Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Exploring The Television Portrayal Of Older People In Hong Kong : A Study Of Two Public Affairs Documentary Series, Caillie Tam

Lingnan Theses

Adopting the contextual social constructionist perspective on social problems, the present study investigates how older people are portrayed in two public affairs television documentaries in Hong Kong over a period of two decades. There were The Hong Kong Connection (produced by the public service broadcaster, Radio Television Hong Kong); and Chasing Current Affairs (produced by a commercial broadcaster, Asia Television Limited). A mixture of research designs was employed in the analysis, namely: (1) content analysis on the documentary episodes, (2) reviews of government documents and (3) in-depth interviews with social workers and the staff engaged in documentary episode productions. A …

Risk Culture Of Late Modernity? : Mass Tutoring Enrolment Of Hong Kong's Senior Secondary Students, Cheuk Wai, Jeffrey Cheung

Lingnan Theses

Mass tutoring on senior secondary curricula, with specific focus on examination syllabi and techniques, has expanded rapidly in Hong Kong in the recent decade. Through semi-structured in-depth interviews, conducted in summer 2007, with 20 certificate level (Secondary 4 and 5) and 21 advanced level (Secondary 6 and 7) students with various level of involvement in mass tutoring, this study discovered:

(1) Risk awareness and future-oriented mentality: Students expected that mass tutoring could help improve their performance in public examinations, and could secure good grades. To them, better grades mean higher chance to get a recognized qualification, fulfil their career aspiration, …

The Security Dilemma In Sino-Japanese Relations, Yu Pan Lee

Lingnan Theses

Even though economic relations between China and Japan have improved in recent decades, their security relations raise the prospect of clashes due to the perceived incompatibility of their interests, as manifested for example in territorial claims and rivalry for energy resources. This thesis analyzes the two states’ security relations using the “security-dilemma” and “constructivist theories” of international relations.

The security dilemma is a condition in which states’ attempts to increase their own security, out of the mutual fear and suspicion, results a decrease in security for all. The constructivist theories suggest that the identities of actors, social norms, states’ interests …

Decomposition Of Changes In Hong Kong Wage Dispersion Since 1980s : A Distributional Approach, Kai Wai Huang

Lingnan Theses

Wage dispersion is one of the social and economic issues arousing public concern in Hong Kong. There are many studies exploring the possible causes and changes in wage dispersion. They often focus on the study of summary measures such as Gini and Theil indexes, or adopt OLS-based regression approach. In foreign studies on wage dispersion, Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition, originated from Oaxaca (1974) and Blinder (1973), is a common method of decomposing changes or differences in mean wages between two groups into wage structure effect and composition effect, and then further decomposing the two effects into contributions of each control variable. Nevertheless, …

Beyond Public Health : The Cultural Politics Of Tobacco Control In Hong Kong, Wai Yin Chan

Lingnan Theses

This work provides cultural and political explanations on how and why cigarette smoking has increasingly become an object of intolerance and control in Hong Kong. Since the 1980s, the smoking population has been falling. Smoking behavior, sales and promotion of cigarette products have been under close surveillance by the government, medical experts and society at large. Cigarette smoking, as well as smokers, has increasingly been rejected and demonized in the public discourse. What are the conditions that make the growing intolerant discourses and practices against cigarette smoking possible and dominant? Why and how has the tobacco control campaign become prevalent …

Queering Sex Machines : The Re-Articulation Of Non-Normative Sexualities And Technosexual Bodies, Hok Bun, Isaac Leung

Lingnan Theses

From the simple electronic vibrator to the complex assemblages of cybersex, sex and technology have always intersected. The dynamic relations between sexuality and technology are constantly changing along with the ways in which human beings achieve psychological and bodily pleasure through these devices. Sex machine, a term that denotes an automated device that can assist human in the pursuits of sex, has been broadly defined as therapeutic and pleasure machines in the West. Large numbers of sex machines have been documented in Europe and America starting from the nineteenth century, and were widely produced and utilized by medical practitioners, sex …

Competition And Tax Evasion : A Cross Country Study, Yiqun Wang

Lingnan Theses

This paper investigates the determinants of informality (tax evasion in particular) utilizing rich cross-country data of firm-level survey from the World Bank, and hypothesizing that competition is a significant factor determining tax evasion behaviors. Competition pressure is a key stimulus to induce questionable manipulations of tax reporting behaviors. However its effect works at a decreasing speed. It is also hypothesized that business obstacles facing firms such as tax administration and corruption play significant roles in explaining tax evasion. This paper further hypothesizes that firm characteristics such as size, age, ownership are important evasion determinants. Empirical results are found supporting these …

America New China Policy : The Hedgagement Approach, Cheong Wai Yuen

Lingnan Theses

In the past few decades, the rise of China has shifted the political landscape in the Asia Pacific region. China has succeeded in economic development since the reform in 1979. It is transforming its growing economic strength into military power by substantially increasing military expenditure. According to the estimation of Global Trends 2025, by 2025 China will be the second largest economic and military power if current trend persists. The emergence of China has inevitably altered its international role when it is becoming the great power. With increasing economic interdependence and the anti-terrorism, the Sino-U.S. relations have become more complicated …

Negotiation In Cross-Cultural Marriages : An Exploratory Qualitative Study Among Middle Class Professionals In Hong Kong, Pui Kwan Man

Lingnan Theses

This thesis attempts to focus on families and their children (if any) in cross-cultural marriages. These families potentially face extra stress and strains in addition to those which all families face. As a result of recent social and economic changes, certain roles such as those of the breadwinner and caregiver, traditionally male-female roles, may be becoming more interchangeable. Cross-cultural families’ may have differences in cultural backgrounds, attitudes and expectations, as well as potential support networks, so the research will investigate whether these sorts of changes place even greater than usual demands on families.

Therefore, it may be important for couples …

Older Persons' Perceptions Of Their Future : A Qualitative Study In Hong Kong, Shuk Ching, Crystal So

Lingnan Theses

This study examines older persons’ hopes, fears and expectations for the future, a topic little explored in Hong Kong. The study of twenty-five people aged 65-85 years adopts a qualitative approach to explore the experiences that shape older persons’ views of their future lives. Three models emerged from the empirical study, namely The Model of Resignation, The Model of Predestination and The Model of Adaptation.

The findings suggest that respondents who had and still have little social support from friends tend to live very much in the present; they do not look forward to the future nor do they have …