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Background: People with intellectual disability (ID) who live in regular neighbourhoods have experiences with their neighbours, which are important to understand when studying social integration. Method: This study describes and analyses the opinions on, and experiences with, neighbour relationships of 39 people with ID living in neighbourhood housing facilities. Results: We found that, while the views of people with ID on "good neighbouring" were consistent with "neighbouring" described in sociological literature, their experiences may be influenced by an organisational context, the tendency to formalise relationships and apprehension towards meeting unfamiliar people. Conclusion: Understanding influential factors to neighbouring for people with ID may shed light on the processes involved in social integration of people with ID at a neighbourhood level. This paper contributes to understanding the opinions of people with ID on satisfactory neighbourhood relationships, and explores opportunities to improve them.

In order to examine the relative influence of size-based expectancies and social cues on the perceived weight of objects, two studies were performed, using equally weighing dolls differing in sex-related and age-related vulnerability or physical strength cues. To increase variation in perceived size, stimulus objects were viewed through optical lenses of varying reducing power. Different groups of participants were required to provide magnitude estimates of perceived size, physical strength, or weight, or of expected weight. A size-weight illusion (SWI) was demonstrated, such that smaller objects felt heavier than larger ones, that was entirely accounted for by the mediating role of expected weight. Yet, perceived physical strength exerted an additional and more reactive influence on perceived weight independently of measured expectancies. Results are used to clarify the nature of "embodied", internal sensory-motor representations of physical and social properties.

ABSTRACT Dutch adults from a nationwide Internet panel ( N = 426) were asked to imagine that their next-door neighbours would move out and that people with intellectual disability would move in. Severity of disability and group size were varied to manipulate intergroup threat. These two factors independently influenced social acceptance and a variety of emotional and behavioural measures. In particular, it was found that a large group with severe disability aroused the strongest negative response, whereas a small group with mild disability aroused the weakest negative response. Small groups with a severe disability and large groups with a mild disability aroused similar and intermediate negative responses. Results are discussed in terms of theories of intergroup threat and stigmatisation. Practical implications for predicting the success of de-institutionalisation and social integration of groups with special needs are addressed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two studies examined the influence of HIV+ individual's expression of distress on perceivers' emotional and behavioral reactions. In Study 1 (N = 224), HIV+ individual's expression of distress was experimentally manipulated by means of vignettes. Men and women reacted differently when persons with HIV conveyed distress: women reported stronger feelings of pity, whereas men reported stronger feelings of anger. Study 2 (N = 136) replicated this study in a realistic experimental setting with additional behavioral measures. Similarly, women reported stronger pro-social behavior than men when confronted with a person with HIV who conveyed distress. Results of the present study shed additional light to the self-presentational dilemma of ill persons. Conveying moderate levels of distress may evoke pro-social responses in women, but not in men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigated the role of emotion in the area of intergroup relations. Results showed three ways in which emotions are relevant when Dutch autochthonous people are confronted with members of the three major ethnic minorities in The Netherlands: Surinamers and immigrant workers from Turkey and Morocco. First, four categories of emotions could be identified which appeared to be strongly associated with ethnic attitude-positive mood, anxiety, irritation and concern- each related to a specific kind of action readiness. Second, the influence which proximity of an ethnic group appeared to have on ethnic attitude could be explained by the specific kind of emotional experience related to different levels of proximity. The third Way in which emotions appeared to be relevant was their ability to differentiate between the qualitative aspects of various forms of ethnic contact. With Surinamers, more personal forms of con tact were associated with an increase in positive mood and a decrease in anxiety, irritation and concern. Bus for Turks and Moroccans, who can be considered to be in more basic respects culturally dissimilar from the Dutch, only negative aspects of close contact were found. The correspondence of the results with several research findings in the field of intergroup relations, is extensively discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]