Digital Commons Network^™

Cultural Impact On Identity And How It Is Expressed Through Dress, Jenifer Thao

Apparel Merchandising and Product Development Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study examined how students at the undergraduate and graduate levels at the University of Arkansas incorporate their cultural background into their clothing as a form of self-expression. The study included an online survey platform, Qualtrics, created with a series of Likert-type and open-ended response questions to gather data regarding student opinions on clothing impacts. Results indicated that there were no significant associations when it comes to cultural influences on identity and how it is expressed through dress.

Identifying Risk Factors For Ptsd Symptom Clusters In Maltreated, Multiracial Youth Using Nonparametric Modeling, Mallory Constantine

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Multiracial youth are one of the most at-risk racial groups for child maltreatment. Multiracial individuals are also more likely to report mental health concerns than other racial or ethnic groups. This study aimed to identify demographic and psychological risk factors that are unique to multiracial, maltreated youth with respect to PTSD symptoms (i.e., re-experiencing, hyperarousal, avoidance) through classification and regression tree (CART) analyses. Participants included 99 multiracial, maltreated youth directly following their placement in an emergency group shelter due to substantiated maltreatment. The first hypothesis was that female gender, English first language, questions related to guilt and self-blame, and depressive …

Social Justice Approaches To Cognitive, Emotional, And Language Development During Childhood And Adolescence, Angélique M. Blackburn

Journal of Multicultural Affairs

With contemporary events that have spotlighted social injustices, including the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States and the COVID-19 pandemic, any discussion of child development should take into account the diverse experiences of children facing injustice. In this article, I focus on social justice as it pertains to child development and how this topic has been addressed in literature targeted at students of child development theory. I focus on the contribution of two recent books (Anthis, 2020; De Houwer, 2021) within the greater context of reviewing literature regarding social inequities in cognitive, emotional, and language development. Anthis (2020) …

Personality Traits, Religiosity, And Academic Major, Ryan Schmid

Journal of Interdisciplinary Undergraduate Research

Personality traits are intimately involved with many, if not all, human endeavors, including the pursuit of a college degree. The purpose of this study was to see if there were differences in personality traits amongst academic majors and religiosity levels at Southern Adventist University. It also examined if there were differences in religiosity across academic majors. The differences in academic major and religiosity were compared between both gender and ethnicity. Fifty students from seven academic major categories were given personality and religiosity measures during a class, a LifeGroup, and several arranged meeting times. The results of these measures yielded several …

Racial And Ethnic Differences In Chronic Pain, Sarah M. Revie

MA Research Paper

Chronic pain literature consistently shows differences in the prevalence of chronic pain by race and ethnicity. However, these studies primarily focus on White, African American, and Hispanic respondents. This paper aims to examine differences in pain by race and ethnicity including most major racial categories as well as Asian, Native American, and multiple-race respondents. This study uses data from the 2017 and 2018 National Health Interview Survey (n=33,161). To determine the relationship between race and ethnicity and chronic pain, we conducted multiple nested logistic regression. The analysis found that African Americans [OR= 0.67, p<0.001], Hispanic [OR= 0.61, p<0.001], and Asian [OR= 0.42, p<0.001] respondents have lower odds of pain when compared to White participants while multiracial respondents have higher odds of chronic pain [OR = 1.28, p<0.05]. This study is important for future research as it shows the need for other scholars, as well as policymakers, to focus on expanding racial and ethnic categories commonly studied in chronic pain literature.

Factors Contributing To Activism Among Advantaged-Group And Disadvantaged-Group Undergraduate Students, Anne Guzman

Psychology ETDs

Identifying factors that contribute to activism may be helpful in increasing activism. This study investigated how experiences, personality characteristics, beliefs, attitudes, group membership (i.e., POC, women, LGBTQ, and disabled individuals), and intersectional group membership defined by social location related to reported engagement in racial justice activism. A sample of 155 undergraduate students completed measures of empathy, openness to diversity, authoritarianism, multicultural experiences, level of prejudice, motivation to respond without prejudice, allophilia, understanding of privilege, racial/ethnic identity, and social support. Results supported that engagement in activism differed based on group membership for gender, LGBTQ+, and primary race and based on social …

A Systematic Review And Reflection On The Dimensions Of Diversity Represented In Behavior Analytic Research, Jodie Waits

LSU Master's Theses

The United States continues to transition towards a majority-minority composition and this trend has most rapidly emerged for school-aged children. Work with diverse populations calls for specialized skills and training experiences, but these are not strongly reflected in most training programs in Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA). The present review was conducted to evaluate the scope and range of the dimensions of diversity included in Behavior Analytic research (e.g. race/ethnicity, gender, sexuality, etc.), as well as to compile recommendations related to culturally responsive practice in ABA. The search revealed a total of 50 publications featuring a dimension of diversity. These works …

Analysis Of Covid-19 Infection And Mortality Among Patients With Psychiatric Disorders, 2020, Antonio L Teixeira, Trudy Millard Krause, Lopita Ghosh, Lokesh Shahani, Rodrigo Machado-Vieira, Scott D Lane, Eric Boerwinkle, Jair C Soares

Student and Faculty Publications

IMPORTANCE: People with major psychiatric disorders are more likely to have comorbidities associated with worse outcomes of COVID-19. This fact alone could determine greater vulnerability of people with major psychiatric disorders to COVID-19.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the odds of testing positive for and mortality from COVID-19 among and between patients with schizophrenia, mood disorders, anxiety disorders and a reference group in a large national database.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This cross-sectional study used an electronic health record data set aggregated from many national sources in the United States and licensed from Optum with current and historical data on patients tested …

Vowel Pronunciation As An Ethnic Marker: Pacific Islander Teens In Utah, Lisa M. Johnson

Faculty Publications

Despite the growing numbers and visibility of Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders (NHPIs) in the U.S., these Americans are generally overlooked in the research on language variation. American dialectology tends to focus on speakers of European descent, and most research on minority ethno-racial groups has concentrated on larger demographic groups, such as African American and Latinx American groups. This combination of research deficits limits our understanding of linguistic variation and the social forces that influence it. In addition, it may reinforce stereotypes of “ethnolects” as nonstandard and wholly separate from regional and stylistic influence. (See Eckert, 2008.) Many of …

Barriers To Human Papillomavirus Vaccine Uptake Among Racial/Ethnic Minorities: A Systematic Review, Trisha L Amboree, Charles Darkoh

Student and Faculty Publications

BACKGROUND: Human papillomavirus (HPV) is associated with poor health outcomes, including cervical cancer. Racial/ethnic minority populations experience poor health outcomes associated with HPV at higher rates. A vaccine is available to protect against HPV infections and prevent HPV-related sequelae; however, vaccination rates have remained low in the United States (U.S.) population. Thus, there is an urgent need to increase the HPV vaccination rate. Moreover, little is known about barriers to HPV vaccination in racial/ethnic minority groups. This paper highlights the most recent findings on barriers experienced by these groups.

METHODS: The PubMed database was searched on July 30, 2020, for …

The Impact Of Adaptive Learning In Principles Of Microeconomics, Doris S. Bennett, Cynthia S. Mccarty, Michael S. Carter

Southwestern Business Administration Journal

Abstract

The spread of Covid-19, which forced almost all learning to move to online in March, 2020, abruptly increased the number of undergraduates taking at least one online course by approximately 177% between the fall of 2019 and the spring of 2020 (Koksal, 2020; Carey, 2020; National Center for Education Statistics, 2020). Even without the Covid-19 disruption, online education has become increasing prevalent due to the decreasing allocation of resources to higher education and the pressure on college administrators to make a college education effective, affordable, and accessible for more students. Originally online instruction differed from in-class instruction only be …

Motivations For And Responses To Ethnic Representation, William John O'Brochta

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Why does ethnic political representation occur and what are its effects on ethnic outgroup views? In this dissertation, I examine political leaders’ motivations for increasing ethnic representation and how citizens and representatives themselves respond. In the first project, I theorize that political leaders increase ethnic cabinet representation when they believe that doing so will improve their electoral fortunes. I collect new data on cabinet minister names, code their ethnicity, and generate a country-year measure of ethnic cabinet diversity. Country leaders indeed increase ethnic cabinet diversity when citizens are most likely to lend them electoral support. The second project investigates how …

Reimagining Racism: It's More Than Black & White, Morgan E. Gunter

Dissertations, 2020-current

Human beings have a set of core needs and inalienable rights. Implicit to such needs and rights are concepts of potential – to become what we are able to become – and dignity – to be regarded and treated as equal. Clearly, these aspirational tenets are still not realizable for many of our fellow beings, both locally and globally. For example, from the standpoint of this dissertation, racial injustice (e.g., racism, hate crimes, discriminatory laws and policies, genocide) has – historically and currently – led to transgenerational trauma and otherizing within communities that are marginalized at multiple levels of analysis. …

From Exposure To Violence Between Mother And Her Intimate Partner To Suicidality Experienced By Urban Adolescents In Chicago’S Southside, Dexter R. Voisin

Faculty Scholarship

Although the relationship between exposure to intimate partner violence and youths’ psychological and other wellbeing has been widely studied, there is limited research about how youths’ exposure to violence between mother and her intimate partner may be related to youth psychological wellbeing. The study used a sample of urban adolescents in Chicago Southbound to examine whether youths’ exposure to verbal conflict between mother and her intimate partner is related to their suicidality and whether youth depression and aggression may be in between such a linkage. Our findings indicated that one-third of the youth had suicidal thoughts or suicidal/self-hurting attempts. Youths’ …

Unusual Subjects: Finding Model Communities Among Marginalized Populations, Babette Faehmel Ph.D., Tiombe Farley, Vashti Ma'at

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Unusual subjects:

Finding model communities among marginalized populations

This paper is inspired by the questions that we have asked ourselves since we first met at Schenectady County Community College. What is it, we wondered, that keeps so many of our fellow Americans seemingly wedded to a political economy that is sustainable only at great cost? Could we use our academic work to help spread awareness about people who dared to demand different lives? And might our studies suggest strategies to work for change?

We currently all pursue different projects, but we share a belief that one obstacle to progressive change …

Trends In Race/Ethnicity Of Pediatric Residents And Fellows: 2007-2019, Kimberly Montez, Emma A Omoruyi, Kenya Mcneal-Trice, Wendy J Mack, Lahia Yemane, Alissa R Darden, Christopher J Russell

Student and Faculty Publications

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: A diverse pediatric workforce reflecting the racial/ethnic representation of the US population is an important factor in eliminating health inequities. Studies reveal minimal improvements over time in the proportions of underrepresented in medicine (URiM) physicians; however, studies assessing trends in pediatric URiM trainee representation are limited. Our objective was to evaluate longitudinal trends in racial/ethnic representation among a cross-section of US pediatric trainees and to compare it to the US population.

METHODS: Repeated cross-sectional study of graduate medical education census data on self-reported race/ethnicity of pediatric residents and subspecialty fellows from 2007 to 2019. To evaluate trends …

Temporal Trends In Suicidal Ideation And Attempts Among Us Adolescents By Sex And Race/Ethnicity, 1991-2019, Yunyu Xiao, Julie Cerel, J. John Mann

Social Work Faculty Publications

Importance: Disparities by sex and racial/ethnic group in suicide death rates are present in US adolescents. Whether disparities in suicide death extend to groups targeted for suicide prevention efforts, namely, those with suicidal ideation or nonfatal suicide attempts, is unknown.

Objective: To examine differences in temporal trends between suicidal ideation and suicide attempts in US adolescents from 1991 through 2019 by sex and race/ethnicity subgroups.

Design, Setting, and Participants: A cross-sectional analysis of the national Youth Risk Behavior Survey, weighted to represent US adolescents from 1991 to 2019, included 183 563 US high-school students in grades 9 to 12. Data …

Positive Symptoms Of Schizophrenia And Suicide: A Systematic Review Of Gender, Race/Ethnicity, And Premorbid Iq Variables, Susan Diann Paschall

Dissertations

Schizophrenia is an exceptionally debilitating mental disorder. Its effects permeate all facets of psychosocial functioning and it is associated with premature mortality. As such, suicide is of clinical concern. Positive symptoms such as hallucinations and delusions may influence the risk of suicide among individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia, but additional research is necessary, as the limited literature on this topic is dated and includes heterogeneous results. Early recognition of and intervention for suicide risk factors, such as the presence of positive symptoms of psychosis, may reduce mortality rates for individuals with schizophrenia. The present literature review examined the role of gender, …

Impact Of Moral Injury For Ethnic/Racial Minority Male Veterans, Kristopher Kern

Doctoral Dissertations

Trends in demographics of post-9/11 veterans (deployments to the Middle East after 2001) describe this group as having higher survival rates, increased service-connected disabilities, and more racially diverse (NCVAS, 2018; Schnurr et al., 2009; Tanelian & Jaycox, 2008). Additionally, their deployment experiences include combat-related experiences that contradict personal moral beliefs, later named “moral injury” (MI) (Litz et al., 2009). Currier, Holland, and Mallot (2015) describe MI as intense emotions of shame, guilt, and anger alongside maladaptive behaviors emerging after “witnessing and/or participating in warzone events that challenge one’s basic sense of humanity” (p. 231).

The research on MI continues to …

Studying The Relationship Between Ethnic Identity And Resiliency: A Broad Approach, Mary Zheng

Honors Program Theses and Projects

Ethnic minorities in the United States face prejudice and racial discrimination, causing feelings of distress. However, ethnic minorities have shown an ability to overcome these negative experiences. Racial identity has been associated with more adjustments and higher functioning for ethnic minorities. To gain a clearer understanding of this phenomenon, we included White people in this study to gain an accurate picture of how resiliency operates differently for people of color and Whites and if it is indeed distinct between the two groups. The purpose of this project is to find and examine the link between ethnic identity and resiliency in …

Systematic Review Of Race/Ethnicity In Parkinson's Disease, Amia Fisher

Honors Theses

The goal of this study was to examine race/ethnicity with an emphasis on African Ancestry in Parkinson’s Disease (PD) through a systematic review. Out of 448 scholarly articles that were originally extracted from the search, 445 were excluded due to their irrelevance regarding race/ethnicity and African ancestry in PD. Three scholarly articles were obtained through a PubMed/MEDLINE search for the review. Amongst the three sources that were chosen, there were more than 450,000 participants with PD that ranged in ages 40-65+; each case of PD within these studies were reported from 1993-2005. The varying races/ethnicities of White/non-Hispanic White, Black/African American, …

Untold Stories Of The African Diaspora: The Lived Experiences Of Black Caribbean Immigrants In The Greater Hartford Area, Shanelle A. Jones

University Scholar Projects

The African Diaspora represents vastly complex migratory patterns. This project studies the journeys of English-speaking Afro-Caribbeans who immigrated to the US for economic reasons between the 1980s-present day. While some researchers emphasize the success of West Indian immigrants, others highlight the issue of downward assimilation many face upon arrival in the US. This paper explores the prospect of economic incorporation into American society for West Indian immigrants. I conducted and analyzed data from an online survey and 10 oral histories of West Indian economic migrants residing in the Greater Hartford Area to gain a broader perspective on the economic attainment …

Cultural Influences On Exercise Type And Body Confidence In Women, Skye Sakashita, Desiree Crevecoeur-Macphail

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

This study examined cultural influences on exercise habits and body confidence in women, specifically between ethnic minority and white women. Past research has indicated that Asian women often feel more cultural pressure than their White counterparts. This study wanted to examine further and see if an individual’s parent being an immigrant differs in amount of cultural pressure. Another aspect that this survey examined is motivation for exercise. Past research found that women who felt greater dissatisfaction with their physical appearance were more likely to list factors such as appearance or weight as their reasoning for exercise rather than for health …

The Effects Of Ethnicity And Socioeconomic Status On Anxiety Prevalence And Treatment, Brianna Liberman

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

With the growing rise of anxiety disorders, psychosocial factors including ethnicity and socioeconomic status may be contributing to diagnostic disparities among different groups. The primary explanation for this trend has been income and ethnic differences. While previous research has followed the trends of income levels and mental health disorders, few studies have delved further into the influential nature of psychosocial factors as it relates specifically to anxiety. Rather, studies have focused on how psychosocial factors such as SES, mitigate mental health development overall. Data was collected to determine what role ethnicity, income, and parental marriage, play in the development of …

Examining Race And Anxiety Sensitivity As Predictors Of Electronic Cigarette Use And Dependence, Carson Schmitz

Honors Theses

Electronic Cigarettes (e-cigarettes) have gained popularity among U.S. adults with rates of use significantly increasing over the past decade. As such, the current literature has begun to explore factors associated with e-cigarette use in significantly affected populations. Anxiety sensitivity (AS), the fear of the sensations associated with the experience of anxiety, is a known transdiagnostic risk factor for tobacco use. Additionally, higher AS has been shown to be associated with higher levels of e-cigarette use, greater perceived benefits of use, greater positive outcome expectancies, greater perceived risks of use, more quit attempts, and more difficulty quitting. Further, preliminary research focusing …

Barriers To Careers: How Self-Efficacy Impacts Student Career Readiness, Brandon Goncalves

Honors Program Theses and Projects

This paper explores how known career barriers such as gender, age, and ethnicity are impacting career readiness during the pandemic. Despite these barriers being significant, participants feel that their most challenging barrier currently is the global pandemic. Self-efficacy was measured to investigate its impact on future career outlook. Those with higher self-efficacy scores were more confident and optimistic for their future than those with lower scores.

An Assessment Of The Economic Conditions In The City Of Battle Creek, Kathleen Bolter, Jim Robey, Gerrit Anderson

Reports

The City of Battle Creek offers current and future residents many benefits including a lower cost of living, growing health care and manufacturing sectors, and relatively high wages for the region. At the same time, the City of Battle Creek, like many small-sized midwestern cities, faces many challenges. Its workforce is shrinking and aging. Residents lack the educational attainment needed to compete in the twenty-first-century economy. And, economic, social, racial, and ethnic divisions exist within the city. Together, these issues could risk the ability of the City of Battle Creek to reach a new level of competitiveness and attract new …

Testimonio And Counterstorytelling By Immigrant-Origin Children And Youth: Insights That Amplify Immigrant Subjectivities, Ariana Mangual Figueroa, Wendy Barrales

Publications and Research

This article seeks to amplify our scholarly view of immigrant identity by centering the first-person narratives of immigrant-origin children and youth. Our theoretical and methodological framework centers on testimonio—a narrative practice popularized in Latin American social movements in which an individual recounts a lived experience that is intended to be representative of a collective struggle. Our goal is to foreground first-person narratives of childhood as told by immigrant-origin children and youth in order to gain insight into what they believe we should know about them. We argue for the power of testimonio to communicate both extraordinary hardship and everyday experiences …

Socioeconomic Status And Ethnicity As Predictors Of Childhood Career Aspirations, Sydney Saint-Jean

Honors Theses

Beginning at an early age, children discuss what they want to be when they grow up. This is known as their career aspirations. There are multiple factors that influence the career aspirations of children. Some of which includes familial income level, grade level and ethnicity. Although studies suggest that there is a relationship between income level and career aspirations, there is a gap in the literature when examining the relationships between socioeconomic status, ethnicity, grade level, and their effects on the career aspirations of children. This study explores this multi-level relationship on what a child wants to be when they …

Using True Experiments To Study Culture: Manipulations, Measurement Issues, And The Question Of Appropriate Control Groups, Christine Ma-Kellams

Faculty Research, Scholarly, and Creative Activity

Social group memberships are primarily studied in quasi-experimental contexts, but how can culture, class and gender be manipulated in true experimental designs? This review highlights the different empirical strategies that can be used to manipulate “culture” as it relates to race/ethnicity (activation of thinking styles, language, and priming of cultural constructs), class (social standing, group status, or perceived social status), and gender (role salience, gender identity, sex hormone administration). I review measurement issues related to manipulation checks and the problem of what construct is tapped by the manipulation, appropriate control groups, and intersectional identities or group memberships.