Social Statistics Commons^™

Bayesian Spatiotemporal Model For Counterfactual Estimation In Socioeconomic Studies, Duwani W. Gonzalez

Statistical Science Theses and Dissertations

Impact evaluations of regional development programs often require estimating counterfactual outcomes for a small number of treated regions using survey-based areal data. In practice, evaluators typically rely on two-group quasi-experimental methods such as propensity score matching (PSM) and Difference-in-Differences (DiD). These approaches perform poorly when only a few regions receive treatment, and when the set of observed covariates is limited or only partially relevant. Moreover, they typically do not explicitly exploit the spatial and temporal dependence present in survey-based areal data such as in ACS (American Community Survey). This dissertation develops a family of Bayesian spatial predictive models for directly …

Budgeting Apps, Financial Literacy And Financial Distress: Evidence From U.S. Households, Max Ngenzi Masabo

Posters - 2026

• First, it provides the first large-scale, nationally representative evidence on how budgeting app usage relates to household financial distress in the United States. Contrary to the intended purpose of these tools, we find that app users, especially frequent users, experience significantly higher levels of financial strain. • Second, we show that financial literacy is a critical moderating factor. The adverse association between budgeting apps and financial distress is substantially stronger among low-literacy individuals, highlighting financial literacy as an essential safeguard against harmful fintech outcomes. • Third, we identify behavioral mechanisms through which budgeting apps may exacerbate financial difficulties. App …

The 2025 Pakistan Floods: Investigating The Human, Agricultural, And Economic Collapse, Abdullah Khan

MSJ Capstone Projects

This project examines the 2025 Pakistan floods as a multidimensional climate disaster that triggered severe human, agricultural, and economic consequences. Moving beyond event-based reporting, the study examines how climate change, weak governance, poor infrastructure planning, and delayed institutional responses intensified the scale of destruction. Using investigative journalism methods, the project combines field reporting from flood-affected areas, in-depth interviews with displaced communities, local activists, and experts, and analysis of official data and policy documents. The findings reveal widespread displacement, loss of livelihoods, food insecurity, and long-term social vulnerability, particularly among marginalized rural populations. Agricultural collapse emerged as a central concern, threatening …

Latino Economic Inequality In New York City: Income And Snap Recipiency, 2013–2023, Oswaldo A. Mena Aguilar

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

This Latino Data Project Report analyzes trends in the economic well-being of Latino households in New York City between 2013 and 2023, focusing on household income and participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The findings reveal a paradoxical pattern: although median Latino household income increased over the decade, economic inequality within the Latino community widened substantially. Income gains were unevenly distributed, with higher-income households pulling further ahead while the lowest-income households experienced stagnation or decline. Over the same period, Latino households fell further behind all other racial and ethnic groups in the city. Additionally, Latinos consistently exhibited the …

Integrating Positive Psychology And Spirituality To Foster Meaning And Well-Being In Older Adults, Crystal Morris

Adultspan Journal

This perspective article explores the integration of positive psychology interventions (PPIs) and spirituality in therapy to foster meaning and well-being in older adults. It highlights exercises such as the positive introduction, positive legacy, character strengths, mindfulness, mindful-based yoga, and a manifestation prayer journaling. The interventions presented are tools to support older adults that may experience depression, difficult life transitions, and the search for renewed meaning. Therapists who integrate PPIs and spirituality into therapy can promote a holistic, non-pathological approach to treatment.

Recent U.S. Government Policy Literature On Critical And Strategic Minerals, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Scholarship and Research

Critical and strategic minerals have become increasingly important in U.S. government civilian and military policymaking in recent years. This is demonstrated by the heavy use of such minerals in many critical civilian and military infrastructures. This work will discuss how this subject has been addressed in laws, presidential documents, and works by government agencies along with congressional oversight committees and support agencies. It will stress how the United States is heavily dependent on strategic minerals from adversarial foreign countries such as China and will examine U.S. efforts to increase its ability to produce such materials in the United States by …

Poverty Among New York City’S Most Vulnerable: 2000-2022, Juan Dolores Cerna, Suleyma Vergara-Tapia

Center for Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies

This report examines the trends of poverty in New York City between the years 2000 and 2022, focusing on economically vulnerable groups such as women, children, and older adults

Methods

This report uses data for the years 2000, 2012, and 2022 released by the U.S. Census Bureau and harmonized for public use by IPUMS USA at the University of Minnesota. See Steven Ruggles, Sarah Flood, Ma hew Sobek, Daniel Backman, Annie Chen, Grace Cooper, Stephanie Richards, Renae Rodgers, and Megan Schouweiler. IPUMS USA: Version 15.0 [dataset]. Minneapolis, MN: IPUMS, 2024. https://www.ipums.org/projects/ipums-usa/d010.V15.0

Discussion

From 2000 to 2022, New York City experienced …

Beauty Comes With A Price: But How Much Is It Worth It, Fabliha Afia

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The global skincare market, valued at 104.24 billion dollars in the year 2022, is very heterogeneous, ranging from prestige brands to more drugstore types. Even when the same key ingredients are present, the latter often sells for much higher due to branding and packaging and the aura of prestige created. This capstone project entitled "Beauty comes with a price: but how much is it worth?" investigates if such higher costs are justified due to superior quality or are driven by non-functional factors. It systematically compared the high-end versus drugstore skincare products in categories like sunscreens, serums, and exfoliants with respect …

Evaluating Role Of Household And Individual Characteristics On Femlae Labor Force Participation: Case Of Mgnrega, Anisha Jain

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This paper evaluates the role of household and individual characteristics on labor force participation to get insights into female labor force participation in India. In addition, the paper evaluates the role of household and individual characteristics in estimating the likelihood of employment in government jobs, permanent jobs, and MGNREGA jobs. The household characteristics that this paper focuses on include the number of elders in the family, children and teens in the household, literacy in the household, household income, and income from other sources. The individual characteristics that this paper focuses on include relation to the head, gender, age and marital …

Digital Bodyguards: Experimental Evidence On The Role Of Personal Safety On Mobility And Empowerment, Fareena Noor Malhi, Sheheryar Banuri, Zehra Aftab

CBER Conference

This research paper examines the impact of the Women Safety App (WSA) on female mobility in urban Lahore, Pakistan. Through a randomized field experiment targeting lower middle-income households, we evaluate the effectiveness of the WSA in reshaping gender safety perceptions and increasing female presence in public spaces. The intervention includes comprehensive training and awareness sessions, followed by the download and registration of the app on participants' smartphones. Data collected from 319 working-age women reveal significant improvements in mobility patterns and safety perceptions postintervention. Our preliminary findings indicate the intervention significantly impacts extensive margin, increasing the time spent travelling. Further it …

Providing End-Of-Life Counseling: A Narrative Inquiry, Carol Hecht, Sibyl West

Adultspan Journal

This qualitative study aimed to address the gap in the research related to end-of-life counseling by exploring the experiences of counselors working with clients at end of life. While counseling literature and education are lacking regarding end of life, many counselors will work alongside clients approaching death. The purpose of this study was twofold: (a) to better understand the nuanced experiences of counselors providing end-of-life counseling and (b) to explore the supports and preparations helpful for counselors to provide end-of-life counseling. A narrative approach, using the Listening Guide (Gilligan, 2015), was employed to analyze and present the stories of three …

Considerations Of Medicare Telehealth Services With Older Adults, Sonah Kho, Amanda Dediego

Adultspan Journal

The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic set in motion a rapid expansion of mental health services offered via telehealth. With this rapid expansion came the need to examine how policy and practice should be shaped in a future where telehealth is considered common in counseling practice. For counselors to understand how to support older adult clients in using telehealth services, they must understand telehealth policy. Following the eligibility of licensed counselors to participate in Medicare, counselors need to stay abreast of regulatory changes regarding restrictions and regulations on use of telehealth for mental and behavioral health services, including video and …

Archetypal Energies And Global Mental Health, Carroy U. Ferguson

Psychology Faculty Publication Series

As a keynote speaker at the Global Mental Health Conference 2024, held at Sophia University, Costa Mesa, CA, in-person and virtually, August 16-18, 2024, my topic was "Archetypal Energies As A Framework for Self-Empowerment and Well Being". The theme of this 2024 global conference was: Enlightened Minds, Compassionate Hearts, and Embodied Wisdom. To supplement my keynote address, I wrote this blog article titled "Archetypal Energies and Global Mental Health".

Predicting Homelessness: Housing Risk Insights From Latent Class Analysis, Katherine E. Marcal, Nicholas Barr

Social Work Faculty Research

Millions of families with children in the U.S. struggle to afford adequate housing. Housing cost burden places families at risk for homelessness, and prevention efforts are hindered by limited understanding of insecure housing experiences at the margins. The present study investigated variation in housing insecurity experiences in a sample of mothers, as well as which risk profiles were most strongly associated with subsequent homelessness. Latent class analysis identified four distinct subgroups of housing insecurity: “Stable,” “Unstable,” “Rent-Focused,” and “Strategic Bill-Paying.” Classes differed on whether they made rent or utility payments on time, experienced utility shutoffs, or were evicted. Mothers who …

Returns To Education For Indigenous Populations In The Us: How Women Compared To Men?, Kianna Big Crow

Scholarly Horizons: University of Minnesota, Morris Undergraduate Journal

Previous research finds large gaps in the labor market outcomes for the Indigenous population. Despite recent improvements, Indigenous workers lag other racial groups in terms of educational attainment and earnings. This study uses the 5-year American Community Survey Data (2018-2022) to estimate earning gains (returns to education) associated with college education for Indigenous workers and examine how Indigenous workers fare compared to workers from other racial groups. The research finds that the marginal benefit to a college education is lower for AIAN workers when compared to their white peers. In fact, the marginal benefit from a college education compared to …

Intimacy Without The Chance Of Heartbreak For Richer, For Poorer, In Sickness & In Health, Cynthia Nguyen

Honors Projects

The present study investigates the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the consumption of porn, shifts in the production of porn consumed between men and women, and the breakdown of any pattern in adult content via film, pictures, and audio. A quantitative approach was done by using R to analyze data pulled off of Pornhub, Reddit’s GoneWildAudio subreddit, and Archive of Our Own from 2018 to 2023. Statistical inference and modeling is used to attempt to find a pattern in the production of online porn across three mediums over several years before, during, and after the pandemic. Regardless of events …

Stock Market Volatility In The United Kingdom: Simulating Post-Covid-19 Recovery, Bala A. Dahiru, Mohammed Shuaibu, Najibullah Hassanov

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

This paper investigates the time it would take for the FTSE-100 index to reach its post-COVID-19 peak. The paper utilises an exponential generalised autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity (EGARCH) model that accounts for leverage effect and asymmetries. The preferred models amongst competing variants was the Autoregressive Moving Average (ARMA)-EGARCH(2,1) specification and was used to predict daily FTSE-100 data from 5th January 2000 to 21st June 2024. The empirical exercise showed that the COVID-19-induced financial crisis negatively affected the United Kingdom’s stock market performance. The results show that the FTSE100 index could reach its post-pandemic peak around 27th August, 2024 (two months after …

The Hidden Struggle: Challenges Older Women Face In Nevada, Annie Vong

Student Research

In 2020, almost one in five Nevadans was over the age of 65.[1] However, within this age group, women outnumber men due to longer life expectancies[2] and migration patterns. Women over 65 years of age make up an estimated 18.1% of the female population in Nevada.[3] Of the male population in Nevada, 15.1% are over 65 years of age.[4] Older women are less likely to be married, are less likely to have completed a bachelor’s degree, are more likely to drop out of the labor force, and are more likely to be living in poverty in …

Attitudes Towards Economic Inequality In A Global Perspective: Evidence From The World Value Survey, Francesco Rigoli

Journal of Global Awareness

Scholars have explored the factors responsible for shaping people’s attitudes towards economic inequality. Yet, this research has focused almost exclusively on Western countries. This is an important limitation: only by looking at the different world regions, scholars can fully elucidate the major factors involved. To address this, the paper examines data from the World Value Survey, a database of representative samples drawn from more than one hundred countries. The analyses reveal that people tolerate economic inequalities more when they have higher salary, are better educated, are male, and live in poorer countries. The data also indicate that a country’s level …

Emotion Regulation Strategies And Perceived Emotional Intelligence: The Effect Of Age., Iwanna Sepiadou

Adultspan Journal

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between perceived emotional intelligence and the reported use of cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression. We also investigated the possible effects of age on the aforementioned variables. The total sample consisted of 379 people (158 men, 220 women, 1 unreported). Across participants, 273 were young (20-39 years old) and 106 were middle-aged (40-65 years old). We found statistically significant positive correlations between the dimensions of perceived emotional intelligence and the reported use of cognitive reappraisal and negative primarily correlations between the dimensions of perceived emotional intelligence and the reported use of …

The Mathematics Of Financial Portfolio Optimization Incorporating Environmental, Social, And Governance Score Information, Ian Driskill

Master's Theses

We numerically investigate the effects that Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) scores have on portfolio optimization with Modern Portfolio Theory assumptions and how ESG scores correlate with the market returns of a rated company's stock. Additionally, we review and analyze a research paper published in the Journal of Financial Economics regarding ESG investing titled “Responsible investing: The ESG-efficient frontier” by Pedersen, Fitzgibbons, and Lukasz. Our overall goal is provide insight for socially responsible inclined investors, to help them understand what ESG scores tell us and how those scores may effect their overall investment returns."

Do Americans Support More Housing?, Michael Lewyn

Scholarly Works

An analysis of opinion poll data on housing issues. The article finds that Americans generally believe that their community needs more housing of all types, but are more closely divided about whether such housing should be in their own neighborhoods. The article further finds that members of minority groups, lower-income Americans, and younger Americans are more pro-housing than older, affluent whites.

Consumer Demand For Food Products, Price Surge, And U.S. Public Policy: An Empirical Economic Analysis, Clement Olivier Codjia

Theses and Dissertations--Agricultural Economics

This dissertation, by leveraging advanced econometric modeling approaches and exploiting suitable large datasets, investigates consumer food product demand in a setting of change in regulating policies as well as unforeseen price increases. Three chapters have mainly enabled the dissertation to achieve its research goals, which have been explicitly presented in Chapter 1 along with the background as well as the core problem the studies have elaborated on.

Given that soft drinks stand out as a major cause of obesity and overweight worldwide, whereas the United States is the country most concerned with this problem, experts have agreed that labels and …

The Unequal Distribution Of Social Risk For Black Men Across The Life-Span. A Novel Framework., Waleed Y. Sami

Adultspan Journal

This conceptual overview offers a comprehensive overview of systemic pathways that negatively impact the mental health of Black Men throughout their lives. Our argument highlights the importance for counselors and mental health professionals to utilize a thorough social risk assessment that considers these pathways in order to effectively address the mental health needs of Black Men while fostering positive working relationships. This overview strongly advocates for the use of context and structural determinants when evaluating mental health symptoms. Without an appropriate understanding of social risk and determinants, counselors may inadvertently perpetuate disparities by decontextualizing symptomology, and reproducing racist discourse.

Measuring The Performance Of Sdgs In Provincial Level Using Regional Sustainable Development Index, Nurafiza Thamrin, Ika Yuni Wulansari, Puguh Bodro Irawan

Journal of Environmental Science and Sustainable Development

Measuring the national and sub-national progress in achieving such globally adopted development agendas as Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is particularly challenging due to data availability and compatibility of indicators to measure SDGs, especially in Indonesia. This paper attempts to measure the performance of sustainable development at the regional level in Indonesia by newly constructing a multidimensional composite index called the Regional Sustainable Development Index (RSDI). RSDI comprises four dimensions, covering comprehensive economic, social, environmental, and governance indicators. By applying factor analysis, the paper assesses the uncertainty of RSDI and the sensitivity of its composing indicators, then further investigates the relationship …

Reducing Food Scarcity: The Benefits Of Urban Farming, S.A. Claudell, Emilio Mejia

Journal of Nonprofit Innovation

Urban farming can enhance the lives of communities and help reduce food scarcity. This paper presents a conceptual prototype of an efficient urban farming community that can be scaled for a single apartment building or an entire community across all global geoeconomics regions, including densely populated cities and rural, developing towns and communities. When deployed in coordination with smart crop choices, local farm support, and efficient transportation then the result isn’t just sustainability, but also increasing fresh produce accessibility, optimizing nutritional value, eliminating the use of ‘forever chemicals’, reducing transportation costs, and fostering global environmental benefits.

Imagine Doris, who is …

Generalized Ratio-Product Cum Regression Variance Estimator In Two-Phase Sampling, Isah Muhammad

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

This study develops a flexible and efficient generalized ratio-product cum regression type estimator of population variance utilizing auxiliary variable in two-phase sampling that incorporates the properties of ratio-type and product-type estimators. The properties of the estimator were derived using first order approximation. The theoretical conditions under which the precision and the flexibility of the estimator is better than some classical estimators are also provided. Empirical evidence from five real datasets suggests that the proposed estimator outperforms the classical variance, ratio variance, product, and exponential ratio type estimators in terms of precision and efficiency. The estimator can be utilized to provide …

Modelling The Naira Exchange Rate Dependence Using Static And Time-Varying Copula, Kabir Katata

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

This paper examines the dependence structure of different currencies versus the Nigerian Naira using constant and time-varying copula. Daily Naira/USD, Naira/Yuan, Naira/Pound, and Naira/Euro exchange rates from 23 December 2011 to 12 May 2020 were utilised. We fitted eight constant and time-varying copula families using the exchange rate standardised residuals. The study finds that the Naira exchange rate may be estimated with student t-copula, Symmetrized Joe-Clayton (SJC), or Rotated Gumbel copula models and Autoregressive (AR)– Glosten Jagannathan RunkleGeneralized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedastic (GJR-GARCH) (1,1) models with skewed t residuals for margins. The Naira exchange rate returns is timevarying, tail-dependent, and asymmetric. …

The Impact Of Vaccinations And Chronic Disease On Covid Death Rates, James L. Doti

Economics Faculty Articles and Research

This study presents a theoretical and empirical regression model to measure the efficacy of vaccinations in reducing COVID death rates across states over the 3/10/21 to 12/28/22 period. During that period, it was estimated that the availability of vaccinations resulted in a reduction of 427,000 COVID deaths in the nation. To arrive at that estimate, other covariants were held constant. In particular, it was found that chronic disease should be included as an explanatory variable to arrive at unbiased measures of the efficacy of vaccinations in reducing deaths. In addition, the percentage of people over the age of 65 was …

Improving The Efficiency Of Exponential Ratio-Type Estimator For Population Median: A Calibration Weight Adjustment Approach, Mathew J. Iseh, Kufre J. Bassey

CBN Journal of Applied Statistics (JAS)

This paper modifies the Bahl and Tuteja exponential ratio-type estimator for population median under simple random and stratified sampling schemes using calibration weight adjustment technique with supplementary information to vary the stratum weights. The bias and mean square error of the modified estimator were obtained up to the second-order approximation, which satisfies the necessary conditions for efficiency. The findings show that the new estimator surpasses existing estimators in efficiency gain. This suggests the appropriateness of calibration weight modification in boosting the efficiency of a population parameter estimator under stratified random sampling especially where the population parameter of the auxiliary variable …