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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™
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Articles 1 - 26 of 26
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
An Internal And External Contextual Autoethnography Of A Single Mother's Experience As It Intersects With Misogyny, Patriarchy, And Hegemonic Masculinity, Heidi Sampson
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This dissertation is a contextual autoethnography of my lived experience with stigmatization, stereotypes, and institutional obstructions as a divorced single mother who previously experienced intimate partner violence and was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. The purpose of the study is to shed light on the complexity of the single motherhood experience, both internally and externally. From 2009 to 2019, the institutions I accessed for assistance as a single mother and those I interacted with for my children, my job, my health, and even within the church were unnecessarily burdensome financially, physically, and emotionally. This dissertation takes a contextual look at …
Empowered Presence: Theorizing An Afrocentric Performance Of Leadership By African American Women, Sharon Wamble-King
Empowered Presence: Theorizing An Afrocentric Performance Of Leadership By African American Women, Sharon Wamble-King
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
There is a paucity of theorizing concerning leadership enactments performed by African American women. The performances have been marginalized and obscured within the Western leadership canon as they fall outside its epistemological boundaries; they have also been sidelined within Critical Leadership Studies. This study employed Afrocentricity as a decolonizing paradigm and Africology as the research methodology to describe and define a leadership phenomenon enacted by African American women. Setting aside Western conceptions of leadership, focus groups of African American women examined video excerpts of Africana women’s oral performances through an Africological lens. Participants’ Afrocentric-oriented perceptions sparked collective storytelling and Meaning-Making …
"Because God Said So": A Thematic Analysis Of Why People Denounce Black Greek-Letter Organizations, Mea Ashley
"Because God Said So": A Thematic Analysis Of Why People Denounce Black Greek-Letter Organizations, Mea Ashley
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Today, Black Greek-letter organizations (BGLOs) struggle to use empirical data to address financial burden, elitism, hazing, relevance in social justice issues, and the anti-BGLO movement. The anti-BGLO movement frames this study. The movement stems from beliefs that secret societies, fraternities, and sororities are anti-Christian. Society will continue to question the relevance and importance of BGLOs if they cannot overcome the issues plaguing them. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to ascertain why members are leaving BGLOs, in case the organizations find the anti-BGLO movement to be a threat to organizational vitality. Through thematic analysis, 18 YouTube testimonials from denouncers …
From Me To We: A Phenomenological Inquiry Into Group Beingness, Stacey K. Guenther
From Me To We: A Phenomenological Inquiry Into Group Beingness, Stacey K. Guenther
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
To be human is to be a member of myriad groups. The universality of groups in our lives poses an important area of study for social scientists investigating human flourishing. Additionally, inquiring into the evolutionary potential of groups may begin to inform new ways of addressing the intractable issues we face as a human species. While most empirical studies of groups focus on group performance, or group doingness, this study explored group beingness and the experience of manifesting deep union and oneness, which is an intersubjective phenomenon that has been called coherence. Intersubjective coherence is often written about from a …
A Journey To Finding Space In The Tension: Experience Of Instructors' Relationship With Religion And Spirituality In Doctoral Psychology Programs, Samantha Mcgee
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Religion and spirituality, when viewed through a holistic lens, can reflect important aspects of a person’s identity. It can be a source of well-being and also struggle. The fields of religion, spirituality and psychology have had a history of being polarized, with some efforts to integrate the two fields. Tensions exist at multiple ecological levels around the topic of religion and spirituality, which can make it easier to avoid discussing it in classrooms and therapy rooms. It is important to address and create room for discussion of experiences around religion and spirituality in classrooms that are training psychologists so they …
Adverse Religious Experiences And Lgbtq+ Adults, Alex Fox
Adverse Religious Experiences And Lgbtq+ Adults, Alex Fox
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
The aim of this study is to explore the ways in which LGBTQ+ people are affected by adverse or traumatic experiences related to religion or spirituality. Many LGBTQ+ adults were reared in environments where negative, disaffirming beliefs or teachings about sexual orientation or gender identity were pervasive. This study utilized a mixed-methods approach to data collection and analysis. Participants responded to a brief online survey, the data from which was used for quantitative statistical analysis. Twelve participants were selected at random from a pool of survey volunteers and took part in in-depth interviews regarding adverse religious experiences (AREs). Results of …
Lesbian, Gay, And Bisexual Adults’ Experiences With Supportive Religious Groups, Rachel Grossman
Lesbian, Gay, And Bisexual Adults’ Experiences With Supportive Religious Groups, Rachel Grossman
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This qualitative research study was designed to explore lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) young adults’ views about how being a member of supportive and affirming religious places of worship and social groups influenced their self-acceptance, as well as their ability to integrate their religious and sexual minority identities. In this study, six in-person interviews were completed with participants who (a) were 18-24 years old; (b) identified as lesbian, gay, or bisexual; (c) were members of supportive Jewish and Christian religious groups; and (d) identified as cisgender. The data from the interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis to tell cohesive stories …
Religious Racial Socialization: The Approach Of A Black Pastor At An Historic Black Baptist Church In Orange County, California, Shandell S. Maxwell
Religious Racial Socialization: The Approach Of A Black Pastor At An Historic Black Baptist Church In Orange County, California, Shandell S. Maxwell
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This case study explored and developed the religious racial socialization (RRS) approach of a Black Baptist pastor in Orange County, California. The aim was to assess how the pastor’s direct messages about race influenced and transformed members’ racial and social views and actions and examined the message alignment between what the pastor said and what church members and the leadership team heard. This study took a multimethod exploratory approach, examining multiple sources of data gathered from a Likert scale members’ survey, leadership team interviews, and archival materials. To support triangulation of the data, a word query and emergent thematic analysis …
Shifting Paradigms: Using Action Research To Redefine Engagement In Faith Formation In Unitarian Universalism, Amy Huntereece
Shifting Paradigms: Using Action Research To Redefine Engagement In Faith Formation In Unitarian Universalism, Amy Huntereece
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
The issues that this research addressed were the changes related to engagement in religious education (RE) in the Unitarian Universalist (UU) church in the past several decades. To address this problem, the purpose of this research was to innovatively problem-solve with other religious professionals and consider how to redefine engagement to support families in their faith formation. The research aims to answer the question: How could UU RE professionals more effectively engage families in faith formation opportunities designed to meet the desired outcomes of RE parents/caregivers? To gather data, interviews with seven Millennial and Generation X parents/caregivers from the Baja …
Womanists Leading White People In Intergroup Dialogue To End Anti-Black Racism: An Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis, Tawana Angela Davis
Womanists Leading White People In Intergroup Dialogue To End Anti-Black Racism: An Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis, Tawana Angela Davis
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Womanism is a term curated by Alice Walker (2004) that centers Black women’s lived experiences, past and present, encouraging Black women to no longer look to others for their liberation (Floyd-Thomas, 2006). Soul 2 Soul Sister’s Facing Racism program is facilitated by Womanist instructors, who work with groups of mostly white people to address anti-Black racism. This qualitative study explored the experiences of white participants who took part in this program, Facing Racism, which holds Womanism as its central guiding principle. Although pre- and post-surveys were routinely conducted over the years about participants’ experiences with Facing Racism, this study sought …
Perspectives From The Pew: A Phenomenological Exploration Of Congregants' Experiences Of Change In Their Churches, Courtny Davis Olds
Perspectives From The Pew: A Phenomenological Exploration Of Congregants' Experiences Of Change In Their Churches, Courtny Davis Olds
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Christian churches in the United States are notoriously resistant to change, whether in regard to leadership, worship style, church governance, positions on social issues, or myriad other aspects of congregational life. Yet the ability to navigate change successfully is vitally important to churches’ continued survival and renewed relevance. A particular body of literature, consisting of both scholarly and practitioner-oriented works, has attempted to address the necessity and the challenges of change in a church context. However, the literature is largely silent when it comes to the perspectives of those who are most impacted by congregational change: namely, the congregants themselves. …
Persistence Of Jewish-Muslim Reconciliatory Activism In The Face Of Threats And “Terrorism” (Real And Perceived) From All Sides, Micah B.D.C. Naziri
Persistence Of Jewish-Muslim Reconciliatory Activism In The Face Of Threats And “Terrorism” (Real And Perceived) From All Sides, Micah B.D.C. Naziri
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This dissertation concerns how Jewish-Muslim and Israel-Palestine grassroots activism can persist in the face of threats to the safety, freedom, lives, or even simply the income and employment of those engaged in acts of sustained resistance. At the heart of the study are the experiences of participants in the Hashlamah Project, an inter-religious collaboration project, involving Jews and Muslims. Across chapters and even nations, chapters of this organization faced similar threats and found universally-applicable solutions emerging for confronting those threats and persisting in the face of them. This raised the question of whether revolutionaries and activists in general can persevere …
The Role Of The Black Church In Addressing Collateral Damage From The U.S. War On Drugs, Donald L. Perryman
The Role Of The Black Church In Addressing Collateral Damage From The U.S. War On Drugs, Donald L. Perryman
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This research is a qualitative examination of African American pastors from urban communities who address the needs of congregants and/or local communities affected directly, or indirectly by mass incarceration. The Black Church, because of its unique sociocultural location and historic role as resource for Black social and economic problems, must help supply the answers to the devastating collateral damage of mass incarceration that primarily affect children and families. The study sets out to understand urban pastors’ perceptions of the role of the Church in the post mass incarceration era. Specifically, the study examines the unique contributions of the African American …
The Growing Church: A Case Study In Leadership For Change, Courtny Davis Olds
The Growing Church: A Case Study In Leadership For Change, Courtny Davis Olds
Student Articles, Chapters, Presentations, Learning Objects
This article presents a case study of one church that has overcome the deep-seated resistance to change found in most congregations. The church’s story is told; an analysis of key themes is grounded in relevant scholarship; and insights are drawn that could inform leadership for change in other congregational settings. In keeping with the church’s name, steps associated with the cultivation of plants are used to structure the article.
Spiritual Journeys: A Study Of Ifá /Òrìṣà Practitioners In The United States Initiated In Nigeria, Tony Van Der Meer
Spiritual Journeys: A Study Of Ifá /Òrìṣà Practitioners In The United States Initiated In Nigeria, Tony Van Der Meer
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
The purpose of this study is to understand the culture of one of the newest branches of traditional Yorùbá Ifá/Òrìṣà practice in the United States from practitioners born in the United States that were initiated in Nigeria, West Africa.The epistemology of the Ifá/Òrìṣà belief system in the United States has been based on the history and influence of Regla de Ocha or Santeria that developed out of Cuban innovation and practice.This is an ethnographic and auto-ethnographic study that pulls from participant observation, field notes, interviews, and photos as data.The central question of this dissertation is what are the challenges and …
The Process Of Resolving Spiritual Struggle Following Adulthood Trauma, Aimee L. Keith
The Process Of Resolving Spiritual Struggle Following Adulthood Trauma, Aimee L. Keith
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Spiritual struggle has been described as a disruption in religious practice and spirituality resulting in questioning beliefs, experiencing discord within religious communities, decreasing spiritual practices, and experiencing painful cognitions such as the belief that one is being punished by God. This study used constructivist grounded theory to explore how women identifying as Protestant Christians at the time of the traumatic event resolve their spiritual struggles. Eleven conceptual categories, which are presented in a stage model, emerged from the data. The stages were Experiencing an Event Discordant with Beliefs, Emotional Reaction (following the traumatic event), Questioning (of beliefs, suffering and identity), …
Racial Integration In One Cumberland Presbyterian Congregation: Intentionality And Reflection In Small Group, Carolyn Smith Goings
Racial Integration In One Cumberland Presbyterian Congregation: Intentionality And Reflection In Small Group, Carolyn Smith Goings
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Negative attitudes toward racial minorities and consequent maltreatment of non-Whites continue to be a crisis in America. The crisis of racism is still realized in phenomena such as residential segregation (Bonilla-Silva, 2014), health disparities (Chae, Nuru-Jeter, & Adler, 2012; Chae, Nuru-Jeter, Francis, & Lincoln, 2011), and in the not-so-uncommon unjust arrests and imprisonment of persons of color (Alexander, 2012). Improvement in race relations through the development of meaningful cross racial relationships in racially integrated settings is one avenue that may lead to reduction of racism (E. Anderson, 2010; Fischer, 2011; Massey & Denton, 1993). Christian congregations are common settings in …
Effects Of Negative Media On Evangelical Christians' Attitudes Toward Evangelism, Linda Hoover
Effects Of Negative Media On Evangelical Christians' Attitudes Toward Evangelism, Linda Hoover
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This study examined how negative media influenced Evangelical Christians and their attitude toward evangelism practices. Using self-questionnaires, participants identified their level of in-group identification and type of internalized motivation for engaging in religious practices. After viewing a negative media clip about the professional football player, Tim Tebow, and his public expression of faith, 412 Evangelical Christians rated their fear of negative evaluation about engaging in evangelism. A control group of 31 participants completed questionnaires but received no media exposure. Consistent with previous research, the current study found that media exposure activated internalized social norms and feelings of oughtness, which were …
Servant Leadership And African American Pastors, Clarence Bunch
Servant Leadership And African American Pastors, Clarence Bunch
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Robert Greenleaf (1977) took a follower’s, rather than a leader-centric, point of view of leadership by describing a leader as one who leads by serving. He identified a leader as one who sets other people’s needs above his or her own. He argued that motivation of leaders must begin with the conscious choice to serve others. Greenleaf’s concept provides the basis for a theoretical model of servant leadership. This dissertation examines the extent to which African American pastors exhibit servant leadership characteristics, using the Servant Leadership Questionnaire (Barbuto & Wheeler, 2006). A sample of 358 African American pastors from 11 …
Laughing Buddhas: The Everyday Embodiment Of Contemplative Leadership, Kim Nolan
Laughing Buddhas: The Everyday Embodiment Of Contemplative Leadership, Kim Nolan
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Many of us struggle to find a theoretical framework within which to approach leadership. We may draw upon personal aspects of spiritual practice, scholarship, and vocational experience with hopes of developing a deeper method of conceptualizing all the elements that comprise relevant and meaningful ways of being and leading in the world. The purpose of this phenomenological study extends the inquiry, examining leadership as a path toward wholeness and investigating the research question – what is called into being for the contemplative leader? The roots of the question originate with the conceptual framework set forth by Kriger and Seng (2005), …
A Search For Home: Navigating Change In Battlestar Galactica, Kimberly S. Yost
A Search For Home: Navigating Change In Battlestar Galactica, Kimberly S. Yost
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This dissertation explores the various ways in which the multiple leaders portrayed in the science fiction television series Battlestar Galactica (2003-2009) navigate extreme conditions of continual change. In addition, the dissertation contains a discussion of the larger narrative themes of love, forgiveness, redemption, and embracing the Other as principles effective leaders must cultivate. Through an interpretation of this specific popular media text, a deeper emotional sensitivity to and understanding of leadership, positive and negative, during extreme crises is gained. Furthermore, the series serves as a vehicle through which viewers can reflect on and engage in their own self-awareness about issues …
An Examination Of American-Born Muslim College Students’ Attitudes Toward Mental Health, Benjamin A. Herzig
An Examination Of American-Born Muslim College Students’ Attitudes Toward Mental Health, Benjamin A. Herzig
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Despite American Muslims’ growing numbers in the United States, their frequent encounters with prejudice, and their increased self-reports of emotional stress, little research has been geared toward understanding American Muslims’ attitudes toward mental health, specifically those born and raised in the United States. On the basis of current demographic trends, it is reasonable to suggest that American-born Muslims represent the future of Islam in the United States. This study examined the mental health attitudes of American-born Muslim college students (N = 184). A primarily quantitative survey approach was employed to address several research hypotheses and questions on the topic of …
From Nominal To Radical Discipleship: One Church’S Approach To Disciple Making, Wayne Berk Walters
From Nominal To Radical Discipleship: One Church’S Approach To Disciple Making, Wayne Berk Walters
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
The majority of mainline denomination churches in America have experienced decline in membership, worship attendance, and vitality for over fifty years. As well, church members’ lifestyles, commitments, and habits tend to be not all that unlike Americans who do not attend church. Many church members live relatively nominal Christian lives when compared to the nature of the Christian life and discipleship described by Jesus in the gospels of the New Testament. This nominal understanding and adoption of the Christian life makes church membership and involvement unnecessary or secondary to the many other demands in modern life. Denominational officials, church pastors, …
Dealing With Suffering: A Comparison Of Religious And Psychological Perspectives, Emily R. Pimpinella
Dealing With Suffering: A Comparison Of Religious And Psychological Perspectives, Emily R. Pimpinella
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
One of the main tasks of psychologists is to help clients deal with suffering. In order to assist the client, a therapist needs to have an understanding of the client’s beliefs about suffering. Due to the importance of religion for much of the general population, and considering how beliefs influence clients when dealing with suffering, it is essential that psychologists be mindful and respectful of religious beliefs in order to provide competent service. In order to do this, therapists need to have knowledge about the religious doctrine that their client observes. Therapists also need to be aware of their own …
Educating Clinical Pastoral Education Supervisors: A Grounded Theory Study Of Supervisory Wisdom, Judith R. Ragsdale
Educating Clinical Pastoral Education Supervisors: A Grounded Theory Study Of Supervisory Wisdom, Judith R. Ragsdale
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) is an 80 year old education modality that provides professional education for students of pastoral care. Supervision is central to the CPE process. Pastoral supervisors in the Association for Clinical Pastoral Education (ACPE) have done little writing about their work educating Students in Supervisory Education (SSEs). The purpose of this dissertation is to identify and interview those practitioners in ACPE who have been identified by their peers as excellent in practice, and to cull their wisdom by listening to and categorizing their experience of supervising SSEs. The research question to the supervisors was: What is your …
Dwelling, Walking, Serving: Organic Preservation Along The Camino De Santiago Pilgrimage Landscape, Mercedes Chamberlain Quesada-Embid
Dwelling, Walking, Serving: Organic Preservation Along The Camino De Santiago Pilgrimage Landscape, Mercedes Chamberlain Quesada-Embid
Antioch University Dissertations & Theses
This study is an exploration of the people and the landscape of the well-known Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route. Although there are many routes that make up the entirety of the pilgrimage, this research is specifically focused on the landscape of the Camino Francés, or French Route, in northern Spain. The path has been written about in many ways and for a myriad of reasons since it became affiliated with the Christian tradition in the early ninth century. This research, however, is different. By way of an environmental history and hermeneutic approach, an investigation of the interrelated and overlapping human …