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Keeping Nebraska In Fashion: The Success Of Postwar Custom Dressmaker Ilona Dorenter Berk, Kylin P. Jensen

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Keeping Nebraska in Fashion: The Success of Postwar Custom Dressmaker Ilona Dorenter Berk examines the life and work of previously undocumented Midwestern dressmaker Ilona Berk. Through the interdisciplinary study of three vital components in the entrepreneurial dressmaking business of Ilona; who worked out of her home in Lincoln, Nebraska from 1953 to approximately 2000; research establishes her as a significant contributor to the fashion system of the twentieth century, and an important figure in Midwestern costume history. Components chosen for the study are: Ilona’s unique personal characteristics, the global and regional fashion systems she worked within, and the garments she …

Competing Infant Feeding Information In Mothers’ Networks: Advice That Supports V. Undermines Clinical Recommendations, Sato Ashida, Freda B. Lynn, Natalie A. Williams

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

Objective: To identify the social contextual factors, specifically the presence of information that supports v. undermines clinical recommendations, associated with infant feeding behaviours among mothers in low-income areas.

Design: Cross-sectional survey evaluating social support networks and social relationships involved in providing care to the infant along with feeding beliefs and practices.

Setting: Out-patient paediatric and government-funded (Women, Infants, and Children) clinics in an urban, low-income area of the south-eastern USA.

Subjects: Eighty-one low-income mothers of infants between 0 and 12 months old.

Results: Most mothers reported receiving both supportive and undermining advice. The presence of …

Competing Infant Feeding Information In Mothers’ Networks: Advice That Supports V. Undermines Clinical Recommendations, Sato Ashida, Freda B. Lynn, Natalie A. Williams, Ellen J. Schafer

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

Objective: To identify the social contextual factors, specifically the presence of information that supports v. undermines clinical recommendations, associated with infant feeding behaviours among mothers in low-income areas.

Design: Cross-sectional survey evaluating social support networks and social relationships involved in providing care to the infant along with feeding beliefs and practices.

Setting: Out-patient paediatric and government-funded (Women, Infants, and Children) clinics in an urban, low-income area of the south-eastern USA.

Subjects: Eighty-one low-income mothers of infants between 0 and 12 months old.

Results: Most mothers reported receiving both supportive and undermining advice. The presence …

An Examination Of Sources Of Error In Exit Polls: Nonresponse And Measurement Error, René Bautista

Survey Research and Methodology Program: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This dissertation focuses on understudied aspects of nonresponse in a context where limited information is available from refusals. In particular, this study examines social and psychological predictors of nonresponse in fast-paced face-to-face surveys; namely, election day surveys —popularly known as exit polls. Exit polls present unique challenges to study nonresponse since the population being sampled is fleeting and several conditions are beyond the researcher’s control.

If sample voters choose not participate, there is no practical way of contacting them to collect information in a timely manner. Using a proof-of-concept approach, this study explores a unique dataset that links information of …

Interviewer Voice Characteristics And Data Quality, Nuttirudee Charoenruk

Survey Research and Methodology Program: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

As an aural mode, interviewer voices play an important part in telephone surveys. Telephone interviewers are typically instructed to read questions with a proper phrasing and inflection and to read questions at a speech rate of 2 words per second (wps). However, there is no study that examines whether these interviewer voices affect data quality. In this dissertation, I examine how interviewer voice characteristics are associated with data quality in socially desirable, undesirable, and complex questions.

Data for this study come from the Work and Leisure Today Survey (NSF SES-1132015). I examined the first turn that interviewers read a survey …

Container Vegetable Gardening, Terri James, David Lott

Nebraska Cooperative Extension: Faculty and Staff Publications

If well-managed, vegetables grown in containers can provide high-quality produce in a small space.

Container vegetable gardening is a wonderful option for people who have limited space, impaired physical mobility, or conditions that interfere with in-ground gardening, such as poor garden soil. It also can help avoid problems with soilborne diseases and nematode pests that can exist in the soil in traditional, in-ground gardens. People who do not have access to a garden space, or simply do not want to grow a full-scale garden, may choose container vegetable gardening to provide them with enjoyment and produce. Containers are available in …

A Phenomenological Study Exploring The Leadership Development Experiences Of Academic Research Library Leaders, Beth Mcneil

Department of Agricultural Leadership, Education, and Communication: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This phenomenological study describes the leadership development experiences of academic librarians currently working in leadership roles in academic research libraries to discover their experiences of being a library leader and to explore how they describe their own leadership development. Study participants identified as having experienced positive leadership development experiences during their careers as academic research library leaders and were, at the time of this study, employed and actively working in leadership positions reporting directly to the head of their academic research library. The goal of this exploration was to understand what the academic library leaders had experienced, with regard to …

Tradtional Alcohol Use Among Rural Yi Minority In China: An Application Of Theory Of Planned Behavior, Yonghua Feng

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

It is estimated that 25% of the alcohol consumed in China as traditional alcohol. This study explored the drinking patterns and the motives to use traditional alcohol among a sample of the Yi minority in southern China. The Theory of Planned Behavior was used to explore motives.

Based on initial fieldwork among the Yi a questionnaire was developed to provide data to describe traditional alcohol use and to assess the constructs of attitude, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control as expressed the Theory of Planned Behavior. The questionnaire was refined and the results served as an adequate measurement to explore …

Effects Of Abusive Parenting, Caretaker Arrests, And Deviant Behavior On Dating Violence Among Homeless Young Adults., Kimberly A. Tyler, Rachel Schmitz

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Though dating violence is widespread among young adult homeless populations, its risk factors are poorly understood by scholars. To address this gap, the current study uses a social learning theory to examine the effects of abusive parenting and caretaker arrests on dating violence among 172 homeless young adults. Results from path analyses revealed that child physical abuse and caretaker arrests were positively associated with engaging in a greater number of school fights, which, in turn, was strongly and positively correlated with participating in more deviant subsistence strategies (e.g., stealing) since being on the street. Young people who participated in a …

Current Knowledge And Considerations Regarding Survey Refusals: Executive Summary Of The Aapor Task Force Report On Survey Refusals, David Dutwin, John D. Loft, Jill E. Darling, Allyson L. Holbrook, Timothy P. Johnson, Ronald E. Langley, Paul J. Lavrakas, Kristen Olson, Emilia Peytcheva, Jeffery A. Stec, Timothy Triplett, Andrew Zukerberg

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

The landscape of survey research has arguably changed more significantly in the past decade than at any other time in its relatively brief history. In that short time, landline telephone ownership has dropped from some 98 percent of all households to less than 60 percent; cell-phone interviewing went from a novelty to a mainstay; address-based designs quickly became an accepted method of sampling the general population; and surveys via Internet panels became ubiquitous in many sectors of social and market research, even as they continue to raise concerns given their lack of random selection.

Among these widespread changes, it is …

Perceived Discrimination And Markers Of Cardiovascular Risk Among Low-Income African American Youth, Bridget J. Goosby, Sarah Malone, Elizabeth A. Richardson, Jacob Cheadle, Deadric T. Williams

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Objectives: Our study examines the relationship between perceived discrimination and levels of C-reactive protein and blood pressure in low-income youth ages 10215 years old.

Methods: Data were collected from 10 to 15 year old focal children and their mothers. Face-to-face interviews were implemented to collect data on stressors including experiences of everyday discrimination from youth. High sensitivity CRP in dried blood spot samples and diastolic and systolic blood pressure were also collected at the time of the interview.

Results: Perceived discrimination among youth was significantly associated with higher levels of CRP, systolic, and diastolic blood pressure. CRP, systolic, and diastolic …

Capturing The Gendiverse: A Test Of The Gender Self-Perception Scale, With Implications For Survey Data And Labor Market Measures, Alian Kasabian

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This dissertation assesses a new measure of gender. In doing so, it addresses a glaring inconsistency between how sociologists conceptualize gender and how we measure it (i.e., with sex categories) in most quantitative sociological literature. Research that only measures sex effectively hides the variability in individual social identities that is related to sociological outcomes of interest. Unfortunately, most existing quantitative gender scales are impractical for use in large scale data collection. In this work, I investigated the Gender Self-perception Scale (GSPS) as an alternative survey measure of gender using three projects. For the first project (chapter 2), I used the …

Reported Literacy, Media Consumption And Social Media Use As Measures Of Relevance Of Spanish As A Heritage Language, Isabel Velázquez

Spanish Language and Literature Papers

Aims and objectives: This paper explores one dimension of language maintenance among college-aged heritage speakers of Spanish (HSS) in three communities of the U.S. Midwest. The aim was to understand whether Spanish was relevant at a point in life in which they were developing their own networks away from their families. Research questions: Were reading and writing in Spanish relevant for the participants? Did they use Spanish when on social media? Did they text in Spanish? Was Spanish relevant for them when consuming content on electronic media?

Methodology: This analysis is part of a larger study on HSS in communities …

Identifying Complex Causal Dependencies In Configurational Data With Coincidence Analysis, Michael Baumgartner, Alrik Thiem

The R Journal

We present cna, a package for performing Coincidence Analysis (CNA). CNA is a configurational comparative method for the identification of complex causal dependencies—in particular, causal chains and common cause structures—in configurational data. After a brief introduction to the method’s theoretical background and main algorithmic ideas, we demonstrate the use of the package by means of an artificial and a real-life data set. Moreover, we outline planned enhancements of the package that will further increase its applicability.

The Emotional Experience Of American Indians Receiving Hemodialysis And How It Relates To Treatment Adherence, Anitra M. Warrior

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study used a phenomenological approach as an attempt to capture the essence of the experience of American Indians with diabetes who are receiving dialysis. The purpose of this study and this approach was to develop an understanding of factors that influence treatment adherence, specifically with mental health concerns. As an additional component of this study, this research also followed an advocacy/participatory approach (Creswell, 2007) in which steps to reform services are provided to the Indian Health Service in support of this marginalized group through a written Agenda for Change.

Participants for this study were recruited from multiple states serving …

A Mediational Analysis Of The Influence Of Negative Coping Behaviors On Health Outcomes Associated With Adolescent School Bullying, Joseph C. Jochman

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Adolescent school bullying is a significant public health issue with approximately 20% of US adolescents reporting victimization or perpetration in schools. Much prior research has established that school bullying is associated with significant somatic and depressive health consequences. Additionally, prior research has examined the beneficial impact of positive coping strategies on negative health outcomes associated with school bullying. However, given that bully-involved adolescents often have less access to positive coping outlets, less research has examined the influence of negative coping behaviors on health outcomes associated with school bullying. Using the Health Behavior of School Aged Children 2005-2006 dataset, I examine …

Review Of Edison Bicudo, Pharmaceutical Research, Democracy And Conspiracy: International Clinical Trials In Local Medical Institutions, Roberto Abadie

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

The pharmaceutical industry is—along with the financial and weapons industries—one of the most globalized and profitable business domains. But they wouldn’t make any profits if they weren’t able to recruit research subjects to test an increasing number of drugs. This global trial economy creates its own assemblages of clinical trials, often run by hired contract research organizations (CROs), who fight among each other in a rat-race competition, promising quick and effective trials; at the same time, enterprising countries, hospitals, and doctors jump on the drug trial economy bandwagon by promising quick, endless access to a large pool of research subjects, …

Sexual Mixing In Shanghai: Are Heterosexual Contact Patterns Compatible With An Hiv/Aids Epidemic?, M. Giovanna Merli, James Moody, Joshua Mendelsohn, G. Robin Gauthier

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

China’s HIV prevalence is low, mainly concentrated among female sex workers (FSWs), their clients, men who have sex with men, and the stable partners of members of these high-risk groups. We evaluate the contribution to the spread of HIV of China’s regime of heterosexual relations, of the structure of heterosexual networks, and of the attributes of key population groups with simulations driven by data from a cross-sectional survey of egocentric sexual networks of the general population of Shanghai and from a concurrent respondent-driven sample of FSWs. We find that the heterosexual network generated by our empirically calibrated simulations has low …

Erratum To: Sexual Mixing In Shanghai: Are Heterosexual Contact Patterns Compatible With An Hiv/Aids Epidemic?, M. Giovanna Merli, James Moody, Joshua Mendelsohn, G. Robin Gauthier

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

In the middle of the paragraph just above Figure 6, there is the following sentence: “The range of the mean of the distribution of the proportion infected generated by the simulations is narrow, between 0.5 % and 0.2 % of all nodes.” This should read “between 0.05 % and 0.2 % of all nodes.”

Sae: An R Package For Small Area Estimation, Isabel Molina, Yolanda Marhuenda

The R Journal

We describe the R package sae for small area estimation. This package can be used to obtain model-based estimates for small areas based on a variety of models at the area and unit levels, along with basic direct and indirect estimates. Mean squared errors are estimated by analytical approximations in simple models and applying bootstrap procedures in more complex models. We describe the package functions and show how to use them through examples.

Ensc 300 (Energy Seminar) Annotated Bibliography, Supplementary Reading, Adam Liska

Adam Liska Papers

Innovation
Sociology of Innovation, Business, & Work
Sustainable Business Strategy
Leadership
Science, Engineering, & Business History
Economics
Energy, Business, & Environmental Policy
Climate Change & Insurance
Education
Ethics

62 monographic resources

Feminism And Interior Design In The 1960s, Manli Zarandian

Architecture Masters of Science Program: Theses

Feminism and Interior Design in the 1960s is a research endeavor that attempts to contribute to the professionalization and better recognition of the interior design discipline through addressing gender issues, and specifically analyzes the relationship between interior design and feminism in the 1960s as represented through contemporary advertising imagery. Here, professionalization refers to the process in which decoration as a domestic activity transforms to interior decoration, and later design, as a properly recognized profession. Despite the attempts of many historians of interior design, as well as there being a great deal of existing literature on the issue of professionalization, it …

Parent–Teacher Relationships Across Community Types, Amanda L. Witte

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Children with social-behavioral problems are at high risk for developing long-term, pervasive adjustment problems. Home–school relationships may be critical to alleviating the negative effects of behavior problems and to fostering student success. The environment or community in which homes and schools are situated represents an important influence on the home–school relationship. Despite the evidence supporting positive parent–teacher relationships and the association between community context and educational practices and student outcomes, little is known about the relation between community context and parent–teacher relationships. The manner in which cumulative risk factors and child behavior problems influence the link between community type and …

A Study Of Life Skills From Traditional And Afterschool 4-H Participants, Julia M. Kreikemeier

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cooperative Extension has been serving youth and their families for over one hundred years. The total impact of this service has been measured on several occasions by many researchers, most notably in the research of youth development by Richard Learner; however, his research only took into account those who participated in traditional 4-H clubs. The purpose of this quantitative study was designed to examine which life skills youth participants in traditional and afterschool 4-H programs reported. Quantitative methodology was used to collect post-program survey data of youth participants. Qualitative informal interviews were conducted of Extension Educators and afterschool 4-H program …

Trajectories Of Anxious Withdrawal In Early Childhood, Irina N. Kalutskaya

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The purpose of this study was to examine the developmental trajectory of anxious withdrawal in a group of 3-year old children in transition to kindergarten. This study also examined the role of high quality classroom environments for children, and the role of multiple risk factors for parents on development of children’s anxious withdrawal. The current sample consisted of 1,938 3-year old children (49% female) followed across four time points (Fall 2009, Spring 2010, Spring 2011, and Spring 2012) as a part of the Head Start Family and Child Experiences Survey (FACES 2009), 20% of the children were White, non-Hispanic, 35% …

Exploring The Social Integration Of Sexual Minority Youth Across High School Contexts, Alexa Martin-Storey, Jacob E. Cheadle, Julie Skalamera, Robert Crosnoe

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Mental health disparities between sexual minority and other youth have been theorized to result in part from the effects of the stigmatization on social integration. Stochastic actor-based modeling was applied to complete network data from two high schools in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (mean age =15 years, n=2,533). Same-sex attracted youth were socially marginalized in a smaller predominantly White school but not in a larger, more racially diverse school. For both schools, homophily was a critical network feature, and could represent social support for and social segregation of such youth. These findings emphasize school context in studying …

Land And Law In The Age Of Enterprise: A Legal History Of Railroad Land Grants In The Pacific Northwest, 1864–1916, Sean M. Kammer

Department of History: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Federal land subsidies to railroad corporations comprised an important part of the federal government’s policies towards its western land domain in the middle decades of the nineteenth century. In all, Congress granted over a hundred million acres to railroad corporations to subsidize construction of a transcontinental railway network. Long after the last such grant in 1871, these land grants continued to incite political contests in Congress and state legislatures and legal disputes in communities across the West. By the end of the century, railroad corporations had become manifestations not just of the threatening growth of corporate power in the United …

A Model For Understanding Structure Versus Agency In The Participation Of Minors In The Commercial Sex Market, Courtney Thrash

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

In 2000, the Trafficking Victims Protection Act defined any sex worker under the age of eighteen as a victim of sex trafficking and exploitation, while requiring evidence of coercion for those eighteen and over for the same charge. This definition makes explicit a common conception concerning CSEC, namely, that their status as participants in the sex economy rests upon a lack of personal and legal agency. Research on female sex workers often focuses on their victimization, such as childhood sexual abuse and neglect. Conversely, research on male sex workers often ignores their possible victimization and instead emphasizes their drug use, …

Faculty Parental Status: An Investigation Of Network Homophily, Marginalization, And Supportive Work–Family Academic Culture, Megumi Watanabe

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Serious incompatibility between work and family life among faculty is well known, and various work-family policies have become available to faculty. Due to the traditional academic work culture (e.g., the ideal worker norms and the individualism norms), however, these policies tend to be underused. Therefore, it is necessary to develop an academic work culture that is more supportive of faculty’s work-family needs. Using data collected on tenure-line faculty at a research-intensive Midwestern university, this dissertation pursues three complementary research objectives that provide new insight into the culture of academic work environments. First, based on social identity theory and homophily theory, …

Beyond Corruption: Assessing The Organizational Potential In Alternative Discourses Of Struggle In Nigeria, Chigozirim Utah

Department of Communication Studies: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Despite decades of initiatives and emphasis on combatting corruption in Nigeria, systemic social change has remained elusive. I argue that the discourse of corruption itself should be called into question, specifically how it constrains possibilities for positive identity construction and social change organizing. This dissertation endeavors to disrupt the dominant discourse of corruption by uncovering alternative discourses of socioeconomic struggle that emerge from lived experience. I turned to the rich organizational landscape of Nigeria’s informal economy, performing a critical communicational phenomenology of the work lives of urban roadside food traders in Lagos who embody socio-economic struggle. The ultimate goal was …