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

Disruptive (Re)Memberings: Anti-Blackness & The Mental Health Of Black Millennial Womxn, Perpetual A. Hayfron

Graduate Doctoral Dissertations

This study examines the impact of anti-Blackness on the mental health of Black Millennial Womxn (BMW) pursuing post-secondary education. It explores the historical and contemporary factors that contribute to the neglect of Black Womxn in education research and the systemic issues that affect our access to mental health and educational resources. The research utilizes an Endarkened Feminist epistemology and narrative inquiry to center the narratives and lived experiences of BMW, challenging the prevailing narratives that erase our humxnity and intersectional identities. Data was collected through Black Participatory Research (BPR), individual interviews, and visual arts-based methods that center the lived experiences …

Transnational Methodological Engagements With Artistic Narratives: Challenging Hierarchies And Building Community, Lauren Stetz

The Qualitative Report

Through the analysis Violence Against Women Art Map Project, a publicly accessible online platform that utilizes data visualization to understand the contextual complexities of violence against women (VAW), this article explores how comics and narrative artworks can be utilized to provide voice on sensitive or controversial subject matter, challenge accepted societal hierarchies and norms and build community. Considering social media as a transnational dialogic space, graphic works within online spaces can provide qualitative researchers with the potential to expose the multilayered and entangled experiences of individuals across cultures and to interrupt frequently silenced issues that often go unwitnessed and unspoken. …

The Voices Of Black Motherscholars: Navigating Academia, Motherhood, And Beyond, Danae Peterson

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The experiences of Black women in academia are shaped by the intersection of multiple, often conflicting identities. As mothers and scholars, Black women navigate the complex terrain of competing responsibilities, societal expectations, and institutional barriers, all while striving to achieve personal and professional aspirations. This daily balancing act is complicated by the compounded effects of racism and sexism in academia, coined as misogynoir (Bailey, 2018). Misogynoir, a specific form of anti-Black racist misogyny, manifests through stereotyping, marginalization, and invisibility affecting Black women’s ability to thrive in academic spaces that were not designed with them in mind (Patton & Njoku, 2019). …

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.

Trading Diversity? Judicial Diversity And Case Outcomes In Federal Courts, Ryan W. Copus, Ryan Hübert, Paige Pellaton

Faculty Works

Are federal lawsuits resolved differently based on the race or gender of the judges assigned to hear them? Recent empirical research posits that women and judges of color decide cases more liberally, at least in some identity-salient areas of law. However, these studies analyze small numbers of cases and judges, and use research designs that limit their causal interpretations. Using an original dataset of all civil rights cases filed in 20 federal district courts over multiple decades and a strong causal identification strategy, we find that assignment of cases to judges of color or women has no statistically significant effect …

Who Gets To Have Fun? The Alternative Earmarking Of A Memecoin Marketplace, Mia Tanner

Sociology Honors Projects

Past research on cryptocurrency has highlighted its sociotechnical aspects, framing crypto projects as community-grounded movements disrupting traditional state and market structures through technological advancements. What happens when these disruptive promises are absent or only playfully invoked? Cryptocurrencies known as “memecoins” have grown their own followings without pledging future legitimacy that would seriously challenge existing institutions, instead linking their value to the meme they brand themselves with and vague democratic promises. That new scheme of valuation is especially evident in coins launched on the site pump.fun, which has lowered the barriers to crypto-coin creation. The platform's accessibility provides a new dimension …

Deep-Fake Revenge Porn: The Intersection Of Artificial Intelligence And Revenge Porn For A Modern Attack On Women, Eva C. Hunt

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This study aims to provide a legal analysis grounded in gender legal theory to critique current legislation enacted in the United States. It focuses on the societal and gendered impacts of revenge porn, particularly examining how victimization differs across genders. The legal analysis explores state-by-state legislation addressing revenge porn, assessing the severity of criminal penalties and the timeline of enactment. For current contextual reasons, the study evaluates how emerging Deepfake artificial intelligence technologies intersect with and complicate existing revenge porn laws. Finally, it analyzes the extent to which each state has incorporated Deepfake AI considerations into its legal framework.

Understanding And Modeling Pooled Rideshare Acceptance: Influential Factors, Preferred User Experiences, And Implications, Rakesh Gangadharaiah

All Dissertations

This dissertation explores factors influencing pooled rideshare (PR) adoption to provide actionable insights for transportation network companies (TNCs) and policymakers. PR allows travelers to share rides with unknown passengers, offering benefits such as cost reduction and congestion relief. However, adoption remains limited due to safety concerns, privacy issues, and trust in rideshare platforms. A national U.S. survey with 5,385 respondents examined transportation preferences and barriers to PR adoption. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses identified five key factors influencing PR consideration—safety, service experience, privacy, traffic/environment, and time/cost. Second factor analyses examined ways to optimize PR experiences, revealing four factors—comfort/ease of use, …

Understanding The Underrepresented: A Descriptive Deep-Dive Into The Impact Of Young Legislators, Eric T. Meade Jr.

Honors Scholar Theses

This project explores youth members (thirty-five years old or younger) from the first Congress up until the present Congress by examining and analyzing the ideology, career trajectory, and accomplishments of these members. This project also analyzes the voting records of Congress members on topics that are highly salient to young voters to see how they align with young voters’ preferences and highlights multiple members of note to provide more detail on their backgrounds and unique circumstances. This study aims to demonstrate how young people have been represented historically and why it is so important for the U.S. to have youth …

Barriers Individuals And Families Experience Utilizing Anti-Poverty Programs, Miranda C. Dube'

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This proposed study aims to explore the barriers experienced by residents of the High Desert communities. Using a quantitative method approach, the proposed research will employ surveys to provide a comprehensive understanding of the outcomes experienced by the High Desert residents. Participants will be selected within the High Desert communities, aged 18 years or older, who have or are currently experiencing poverty. The findings from this proposed study would contribute to bridging gaps in understanding the barriers residents of the High Desert experience. By identifying factors that suppress successfully utilizing anti-poverty programs, this research proposal would aim to inform the …

Comics And Photography: The New Frontiers Of The "Reverse Translation", Emanuela Abbatecola, Mariella Popolla

The Qualitative Report

Anyone who was trained in Italy in the last decades of the 20th century will recall how central the debate around "quali(tative)" and "quanti(tative)" was at that time, when quantitative methods seemed to offer reassurance regarding the scientific credentials of a discipline still young and insecure in terms of its identity. The supremacy of the quantitative even though it is already from the 1970s that we witness a slow, and often contested, "revival of qualitative research linked to profound epistemological changes [...], to the crisis of the objectivist paradigm [...] and the recognition of the centrality of language [...] (Frisina, …

Breaking The Pipeline: Exploring Exclusionary Discipline, Restorative Justice, And The Attitudes And Beliefs Of Educators, Ericka J. Varnedoe

Honors College Theses

This study explores the connection between exclusionary disciplinary practices and the school-to-prison pipeline. It highlights how exclusionary discipline, including suspensions and expulsions, disproportionately affects marginalized groups such as students of color, students with disabilities, and LGBTQ youth, further contributing to the school-to-prison pipeline. In contrast, restorative justice, a non-punitive approach, offers a promising alternative. Initially adopted from the criminal justice system, restorative justice has been integrated into school environments to foster positive school climates, improve experiences, and mitigate challenging behaviors. This research examines educators' attitudes toward both exclusionary and restorative practices, as well as their awareness and implementation of restorative …

Life In Dance: Relationship To Self And Dance Environment, Emily Barz

Undergraduate Theses

Dance is an athletic art form in which the body is trained repetitively to perfect sequences of movement. The training regimen for dance requires a lot of time and dedication; this training can have an impact on self-esteem, especially when aspects of dance become detrimental to the dancer.

Maintaining a high level of self-esteem is important for dancers because self-esteem impacts a dancer's ability to grow in their artistry as well as life outcomes outside of dance.

Current research on dancer self-esteem highlights a very specific issue: body image. Dancers are expected to execute technique and fulfill high standards; oftentimes, …

Courage Under Crisis: Examining Altruistic Resistance In Mass Atrocities, Kyra K. Layman

Political Science Honors Projects

Why do individuals resist in different ways during mass atrocities? I theorize that variation in altruistic resistance is shaped by access to platforms, personal connections to victims, and organizational membership. Focusing on bystanders who choose to intervene, I develop a new typology of “Helpers” and construct an original global dataset. Using a mixed-methods approach, I test my hypotheses through regression analysis and triangulate my statistical evidence with individual Helper case studies. This research advances scholarship on resistance by systematically analyzing variation in altruistic behavior, contributing to our understanding of the social and institutional factors that may affect Helpers’ actions.

Zine-Making As Site Of Research Brave Space: From Ethical Challenges To Transformative Opportunities In The Study Of Digital Sexual Intimacies, Rachele Reschiglian, Cosimo Marco Scarcelli

The Qualitative Report

This paper presents zine-making workshops as sites of Research Brave Spaces (RBS), a methodological posture for scholars within transformative worldviews. Positioned within queer research methodologies, the paper argues that zine-making offers a creative and multimodal method that enhances participant engagement and reflexivity, challenging some limitations of traditional research methods. By framing research as a “brave space,” the paper shifts from the notion of “safe spaces,” emphasising the importance of embracing discomfort, vulnerability, and critical reflection throughout the research process in all the subjects involved. The methodology incorporates elements of care, collaboration, and adaptability, addressing the specific needs of marginalised participants, …

Towards An Embodied And Graphic Based Qualitative Sociology: Methodological Reflections On Reflexivity And Pictorial Embodiment In The Field Of Health And Illness, Alice Scavarda, Barbara Grüning

The Qualitative Report

The aim of this paper is to discuss the comicisation of qualitative sociology, i.e., the use of comics as research methods and analytical tools in sociology, drawing from case studies related to illness and neurodivergence. In the first part, we will pinpoint how comics as qualitative research methods enhance the reflexivity of sociologists themselves in the various phases of their research projects: from the definition of a case study to the choice of research and analysis techniques up to the communication of research outputs. In line with El Refaie’s (2012) concept of pictorial embodiment, we will show how producing drawn …

The Ethics Of Drawing Illness: Interdisciplinary Negotiations In A Participatory Graphic Narrative Project, Veronica Moretti, Annalisa Plava, Stefano Ratti

The Qualitative Report

This paper illustrates how the design of health-related comics contributes to reflecting on the methodological and ethical challenges of qualitative research. In line with Comics-Based Research (CBR), we demonstrate how creating a comic on medical topics emerges from continuous and iterative dialogue among multiple voices: patients, sociologists, artists, and physicians. On an ethical and methodological level, our study explores the creation of a comic book about pancreatic diseases with varying stages of severity and possibilities for cure and recovery. Constructing a comic in such contexts provides a new way of visualizing and understanding the illness experience. Representing traumatic memory in …

Discovering The Cultural Impacts On Asian American, Pacific Islander (Aapi) Occupations From Adolescent Experiences, Jasmine Chew, Karen Park

Spring 2025 OTD Capstone Symposium

Background: Among the Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) population, there is a gap in mental health (MH) utilization and seeking support for anxiety and depression (Wu et al., 2021). Adolescents experience a higher risk for self-isolating behaviors and struggle to find appropriate support (Ai et al., 2022; Santos & Kawabata, 2023). Based on cultural and socio-political contexts, what is the occupational impact on AAPI adolescents? How do cultural factors impact the utilization of community-based MH services?

Method: A convergent mixed methods study of unobtrusive data (n = 14), surveys (n = 29), and interviews (n = 4) was …

From Sketches To Stereotypes: Understanding Criminality Through Student Illustrations, Sandra Sicurella, Simone Tuzza

The Qualitative Report

This study investigates the use of comics to challenge stereotypes about criminals, acknowledging the partial and sensationalized nature of cultural production. It examines how TV series, films, and news influence students’ perceptions. Using Art-Based Research (ABR), a creative and uncommon approach in criminology, the research adopts comics as a pedagogical and investigative tool. The study aims to empirically validate this method, contributing to the academic debate on creative techniques in social research. It tests the hypothesis that visual storytelling can reveal beliefs related to the criminal imaginary and stimulate critical reflection. Three workshops were conducted with university students (aged 20–25) …

Illustrative Storytelling And Social Sciences: Reconsidering Boundaries, Extensions, And Meanings Of Qualitative Research, Veronica Moretti, Francesco Della Puppa

The Qualitative Report

Comics are increasingly recognized as a flexible and multimodal medium capable of eliciting, constructing, analyzing, and disseminating qualitative data. Far from being merely illustrative or humorous, comics offer complex visual-narrative forms that can reflect and critique social realities, stimulate reflexivity, and engage diverse audiences. This approach highlights the scientific, ethical, and epistemological implications of using comics in research, particularly in relation to representation, positionality, and the visual construction of meaning. Comics can serve as tools for pedagogy, public sociology, and participatory inquiry, especially in areas such as health, gender, and digital cultures. From autoethnography and zine-making to the co-production of …