Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Racial Domination Through The Grey Areas: The Categorization Of Mixed-Race In The United States And Brazil, Arman Luczkow

Honors Papers

A historical comparison of mixed-race categories in the United States and Brazil, analyzing the influence of governments and political groups.

From Moral Panic To Permanent War: Rhetoric And The Road To Invading Iraq, Kai Philippe

Honors Papers

This thesis seeks to understand the conditions in the United States post-9/11 that enabled the Bush administration to pursue a wide-ranging and all-encompassing “War on Terror,” with substantial support from the general public. I am principally focused on two significant facets of the War on Terror: the invasion of Iraq and the establishment of a permanent security state (and the interrelated creation of a new state of exception). I ask why the George W. Bush administration was so successful in generating support for both the invasion and occupation of Iraq, and for policies that violated fundamental civil liberties; I argue …

The Abortion Burden: Examining Abortion Access, Undue Burden And Supreme Court Rulings In The United States, Tyler E. Sloan

Honors Papers

This thesis’s driving argument is that the Court’s shift from focusing on analyzing abortion cases with strict scrutiny to using the undue burden standard allows states to create legally permissible loopholes that restrict the fundamental right to abortion access. These provisions disproportionately affect low-income women, the majority of whom are women of color in the United States. Conservative state legislatures take drastic measures to prevent abortions from occurring since Roe still holds, but instead of stopping abortions altogether these policies simply make it difficult for the most vulnerable communities to terminate unwanted pregnancies. Recall the three most commonly cited reasons …

Age Of Immigration And Adult Labor Market Outcomes: Childhood Environment In The Country Of Origin Matters, Aaron Watson Mccartney

Honors Papers

This paper builds on previous studies that have examined the effect of age of immigration on adult labor market outcomes by considering the potential impact of the childhood environment in the country of origin. 2000 United States Census data and historical child mortality data is used to quantify the impact of the childhood environment in the country of origin on the effect of age of immigration on adult labor market outcomes. Results from children who immigrated to the United States between ages zero and ten indicate that the impact of age of immigration on adult labor market outcomes is more …

The Language Of Nation: Multiculturalism, Nationalism And Language Policy In The United States And Canada, Laura Blum-Smith

Honors Papers

This thesis will examine the ways in which the national character of these two countries interacts with their histories of immigration and settlement. It will also examine the histories of language policy and debate in the two countries. I consider histories of immigration, nationalism, and language policy for each country, beginning with the United States and then Canada, and then examine the interaction between these factors within each nation. Finally, I compare and contrast the experiences of the US and Canada, examining their similarities and differences with respect to their experiences of the interplay between immigration, nationalism, and language. Benedict …

Cost Benefit Analysis Of Wind Turbine Investment In Oberlin, Ohio, Saul Domingo Flores

Honors Papers

As concern over global climate change and fears of rising energy costs permeate our collective and individual decision making, more and more private institutions are seeking out innovative and feasible solutions to meet these issues. Many colleges and universities throughout the United States have been among the first private and public institutions to dedicate themselves to positions of climate neutrality and have begun to incorporate the ethics of conservation and commitment to environmental sustainability into their primary objectives. To date nearly five hundred institutions of higher education have signed the American College and Universities Climate Change Commitment, pledging to take …

Post Merger Performances In Japan, Mami Suzuki

Honors Papers

Mergers and acquisitions are relatively new phenomena in the Japanese market. The total number M & A transactions per year has increased from approximately 500 to 1,752 between 1995 and 2002. MergerStat records 3,510 and 7,411 transactions in the U.S. for the equivalent years. The percentage of M & A transactions per number of business entities was 0.03% for Japan in 2001 and 0.1% for the U.S. in 2002. As illustrated through the figures, the frequency of M&A in Japan is considerably lower relative to the U.S., but proliferation of transactions is evident as well. Post-merger performances of firms in …

Yoga 'Holistic' Exercise In Ohio, Theresa Schmidt

Honors Papers

Yoga is depicted in U.S. popular culture as the sacred practice of an ancient tradition, guaranteed to initiate the western participant into the secrets of health and well being, i.e. a low-impact exercise regimen. However, the yoga that is practiced in the U.S. is often removed from its actual history. The physical practices are regularly isolated from the holistic philosophy and come to be understood as the entirety of yoga and marketed as a "spiritual" form of exercise. This paper will explore literature relevant to these themes and examine the reasons for yoga's popularity and the manner in which it …

Shaping The Thin Blue Line: American Police Reform From The London Model To Community Policing, Philip Rosenbloom

Honors Papers

American interpretations of the police officer's role in our society span the distance between two distinct and opposite poles. On the one hand, many Americans, especially those living in middle or upper class, non-urban, predominantly white areas, believe that a police officer is a hero, "a courageous public servant [and] a defender of life and property." If they are victimized in some way, they believe they can call the police, and that the police will come to their aid. There is however, a considerable segment of our society, often those living in poor, urban, non-white areas, that understands police officers …

The Us School Breakfast Program: Short- And Long-Term Academic Effects, Chris Rohlfs

Honors Papers

This paper evaluates short- and long-term academic effects of the US School Breakfast Program (SBP). The paper divides into four sections: an introduction (page 4), a literature review (page 11), a statistical model (page 31), and an empirical model (page 38). In the first section, we cover general facts and details about the SBP. In the second section, we first review literature relevant to the SBP (supply, demand, and short-term effects studies). Next, we explore studies of the long-term effects of schooling and of school quality. Many of the techniques and information from these studies relate to our discussion of …

Viability Of Traditional Banking Services: Evidence From The Regional Level U.S. Banking Industry, Sofia Xinchen Lou

Honors Papers

My study focuses on testing the conduct of banks in their traditional activities, loans and demand deposits provision. The twenty-one year period runs from 1972 to 1992. A relatively recent econometric model is employed. The model takes a set of two-equation system that contains one demand function and one reduced-form supply equation. A parameter that references the deviation in the conduct of banks from the competitive equilibrium level can be estimated using the model. When the parameter has a value that is not significantly different from 0, banks' conduct is said to be competitive. A positive value indicates market power …

State Anti-Smoking Legislation And The Demand For Cigarettes, Jean Mcintire

Honors Papers

This paper evaluates the effects of anti-smoking legislation on cigarette sales across the fifty states for the years 1975 through 1990. The relevance of this issue can be entertained from several perspectives as it pertains to both smokers and non-smokers contrasting the right to smoke with the right to breathe clean air. Anti-smoking legislation was initiated from early on in our country's legal history, not as a method of protecting non-smokers from the externalities imposed upon them by smokers with respect to their right to clean air, but rather in light of smoking's inherent fire hazards. The most significant development …

Kendal At Oberlin: An Examination Of Desires, Expectations, And Concerns Of Residents And Management And Staff In The Formation And Development Of A New Continuing Care Retirement Community, Megan A. Schulte

Honors Papers

Due to changing demographics in the United States' elderly population,adequate senior housing is becoming a major concern for an increasing number of Americans. Issues and concerns of housing are related to a multitude of issues surrounding aging including the retention of one's independence and adaptation to age-related changes, the physical, the cognitive, the environmental. One of the most recent developments in senior housing is the continuing care retirement community (CCRC). This research focuses on Kendal at Oberlin, a newly constructed CCRC in Oberlin, Ohio.

Methodologically, data were gathered with resident-targeted and management and staff-targeted surveys. Research goals include delineating resident …

All Work: An Evaluation Of Worker's Attitudes, Worker's Behavior And Productivity In The U.S. Automobile Industry, Todd M.R. Baker

Honors Papers

The American automobile industry has become extremely sensitive to the increased number of Japanese cars and plants in the United States. Some parties believe that in order to operate competitively in the future labor and management must continue to find ways to work together and improve relations. Irving Bluestone, a former labor leader, believes that humanistic relations between the two parties are essential to the welfare of everyone involved. Joint efforts between the workers and management need to be continued and expanded. Both sides can benefit from such cooperation.

Devaluation, Short-Run Supply Response, And The J-Curve, Alexander L. Brown

Honors Papers

This paper will attempt to empirically illustrate the contribution of short-run supply adjustment to the U.S. J-curve. I plan to study, on the major industry division level (2 digit SIC), 15 manufacturing sectors of the united states. Their supply movements will be calculated in terms of total short-run adjustment. These statistics will then be compared to the trade balance (J-curve) for the U.S. to see if the supply movements of U.S. manufacturers can explain the continued drop in U.S. international trade. If the theory is supported few industries will adjust quickly in the short-run, reflecting the slow adjustment of aggregate …

The Presidential Business Cycle In The U.S.: A Theoretical And Empirical Examination, Ranjit S. Dighe

Honors Papers

The idea of a politically-motivated business cycle is basically a conspiracy theory: "office-motivated" politicians, seeking to exploit the well-documented relationship between favorable economic news and votes for the incumbent president and his party, manipulate the timing of business cycles for their own electoral gain. This manipulation, theorists maintain, is effected through the use of any of several policy instruments including discretionary federal spending, government transfer payments, and the average tax rate, as well as pressure on the central bank to pursue a more accommodating monetary policy.

Theories of such a cycle seem to fall in and out of favor with …

Extra-Legal Factors In The American Legal System, Peter W. Mayer

Honors Papers

The laws of the United States have been written over time with the intention of providing a framework for fair, legitimate, and uniform legal decisions to be made. Laws attempt to provide national tranquility by providing channels of punishment for those who disobey them. At the same time laws in the United States attempt to avoid any conflict with differing cultural values present in our nation. The laws of the United States are intended to function without regard to the race, sex, or religion of the defendant, complainant, or attorneys involved. Laws themselves cannot help but embody the cultural values …

Public Insurance, Private Insurance, And The Demand For Hospital Care: Implications For Medicare And Private Contracts, Martin Zelder

Honors Papers

The findings of this paper can briefly be summarized. Demand, as measured by hospital admissions rate, is inelastic. Demand, as measured by mean length of stay, is elastic. A given amount of public hospital insurance has a small, but significantly larger effect on demand, by either measure, than an equal amount of private hospital insurance. These estimates can then be applied to several topics. One such topic is the effect of the Reagan Administration's plan to alter the Medicare benefit payment system. A second application measures the welfare loss (Martin Feldstein's phrase) of "excess" hospital insurance coverage, and the gains …

Community Power And Powerless Communities: Two Theories Of Urban Politics, Jonathan Pincus

Honors Papers

I will not attempt to illustrate this point through a comprehensive literature review of urban politics; such an enterprise would most likely yield more reams than results. Instead, I will examine the pro-growth bias of two prominent theories of urban politics; pluralism – as represented by Robert Dahl, Nelson Polsby, Edward C. Banfield and Raymond Wolfinger – and Paul E. Peterson’s most recent work City Limits. These two approaches share fundamental methodological and normative foundations that lead to an emphasis on process over outcomes in city politics.

This emphasis provides a justification for existing political and economic conditions by collapsing …

Women's Liberation: Is It Smashing The Hothouse?, Wendy Tarnoff

Honors Papers

Since this paper has concentrated on the cultural and societal influences on women's roles, and how these affect their criminal behavior, these variables rather than exclusively economic ones, will be presented now in relatively economic homogeneous contexts. The remaining discussion will, therefore, compare the patterns and trends of female criminal behavior in England-Wales and Japan with those in the United States. A final note will be made on some research done by Safilios-Rothschild in Greece concerning socio-cultural changes which have occurred in Greece, and how they have affected the commission of "honor crimes."

A Study Of The Propaganda Of The Anti-Saloon League Of America: A Typical Representative Of "The Pressure Group", George M. Winwood

Honors Papers

Democratic government implies that "the people shall rule." This means if it means anything, that public opinion shall found expression in law. The mechanism by which this takes place seems to me to be one of the basic problems of popular government. Democracy without organization is in conceivable and public opinion that is organized is likely to be evanescent and ineffective--a phantom. In a Greek city-state or in a New England town, the determination of the collective will upon a particular problem will occasion no great difficulty. But direct democracy falls down in the face of increasing numbers. The individual …

The Mexican Colony In South Lorain, Ohio: An Exploratory Study, Robert W. O'Brien

Honors Papers

The object of this thesis is to show the process of adjustment which the Mexican faces when he leaves his less competitive physical and social environment in Mexico and lives in a typical steel city of the Northern section of the United States. This study is sociological, rather than economic in its approach. It is an attempt to get at the way in which these people live, and the attitudes which they have toward themselves and other groups.