Other Sociology Commons^™

Campus Climate Sexual Assault Survey (2015) Analysis, Felicia Rosin

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The issue of sexual assault has garnered widespread attention in recent years, as is evident by the growing number of high-profile cases and mainstream social movements. With this increasingly bright spotlight, it is no surprise that The University of Akron has interest in improving the sexual violence education programs offered to students. In 2015, the university conducted a survey to gather information on the campus climate surrounding sexual assault. This analysis dives into a deeper analysis of the data gathered in an attempt to pinpoint areas that require the university’s attention. The analysis covers topics identified by Dean of Students …

Differences In Mental Health Education Across Baby Boomers, Generation X, And Millennials, Ashlyn M. Avera

Honors College Theses

There is no denying that mental illness has gained a strong prevalence in the United States. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, approximately one in five adults in the United States experiences a mental illness in any given year. Although mental health stigmas have played a role in the past, it does not mean they must continue to play the same role in the future. Research is now looking toward ways to decrease mental health stigma through increasing mental health knowledge. This study examines the starting point for which a society becomes literate in mental health. Using a …

A Tradesperson’S Transition To Vocational Technical (Vt) Teaching, Susan J. Sylvia

Educational Studies Dissertations

This qualitative study examined survey and interview data collected from tradespeople who transitioned to vocational technical (VT) teaching in regional vocational technical schools in Massachusetts. This study included two research questions that inquired about how tradespeople’s prior experiences, beliefs, and thoughts influenced or inspired them to pursue a transition to vocational technical (VT) teaching and about how their anticipated transitional experiences aligned with their actual transitional experiences. The survey phase included 170 respondents. Survey responses provided an overview of participants, which was integral in identifying four interview participants who were digitally recorded during one-to-one interview sessions. A multiple Case Study …

Quantitative Historical Analysis Uncovers A Single Dimension Of Complexity That Structures Global Variation In Human Social Organization, Peter Turchin, Thomas E. Currie, Harvey Whitehouse, Pieter François, Kevin Feeney, Daniel Mullins, Daniel Hoyer, Christina Collins, Stephanie Grohmann, Patrick Savage, Gavin Mendel-Gleason, Edward Turner, Agathe Dupeyron, Enrico Cioni, Jenny Reddish, Jill Levine, Greine Jordan, Eva Brandl, Alice Williams, Rudolf Cesaretti, Marta Krueger, Alessandro Ceccarelli, Joe Figliulo-Rosswurm, Po-Ju Tuan, Peter Peregrine, Arkadiusz Marciniak, Johannes Preiser-Kapeller, Nikolay Kradin, Andrey Korotayev, Alessio Palmisano, David Baker, Julye Bidmead, Peter Bol, David Christian, Connie Cook, Alan Covey, Gary Feinman, Árni Daníel Júlíusson, Axel Kristinsson, John Miksic, Ruth Mostern, Camero Petrie, Peter Rudiak-Gould, Barend Ter Haar, Vesna Wallace, Victor Mair, Liye Xie, John Baines, Elizabeth Bridges, Joseph Manning, Bruce Lockhart, Amy Bogaard, Charles Spencer

Religious Studies Faculty Articles and Research

Do human societies from around the world exhibit similarities in the way that they are structured, and show commonalities in the ways that they have evolved? These are long-standing questions that have proven difficult to answer. To test between competing hypotheses, we constructed a massive repository of historical and archaeological information known as “Seshat: Global History Databank.” We systematically coded data on 414 societies from 30 regions around the world spanning the last 10,000 years. We were able to capture information on 51 variables reflecting nine characteristics of human societies, such as social scale, economy, features of governance, and information …

Race, The Condition Of Neo-Liberalism, Vikash Singh

Department of Sociology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This article addresses the social and historical relation between Chicago School neo-liberalism and contemporary racism, and its connections with the formations of racism in classical liberalism and its colonial character. I show the pragmatic and discursive operations of neo-racism in the context of this shift to a neo-liberal discourse, drawing particularly on Michel Foucault’s seminars, Society Must be Defended, and Birth of Bio-politics. Insofar as “race” cannot be understood as a discrete category outside its social, economic, moral, and political embeddedness in liberalism, I argue that methodological individualism and expectations of high-specialization constrain the theorization of race in U.S. scholarship. …

“That’S Why I Say Stay In School”: Black Mothers’ Parental Involvement, Cultural Wealth, And Exclusion In Their Son’S Schooling, Quaylan Allen, Kimberly A. White-Smith

Education Faculty Articles and Research

This study examines parental involvement practices, the cultural wealth, and school experiences of poor and working-class mothers of Black boys. Drawing upon data from an ethnographic study, we examine qualitative interviews with four Black mothers. Using critical race theory and cultural wealth frameworks, we explore the mothers’ approaches to supporting their sons’ education. We also describe how the mothers and their sons experienced exclusion from the school, and how this exclusion limited the mothers’ involvement. We highlight their agency in making use of particular forms of cultural wealth in responding to the school’s failure of their sons.

The Attitudes And Stigmas Surrounding Modern Day Interracial Relationships, Charisse Allen

Siegel Institute Ethics Research Scholars

Interracial relationships are defined as relationships where each person is of a different race than the other. Historically, we’ve seen interracial relationships between slave owners and their slaves and in recent years among many different types of people across different races other than the “traditional” black and white. The current study that will be discussed is concerning people’s views on interracial relationships amid an election and 49 years after the court case Loving v. Virginia which overturned anti-miscegenation laws.

Proliferating A Culture Of Fear: Islam In A Post 9/11 America, Setareh Motamedi

Political Science Student Papers and Posters

The threat of terrorism perceived by the American public has been shaped by a series of traumatic events over the past decade. In the years following the attacks of September 11, 2001, fear of terrorism has extended beyond the threat of terrorist groups. Much of the American public considers not only terrorist groups like al-Qaeda, but the entire religion of Islam to be a security threat. In much of this security discourse, ideas of hatred, violence, and terror have become associated with Islam. This study explores that association, and aims to identify what motivates existing stereotypes. Drawing on research from …

Biography As A “Tree Of Choices”: Discovering The Life Trajectories Of Young Entrepreneurs In Russia, Anastasia Poylova, Elizaveta Polukhina

The Qualitative Report

The article reveals the life trajectories of Russian entrepreneurs in the context of four modern institutions of socialization which determine individual career paths—family, education, social environment and professional experience. Our empirical data were 20 semi-structured narrative interviews with entrepreneurs analyzed based on grounded theory (open and axial coding). We analyzed individual life trajectories as “trees of choices,” where the main branches are institutions of socialization, and the subsequent branches—individual life features. Finally, we showed the meanings of each institution and found out the determining role of gender and the city of socialization. The empirical output is a model of life …

How To Conduct A Mini-Ethnographic Case Study: A Guide For Novice Researchers, Patricia I. Fusch Ph.D., Gene E. Fusch, Lawrence R. Ness

The Qualitative Report

The authors present how to construct a mini-ethnographic case study design with the benefit of an ethnographic approach bounded within a case study protocol that is more feasible for a student researcher with limited time and finances. The novice researcher should choose a design that enables one to best answer the research question. Secondly, one should choose the design that assists the researcher in reaching data saturation. Finally, the novice researcher must choose the design in which one can complete the study within a reasonable time frame with minimal cost. This is particularly important for student researchers. One can blend …

Rulers, Religion, And Riches: Why The West Got Rich And The Middle East Did Not, Jared Rubin

Economics Faculty Books and Book Chapters

For centuries following the spread of Islam, the Middle East was far ahead of Europe. Yet, the modern economy was born in Europe. Why was it not born in the Middle East? In this book Jared Rubin examines the role that Islam played in this reversal of fortunes. It argues that the religion itself is not to blame; the importance of religious legitimacy in Middle Eastern politics was the primary culprit. Muslim religious authorities were given an important seat at the political bargaining table, which they used to block important advancements such as the printing press and lending at interest. …

E-Cigarette Specialty Retailers: Data To Assess The Association Between Retail Environment And Student E-Cigarette Use, Georgiana Bostean, Catherine M. Crespi, Patsornkarn Vorapharuek, William J. Mccarthy

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

The retail environment is a major social determinant of health, yet little is known about the e-cigarette specialty retailer environment. The e-cigarette specialty retail environment may be associated with e-cigarette use by middle and high school students, an issue that was addressed in a recent article entitled, “E-cigarette use among students and e-cigarette specialty retailer presence near schools,” by Bostean and colleagues (G. Bostean, C.M. Crespi, P. Vorapharuek, W.J. McCarthy, 2016). We present data relating to e-cigarette specialty retailers in Orange County, California. We describe the data collection method (including the search methodology to identify e-cigarette specialty retailers), present descriptive …

Cognitive And Emotional Processes Involved In The Experience Of Objects As Holy Or Transcendent, Lotte J. Pummerer

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

In recent years, attitudes about religion/spirituality have become more pluralistic (Pew Research Center, 2015a). At the same time, the number of individuals who identify themselves as nonreligious, atheist or agnostic are growing (Pew Research Center, 2015b), yet we are lacking words and research to describe their attributions of transcendence in language not bound to religious concepts. This study aims at examining both concepts – holiness and transcendence – in their similarities and differences through assessing cognitive and emotional processes involved in experiences of objects.

The study consisted of two parts with a total of 206 Christian and 52 nonreligious/atheistic/agnostic participants. …

Happiness Index Methodology, Laura Musikanski, Scott Cloutier, Erica Bejarano, Davi Briggs, Julia Colbert, Gracie Strasser, Steven Russell

Journal of Sustainable Social Impact

The Happiness Index is a comprehensive survey instrument that assesses happiness, well-being, and aspects of sustainability and resilience. The Happiness Alliance developed the Happiness Index to provide a survey instrument to community organizers, researchers, and others seeking to use a subjective well-being index and data. It is the only instrument of its kind freely available worldwide and translated into over ten languages. This instrument can be used to measure satisfaction with life and the conditions of life. It can also be used to define income inequality, trust in government, sense of community and other aspects of well-being within specific demographics …

A Theoretical Analysis Of Isis Indoctrination And Recruitment, Trevor Hawkins

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This paper is an attempt to use various theories in the social sciences as a tool to understand the mechanisms employed in ISIS indoctrination and recruitment tactics. There is a discussion of theories that have been developed in the field of influence psychology, rationalizing the context of indoctrination within this area of study. There is a discussion of proposedly relevant materials in philosophy, specifically simulacrum and linguistic deconstruction. These components are extrapolated to interpret a first person account of ISIS indoctrination, the first-ever ISIS recruitment film, and a Radical-Islamist periodical Inspire Magazine. Using a form of propaganda film analysis, and …

E-Cigarette Use Among Students And E-Cigarette Specialty Retailer Presence Near Schools, Georgiana Bostean, Catherine M. Crespi, Patsornkarn Vorapharuek, William J. Mccarthy

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

Objective. This study examined the association between presence of e-cigarette specialty retailers near schools and e-cigarette use among middle and high school students in Orange County (OC), CA.

Methods. The OC subsample of the 2013-2014 California Healthy Kids Survey (N=67,701) was combined with geocoded e-cigarette retailers to determine whether a retailer was present within one-quarter mile of each public school in OC. Multilevel logistic regression models evaluated individual-level and school-level e-cigarette use correlates among middle and high school students.

Results. Among middle school students, the presence of an e-cigarette retailer within one-quarter mile of their school predicted …

Understanding How Intentionally Unplugging From Cell Phones Shapes Interpersonal Relationships And The Undergraduate College Experience, Jadelin P. Felipe

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of what motivated college students—the Unplugged Students—to intentionally use their cell phones less and how they understood the impact that unplugging had on their interpersonal relationships and college experience. Nine undergraduate college students from four private schools were interviewed in one-on-one semi- structured interviews. These students, considered non-users, provided a particularly useful perspective as these students made a conscious choice to counteract social norms and experienced both being plugged in and unplugged. Cell phones and the act of unplugging proved to make up a complex and more nuanced topic than …

The Bureau Of Sociological Research At The University Of Nebraska–Lincoln: A Brief History 1964–2014, Michael R. Hill

Zea E-Books Collection

This volume is a provisional account of the origins and subsequent work of the Bureau of Sociological Research (BOSR) at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln (UNL). This study was prepared at the request of Julia McQuillan, Chair of the UNL Department of Sociology and a past BOSR Director, for the 50th anniversary celebration of the Bureau in April 2014.

This study falls within the field known generally as “the sociology of sociology” and this accounts for the devising of a typology of sociologies that delineates the intellectual field of play historically occupied by the Bureau of Sociological Research at the University …

The Experiences Of Siblings Of Individuals With Disabilities: A Holistic View, Ashley Mc Adams

Educational Studies Dissertations

The research on siblings of individuals with disabilities has rarely addressed the perceived benefits of having a sibling with a disability. The existing research on the experience of siblings of persons with disabilities is also limited to European American families (Sage & Jegatheesan, 2010). With families from different cultures, I sought to capture the experiences of brothers and sisters who have siblings with disabilities. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationships of siblings with disabilities and typical developing siblings, and present a holistic picture from the perspective of the typical developing siblings. These gaps in the literature …

Emerging Justice Technologies And The Need For Evaluation, Jason Tashea

Publications and Research

This report from John Jay College’s Research and Evaluation Center examines the role of emerging technologies in criminal justice reform, emphasizing the need for thorough evaluation to assess effectiveness and avoid unintended consequences. It suggests that technology should support, not replace, human judgment in justice processes.

Liberal Arts, Religion, And Irreligion: A Cross-Sectional Analysis Of Student Religiosity And Secularity At The Claremont Colleges, Jennie Frishtick

Scripps Senior Theses

This study measures levels of religiosity and secularity among students at the Claremont Colleges, including students’ (ir)religious affiliations, beliefs, and practices. The religious landscape in the U.S. is shifting in multiple ways, and young adults feature prominently in these changes. Using data from an online survey of students, the present study addresses the following research questions: What is the (ir)religious makeup of the student body at the Claremont Colleges? Do the observed patterns mirror those of the general U.S. population? The results of this study show that the sample population at the Claremont Colleges is much less religious than the …

Imagining The Unimaginable: Torture And The Criminal Law, Francesca Laguardia

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This article examines the use of torture by the U.S. government in the context of the late 20th-century preventive turn in criminal justice. Challenging the assumption that the use of “enhanced interrogation tactics” in the war on terror was an exceptional deviation from accepted norms, this article suggests that this deviation began decades before the terror attacks, in the context of conventional criminal procedure. I point to the use of the “ticking time bomb hypothetical,” and its connection to criminal procedure’s “kidnapping hypothetical.” Using case law and criminal procedure textbooks I trace the employment of that narrative over several decades, …

New York’S “Close To Home” Initiative — Lessons Learned, Jeffrey A. Butts

Publications and Research

The Close to Home initiative is a policy reform that brings young people home from far-away correctional institutions to be served by programs closer to their families. New York plans to implement a second phase of the program in March 2015, bringing back youth from “limited-secure” programs that house more serious offenders. The program appears to be effective in helping youth maintain positive connections to their families and communities, increasing Regent Exams scores of justice-involved youth, and returning youth to their neighborhood schools following placement. Although more research and analysis needs to be done on the effects of Close to …

Critical Champions Or Careless Condemners? Exploring News Media Constructions In Cases Of Wrongful Conviction, Katherine Rozad

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Countless incidences occur throughout the world each and every day. However, only a few of these occurrences are deemed newsworthy by the media. One area of information quite often categorized as “newsworthy” is that surrounding crime. Within crime-related news coverage are occasionally cases of wrongful conviction – miscarriages of justice in which the innocent are labeled “guilty” and wrongly punished. Despite decades of research in both the areas of crime and media, as well as wrongful conviction studies, no research to date has examined the way that cases of wrongful conviction are constructed in the media from the beginnings of …

Tailoring General Population Surveys To Address Participation And Measurement Challenges Of Surveying Lesbian, Gay, And Bisexual People, Mathew Stange

Survey Research and Methodology Program: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Being rare and stigmatized, lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) people are hard-to-survey. Gaining their participation, reducing concealment of LGB identity, and accurately measuring their marital status are challenging. In this dissertation, I examine the effects that LGB-inclusive tailoring—inclusive cover image design and “same-sex” and “opposite-sex” marital status categories—has on addressing these challenges; particularly, the effect on who responds to a survey and the answers that they provide, among LGB and non-LGB people. The experiments were embedded in the 2013 Nebraska Annual Social Indicators Survey (NASIS), a general population mail survey of Nebraskans (n=1,608). I test how the LGB-inclusive cover design …

Assessing The Mechanisms Of Misreporting To Filter Questions In Surveys, Stephanie Eckman, Frauke Kreuter, Antje Kirchner, Annette Jäckle, Roger Tourangeau, Stanley Presser

Survey Research and Methodology Program: Faculty Publications

To avoid asking respondents questions that do not apply to them, surveys often use filter questions that determine routing into follow-up items. Filter questions can be asked in an interleafed format, in which follow-up questions are asked immediately after each relevant filter, or in a grouped format, in which follow-up questions are asked only after multiple filters have been administered. Most previous investigations of filter questions have found that the grouped format collects more affirmative answers than the interleafed format. This result has been taken to mean that respondents in the interleafed format learn to shorten the questionnaire by answering …

Assessing Within-Household Selection Methods In Household Mail Surveys, Kristen Olson, Mathew Stange, Jolene D. Smyth

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Household surveys are increasingly moving toward self-administered modes of data collection. To maintain a probability sample of the population, researchers must use probability methods to select adults within households. However, very little experimental methodological work has been conducted on within-household selection in mail surveys. In this study, we experimentally examine four methods—the next-birthday method, the last-birthday method, selection of the youngest adult in the household, and selection of the oldest adult in the household—in two mail surveys of Nebraska residents (n = 2,498, AAPOR RR1 36.3 percent, and n = 947, AAPOR RR1 31.6 percent). To evaluate how accurately respondents …

Denormalizing Violence: Evaluation Framework For A Public Health Model Of Violence Prevention, Jeffrey A. Butts, Lindsay Bostwick, Jeremy Porter

Publications and Research

John Jay College's Research and Evaluation Center evaluated the effectiveness of the Cure Violence approach to violence reduction. Between April 2013 and February 2014, researchers began the project by visiting Cure Violence sites in New York City and Chicago, the home base for Cure Violence. The research team observed the program's operation and assessed the model's suitability for detailed evaluation. The report addresses the operations of the Cure Violence model and how it differs from other approaches for reducing gun violence. It reviews the evidence underlying these models and proposes an agenda for future evaluation research.

Line Drawing: Raising The Minimum Age Of Criminal Court Jurisdiction In New York, Jeffrey A. Butts, John K. Roman

Publications and Research

This report was designed to inform New York's 2014 state commission on raising the age at which juveniles were charged as adults in New York courts. The report includes a review of existing evidence that supports raising the minimum age of criminal court jurisdiction in New York, describes the critical role economic consequences often play in such policy debates, and suggests how lawmakers should move forward by projecting the costs and benefits of reform transparently and objectively.

Identifying Predictors Of Survey Mode Preference, Jolene D. Smyth, Kristen Olson, Morgan Millar

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

To increase the likelihood of response, many survey organizations attempt to provide sample members with a mode they are thought to prefer. Mode assignment is typically based on conventional wisdom or results from mode choice studies that presented only limited options. In this paper we draw heavily on research and theory from the mode effects and the survey participation literatures to develop a framework for understanding what characteristics should predict mode preferences. We then test these characteristics using data from two different surveys. We find that measures of familiarity with and access to a mode are the strongest predictors of …