Dealing with harm in organizations can be tricky. In this post, Maja Graso explores a particularly difficult issue: How do people assess allegations of harm that they have not seen themselves and that leave no evidence, no witnesses, and no other reliable signal that the harm has actually occurred (e.g., “my word against yours” cases)?
This Thursday, Thijs Bouman will defend his doctoral thesis in which he explains the influence of foreign news on how we perceive groups within our nearby surroundings. Generalizations from global to the local situations seem to specifically occur for negative news and rely on often trivial and unconscious associations between the foreign and nearby groups.
People often enjoy casual chats, especially about others. Although these conversations may seem harmless, they facilitate escalation of conflict between groups. Hedy Greijdanus’ dissertation research investigated the possibility to de-escalate conflict by influencing both what people talk about and how they talk. Tomorrow, June 25th at 14.30, she will defend her thesis in the Academy Building.