Digital Commons Network^™

Twitch.Tv And Its Lgbtqia+ Tag: A Digital Ethnography Investigating How Lgbtqia+-Affirming Video Game Streamers And Viewers Interact And Build Lgbtqia+ Spaces Online, Cadyn Alexander Williamson

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

LGBT people use online communities to find information and people with shared experiences. Many also find communities within video game culture. However, there is some tension between LGBT people and “true gamers” who are typically white cisgender heterosexual men. For those who do not fit the “true gamer” label, studies have found high levels of online harassment. This study investigates how LGBT people use Twitch.tv, a livestreaming video game website. Built on previous research of LGBT people, online communities, and video game culture, I answer the question: How, and to what extent, do interactions between streamers and viewers using the …

Measuring Social Integration: Linking Personal And Associational Ties In Ego Networks, Sela Harcey

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Objective: Social integration is a foundational feature of society that influences individual-level outcomes. However, as our social worlds increase in complexity, integration becomes difficult to precisely measure. Contributing to research on social integration, this dissertation: (1) develops more precise ways to measure social integration, (2) identifies who is socially integrated, and (3) explores which social ties have the most influence on social integration.

Study 1: The first study aims to measure social integration more precisely by establishing a network structure and set of measures that utilize personal and associational ties with ego network data. Defined as personal affiliation networks (PAN), …

Cover Guys: Masculinity, Sexuality, And Representations Of Men's Bodies In Popular Magazines For Men, Trenton M. Haltom

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Scant research puts magazines into conversation with sociological theories of masculinity or sexuality. Yet, magazines have long projected idealized images of masculinities, the male body, and men’s sexuality. In this dissertation, I examine representations of men in popular magazines, highlighting the multifaceted ways magazines have marketed masculinity and the sexualization of men.

Using an explanatory sequential mixed method content analysis, I analyze 38 years (1980–2018; N=2,750) of magazine covers from GQ (n=516), Men’s Health (n=277), and Sports Illustrated (n=1,671). Each cover was coded using a standardized coding form developed for this dissertation. The coding …

The Relationship Between Quality Of Life, Extreme Climatological Conditions And Social Unrest In India, Daniel Schaefer

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Scholars have grown increasingly interested in the association between climate conditions and social unrest. Though no consensus exists regarding the specific mechanisms that connect both phenomena, scholars have found a links between rising temperatures, precipitation, or the magnitude of disasters and social unrest. However, is unclear to what extent deviations from historical trends rather than absolute levels might serve as important indicators of unrest. Moreover, it remains unclear how effectively socio-demographic factors like quality of life and ethno-religious fragmentation can explain trends on unrest, net of climatological indicators. This project tests the extent to which deviation from historical trends in …

Protective Factors Against Dating Violence Perpetration And Victimization, Meagan Kunitzer

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Dating violence is a prominent problem among college students that can result in harmful physical and mental health outcomes. To date, much research has focused on risk factors, but less is known about protective factors that may decrease the likelihood of dating violence. As such, the current paper examines protective factors (e.g. religion, positive parental relationships) against perpetrating and/or experiencing dating violence and whether these protective factors operate similarly for both perpetration and victimization. Data were gathered in 2013-2014 at two large public universities using pencil and paper surveys (N = 1482). Bivariate results revealed that women have more protective …

Housework: Socialization Influences On Individual Performance, Couple Division Of Labor And Mental Health, Jaala Robinson

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Despite the continued gender inequality in the division of housework, little research has considered how family housework socialization influences the amount of housework a person performs and their mental health. Socialization processes occur via the amount of housework performed in the home during childhood by each parent and the parents’ gender division of household labor. This analysis details three studies that explore the impact of socialization to housework. All three studies take advantage of intergenerational data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID). The first study uses a social learning framework to test whether the amount of housework a …