Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

The available literature presents the need to improve the training of community psychologists in order to understand and take action on the complexity of current social settings. However, there are knowledge gaps regarding how to train community social psychology (CSP) practitioners. This article postulates that integrality, as a political-strategic orientation of the Universidad de la República in Uruguay, creates suitable conditions to meet these requirements. Based on the notion of integral training spaces (EFI- espacios de formación integral) as pedagogical devices aimed at implementing this approach and examining a specific case (EFI In-Ter-Acción Colectiva), the authors reflect on the components of these spaces and the dynamics that they acquire. It is proposed that complex pedagogical devices are needed, which must consider multiple dimensions of the training process: the theory-practice articulation, interdisciplinarity, knowledge co-production, the articulation of research in the intervention processes, and a consistent pedagogical proposal. It is concluded that it is necessary to address the increasing commodification of university education nowadays, acknowledging that the requirements of CSP training are situated in specific institutional contexts that condition the discipline.

This article presents the results of an academic training experience in Community Psychology that has been ongoing since 2013 at a Chilean private university located in the city of Santiago. This ongoing experience was implemented through an institutional agreement with the Independencia municipality (urban area of Santiago) and has focused on the increasingly large migrant population present in this district. The experience is described considering the institutional framework made possible by the learning and service policy of the university, the educational approach adopted by the teaching team, and the assessment of all the local actors involved. This proposal is described through the documentary review and analysis of several written sources, 8 individual interviews with community members and municipality workers, 2 focus groups with students, and 14 surveys administered to teachers and students. Purposive sampling was used. The information is analyzed qualitatively using thematic analysis. Results describe the development of the training project within an institutional framework defined through a public policy that takes advantage of the migration context to implement interventions at a local level, thus responding to the social demands derived from the phenomenon.

Esta Sección Especial es parte de una larga tradición que el Grupo de Trabajo de Psicología Comunitaria de la Sociedad Interamericana de Psicología (SIP) viene sosteniendo desde el año 1991. Dicha tradición comprende la publicación de trabajos que son presentados en los congresos que la SIP realiza cada dos años, y tiene como objetivo visibilizar la producción que se desarrolla en la disciplina. En este caso, los artículos que componen esta Sección fueron presentados en el XXXV Congreso Interamericano de Psicología realizado en la ciudad de Lima, Perú, en julio de 2015. Si bien el largo proceso editorial al que han sido sometidos los textos ralentizó la difusión y discusión de temáticas que fueron tratadas en aquel momento, dicho proceso asegura su plena vigencia, ya que los trabajos debieron ser actualizados. Reconocemos y agradecemos el esfuerzo y la perseverancia de los y las autores/as por sostener este proyecto.

This work is part of an action-research funded by the University of Buenos Aires. Its aims were to investigate the life trajectories and the processes of identity construction in homeless people in the City of Buenos Aires, Argentina, and create a space for participation and collective reflection that facilitates the problematization of both these trajectories and socio-care circuits for homeless people. Using participative qualitative research, this work had three stages: (a) participatory diagnosis, (b) problematization and (c) first intervention. An intentional sample was selected of 10 organizations that were part of the healthcare offer for homeless people, and with a snowball sampling one of 18 homeless adults users of this offer, both men and women, who were in the streets for at least 3 years. Through interviews, focus groups, collective mapping, and the construction of a problem tree, and using grounded theory approach, it was found that interventions are organized according to certain social representations of the street situation, of the people themselves and of what is meant by "addressing the problem”. Based on these results, the limits and challenges of interventions with community-based approaches with homeless people are problematized, as well as relations between the University and the Community in the process of building knowledge.

Although the abbreviated Basic Empathy Scale (abbreviated BES) has been used to study the differences of empathy between adolescent men and women, it is unknown whether the construct is measured similarly in both, that is, whether there is factor invariance across sex. The aim of the study was to analyze the factor invariance of the abbreviated BES across sex in a convenience sample of high-school students (480 males and 454 females) attending 3 schools in Lima Metropolitana, Peru. A multigroup confirmatory factor analysis showed that the 2-factor model (cognitive and affective empathy) is feasible for both sexes. Configural invariance verifies the two-dimensional structure, reaching a satisfactory compliance of strong invariance. Student's t-test revealed that women have greater cognitive and affective empathy than men. It is concluded that there is empirical evidence to support the partial factor invariance across sex of the abbreviated BES in Peruvian adolescents. Future studies should replicate these procedures in participants with different cultural characteristics and other age ranges.

The debate around the so-called gay cure and reparative practices or therapeutic accompaniment to individuals who want to change their sexual identity is still active. This article proposes a critical approach to the political place of psychotherapy in current debates around therapeutic offers aimed at changing non-heterosexual sexualities, focusing on the ways this discussion has played out in Chile. With this in mind, 2 specific analytical dimensions are discussed. Firstly, the article reviews some of the main milestones that enabled the clinical invention of the ex-gay and the reparative device, critically discussing the place that motivation, effort, and individual freedom play in the context in which psychotherapy is currently practiced, particularly in relation to logics of personal responsibility that are characteristic of the market and neoliberalism. Secondly, the ideological component of the device and the contingent nature of the heterosexual norm are also analysed, challenging the relative legitimacy of pathologising discourses against non-heterosexual sexualities, in a context where the normative principles of the contemporary sexual order are being contested by politico-religious forces.

This research aimed to establish the meaning that risk behaviors have for homosexual men in relation to contracting HIV/AIDS through sexual contact. Adopting a qualitative approach, 19 interviews were held with homosexual men residing in the city of Medellín, Colombia. Grounded theory, from the perspective of symbolic interactionism, was used to find the relationship between meanings and behaviors. Coding, categorization, and interpretation processes were conducted. Results show that (a) the clandestine nature of sexual encounters causes risk to be regarded as a way of experiencing affection and that (b) there is an inverse relationship between affection and risk: the stronger the affection the greater the risk avoidance, informed by prevention recommendations; the weaker the affection the greater the proneness to take risks, searching for recognition and denying the information about protective measures.

The discussion about the validity of the factor structure of the dimensions that constitute the quality of life (QOL) construct in the field of intellectual disability has highlighted the need to conduct new studies. The aim of this study was to analyze the dimensional structure of the KidsLife Scale, designed upon the basis of the 8-factor QOL model advanced by Schalock and Verdugo Alonso (2007). Using a convenience sample, the scale was administered to the caregivers of 220 people receiving support in specialized institutions. These caregivers' wards were between 4 and 21 years old, had been diagnosed with intellectual disability, and resided in 3 cities in Colombia. The study, of an instrumental nature, was conducted using structural equation modeling, confirmatory factor analysis, construct reliability analysis, average variance extracted, and multiple correlations R2. Working hypotheses based on 5 different models were analyzed. The model composed of 8 interrelated dimensions displayed factor loadings ranging from 0,63 to 0,95, multiple correlations between 0,24 and 0,81, a general reliability value of 0,979, and an average variance extracted greater than 50%, without any second-order dimensions being identified. It is concluded that the proposed KidsLife Scale model positively reports the QOL of people with intellectual disabilities in 3 Colombian cities. New studies are needed to identify the possible existence of second-order factors.

Despite the wide recognition of Elizabeth Lira's research career, a discussion of the contributions and debates that her work has inspired has yet to emerge. Likewise, no specialized intellectual developments exist which make it possible to reuse, develop, and circulate her work and its implications critically. In this article the author aims to contribute to this still pending discussion and explore some aspects of Elizabeth Lira’s work from the point of view of memory studies, focusing on political violence and the recent past. The author presents a historical contextualization of Lira's intellectual trajectory within the framework of the Southern Cone military dictatorships, identifying thematic axes that organize her work: the analysis of the effects of dictatorships, longterm analyses of practices and institutions, and analyses of political memory. Finally, the author outlines some dilemmas that arise from the discussion, such as the tension between memory and representation and the relation between memory and democracy.

The objective was to investigate gender violence in affective relationships and how gender issues are presented in the narratives of 11 teenagers between 15 and 16 years old conveniently recruited from 2 public schools of rural and urban contexts from the countryside city of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Six focus groups were formed. Through an analysis of thematic content, the results pointed out the difficulty in delimiting different modalities of relationships, as well as the impact of romantic love on the invisibility of violence. While some teenagers advocated for feminism, they also antagonized and pathologized homosexual relationships. Despite the fact that most adolescents were heterosexual, they presented heteronormative, monogamous conceptions of romanticism and sexist gender views. In conclusion, the imaginary of romantic love, on the one hand, is fascinating due to the idealization of the relationship; on the other hand, it limits relationships and the ability to perceive situations of gender violence. Thus, the ideal of romantic love facilitates narratives of prejudice regarding sexual orientation.