Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Lbsci 700 / Info 7001. The Technology Of Information., Brandon K. Jeffries Mr.

Open Educational Resources

This course will introduce the student to the conceptual and practical elements of visual and computer literacy for the library and information science profession. Particular attention will be paid to the place and role of libraries and information centers. A laboratory session following each class will give students the opportunity to apply some of the concepts learned in class.

Psci 102: Political Controversies: Democracy, Politics, And Freedom., Antonia Cucchiara

Open Educational Resources

This course aims to provide students with an introduction to the analysis of political controversies stemming from issues related to freedom and democracy in America today. Students will first engage with questions central to the understanding of the concepts above, such as: What is freedom? What is the relationship between freedom and democracy? How have thinkers, from the ancient to modern era, defined freedom? How can we compare and contrast the varied definitions of freedom put forward by thinkers across time? Students will then apply the theories of freedom and democracies to analyze a series of case studies from the …

The Importance Of Humanities In A Career-Focused Educational Environment, Geoff Zylstra, Jill Belli, Candido Cabo, Sean Macdonald, Robin Michals, Ann Marie Sowder, Christopher B. Swift

Publications and Research

The humanities have the potential to enhance STEM curriculum in career-oriented professional degree programs. As part of a larger college-wide initiative to develop interdisciplinary curricula, the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) awarded a grant to New York City College of Technology to explore the relationship between the humanities and career-focused degree programs in STEM departments. This article describes the design and implementation of coursework that bridges the curricular divides between humanities disciplines and technical or career-focused disciplines by bringing the humanities to bear on science and technology-oriented courses. Specifically, the humanities served to improve technical skills for students in …

Architecting Standards: Leveraging Ia To Drive Emerging Technology Standards​, Noreen Y. Whysel

Publications and Research

In this talk for the annual meeting of the W3C Information Architecture Community Group, I discuss how standards bodies can learn from the Information Architecture field to improve accessibility and usability. By adopting user-centered design principles and engaging in iterative feedback loops, standards organizations can create more relevant and practical standards that align with real-world applications. Emphasizing collaboration with industry experts and end-users will help ensure that standards evolve along with technological advancements.

In the meantime, key standards are examined, such as ISO 9241, which provides guidelines for usability and user-centered design, and the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), …

"Finding Your People: Seeking Strength And Solidarity In Employee Resource Groups (Ergs)" - The One Club For Creativity's "Where Are All The Black People?" 2024 Conference Proceedings & Reading List, Javier O. Garcia

Publications and Research

Employee Resource Groups (ERGs) help create community in the workplace, and can serve as a source of strength for employees of marginalized identities.

This panel, originally held at The One Club for Creativity's "Where Are All the Black People?" conference and career fair in 2024, explores the value of intersectional identities in the workplace.

The featured panelists offer insights into the changing landscape of DE&I (diversity, equity, & inclusion) - particularly in the advertising, marketing communications, and creative industries - the impact it is having on employees, and how ERGs can serve as a catalyst for professional and organizational growth. …

Notes From The Field - A Militarização Do Espaço Urbano Do Rio De Janeiro: Grupos Armados, Forças De Segurança E Forças Armadas E A Disputa Por Território, Thiago Sardinha

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

The Militarization of the Urban Space of Rio de Janeiro is the synthesis of different historical processes: The state through massive incarceration of black and racialized people, and the systematic elimination of black poor people from favelas through urban policing operations by security and armed forces, traffic patrols, and paramilitary/vigilante groups. Together, they result in the production of different actors that exert violent territorial domination for economic exploitation and social control.

Bridging Implementation Science And Human-Centered Design: Developing Tailored Interventions For Healthier Eating In Restaurants, Melissa Fuster, Shelby Hipol, Terry Tk Huang, Uriyoán Colón-Ramos, Cara Conaboy, Rosa Abreu, Lourdes Castro Mortillaro, Margaret A. Handley

Publications and Research

Restaurants are important institutions in the communities’ economy with the potential to promote healthier foods but have been under-engaged in public health nutrition efforts. In particular, independently owned, minority-serving and minority-owned restaurants, remain under-represented in nutrition promotion efforts despite disproportionate burdens of diet-related health outcomes among minority populations. Addressing this gap in engagement, we undertook a process of co-designing and implementing healthy eating-focused interventions in two Latin American restaurants in New York City, combining the Behavior Change Wheel intervention development framework with a Human-Centered Design approach. Restaurant owners and chefs were involved in the research synthesis and solution development processes, …

The News Is History: Building News Literacy Skills With Historic Primary Sources, Jen Hoyer

Publications and Research

The news is inescapable, and simultaneously headline-laden advertising-as-news follows us on scrolling video screens through public transit, at the gym, and on billboards lining the sidewalks. As the news and its lookalikes feel more and more omnipresent, the need for news literacy skills and their implementation feels more and more urgent. At the same time, continually morphing media platforms and news formats make it seem impossible to know: which of these things actually is the news? What’s most important for me to pay attention to?

What if, instead of teaching skills for understanding the next shiny news format, we turn …

Burnout: Half A Century Of Controversy, Renzo Bianchi, Irvin Sam Schonfeld

Publications and Research

Burnout has become a focal point of concern in the contemporary workplace. The syndrome has elicited undiminished interest among occupational health specialists. The World Health Organization defines burnout as a syndrome "resulting from chronic workplace stress." Burnout is said to comprise three components: (i) feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion; (ii) increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism toward one’s job; and (iii) a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment. This definition mirrors the conceptualization of burnout embodied in the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI), the ‘gold standard’ for the assessment of burnout. However, controversies …

Reimagining Community Safety: Perceptions Of Policy And Practice In Five Cities, Patricia A. Cobar, Kathleen A. Tomberg, Fidel L. Osorio, Jeffrey A. Butts

Publications and Research

The John Jay College Research and Evaluation Center (REC) and the Urban Institute partnered with the National League of Cities to support five U.S. cities in reimagining public safety through the Municipalities Reimagining Community Safety (MRCS) initiative, funded by Wells Fargo. As the research lead, JohnJay REC conducted a three-wave survey to assess local stakeholder perceptions of public safety strategies, focusing on efficacy and equity. Findings provided insight into city-level approaches to crime prevention and community well-being, informing evaluations of MRCS’s impact across diverse urban contexts.

Brain Injury And Psychosocial Trauma: Outcomes Among Justice-Involved Individuals, Mahathi D. Kosuri

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Justice-involved individuals experience disproportionately high rates of both traumatic brain injuries (TBI) and psychosocial traumas. However, these traumas have yet to be conceptualized together, leaving a chasm of research on how they interact and influence this population. The current study was the first to measure the effects of TBIs as well as psychosocial trauma among justice-involved men, within the context of executive functioning, history of justice involvement, and recidivism. A sample of men (N=95) from a private correctional facility were given the Ohio State University Traumatic Brain Injury Questionnaire (OSU-TBI-ID), the Lifetime Stressor Checklist- Revised (LSC-R), along with …

Controlling Emotional Text To Speech Using Complex Adverbial Phrases, Zainab T. Akande

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study investigates the usage of adverbial modifiers from audiobook data as a resource for training speech synthesizers with a greater range of speech descriptions. The Tacotron2 text-to-speech (TTS) model was used for the purposes of this study. Utilizing the LibriTTS dataset, the Tacotron2 model is trained under two experimental conditions: one incorporating adverbial modifiers into the input text and the other without. The dataset preprocessing involves embedding descriptions using word embeddings and encoding speaker IDs with machine learning techniques. Additionally, the model architecture includes a prosody encoder inspired by prior research. Evaluation of the trained models involves subjective assessments …

Resting-State Eeg Microstate Features For Major Depressive Disorder Classification, George M. V. Quinn

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Neuroimaging studies have revealed consistent abnormalities in functional connectivity within specific neural networks that may serve as biomarkers for major depressive disorder (MDD). It is important to find inexpensive, non-invasive techniques that target these biomarkers to make diagnosis easier and more objective. EEG microstates are quasi-stable potential topographies that are thought to reflect the quasi-stable network activity of the underlying neural generators. MDD has been shown to alter features of the four canonical EEG microstates (A, B, C, D) with some conflicting results. The most consistent network abnormalities in MDD are found in the anterior default mode network, and this …

On The Lower Levels Of The Ivory Tower: What Color Collars Do Adjunct Faculty Wear?, Frederick Tucker

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Institutional reliance on tenure-line faculty reached a historic low after the Great Recession in 2009, remaining at approximately a third of all faculty through 2022. Postsecondary institutions have steadily increased their reliance on full-time adjunct faculty over the last two decades. Part-time adjuncts, meanwhile, were hired in great numbers before and during the Great Recession, as student enrollment increased, but have steadily declined since 2012, as college enrollment waned. Almost all evidence suggests that tenure expansion would benefit both the recipients of tenure and their students, but would come at a cost. There are few studies, however, that distinguish between …

Advanced Predictive Analytics On Financial Donations To Nonprofit Organizations, Fhamida Keya

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Non-profit organizations rely on donation contributions to carry out their social driven agenda. In the context of fundraising and donor management, it is crucial to uncover complex insights about donor behavior for optimizing strategies and enhancing donor engagement. This project employed advanced analytical techniques on the dataset Donations Received by City Agencies sourced from NYC Open Data by implementing predictive modeling, clustering segmentation, and time series analysis and forecasting. The project will attempt to uncover patterns in donation behavior, identify factors that influence donation amounts, and segment out donor profiles all of which can be leveraged to optimize strategy decisions, …

Who Are You Rooting For? T20 Cricket World Cup 2024, Usa & Wi, Purvesh Desai

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The T20 Cricket World Cup '24 played in USA & WI will bring immense excitement to the cricket lovers around the world and have a question to themselves “Who shall I Root for?” How do people or fans support their favorite teams and on what criteria do they pick these teams will discuss in here.

Patriotism, tradition, and favorite individual players, are the main reasons for the fans to choose their and support the team. Nation is the biggest pride of an individual and many people choose their pride over everything. People celebrate when the home team plays on the …

United States Foreign Policy Towards South Africa: From Constructive Engagement To Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act Of 1986, Jennifer J. Squires

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

U.S. domestic pressure groups have historically utilized the tactic of lobbying Congress as a tool to pressure the legislative body to make specific foreign policy decisions. My research findings suggest that over various periods of time, in total spanning approximately four decades, first heralded by African American human rights leaders and organizations, the actions of six separate domestic anti-apartheid economic sanctions and divestment organizations, influenced by episodic anti-apartheid protest actions in South Africa, used their varied American protest actions to remind and to admonish Congress that apartheid is synonymous with racism. Thus, apartheid had to be dismantled. An important number …

Disappearing Immigrant Shadows: A New Analytical Framework And Typology For Second-Generation Chinese American Ethnic Engagement, Annie Wang

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This capstone challenges the predominant narrative that upwardly mobile, second-generation individuals prefer to socially distance themselves from working-class, first-generation co-ethnics, a concept referred to here as ethnic distancing. It argues that this narrative fails to capture the second generation’s affinity and capacity for ethnic engagement, which includes desired and actual participation in ethnic-based activities ranging from casual consumption to more meaningful volunteerism, activism, and community building with co-ethnics of diverse socioeconomic backgrounds. Drawing on 32 interviews with second-generation Chinese Americans aged 18-35, I argue that we can better understand ethnic engagement in New York City’s Manhattan Chinatown by …

Supporting Social Equity Through Informal Spaces On An Urban Campus, Eve B. Klein

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation focuses on applying research to design in the setting of higher education. Specifically, it explores the informal spaces outside the classroom at a predominantly Black college in an urban setting. The existing structural challenges facing college students are many, including issues related to financial resources, mental health/wellness, family responsibilities, psychosocial identity formation, and structural racism. These challenges were compounded by the events of the spring of 2020, when a heightened awareness of anti-Black racism, combined with the hardships of COVID-19, brought college campuses to a close and masses of people to the streets to protest the unjust killings …

Original Vs. Simplified Miranda Rights: The Impact On Miranda Rights Comprehension And Subsequent Waiver Decisions, Sydney Baker

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Youths’ developmental immaturity negatively impacts their ability to meaningfully understand and appreciate their Miranda rights, raising questions about the validity of their waiver decisions. Moreover, most Miranda warnings are long, written at advanced reading levels, and contain complex sentence structure and vocabulary, which further hinders comprehension. In response, several jurisdictions have begun to use developmentally informed Miranda warnings for youth. However, research has yet to determine whether this improves youths’ ability to make informed Miranda waiver decisions. As such, the current research study explored whether simplified Miranda warnings increased youths’ comprehension of their rights, whether Miranda comprehension was related to …

The Crisis Of Market Society And The Fascist Solution In The Work Of Karl Polanyi, Nicholas E. Reynolds

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The revival of interest in the work of Karl Polanyi, which has generated valuable lines of inquiry across disciplines, has largely neglected Polanyi’s extensive writings on fascism. This dissertation argues that Karl Polanyi should be considered a theorist of fascism, one whose thinking revolves around the concept of a “fascist solution” arising as a consequence of a terminal deadlock of market society. This dissertation surveys two decades of Polanyi’s work to construct a full picture of his theory of fascism and its importance for his broader theorizing about the dynamics of capitalist societies. Polanyi makes at least three specific contributions …

Relationship Interventions For Autistic Children And Their Non-Autistic Siblings, Susan Vanessa Mchugh

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Relationships between children with autism and their non-autistic siblings are often characterized by great warmth, empathy, and affection. However, because of core deficits in social-emotional reciprocity, autistic children and their siblings often experience difficulties with communication, play, and associated mental health problems. Interventions aimed at improving relationships in these sibling dyads historically have involved teaching non-autistic children to behave similarly to interventionists for autistic siblings, and support groups for children with broad chronic illnesses. More recent interventions have shifted focus to improvement of play between siblings, and support groups for siblings of children with autism spectrum disorder. Some are naturalistic …

Love In The Time Of Dating Apps: Exploring Latino Young Adults’ Experiences Constructing Online Identity, Partner Preferences, And Plans For Happily Ever After, Dakota Z. Ross-Cabrera

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines how Latino young adults navigate dating apps; construct their dating app profiles, select partners and develop preferences, and conceptualize their futures. While earlier dating app research explores these themes with quantitative data or with non-Latino samples, the qualitative experiences of Latino young adults have been broadly excluded. Latinos are a large portion of the dating app market, and their relationships, outcomes, and future family formation are integral to understand. Drawing on 60 qualitative interviews with Latino young adult dating app users, I find that app users encounter five stages of dating app usage including constructing and often …

Understanding Climate Change Adaptation And Gentrification Through The Framework Of Uneven Coastal Development In Keansburg, New Jersey, Zachary Paganini

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examines the rapid acceleration of coastal development in the United States despite projections of climate change-induced sea level rise. Like no other developed country, the U.S. has transformed its fragile coastline into sites for leisure, consumption, and retirement. These spaces now face the prospect of more frequent and severe storms, as well as land loss and inundation, due to climate change. This dilemma has sparked debates around coastal resilience, adaptation, retreat, and climate gentrification.

While many studies seek to measure perceptions of climate change risk and vulnerability, this dissertation reverses the question by positioning risk perceptions as an …

Féminas Speaking Up: Three Papers On Feminine Transgender Identities, Gender Identity Activism, And Language Reform In Lima, Peru, Ernesto Cuba

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this three-paper dissertation, I explore the linguistic and discursive practices of Féminas, a leading transgender rights activist organization based in Lima, Peru. Building on scholarship on language ideologies (Irvine & Gal, 2000), queer linguistics (Motschenbacher, 2011), and socio-onomastics (Ainiala & Östman, 2017), I analyze the role that language beliefs and language-in-use plays in performing local (trans)gender identities and shaping grassroots politics within this specific community of practice (Eckert & McConnell-Ginet, 1992). Based on an extensive corpus of semi-structured interviews and ethnographic material gathered during my long-term investigation with Féminas, I present three studies exploring distinct –though related– ideologically-driven sociolinguistic …

Essays On Macroeconomics And Banking, Christopher Naubert

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation consists of three chapters.

Chapter 1 - The Heterogeneous Effects of Interest Rate Liftoff in an Estimated New Keynesian Model In recent years, the question of how central banks should proceed with lifting interest rates from the zero lower bound has moved into focus. I study how alternative plans for interest rate liftoff affect households across the income and wealth distribution in an estimated New Keynesian model with fixed heterogeneity and aggregate shocks. I solve the model globally and develop a new methodology for estimating globally solved, non-linear models. In the estimated model, I find that all agents …

Defining Resilience In Young People With Inflammatory Bowel Disease: A Theory Informed Approach, Barbara Storch

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) is a chronic gastrointestinal illness for which there is no existing cure. There is significant literature documenting the increased likelihood of adverse biopsychosocial outcomes in young people with IBD (e.g., Greenley et al., 2010); however, many individuals with IBD respond by either maintaining or increasing outcomes categorized as positive. These trajectories can be thought of as characterized by a resilient response. The study of resilience in young people with IBD is nascent. Given the unique disease-specific and developmental contexts young people with IBD experience, the first step in understanding the process of resilience in young people …

Investigating The Impact Of Affect In Suicide-Specific Attentional Biases, Beverlin Rosario-Williams

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Objective: Biased processing of suicide-related information has been implicated in risk of future suicidal thoughts and behaviors. Although previous studies have classified this biased processing, the tasks used to examine these biases cannot definitely specify which attentional processes are related to risk for suicidal thoughts and behaviors. Therefore, via two independent studies, this dissertation sought to distinguish suicide-specific attentional engagement and disengagement biases from other forms of cognitive processing, such as accessibility of suicide-related stimuli and threat bias toward and away from socially threatening stimuli. Additionally, this dissertation investigated under which affective conditions suicide-specific engagement and disengagement biases emerged. …

The Effects Of Mood And Anxiety Sensitivity On Attentional Engagement And Disengagement In Sleep Disturbance, Kara L. Buda

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Insomnia is a highly prevalent, chronic disorder that is associated with adverse psychological, physical, and psychosocial outcomes. Harvey’s (2002) cognitive model of insomnia and Espie’s (2006) attention-intention-effort pathway model highlight two critical processes believed to play a role in the onset and persistence of insomnia: (a) emotional distress and physiological arousal and (b) selective attention and monitoring. However, investigations examining attentional bias in sleep disturbance have produced mixed results and have exclusively used paradigms that are limited in their ability to differentially examine the two unique components of attentional bias (i.e., facilitated engagement, impaired disengagement). Discrepant findings in the attentional …

Claiming The Right To Belong: Diversity And The Politics Of Inclusion In Queens, New York, Susan J. Tanenbaum

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines social integration in a diverse civic and political mainstream. The social science research on intergroup contact in U.S. cities undergoing significant demographic change tends to focus on encounters between members of majority “in-groups” and minority “out-groups” in the context of workplaces, neighborhoods, and families. I contend that civic politics is another compelling strategic site for observing intergroup contact between emerging and established players. My study presents three cases of claims-making activity during the post-9/11 period in New York City’s borough of Queens, where close to 50% of the population is foreign-born and no single racial group predominates. …