Sociology Commons^™

Gaming, Gambling, And Getting Ahead In American Society, Dmitri N. Shalin

International Conference on Gambling & Risk Taking

This paper explores a continuum of gaming, gambling, and risk taking in society at large as crucial for understanding the American dream. The distinction is made between gaming as a challenge enjoyed for its own sake, gambling as betting a value on a chancy outcome, and calculated risk taking as a means of getting ahead in life’s journey. The argument is made that everyday life is full of practical gambles which expose risk takers to setbacks and opportunities and which impact our life chances. The question is raised how the unequal distribution of life chances in American society affects the …

Sexual Dimorphism In Homo Erectus Inferred From 1.5 Ma Footprints Near Ileret, Kenya, Brian Villmoare, Kevin G. Hatala, William Jungers

Anthropology Faculty Research

Sexual dimorphism can be one of the most important indicators of social behavior in fossil species, but the effects of time averaging, geographic variation, and differential preservation can complicate attempts to determine this measure from preserved skeletal anatomy. Here we present an alternative, using footprints from near Ileret, Kenya, to assess the sexual dimorphism of presumptive African Homo erectus at 1.5 Ma. Footprint sites have several unique advantages not typically available to fossils: a single surface can sample a population over a very brief time (in this case likely not more than a single day), and the data are geographically …

Keeping Up Appearances: Spatial Spillovers And Housing Renovations, Nicholas B. Irwin

Molasky Family Department of Economics and Real Estate Faculty Research

Spatial spillovers from renovations can bolster urban redevelopment efforts by multiplying scarce city funds, creating a reinforcing feedback cycle of redevelopment. Using spatially explicit data on renovations from Baltimore, MD, we model the extent of spatial spillovers in housing renovations and estimate the effect of previous renovations on the likelihood to renovate while controlling for underlying spatial correlation. We find strong evidence of spatial spillovers with a neighbouring renovation increasing renovation likelihood by at least 1.8% These positive feedback cycles indicate the potential for significant private market multipliers from city‐led urban revitalization policies that encourage renovation.

Project 150, Jason Pagtolingan

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Project 150 addresses the issue of youth homelessness in the Clark County School District. Project 150 currently serves more than 6,000 disadvantaged high school students at 58 schools in Southern Nevada.

Three Square, Kamal Jenkins

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Three Square is an organization that helps people who are food insecure.

Project 150: High School’S Tough Enough, Lorena Altabaz

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Project 150 addresses the issue of youth homelessness in the Clark County School District. Project 150 currently serves more than 6,000 disadvantaged high school students at 58 schools in Southern Nevada.

Friends Of Sloan Canyon, Nicole Nitschke

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Sloan Canyon, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization providing community support and educational resources that enhance the conservation, protection and public enjoyment of Sloan Canyon National Conservation Area, one of your National Conservation Lands.

Project F.O.C.U.S, Chelsea Rogers

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Project FOCUS addresses the lack of inclusion within the higher education environment.

Three Square, Jessica Smith

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Three Square is an organization that helps people who are food insecure.

Project 150: High School’S Tough Enough, Korina Czajka

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Project 150 addresses the issue of youth homelessness in the Clark County School District. Project 150 currently serves more than 6,000 disadvantaged high school students at 58 schools in Southern Nevada.

Project 150, Edith Garibay

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Project 150 addresses the issue of youth homelessness in the Clark County School District. Project 150 currently serves more than 6,000 disadvantaged high school students at 58 schools in Southern Nevada.

University Methodist Church, Michael Malikian

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Helping the community through service.

Service Learning, Thanh Nguyen

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Helping the community through service.

Queering Utopia: Act Up And The Disruption Of Heteronormativity, Nicholas Lepp

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The existing literature on queer utopianism tends to analyze static aesthetic artifacts as opposed to diachronic social movements designed to create material policy changes. This opens room for various criticisms of queer utopianism regarding it being too wishful and devolving into political and social forms of queer dystopia. In order to remedy this concern, this thesis seeks to investigate how queer utopic thought can be used to create long-lasting change. To answer this question, this thesis is broadly divided into two sections—one theoretical and one practical. My theoretical section delves into an analysis of the after-effects of queer utopic cuts …

Factors Associated With Food Insecurity Among Individuals, Aged Sixty And Older, In Clark County, Nv, Lisa M. Segler

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Food insecurity is defined as a lack of consistent access to enough food for an active, healthy life. In Nevada, an estimated 80,000 individuals, aged 60 years or older, were food insecure in 2016. The primary aim of this study was to identify factors that are associated with food insecurity in older adults, aged sixty and older, in Clark County, NV. The secondary aim of this study was to identify which factors interact with each other to explain food insecurity among individuals aged sixty and older, in Clark County, NV. A secondary data analysis was conducted using data collected by …

Emerging Adults’ Identities, Attitudes, And Orientations Concerning Consensual Non-Monogamy, Amber Kory Stephens

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study considered the connection among aspects of emerging adults’ identities and their relational and sociosexual orientations as well as their attitudes toward consensual nonmonogamy (CNM). Results indicated significant relationships among individuals’ collective and social identity aspects, as dictated in the AIQ-IV, and how emerging adults label their relational orientations (e.g., strictly monogamous, monogamish, open, and polyamorous). Additionally, findings demonstrated that the salience/importance of social categories, roles, and reputations in one's identity influences how they choose to label their relational orientation, their attitudes toward non-monogamy, and their orientation toward uncommitted sex (sociosexual orientation). Discussion, implications and future directions follow.

Police Use Of Force And Officer Injury: A Closer Examination Of The Impact Of Taser Deployment And Contextual Factors, Jason Kuzik

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Using secondary data from the Henderson Police Department (NV), a study was conducted to explore the contextual relationships of officers, subjects and situational characteristics related to use of force encounters. A series of research questions examine the combinations of contextual factors (i.e., officer demographics, subject demographics, and event-specific characteristics) that are associated with different types of police use of force (e.g., Taser, non-Taser), officer injuries and subject injuries. Univariate analysis, Bivariate analysis and Conjunctive Analysis of Case Configurations examine the data and identify contextual profiles associated with police use of force. The analysis shows that there is variation in the …

Email Is Alive: How To Communicate With Graduate College Students, Valarie C. Burke

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this research is to ascertain how graduate college students prefer to be communicated with regarding academic deadlines, professional development events and social events. Living in a Web 3.0 world, where people are never alone, but rather always connected, there are several methods to share information. I focus on email, websites, text messaging, instant messaging, and Facebook. For the richest data, I used both quantitative and qualitative methods. First, I conducted focus groups and then designed and distributed a survey. If more engaged students are the more successful, they first need to be aware of ways to get …

Encyclopedia Of My Body, Alice Hastings

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This creative thesis project is a culmination of the Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing degree at UNLV. The thesis—titled Encyclopedia of My Body—was composed entirely during my graduate semesters at UNLV. As a hybrid collection book of poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction, it explores the different bodies that create and shape human people. Included within these bodies are of course the temporal, organic bodies human people inhabit; using my own body as the focus, I explore the intersections of gender, pain, and transness. This collection however seeks to trouble the idea of bodies, and therefore explores the bodies …

Stop Running In Laps: Evaluating The Lethality Assessment Program's Effectiveness In Reducing Repeat Intimate Partner Violence, Dory A. Mizrachi

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Repeat victimization is a phenomenon which is generally understood as the pattern and prevalence of victimization. This is an important factor for local authorities in their attempt to develop innovative policies and practices to facilitate predicting and preventing crimes. Thus, many police departments around the country, including the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD) have adopted the Lethality Assessment Program (LAP). This is a risk assessment tool used by responding officers on domestic violence calls that intends to prevent future risk of lethal violence to victims of domestic violence by assessing their risk of lethality and providing immediate referrals to …

From Deviant Symbol To Cultural Icon? Understanding Pit Bull Stigma, Genevieve Minter

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This research draws from twelve months of ethnographic data using Las Vegas as a case study to understand how pit bull owners experience and negotiate stigma in various social settings. The human-dog relationship, long rooted in utility, transformed in the modern era as animals were promoted from worker to companion. The world’s first dog register, The American Kennel Club, created breed standards and encouraged selective breeding, which influenced the idea of certain dogs being more physically “dangerous” than others. Though the pit bull is not the first dog “breed” to be the object of discrimination, it is the first dog …

Missed Opportunities: The Effect Of Cps Involvement On Trafficking Victims In The Delinquency System, Kelly Rae Stout

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Children and youth involved in the child welfare system are an incredibly vulnerable population that could potentially have an increased risk for being sexually exploited. In 2014, Federal Public Law 113-183 mandated that all child protective service (CPS) agencies in the United States improve services of commercially sexually exploited children and youth (CSEC). This federal directive requires that states and counties train their staff in identifying and helping children who have been or are at risk for being trafficked. To explore this complex issue, quantitative methods were used. The data were analyzed for CPS engagement among the CSEC victims identified …

Beyond Suffrage: Intermarriage, Land, And Meanings Of Citizenship And Marital Naturalization/Expatriation In The United States, Shiori Yamamoto

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This dissertation investigates how the laws of marital naturalization/expatriation, namely the Citizenship Act of 1855, the Expatriation Act of 1907, and the Cable Act of 1922 and its amendments throughout the 1930s, impacted the lives of women who married foreigners, especially in the American West, and demonstrates how women directly and indirectly challenged the practice of marital naturalization/expatriation. Those laws demanded women who married foreigners take the nationality of their husbands depending on the race of women and their husbands, making married women’s citizenship dependent on that of their husbands. Particularly under the Expatriation Act of 1907, all American women …

Virtually Healthy: Using Virtual Ethnography To Survey Healthcare Seeking Practices Of Transgender Individuals Online, Rogelio Arenas

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The use of digital spaces becomes more prevalent as technologies improve and more individuals become connected online. For many, the virtual world may become the primary means by which they engage socially and commercially with larger society. For individuals who identify as transgender or gender nonconforming, the virtual world serves as an environment where the fluidity of identity construction, the security of anonymity, and the physical separation provided by using a digital medium allows for the creation of a secure space for social engagements that may otherwise be discriminatory or infeasible in physical interactions. The stigma, discrimination, and prejudice experienced …

Attitudes Toward Marijuana Legalization: Temporal And Thematic Trends, Daniel James Krystosek

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This dissertation examines historical changes in marijuana legalization attitudes between 1974 – 2018, using a qualitative study of pro-legalization social movements in marijuana culture and quantitative analyses of measures from the General Social Survey (GSS). The main research question asks what themes have been prevalent in pro-legalization social movements (e.g., libertarianism, anti-establishment and anti-drug-war, medical/cancer patient advocacy, market incentives), how these themes have changed over the past several decades, and whether they connect to trends in legalization attitudes in the (GSS).

The first part of this study is qualitative, employing thematic content analysis of the most prominent national pro-marijuana publication. …

The Crossing, A Christian Church, Victoria Pierce

Second-Year Seminar Posters (COE 202)

Helping the community through service.

A Narrative Criticism Of Online Anti-Vaccine Stories Of Vaxtruth, Stephanie Willes

Graduate Research Symposium (2018 - present)

Using narrative methods, this professional paper provides a rhetorical criticism of an anti-vaccine community called, VaxTruth. This analysis will aid in understanding why anti-vaccine narratives are so persuasive and what they offer people who join anti-vaccine communities. To explore this phenomenon I first look at the affordances of the Internet, how it encourages participation, which spreads misinformation, pseudoscience, and conspiracy theories. Understanding how actions through the Internet become rhetorical acts, I turn to rhetorical theories of counterpublics and exigences, which also aids in finding the outcomes of anti-vaccine discourses. Current findings show meta-narratives of government conspiracy theories that break away …

Fans Gone Wild: An Interdisciplinary Review Of Spectator Violence, Ryan Radmall

Graduate Research Symposium (2018 - present)

Spectator violence refers to physical violence that occurs at special events within entertainment venues. This phenomenon can be problematic for event attendees, promoters, and security at these events.

Being A Prison Chaplain In A Godless Country: An Exploration Of The Czech Correctional Chaplaincy, Andrea Beláňová, Tereza Trejbalova, Bridget Kelley

Graduate Research Symposium (2018 - present)

Prison chaplaincy, along with religiosity in the criminal justice system, are widely researched in the US (e.g.,Maruna, Wilson, & Curran, 2006; Sundt & Cullen, 1998). The Czech Republic remains one of the most secular countries in the world; about 72% of the population does not identify with any religion or church (Pew Research Center, 2017). The religious landscape in the country lead to prison chaplains being a largely unexplored population, existing in the tension between a total institution and their church. Due to the lack of research concerning this population in the Czech republic, this study aims to examine the …

Nutrient And Food Group Intakes Of Low-Income Pregnant Women By Race/Ethnicity, Alla M. Hill, Danielle L. Nunnery Phd, Rdn, Ldn, Alice Ammerman Drph, Jigna M. Dharod Phd

Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice

In an exploratory study, a convenience sample of 148 pregnant women was recruited from a WIC clinic in the southeast region of the U.S. to: 1) Examine and compare daily nutrient and food group intakes of WIC pregnant women to national guidelines, and; 2) Determine racial/ethnic differences in nutrient and food group intakes among WIC pregnant women. Women were selected for the study if they were: ≥ 18 y, in 2^nd trimester of pregnancy, and if they spoke English or Spanish as a first language. Upon recruitment, participants were interviewed to collect information on their socio-demographics, including race/ethnicity. Additionally, …