Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Elder Abuse In Canada: Dimensions And Policy Responses, Taylor Marekovic

Major Papers

Elder abuse and neglect continues to be a gray area when it comes to convicting perpetrators such as family, friends, strangers, and caregivers who commit any form of physical, psychological, financial, neglect, or sexual abuse towards an elder. This is due to the legal definition being vague and non-transparent. The legal and health systems rely on two different definitions of what is deemed to be elder abuse and neglect in Canada when reviewing or assessing allegations of such abuse. Elder abuse and neglect increased throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, during which Ontario and the rest of Canada experienced staffing shortages in …

Housing From A Social Harm Perspective, Addison David Kornel

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

From 2019 to 2022 housing prices in Canada surged. This paper investigates the social consequences of rising prices by considering the exceptional example of Windsor, Ontario. Unlike in most Canadian cities, the “Canadian dream” social narrative of timely and reliable homeownership on the back of local labour wages had survived in Windsor until recently. The latest run-up marked a turning point. Qualitative interviews conducted in early 2022 with both successful and unsuccessful homebuyers in Windsor reveal the centrality of homeownership to the life course and social fabric. Participants articulated long-standing economic and sociological concerns that home value spikes drive wealth …

The Continued Prohibition Of Cannabis & Racism At Canada’S Borders, Dara Vosoughi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Canada is one of the few jurisdictions in the world where cannabis for personal and recreational purposes is legal. Prior to October 17th 2018, the possession of any quantity of cannabis was a criminal offence, making individuals vulnerable to onerous criminal sanctions. The legislative act that resulted in the decriminalization and regulation of cannabis was framed as a means of advancing public health goals and reducing inequalities. Those once engaged in low level cannabis activities were no longer subject to criminal sanctions within Canada. However, the criminal status and practices upholding the prohibition of cannabis continues at Canada’s borders and …

Regulating Unsheltered People In The Public Library, Bailey Trotti

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis focuses on the library as a public space in relation to unsheltered people. The public library is a historically significant institution in the Western world and one of the few remaining public spaces whose occupants do not need purchasing power for temporary tenancy. For unsheltered people, public libraries may provide important resources they do not possess or cannot otherwise access. Yet, despite the importance of libraries to unsheltered people, public libraries have sought to use policies to closely govern and sometimes exclude them in various ways. Drawing on governmentality, sociology of governance, and related literature, the overarching research …

Contact Is A Stronger Predictor Of Attitudes Toward Police Than Race: A State-Of-The-Art Review, Amy Alberton, Kevin M. Gorey

Social Work Publications

Purpose – This scoping review thoroughly scanned research on race, contacts with police and attitudes toward police. An exploratory meta-analysis then assessed the strength of their associations and interaction in Canada and the USA. Key knowledge gaps and specific future research needs, synthetic and primary, were identified. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Design/methodology/approach – A germinal methodological framework for conducting scoping reviews was used (Arksey and O’Malley, 2005). The authors searched for published or unpublished research over the past 15 years and retrieved 33 eligible surveys, 19 of which were included in a sample-weighted meta-analysis.

Findings – The …

Promoting Hiv Testing For Gay And Bisexual Men: An Evaluation Of The 2011-2012 Campaign In Toronto And Ottawa, Barry D. Adam, Sandra Gardner, Carol Major, Diana Campbell, Lucia Light, Jason Globerman

Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology Publications

This paper reports on a social marketing campaign directed toward high-risk men who have sex with men (MSM) in Toronto and Ottawa to: encourage testing for HIV and syphilis; improve knowledge about HIV transmission, seroconversion symptoms, and the HIV window period; and heighten awareness of syphilis transmission and its relationship to facilitating HIV transmission. Evaluation data were collected from a large-scale online pre-and post-campaign survey of sexually active MSM and from laboratory testing data. Men who turned up to be tested also filled out an exit survey. The campaign websites attracted some 15,000 unique visitors, 54% of whom had an …

Hivpositive People's Perspectives On Canadian Criminal Law And Non-Disclosure, Barry D. Adam, Jason Globerman, Richard Elliott, Patrice Corriveau, Ken English, Sean Rourke

Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology Publications

The largest survey to date of people living with HIV regarding attitudes toward criminalization of HIV non-disclosure, this study investigates: sources of legal information available to HIV-positive people; perceptions of how criminal prosecutions and media coverage affect understanding of rights and responsibilities of self and others; and where HIV-positive people themselves stand on the role the criminal justice system should play. While mainstream media constructions of criminal iconography do affect PHA views, those who have higher levels of formal education, are active in the dating scene, and have been living longer with HIV hold less punitive views than those who …

Impacts Of The Criminalization On The Everyday Lives Of People Living In With Hiv In Canada, Barry D. Adam, Richard Elliott, Patrice Corriveau, Ken English

Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology Publications

As part of a study on the social consequences of the criminal justice system on people living with HIV or AIDS (PHAs) in Canada, this article focuses on how heightened public identification of HIV with criminal matters is having wide ranging effects on perceived personal security and in particular on negotiating potential romantic and sexual interactions. As articulated by the Supreme Court of Canada, the courts have been enforcing a requirement that HIV-positive people disclose their sero-status to prospective partners, relying on the notion that “through deterrence it [the Criminal Code] will protect and serve to encourage honesty, frankness and …

Silence, Assent And Hiv Risk, Barry D. Adam, Winston Husbands, James Murray, John Maxwell

Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology Publications

Based on interviews with 34 men, almost all of whom have unprotected sex with men most or all of the time, this paper documents the interactional process, narrative elements, and meaning construction in situations of ‘bareback’ sex. Narratives show the differentiated cultural capital circulating among distinct circuits of gay and bisexual men that define the taken-for-granted rules of conduct for sexual interactions and give rise to high risk situations. Many of the positive men speak of being part of a social environment where ‘everybody knows’ a set of rules whereby sex without condoms can happen as a default circumstance to …

Effects Of The Criminalization Of Hiv Transmission In Cuerrier On Men Reporting Unprotected Sex With Men, Barry D. Adam, Richard Elliott, Winston Husbands, James Murray, John Maxwell

Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminology Publications

This paper reports on the perceptions and practices of men who have frequent unprotected sex with men in a socio-legal environment defined by the 1998 decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Cuerrier. HIV-positive people are increasingly finding themselves in court since Cuerrier and many are trying to take account of legal reasoning in their own conduct. The judicial construction of behaviour likely to transmit HIV relies on a set of presumptions concerning individual responsibility, rational and contractual interaction, and consenting adults that raise a series of ambiguities and uncertainties among HIV-positive people attempting to implement …

Prevalent Low Income Status In Canadian And United States Metropolitan Areas, 1980 And 1990, Kevin M. Gorey

Social Work Publications

As compared to Toronto’s poor people, three to four-fold as many of upstate New York’s poor live in severely impoverished neighborhoods, areas where 40% or more of the residents have annual incomes below the federally established low income or poverty criterion. However, the prevalence of such extremely degraded living conditions increased similarly (two-fold) on both sides of the Canadian-US border during the 1980s. This urban problem, of the concentration of poor people, seems to predominantly be an inner-city problem in the US, whereas it was found to be nearly equivalently extant in the inner-city, mid-suburban and outlying suburban areas of …