Sociology Commons^™

Movement Without Mobility: Adolescent Status Hierarchies And The Contextual Limits Of Cumulative Advantage, Jeffrey A. Smith, Robert Faris

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

This paper develops a theory of interpersonal status hierarchies that builds on and challenges traditional models of cumulative advantage. Cumulative advantage models predict stability in interpersonal status hierarchies, where status is defined by asymmetries in social relationships. According to strict cumulative advantage, initial status differences are exaggerated over time, making upward or downward mobility unlikely. We argue that interpersonal status hierarchies are instead quite fluid, with individuals regularly moving up or down the hierarchy. Individual status gains do not, however, disrupt the status order as the upwardly mobile are often pulled back to their original positions. This drag of the …

Hidden In Plain Sight: Exploring The Vulnerabilities Of Street-Working Boys In Se Asia, Jarrett Davis, Glenn Miles

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

The sexual exploitation of men and boys is often little understood and commonly goes ignored. Internationally, it is said that 1 in 6 boys are sexually abused before reaching adulthood and in some nations the exploitation and abuse of boys far outweighs that of girls. Social and cultural norms often assume men and boys to be inherently strong and/or invulnerable to sexual exploitation; however, research in this area continues to show these assumptions to be false. Because of this lack of awareness, the efforts of the organizations and individuals who work to provide for the needs of male victims are …

Analysis Of Human Trafficking Cases In Rhode Island, 2009-2013, Donna M. Hughes, Rachel Dunham, Faith Skodmin, Lucy Tillman, Jessica Wainfor

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

This presentation is an analysis of seven state and federal cases of human trafficking, including forced labor and sex trafficking, in Rhode Island from 2009 until 2013. In 2009, Rhode Island passed a comprehensive human trafficking law. Since then there have been six cases of sex trafficking and one case of forced labor. Sources for information on the human trafficking cases were police reports, witness statements, court documents and media reports. This presentation will briefly summarize the cases and discuss the similarities and difference among the cases and discuss of some key findings from these cases, which include:
1) Victims …

The Problem Of State Intervention In Post-Abolition Slavery: A Critique Of Consensus, Anthony Talbott, David Watkins

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

Slavery is now illegal by all states and under international law. Contrary to the hopes of abolitionists, this state of affairs has transformed rather than eradicated slavery as an institution. Furthermore, responses by states to post-abolition forms of slavery have often been less than ideal. This paper begins by comparing two state responses to slavery in the early 20th century: the federal peonage trials in Montgomery, Alabama from 1903-1905, and the federal response to an alleged epidemic of “white slavery” from 1909-1910, culminating in the passage of the White Slave-Traffic Act. Taken together, these responses engender pessimism about the state …

Human Trafficking To Northern America: The Balkan Connection, Natalya Timoshkina, Naser Miftari, Antonela Arhin

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

This paper draws on the results of a large multi-method study, which examined human trafficking from the former Eastern Bloc to Northern America (Canada and the United States). The study was conducted in 2011-2013, and funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). The analysis is grounded in the findings from 9 countries of the Balkan region included in the study: Albania, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia. The following data sources were used: (a) national and international reports, media and academic articles, and various documents (in English and official languages …

Human Trafficking, Education And Migration At Ngos In Cambodia And Thailand, Robert Spires, Xinyi Duan

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

This presentation is based on in-progress collaborative research between researcher Dr. Bob Spires and Hong Kong-based NGO Liberty Asia. The research involves interviews and observations conducted at multiple NGOs in Cambodia and Thailand working to address human trafficking and incorporating educational components into their programs. The study uses comparative lenses to examine issues of education and migration in both the Cambodian and Thai context for human trafficking survivors and at-risk populations. The study is interdisciplinary, drawing on the work on human trafficking in several social science fields. The framework for the research is based on Frank Laczko and Elzbieta Gozdziak’s …

Bra’S For A Cause: A Service Learning Project In A Freshman Level Human Trafficking Course, Beth A. Wiersma

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

Women and Children for Sale: The Global Problem of Human Trafficking is a General Studies Portal course for college freshman at a Midwestern university. The students in the course were surveyed the first day of class about why they chose the course, what they hoped to get out of the course, what they believed to be true about human trafficking, and how they learned about human trafficking. During the semester the students planned and carried out a service learning project “Bras for a Cause”. This project involved educating others about human trafficking and collecting bras. The bras are sent overseas …

Attitudes Toward Motherhood Among Sexual Minority Women In The United States, Emily Kazyak, Nicholas Park, Julia Mcquillan, Arthur L. Greil

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

In this article, we use data from the National Survey of Fertility Barriers—a national, population-based telephone survey—to examine how sexual minority women construct and value motherhood. We analyze the small (N = 43) random sample of self-identified sexual minority women using “survey-driven narrative construction,” which entails converting the structured answers and open-ended responses for each respondent into narratives and identifying themes. We focused on both sexual minority women’s desires and intentions to parent and on the importance they place on motherhood. We found that there is considerable variation in this population. Many sexual minority women distinguish between having and raising …

Reconstructing A College Model For Countering Human Trafficking, Ron D. Petitte

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

Assessment is a hallmark of 21st Century academia. Accordingly, the 2013 college model for countering human trafficking² was reviewed and assessed by the author, leading to a restructuring of the model, in order to present developments that have occurred since the October 2013 Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, as well as attempting to engineer a more practical and effective model: There are two areas of research that link directly to the spectre of human trafficking. The first is economics; and, the question that is raised: “Is human trafficking, today, the result of unjust economic …

A Content Analysis Of Backpage.Com Advertisements In Louisville, Kentucky, Theresa C. Hayden

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

Backpage.com and Craigslist are replacing the street corner as a crime source for buying and selling of sex. “To reduce commercial sexual exploitation and enforce existing trafficking laws, communities must first recognize the extent of the problem within their local area (Janson, Mann, Marro, & Matvey, 2013, 99). In a population density study conducted in 15 major U. S. cities, it was found that males over 18 years of age who buy sex online ranged from 0.6% in San Francisco to 21.4% in Houston (Roe-Sepoqitz, Hickle, Gallagher, Smith, & Hedberg, 2013). Researchers in the Greater Cincinnati area found a high …

The Social And Economic Implications Of Human Trafficking In Nigeria: Naptip In Focus, Eunice I. Anuforom

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

Human trafficking is globally recognized as a modern day slavery with multifarious negative socio-economic, legal and health implications. Besides drugs trafficking and gun running, human trafficking has become a lucrative business globally and yields an estimated US$32 million annually. Traffickers trade on human lives, subject them to gory and traumatic experiences in order to make profits. Human trafficking is therefore the worst form of human rights violations and a gender based violence against female who constitute the majority of the victims in the country. Regrettably, Nigeria occupies the ignoble position of a source, transit and destination country for trafficking. In …

The Effect Of Victimization, Mental Health, And Protective Factors On Crime And Illicit Drug Use Among Homeless Young Adults, Kimberly A. Tyler, Lisa Kort-Butler, Alexis Swendener

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Although research has found high rates of child maltreatment, widespread victimization, and other negative outcomes among homeless youth and young adults, resiliency among this population has largely been understudied. Specifically, a gap remains in terms of how protective factors such as self-efficacy, low deviant beliefs, and religiosity operate among homeless youth and young adults. The purpose of the current study is to examine the relationship between various forms of victimization, mental health, and protective factors with property and violent crime and illicit drug use among homeless young adults. Results from regression analyses indicate that running away from home more frequently, …

Yaya: Philippine Domestic Care Workers, The Children They Care For, And The Children They Leave Behind, Maria Rosario De Guzman

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

The domestic and care labor sector is integral to the economic and social fabric of almost every nation. Although there has been increasing attention to the plight and experiences of international migrant workers within this field, less is known about the experiences of rural-to-urban migrants employed in this same sector. This study focuses on “yayas”—domestic workers caring for children in affluent families in the Philippines and draws from fieldwork and interviews conducted in Quezon City. Participants were female “yayas” caring for young children while they themselves were separated from their own offspring, most of whom were left behind in their …

Exploring The Factors That Influence And Motivate Female Students To Enroll And Persist In Collegiate Stem Degree Programs: A Mixed Methods Study, Rosemary L. Edzie

Department of Educational Administration: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Nationally, the need for an increase in interest, enrollment, and degrees awarded from science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) degree programs continues to suffer. While students are enrolling in collegiate STEM degree programs, it is not occurring at a rate that meets the workforce demand. In addition to the concern that there is not a sufficient amount of collegiate STEM majors, there is a concern over too few females enrolling and persisting in collegiate STEM degree programs.

This mixed methods sequential exploratory research study considered the factors that influence and motivate undergraduate female students to enroll and persist in collegiate …

"I Want To Be Brave": A Baseline Study On The Vulnerabilities Of Street-Working Boys In Sihanoukville, Cambodia, Jarrett Davis, Glenn Miles, M’Lop Tapang

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

Focusing on street-working boys in Sihanoukville, this study partnered with social workers and child protection officers from M’lop Tapang (a key social service provider in Sihanoukville) to identify locations where young boys were known to be working along the beaches and within the town center. In recent years, Sihanoukville has become known as a rapidly developing commercial beach area, which has received increasing attention from foreign tourists, backpackers, and ex-patriots. Within this context, it has become a destination for migrant workers from surrounding provinces who have hopes of generating income through selling, begging, and other various means. The study conducted …

Trafficking In Child Labor In Ghana And Senegal, Steven Brandt

Sixth Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Human Trafficking 2014

The goal of this paper is to determine the efficacy of anti-trafficking governance in Senegal and Ghana and what social, political, legal and economic factors work for or against those policies such as: - social policies for and against the growth of the NGO community - enforcement of anti-trafficking laws - economic policies for impoverished urban and rural communities - government rehabilitation policies for minors - federal, state and local corruption - border security/immigration - religious and political freedom This research comprises a comprehensive literature analysis as to the current state of trafficking of minors in Ghana and Senegal. First …

Teaching About Organized Racism, Kathleen Blee, Kelsy Burke

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

The challenges of teaching about organized racism are different than those found in teaching about other aspects of American race relations. On the one hand, it can be quite easy to engage students in the topic of organized racism, at least on a surface level, as the vile propaganda and violent actions of racist groups and movements are sensational and provocative. Students across racial lines, like the general public, for the most part have strong negative opinions about the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis, and racist skinheads and are eager to share these (Nelson et al. 1997; Schuman et al. 1997). …

Rural Latino Adolescent Health: Preliminary Examination Of Health Risks And Cultural Correlates, Timothy D. Nelson, Katherine M. Kidwell, Brian E. Armenta, Lisa J. Crockett, Gustavo Carlo, Les B. Whitbeck

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Latino adolescents living in rural settings may be at increased risk of health problems; however, data describing the health status of this population are limited. This study examined 60 rural Latino adolescents and found high rates of health risk, including at-risk/clinical results for hemoglobin A1C (23.3%), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (55%), systolic blood pressure (21.7%), and overweight/obesity (55%). Time in sedentary behaviors was high and physical activity was limited. Adolescent language use was associated with health risk status, with greater use of English associated with lower risk. Health psychologists could promote improved health by providing health behavior interventions to this underserved …