Pete Seaman
Dr Pete Seaman is a part-time lecturer in Substance Use and Misuse within the Institute of Applied Health Research at Glasgow Caledonian University. He is also a Senior Public Health Research Specialist with the Glasgow Centre for Population Health. Research interests include normative alcohol use, life course transitions, resilience and knowledge transfer processes.
Pete graduated from the University of Glasgow (First Class Honours in Sociology)in 1995 and completed his PhD at the Medical Research Council's Social and Public Health Sciences Unit in 2002. His thesis explored contemporary understandings of family life focussing on parental discipline styles and children and young people as generators of family social capital.
Pete works as a qualitative sociologist in both academia and the NHS and has published on a broad range of research topics. Recent work includes a Joseph Rowntree Foundation supported study of young people, peer networks and decision making around alcohol consumption. A subsequent GCPH report "Creating Better Stories" explored a role for gender in shaping young adults’ experiences of alcohol consumption and was accompanied by "Alcohol Through Our Eyes", collected words and images from young people exploring their understandings of Scottish drinking culture. Other published work include journal articles exploring the transition to adulthood in relation to social capital and alcohol consumption ‘arcs’, experiences of early fatherhood, resilience in disadvantaged communities and facilitators and barriers to urban greenspace access.
Pete graduated from the University of Glasgow (First Class Honours in Sociology)in 1995 and completed his PhD at the Medical Research Council's Social and Public Health Sciences Unit in 2002. His thesis explored contemporary understandings of family life focussing on parental discipline styles and children and young people as generators of family social capital.
Pete works as a qualitative sociologist in both academia and the NHS and has published on a broad range of research topics. Recent work includes a Joseph Rowntree Foundation supported study of young people, peer networks and decision making around alcohol consumption. A subsequent GCPH report "Creating Better Stories" explored a role for gender in shaping young adults’ experiences of alcohol consumption and was accompanied by "Alcohol Through Our Eyes", collected words and images from young people exploring their understandings of Scottish drinking culture. Other published work include journal articles exploring the transition to adulthood in relation to social capital and alcohol consumption ‘arcs’, experiences of early fatherhood, resilience in disadvantaged communities and facilitators and barriers to urban greenspace access.
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Papers by Pete Seaman
The exploratory research project sought to investigate whether, rather than a decline in social capital generation per se, there may be a change occurring in the places and activities that generate social capital and, if so, whether these new forms of social capital generation are more suited to current society than more traditional forms (such as traditional churches, the nuclear family and communities based around large industrial workplaces).
Key findings of this paper are:
* New forms of spiritual practice, while promoting health and wellbeing for individuals involved, are not yet at a stage at which they generate community level benefits.
* New forms of spiritual practice are successful in simultaneously satisfying a need for deeper engagement with spiritual issues alongside a desire to maintain personal autonomy and be an author of one’s own belief.
* Existing successful forms of informal voluntary activity should be recognised rather than seeking to create new structures for participation.
outcomes for individuals or families in circumstances where problems were to be expected. Compared with the traditional study of child development, which has tended to portray ‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ patterns, a resilience approach offers a
more differentiated account. In professional practice, resilience means looking for strengths and opportunities to build on, rather than (or alongside) problems and deficits to be remedied or treated.
This review considers parents’ actual and potential contributions to children’s resilience and to parental resilience, which is sometimes subsumed within ‘family resilience’. However, since most publications are concerned with resilience in relation
to children and young people, the specific role of parents often has to be inferred.
The review draws on important UK-based publications on resilience and includes more selective references to the comparatively huge American literature, as well as significant material from elsewhere.
social capital inherent within their communities toward the specific end of helping their children negotiate the risks that accompany increasing independence. It adds to the development of understanding social capital by
showing how in environments in which social capital is perceived as low, adaptive parenting strategies are called for that ultimately put more pressure on less advantaged parents. Furthermore, it shows how parents and young people may be inventive in identifying community level resources in a manner
which draws a slender distinction between risk and safety. This situation leaves parents and young people in a potential double bind, where strategies to improve young people’s life-chances through engagement with the local community involve an increased exposure to potential risks.
Greenspace has the potential to be a vital resource for promoting healthy living for people in urban areas, offering both opportunities for physical activity and wellbeing. Much research has explored the objectively measurable factors within areas to the end of explaining the role of greenspace access in continuing health inequalities. This paper explores the subjective reasons why people in urban areas choose to use, or not use, local public greenspace.
Methods
In-depth interviews with 24 people living in two areas of Glasgow, United Kingdom were conducted, supplemented with participant photography and participatory methods. Data was thematically categorised to explore subjectively experienced facilitators and barriers to greenspace use in urban areas.
Results
From the perspective of current and potential urban greenspace users, access is revealed to be about more than the physical characteristics of neighbourhoods, greenspace resources or objectively measurable features of walkability and connectivity. Subjectively, the idea of walkability includes perceptions of social cohesion at a community level and the level of felt integration and inclusion by individuals in their communities. Individual's feelings of integration and inclusion potentially mitigate the effects of experiential barriers to urban greenspace access, such as evidence of anti-social behaviour.
Conclusions
We conclude that improving access to greenspace for all in urban communities will require more than providing high quality resources such as parks, footpaths, activities and lighting. Physical availability interacts with community contexts already established and a holistic understanding of access is required. A key cultural component of areas and neighbourhoods is the level of social cohesion, a factor that has the potential to reinforce existing health inequalities through shaping differentiated greenspace access between subgroups of the local population.
How young people drink alcohol underpins rates of harm, which
have been rising steadily in recent decades. Understanding the meaning and motivation behind young adults’ drinking habits will help predict future need. Policy-makers and health educationalists will be better informed to develop responses that make sense to younger drinkers. This report identifies the influence of both existing cultural attitudes around alcohol, and new and emergent attitudes that separate younger drinkers’ consumption from that of other age groups.
The report highlights:
• a norm for excessive alcohol consumption in young adulthood;
• how today’s young adults find it diffi cult to imagine alternatives to the excessive drinking that supports group socialising;
• how the commercial alcohol offer made to young people contributes to the narrowing of their options; and
• the influences of pricing on decision-making.
Preliminary research by the Full Employment Areas initiative (FEA) suggested that client’s social networks could be an additional factor contributing to labour market proximity and likelihood of attaining sustained employment, particularly when the networks are confined to small geographical areas characterised by high levels of worklessness. This research explored these networks through qualitative methods and aimed to build upon and contribute new knowledge of processes underpinning client’s participation in employment. The overall aim was to offer employability agencies better understanding of how to support and advise clients in a holistic manner
The exploratory research project sought to investigate whether, rather than a decline in social capital generation per se, there may be a change occurring in the places and activities that generate social capital and, if so, whether these new forms of social capital generation are more suited to current society than more traditional forms (such as traditional churches, the nuclear family and communities based around large industrial workplaces).
Key findings of this paper are:
* New forms of spiritual practice, while promoting health and wellbeing for individuals involved, are not yet at a stage at which they generate community level benefits.
* New forms of spiritual practice are successful in simultaneously satisfying a need for deeper engagement with spiritual issues alongside a desire to maintain personal autonomy and be an author of one’s own belief.
* Existing successful forms of informal voluntary activity should be recognised rather than seeking to create new structures for participation.
outcomes for individuals or families in circumstances where problems were to be expected. Compared with the traditional study of child development, which has tended to portray ‘normal’ and ‘abnormal’ patterns, a resilience approach offers a
more differentiated account. In professional practice, resilience means looking for strengths and opportunities to build on, rather than (or alongside) problems and deficits to be remedied or treated.
This review considers parents’ actual and potential contributions to children’s resilience and to parental resilience, which is sometimes subsumed within ‘family resilience’. However, since most publications are concerned with resilience in relation
to children and young people, the specific role of parents often has to be inferred.
The review draws on important UK-based publications on resilience and includes more selective references to the comparatively huge American literature, as well as significant material from elsewhere.
social capital inherent within their communities toward the specific end of helping their children negotiate the risks that accompany increasing independence. It adds to the development of understanding social capital by
showing how in environments in which social capital is perceived as low, adaptive parenting strategies are called for that ultimately put more pressure on less advantaged parents. Furthermore, it shows how parents and young people may be inventive in identifying community level resources in a manner
which draws a slender distinction between risk and safety. This situation leaves parents and young people in a potential double bind, where strategies to improve young people’s life-chances through engagement with the local community involve an increased exposure to potential risks.
Greenspace has the potential to be a vital resource for promoting healthy living for people in urban areas, offering both opportunities for physical activity and wellbeing. Much research has explored the objectively measurable factors within areas to the end of explaining the role of greenspace access in continuing health inequalities. This paper explores the subjective reasons why people in urban areas choose to use, or not use, local public greenspace.
Methods
In-depth interviews with 24 people living in two areas of Glasgow, United Kingdom were conducted, supplemented with participant photography and participatory methods. Data was thematically categorised to explore subjectively experienced facilitators and barriers to greenspace use in urban areas.
Results
From the perspective of current and potential urban greenspace users, access is revealed to be about more than the physical characteristics of neighbourhoods, greenspace resources or objectively measurable features of walkability and connectivity. Subjectively, the idea of walkability includes perceptions of social cohesion at a community level and the level of felt integration and inclusion by individuals in their communities. Individual's feelings of integration and inclusion potentially mitigate the effects of experiential barriers to urban greenspace access, such as evidence of anti-social behaviour.
Conclusions
We conclude that improving access to greenspace for all in urban communities will require more than providing high quality resources such as parks, footpaths, activities and lighting. Physical availability interacts with community contexts already established and a holistic understanding of access is required. A key cultural component of areas and neighbourhoods is the level of social cohesion, a factor that has the potential to reinforce existing health inequalities through shaping differentiated greenspace access between subgroups of the local population.
How young people drink alcohol underpins rates of harm, which
have been rising steadily in recent decades. Understanding the meaning and motivation behind young adults’ drinking habits will help predict future need. Policy-makers and health educationalists will be better informed to develop responses that make sense to younger drinkers. This report identifies the influence of both existing cultural attitudes around alcohol, and new and emergent attitudes that separate younger drinkers’ consumption from that of other age groups.
The report highlights:
• a norm for excessive alcohol consumption in young adulthood;
• how today’s young adults find it diffi cult to imagine alternatives to the excessive drinking that supports group socialising;
• how the commercial alcohol offer made to young people contributes to the narrowing of their options; and
• the influences of pricing on decision-making.
Preliminary research by the Full Employment Areas initiative (FEA) suggested that client’s social networks could be an additional factor contributing to labour market proximity and likelihood of attaining sustained employment, particularly when the networks are confined to small geographical areas characterised by high levels of worklessness. This research explored these networks through qualitative methods and aimed to build upon and contribute new knowledge of processes underpinning client’s participation in employment. The overall aim was to offer employability agencies better understanding of how to support and advise clients in a holistic manner