Economic Survival And Chosen Kinship: Analyzing Intersectionality’S Role In Reframing Trans Representation In Tangerine, Lydia Britton '27

Student Research

Transgender representation in mainstream media has grown in recent years. However, these portrayals are often hegemonic, clinging to a traditional worldview. Depictions of trans characters prioritize Whiteness, higher socioeconomic status, and transitions that adhere to the binary. Additionally, transgender characters often have access to gender-affirming care and are supported by their families throughout their transition (Mocarski et al., 2019). Research on the media representations of transgender and gender diverse (TGD) individuals points out how these portrayals reinforce ideals surrounding transnormativity, or the idea that trans people’s identities and experiences must be applied to the dominant binary and medicalized framework (Bradford …

I Lost My Number, Can I Have Yours? Body Image Satisfaction With Sexually Dimorphic Traits Is Associated With Men's Dating Anxiety And Confidence, David A. Frederick, Tania A. Reynolds, Nikoline L. Smart, Justin R. Garcia, David A. Puts

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Evolutionary scientists posit that sexual selection processes caused males to develop sexually dimorphic traits to aid them during intrasexual competition and increase their likelihood of being chosen as mates. Evolutionary social sciences have extensively examined women's preferences for traits such as muscle mass and voice pitch, reasoning that these traits serve as cues of men's ability to provide direct benefits (e.g., resources) and indirect (genetic) benefits passed on to offspring. At the same time, body image researchers have extensively focused on the social causes and consequences of men's dissatisfaction with their muscularity and body fat. We connected these two research …

Gendered Socialization Of Comfort With Risk And The Selection Of A College Major, Eliza S. Staton

Sociology and Criminology Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study investigates the potential relationship between the gendered socialization of risk preferences and the selection of a college major. Women are underrepresented in many fields of study, but especially in those related to science, technology, engineering, and math (S.T.E.M). Careers in STEM fields tend to require degree paths that require difficult classes, with lower average grade points, and a high chance of failure. As of 2023, only 24% of the student body in the College of Engineering at the University of Arkansas was composed of women (Uark 2023). These high-pressure, male-dominated environments have been found to lose women at …

Dominance And Desire: Perceptions Of Dominant And Submissive Traits Among Men And Women, Anna Mahealani Gritzenbach

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

Dominant, possessive “alpha male” characters are common across media and often embody traditional masculine norms, which include emotional stoicism, physical strength, and assertiveness. Portrayals such as these reinforce hegemonic masculinity and masculine honor ideology, which position dominance as essential to men’s social and romantic success, and submission as the expectation for women. Previous research has not explored how both dominant and submissive traits are evaluated across genders, and how endorsement of masculine honor ideology vary these perceptions. We examined how men and women perceive dominant and submissive traits in male and female characters across perceived romantic attraction, social attraction, leadership …

Women's Economic Perceptions And Political Behavior, Alyssa Shaia

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

The gender pay gap in America is large and still growing, as women in 2026 still only earn $0.82 per every dollar earned by a man. This is a politically important issue because women live in a different economic reality than men and experience different economic constraints. This study aimed to determine the impact that the impact that women's economic lives have on their political participation. I answered this question by fielding an original survey of college students to explore the relationship between economic perceptions and beliefs and political behavior. This survey measured how participants defined financial security, how this …

Snitch Switch: Does Gender Affect The Credibility Of Jailhouse Informants?, Claire Katherine Yontz

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

The testimony of jailhouse informants (JIs)—individuals who claim to have gained knowledge about a crime while incarcerated with a defendant—is considered a leading cause of wrongful convictions. The present study examined how the gender of the JI affects participants’ rating of the informant’s credibility by adapting a trial summary from Wetmore et al., 2014. In the trial summary, a male defendant, whose wife recently filed for divorce, returns home fro the bar one night to find the dead bodies of his wife and her alleged new romantic partner. Included in the trial summary, is the testimony of the defendant, numerous …

Exploring The Significance Of Hyper-Feminine Fashion Within Gen Z, Riley D. Frymark

Apparel Merchandising and Product Development Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study examines the rise of hyper-feminine fashion within Gen Z and the role that social media plays in shaping trends. Through a social media content analysis, this study explores how hyper-feminine fashion and aesthetics gained popularity and how it is perceived by Gen Z women. The findings suggest that Gen Z associates hyper-feminine fashion with empowerment, agency, and a sense of nostalgia redefining and challenging traditional expectations of femininity. These findings informed a fashion design developed to reflect key themes and design elements identified in the content analysis such as a pink color palette, lace, bows, and ruffles. Overall, …

Where Were Women?: Women In The United States Intelligence Organizations From The Office Of Strategic Services To The Central Intelligence Agency, Madison Harris

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

United States intelligence historians have largely neglected the importance of women’s intelligence labor as well as the centralized intelligence organizations that existed from World War II to the early years of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) – including the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), Strategic Service Unit (SSU), and Central Intelligence Group (CIG). While assumptions about women in intelligence work during this period are usually drawn from stereotypical portrayals in popular media, such as books and movies, this thesis utilized statistical data and other agency sources to build a broader understanding of women’s actual labor.

This thesis demonstrates that women …

An Experimental Study On Gendered Leadership Effects In Neighborhood Climate Protests, Farzana Fahmee

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Leaders are at the frontline as they determine the attitude that audiences have towards social movements and the level of attention they are willing to give to those movements. This paper investigates the influence of a neighborhood environmental protest leader’s gender on perceived leadership and democratic participation. The study relies on self-categorization theory, social identity theory, and the concept of issue-fit to assert the possibility of women gaining from the cultural connection between environmental care and femininity, while also experiencing backlash due to the masculine coding of leadership. A post-test online experiment involving 189 university students was conducted in which …

An Investigation Of The Roles Aging, Gender And Age-Related Hearing Loss Play In Emotional Prosody Recognition, Giavanna Yowell

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

Emotional prosody recognition is crucial for social interactions but is influenced by aging, gender, and age-related hearing loss (Lambrecht et al., 2012; Oerlemans et al., 2014; Palermo et al., 2013). No past studies have looked at all of these factors collectively. To address this shortcoming, the current study explored the relationships between aging, hearing loss and gender differences in emotional prosody recognition. The ability to recognize emotions through facial expressions was also included as a comparative measure. One hundred fifteen individuals (42 men and 73 women), ages 50 and older (M = 60.39, SD = 8.12), completed a hearing handicap …

The Impact Of Representation In Sex Education On Gender And Sexual Minority Youth, Piper A. Ellison

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

The purpose of this capstone project is to examine the representation of gender and sexual minority youth in sexual education. Given that, not all representation is good representation, this senior capstone examines the effects of both a lack of representation and misrepresentation. Through a literature review, administrator interviews, and college student surveys, the findings showed that there is often little to no practical representation of gender and sexual minority students in sexual education. Further findings show that when there is representation, it is often either at the superficial level, meaning that the identities exist, but do not provide detailed health …

The Mouse At The Border: Magic, Money, And Manufactured Identity, Ricardo Manuel Hinojosa

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This thesis investigates the methods by which The Walt Disney Company constructs and negotiates representations of Latine, gender, and queer identities within contemporary animation, with a particular emphasis on Coco (2017), Encanto (2021), and Wish (2023). Through a critical and intersectional lens, this research posits that Disney strikes a balance between cultural specificity and global market appeal, often leading to representations that are visually elaborate yet narratively limited. Both Coco and Encanto showcase a significant engagement with cultural traditions and themes such as memory and generational trauma; however, they ultimately fall short of thoroughly addressing systemic issues like colonialism and …

Domestic Cow Of Plenty: Gender And Womanhood In The Bhāgavata Purāṇa, Harshika Ajay Gupta

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

This thesis examines gender and womanhood in the Bhāgavata Purāṇa (Bhāgavata), a Sanskrit text from the 10th century CE that holds an important theological and cultural position in contemporary Hindu traditions. It decodes the Bhāgavata’s unique perspectives on the following: (1) gender, sex, sexuality, and reproduction, (2) women’s social normativity, and (3) women’s personhood and agency. This thesis argues that the Bhāgavata contains a unique theorization of gender and sex as well as a positive valuation of femininity, and that it imbues its narratives with practical resources and actions to recognize and expand the agentive capacity of women.

For scholars …

"Am I A Man Or A Muppet": A Rhetorical Analysis Of Generative Ai’S Representation Of Gender, Jessica Boaz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how generative artificial intelligence constructs and performs gender roles through a rhetorical analysis of the fully AI-generated podcast Fairytale Forensics. Drawing on theories of constitutive rhetoric, stereotyping, and McLuhan’s approach to the medium, this thesis investigates how AI-generated hosts interpret classic fairy tales while simultaneously reproducing and negotiating gender norms through the lens of prosopopoeia, metonymy and synecdoche. These performances rely on normative gender stereotypes that align with broader societal expectations, thereby potentially reinforcing existing cultural assumptions about masculinity and femininity. Ultimately, it demonstrates that AI-generated discourse does not merely reflect human biases but actively participates in …

From Awareness To Action: Exploring The Behavioral Gap In Green Computing Among Surveyed University Students In Tanzania, Victor G. Wilson

Business Management Review

As digital technologies become increasingly embedded in higher education, promoting environmentally responsible computing practices has become an important sustainability and management concern. This study applies the Norm Activation Model (NAM) to examine green computing behavior among university students in Tanzania. Drawing on responses from 868 students across science, education, and business programs, the study investigates how Awareness of Consequences, Ascription of Responsibility, and Personal Norms influence green computing behaviors. Hierarchical regression analysis was used to assess both the explanatory power of the NAM variables and the selective moderating roles of gender and academic program. Findings reveal that both awareness and …

How Speaker Gender Shapes Audience Perceptions Of Credibility: Responses To Humor, Reed Wilson

Honors Theses

This study aims to answer the question of whether the speaker’s gender, the participant’s gender, or the interaction between the two has an effect on the audience’s opinions of the message and the credibility of the speaker. Public speaking has been and continues to be a tool used by politicians, both on the campaign trail and as they seek to advance their agendas in the public sphere. Politicians use humor to relate to their audience and enhance their likeability and credibility. Google VEO 3’s generative text-to-video AI capabilities were used to create two videos of political speakers, one male and …

We’Ve Been Dying From Trying: Taylor Swift, Earnestness, And The Collective Repudiation Of Cool., Kathryn J. Lively

The Manuscript: Journal of Taylor Swift Studies

This essay argues that cool operates not as an aesthetic preference but as a feeling rule—a socially enforced constraint on which emotions are permissible in public life. Drawing on Thornton's concept of subcultural capital, Goffman's dramaturgical framework, and Hochschild's theory of feeling rules, the paper identifies three structural requirements of cool: distinction in the mode of appreciation, performative concealment of effort, and emotional constraint. Taylor Swift violates all three. Through analysis of the Eras Tour, Swift's songwriting, her public persona, and the ritual practices of her fandom, the essay demonstrates that Swift's cultural significance lies not in her popularity but …

Taylor Swift, Gender, And Feminism: What Do The Data Say?, Maxine Lewis

The Manuscript: Journal of Taylor Swift Studies

In the world of Swiftian scholarship, several scholars have credited Taylor Swift with feminist impact, while others have criticized both her type of feminism and claims to be a feminist. Many arguments rest on a narrow group of protest songs (“The Man”, “You Need To Calm Down”, and “Only The Young”) and a short period of Swift’s career in which she made many paratextual political gestures (2019-2020). However, claims about a songwriter’s feminism (or lack thereof) will be more accurate, robust, and nuanced if they draw on data from her whole career.

This article provides the first systematic survey of …

The Influence Of The Japanese Language On Gender Perceptions, Jasmine Bishara

Honors Projects

This study aimed to understand the how the Japanese language impacted people’s gender perceptions of women. Previous research showed that there are words and phrases in the Japanese language that are devaluing towards women, and that there are different societal expectations of women in their speech style. There are also different expectations of women’s behavior, which has impacted them in the workplace. Due to a lack of participants, no conclusions can be drawn about how language and social expectations impact how women are perceived in society. However, based on previous research it can be assumed that these issues still remain …

Unprotected In Public: Street Harassment And The Legal Control Of Female Resistance, Joanne Sweeny

Cleveland State Law Review

This Article traces the historical development of street harassment from its emergence in the Victorian era to its contemporary manifestations, situating it within broader social, legal, and gendered frameworks. It explores the cultural and structural forces that have enabled street harassment to persist over time, examining how it functions as both a method of gendered control and a reflection of public space dynamics. While street harassment has long been recognized by those who experience it as a form of violence and domination, the law has consistently failed to treat it as such. Instead, legal responses have often focused not on …

Distilled Identities: The History And Gender Politics Of The Perfume Industry, Emma Shaffer

Honors Projects

This paper analyzes the use of gendered perfume marketing in the West. Drawing upon the work of Joe Schwartz, Sarah Evrett, and others, I examine the history of this phenomenon and the politics keeping the perfume market segregated by gender. How long has perfume existed? Has it always been so strict on who wears what fragrance? My results found that perfume has only been gendered since the Victorian era, dispelling the myth that gendered fragrance is the only way to market perfume. However, I also found that when gender neutral fragrances have been introduced, they have not had much staying …

Working At The Margins In Interwar Yugoslavia, Stefano Petrungaro

Central European Studies

Prostitutes, beggars, folk healers, peddlers, wandering artists, and bear-leaders: Working at the Margins in Interwar Yugoslavia shows how work shaped their relations with the state and the rest of their world. The protagonists of the book’s story lived on the fringes of society and engaged in activities that were only partially recognized, from a legal and social point of view, as proper jobs, while some of them had no job at all. This book looks at Yugoslavia’s disciplining and social engineering practices through the lens of socially marginal workers. The analysis shows that in this period the South Slav regions …

How Gender Impacts Mock Jurors’ Receptiveness To Aggravating And Mitigating Evidence In Capital Trials, Jolie E. Parker

Undergraduate Theses

This study examines how gender influences mock jurors’ receptiveness to aggravating and mitigating evidence in capital trials. Drawing on prior research that highlights the critical role of mitigation in reducing death sentences and persistent gender differences in death penalty attitudes, this study addresses a gap in the literature by analyzing how gender shapes responses to specific types of evidence rather than general support for capital punishment. Using a quantitative survey of 209 participants, the research analyzes Likert-scale responses measuring how various aggravating and mitigating factors impact sentencing preferences. Results indicate a weak but consistent relationship between gender and receptivity to …

Gender And Emotional Expression In The Courtroom: Mock Juror Perceptions Of Attorney Effectiveness, Emma Cantrell

Undergraduate Theses

This quantitative study examines how gender and emotional expression influence mock jurors' perceptions of an attorney's courtroom effectiveness. Using mock jurors, this study extends previous research suggesting that assertiveness and emotional displays are evaluated differently by gender. Participants were randomly assigned to view one of four closing statements in a mock burglary trial. The videos were of either a male or a female attorney delivering a passive or an aggressive argument. Participants then evaluated the attorney’s effectiveness across four categories: competence, persuasiveness, ability to instill confidence, and emotionality. Male participants generally rated female attorneys as less effective than female participants …

Answering The Call: Resiliency, Gender, And Growth Following Secondary Trauma In Emergency Dispatchers, Brandi D. Colding

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This quantitative study examined secondary traumatic stress (STS), resiliency, posttraumatic growth (PTG), and gender among 911 emergency dispatchers, a population exposed to high levels of indirect trauma yet underrepresented in research. The purpose of the study was to investigate whether resiliency moderates the relationship between STS and PTG, and whether gender moderates the relationship between resiliency and STS. Data were collected from 99 U.S. emergency dispatchers using the Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale, Brief Resilience Scale, and Posttraumatic Growth Inventory. Results indicated that most participants reported elevated STS, and correlations revealed that resiliency was negatively related to STS, while STS was …

Cross-Gender Teaching Dynamics In Single-Gender Schools: A Case Study On School Leaders’ Perspectives On Gendered Teaching Practices, Support, And School Culture, Kelsie R. Copeman

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this comparative case study is to examine the gendered experiences of teachers through the perspective of school leaders at single-gender schools. The theory guiding this study is Tomlinson’s theory on differentiated instruction, as it explains how the recognition and response to student differences allows for effective teaching in order to optimize learning experiences. The central research question is: How do school leaders perceive and navigate cross-gender teaching dynamics in single-gender schools? This study uses semi-structured interviews, focus groups, and journal entries from school leaders. The sample consists of 10 school leaders with current experience in single-gender schools, …

Addiction And Dalits: The Impact Of India’S Caste System, Ava Jackson

Audre Lorde Prize

Across global public health and psychology, addiction is defined as a chronic condition that involves compulsive seeking and taking of a substance. In Western frameworks, addiction is often treated as an isolated condition, where the individual is blamed for their actions. In reality, addiction is rooted in biological, psychological, and social factors and is more complex than an individual level. Looking at the Global South, addiction is prominent in Dalit or “untouchable” individuals in India’s caste system, who face exclusion from all forms of society, including education, work, and social experiences. Addiction among Dalit women in India, Bangladesh, and the …

Exploring The Psychological Health Of First Responder Women And Their Children, Shelby S. Deschepper

Honors Thesis

Abstract

First responders (law enforcement officers, firefighters, paramedics, and emergency medical technicians) often face occupational stressors and may have exposure to traumatic events. As a result, they are at risk for developing mental health conditions. Although there is substantial research on first responder mental health, potential gender differences within this population have received limited attention. The existing evidence suggests that first responders who are women encounter an even higher risk for adverse mental health outcomes than first responders who are men. Additionally, few studies have explored the mental health outcomes of children with first responder parents, and even fewer have …

Ultra-Processed Food Consumption, Physical Activity, And Overweight Among Adolescents: A Path Analysis In Indonesia, Oktia Woro Kasmini Handayani, Syifa Qolbiyah Nasir, Rinta Amalia, Rafidha Nur Alifah, Ida Leida Maria, Wahiduddin Wahiduddin, Andi Selvi Yusnitasari

Media Kesehatan Masyarakat Indonesia

The prevalence of overweight in adolescents aged 13–15 has increased from 2018 (11.2%) to 2023 (12.1%), as well as the impacts caused in the short and long term related to degenerative diseases. This study aimed to analyze the influence of Ultra-Processed Food (UPF) consumption habits and physical activity on overweight incidence among adolescents. A quantitative approach was employed, involving 280 junior high school students in Tangerang Regency, Banten Province, Indonesia, selected through quota sampling based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. The independent variables were UPF consumption habits and physical activity, while the dependent variable was the incidence of over-weight. Age, …

Historic Shrouds: A New Voice For Shakespearean Women, Ashleigh E. Weinstock

Global Tides

This article presents, and seeks to remedy, the argument that Shakespeare’s female characters are deprived of equal representation as complex humans through narrative gaps, action relegated to offstage scenes, and reduced opportunities for direct-to-audience speech, mirroring the social hierarchies of early modern gender, which continue to be reflected in modern society.

While this critique is not new, this essay argues that the criticism of these theatrical inequalities is insufficient to remedy their harms. Instead, this author proposes a performance-based, generative model of restorative justice termed the Historic Shroud, which seeks to give voice to sidelined female characters by placing …