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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™
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Articles 1 - 16 of 16
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Already Too Late, Abigail Logan
Already Too Late, Abigail Logan
Honors College
Already Too Late (Dec. 2021), in its beginning stages, is a novel that explores the intricacies of trauma response within the context of creative writing that appeals to both older and younger readers alike. This thesis consists of a complete story outline, four well-established chapters, and a disquisition that examines my motivations, methodology, and the research related to the content of this project. The novel is a dual-perspective narrative that interweaves 17-year-old Avery Landon’s traumatic experiences with sexual assault with her father Marty’s overwhelming grief and his coming to terms with his failed parenting. When Avery is raped at a …
The Effect Of Waste And Waste Management On The University Of Maine And Community During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Alexis Welch
The Effect Of Waste And Waste Management On The University Of Maine And Community During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Alexis Welch
Honors College
The Covid-19 pandemic closed the University of Maine the second week of March. Quickly following, most of the country was on lockdown. The virus also has directly affected the University of Maine and its waste stream due to the drastic changes in population and the types of waste being produced. The purpose of this study is to first analyze the direct effects on the amount of waste produced per category on campus in 2019 compared to 2020. The main categories are municipal solid waste, single stream, compost, demo debris, metals, electronics, hazardous waste, universal waste, and biowaste. The second purpose …
The Defense Of American Exceptionalism: President Trump's Covid-19 Rhetoric, Sabrina Paetow
The Defense Of American Exceptionalism: President Trump's Covid-19 Rhetoric, Sabrina Paetow
Honors College
This thesis uses grounded theory and content analysis to examine the political rhetoric President Donald Trump used in the Coronavirus Task Force press briefings during the early phases of the COVID-19 pandemic. I collected 44 transcripts of these press briefings from when they began on February 26, 2020 until April 27, 2020. This time frame marks the period during which the press briefings happened with consistency and when Trump spoke at all of them. Through my research, I established that United States presidents have employed rhetorical tropes of American exceptionalism, including Trump. Trump invoked American exceptionalism in a three-pronged rhetorical …
An Analysis Of Citizenship Education In Maine Middle Schools, Tom Adams
An Analysis Of Citizenship Education In Maine Middle Schools, Tom Adams
Honors College
An essential responsibility of public schooling is to cultivate civic awareness in students and prepare them to participate in a democratic society. Schools have, however, broadly failed this task, a trend the Maine Department of Education has attempted to reverse through policy. The 2019 edition of the MDoE’s Maine Learning Results (“MLR”) standards mandates that middle school social studies teachers implement civic action and service-learning projects (a.k.a. “citizenship education”) to address community needs and foster students’ civic identity. Existing literature suggests that citizenship education improves students’ civic awareness, community engagement, and future voting behavior, but the effectiveness of this new …
The Effect Of The September 11, 2001 Terror Attacks On Policing In Maine: The Officers Point Of View, Andrew King
The Effect Of The September 11, 2001 Terror Attacks On Policing In Maine: The Officers Point Of View, Andrew King
Honors College
There was a marked change in policing after the terror attacks on September 11, 2001. While much research has examined this change in other areas of the country, less is known about how 9/11 impacted policing in Maine. To fill this research gap, the present study examined police officers’ perceptions of job change since the 9/11 terrorist attack. Data from semi-structured interviews with ten police officers were analyzed using focused content coding. The data analysis revealed three general themes that represent how police officers thought that their jobs had changed: (1) national security, (2) local policing, and (3) fusion centers. …
Voting At Umaine: An Empirical Study Of Student Turnout Trends And Motivations, Abigail Despres
Voting At Umaine: An Empirical Study Of Student Turnout Trends And Motivations, Abigail Despres
Honors College
Thomas et al. (2016) estimates that around 10 million currently enrolled college students did not vote in the 2016 presidential election. Unfortunately, this statistic is representative of a national downward trend in youth voter turnout rates where those in the youngest (and largest) voter age bracket are turning out at the lowest rate compared to any other bracket. Previous research on this phenomenon has focused on procedural and institutional barriers like registration, residency requirements, and voter ID laws to describe what physically stands between a prospective young voter and the ballot box. This research looks to study that issue from …
The Impact Of Mental Health Stigma On Hireability, Cassidy Mccusker
The Impact Of Mental Health Stigma On Hireability, Cassidy Mccusker
Honors College
Society tends to view those with mental illness as dangerous, impulsive, and unstable. These perceptions are often made quickly, with very little information available, and have lasting impacts (e.g., impacting job opportunities). The purpose of the current research is to examine stigma associated with various mental health disorders as compared to a physical health disorder or no disorder on perceptions of hireability of a candidate for a job. Undergraduate participants (N = 329) rated deidentified medical forms as part of a job application that varied in terms of diagnosis (depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia), past hospitalization (yes vs. no), …
Effects Of The Transportation And Climate Initiative On The Maine Economy: An Analysis Of Cap-And-Invest And Its Heterogeneous Impacts On Rural And Urban Households, William L. Somes
Honors College
In December 2020, a memorandum of understanding (MOU) was released by the Transportation and Climate Initiative Program (TCI-P), a collaboration of 13 jurisdictions in the New England and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. Modeled on the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), the TCI-P follows a cap-and-invest framework to reduce emissions from the transportation sector by 26% from 2022 to 2032. Since the TCI-P is expected to raise the price of gasoline by 5¢ to 9¢ per gallon, there has been concern that some populations may be disproportionately affected. The present research studies the potential heterogeneous impacts of the TCI-P …
Domestic And Foreign Policy Priorities Of Maine Voters, Caitlyn Rooms
Domestic And Foreign Policy Priorities Of Maine Voters, Caitlyn Rooms
Honors College
Understanding the political priorities of a population is key to unravelling the ways that people engage in local, state, and national politics. National polling organizations do studies in every election cycle on the domestic priorities of national voters, and every few years on the foreign policy priorities of the American public. These polls help academics and policymakers understand the motivations of the American populace and help to guide the public narrative surrounding contentious issues. Polls like this are, however, rare at the state level. This study aims to fill that gap for the state of Maine, providing state-level data on …
Songs Of Myself: An Exploration Of Identity Through Composition, Megan Howell
Songs Of Myself: An Exploration Of Identity Through Composition, Megan Howell
Honors College
Songs of Myself is an Extended Play (EP) of original music that I recorded entirely on my own, depicting my personal exploration of identity. Inspired by Walt Whitman’s “Song of Myself”, a poem that describes the importance of all beings and explores the idea of identity and self-worth, the EP is comprised of seven songs: “Sunrise”; “Dawn”; “Autumn”; “Overcast”; “Storm”; “Dusk”; and “Sunset”, each of which describes a different aspect of my life and identity. “Sunrise” begins the EP, establishing the main theme that returns throughout the rest of the tracks. “Dawn” depicts the important of my family and my …
Political Polarization And The Dissemination Of Misinformation: The United States Pandemic Response As A Cautionary Tale, Mary Giglio
Honors College
This thesis discusses the failings of theUnited States response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and how it has been shaped by the nation’s intense political polarization and the widespread dissemination of misinformation. In this thesis, I critically examine the government’s initial response to the pandemic, including its lack of preparedness and the ineffectiveness of its eventual policies. I also attempt to explain the influence of political polarization on the states, resulting in congressional gridlock, as well as wildly varying policies regarding lockdowns and mask mandates. I connect the increasing prevalence of misinformation today to the historically recent rise of postmodernism, a …
Speak For Yourself: Examining Subjectivity And Trauma In American Literary Journalism, Nathaniel Poole
Speak For Yourself: Examining Subjectivity And Trauma In American Literary Journalism, Nathaniel Poole
Honors College
Due to their relevance and emotional draw for readers, stories of tragedy and suffering are a nearly inescapable aspect of journalism. However, the routine reporting and formulaic styles associated with coverage of these events has contributed to audience compassion fatigue. Studies have been done on the success of some journalists who have historically pushed the boundaries of style and deployed literary strategies to elicit emotion and subvert compassion fatigue in their reporting. However, there is more room in the scholarship on this subject for studies of the specific strategies that contemporary literary journalism writers use and how they adapt them …
"Phone Bad": A Mixed-Methods Exploratory Case Study Analysis Of Social Media And Ostracism, Emmeline Willey
"Phone Bad": A Mixed-Methods Exploratory Case Study Analysis Of Social Media And Ostracism, Emmeline Willey
Honors College
Foundational theories of social psychology were written before the existence of social media. As evolving technology has created an environment where users maintain constant social contact, there exists a need for research concerning how human social needs manifest in an online environment, and even moreso for how constant interconnectedness affects people. Previous research indicates a positive correlation between experienced ostracism and social media addiction. However, social media usage tends to be high among users who feel connected, as well as users who feel disconnected, thus indicating that the link between social media and social disconnection may be a ‘chicken-and-the-egg’ situation. …
“But You Have To Have Been There To Know What We Are Talking About”: An Examination Of The Rhetorical Environments Of Cults And Other Extremist Groups And How They Lead To Violence, Katherine Camille
Honors College
Popular culture often cites charismatic leaders as the catalysts for violent acts in cults and other extremist groups. This explanation is insufficient and oversimplified, and this thesis challenges the idea that a single speech or person can move a large group to act violently and without their own best interests in mind. This thesis examines two well- known cults: The Peoples Temple and Heaven’s Gate, to determine what compelled their followers to commit violent acts 3⁄4 particularly mass suicide. I then take this analysis and look at QAnon, a far-right conspiracy theory group, whose participation in the January 6th, 2021 …
Identifying The Advocate In Me: An Undergraduate Autoethnography Exploring The Personal Identity Of Activist Versus Advocate, Aiden Ciaffaglione
Identifying The Advocate In Me: An Undergraduate Autoethnography Exploring The Personal Identity Of Activist Versus Advocate, Aiden Ciaffaglione
Honors College
“Identifying the Advocate in ME: An Undergraduate Autoethnography Exploring the Personal Identity of Activist Versus Advocate” explores and redefines the social definition of “activists” and “advocates” through an autoethnographic lens of personal growth and identity formation. Stemming from my previous research into the University of Maine 1974 Gay Symposium,I reflect on my undergraduate academic ecology composed of leadership roles, course work, and extracurricular involvement in order to understand my identity development as a queer advocate. I incorporate previous scholarship around social movements, emotion work, and the role of activists in social change to develop a “Social Movement Identification” typology that …
The One-Eyed Man And The Wicked Boar, Iaryna Iasenytska
The One-Eyed Man And The Wicked Boar, Iaryna Iasenytska
Honors College
This thesis examines territorial authoritarian threats to the Western world through an examination of historical and contemporary case studies. The historical examples used in this thesis are fromEastern Europe, since it had many chances to engage in international law with the authoritarian state, leading its people to understand the nature of one of the oldest authoritarian states: Russia. The four case studies used are: 1) Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (1918), 2) Soviet Invasion of Poland (1939-1940), 3) Soviet Occupation of Baltic states (1939-1945), and 4) Russian Annexation of Crimea (2014). Meanwhile, the thesis presents a table of predictions to theorize on …