"Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference" : further exploration of attitude alignment in the context of close relationship dyads /

One hundred and five primarily Caucasian undergraduate couples were tested to study the phenomenon of attitude alignment, or the way in which individuals change their opinions to achieve greater attitudinal congruence with their romantic partners, and the hypotheses that relationship closeness, affect, attachment, social desirability, and centrality are each related to attitude alignment for individuals in close couples. The couples filled out an attitude questionnaire consisting of 50 issues in which they were asked to give their attitude on a scale from 1 to 9 as well as to rate the centrality, or importance, of that issue on a scale from 1 to 9. Before discussing four of these issues with each other - 2 were more central to the man and less central, or peripheral, to the woman, whereas the other 2 were central to the woman and peripheral to the man - the individuals completed established measures of relationship closeness, affect, attachment, and social desirability. The couples then filled out the identical attitudes questionnaire again, and their answers on the four discussion issues were compared to their prediscussion answers to determine whether attitude alignment had occurred. There were two experimental groups: a social desirability group, where the couples were told it was natural and normal to disagree with their partners, and a control group. Results indicated that attitude alignment did significantly occur across all couples, but most other variables - including centrality, relationship closeness, and affect - did not predict attitude alignment behaviour. As well, the social desirability experimental groups did not significantly differ on attitude alignment behaviours, but higher scores on the social desirability scale, specifically self-deception, significantly predicted higher attitude alignment scores across all couples. Large differences between individuals' frequency.

The battle over deficits : the struggle to maintain Canada's social welfare state : a thesis /

Abstract This thesis seeks to answer a number of questions concerning the deficit and debt in Canada. It focuses pri.arily on the federal level of government but with SOBe discussion of provincial governaent policy as well. In ~997, Canada's federal debt caae close ro six hundred billion dollars - $594 billion or 74.4 % of Gross Do.estic Product (GDP) to be exact. The purpose of this theses is threefold: To find out why Canada accu.ulated such a debt, to discover if there is a so-called debt crisis; and to discover if it is possible to preserve Canada's national welfare state given the financial restraints that have been adopted by both federal and provincial governments. Politicians are torn between economist' two contrasting views regarding deficits: Neo-Keynesian and neo-conservative. The neoKeynesian school focuses al1llOst exclusively on the short term stability of the economy and tends to dismiss concerns regarding the level of debt. Neo conservatives focus almost exclusively on the perceived costs of growth in the national debt and are willing to forego any stabilization benefits to ensure that the debt is controlled. These polar view do have one thing in coa.on; both confix-. that deficits influence govermaent policies. Both of these econoBic theories will have far-reaching influences on the federal gover1lJlJent's decision-making process. These economic theories will be discussed throughout this thesis.

Kierkegaard : the temporality of becoming a self

Introduction In Difference and Repetition, Deleuze compares and contrasts Kierkegaard's and Nietzsche's ideas of repetition. He argues that neither of them really give a representation of repetition. Repetition for them is a sort of selective task: the way in which they determine what is ethical and eternal. With Nietzsche, it is a theater of un belie f. ..... Nietzsche's leading idea is to found the repetition in the etemal return at once on the death of God and the dissolution of the self But it is a quite different alliance in the theater of faith: Kierkegaard dreams of alliance between a God and a self rediscovered. I Repetition plays a theatrical role in their thinking. It allows them to dramatically stage the interplay of various personnae. Deleuze does give a positive account ofKierkegaard's "repetition"; however, he does not think that Kierkegaard works out a philosophical model, or a representation of what repetition is. It is true that in the book Repetition, Constantin Constantius does not clearly and fully work out the concept of repetition, but in Sickness Unto Death, Kierkegaard gives a full explanation of the self and its temporality which can be connected with repetition. When Sickness Unto Death is interpreted according to key passages from Repetition and The Concept of Anxiety, a clear philosophical concept of repetition can be established. In my opinion, Kierkegaard's philosophy is about the task of becoming a self, and I will be attempting to show that he does have a model of the temporality of self-becoming. In Sickness Unto Death, Kierkegaard explains his notions of despair with reference to sin, self, self-becoming, faith, and repetition. Despair is a sickness of the spirit, of the self, and accordingly can take three forms: in despair not to be conscious of having a self (not despair in the strict sense); in despair not to will to be oneself; in despair to will to be oneself2 In relation to this definition, he defines a self as "a relation that relates itself to itself and in relating itself to itself relates to another.''3 Thus, a person is a threefold relationship, and any break in that relationship is despair. Despair takes three forms corresponding to the three aspects of a self s relation to itself Kierkegaard says that a selfis like a house with a basement, a first floor, and a second floor.4 This model of the house, and the concept of the stages on life's way that it illustrates, is central to Kierkegaard's philosophy. This thesis will show how he unpacks this model in many of his writings with different concepts being developed in different texts. His method is to work with the same model in different ways throughout his authorship. He assigns many of the texts to different pseudonyms, but in this thesis we will treat the model and the related concepts as being Kierkegaard's and not only the pseudonyms. This is justified as our thesis will show this modelremains the same throughout Kierkegaard's work, though it is treated in different ways by different pseudonyms. According to Kierkegaard, many people live in only the basement for their entire lives, that is, as aesthetes ("in despair not to be conscious of having a self'). They live in despair of not being conscious of having a self They live in a merely horizontal relation. They want to get what they desire. When they go to the first floor, so to speak, they reflect on themselves and only then do they begin to get a self In this stage, one acquires an ideology of the required and overcomes the strict commands of the desired. The ethical is primarily an obedience to the required whereas the aesthetic is an obedience to desire. In his work Fear and Trembling (Copenhagen: 1843), Johannes de Silentio makes several observations concerning this point. In this book, the author several times allows the desired ideality of esthetics to be shipwrecked on the required ideality of ethics, in order through these collisions to bring to light the religious ideality as the ideality that precisely is the ideality of actuality, and therefore just as desirable as that of esthetics and not as impossible as the ideality of ethics. This is accomplished in such a way that the religious ideality breaks forth in the dialectical leap and in the positive mood - "Behold all things have become new" as well as in the negative mood that is the passion of the absurd to which the concept "repetition" corresponds.s Here one begins to become responsible because one seeks the required ideality; however, the required ideality and the desired ideality become inadequate to the ethical individual. Neither of them satisfy him ("in despair not to will to be oneself'). Then he moves up to the second floor: that is, the mystical region, or the sphere of religiousness (A) ("despair to will to be oneself). Kiericegaard's model of a house, which is connected with the above definition ofdespair, shows us how the self arises through these various stages, and shows the stages of despair as well. On the second floor, we become mystics, or Knights of Infinite Resignation. We are still in despair because we despair ofthe basement and the first floor, however, we can be fiill, free persons only ifwe live on all the floors at the same time. This is a sort of paradoxical fourth stage consisting of all three floors; this is the sphere of true religiousness (religiousness (B)). It is distinguished from religiousness (A) because we can go back and live on all the floors. It is not that there are four floors, but in the fourth stage, we live paradoxically on three at once. Kierkegaard uses this house analogy in order to explain how we become a self through these stages, and to show the various stages of despair. Consequently, I will be explaining self-becoming in relation to despair. It will also be necessary to explain it in relation to faith, for faith is precisely the overcoming of despair. After explaining the becoming of the self in relation to despair and faith, I will then explain its temporality and thereby its repetition. What Kierkegaard calls a formula, Deleuze calls a representation. Unfortunately, Deleuze does not acknowledge Kierkegaard's formula for repetition. As we shall see, Kierkegaard clearly gives a formula for despair, faith, and selfbecoming. When viewed properly, these formulae yield a formula for repetition because when one hasfaith, the basement, firstfloor, and secondfloor become new as one becomes oneself The self is not bound in the eternity ofthe first floor (ethical) or the temporality of the basement (aesthete). I shall now examine the two forms of conscious despair in such a way as to point out also a rise in the consciousness of the nature of despair and in the consciousness that one's state is despair, or, what amounts to the same thing and is the salient point, a rise in the consciousness of the self The opposite to being in despair is to have faith. Therefore, the formula set forth above, which describes a state in which there is not despair at all, is entirely correct, and this formula is also the formula for faMi in ^elating itself to itself and in willing to be itself, the self rests transparently in the power that established it.

Forsaking all others: towards a new model of nationalism utilizing the case study of former Yugoslavia

Many people would like to believe that nationalism is a thing of the past, a dinosaur belonging to some bygone, uncivilized era. Such a belief is not borne out by recent history, however. Nationalism occupies the political forum with as much force as ever. Yet, in many ways, it remains a mystery to us. The purpose of this study is to explore individual motivations involved in the rise of nationalism, in addition to the role of structural factors. The linkage employed in this exploration is the psychosocial phenomenon of self-identity, including emotions and self-esteem. We demonstrate how individual, socially-constructed self-identity accounts for why some people embrace nationalism while others eschew it. The methodology employed was theoretical and historical analyses of secondary sources and indepth interviews with subjects who had some connection with former Yugoslavia, the country utilized to test the new model. Our analyses yielded the result that current conceptualizations of nationalism from an exclusively macro or micro perspective are unsatisfactory; we require a more comprehensive approach wherein the two perspectives are integrated. Such an integration necessitates a bridge: hence, our new model, which rests on the psychosocial premise, offers a more useful conceptual tool for the understanding of nationalism. We conclude that nationalism is first and foremost a matter relating to individual social self-identity which takes place within a particular context where oppositional forces emerge from structural factors and our membership in a particular group becomes paramount.

A black-focused school : black Canadian youth and the mainstream curriculum

ABSTRACT When asked about the proposal for a black-focused school, black youth from the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) voiced their agreement with elements of the proposal, but resisted the idea of implementing the proposal by creating a separate school. Although media representations and Dei (1996, 2006) provide insight into what Torontonians' reactions are to the proposed blackfocused school there has been no such information documented on what black youth in the GTA think about the project. This is the first known study that attempts to fill that gap by providing a representation of black youths' voices obtained via focus groups. The study examines what black youth know and think about the proposal, and why they largely disagree with the blackfocused school proposal. While the findings of this study indicate that the participants saw many positive elements of the proposal, they did not support the implementation of a black-focused school as they saw the creation of a separate space for the school as a negative thing. The youth had trouble conceptualizing 'black-focused schooling' as an alternative approach to mainstream education, which had an impact on whether they choose to, or could, respond to questions that precisely related to the black-focused school project. The study concludes that the youth could not visualize what the school would look like and how it would operate because they draw on liberal racist discourses (e.g. colour-blindness, blaming the victim, and equal opportunity) when thinking about their educational experiences; however, there was a clear contradiction in the way the youths' voices reflected an awareness of the role of race in education experiences. It was evident when they talked about fear of stigmatization, but when using liberal discourses the youth discounted the role of race, and seemed not to be aware of its role in educational experiences. These findings pose important implications for educators, would-be educators, administrators, the TDSB and proponents of the black-focused school.