Quantitative, Qualitative, Comparative, and Historical Methodologies Commons^™

Matters Of Measurement: Investigating The Universal Welfare State, Kaitlin Pauline Wannamaker

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This master’s thesis investigates the mechanisms leading to the development of robust and generous welfare states, focusing on the ongoing debate around targeting versus universalism in welfare state studies. By leveraging multiple welfare state datasets and expanding the scope of welfare outcomes using cross-national time-series analyses, it uncovers the pivotal role that measurement plays in understanding universalism's effects. This research unveils substantial variations in outcomes based on the universalism measures used, thus highlighting how our perception of the welfare state is deeply entwined with our methodological choices. The findings of this study not only carve new paths in the field …

Exploring The Experience Of Disclosing In The Workplace, Jillian Auger

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

An alarming rate of workplace violence/harassment is observed each year, with negative outcomes that affect the organization (i.e., financial loss) and those directly involved (i.e., job loss, financial strain, fear of being blamed, being labeled a ‘troublemaker’). The literature indicates that, for many victim-survivors, there is little hope for positive outcomes following a disclosure of workplace violence/harassment. In fact, some studies show that negative reactions to disclosure can compound and intensify the impact of violence/harassment on psychological functioning. However, minimal research has been devoted to the experiences of victim-survivors regarding the outcomes of a disclosure. Utilizing virtual semi-structured interviews, the …

The Impact Of Covid-19 On Undergraduate University Students With Part-Time Jobs, Miguel F. Bernard Bravo

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This study explored how the pandemic and the shift to online learning impacted university students’ experiences of learning and working, and how students’ capital and other resources impacted their university experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic. Eighteen undergraduate students who had paid employment in the last 12 months were recruited. In interviews participants were asked about their experiences with work, schooling and balancing the two with the pressures of the pandemic. Students cited financial concerns, as well as challenges with difficulties with online learning, motivation, and isolation. Importantly, this study found that students experiences differed in accordance with their capital and …

Working Towards More Effective Sexual Violence Prevention Programming For Young Men In Canada, Aadhiya Vasudeva

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Although extant literature underscores the importance of addressing men’s risk for sexual violence perpetration, there is limited research examining sexual violence prevention programs for young men in Canada. Using community-based, mixed-method research and a clinical logic model, this study involved the development and application of an evaluation mechanism for a sexual violence prevention program for young men, Man|Made. Triangulation of survey data (n = 43 pre-program and n = 21 post-program) and qualitative interviews of program participants (n = 5) and facilitators (n = 6) highlighted some promising findings related to changes in men’s consent knowledge, acknowledgement of past harm, …

Music Sounds Better With You, M Gillian Carrabre

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Electronic Dance Music (EDM) is a catalyst for creative expression, from the solo dance form known as shuffling, to “Flow Arts” activities (forms of self-expression inducing a flow state) like poi, hula hooping, orbiting, and gloving. Gloving is a subcultural practice and artform that couples LED lights with dexterous finger movements. It is a method of expression for dance music enthusiasts (also known as ravers) and has become an important component of the EDM scene, particularly over the past decade. Glovers engage in “secondary” performances to live music (DJs) using complex techniques such as symbolism, word painting, and what the …

Post-Secondary Education (Pse) Indigenous Students' Perspectives: Sharing Our Voices On How We Fit Into Residential School (Rs) History Of Canada And The United States Using Photovoice, Natahnee Winder

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

A substantial body of literature about Indigenous experiences regarding the boarding school and residential school systems in the US and Canada, respectively, does exist. Both federal governments’ intentions were to Christianize, assimilate, and “civilize” students who attended these schools. Most Indigenous educational research is centered in either an American or Canadian context, and the colonial education of Indigenous peoples is rarely discussed as a collective experience. This colonial education occurred in tandem, in both countries, and its legacy severely impacted Indigenous students by separating them from their families and communities and stripping them of their Indigenous identities and lifeways. Furthermore, …

Resignation Or Resistance? Examining The Digital Privacy Attitudes And Behaviours Of East Yorkers, Kaitlyn Cavacas

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Digital technologies have become enmeshed in everyday life causing the public to become exposed to potential privacy risks through data collection and aggregation practices. Further, the upsurge in use of social networking platforms has also created opportunities for privacy violations through institutional and social surveillance. Employing a qualitative thematic analysis, this study explores how adults (N=101) living in East York, Toronto, navigate privacy through their use of the internet and digital services. Participants expressed feelings of mistrust, loss of control, resignation, and perceived self-unimportance with regards to their digital data. Importantly, others noted their desire and attempts to …

The Canadian Urban - Rural Health Disparity: The Role Of Health Lifestyles And An Alternative Explanation For Rurality's Higher Bmi Rates, Matthew J. Stackhouse

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The Canadian urban - rural health disparity is concerning, as rural residents are more likely to experience deleterious health outcomes such as injuries, chronic conditions, obesity, and shorter life expectancy. There are several rural social-structural explanations for the disparity such as an aging population, less education attainment, greater unemployment rates, poorer working conditions, lack of health professionals, greater distance from quality health resource, and poorer health behaviours. Some of these findings have been linked to higher Body Mass Index (BMI) scores in rural areas. However, no study has considered the health lifestyle differences of urban - rural Canadians and how …

Investigating The Health Meanings Of Young Saudi Women, Tagreed Alnajjar

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Women’s structural position within society and their family roles significantly influence their health. Previous studies have shown women hold lower health and socioeconomic status because of their gender within the Saudi culture. This study aimed to provide an understanding of how Saudi women value health and define being healthy within their social contexts. Adopting an ethnographic perspective, three focus groups (31 participants in total) were conducted with volunteer undergraduate Saudi female students on campus during a nine-week field trip to the participants’ university, King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Three themes were generated from this study that characterize the …

Stronger, Leaner, Francophone: Physical Culture In The Nationalism Of Adrien Gagnon, Phillip Chipman

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The idea of nationalism within the Province of Quebec has been prominent throughout its history. As a notable subject, French Canadian nationalism has been studied in great detail, in relation to sport, politics, and art. However, the relationship between Francophone pride and physical culture has yet to be examined.

The purpose of this thesis was to reveal the presence of French Canadian nationalism within the realm of bodybuilding, more specifically, to study Adrien Gagnon’s physical culture magazine Santé et Développement Physique as a vehicle for nationalist thinking. Since Gagnon was publishing between 1946 and 1956, but was born in 1924, …

History Of Sioux Lookout Black Hawks Hockey Team, 1949-1951, Fatima Ba'abbad

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Existing literature on residential schools in Canada indicates that sports played an important role within that system and were a positive experience for Aboriginal students. However, these sporting experiences have not been analyzed from the students’ perspectives. This thesis aims to enrich our understanding of the role of sports within residential schools; the meanings former students attached to their experiences, and what sports mean to reconciliation initiatives using 1) narrative analysis of media representations of the Black Hawks team from Pelican Lake Indian Residential School during their 1951 hockey tour to Ottawa and Toronto, 2) a two-part interview process (photo …

Cultural Diversity In Artificial Societies: Case Studies Of The Maya Peoples, Roberto Ulloa

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The existence of cultural diversity in a connected world is paradoxical given that all individuals constantly interact and share information, and that individuals are all part of one giant network of connections. In the long term, it seems logical to assume that everybody should hold the same cultural information and, therefore, the same culture. Yet cultural diversity is still manifest around the globe. Cultural diversity as a phenomenon becomes even more puzzling when we take into account how it survives catastrophic events which regularly befall societies, such as invasions, natural disasters, and civil wars. In this thesis, agent-based computer simulations …

Representations Of Youth Crime In Canada: A Feminist Criminological Analysis Of Statistical Trends, National Canadian Newspapers, And Moral Panics, Jennifer Silcox

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This research explores different representations of youth crime in Canada from a feminist criminological and social constructionist perspective. Using a mixed-methods approach that draws upon historical scholarly works, official governmental crime and court statistics, and national Canadian newspapers, I investigate statistical and media representations of youth crime in Canada.

Official crime and court statistics were analyzed to identify trends in youth crime and how they vary by gender and legislative changes. I provide an historical overview of changing definitions of youth, crime and delinquency, and consider how these combined with changing norms regarding morality to shape youth crime legislation in …

Madness In The Media: Understanding How People With Lived Experience Interpret Newspaper Headlines, Da Qing Wang

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

There is research on media representations of mental health that suggests there is a tendency to portray mental health as problematic and those who are affected by mental illness as dangerous. It is evident there has been an increase in anti-stigma media campaigns. However, the effects of these efforts on beliefs held by members of the public has been mixed. What is most surprising from the literature is a lack of research about how people who have personal experience with mental illness interpret media messages. Individuals with and without lived experience participated in a structured conceptualization process known as concept …

Early Adult Transitions In Canada: Expectations, Stability And Change, Laura Wright

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The transition to adulthood is a much longer and less structured process for more recent generations than for those who came of age before the 1960s. Median age at first marriage has been increasing, cohabitation has become more prevalent, the role of cohabitation in the partnering process has changed, and young adults tend to live with their parents longer. This dissertation presents three studies of how new cohorts of Canadian youth are leaving home and starting their conjugal lives. I apply event history techniques using the 2011 General Social Survey, the most recent available data on the union and home-leaving …

Exploring The Career Pathways, Professional Integration And Lived Experiences Of Regulated Nurses In Ontario, Canada, Godfred O. Boateng

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In the context of an enduring shortage of nurses, this study explores the career pathways and experiences of immigrant and Canadian-born nurses in two Ontario cities utilizing a qualitative research design consisting of 70 in-depth interviews. Differences in career entry and experiences of workplace conflict across immigration status and race are explored.

First, I explore successful immigrants’ pathways into the nursing profession and their social and economic integration into the Canadian economy in light of the traditional assimilation and segmented assimilation theories. The study reveals distinct career pathways taken by foreign-born nurses and Canadian born nurses. While Canadian-born nurses have …

Looking To The Future: Considering The Educational Transitions Of Deaf Youth In Ontario, Kaitlyn A.W. Blair

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

National and provincial policy development reflects increased attention to inclusivity for all Ontarians in education and work. However, academic and government literature examining educational and employment transitions, fails to effectively address the experiences of those who are deaf. The limited research that does exist suggests that deaf Ontarians have lower educational and occupational attainment levels than their hearing peers (PALS 2006). Drawing on four qualitative case studies of deaf youth, this study analyzes participants’ planned transitions from high school to post-secondary education. Findings suggest that high levels of perceived self-efficacy are helpful in motivating transitions to higher education. The life …

Interesting Shapes Of Vegetables: Is It A Strategy To Promote Consumption Among Preschool Children?, Salma H. Alhabshi

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This study highlighted the low intake of vegetables by preschool children and determined whether changing the shape of vegetables increased their level of consumption. A new strategy of repeated exposure to interesting-shaped vegetables was a step aimed at increasing vegetable consumption by increasing the fun element in having vegetables as snacks. Vegetables are the less desirable food in comparison to more attractive unhealthy choices available to children, and discovering a strategy to promote vegetables is considered an important step in nutrition. The primary aim was to explore the effect of repeated exposure (eight times) of shaped vegetables on consumption by …

Manufacturing Legitimacy: A Critical Theory Of Election News Coverage, Gabriel N. Elias

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

To what degree does instrumental reason influence election news coverage? Using Habermas's understanding of system/life-world as a heuristic, I map the rationalization process of political communication. This illuminates the institutional logics at play in the field of politics and the field of journalism, and the way the social dynamics between them enable the framing of political life as a strategic game. This understanding is then contextualized within an analysis of the media frames that informed the Canadian federal election of 2011. I find that news coverage does tend to focus on political strategy; but this is not wholly at the …

"Being Stuck": Understanding The Health-Related And Everyday Lived Experiences Of Young Mothers In Rexdale, Ontario Through A Social Determinants Framework, Jaspreet Kaur

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of the ways the health-related and everyday lived experiences of young mothers are shaped by various social determinants, and in the context of their neighbourhood. Using a critical qualitative methodology, five mothers between the ages of 17 to 19 were interviewed from Rexdale, a neighbourhood in the City of Toronto characterized by a number of social risk factors(e.g. high rates of visible minorities, unemployment, and teen mothers). In-depth thematic analysis led to the emergence of four themes: 1) Living in Rexdale: Representations and realities; 2) Leaving Rexdale and wanting something …

Exploring Parental Experiences And Decision-Making Processes Following A Fetal Anomaly Diagnosis, Ramona L. Fernandez

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Often the first indication that something may be wrong in a seemingly normal pregnancy occurs during the first detailed ultrasound appointment between 16 and 20 weeks gestation. Even the most tentative suspicions of fetal anomalies is jarring. Parent’s default reality of a normal pregnancy and a ‘perfect child’ changes to one of risk factors and the possibility of an ‘unhealthy child’. This study begins with the realization of this first loss in a series of losses that follow for parents as they grapple with diagnostic information to be able to make informed medical decisions regarding their fetus and pregnancy. The …

A Mile In My Shoes: A Prolegomenon For An Empathic Sociology, Hart J. Walker

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The main purpose of this work is to undermine the fact-value distinction as it is presented in the work of Max Weber, and also to provide an outline for an empathic sociology that can replace public sociology by shifting the focus of sociological research from the public sphere to abject material suffering. To do this I will be providing a critical explication of Weber’s methodological writings. I will also construct a notion of empathy using contemporary research in social psychology, as well as the phenomenology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Jean-Paul Sartre. I will then use this notion to argue that …