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Sociology

Honors Theses

Criminology

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Furthering Women In Policing: How A Police Department's Duty Firearm Selection Process May Mitigate The Gender Disparity In Marksmanship, Jenna Prochnau Mar 2022

Furthering Women In Policing: How A Police Department's Duty Firearm Selection Process May Mitigate The Gender Disparity In Marksmanship, Jenna Prochnau

Honors Theses

Previous research has revealed that there are several benefits to increasing the representation of women in law enforcement, including less use of force, increased community trust, and better outcomes for domestic violence and sexual assault victims. While many police departments now recognize these benefits and are aiming to recruit more women, a problem persists because women are less likely to graduate from police academies than their male counterparts. A significant difference has been observed in the area of marksmanship, particularly, with more female recruits failing to meet firearm scoring standards. Currently, very little is known about how police departments select …


Reforming United States Prisons: A Cross-Cultural Analysis, Alex Henkel Oct 2021

Reforming United States Prisons: A Cross-Cultural Analysis, Alex Henkel

Honors Theses

This paper examines the United States prison system and its standing among peer countries, as well as potential reforms to improve this system and its effectiveness. The incarceration statistics of many different countries show that the United States incarcerates significantly more of its population than similar countries. I turn to an examination of how penal policies are formed across the world to evaluate their impact on the U.S. prison rate compared to other countries. Additionally, I look at recidivism to determine the effectiveness of United States incarceration. This analysis aims to highlight the differences between the U.S. and other countries …


Transformation As Desistance Inside: Temporality And Identity Reconstruction Among Men With Life Sentences, Richard Stover Jan 2020

Transformation As Desistance Inside: Temporality And Identity Reconstruction Among Men With Life Sentences, Richard Stover

Honors Theses

This thesis is an investigation of destistance strategies among men sentenced to life in prison in a medium security prison in Pennsylvania. Desistance here is defined as the process leading to the cessation of formally deviant behavior. Drawing from life narrative interviews conducted among 22 men, I argue that desistance is intrinsically tied to how inmates conceptualize themselves within the institutional context of the prison and can be expanded to include people who are still incarcerated. I build off of Peggy Giordano and colleagues symbolic interactionist perspective on desistance and expand it to chart how men with life sentences order …