Sociology Commons^™

Ethnic Disparities In Prenatal Care Utilization In Vietnam, Ha Ngoc Trinh

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Prenatal care is credited with reducing neonatal, perinatal, and maternal mortality and morbidity. The main purpose of the thesis is to examine the ethnic disparities between majority and ethnic minority women in prenatal care usage. The thesis also analyzes the effects of age, education attainment, female employment, and region on prenatal care utilization in Vietnam. I employ the Demographic and Health Survey 2002 in Vietnam. Descriptive statistic and logistic regression are the two statistical tests employed in this research. Results exhibit evidence of ethnic disparities in type of prenatal care utilization. Although ethnic minority women are likely to enter prenatal …

A Failing Correctional System: State Prison Overcrowding In The United States, Susan M. Campers

Pell Scholars and Senior Theses

State prison overcrowding has grown into a detrimental problem within our American penal system, such that after decades of being ignored by politicians, media outlets, and the lower court system, it has resulted in an ineffective and overcrowded correctional system that craves reformation.

Delayed Marriage And Ultra Low Fertility - The Confounding Challenges To Social Stability, Paulin Tay Straughan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Much of Singapore’s recent problems with social acceptance and integration of foreigners is attributed to the city-state's sustained ultra-low fertility. To augment labour shortage, state policies on immigrant were eased to facilitate an inflow of guest workers. The backlash on rapid globalisation of the workforce was felt acutely when the non-resident segment rose to account for over 20% of the almost 5.2 million population. To ease social tension between locals and foreigners, the city-state has to curb reliance on foreign labour through ensuring a steady growth of the local population. This paper discusses the social, cultural and structural barriers to …

Sacred Changes On Campus The Effects Of Higher Educational Experience On Religiosity And Spirituality, And Resolving Cognitive Dissonance, Shawn Gaulden

HIM 1990-2015

Changes in religious and spiritual trends over the past few decades are contradicting previously held assumptions in academia pertaining to personal religious and spiritual definitions, identities and how these religious and spiritual identities are affected by higher educational attainment. In addition, there is limited research on how students may resolve cognitive dissonance if it develops due to discrepancies between their college experiences and their personal spiritual or religious convictions. The intent of this thesis is to explore the effects of college experience and higher educational attainment on students' religious and spiritual identities; to explore the growing trend to identify as …

Examining Crowd Violence Connected To Sport Applying The Hooligan Template, Kelly Worthen

HIM 1990-2015

The aim of the research is to evaluate crowd violence as it pertains to sports and its spectators. In particular, the research examines sports riots. "A sports riot is defined as violence-vandalism, throwing/shooting missiles, rushing the field or court, committing arson, and/or fighting- committed by five or more individuals in a crowd of one hundred people associated with a formally organized sporting event" (Lewis, 2007). On a micro level, the most prevalent form of spectator violence is the act of Hooliganism in relation to football (soccer). The research on this aggression has been primarily inherent in Europe and South and …

I'M Every Woman College Women's Perceptions Of "Real Women" In Print Advertisements, Marie Gualtieri

HIM 1990-2015

In the American capitalist society, the media is often an agent used to perpetuate ideals and to inform consumers of products that they can purchase by using multiple advertising techniques. In an attempt to counter the thin body ideal for women, some companies have begun advertising their products by using plus size models, such as the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty. The purpose of this research is to examine college women's perceptions of the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty, an advertising campaign whose goal is to reverse the stereotypical body ideal for women and broaden the definition of beauty. Some …

Measuring Spillover Effects Of Residential Amenity Improvements Using Spatial Hedonic Approach, Shruti Bishan Tandon

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this dissertation is to develop a methodology for the estimation of the appropriate welfare benefits in the presence of spillover externalities. The ability to capture influences of the not so easily observed variables allow spatial lag models to measure the direct and indirect spillover effects. The direct effect measures the value of the property in question and the indirect captures the influences of neighboring properties, through a spatial multiplier effect.

Kim et al. (2003) through a path breaking approach estimated welfare benefits of air quality improvement. Their methodology captured spillover effects of amenity changes that lump both …

Perceptions Of Barriers That Inhibit African American Women And Adolescent Girls From Participation In Physical Activity, Sonya Daniels Walker

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study examined the barriers to leisure time physical activity for African American women and their adolescent daughters. Six mother-daughter dyads were interviewed who have access to physical activity opportunity. Three of the dyads participated in a follow-up focus group. A qualitative research design that utilized a grounded theory approach identified two themes for the women and two themes for the girls. Themes for the women include influence of culture and low physical activity IQ. Sub-themes of influence of culture are (a) hair and (b) body image. Sub-themes of low physical activity IQ are (a) mommy guilt, (b) perception of …

Do Attitudes About Spoiling Children Affect Attitudes Regarding What Infants Need For Early Social-Emotional Development, Kathleen Westover

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Infants that are raised in a warm loving environment have an increased probability of growing into responsible loving adults. Infants have the ability to make their needs known through different cues such as crying. Many parents do not understand how to respond appropriately to their infant’s cues. For instance many parents believe that if you pick up an infant every time they cry they will become spoiled. Researchers have studied the effects of responding appropriately to an infant. Infants who have their needs met when they demonstrate signs of distress learn that the world is a safe place for exploration. …

Exploring A Stable Aspen Niche Within Aspen-Conifer Forests Of Utah, Cody M. Mittanck

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study addresses a critical issue faced by resource managers confronting aspen restoration projects in the Intermountain West. Quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides Michx.) forests have received a large amount of popular and academic attention over the last decade due to concerns over decline. As a result, both private and public forest resource managers have focused attention on actively restoring aspen communities through treatments such as prescribed burning, logging, and grazing exclosures to name a few. There is increasing evidence suggesting the existence of "stable" aspen communities. This community type undergoes processes entirely different from successional aspen communities and …

Assessment Of Atmospheric Nitrogen Deposition: Possible Effects On Alpine Ecosystems Above 9000 Feet In Grand Teton National Park, Jennifer Hansen

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Certain forms of nitrogen (N) in the atmosphere are pollutants with effects that mimic fertilizer application. If there is too much N, it can become a stressor, and the ecosystem may undergo drastic changes (e.g. certain plant species may decline or disappear). The N load at which a system starts exhibiting negative effects is dependent on the type and location of the ecosystem. Alpine ecosystems (i.e. above 9000 feet in Wyoming) may be particularly sensitive to low levels of atmospheric N input because of short growing seasons, sparse plant cover, and shallow soils that limit their ability to absorb the …

The Satisfaction Of Participants In Utah's Mutual Self-Help Housing Program, Lucas D. Martin

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Many low-income households have difficulty finding affordable housing. Some may turn to government housing programs for assistance. This study looks at the Mutual Self-Help Housing Program, an affordable homeownership program offered by the USDA Rural Development and run by local nonprofit organizations. The program organizes groups of low-income families who help one another build their own homes. The loan payments are determined by the households’ income and the cost to build the home is usually less than if the family were to buy a comparable home new, helping them have some equity in the home. A survey was sent to …

Military As Welfare State: Conditions Leading To The Adoption Of The National Guard Youth Challenge Program, Madisen B. Drury

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Since its inception in 1993, nearly 90,000 high school dropouts have completed the National Guard Youth Challenge Program, a youth diversion program for unemployed high school dropouts. As of 2008, 27 states have partnered with the military to implement this residential program for at-risk youth. There is limited research on this new social welfare program despite its representing a dynamic military-state-welfare relationship. This study examines state-level conditions and looks to answer three research questions: 1) Under what conditions do states start a ChalleNGe program?; 2) What role do time-varying social and economic factors have in influencing states to initially adopt …

A Demographic Evaluation Of Increasing Rates Of Suicide Mortality In Japan And South Korea, Sun Young Jeon

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

According to a World Health Organization report, about one million people die by suicide each year. Fortunately, rates of suicide mortality have been decreasing
among most of the OECD countries, but Japan and South Korea are the only two exceptions to this trend, which has shown increasing suicide rates over the last 25
years. A number of studies have focused on psychological motives and individual-level causes of suicide, such as depression, mental disorder, and disability. However,
as Durkheim pointed out, suicide in a society does not have any obvious relationship to the prevalence of mental disorder. With his theory indicating …

This Was The Place: Apostasy From The Lds Church, Traci K. Burnett

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

As with every religion, the LDS (Mormon) Church suffers from attrition of membership. This study looks at the experiences of 21 individuals who have left the LDS church, asking about the reasons for leaving the church and about the consequences of making such a decision.

Unlike many other studies concerning religious apostasy, this research takes a strictly qualitative approach to examining the causes and consequences for leaving the LDS Church. Instead of focusing on demographic characteristics such as race, class, or gender as indicators for apostasy, this research asks a small group of individuals in-depth questions to gain a deeper …

Sexual Liberty And Same-Sex Marriage: An Argument From Bisexuality, Michael Boucai

Journal Articles

In Lawrence v. Texas (2003), the U.S. Supreme Court recognized a right to choose homosexual relations and relationships. Same-sex marriage bans unconstitutionally burden this right because they have the purpose and effect of channeling individuals into heterosexual relations and relationships. Bisexuals are in the best position to raise this claim because they share homosexuals’ interest in the freedom to choose same-sex partners, yet are more easily steered toward different-sex partners by marriage’s enormous prestige and benefits.

An argument from bisexuality for same-sex marriage refutes on normative rather than empirical grounds what this article calls “the politics of containment,” a politics …

From Martyrs To Mothers To Chick In Choos: The Medieval Female Body And American Women's Popular Literature, Gina M. Sully

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Placing the generic conventions of medieval hagiography, Nina Baym's insights about nineteenth-century American sentimental fiction's overplot, and contemporary American women's popular literature into tension illuminates some important commonalities. First, biographers of the medieval virgin saints and authors of contemporary American women's popular literature deploy the same overplot that Baym identifies as characteristic of American women's nineteenth-century popular fiction. Second, in order to define feminine virtue and establish the virtue of their protagonists, nineteenth-century and post-millennial American women writers rework the contrastive tropes by which hagiographers establish their heroines' virtue. Third, struggles for ascendance in the domestic realm gesture toward its …

Fortifying The Pipeline: An Exploratory Study Of High School Factors Impacting The Information Literacy Of First-Year College Students, Jennifer L. Fabbi

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Information literacy—the ability "to recognize when information is needed and have the ability to locate, evaluate, and use effectively the needed information” (American Library Association [ALA], 1989, para. 3)—has been widely and increasingly cited as an essential competency for college success, for the workplace, and for life (Bruce, 1997; Eisenberg, 2008; Fitzgerald, 2004; Johnston & Webber, 2003; National Leadership Council for Liberal Education and America’s Promise, 2007; Obama, 2009; Rader, 2002). Information literacy best practice and standards state that students optimally develop this skill set through immersion in the research process—often and over time—and this proposition is also supported in …

The Potential Of Downtown Las Vegas Becoming A Creative Milieu, Ana Magdalena Barragan

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The city of Las Vegas is attempting to revitalize downtown through a creative economy by bringing cultural and experiential activities to the area in a mixed use arrangement with residential, business and civic uses. This study looks at the possibility of not only revitalizing downtown, but on it becoming a true creative milieu - a place that fosters creativity and innovation. It does so by first identifying three major forces working upon the realization of these goals: 1) the regional socio-economic conditions, 2) the government strategies, and 3) the creative population's participation.

The study conducts a quantitative assessments of each, …

Predicting Expenditure Patterns Based On Motivations To Travel For Active Sport Tourists, Chris Brown

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The present study continued the line of research into general tourism motivations and expenditures by further expanding the scope into active sport tourists traveling to participate in a specific sport. In completing this research, a broad range of travel, expenditure, and motivational factors were considered. In addition, multiple regression was utilized to answer the proposed research question in an attempt to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of active sport tourists' motivations for travel and their subsequent expenditures.

Beyond The Baccalaureate: Black Students' Decisions To Pursue A Graduate Education, Edward Collins

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study uses data from the Baccalaureate and Beyond 1993/03 (B&B: 93/03) Longitudinal Study to investigate the issues that affect the likelihood of graduate/professional school enrollment of Black, 4-year degree earners. Also of particular interest were a comparison of graduate degree aspirations to actual post baccalaureate participation and the effect of attending a Black college on graduate school matriculation. Adapting Perna's (2006) college choice model and applying logistic regression, this study examined how academic achievement, financial aid, habitus, school and community, and the higher education context influence the decision of whether or not Black students enrolled in a graduate education …

Nuestras Experiencias: A Phenomenological Study Of Latina First Generation Higher Education Graduates, Diana Elizabeth Cruz

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

A review of the literature indicates that Latinos lag behind White and

African American students in higher education degree attainment. This educational gap is of concern because Latinos are the largest minority group in the United States, and the Latino population is expected to increase in the future. Higher education degree attainment for Latinos is vital because statistics show an undeniable relationship between degree attainment and income level. In order to ensure the economic well being of Latinos, it is important that Latinos persist through university degree programs. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the experiences of …

Community Resources And Black Social Action, F Street, A Case Study, Robert Joseph Mckee

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study examines the resources employed by the predominantly African American residents of Historic West Las Vegas, Nevada, to protest a street closure in their community. Previous studies of collective social action in the black community have stressed the involvement and resources of the black church. Instead, the residents of this community relied on cultural, social, and economic resources that did not depend heavily on the church. In this ethnographic case study, I combined participant observation, ethnographic interviews, prolonged engagement, photographs, and document analysis. I argue that the resources a community employs in social action can be analyzed using my …

The New American Conservation Movement: New Strategies, Focus And Organizations For The 21st Century, Amy Deanna Northrup

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This dissertation provides evidence of the emergence of a new conservation movement in the United States. The strategic, tactical and organizational approaches of traditional conservation efforts, which began in the early 1900s, have shifted during the last two decades. Specifically, the new conservation movement is characterized by three distinct changes. First, many of the well-established conservation organizations, such as the Sierra Club and National Audubon Society, have largely abandoned their traditional focus on increasing the number of acres preserved; instead more defensive and fragmented forms of conservation now reign. The second change to the conservation movement involves a dramatic expansion …

To Set The World Right: Religious Pluralism And The Progressive Era, Lance Sorenson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The contention of this thesis is that religion played a vital and sometimes overlooked role in the promotion and success of progressive reform. Religious leaders often provided primary leadership for reform. But even when their role was not so direct, they and the institutions they represented helped cloak reform efforts in moral and religious institutional authority in order to garner support for change. The process of spreading reform was directly related to the process of articulating reform in language with which people would be comfortable.

Just as reform efforts inevitably faced traditionalist resistance, they often succeed when cast in traditional …

Formal, Bounded, And "Hyper" Rationality In Police Processing Of Sexual Assualt Claims: Case Dispositions And Ucr Reporting, Brooke M. Wagner

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Over the past three decades, many scholars have examined the prevalence, consequences, and official sanctions of sexual violence. The following study builds on past research by quantitatively examining police and crime analyst discretion in sexual assault claims. Using recently accessed data from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department from 2008 through 2010 and utilizing labeling theory, rape myth literature, and the theoretical perspectives of justice processing outcomes, I assess the extent to which police officers and crime analysts are influenced by extralegal variables like victim and offender's race, victim's age, the location of assault, incident characteristics, and victim's background. I …

Emergency Medical Technicians’ Experience With Visual Journaling: A Qualitative Study, Pamela Gandolfi

EVMS School of Health Professions Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to understand the experience of EMTs who incorporate the process of visual journaling each week in response to their professional responsibilities. In particular, this study aimed to understand EMTs’ perceptions of the usefulness of visual journaling and to determine possible themes from visual and written journal content.

Six participants, five male and one female, who were certified EMT-Basic (EMT-B), EMT-Intermediate (EMT-I) and Paramedics (EMT-P) volunteered to be part of this study. In addition to being an EMT, they were all also certified firefighters. All participants were aged 18 to 70 years and had met …

Examining Attachment Styles In Adult Adoptees Using The Bird’S Nest Drawing, Kim Clemens

EVMS School of Health Professions Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to examine adult attachment styles seen in the Bird’s Nest Drawings of adopted adults, compared to those seen in non-adopted adults. A sample of 17 participants (16 non-adopted adults and 1 adopted adult) in the age range of 21-57 completed a Bird’s Nest Drawing (BND), Bird’s Nest Drawing Story, Adult Attachment Scale Questionnaire, and a demographic questionnaire.

The BND was devised by Donna Kaiser to assess secure and insecure attachment as seen through graphic indicators in a projective drawing test. Kaiser’s February 2012 updated BND checklist is comprised of 14 hypothesized graphic indicator items, …

Securing South Africa's Future Grandmothers Against Poverty And Aids As A Model For Social Development Change, Savannah Lynn Eck

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Focusing on the role of elder women in South Africa as a lens to understand the central connections among HIV/ AIDS, poverty and Human Security provides a distinct approach to analyze women's contributions to community development and social change. Drawing from the theories of Gender and Development and Human Security, this research aims to highlight HIV/ AIDS as a social and political security issue, while underscoring the vitality of the inclusion of women in the processes of peace building, reconciliation, education and social development. Furthermore, the influential role of elder women in South Africa will serve as a model in …

Closures And Consolidation: Schools, Farms, And Population Decline In Rural Illinois, Eric Porter

Master's Theses - Sociology and Anthropology

This thesis reports the results of a year-long quantitative research project that examined the causal relationships between population loss, agricultural consolidation and school closures in rural Illinois—three primary facets of the overall decline in rural America. Conventional wisdom conceptualizes the following progression: a shifting U.S. economy from agriculture to manufacturing moved jobs to urban centers, which along with the reduced need for labor from industrialization in farming, caused out-migration from rural America; eventually this led to many rural schools closing due to dropping enrollment. However, it is hypothesized that these processes create exacerbating feedback loops. Specifically, loss of population leads …