solving Skills, with male students showing higher mean ranks than female students (p = 0.038); however, the effect size was small (r = 0.13). A moderate positive correlation was observed between Problem-Solving Skills and Personal and Social Support Skills (ρ = 0.394, p < 0.001). No statistically significant associations were found between the resilience dimensions and age, year of study, higher education institution, displacement status, place of residence, or religious affiliation. Conclusions: Undergraduate nursing students demonstrated generally favourable levels of resilience-related factors. Personal and Social Support Skills and Problem-Solving Skills were positively associated, suggesting a meaningful relationship between interpersonal resources and problem-solving competencies. Although a small gender difference was observed in Problem-Solving Skills, the findings do not indicate substantial gender-related differences in resilience-related factors. Educational strategies aimed at strengthening problem-solving, adaptive coping, emotional self-regulation, and social support may be relevant throughout undergraduate nursing education. Longitudinal and multicentre studies are warranted to further investigate the factors associated with resilience and to evaluate the effectiveness of resilience-focused educational interventions. Full article

Battlefield preservation is commonly understood as a matter of heritage management, historical education, or cultural tourism. This article argues that its origins and enduring significance lie elsewhere. Modern battlefield preservation emerged as a direct consequence of the transformation of warfare between the late eighteenth and twentieth centuries. Beginning with the French Revolution and the levée en masse, military service became increasingly associated with citizenship, national identity, and mass participation, while industrialization provided the logistical and technological foundations necessary for warfare on an unprecedented scale. As warfare expanded, so too did its human consequences, transforming military death from the experience of a relatively small warrior elite into a shared social reality affecting entire populations. Drawing upon military history, memory studies, sociology, religious studies, and heritage scholarship, this article examines how mass warfare generated new forms of collective bereavement, ritual commemoration, battlefield pilgrimage, and historical preservation. Through case studies ranging from the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars to the Crimean War, Gettysburg, the World Wars, and the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam, it demonstrates how expanding mobilization, industrialized conflict, and rising casualty rates produced enduring landscapes of memory. The article argues that battlefield preservation developed through a cumulative historical process linking mass warfare, mass casualties, collective trauma, commemorative practices, and the creation of commemorative landscapes. Preserved battlefields are not merely remnants of past conflicts; they are cultural institutions through which societies negotiate memory, identity, and meaning. As traditional sources of collective authority weakened in modern societies, battlefields increasingly acquired functions associated with ritual, pilgrimage, and civil religion. The expansion of warfare produced an expansion of remembrance, and the preserved battlefield emerged as one of the most enduring cultural responses to the human consequences of modern conflict. Full article

Evolutionary medicine (EM) applies evolutionary principles to explain disease mechanisms and improve clinical practice, yet it remains underrepresented in medical education, particularly in non-Western settings. This study investigated Egyptian medical students’ perceptions of EM by assessing their acceptance of evolutionary theory, knowledge of natural selection, and perceived barriers to EM education. A cross-sectional, multicentre online survey was conducted among 589 undergraduate medical students from seven Egyptian medical schools. Acceptance of evolution was measured using the Measure of Acceptance of the Theory of Evolution (MATE 2.0), and knowledge was assessed using the Conceptual Inventory of Natural Selection (CINS). Students demonstrated limited knowledge and relatively low acceptance of evolutionary theory, while a substantial proportion had no previous awareness of EM. Nevertheless, many students supported integrating EM into medical curricula and recognized its potential contribution to research and clinical practice. Curriculum overload and religious concerns were among the most frequently perceived barriers to EM integration. These findings identify important gaps in students’ exposure to and understanding of evolutionary concepts and support the integration of clinically relevant, culturally responsive evolutionary education into undergraduate medical curricula to strengthen evolutionary literacy and facilitate meaningful engagement with EM. Full article

This article maps research on artificial intelligence (AI) in Christian Religious Education (CRE) during the first phase of rapid development following the widespread adoption of generative AI. A scoping review was conducted in Scopus, Web of Science, the Open Digital Theological Library, and IxTheo, supplemented by Google Scholar. Included were full-text English-language publications from 1 January 2023 to 31 March 2026 that addressed AI in Christian educational, catechetical, theological–educational, or formative contexts. The final corpus comprised 23 publications. Data were charted by publication type, geographical and educational context, main topic, and key claims or findings. The results show that the field is recent, methodologically heterogeneous, and not yet well consolidated, but that the emerging debate is organised around four inter-related strands: didactic potential and personalisation, ethical–technical limitations, anthropological–theological reflection, and systemic, institutional, and cultural–geographical conditions. The literature is marked by a tension between AI’s didactic potential and concerns regarding its ethical, theological, anthropological, and institutional implications. The review contributes a thematic synthesis that clarifies why AI integration in CRE requires not only educational innovation but also theologically informed, pedagogically mediated, and context-sensitive frameworks for religious formation. Significant gaps remain, including limited empirical and longitudinal research, insufficient attention to students’ and parents’ perspectives, cultural and linguistic contexts, and a lack of religion-specific, empirically tested didactic models. The review concludes that future research should move toward longitudinal, practice-based, and theologically grounded models for AI use in CRE. Full article

Background: Edible insects constitute a highly nutritious, environmentally sustainable and culturally significant food resource with considerable potential to contribute to food system transformation within academic and broader societal contexts. Although global interest in entomophagy continues to increase, there remains limited research exploring the knowledge, perceptions, attitudes and consumption practices of university populations within rural South African settings. Methods: Three concurrent cross-sectional quantitative studies were conducted at the University of Venda (UNIVEN), located in Thohoyandou, Vhembe District, Limpopo Province, South Africa. Study 1 evaluated the knowledge, attitudes and consumption patterns of edible insects among 200 students. Study 2 examined knowledge and utilisation of edible insects among 390 students. Study 3 investigated knowledge and perceptions regarding edible insects among 200 university staff members. Structured questionnaires covering socio-demographic characteristics, knowledge, perceptions, attitudes and food frequency practices were administered across all studies. Data analysis was performed using SPSS version 28 through descriptive statistics, frequencies and percentages. Analyses were descriptive only; no inferential testing, factor analysis or regression was undertaken, and the three studies are compared as a descriptive synthesis rather than pooled into a single dataset. Results: Findings across all study groups demonstrated high levels of awareness regarding edible insects, with awareness reported by 85% of participants in Study 1 and 100% in Study 2, and 98% of staff members acknowleded the ecological importance of insects. Mopane worms (Gonimbrasia belina), termites and grasshoppers emerged as the most recognised and frequently consumed edible insect species. Consumption prevalence was notably high, reported at 91% in Study 1 and 69.2% in Study 2 and 66.3% among staff in Study 3. General attitudes towards entomophagy were largely favourable, with 41% of students expressing excitement about edible insect consumption and 91.1% of staff supporting the commercialisation of edible insects. Key barriers influencing consumption included religious restrictions (25.1%, reported in Study 2 only; participants with religious dietary prohibitions were excluded at sampling in Studies 1 and 3, limiting cross-study comparability of this barrier), cultural taboos (3%), inadequate market availability and limited awareness regarding nutritional benefits. Staff members further demonstrated positive environmental and sustainability perceptions, with 84.1% recognising edible insects as environmentally beneficial and viable future food sources. Conclusions: Across three independent cross-sectional studies conducted at the University of Venda, broadly similar patterns of awareness, attitudes, perceptions and edible insect consumption were observed. Although the studies differed in sampling and measurement, they consistently suggest that edible insects remain culturally accepted among many students and staff. Nevertheless, challenges relating to nutritional literacy, market accessibility and policy integration continue to limit broader adoption. Strengthening nutrition education initiatives and incorporating edible insects into institutional food systems may enhance the contribution of edible insects towards food security, sustainable protein provision and nutrition sustainability within Limpopo Province and beyond. Full article