The high-quality workspace can be used as a physical carrier for design innovation and entrepreneurial organizational culture to continuously change the psychological cognition and behavior of employees in community of practice. The spatial narrative of the culture of design innovation and entrepreneurial organizations means to integrate entrepreneurship and organizational culture into the space through visual presentation. Whether the spatial narrative is successful or not needs to be judged by whether the change of people’s psychological cognition achieves (...) the expected effect. The traditional qualitative research methods such as interviews and questionnaires cannot fully and accurately present the psychological cognitive mechanism of design Innovation and entrepreneurship organization members. We use virtual reality technology combined with electrophysiological technology to conduct experiments. We use these technologies to conduct quantitative experiments on psychological cognition in community of practice. This study will select a design innovation and entrepreneurial organization, randomly select 20 participants, and divide them into 2 groups for experimentation. The VR scene is based on their real office space as a prototype. Put the visual elements of corporate culture in one of the VR scenes. The other VR scene as a reference does not incorporate visual elements of organizational culture. Participants participated in the experiment in these two VR scenarios. There are many advanced devices that can accurately test individual psychological changes, but the ErgoLab man-machine environment test platform, can collect and compare these data [physiological data, electroencephalogram data, and behavior data] in real-time and comprehensively, which is its advantage. According to the experimental results, judge the changes in the psychological cognitive data of the participants before and after the placement of the spatial narrative in design innovation and entrepreneurial organizations. The experiment combined interviews and questionnaires to ensure the authenticity of the quantitative data. The conclusion of the experiment will produce an accurate quantitative study on the psychological cognition of the spatial narrative of design innovation and entrepreneurial organizational culture. A sense of organizational belonging, collective sense, pride, mission, and work fun can be generated in the workspace. (shrink)

The first book to look architectural narrative in the eye Since the early eighties, many architects have used the term "narrative" to describe their work. To architects the enduring attraction of narrative is that it offers a way of engaging with the way a city feels and works. Rather than reducing architecture to mere style or an overt emphasis on technology, it foregrounds the experiential dimension of architecture. Narrative Architecture explores the potential for narrative as (...) a way of interpreting buildings from ancient history through to the present, deals with architectural background, analysis and practice as well as its future development. Authored by Nigel Coates, a foremost figure in the field of narrative architecture, the book is one of the first to address this subject directly Features architects as diverse as William Kent, Antoni Gaudí, Eero Saarinen, Ettore Sottsass, Superstudio, Rem Koolhaas, and FAT to provide an overview of the work of NATO and Coates, as well as chapters on other contemporary designers Includes over 120 colour photographs Signposting narrative's significance as a design approach that can aid architecture to remain relevant in this complex, multi-disciplinary and multi-everything age, Narrative Architecture is a must-read for anyone with an interest in architectural history and theory. (shrink)

Descartes’s Meditations on First Philosophy, regarded by many as his masterpiece, has been the subject of significant philosophical debate since its publication in 1641. Yet the Meditations is remarkable not only for its philosophical ideas but also for the style in which it was written. Two of the most notable stylistic elements of the Meditations are the use of temporal markers—a significant departure from analogous philosophical treatises of the same period—and the fact that the text is written in such a (...) way as to invite readers to subsume themselves into the role of the narrator, so as to experience its arguments for themselves. Many commentators have hinted at the importance of the narrator. But there has been little attempt at a sustained engagement. The function of the text as a series of days of meditation has also been insufficiently explored. In order to further investigate the roles of time and narrative within the Meditations, this thesis uses various reading methods provided by narrative theory, with particular focus on Monika Fludernik’s experiential model of narrative. Fludernik’s model allows for a clearer articulation of the role readers play in enacting meaning, and the way in which readers will in a sense “author” a text on their own terms. Reading the Meditations as an experiential narrative also illuminates significant issues to do with Descartes’s distinction between geometric and discursive argument, his conception of time, the specific expression of the Cogito in the Meditations, and the “reorientation” at the heart of the text—which I am calling a sort of conversion. The conversion at the heart of the Meditations will be explored in parallel with Saint Augustine’s Confessions and Saint Ignatius of Loyola’s Spiritual Exercises, two texts which—like the Meditations—can be thought of as experiential narratives designed to bring about some kind of conversion. I argue that such an experiential reading, drawing on the roles of time and narrative in the text, offers to enrich our understanding of the Meditations. (shrink)

Climate change is difficult to connect with personally, because people only regard the phenomenon as important if it becomes a perceived threat to themselves. Arguments like statistics and policy debates are extrinsic motivators, which do not necessarily align people’s own intrinsic motives with those of climate action. Instead, narratives and visual communication can influence viewers implicitly by the way they show and reinforce actions and thoughts that align with climate action. In this design study, we used comics created for (...) human-level climate change influence to promote ideas like future-based thinking, sharing of responsibility, and caring for each other. We also created data visuals that illustrate future consequences of climate change for the purpose of averting negative alternative realities. To see whether our design can affect audience perception of climate change on the human level of goals and desires, we showed the comics to readers unfamiliar with the themes of the stories, presenting them as manga about characters and situations. The survey showed that data stories can affect the way naive readers interpret narratives to align with pro-climate attitudes such as sharing and future-vision, and that readers are focused on the human-level of the data and story as opposed to the physical resource level. Speculative fiction and data visuals provide a potentially effective way to influence individuals’ climate change attitudes by showing alternative realities and attributes of collective responsibility and planning-for-the-future as data stories. (shrink)

The advent of the intelligence age has injected new elements into the development of literature. The synergic modification of Anglo-American traumatic narrative literature by artificial intelligence technology and interactive design psychology will produce new possibilities in literary creation. First, by studying natural language processing technology, this study proposes a modification language model based on the double-layered recurrent neural network algorithm and constructs an intelligent language modification system based on the improved LM model. The results show that the performance (...) of the proposed model is excellent; only about 30% of the respondents like AAL literature; the lack of common cultural background, appreciation difficulties, and language barriers have become the main reasons for the decline of reading willingness of AAL literature. Finally, AI technology and ID psychology are used to modify a famous TN work respectively and synergically, and the modified work is appreciated by respondents to collect their comments. The results corroborate that 62% of the respondents like original articles, but their likability scores have decreased for individually modified work by AI or ID psychology. In comparison, under the synergic modification efforts of AI and ID psychology, the popularity of the modified work has increased slightly, with 65% of the respondents showing a likability to read. Therefore, it is concluded that literary modification by single ID psychology or AI technology will reduce the reading threshold by trading off the literary value of the original work. The core of literary creation depends on human intelligence, and AI might still not be able to generate high-standard literary works independently because human minds and thoughts cannot be controlled and predicted by machines. The research results provide new ideas and improvement directions for the field of AI-assisted writing. (shrink)

The deceptive clues in the impossible puzzle film confirm the viewer’s internal expectations and allow retrospective attributing. In the film, a transcendental object negates an internal expectation, causing a retrospective blockage. Retrospectivity does not stop there; the transcendental object reinterpreting deceptive clues in the associative area leads to repeated attribution. This article consists of three parts. First, it discusses impossible puzzle films in the context of complex narrative classification. The following section introduces the Jungian concept of synchronicity and illustrates (...) how it works. The article concludes with a case study of Long Day’s Journey into Night (2018), which contains more complicated puzzles and explains how mind-game narrative techniques create deceptive clues and induce deceptive retrospective attribution. (shrink)

Background: Explicating nurses’ moral identities is important given the powerful influence moral identity has on the capacity to exercise moral agency. Research objectives: The purpose of this study was to explore how nurses narrate their moral identity through their understanding of their work. An additional purpose was to understand how these moral identities are held in the social space that nurses occupy. Research design: The Registered Nurse Journal, a bimonthly publication of the Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario, Canada, features (...) a regular column entitled, ‘In the End … What Nursing Means to Me …’ These short narratives generally include a story of an important moment in the careers of the authors that defined their identities as nurses. All 29 narratives published before June 2015 were analysed using a critical narrative approach, informed by the work of Margaret Urban Walker and Hilde Lindemann, to identify a typology of moral identity. Ethical considerations: Ethics approval was not required because the narratives are publicly available. Findings: Two narrative types were identified that represent the moral identities of nurses as expressed through their work: (1) making a difference in the lives of individuals and communities and (2) holding the identities of vulnerable individuals. Discussion: Nurses’ moral identities became evident when they could see improvement in the health of patients or communities or when they could maintain the identity of their patients despite the disruptive forces of illness and hospitalization. In reciprocal fashion, the responses of their patients, including expressions of gratitude, served to hold the moral identities of these nurses. Conclusion: Ultimately, the sustainability of nurses’ moral identities may be dependent on the recognition of their own needs for professional satisfaction and care in ways that go beyond the kind of acknowledgement that patients can offer. (shrink)

This essay offers a rationale for the employment of narrative pedagogies in introductory philosophy courses, as well as examples of narrative techniques, assignments, and course design that have been successfully employed in the investigation of philosophical topics. My hope is to undercut the sense that “telling stories in class” is just a playful diversion from the real material, and to encourage instructors to treat storytelling as a genuine philosophical activity that should be rigorously developed. I argue that (...) introductory courses focused on student narratives fulfill the ideals of learning-centered teaching. Since narrative learning also promotes self-knowledge and empathic understanding, there is good reason to consider replacing or supplementing canonical texts or arguments with narrative assignments. The concluding sections provide details as to how such assignments can be constructed,integrated into course units, and assessed. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Narrative Symposium:Living Organ DonationLaura Altobelli, Sherri Bauman, Janice Flynn, Andy Heath, Joseph Jacobs, Tim Joos, Amy K. Lewensten, Donna L. Luebke, Sarah A. McDaniel, Donald Olenick, Laurie E Post, Vicky Young, Blake Adams, Anonymous One, Michael Sauls, Christine Wright, Shannon D. Wyatt, and Cara Yesawich• An Altruistic Living Donor’s Story• Surgery for the Soul• Kidney Donation Story• The Essence of Giving—A Transplant Story• Love—the Risk Worth Taking• My (...) Donation Journey• A Life For A Life: My Gift To My Dad• Lessons Learned: The Realities of Living Organ Donation• Sarah’s List Exchange Experience• Accelerated Living Donation• Liver Donor Nightmare• Adrift After Donation• Getting Our Child Off Dialysis• A Living Donor’s Journey• The Spare Kidney• Living Donors are People Too• The Gift of Life—Walking by Faith• Journey of an Altruistic, Non–designated Living DonorCopyright © 2012 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

The first objective of this paper is to recognize the role of emotion and feeling in Ricœur’s “little ethics” and what they can further add to it, then to explore in more detail how solicitude as a virtue, and affective disposition more broadly, can contribute to a modern ethics of technology. Ultimately, emotions help us to understand technologies and technological ways of being today; Ricœur’s “little ethics”, along with his narrative theory, provide a framework for understanding the ethically salient (...) aspects of technical practice, especially through the openness to the other demanded by solicitude, and essentially by emphasising emotion or feeling as a way of being in the world, and a mode of existence: one which is done with, if not sometimes because of, technology and technical practice. (shrink)

The configurational dimension, in turn, displays temporal features that may be opposed to these "features" of episodic time. The configurational arrangement makes the succession of events into significant wholes that are the correlate of the act of grouping together. Thanks to this reflective act—in the sense of Kant's Critique of Judgment—the whole plot may be translated into one "thought." "Thought," in this narrative context, may assume various meanings. It may characterize, for instance, following Aristotle's Poetics, the "theme" that accompanies (...) the "fable" or "plot" of a tragedy.1 "Thought" may also designate the "point" of the Hebraic maschal or of the biblical parable, concerning which Jeremias observes that the point of the parable is what allows us to translate it into a proverb or an aphorism. The term "thought" may also apply to the "colligatory terms" used in history writing, such terms as "the Renaissance," "the Industrial Revolution," and so on, which, according to Walsh and Dray, allow us to apprehend a set of historical events under a common denominator. In a word, the correlation between thought and plot supersedes the "then" and "and then" of mere succession. But it would be a complete mistake to consider "thought" as a-chronological. "Fable" and "theme" are as closely tied together as episode and configuration. The time of fable-and theme, if we may make of this a hyphenated expression, is more deeply temporal than the time of merely episodic narratives. · 1. It may be noted in passing that this correlation between "theme" and "plot" is also the basis of Northup Frye's "archetypal" criticism. Paul Ricoeur is professor of philosophy at the Université de Paris and John Nuveen Professor at the University of Chicago. Some of his works to appear in English are Husserl: An Analysis of His Phenomenology, Main Trends in Philosophy, and The Conflict of Interpretations: Essays on Hermeneutics. His previous contribution to Critical Inquiry, "The Metaphorical Process as Cognition, Imagination, and Feeling," appeared in the Autumn 1978 issue. (shrink)

Several competing narratives drive the contemporary AI ethics discourse. At the two extremes are sociotechnical dogmatism, which holds that society is full of inefficiencies and imperfections that can only be solved by better technology; and sociotechnical skepticism, which highlights the unacceptable risks AI systems pose. While both narratives have their merits, they are ultimately reductive and limiting. As a constructive synthesis, we introduce and defend sociotechnical pragmatism—a narrative that emphasizes the central role of context and human agency in designing (...) and evaluating emerging technologies. In doing so, we offer two novel contributions. First, we demonstrate how ethical and epistemological considerations are intertwined in the AI ethics discourse by tracing the dialectical interplay between dogmatic and skeptical narratives across disciplines. Second, we show through examples how sociotechnical pragmatism does more to promote fair and transparent AI than dogmatic or skeptical alternatives. By spelling out the assumptions that underpin sociotechnical pragmatism, we articulate a robust stance for policymakers and scholars who seek to enable societies to reap the benefits of AI while managing the associated risks through feasible, effective, and proportionate governance. (shrink)

The idea of narrative has been widely discussed in the recent health care literature, including nursing, and has been portrayed as a resource for both clinical work and research studies. However, the use of the term 'narrative' is inconsistent, and various assumptions are made about the nature (and functions) of narrative: narrative as a naive account of events; narrative as the source of 'subjective truth'; narrative as intrinsically fictional; and narrative as a mode (...) of explanation. All these assumptions have left their mark on the nursing literature, and all of them (in our view) are misconceived. Here, we argue that a failure to distinguish between 'narrative' and 'story' is partly responsible for these misconceptions, and we offer an analysis that shows why the distinction between them is essential. In doing so, we borrow the concept of 'narrativity' from literary criticism. Narrativity is something that a text has degrees of, and our proposal is that the elements of narrativity can be 'sorted' roughly into a continuum, at the 'high narrativity' end of which we find 'story'. On our account, 'story' is an interweaving of plot and character, whose organization is designed to elicit a certain emotional response from the reader, while 'narrative' refers to the sequence of events and the (claimed) causal connections between them. We suggest that it is important not to confuse the emotional persuasiveness of the 'story' with the objective accuracy of the 'narrative', and to this end we recommend what might be called 'narrative vigilance'. There is nothing intrinsically authentic, or sacrosanct, or emancipatory, or paradigmatic about narrative itself, even though the recent health care literature has had a marked tendency to romanticize it. (shrink)

This article analysed the Indonesian government’s strategy in eradicating terrorism and radicalism. This study was designed with quantitative methods within the framework of normative legal research using anti-terrorism-related regulations as the sample. Data analysis was carried out with content analysis to identify the conception of terrorism, radicalism and deradicalisation in the legislation. The research found that most of Indonesia’s counter-terrorism regulations associate terrorism with criminal actions. However, regulatory developments also present a decreasing association between terrorism and acts of violence alone (...) as terrorism is growingly being conceptualised by policymakers not only as a virulent action to an increasing extent but also ideologically based on the process of radicalisation. Consequently, various regulations after 2013 accommodate many prevention-based ideas and soft approaches. Newest regulations also accommodate deradicalisation as an important strategy in countering terrorism. This finding practically would imply including counter-narratives through education and deradicalisation strategies. It is also projected through counter-propaganda as a strategic deradicalisation approach. Its incorporation into regulations is needed as digital technology advances, making it easier for young people to be exposed to radical ideas through internet channels. Contribution: This study deepens empirical evidence regarding the need for an alternative soft approach strategy in dealing with religious doctrine-based radicalism. Apart from preventive measures through law enforcement which should be continuously strengthened, the findings in this research encourage preemptive methods in deradicalisation through counter-narrative, counter-propaganda and counter-ideology. (shrink)

Background: While witnessing and providing aggressive care have been identified as predominant sources of moral distress, little is known about what nurses “know” to be the “right thing to do” in these situations. Research objectives: The purpose of this study was to explore what nurses’ moral knowledge is in situations of perceived overly aggressive medical care. Research design: A critical narrative approach was used. Participants: A total of 15 graduate nursing students from various practice areas participated. Findings: Four (...) narrative types were identified, including “Wait and see: medical uncertainty,” “Deflected responsibilities to respond to dying, death, or futility,” “Divergent understandings, responsibilities, and temporalities,” and “Privileged medical understandings and responsibilities.” Discussion: The knowledge of differentially situated persons is acknowledged in dissimilar ways, the time required to determine that enough has been done is perceived differently, and how moral responsibilities are understood also varies. Conclusions: A better understanding of how social roles influence how time, knowledge, and responsibility are related to the provision of aggressive care is needed. (shrink)

Conviction Narrative Theory bears a close resemblance to the Theory of Narrative Thought, although the two were designed to address different questions. In this commentary, we detail some of the more pronounced similarities and differences and suggest that resolving the latter could produce a third theory of narrative cognition that is superior to either of these two.

ZusammenfassungObwohl Film nicht nur eine große Popularität und mediale Vertrautheit genießt, sondern auch als eine der bedeutendsten kulturprägenden Kunstformen der Gegenwart sowie als Mittel kollektiver Selbstverständigung und Ausdruck gesellschaftlicher Reflexion gelten kann, finden filmische Auseinandersetzungen mit aktuellen bioethischen Problemkonstellationen bislang kaum Beachtung im akademischen Diskurs. Dies gilt nicht nur für die vielschichtige Symbolbildung von Spielfilmen, sondern auch für das narrative Potenzial von Dokumentarfilmen. Dabei können dokumentarische Erzählformen wichtige Bedeutungsebenen ethischer Fragestellungen erschließen, indem sie Einblick in die individuellen Lebenslagen der (...) Betroffenen und ihre jeweiligen Perspektiven gewähren. Wie kaum ein anderes Medium ist der Dokumentarfilm geeignet, dabei die persönliche Dimension medizinischer Entscheidungen jenseits theoretischer Argumentationen erfahrbar zu machen. Dieser diskursive Mehrwert, den die Einbeziehung von Dokumentarfilmen in die bioethische Debatte haben kann, wird in diesem Beitrag zunächst als Theorie formuliert und anschließend an zwei Filmbeispielen erläutert, welche die Thematik der Leihmutterschaft aufgreifen und somit eine aktuelle Fragestellung der Reproduktionsmedizin ins Bild setzen. (shrink)

Background: ICU patients’ family members are in a new, uncertain, and vulnerable situation due to the patient’s critical illness and complete dependence on the ICU nurses and physicians. Family members’ feeling of being cared for is closely linked to clinicians’ attitudes and behavior. Aim: To explore ICU nurses’ and physicians’ bedside interaction with critically ill ICU patients´ families and discuss this in light of the ethics of care. Research design: A qualitative study using participant observation, focus groups, and thematic (...) narrative analysis. Participants and research context: Data were gathered from July 2017 to August 2019, in four ICUs in Norway through 270 h of fieldwork and seven focus groups with ICU nurses and physicians. Ethical considerations: The Regional Committee for Medical and Health Research Ethics and the Norwegian Centre for Research Data approved the study. Findings: Quality of ICU family care depends on nurses’ and physicians’ attitudes, behavior, and personality traits. Three main themes were identified: being attentive, an active approach, and degree of tolerance. Discussion: The findings are discussed in light of the ethics of care and empirical research from the intensive care environment. Conclusions: This study shows that attentive, active, and tolerant clinicians represent a culture of ethical care that gives families greater freedom of action and active participation in patient care. Clinicians must not bear sole responsibility for this culture; it must have a firm basis in the hospital and ICU and be established through training, interprofessional reflection, and support of clinicians. (shrink)

Digital games have matured substantially as a narrative medium in the last decade. However, there is still much work to be done to more fully understand the poetics of story-based-games. Game narrative remains an important issue with significant cultural, economic and scholarly implications. In this article, we undertake a critical analysis of the design of narrative within Mass Effect 2: a game whose narrative is highly regarded in both scholarly and vernacular communities. We follow the (...) classic humanities methodology of “close-reading”: the detailed observation, deconstruction, and analysis of a text. Our close-reading employs a critical framework from our previous work to isolate and highlight the central narrative design parameters within digital games. This framework is grounded in the scholarly discourse around games and narrative, and has been tested and revised in the process of close-reading and analyzing contemporary games. The narrative design parameters we examine are character, storyworld, narrativized interface, emotion, and plot coherence. Our analysis uses these parameters to explicate a series of design decisions for the effective creation of narrative experience in Mass Effect 2, and by extension, for game narratives in general. We also expand our previous methodology through a focused “edge-case” strategy for exploring the limits of character, action, and story in the game. Finally, we position our analysis of Mass Effect 2 within contemporary discourses of “bounded agency”, and explore how the game negotiates the tension between player-expression, and narrative inevitability to create opportunities for sophisticated narrative poetics including tragedy and sacrifice. (shrink)

The virtue named σϖφροσύνη, which designates « self-restraint », « temperance », « prudence », « circumspection », sometimes condensed in the term « wisdom », is first a moral virtue. In other respects, this word signifies « right senses » in contrast with « frenzy » (either god-inspired or as a part of illness). But the notion of σϖφροσύνη has also a meaning in literary criticism. And in this very context, it presents several employments. One of these is stylistic. (...) Another regards narrative structure and content : this is the subject of the present study. After I have referred to the use of this narrative concept in Plato, I shall demonstrate that its interpretation by Aelius Aristides allows, with that of Maximus of Tyre, to understand Longus’ prayer at the end of the prologue to the Pastorales. This interpretation sheds light specially on the process of a significant episode in the plot of this novel. (shrink)

Gene editing in the environment must consider uncertainty about potential benefits and risks for different populations and under different conditions. There are disagreements about the weight and balance of harms and benefits. Deliberative and community‐led approaches offer the opportunity to engage and empower diverse publics to co‐create responses and solutions to controversial policy choices in a manner that is inclusive of diverse perspectives. Stories, understood as situated accounts that reflect a person's life experiences, can enable the articulation of nuanced perspectives, (...) diversify how perspectives are communicated, encourage wider participation, open dominant perspectives to challenge, and invite participants to assess appropriate empathy and precaution in collective positions. An emphasis on storytelling in deliberations on gene editing of organisms emphasizes carefully designed recruitment and facilitation to support hearing from a range of perspectives, including those that present a different set of assumptions than those that may be held by experts or other stakeholders, among these, consideration of how to understand our relationships to nature. (shrink)

This comparative case study examines the place of white supremacy in teacher lessons on the U.S. South. Multi-day lesson plans and interviews with three teacher participants revealed that open encounters with white supremacist histories were supported by a high degree of professional freedom in their school settings. The teachers held a common commitment to teach about white racism and violence. However, extending these lessons into a more comprehensive confrontation with harmful white supremacist master narratives is complicated by highly varied conceptions (...) of the history classroom, among these teachers and in the field of social studies. This study supports continued efforts to provide teachers with resources and space to address racist legacies. I recommend that these efforts should be paired with an inspection of the individual and collective conceptions of social studies classrooms so that master narratives may be addressed more directly. (shrink)

Narrative Representation Theory, an evolved framework of Verse Analysis, has come into existence with the mission of explaining the operation of macro-systemic structure that could be hardwired in the brain. Based on the analyses of creoles or archetypal human languages, the theory puts forward the premise stating that the fundamental design of the human language faculty possesses the computational system for internalized discourse. The theory preserves the principles of Quint-patterning, Idea-formatting, N-ary-branching and X-numbering, complying respectively with the hierarchical (...) orderings of constituency, the atomic elements of componentiality, the linear sequences of precedence and the specific measurement of terminal nodes. NRT tells that the macro-system of narrative superstructure must have emerged autonomously, yet links closely with the micro-system of phonology, morphology and syntax. This article explores for the first time scientific insights into the nature of human language, referring to recent research on the right cerebrum as well as on the prefrontal lobes of the brain, the relationship between mental disorders and their genetic deficiencies, and the investigations of human evolution during the period 200,000–40,000 years BP. All the converging evidence in biological sciences reinforces the hypothesis that the narrative superstructure of language faculty manifests as an inherent linguistic capacity in our mind. (shrink)

. . . I should like to review and summarize the preceding general points: 1. For any particular narrative, there is no single basically basic story subsisting beneath it but, rather, an unlimited number of other narratives that can be constructed in response to it or perceived as related to it.2. Among the narratives that can be constructed in response to a given narrative are not only those that we commonly refer to as "versions" of it but also (...) those retellings that we call "plot summaries," "interpretations," and, sometimes, "basic stories." None of these retellings, however, is more absolutely basic than any of the others.3. For any given narrative, there are always multiple basic stories that can be constructed in response to it because basic-ness is always arrived at by the exercise of some set of operations, in accord with some set of principles, that reflect some set of interests, all of which are, by nature, variable and thus multiple. Whenever we start to cut back, peel off, strip away, lay bare, and so forth, we always do so in accord with certain assumptions and purposes which, in turn, create hierarchies of relevance and centrality; and it is in terms of these hierarchies that we will distinguish certain elements and relations as being central or peripheral, more important or less important, and more basic or less basic.4. The form and feature of any "version" of a narrative will be a function of, among other things, the particular motives that elicited it and the particular interests and functions it was designed to serve. Some versions, such as translation and transcriptions, may be constructed in order to preserve and transmit a culturally valued verbal structure. Others, such as adaptations and abridgements, may be constructed in order to amuse or instruct a specific audience. And some versions, such as "interpretations," "plot summaries," and "basic stories," may be constructed in order to advance the objectives of a particular discipline, such as literary history, folklore, psychiatry—or, of course, narratology. None of these latter versions, however, is any less motivated or, accordingly, formally contingent than any of the other versions constructed to serve other interests or functions. Barbara Herrnstein Smith is professor of English and communications and the director of the Center for the Study of Art and Symbolic Behavior at the University of Pennsylvania, and the author of Poetic Closure and On the Margins of Discourse. "On the Margins of Discourse" was also contributed as an essay to Critical Inquiry in the June 1975 issue. Responses to the present essay are Nelson Goodman's "The Telling and the Told" and Seymour Chatman's "Reply to Barbara Herrnstein Smith". Both appear in the Summer 1981 issue of Critical Inquiry. (shrink)

The slogan that ‘the virus doesn’t discriminate’ has been belied by the emergence of stark and persistent disparities in rates of infection, hospitalisation, and death from Covid-19 between various social groups. I focus on two groups that have been disproportionately affected, and that have been constructed or designated as particularly ‘at-risk’ during the Covid-19 pandemic: racial or ethnic minorities and fat people. I trace the range of narratives that have arisen in the context of explaining these disparities, in both the (...) scientific literature and wider expert and public discourse. I show that the scientific and public narratives around these groups have differed significantly, revealing contested and competing conceptions of the basis of these categories themselves. These different conceptions have important impacts on the kinds of interventions that become possible or desirable. I show that in the case of racial or ethnic disparities, genetic narratives have been combatted by a strong focus on structural racism as a driver of pandemic inequalities. However, in the case of fatness, individualising and stigmatising narratives have dominated discussions. I suggest that, given racial or ethnic differences in prevalence of fatness, and scholarship casting anti-fatness as historically racialised, the stigmatisation of fatness disproportionately affects racial or ethnic minorities in terms of placing individual blame or responsibility for the increased burden of Covid-19 on these groups. Despite widespread acknowledgement of the role of structural racism in driving racial inequalities in the burden of Covid-19, anti-obesity rhetoric and research provides a ‘backdoor’ to placing blame on individuals from racial minorities. (shrink)

Digital games have matured substantially as a narrative medium in the last decade. However, there is still much work to be done to more fully understand the poetics of story-based-games. Game narrative remains an important issue with significant cultural, economic and scholarly implications. In this article, we undertake a critical analysis of the design of narrative within Mass Effect 2: a game whose narrative is highly regarded in both scholarly and vernacular communities. We follow the (...) classic humanities methodology of “close-reading”: the detailed observation, deconstruction, and analysis of a text. Our close-reading employs a critical framework from our previous work to isolate and highlight the central narrative design parameters within digital games. This framework is grounded in the scholarly discourse around games and narrative, and has been tested and revised in the process of close-reading and analyzing contemporary games. The narrative design parameters we examine are character, storyworld, narrativized interface, emotion, and plot coherence. Our analysis uses these parameters to explicate a series of design decisions for the effective creation of narrative experience in Mass Effect 2, and by extension, for game narratives in general. We also expand our previous methodology through a focused “edge-case” strategy for exploring the limits of character, action, and story in the game. Finally, we position our analysis of Mass Effect 2 within contemporary discourses of “bounded agency”, and explore how the game negotiates the tension between player-expression, and narrative inevitability to create opportunities for sophisticated narrative poetics including tragedy and sacrifice. (shrink)

The narrative and design of Cicero's overlooked collection of letters to his brother Quintus (henceforth, QFr.) demand investigation. Within each book, the constituent letters delineate the trajectory of Cicero's life, transitioning from his political prominence to his increasing irrelevance. This narrative unfolds not only within the micro-narratives of individual books but also across the macro-narrative of the entire collection. Containing only letters from Cicero to Quintus dated between 60/59–54 and featuring a notable resemblance to the Epistulae (...) ad Atticum (henceforth, Att.) Books 2–4, QFr., it can be argued, functions as both a ‘microcosm’ of Att. and its supplement. This article addresses these issues and argues that QFr. deserves a place alongside the ‘major’ Ciceronian collections. (shrink)

Interactive narratives have been used in a variety of applications, including video games, educational games, and training simulations. Maintaining engagement within such environments is an important problem, because it affects entertainment, motivation, and presence. Performance arts theorists have discussed and formalized many techniques that increase engagement and enhance dramatic content of art productions. While constructing a narrative manually, using these techniques, is acceptable for linear media, using this approach for interactive environments results in inflexible experiences due to the unpredictability (...) of users’ actions. Few researchers attempted to develop adaptive interactive narrative experiences. However, developing a quality interactive experience is largely an art process, and many of these adaptive techniques do not encode artistic principles. This paper presents a new interactive narrative architecture designed using a set of dramatic techniques that have been formulated based on several years of training in film and theatre. (shrink)

This article presents a model and a case study of the narrative structures that are present in the interactive media design of multimedia applications in the mass media. As basic categories for the history and structure of media, we employ the model of the modes of the physical, analog, and digital presentation/representation. In this case study of the online edition of the New York Times, we have the case of a newspaper that in the digital edition employs multi-media (...) applications. Contrasting the traditional concept of “narrativity” with the current status quo of the digital media outlets, we will examine the specific conditions of the multimedia applications in the mass media with this sample case of the New York Times. As narrative structure of interactive design in multimedia for mass communication, we analyze the types of narrative media and general narrativity in the New York Times with the background of its processes of interactivity and media convergence. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Narrative, Interpretation, and Plagiarism in Mr. Robertson's 1778 History of Ancient GreeceGiovanna CeseraniDays after the successful debut of his History of Scotland in 1759, Dr. William Robertson was busy consulting his friends about what project to undertake next. David Hume solicitously responded by expressing doubts about two of the possible topics—the age of Pope Leo Xth and the Emperor Charles Vth. The first would be difficult because it (...) would require the understanding of that age's "great Works of Sculpture, Architecture, Painting," while attaining the "competent Knowledge... requird of the State & Constitution of the Empire," including numerous European countries, necessary to carry out the second project "would be the Work of half a Life." Rather Hume recommended "the ancient History, particularly that of Greece": "I think," he wrote, "Rollin's Success might encourage you, nor need you be in the least intimidated by his Merit. That Author has no other Merit, but a certain Facility & Sweetness of Narration; but has loaded his Work with fifty Puerilities."1 Yet, after considering further the excellent historical narratives that survived from antiquity, Hume feared that they could indeed turn into a disadvantage for the aspiring modern historian: "For what can you do in most places with these Authors, but transcribe & translate them? No Letters or State Papers from which you coud correct their Errors, or authenticate their Narration, or supply their Defects. Besides, Rollin is so well wrote with respect to Style, that with superficial people it passes for sufficient." On the whole he thought, however, that a "History of Greece till the death of Philip... would be successful, notwithstanding all these discouraging Circumstances. The Subject is noble, & Rollin is by no means equal to it."2 [End Page 413]Despite his friend's advice, Robertson went on to write what became his most successful work, the History of the Reign of Charles V (1769), but Hume's letters are nevertheless revealing.3 Hume's acute concern with publishing success speaks, on the one hand, to his lifelong economic struggle, but also of the flourishing market for history books in his times, on which, before the professionalization of the discipline, authors more and more came to rely in lieu of the literary patronage of earlier times.4 But the issue of the status of the historian was more than an institutional one for Hume's contemporaries. While the classical model of the historian as political man writing history in his retirement from public life was in sharp decline, a clear successor was still to follow. As Pocock puts it: would one who studied, edited, or rewrote past history be an historian at all?5 Hume's concern with historical authority and his consciousness of the difference between a narrative based on experience, in the Thucydidean mode as he would have understood it, and one based on authorities, is clear in his letter advising Gibbon to transform the Decline and Fall's endnotes into footnotes.6 Hume's letters to Robertson show again this concern developed in parallel to a philosophical preference for manners over details of action, human explanations rather than divine ones. From this perspective he found "puerile" the French Jansenist educator Charles Rollin, who in the preface to his Histoire Ancienne (1730–38) set out the goal to reveal the design of divine Providence within human history and whose work was dominated by a moralistic reading of the past.7Hume's reflections and concerns neatly fit the influential interpretation that, more than half a century ago, Arnaldo Momigliano formulated for the genealogy of modern Western historiography. As Momigliano saw it, modern history developed precisely out of the eighteenth-century convergence of traditional historical narrative—what used to be linear accounts of mostly political events—and antiquarian research—scholarship traditionally devoted to systematic treatment of a variety of subjects that relied on the skills of paleography, epigraphy and the interpretation of archaeological material.8 This process—culminating with Gibbon—presupposed the philosophical shift of the age: "what used to be secondary becomes primary. What used to be primary—wars and dynasties—becomes secondary."9 Recent research has since [End Page 414] expanded the Momigliano's formula—this... (shrink)

This paper contributes towards a lay ethics of nanotechnology through an analysis of talk from focus groups designed to examine how laypeople grapple with the meaning of a technology ‘in-the-making’. We describe the content of lay ethical concerns before suggesting that this content can be understood as being structured by five archetypal narratives which underpin talk. These we term: ‘the rich get richer and the poor get poorer’; ‘kept in the dark’; ‘opening Pandora’s box’; ‘messing with nature’; and ‘be careful (...) what you wish for’. We further suggest that these narratives can be understood as sharing an emphasis on the ‘giftedness’ of life, and that together they are used to resist dominant technoscientific and Enlightenment narratives of control and mastery which are encapsulated by nanotechnology. (shrink)

This article investigates the hypothesis of creating non-linear audio-visual narratives, through an unanticipated use of traditional print-based games, enriched with videos, via augmented reality (AR) possibilities. A ludic system has been created and presented. Based on a traditional card game, a non-linear cinematic narrative occurs. We attempt to examine the following questions: in which way can we bring together different forms of visual communication, such as graphic design and video? Can the above forms create a complex narrative (...) whole and what kind of rules will be needed for this? How can we enrich traditional forms of gaming with the potentials of AR? Gaming itself demands a set of rules. Can these rules play the role of algorithms in the combined universe that we have designed and created? In which way can the designer on the one hand and the user on the other influence the overall output of the system? What will the user experience be like? The printed card system chosen for this is Tarot and more precisely the Great Arcana, which makes use of the 22 fundamental Tarot figures. (shrink)

This paper builds upon recent work in narrative theory and the philosophy of technology by examining the place of transparency and responsibility in discussions of AI, and what some of the implications of this might be for thinking ethically about AI and especially AI practices, that is, the structured social activities implicating and defining what AI is. In this paper, we aim to show how pursuing a narrative understanding of technology and AI can support knowledge of process and (...) practice through transparency, as well help summon us to responsibility through visions of possibility and of actual harms arising from AI practices. We provide reflections on the relations between narrative, transparency and responsibility, building an argument that narratives (about AI, practices, and those persons implicated in its design, implementation, and deployment) support the kind of knowing and understanding that is the aim of transparency, and, moreover, that such knowledge supports responsibility in informing agents and activating responsibility through creating knowledge about something that can and should be responded to. Furthermore, we argue for considering an expansion of the kinds of practices that we might legitimately consider ‘AI practices’ given the diverse set of (often materially embedded) activities that sustain and are sustained by AI that link directly to its ethical acceptability and which are rendered transparent in the narrative mode. Finally, we argue for an expansion of narratives and narrative sources to be considered in questions of AI, understanding that transparency is multi-faceted and found in stories from diverse sources and people. (shrink)

Hayden White suggested that narratives achieve coherence through literary types of emplotment. Generally, this is not the case. I contrast simple narratives, whose coherence lies in their subject and chronological structure; reflective narratives, which give an account of a trend; and genetic narratives, designed to explain and outcome. Some narratives do more than one of these things. Each kind of narrative is constrained by its function, but this constraint seldom if ever ensures its complete objectivity.

Attachment is the way we relate to others. The way we attach to others is developed early in childhood, can be impaired by early traumatic life events, and is disturbed in many psychiatric disorders. Here we give a short overview about attachment patterns in psychiatric disorders with a focus on depression, and discuss two recent empirical studies of our own that have investigated attachment related brain activation using fMRI. In the first study with patients with borderline personality disorder we used (...) a paradigm in which patients produced narratives in response to attachment pictures and measured brain activity while participants were talking. Our results are consistent with the view that BPD pathology might be correlated with traumatic attachment fear related to autobiographic abuse and loss experiences. In the second study we investigated patients with major depression undergoing therapy in a longitudinal design. In this study we used a design with individualized stimuli that were extracted from narratives produced outside of the scanner. We found that patients, as compared to healthy controls, showed differences in a pre-post comparison. The significant correlation of changes in the subgenual cingulate and medial prefrontal cortex with symptom improvement provides evidence that these regions are involved in mediating therapy related effects. (shrink)

This article argues that the narrative of public participation in environmental governance that emerged from the Earth Summit in 1992 can be read as a direct challenge to the neoliberal approach to environmental governance. The challenge comes from constructing the concept of public participation as (i) the practice of providing decision makers with more and better information in order to help them design more equitable policies, and (ii) the practice of potentially influencing policy decisions by bringing new perspectives (...) and values into the decision-making process. The article shows how this counter-narrative has itself now become a contested terrain: among a variety of normative presuppositions justifying practices of public participation, one can also find a market friendly rationale. (shrink)

The hope of moving beyond formalism is one of two things that unites an otherwise diverse group of literary theorists who have begun to explore the role of desire in narrative. Peter Brooks, for example, in Reading for the Plot, says in more than one place that his interest in desire “derives from my dissatisfaction with the various formalisms that have dominated critical thinking about narrative.”3 Leo Bersani sees desire as establishing a crucial link between social and literary (...) structures. Teresa de Lauretis faults structuralist models for their inability to disclose the ways in which narrative operates, through the desire it excites and fulfills, to construct the social world as a system of sexual differences. Other names could be added, both within and outside the field of narrative theory—Nancy Armstrong, Roland Barthes, Georges Bataille, Jessica Benjamin, Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, René Girard, Luce Irigaray, Fredric Jameson, Peggy Kamuf, Linda Kauffman, Julia Kristeva, Jacques Lacan, Jean Laplance, Catharine A. McKinnon, and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick—for desire has become one of the master tropes of contemporary criticism. 3. Peter Brooks, Reading for the Plot: Design and Intention in Narrative , p. 47; hereafter abbreviated RP.4. Leo, Bersani, A Future for Astyanax: Character and Desire in Literature , p. 13; hereafter abbreviated FA.5. Bersani and Ulysse Dutoit, The Forms of Violence: Narrative in Assyrian Art and Modern Culture , p. v; hereafter abbreviated FV. Although Bersani coauthored this book with Dutoit, for convenience I refer to it by Bersani’s name alone. This practice is justified by two considerations: first, most of the arguments about narrative, violence, and desire are elaborations of positions that Bersani has taken in earlier works; second, passages and examples in the sections with which I shall be dealing are reprinted with only minor changes from an article that Bersani published under his own name. Jay Clayton, associate professor of English at Vanderbilt University, is the author of Romantic Vision and the Novel and coeditor of Contemporary Literature and Contemporary Theory . He is currently completing a study of contemporary American literature and theory, Narrative Power. (shrink)

According to the mainstream narrative about race, all groups have the same innate dispositions and potential, and all disparities—at least those favoring whites—are due to past or present racism. Some people who reject this narrative gravitate toward an alternative, anti-Jewish narrative, which sees recent history in terms of a Jewish/gentile conflict. The most sophisticated promoter of the anti-Jewish narrative is the evolutionary psychologist Kevin MacDonald. MacDonald argues that Jews have a suite of genetic adaptations—including high intelligence (...) and ethnocentrism—and cultural practices that lead them to undermine gentile society to advance their own evolutionary interests. He says that Jewish-designed intellectual movements have weakened gentile identity and culture while preserving Jewish identity and separatism. Cofnas recently argued that MacDonald’s theory is based on “systematically misrepresented sources and cherry-picked facts.” However, Cofnas gave short shrift to at least three key claims: Jews are highly ethnocentric, liberal Jews hypocritically advocate liberal multiculturalism for gentiles/gentile countries but racial purity and separatism for Jews/Israel, and Jews are responsible for liberalism and mass immigration to the United States. The present paper examines these claims and concludes that MacDonald’s views are not supported. (shrink)

The purpose of this article was to comprehensively explore the phenomenon of the narrative of the Decalogue in its fundamental principles in the context of the theological understanding of Jewish law. For this purpose abstract-logical methods, historical-legal, phenomenological, axiological, epistemological methods, method of critical and systematic analysis and method of comparative theology were used. The result is a theological understanding of the basic moral and legal principles and reducing to a single, systematic; a study of the correlation between the (...) normative and the moral side of such a narrative was conducted. Of particular importance is the establishment and isolation of the basic initial principle in the defined context that underlies both Sinai law and all the biblical law. Because with the change of historical realities, which coincided with the destruction of the Temple and the termination of sacrifices, the law has also changed. However, the biblical law was of particular ideological importance, it set the tone and revealed and formed the basic principles for the further development of all Jewish law. Therefore, in our study we have drawn attention to the main ideological features of the biblical laws, because in our opinion, the basic formative essence is hidden in them and only by understanding it − will we be able to understand Jewish law itself. However, the phenomenon of law and even more so of Jewish law, is one of the best regulators and exponents of the educational principle that is designed to raise a person in love. Of course, morality is called for it and it should take precedence over everything else, but the legal part should not be ignored. Law should serve as a socially just, integrative, fundamental, binding, most effective, most respected regulator. Therefore, the problem of combining legal principles and moral precepts for biblical law did not stand basically. The significant part of the adopted legal norms initially was characterized by moral prescriptions, confirmed and expressed by law. Such a transition, the shift from morality to law, and the close relationship between them are one inseparable whole. And apart from Halacha, which was responsible for the legal aspect, there were also the writings of the prophets whose task was to illuminate the transition from law to morality, because precisely morality is the essence of everything. Here is the true meaning of the existence of a legal expression of such an educational principle. Thus, the basic educational principle of the Decalogue, in particular, and of biblical law in general, was to educate a high-moral person who had restrictive precepts that would not allow him to fall into lawlessness, and the formative commandments that would allow a person to be educated in the search for God, and to stabilize himself in the godlike state commanded by God through Moses. That is the essence of the Decalogue and Jewish law. The educational principle, both basic and effective, though not so familiar to the modern understanding of the nature of law, is precisely the principle that laid down both the basis of the Decalogue and the foundation of all Jewish law at least in its biblical part. (shrink)

Background: The literature and research on nursing ethics and advocacy has shown that generally very few nurses and other clinicians will speak up about an issue they have witnessed regarding a patient advocacy concern and that often advocacy in nursing is not learned until after students have graduated and begun working. Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of narrative pedagogy on the development of advocacy in student nurses, as measured by the Protective Nursing Advocacy Scale. Design: We tested the (...) hypothesis that use of a narrative pedagogy assignment related to ethics would improve student nurse’s perception of their advocacy role as measured by the Protective Nursing Advocacy Scale using a quasi-experimental nonrandomized study using a pre-test, intervention, post-test design. Data collection occurred during class time from October 2012 to December 2012. The Protective Nursing Advocacy Scale tool was administered to students in class to assess their baseline and was administered again at the completion of the educational intervention to assess whether narrative pedagogy was effective in developing the nursing student’s perception of their role as a patient advocate. Ethical considerations: Students were informed that their participation was voluntary and that the data collected would be anonymous and confidential. The survey was not a graded assignment, and students did not receive any incentive to participate. The institutional review board of the college determined the study to be exempt from review. Setting: School of Nursing at a small liberal arts college in the Northeastern United States. Participants: A consecutive, nonprobability sample of 44 senior-level nursing students enrolled in their final nursing semester was utilized. Findings: Results indicated significant differences in student nurse’s perception of their advocacy role related to environment and educational influences following an education intervention using an ethics digital story. Conclusion: Using the Protective Nursing Advocacy Scale, we were able to measure the effectiveness of narrative pedagogy on nursing student’s perception of the nurse’s advocacy role. (shrink)

This book analyzes a rich and diverse body of philosophical and theological literature concerning the import of narrative for the understanding of morality. Nelson begins by examining the theses that to understand oneself, a tradition, and history as a whole, they must be understood in the context of a narrative. Recent philosophical writings on the relation of narrative to the moral concepts of social groups and individuals—including Alasdair MacIntyre's proposal for the rehabilitation of an ethic of virtue (...) shaped by narrative—are explored. Issues discussed include the freedom of moral agents in relation to their narratives, the relation between narrative and universal moral rules, and the problem of relativism. Next, Nelson classifies theological uses of narrative as belonging to either a liberal-universalistic or postliberal-particularistic tradition and considers the implications of construing scripture as narrative for the problematic relation between scripture and ethics. The work of Stanley Hauerwas, the foremost narrativist in Christian ethics, is analyzed at length. Nelson argues that while narrative is a necessary focus, it does not exhaust the methodological agenda. Narrative is not, as its advocates sometimes suggest, a universal solvent for every theological problem and disagreement. An adequate Christian ethics must not lose sight of the universal, narrative-independent features of morality. Since the realm of the moral is an interweaving of narrative-dependent and narrative-independent features, Christian ethics stands to profit from both narrativist and rationalist insights. The role of narrative is demonstrably a major topic of conversation across several fields in religious studies today. Particularly designed for scholars in ethics, theology, and the philosophy of religion, the book is a reliable guide to an expanding literature and a judicious introduction to these interdisciplinary discussions. (shrink)

Resumo: Este artigo toma a estética do produto, como objeto de pesquisa, e utiliza uma combinação de teoria e análise de caso para estudar a construção narrativa histórica da estética do produto. Ele concentra-se em explorar os mecanismos da estética do produto, a partir das perspectivas da forma e emoção, a fim de revelar como a expressão estética transmite emoções através de formas de design e explorar, ainda mais, seu impacto no design de produto moderno. O ponto de (...) vista central deste texto é que a estética do produto não é apenas o resultado da expressão visual, mas ela também forma experiências multidimensionais, por meio da construção da forma, da realização da função e da transmissão de emoções. No âmbito da filosofia e estética, a análise de exemplos de design clássico e moderno revela a importância significativa de integrar emoções e formas no desenvolvimento de produtos, em um ambiente de mercado em rápida mudança. Este artigo pode fornecer referências úteis para os designers aplicarem e inovarem na prática do design, além de ajudar a aprofundar sua compreensão da estética emocional do produto. (shrink)

This article argues for engaging with the smart city as a sociotechnical imaginary. By conducting a close reading of primary source material produced by the companies IBM and Cisco over a decade of work on smart urbanism, we argue that the smart city imaginary is premised in a particular narrative about urban crises and technological salvation. This narrative serves three main purposes: it fits different ideas and initiatives into a coherent view of smart urbanism, it sells and disseminates (...) this version of smartness, and it crowds out alternative visions and corresponding arrangements of smart urbanism. Furthermore, we argue that IBM and Cisco construct smart urbanism as both a reactionary and visionary force, plotting a model of the near future, but one that largely reflects and reinforces existing sociopolitical systems. We conclude by suggesting that breaking IBM’s and Cisco’s discursive dominance over the smart city imaginary requires us to reimagine what smart urbanism means and create counter-narratives that open up space for alternative values, designs, and models. (shrink)

Background: Nursing is a profession that has always been accompanied with common ethical concerns. There are some evidences which indicate that narrative writing on traumatic experiences may improve an individual’s emotional health. Objective: This study aimed to determine the effectiveness of narrative writing on moral distress of nurses working in intensive care unit. Research design: This study was a clinical trial with pre- and post-test design. The frequency and intensity of moral distress was measured by a (...) valid and reliable questionnaire (Corely) at baseline and after 8 weeks. The intervention group was asked to write about their deepest emotions and stressful experiences in the intensive care unit for 8 weeks. Participants and research context: Using consensus sampling, 120 nurses of intensive care unit and neonatal intensive care unit of the teaching hospitals (in Iran) were invited to and were randomly allocated into the intervention and control groups. Ethical considerations: Participation was voluntary, data were anonymized, and the confidentiality of the participating nurses and their institutions maintained. The ethical approval was obtained from an IRB or research ethics committee. Findings: In total, 106 nurses completed the trial consisting of 87.75% females. The mean work experience of nurses in the intervention and control groups was 7.21 ± 4.96 and 8.28 ± 5.45 years, respectively. Independent t-test showed no statistical difference neither in the intensity of moral distress ( P = 0.8), nor in its frequency ( P = 0.5) between the two groups. Discussion: As nurses constantly face ethical tensions, moral distress is a phenomenon that results from the different situations of critical care units. Their concern about receiving negative feedback from the managerial level may have influenced the outcome of the intervention. Conclusion: Narratives writing by the nurses showed no effect on reducing the intensity and frequency of moral distress. It seems that due to the intensity of moral distress in clinical settings, we need to test variety solutions to reduce the problem. (shrink)

Aims: The aim of this narrative synthesis was to explore the necessary and sufficient conditions required to define moral distress. Background: Moral distress is said to occur when one has made a moral judgement but is unable to act upon it. However, problems with this narrow conception have led to multiple redefinitions in the empirical and conceptual literature. As a consequence, much of the research exploring moral distress has lacked conceptual clarity, complicating attempts to study the phenomenon. Design: (...) Systematic literature review and narrative synthesis (November 2015–March 2016). Data sources: Ovid MEDLINE® In-Process & Other Non-Indexed Citations 1946–Present, PsycINFO® 1967–Present, CINAHL® Plus 1937–Present, EMBASE 1974–24 February 2016, British Nursing Index 1994–Present, Social Care Online, Social Policy and Practice Database (1890–Present), ERIC (EBSCO) 1966–Present and Education Abstracts. Review methods: Literature relating to moral distress was systematically retrieved and subjected to relevance assessment. Narrative synthesis was the overarching framework that guided quality assessment, data analysis and synthesis. Results: In all, 152 papers underwent initial data extraction and 34 were chosen for inclusion in the narrative synthesis based on both quality and relevance. Analysis revealed different proposed conditions for the occurrence of moral distress: moral judgement, psychological and physical effects, moral dilemmas, moral uncertainty, external and internal constraints and threats to moral integrity. Conclusion: We suggest the combination of (1) the experience of a moral event, (2) the experience of ‘psychological distress’ and (3) a direct causal relation between (1) and (2) together are necessary and sufficient conditions for moral distress. (shrink)

In this chapter, the author's solution was narrative storytelling, featuring the voices of people experiencing a conflict in the world, a conflict that opened up a philosophical question. He begins with a hook story, like that of CH and his shopping for a good quality stereo system, one that requires him to make use of an obscure and counterintuitive piece of practical reasoning. The story of Dr. Shukor and the Fatwa Council presents the central conflict posed by the problem (...) of vagueness in real‐life decisions. Decisions about the meaning of central words in scripture would affect generations of Muslim astronauts in the future. The design of a piece of academic writing is to make a case for a claim using evidence and argument against an epistemically adversarial reader. One of the essential features of good narrative storytelling is change in fortune over time. (shrink)

The new series of Ideen&Argumente subscribes to the ideal of a pluralist and open culture of argument and debate and presents well-produced volumes on topics and questions which make substantive or methodologically important contributions to contemporary philosophy. The publications are designed to effect a productive synergy between the Anglo-Saxon and Continental European philosophical traditions. Ideen&Argumente provides a platform for outstanding systematically oriented original editions and German first editions from all areas of Theoretical and Practical Philosophy. A welcome is extended to (...) programmatic monographs from whatever philosophical direction. The aim is to highlight anew the thematic and methodological richness of contemporary philosophy. (shrink)