Despite variation in their social needs and experiences, all humans require social connections to thrive. When humans lack fulfilling connections, they experience loneliness. However, while seemingly simple, loneliness is a multidimensional construct arising from varied social deficiencies and leading to varied psychological experiences. This chapter reviews the literature on loneliness, describing what it is, why we experience it, its prevalence and consequences, and what is being done globally to address it. In doing so, we highlight the considerable impacts of loneliness on individuals and society, its complexity, and the opportunities for future work. We close acknowledging the significant advancements made in loneliness research over the past several decades and highlight how this knowledge is being mobilized to advance the prevention and treatment of loneliness. In doing so, we hope this chapter serves as a useful starting point for understanding the problem of loneliness and the challenge of addressing it.

The fairness of criminal jury trial is predicated on the jury being able to clearly understand and accurately apply the criminal standard of proof. Among legal scholars, there is a strong international consensus that the criminal standard of proof as a legal concept is a very high standard that must be met by the prosecution and judged subjectively by the jury after hearing and assessing all the evidence. There is very little consensus, though, on how best to convey this standard to the jury. In this chapter we consider the practice in the jurisdiction of England & Wales of using sure as an ordinary language legal synonym of beyond reasonable doubt. In doing so, we outline a set of legal-discursive practices that transform the notion of ‘being sure’ from a simple gut assessment to an immensely confusing legal prescription. These practices are then exemplified through a judge’s excruciating attempt to clarify the use of sure and the Court of Appeal’s misreading of the fundamental issue. The chapter ends with some recommendations.

The current chapter focuses on basic properties of communication that inform the ways that the study of communication and the study of relationships intersect. These properties include interdependence (the idea that messages simultaneously influence and are influenced by messages that precede and follow them), reflexivity (the notion that communication creates and is constrained by structure), complexity (the concept that communication conveys multiple messages and functions at different levels of analysis), ambiguity (the notion that any given message has various meanings), and indeterminancy (the idea that messages can have multiple and diverse outcomes on relationships). Research on relationship narratives, message features, multiple goals, and message processing, among other topics, is reviewed and challenges for researchers who study communication and relationships are discussed.

This short introduction offers an overview of second part of the volume. It highlights humanitarianism’s focus on the victims of armed conflicts and begins with the foundation of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in 1864. Stemming from Genevan philanthropy, the ICRC aimed to reduce the degree of cruelty in war and to aid those soldiers struck down by enemy arms or by illness. The success of its programme was partly the result of the wide and rapid accreditation the new body managed to obtain from the European governments. In the First World War, civilians became the primary recipients of the ICRC’s assistance. In the post-war years international aid was planned to combat hunger, epidemics and population displacement, and humanitarianism acquired a new meaning in the overall transition of the European countries from wartime to peacetime. The same function was relaunched and strengthened after the Second World War, when humanitarian programmes became the symbol of the victorious powers’ will to write a new start for the history of humanity.

Part III covers the period from the end of the Popular Front in 1938 through the German occupation of France. The Popular Front had led to the marginalization and disarticulation of neo-socialism as a distinct position in the political field. Déat and the neo-socialists became unmoored from the left and thus “available” for political conversion in the years immediately following the dissolution of the Popular Front. The vector through which this happened was the reclassification of the political field around the question of war and peace. As a leading pacifist, Déat took up an anti-anti-fascist position and rallied to the politics of collaboration after the 1940 armistice. Initially seeking his place within Vichy’s “national revolution,” his failure to impose himself there led him to occupied Paris, where he came to adopt an increasingly radicalized form of collaborationist fascism modeled on Nazism through his leadership of the Rassemblement National Populaire (RNP).

In this chapter I focus on the nature of theories in the social sciences, some philosophy of science behind the validation of theories (e.g., falsifiability, approaches to deciding the value of evidence for/against a theory), and some issues to consider with respect to the research process and theory development and evaluation. I discuss the value of deconstructing theories to assess their core and auxiliary assumptions and determine aspects of a theory that have yet to be examined. I also discuss modern approaches to assess the evidentiary value of this body of research. I suggest that in our interdisciplinary field, researchers should consider generating hypotheses, as well as research explorations, through carefully evaluating and questioning the assumptions of the theories typically applied in the study of personal relationships. This discussion includes the use of modern approaches such as computational models. The overarching theme of the chapter is that as a field we need to evaluate and develop our theories using some recommendations put forward for decades combined with recently developed techniques in order to advance our theories beyond vague verbal statements that are interesting yet not precise to theories that allow for more consistent deductions of specific hypotheses.

The Introduction sets out how the book explores why and how Dogdom was recreated, by whom and with what consequences for both dogs and people. The cast runs from the very pinnacle of society, Queen Victoria, to near the bottom with Jemmy Shaw, a publican, boxer and promoter of dogfights and rat-killing. His activities often brought him before the courts, and he was enough of a roguish celebrity to feature in Henry Mayhew's study of the London poor. The remainder includes an artist, aristocrats, authors, bankers, clergymen, doctors, a dog dealer, a feminist, journalists, landowners, millionaires, philanthropists, scientists, veterinarians and a showman – Charles Cruft. Victorians had a term for these canine enthusiasts and activists – Doggy People.

Alice Stennard-Robinson, née Cornwell, challenged the authority of the male-only Kennel Club in canine affairs and helped develop a women’s alternative. Her initiative was orchestrated through the Ladies Kennel Association (LKA), which gave women a greater, though still subordinate, role in the British doggie world. Her influence came from her drive and wealth. Her brusque manner and unconventional personal life meant she attracted controversy. Scandal was never far away. Her millions came from the Australian gold rush, earning her the name Princess Midas. Pugs were her chosen breed, and while only she had only moderate success in shows, she helped establish the Black variety. Her mismanagement of the LKA saw her hounded out of the fancy.

Everett Millais established the Basset Hound as a breed in Britain and sought to bring a more scientific approach to dog breeding and disease control. As the eldest child of the Victorian superstar John Everett Millais and his wife Effie Gray, he enjoyed wealth and privilege. He was the first person to exhibit a Basset Hound at a British dog show and a founder member of the Basset Hound Club. He undertook scientific work in three areas: artificial insemination; ‘rational breeding’ using the ideas of Francis Galton; and the microbiology of dog distemper. His experience and expertise gave him the confidence to campaign for the reform of dog shows, which made him enemies in the Kennel Club.

What is the effect of one’s personality on one’s close relationships? In this chapter, we review the literature on this topic, focusing especially on the personality dimensions of self-esteem and the Big 5 traits of neuroticism and agreeableness. We review empirical studies of each of these three traits as predictors of (a) interpersonal processes and (b) relationship outcomes, including relationship satisfaction and dissolution. We also summarize any existing theoretical perspectives on these associations, including the most complete theoretical account offered for the influence of any of these traits on relationships—namely, the Self-Esteem-Infuses-Relationships-through-Trust (SIRT) model. We expect that two core assumptions of the SIRT model would be fundamental to theoretical accounts concerning any personality dimension’s influence on relationships. Specifically, (a) any trait?s influence must exert its influence through a causal chain of mediators, and (b) one of the essential mediators is behaviors between partners. Finally, we also evaluate how complete theoretical accounts concerning neuroticism and agreeableness that are likely to be offered in the future are likely to differ from or be similar to the account for self-esteem offered by the SIRT.

The interests of the home country’s inhabitants in the populations of the colonies derived most of all from the conviction that acquiring new territories meant taking on certain responsibilities. A now moral public recognised the value in compassion and benevolence. The prevailing idea was that the imperial government had obligations to deal with the c olonised subjects’ living conditions, to understand the reasons for their suffering and to find solutions to end it or at least to relieve it. The crossover between responsibility, compassion and benevolence permeated the whole European colonial experience and contributed to shaping the colonies’ administration. The chapter outlines the emergence of a transnational network of philanthropic activity which developed in close interaction with the relief work carried out at home. This interaction is clear both if we look at the types of initiatives undertaken ‘in the field’ and if we take into consideration the origins and set-up of the associations that were being founded to support the missionaries’ work.

This chapter addresses intimate relationships of Black populations, as well as the sociocultural and economic contexts in which they are embedded. The authors underscore the heterogeneity of Black populations both in, and outside of, the United States. How racial discrimination is experienced, and the impact of that experience, differs across Black populations – underscoring heterogeneity. While some research suggests that racial discrimination contributes to negative relationship dynamics, other work suggests that when some individuals experience racial discrimination their partners engage in supportive behaviors. Despite declines and delays in marriage, many U.S.-born Blacks are still pursuing marital unions and are happily married (Skipper & Taylor, 2021; Skipper et al., 2021). This is likely a function of relational resilience, or even the Black Advantage Vision as many U.S. Black couples adapt and strive in spite of seemingly unsurmountable stressors over which they have little control.

Relationship development and growth have long drawn the interest of relationship scholars. This chapter focuses on the theoretical frameworks that have guided inquiry. We begin by explicating the term relationship development, including different ways researchers have studied it. Traditional theories (e.g., relational dialectics, relationship stage models, social exchange, social penetration, relational turning points) are described, alongside recently developed perspectives on relationship development and growth (e.g., relational turbulence theory, the relationship trajectory framework). The chapter also discusses current research associated with the theories and how this scholarship informs our understanding of the initiation of relationships and how relationships develop over the lifespan. Special attention is paid to the development and maintenance of marginalized relationships. The chapter concludes with suggestions for future research, including the need to assess the ability of current theories to describe development in different relationship contexts (e.g.., friendships, courtship, families) and in different communication contexts (e.g., online, offline).