Purpose Virtually all analyses of hotspots have been devoted to a crude counting system, i.e. tallying the number of occurrences that take place in pre-specified units of space and time. Recent research shows that while usually half of all criminal events are concentrated in about 3 percent of places commonly referred to as “hotspots” of crime, similar proportions of harm concentrate in only 1 percent of places. These are “harmspots.” Identifying that harm is a more concentrated issue suggests wide policy and research implications, but what are the dynamics of these harmspots? The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach This paper provides a descriptive framework for measuring, as well as evidence about, these patterns and concentrations, harmspots in Sussex, England. Findings There are four discrete offense categories that account for 80 percent of all the harm within harmspots. These categories include: sexual offenses, violence against the person, robbery and theft. Within these high harmspots, crime counts and harm are strongly correlated (r=0.82, p=0.001). Temporal analyses show that harmspots are not evenly spread across time and place, with night time and weekends becoming substantially more susceptible to harm – more than count-based models. Harmspot trajectory analysis suggests evidence of stability over time within the high harmspots; most harmspots remain chronically inflicted with harm. Violence and sexual offenses are random in their spatial distribution between the harmspots, but robberies and theft are more closely coupled to particular harmspots than others. Originality/value Implications of these findings are discussed in terms of future research avenues and crime policy.

In the current polarized U.S. political environment, what it means to be a “true American” is increasingly contested. Researchers often look to conceptualizations of patriotism and nationalism to account for national identity; but the extent to which these measures capture current understandings of American identity beyond left and right political divides is unknown. In a novel application of Q‐methodology, this study investigates the relationship between patriotism and nationalism measures and participants’ subjective understandings of their national identity. Forty‐seven U.S. citizens representing a wide range of ideological positions constructed American identity profiles by ranking 56 statements taken from patriotic and nationalistic operationalizations. The two extracted profiles revealed national identities largely along left/right ideological, not patriotism/nationalism, lines. Further analysis indicated that the political left and right also differently interpret items within patriotism and nationalism measures. These findings highlight the intertwining of American national identity and political ideology; they also cast doubt on the ideological independence and descriptive value of patriotism and nationalism measures.

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The present study investigates the relationship between the foreign policy orientation of Irish neutrality and national identity using a social representations approach (Elcheroth, Doise, & Reicher, 2011; Moscovici, 1961/76). In four focus groups conducted in the Republic of Ireland, 22 participants discussed vignettes in which hypothetical conflicts were described. The findings pointed towards the dynamic relationship between neutrality and Irish national identity and more generally to the importance of macropolitical phenomena for identity construction. The process of categorization was key to participants' decision making regarding the hypothetical conflicts; the decision to support or oppose the Irish state's involvement in the conflicts frequently revolved around a reconsideration of the boundaries of the ingroup. Furthermore, social representations were laden with the possibility of social change; the construction of neutrality as morally ambivalent, motivated by pragmatism rather than principles, opened up a space for younger participants to resist dominant, pragmatic interpretations of the policy and offer alternatives. Theoretical and empirical implications of the findings are discussed. Taken together, the findings demonstrate the critical potential of extending a social representations approach to issues of political psychological significance.

The recognition and representation of BAME community as ‘high risk’ of Covid-19 in the UK presents both a health and an identity threat to this ethnic group. This study employed thematic analysis to explore response to these threats as related by a sample of 13 middle class members of the South Asian community. This work advances both health and identity psychological theory by recognising the affinity between expressions of health efficacy and identity. Our findings identify South Asian intragroup stigmatisation and commonalities that have implications for the promotion of health behaviour and health communications for minority groups.

Recent research highlights the significant role of political ideological identities in America’s increasing political polarisation. In line with social identity theory, self-placement as a US liberal or conservative predicts favouritism toward the ideological in-group and negative attitudes and behaviours toward the outgroup. The theory also holds that the link between self-categorisation and behaviour is mediated by the content of that identity, by what an individual believes it means to be a member of that group. Although previous research has done much to analyse the differences between US liberals and conservatives on various a priori dimensions, little work has been aimed at gaining a holistic account of ideological identity content from the individual’s lay perspective. Through qualitative analysis of 40 interviews (20 liberals and 20 conservatives), this study identifies central themes in the meaning self-identified US liberals and conservatives attribute to these labels and finds evidence for asymmetrical constructions of these identities. The liberal participant group’s identity construction revolved around identification as, and concern for, individuals, supported by reference to personal values and political issues and underpinned by a motivation to move toward a more equal society. Conversely, the conservative participant group connected the understanding of their identity directly to the political ideology of the nation through a thread of self-reliance and reverence for the national group. Implications for political behaviour and the study of ideological identity are discussed.

People across the world have responded to the pandemic by mobilising and organising to support their communities, setting up mutual aid groups to provide practical, financial, and social support. Mutual aid means short-term ‘crisis response’ for some, while for other groups, it is a chance to radically restructure society, and what it means to be a member of that society. We applied a social representations lens to examine the ways in which citizenship was understood and performed by members of UK Covid-19 mutual aid groups. Interviews were conducted with 29 members of these groups. A reflexive thematic analysis developed three conceptualisations of citizenship: (1) human rights-based citizenship, untied to concerns around ‘deservingness’ or legal status; (2) neoliberal citizenship, to which participants oriented pragmatically in order to claim their group’s legitimacy at the same time as they rejected its individualism; and (3) resistant citizenship, which captured the tension between working within/with existing political structures, or working outside/against them. Findings are discussed in relation to previous theoretical and empirical work and practical implications for policy makers and local government are set out.

Mutual aid groups developed and mobilized in communities across the UK and globally at the outset of the pandemic in order to support vulnerable community members with practical assistance and emotional support, with some understanding their work in political terms. This study adopted a “social cure” lens to investigate the effects of group identification and group perceptions on anxiety and coping self‐efficacy among members of UK Covid‐19 mutual aid groups. Survey data were collected from self‐identified members of these groups ( N = 844) during the initial period of “lockdown” restrictions in April – May 2020. Correlational analyses showed that identification with the mutual aid group was linked to more positive group perceptions and better self‐reported psychological outcomes. Perceived group politicization showed the reverse pattern. Mixed support for the “social cure” model was evident; the effect of group identification on coping self‐efficacy (but not anxiety) was serially mediated by perceived support and collective efficacy. Perceived group politicization was a significant moderator, seeming to amplify the indirect effect of group identification on coping self‐efficacy via perceived support. Results are discussed in light of previous empirical work on the social cure and Covid‐19 mutual aid groups. Please refer to the Supplementary Material section to find this article's Community and Social Impact Statement .