Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

No. 67: Migrant Entrepreneurship, Collective Violence And Xenophobia In South Africa, Jonathan Crush, Sujata Ramachandran

Southern African Migration Programme

The remarkable growth of informal migrant entrepreneurship in South Africa since 1990 would have been much lauded had it not been for the striking detail that the actors in question are seen as “foreigners” or “outsiders”. As such, they are uniformly viewed as undesirable and disadvantaging poor South African citizens. The growing presence of migrants in the informal sector has created various tensions in South Africa, including in government circles, ignoring the fact that in the free market economy of South Africa, immigrants and refugees, like citizens and commercial enterprises, would otherwise enjoy the freedom to establish, operate and expand …

No. 66: Xenophobic Violence In South Africa: Denialism, Minimalism, Realism, Jonathan Crush, Sujata Ramachandran

Southern African Migration Programme

Violent xenophobia has become a regular feature of South African life. Everyday animosity frequently spills over into violence against individual migrants and refugees and their economic enterprises. Some of these incidents reach the scrutiny of the media and officialdom, but most remain invisible and unremarked. The fact that most of the violence occurs in marginal urban locations of informal settlements, townships and inner-city suburbs in South Africa has prompted intense debate over the nomenclature and identification of the underlying causes. Explanations for the large-scale anti-migrant violence that swept the country in May 2008, and continues in more isolated and sporadic …

Is Burnout A Depressive Disorder? A Reexamination With Special Focus On Atypical Depression, Renzo Bianchi, Irvin Sam Schonfeld, Eric Laurent

Publications and Research

Whether burnout and depression cover the same psychopathology remains to be elucidated. To date, subtypes of depression have been overlooked in research on the burnout–depression overlap. Our aim was to estimate the prevalence of depressive disorders in workers with burnout while examining the overlap of burnout with the atypical subtype of depression. The present study included 5,575 schoolteachers (mean age = 41 years; 78% female). Burnout was assessed with the Maslach Burnout Inventory. Depression was measured with the 9-item depression scale of the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9). Atypical features of depression were examined using a dedicated module, referenced to …

Addressing The Consequences Of Violence And Adversity: The Development Of A Group Mental Health Intervention For War-Affected Youth In Sierra Leone, Theresa S. Betancourt, Elizabeth A. Newnham, Katrina Hann, Ryan K. Mcbain, Adeyinka M. Akinsulure-Smith, John Weisz, Grace M. Lilienthal, Nathan Hansen

Publications and Research

It is estimated that over one billion children and adolescents live in regions affected by armed conflict Oacob et al., 2007). Whereas access to mental health care is already very limited in low- and middle-income countries (LAMIC}-the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates the level of untreated mental disorders among adults in low- and middleincome countries may be as high as 78 percent (Kohn, Saxena, Levav & Saraceno, 2004)-the gap between the need for services and their limited availability is accentuated in regions affected by armed conflict (Betancourt, McBain, Newnham & Brennan, 2013; IASC, 2007; Walker et al., 2011). Among adolescents …

The Biggest Winner: Using Statistics To Assess The Effectiveness Of An E-Resources Promotional Campaign, Amy Fry

University Libraries Faculty Publications

In the fall of 2011, librarians at Bowling Green State University were given the opportunity to compete for a $100 Amazon.com gift card by promoting an underused database. Usage statistics were tracked throughout the semester and compared to those for the same time period from the previous year. Eight of the twelve databases promoted rose in use. This article discusses the project methodology and uses its outcomes to assess the effectiveness of a range of marketing techniques for electronic resources, present hypotheses to account for some declines in usage, and demonstrate the value of distributed, personalized promotion for library resources.

Interactions Between African Americans And Police Officers: How Cultural Stereotypes Create A Wrongful Conviction Pipeline For African Americans, Cynthia J. Najdowski

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Erroneous convictions are not as rare as one might expect and when they occur, the wrongfully accused are more often African American than White: Of those who were wrongfully convicted and later exonerated in the last quarter century, 47% were African American (The National Registry of Exonerations, 2013), even though only 13% of the U.S. population is (Rastogi, Johnson, Hoeffel, & Drewery, 2011). Yet Gould, Carrano, Leo, and Young’s (2013) recent analysis of miscarriages of justice indicated that race does not reliably differentiate between cases in which innocent defendants are wrongfully convicted as opposed to rightfully acquitted. They suggested that, …

Applied Theater: Giving Voice To Low-Income Teenage Immigrants Through Theater, Nadia S. Garzon

Master of Liberal Studies Theses

In the United States, immigration is feared, criticized, and highly misunderstood. The current immigration debate relies on, and reinforces, anti-immigrant myths. This rhetoric negatively impacts the lives of immigrants, especially that of the 11.7 million undocumented immigrants who currently live in the United States. The first chapter of this paper talks about some of the myths associated with immigration, the situation of many immigrants, and some of the root causes of immigration, including the role of the United States. The second chapter describes Augusto Boal’s life and his Theater of the Oppressed. The third chapter describes the process, challenges, and …

An Anthropocene Without Archaeology—Should We Care?, Todd J. Braje, Jon M. Erlandson, C. Melvin Aikens, Tim Beach, Scott Fitzpatrick, Sara Gonzalez, Douglas J. Kennett, Patrick V. Kirch, Gyoung-Ah Lee, Kent G. Lightfoot, Sarah B. Mcclure, Lee M. Panich, Torben C. Rick, Anna C. Roosevelt, Tsim D. Schneider, Bruce Smith, Melinda A. Zeder

Faculty Publications

For more than a decade, a movement has been gathering steam among geoscientists to designate an Anthropocene Epoch and formally recognize that we have entered a new geological age in which Earth’s systems are dominated by humans. Chemists, climatologists, and other scientists have entered the discussion, and there is a growing consensus that we are living in the Anthropocene. Nobel Prize-winning atmospheric chemist Paul Crutzen (2002a, 2002b; Crutzen and Stoermer 2000) coined the term, but the idea that humans are a driver of our planet’s climate and ecosystems has much deeper roots. Italian geologist Antonio Stoppani wrote of the “anthropozoic …

Fy2014 Association Of College And Research Libraries (Acrl) Statistical Survey: University Of Rhode Island Data, Michael Vocino

University Libraries Reports & Statistics

The main document posted here is a report generated from the online subscription service ACRLMetrics. The report contains FY2014 data as submitted by the University of Rhode Island Libraries for the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) 2013-2014 statistical survey. It also provides additional metrics calculated by ACRL. Several files are included as supplemental content: "ACRL academic library survey -- URI FY2014 data.xlsx," the report (above) in spreadsheet format; "2014 ACRL data entry worksheet filled out.pdf;" "2014 ACRL data entry worksheet as PDF interactive form.PDF;" "ACRL Statistics blank worksheet 2013-14.pdf;" "ACRL Statistics Questionnaire 2013-14 instructions.pdf," and "ACRL Statistics FAQ …

The Effects Of A Career-Planning Course On Community College Students' Career Self-Efficacy And Career Indecisiveness, Jefferey Samuel Lip

Wayne State University Dissertations

The principal aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of a career-planning course for college students who were undecided on a major or want to change or confirm their major at community college. The career-planning course was designed to assist students in becoming more aware of themselves and career options. From this study, the career-planning course assisted students in improving their career decision-making self-efficacy. A reduction in career decision-making difficulties for students was seen in this study. A quasi-experimental nonequivalent control group research design was used for this study. To determine if the experimental and control group were …

Empathy As A Moderator Of Adolescent Bullying Behavior And Moral Disengagement After Controlling For Social Desirability, Amy Zelidman

Wayne State University Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to assess the moderating influence empathy has on the associations between adolescent bullying behavior and moral disengagement after controlling for social desirability (e.g., response bias). 676 students in 7th and 8th grade from a suburban middle school in Southeast Michigan participated in this study in the fall of 2012.

Results showed male respondents were more likely than female respondents to (a) report engaging in all forms of traditional bullying behavior overall, including physical, verbal, and social bullying and (b) report higher rates of physical victimization and moral disengagement. Female respondents were more likely to …

Accumulation Of Subcortical Iron As A Modifier Of Volumetric And Cognitive Decline In Healthy Aging: Two Longitudinal Studies, Ana Marie Daugherty

Wayne State University Dissertations

Accumulation of non-heme iron in the brain has been theorized as a cellular mechanism underlying global neural and cognitive decline in normal aging and neurodegenerative disease. Relatively few studies of brain iron in normal aging exist and extant studies are almost exclusively cross-sectional. Here, I estimated iron content via T2* and measured volumes in several brain regions in two independent samples of healthy adults. The first sample (N = 89) was measured twice with a two-year delay; and the second sample (N = 32) was assessed four times over a span of 7 years. Latent models estimated change in iron …

Religiosity-Spirituality And Risky Drinking Over The Transition To College: A Multi-Wave Longitudinal Study, Brian J. Klassen

Wayne State University Dissertations

Although the relationship between religiosity-spirituality and risky alcohol use is one of the most frequently studied topics in mental health, relatively little is known about how these variables relate to each other over time, especially during specific developmental periods such as the transition from high school to college. This study analyzed three waves of self-report data collected from a sample (N=623) of college students over a two-year period. Analyses examined (1) the stability of religiosity-spirituality and risky drinking over the transition to college, (2) the magnitude and direction of relationships between religiosity-spirituality and risky drinking, (3) the degree to which …

Understanding The Role Of Nutritional Stress In The Adult And Developing Zebra Finch, Jessica Bayley Thompson

Wayne State University Dissertations

Songbirds are particularly susceptible to stress during the sensitive period for song learning. Thus the developmental stress hypothesis (DSH) proposes that adult song reflects a male's early life environment during this period. Nutritional stress (NS) has been shown to cause deficits in song learning and adult song output that are salient to females. Female song birds consistently prefer control males over those raised under NS, yet the effects NS on females are still unclear. The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPA) has been implicated in this process. However, evidence directly linking HPA functioning to the deficits due to NS have inconsistently shown elevations …

Coping Similarity And Psychosocial Risk Factors In Couples With Chronic Pain, Amy M. Williams

Wayne State University Dissertations

Chronic pain is an important public health problem that is associated with a host of negative individual and relationship outcomes. Chronic pain is a chronic stressor that both the individual in pain and their spouse must cope with. The current study examined how pain coping similarity within the couple predicted not only patient adjustment, but also spouse adjustment in a longitudinal study. Participants were 108 heterosexual couples in which one partner had chronic pain. The participants completed measures at 3 time points at 6 month intervals. Both the patient and spouse individually completed questionnaires pertaining to their marriage, mood, pain …

Self-Construal Moderates Testosterone Reactivity To Competitive Outcomes, Keith Welker

Wayne State University Dissertations

Previous research shows that testosterone reactivity to competitive outcomes predicts aggressive behavior in men. However, some studies have failed to find these effects, and it has been suggested that individual differences moderate the relationships between competitive outcomes, testosterone fluctuations, and aggressive behavior. The current research examined whether one individual difference--self-construal--would moderate these effects. In Study 1, participants were assigned to win or lose a competitive video game and engaged in a reactive aggression task. Results indicated that increases in testosterone in response to winning and decreases in response to losing occurred in men with independent, not interdependent, self-construals. These changes …

An Exploration Of The Use Of Objects In The Creation, Maintenance, And Social Performance Of Self Among People With Alzheimer's Disease And Related Disorders, Jayne Marie Yatczak

Wayne State University Dissertations

In the United States individuals with Alzheimer's disease and related disorders (ADRD) are faced with multiple threats to their social lives and to their sense of self. Such threats include the assumption that our sense of self is entirely dependent upon cognition and memory, elements that become impaired in AD (Kontos 2006) and images of Alzheimer's disease as the death before death (Behuniak 2011). The move to a long term care setting with its simultaneous stripping away of possessions that supply one with personal identity also poses such a threat. Although, individuals with ADRD who move to long term care …

Networks Of Users And Powers: Blackboard Software Roadmap As Cultural Practice, Diana Gellci

Wayne State University Dissertations

With the rapid growth of eLearning applications - the software providing for learning through the Internet - it has become commonplace to describe those technologies as both simple tools and user-friendly. These two vague yet suggestive terms make the operating of the technology appear as social value and any related issues as a user's problem. Interested neo-liberal groups take a step further when considering eLearning technologies as the solution for the problems faced in the field. STS studies recognize that technology fetishism is strategically employed to justify the latest developments of capitalism as technological and logical.

This doctoral study examines …

Elections And Asset Pricing: The Politically Sensitive Equity Of Us Military Contractors, Matthew Mark Ross

Wayne State University Dissertations

I quantify the relationship between political uncertainty and equity volatility in the months around US elections from 1989-2012. The Economic Policy Uncertainty Index and Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) data are employed to measure political uncertainty faced by military contractors, capitalizing on the unique monopsony-oligopoly business environment of these firms. I employ a GARCH (1,1) model with cross-sectionally correlated moments to produce daily firm-election volatility measures. Volatility increases 11% for local, 27% for midterm, and 43% for presidential elections. These measures demonstrate that all election categories: local, federal, presidential, and midterm exhibit differential effects on equity volatility. My results …

The Influence Of Individual And Perceived Organizational Characterisitics On Teacher Interventions In Bullying Situations, Sarah Vanzoeren

Wayne State University Dissertations

Complex issues, such as bullying, have brought to light the importance of expanding school social work to include interventions focused on multiple levels of practice. Recognizing that teachers play an important role in influencing educational, social, and emotional outcomes for students, this study seeks to broaden our understanding of what motivates teachers to intervene in bullying situations in order to inform school social work practice as well as future anti-bullying programs and policies. A cross-sectional descriptive design was utilized to gather data from middle school teachers in ten districts across the state of Michigan (n=176). Participants completed an online survey …

An Analysis Of Self: The Development And Assessment Of A Measure Of Selfobject Needs, Eamonn Arble

Wayne State University Dissertations

The theory of self psychology as advanced by Heinz Kohut (1971, 1977, 1984) emphasized the importance of early developmental experiences, most centrally, the empathic attunement of caregivers as key nutrients for fostering the capacity for healthy self-regulation and interpersonal relations. Kohut elaborated three critical selfobject needs (i.e., idealizing, mirroring, and twinship) that were ideally satiated by these early experiences, deeming the fulfillment of these needs as essential for developing a healthy sense of self, capable of sustaining ambitions, self-soothing, and caring for others and oneself. In the case of psychopathology, these needs were theorized to have gone unmet, leaving the …

Identifying And Understanding Nonsuicidal Self-Injury Among College Students, Angela S. Fedewa

Wayne State University Dissertations

Nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) behavior in college students

at an urban university was studied. Relations between NSSI

and poor quality relationships with their parents and peers, as

well as deficient coping and help-seeking behavior were examined

from an attachment perspective. Undergraduates were recruited

via an online psychology subject pool and completed an online survey.

T-tests were conducted to identify what variables differed between

students who engaged in NSSI in contrast to students that did not.

In addition, a discriminant function analysis was conducted. It was

found that intrapersonal and interpersonal variables predicted group

membership (i.e. social desirability, body protection, positive affect, …

A Daily Study Of The Sleep-Pain Relationship In Fibromyalgia, Maren Elizabeth Hyde-Nolan

Wayne State University Dissertations

Fibromyalgia (FM) impacts millions of individuals around the world and is characterized by widespread chronic pain and tenderness as well as nonrestorative sleep, fatigue, and stiffness (Wolfe et al., 1990; Wolfe et al., 2010). Poor sleep quality is reported by more than 90% of individuals with FM, suggesting that sleep disturbance may be a contributing factor to the pain experience (Moldofsky, 2008). Recent reviews of the literature have established the connection between sleep and pain, although the direction of this relationship remains unclear (Finan et al., 2013; Moldofsky, 2001). This dissertation sought to examine the daily relationship between sleep and …

Associations Between Maternal Maltreatment-Specific Shame, Maternal-Infant Interactions, And Infant Emotion Regulation, Rena A. Menke

Wayne State University Dissertations

The current study focuses on maltreatment-specific shame as a potential mechanism by which mothers' histories of childhood maltreatment might influence parenting and infant emotion regulation. Shame is a common reaction to childhood maltreatment, and the persistence of maltreatment-specific shame is associated with psychopathology and other psychosocial problems long after the abuse ends (Andrews, Brewin, Rose, & Kirk, 2000; Feiring, Taska, & Lewis, 2002a; Feiring & Taska, 2005). Despite being associated with psychopathology (e.g., depression, PTSD), shame is a conceptually distinct abuse-specific reaction that can interfere with self and interpersonal development (Feiring, Cleland & Simon, 2010; Feiring, Simon, Cleland, 2009; Feiring, …

Subjugated Bodies, Normalized Subjects: Representations Of Power In The Panamanian Literature Of Roberto Díaz Herrera, Rose Marie Tapia And Mauro Zúñiga Araúz, Sara Escobar-Wiercinski

Wayne State University Dissertations

This dissertation examines the dissemination of power represented in the works of Panamanian writers Roberto Díaz Herrera, Rose Marie Tapia and Mauro Zúñiga Araúz. My work focuses on two important periods in Panama's history: the repressive dictatorial era of Manuel Noriega and the post-dictatorial era during which subjugation and power operate in subtle ways, through institutions, mechanisms of civil society, and globalization. The primary sources are Díaz Herrera's testimony, and the novels of Tapia and Zúñiga Araúz. In my analysis, I draw upon the notions of power, subjugation and normalization developed by the French philosoher Michel Foucault. I also draw …

Mental Health Service Utilization Among African-American Adolescents, Marilyn Franklin

Wayne State University Dissertations

Underutilization of mental health services by ethnic minorities has been identified as a major public health threat by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (2001). Research on ethnic disparities has focused on identifying the sociodemographic correlates of between group differences in treatment attendance. The current study adds to the utilization literature by exploring within group differences amongst a sample of African-American families. Based on extant literature related to treatment utilization in other samples, this study examined the associations between multiple modifiable factors and adolescent treatment engagement amongst 90 African-American caregiver-adolescent dyads.

Consistent with previous research, psychological symptoms, functional …

Health-Related Behaviors In Low-Income, Minority Youth: The Role Of Motivation, Basic Needs, Mental Health, And Environmental Barriers, Brittany A. Kohlberger

Wayne State University Dissertations

Engaging in health-related behaviors, such as exercise, healthy eating, and sleep hygiene, are associated with fewer externalizing and internalizing behavior problems and higher self-esteem, suggesting that there may be large benefits to engaging in health-related behaviors during the transitional developmental phase of adolescence (Ong, Wickramaratne, Tang, & Weissmann, 2006; Stathopoulou, Power, Berry, Smits, & Otto, 2006). The purpose of the current study was to identify key psychological processes and external factors that may boost or impede youths' motivation and engagement in health-related behaviors. Specifically, we expected that higher levels of psychological symptoms and environmental barriers will be significantly, negatively associated …

Factors Related To Quality Of Life In Families Of Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Jessica R. Garrett

Wayne State University Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore how caretakers of children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are able to move through adverse circumstances with which they are confronted while raising their child with considerable developmental needs and challenges. Family resilience in this study includes family quality of life, locus of control, sense of coherence, perceived stress, uncertainty, severity, and demands. The participants in this study were 153 parents of children diagnosed with ASD. The parents were members of the Autism Society of Oakland County. The participants completed a survey comprised of six scales (Parental Concerns Questionnaire, Perceived …

Predictors Of School Administrator Responses In Bullying Situations: Implications For Bullying Prevention Programs, Aguib Diop

Wayne State University Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate school administrators' responses to bullying situations and explore variables that predict their responses. Elementary, middle and high school administrators (n = 126) from school districts throughout Michigan participated in the study. Data were collected during the 2013-2014 school year.

Differences between beliefs about the causes of victimization were found in that school administrators were less likely to endorse normative beliefs about the causes of victimization than assertive or avoidant beliefs. School administrators were more likely to endorse assertive beliefs for girls than for boys. Empathy towards victims, perceived seriousness of the bullying …

2014 American Incentive System Almanac, Don P. Diffine Ph.D.

Belden Center Monographs

No abstract provided.