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A Mentor Training Module Designed To Build Resiliency For Homeless Emerging Adults, Courtney J. Edwards

Master's Theses and Capstones

Homelessness in emerging adulthood is a problem that potentially creates a lifetime of extreme poverty and limits the ability to thrive in adulthood. The literature demonstrates a need for programs specific to the homeless emerging adult population. A mentoring program is beneficial because the relationship between the mentor and mentee can offset developmental and psychosocial shortfalls that impede the individual's transition to adulthood. The homeless emerging adult needs a sense of belonging and positive role models. The theories of Maslow and Bandura therefore become the foundation of the mentoring training manual. The Walk with Me mentoring program manual and training …

Dominance In A Dating Relationship And Violence Approval As Partial Mediating Factors Between Violent Socialization And Perpetrating Dating Partner Violence, Thomas Lopez

Master's Theses and Capstones

This study investigated the possible mediating relationships between experiencing corporal punishment and partner violence perpetration and witnessing parental violence and partner violence perpetration. The sample used was 14,252 university students in 32 nations who participated in the International Dating Violence Study. For both men and women, self-dominance partly mediated the relationships between corporal punishment and perpetrating minor assault and corporal punishment and perpetrating severe assault. For men and women self-dominance mediated the relationships between witnessing parental violence and perpetrating minor assault and witnessing parental violence and perpetrating both types of assault for males and females. Violence approval did not partly …

An Exploratory Approach To Social Impact Assessment Of Public Policy Decisions: Multiple Stakeholders Perspectives On The Social Impact Of Overfishing In New England Groundfisheries In The 1990s, Fabienne Lord

Doctoral Dissertations

This thesis seeks to understand how stakeholders' perspectives and understanding of social impacts influence decision processes. Understanding stakeholders' comprehension of social impacts provides insight as to how they weigh these impacts against others when making decisions. Moreover, the way stakeholders influence, or are influenced by, management decisions provides information on the use and development of methodologies successful in assessing social impacts and communicating the results. Built on this information, the main objective is to explore and develop a Social Impact Assessment (SIA) approach that could capture and integrate multiple stakeholders' perspectives in predicting impacts from ongoing, renewable resource management actions. …

The Implications Of Socioeconomic Status And A Usual Source Of Care For The Health And Health Care Experiences Of Elders With Chronic Illnesses, Michelle L. Stransky

Doctoral Dissertations

Recently developed models of health care provision have promoted the relationship between providers and patient for improving care continuity and coordination. This may be especially important for the growing population of elders, who often have fragmented care because of multiple chronic illnesses. Previous research shows that elders who have a usual source of care (USC) have better health and health care experiences than other elders. However, research has rarely considered whether the benefits of USCs may be affected by the elder's socioeconomic status (SES), their levels of chronic illness, or various provider characteristics.

This dissertation utilizes the 2007 Medicare Current …

Sex, Infection, And Trust: Condom Use Among Gay Men And Their Perceptions Of Hiv, Michael Jeffrey Staley

Master's Theses and Capstones

Unprotected anal intercourse among gay men remains high, despite the well-known fact that HIV/AIDS still disproportionately affects men who have sex with men (MSM). This qualitative, exploratory study seeks to understand the meanings and motivations of gay men's condom use and non-use. I observed three organizations that center on gay identities in the spring and fall of 2010 and in the spring of 2011. Additionally, using a semi-structured format, I interviewed 19 gay or bisexual men between the ages of 19 and 39. Condom non-use was high; 16 men reported not using a condom in their sexually active lifetime. Three …

Wage Employment, Traditional Subsistence, And Aspirations Among Inupiat And Yup'ik In The Mixed Economy Of Northwest Alaska, Catherine Turcotte-Seabury

Doctoral Dissertations

This project identifies, investigates, and analyzes factors contributing to the maintenance of a mixed economy in villages and regional centers largely inhabited by Inupiat and Yup'ik in three regions of Northwest Alaska. By examining employment and subsistence patterns, desires for relocation, and employment and subsistence aspirations, this research will contribute to the understanding of work (both traditional and modern), culture, and population shift within indigenous, Arctic populations.

The Survey of Living Conditions in the Arctic (SLiCA) is used in conjunction with aggregate demographic data from the Arctic Observation Network Social Indicators Project (AON-SIP) and interviews of residents in the Northwest …

Raping The Raced Body: Trauma In Asian North American Women's Literature, Amy Lillian Manning

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines the representation of racial and sexual traumas in short fiction and novels by Asian American women writing post-WWII to the present. The central focus of this project is on Asian American literary representations of the lingering effects of physical, racial, and sexual traumas to Asian American women, specifically the nuances of narrating traumatic experiences. Each chapter explores various literary representations of post-traumatic psychological states of unrest, instability, and incoherence. Most importantly, this study examines the frequently simultaneous narrations of sexual trauma and racial awareness, of how personal narratives of trauma against the physical body become entangled with …

"If We Want An Education, We Want An Education It's Our Choice": How Four Youth At Risk Of Dropping Out Of High School Experienced Social Capital, Joanne Mcfarland Malloy

Doctoral Dissertations

Youth who are at risk of dropping out of high school are often challenged by significant emotional and behavioral support needs, and are typically disengaged from the educational process and the social networks that can help them succeed in their homes, in school, and in their communities. This research project investigated the experiences of four youth, two females and two males, who were at significant risk of dropping out of high school as they were engaged in a supportive intervention designed to build skills in self-determination, school-to-adult life transition planning, and leveraging social resources. Using social capital as a sensitizing …

Decoding Minority Student Retention: An Investigation Of Student Experiences And Institutional Characteristics, Stephanie S. Bramlett

Doctoral Dissertations

This study seeks to explain factors that contribute to the retention of black and Hispanic students from their first year through graduation at colleges and universities in the United States. Other studies have investigated the experiences of minority college students (Massey et al. 2006, Steele 1999, and Bowen and Bok 1998) and have focused primarily on student experiences. Using Bourdieu's (1973) conceptualization of capital as the theoretical backdrop, this study is a preliminary investigation of how student experiences and institutional characteristics influence college student graduation.

The study uses data from both the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshmen and the 2008 …

How Age And Religiosity Affect Forgiving Others, Andrew Schaefer

Master's Theses and Capstones

Using data from the General Social Survey (1998), Robert Wuthnow's Forgiveness Survey (1999), and ten in-depth interviews of members of an evangelical church (2010--11), I investigate three research questions: (1) How are age and religiosity related to people's attitudes toward forgiving others? (2) Do age and religiosity have the same effect on people's forgiving behaviors? (3) How do respondents' accounts of their own experiences forgiving others help explain and contribute to answers of the first two questions? I found that those with the highest levels of religiosity were most likely to have positive attitudes toward forgiving and to have engaged …

Outreach And Citizen Engagement In The Winnicut River Watershed: A Participatory Action Study, Jillan Scahill Farrell

Master's Theses and Capstones

Recently, citizen initiated watershed management has seen a rise in popularity. Citizen watershed groups have been created across the country especially in New England. These groups advocate for protections and responsible watershed-wide management. Each watershed contains a certain set of unique ecological, social, regulatory and problem situations and therefore each watershed organization requires a full mapping process of the policy and social process as well as the ecological and problem situation before engaging the citizens. This research explores the Winnicut River watershed in southeastern New Hampshire. Covering three communities and representing a subwatershed of the Great Bay coastal watershed this …

New Media Use And Rural Youth Substance Use, William Meub

Master's Theses and Capstones

Data from the Coos county youth survey is used to examine new media use habits and explore the relationship between new media use and substance use among two cohorts of rural youth (N = 657). Specifically, I present descriptive information on new media usage, examine whether new media use is related to substance use and explore a possible moderation relationship between substance use and negative substance-use-related behavioral outcomes. Older adolescents reported more new media use than younger adolescents but there was no evidence of sex differences in usage. Greater new media use was found to be related to greater substance …

Rape In Prison: A Hidden Epidemic, Mark L. Wefers

Master's Theses and Capstones

America's prisons are filled. The war on crime has created a bulging prison system. Inside the jails and prisons, crime -- especially rape -- occurs every day. Traditionally, the rape of prisoners in the American prison system was either ignored or the subject of bad jokes. Recently, serious inquiry has begun into the incidence of sexual assault behind prison walls. This study examines prison rape. Using data generated as a result of the Prison Rape Elimination Act, along with statistics from national databases and testimony from victims of prison rape and their advocates, this study suggests that the incidence of …

The Foster Parent Experience Of Attachment, Taylor Cohen

Master's Theses and Capstones

This study explores the attachment experience of foster parents. The researcher used a qualitative research framework to explore what 10 foster parents experienced in regards to attachment with their foster children. Based on the data and content analysis, a foster parent ecology emerged showing that the foster parent/child attachment relationship is affected by doctors, therapists, social workers, case workers, other foster parents, and the biological parents. The temporary nature of foster care and the goal of reunification of child to biological parent also affected the attachment relationship between foster parent and foster child.

The Needs Of Rural Homeless Families In Grafton County, New Hampshire: A Qualitative Inquiry, Pamela B. Thyng

Master's Theses and Capstones

This study explored the experiences of homeless families in the rural area of Grafton County in New Hampshire. In the literature review there is evidence that the needs of homeless people in rural areas are unique. Because of the unique needs of this population the service providers face different obstacles than their counterparts in urban areas. The researcher interviewed (N=7) homeless family members living in, or previously living in, a shelter as well as county government officials in the region. Through the use of a semi-structured interview and a grounded theory approach to the analysis of the data several themes …

Net Resiliency: A Study Of Risk And Protective Factors In Single And Two-Parent Familes, Chad E. Depasquale

Master's Theses and Capstones

The main goal of this study was to discover how family makeup affects net resiliency scores of children. This quantitative study uses Two-Tailed t-tests, and Pearson correlation to uncover any relationships between net resiliency and living in a single or two-parent household. A sample of 91 children ranging from eleven to eighteen years old was utilized for the study's data collection. Their net resiliency scores, risk factors, protective factors, and family makeup were analyzed to discover any potential relationships between them. The analysis of these factors showed children living in single-parent families have: lower net resiliency scores, fewer protective factors, …

The Color Of Labor: The Changing Racial And Spatial Distribution Of Middle-Skill Employment, Justin R. Young

Master's Theses and Capstones

Research regarding the growing gap between rich and poor has not wholly considered the dissolution of America's middle-skill jobs (occupations that require training/education beyond the high-school level, but less than a four-year degree). I draw on data from the CPS (1990 to 2009) to uncover the extent to which low, middle, and high-skill employment are distributed among white and nonwhite workers in rural, suburban and urban regions, and how this distribution has changed since 1990. Blacks and Hispanics remain overrepresented in low-skill employment and underrepresented in high-skill labor, although blacks made the most significant percentage gains in high-skill employment since …