Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Navigating Families, Negotiating Identities: Asian-White Mixed Family Experiences, Hayden Daeshin Ju

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines how White and second-generation Asian American heterosexual couples negotiate race, ethnicity, and gender as they come together and form families. While Asian-White intermarriage is often theorized as an endpoint of assimilation, this research concerns itself with the ways in which race plays a central role in shaping various domains of family life among mixed couples. Drawing on 62 semi-structured interviews with White and second-generation Asian American individuals, I find that race and gender jointly shape how the couples navigate household divisions of labor, in-law relationships, naming decisions, and transmitting ethnicity to children. By revealing the ongoing processes …

Environmental Drivers Of Dispersal In Black-And-White Ruffed Lemurs (Varecia Variegata), Amanda Mancini

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Dispersal is a fundamental aspect of primates’ lives, influencing population connectivity through gene flow, driving community structure and assembly, and having important consequences for adaptation and speciation. Primates disperse within an environmental context, with both intervening and local environmental factors affecting the motivation, capacity, timing, and success of dispersal at all phases. Direct evaluations of primate dispersal are challenging given the rarity of dispersal events and the large distances that animals often settle from their departure site, therefore indirect measures– such as the use of population genetic data– are more common.

The field of landscape genetics enables researchers to combine …

Salty: A Diffractive Inquiry Of Visceral Knowing And Embodied Aesthetics, Mei Ling Chua

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation takes a diffractive, onto-epistemological approach to everyday practices with salt in order to articulate an expanded understanding of meaning making and knowledge production. This research reckons with and challenges dominant modes of knowing that engage a Cartesian perspective to situate knowing as the exclusive domain of the mind in both form and topic of inquiry. This research acts simultaneously as both a direct practice of and metacognition about knowledge production by examining 1. the embodied (including sensory and emotional aspects) and 2. the relational (including interpersonal and socio-cultural) dimensions of experience as visceral knowing. This articulation of …

From Prostitution To Sex Trafficking: Dilemmas Of Victim Service Workers Helping Chinese Immigrant Women At The Courts, Yen-Chiao Liao

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study aims to explore the policy ambivalence towards commercial sex trade, resulted by prostitution laws and anti-trafficking policies in the United States. It focuses on Chinese immigrant women and those who served them in the Human Trafficking Intervention Courts (the HTICs) in New York City. Specifically, it investigates the process of Chinese immigrant women becoming potential “victims” of sex trafficking from the perspectives of the service workers, the social workers and the public defenders. Though research on human trafficking seems to be exploding for the past decades since the passage of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) in 2000, …

Civil Society Organizations Serving Children In Vietnam: Opportunities And Constraints Working With Government Agencies, Trang P. Kelly

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

When Vietnamese civil society organization (CSO) administrators manage their relationships with government authorities to ensure children receive social services, they operate under Vietnam’s complex political, socioeconomic, and cultural constraints in environments where the Vietnamese government employs soft power to control CSOs and their donors. This study adds to the literature on the nature of CSO in Vietnam. It details the current imbalance of power between state-sponsored organizations (SSOs) and non-SSOs and provides an updated view of how Vietnamese non-SSOs mix social, economic, and political roles as employers and advocates.

Combining a qualitative exploratory and interpretative case study, I address a …

Developing A Scale To Measure Internalization Of Oppression Among Latinx Living In New York City, Jeannette A. Sucre

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study created a valid scale of internalization of oppression experienced by Latinx students in New York City. This scale might be used by school counselors, college advisors, and clinicians who work to help Latinx clients. Internalization of oppression refers to the attitudes, beliefs and feelings that may develop among people who belong to populations placed in subordinate positions or devalued by the dominant populations in the societies in which they live. During the past hundred years, sociologists, anthropologists, psychologists, historians, and other social thinkers have theorized about the problems that people experience when the groups and categories they belong …

Exploring The Barriers And Facilitators Of Puerto Rican Women Senior Leadership In New York City Nonprofit Social Service Organizations, Emily Lopez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Puerto Rican women in senior leadership positions within nonprofit organizations contribute to the direction and governance of many New York City agencies. The findings in this research bring attention to their experiences and grit in the sector. According to Smith and Nkomo (2022) grit gives women of color in leadership the ability to bounce back after being discouraged and sidelined in their careers or to survive in hypermasculine cultures. Grit is defined as women who lead with passion, perseverance and know who they are (Smith & Nkomo, 2022). This study explores barriers and facilitators encountered by Puerto Rican women who …

Sit Less, Move More: A National Study Of Physical-Activity Behavior And Cancer, Stella O. Nwogugu

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: Physical activity is associated with lower risks of cancer, the second leading cause of death among Americans. Yet, sedentary behavior is the prevailing lifestyle for about 80% of American adults. Additionally, cancer survivors remain significantly inactive, even though physical activity has been shown to decrease risk of cancer and cancer recurrence, improve tolerance of cancer therapy, and reduce mortality. This research explores the relative impact of personal agency, social support, and key demographic variables on physical-activity behavior for a national sample of adults as well as how these relationships differ for cancer survivors and their counterparts.

Methods: Using the …

Stand-Up Comedy Visualized, Berna Yenidogan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Stand-up comedy has become an increasingly popular form of comedy in the recent years and comedians reach audiences beyond the halls they are performing through streaming services, podcasts and social media. While comedic performances are typically judged by how 'funny' they are, which could be proxied by the frequency and intensity of laughs through the performance, comedians also explore untapped social issues and provoke conversation, especially in this age where interaction with artists goes beyond their act. It is easy to see commonalities in the topics addressed in comedians’ work such as relationships, race and politics.This project provides an interactive …

The Impact Of Utilitarian Public Policies On Minority Communities: A Comparison Of New York City And New South Wales, Australia., Nicholas Reyes

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The purpose of this thesis is to highlight and critique the ways in which utilitarianism manifests itself in comparative public policy. While public policy studies tend to focus on national levels, cities, and states can also be major sites of theoretical and policy formulation that are adopted globally. The moral ethics that are involved in public policy are especially important because these policies have a direct impact on society. Utilitarianism encompasses the logic of utility maximization: the ends justify the means and the idea that the moral ethical choice is the one that will produce the greatest good for the …

Confusion Of Tongues: Translation And Transfers Of Attachment In A Post-Monolingual Condition, Hiji Nam

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

“Confusion of Tongues” proposes an intersubjective, dialogic approach to translation, psycholinguistics, and patient and clinicians’ relationships to the “mother tongue” and secondary languages. By tuning in to linguistic and translational shifts, stutters, and gaps, the study presents a consideration of the challenges and rewards presented by what I call a “post-monolingual clinical condition.” An individual’s self-state in a specific language will be shadowed by the emotional history and associations one brings to that language, which will also ripple into the counter-transferential matrix—we might call this the “transference to language,” or attachment styles that manifest and repeat an individual’s forgotten libidinal …

New Frontiers Of Integration: Convergent Pathways Of Neighborhood Diversification In Metropolitan New York, Kasey Zapatka, Van C. Tran

Publications and Research

This article examines the most recent trends on neighborhood racial integration in New York—the country’s largest metropolitan area in 2019 with a total population of 19.2 million. We ask how the suburbanization of both immigration and poverty have transformed suburbs over the last two decades. We highlight four findings. First, ethnoracial diversification has led to a significant decline in nonintegrated neighborhoods and a sharp rise in integrated neighborhoods, but such a decline is more dramatic in suburbs than in cities. Second, White-integrated neighborhoods remain the most prevalent form of neighborhood integration in both cities and suburbs. Third, immigrant neighborhoods are …

Analysis Of Freight Movements In The San Joaquin Valley, Aly Tawfik, Utsav Shah

Mineta Transportation Institute

Freight transportation plays a primary role in supply chains, costs, and availability of goods and is a major part of the economy. This study identifies, assesses, and utilizes different data sources to uncover and understand the patterns and movements of different types of freight in the San Joaquin Valley’s (SJV's) different counties. The San Joaquin Valley region consists of eight counties: San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Merced, Madera, Fresno, Kings, and Tulare. This research explored some major datasets with freight information, such as Global Trade Atlas (GTA), Port Imports and Exports Reporting Systems (PIERS), and Streetlight data insights for the year 2019 …

Evaluation, Comparison, And Improvement Recommendations For Caltrans Financial Programming Processes And Tools, Wenbin Wei, Nigel Blampied, Raajmaathangi Sreevijay

Mineta Transportation Institute

The California Transportation Improvement Program System (CTIPS) is the main tool used by Caltrans’ Division of Financial Programming to support the business of transportation programming. It is a multi-agency joint-use project programming database system applied to develop and manage various state and federal transportation programming documents. The goal of this project is to evaluate CTIPS and explore various new options that will maintain the current functionality of CTIPS, meet legislative guidelines for ADA compliance, ensure security of the system, and have sufficient scalability and capabilities for integration with other systems in the future. The research is based on the review …

Trade And Transportation Talent Pipeline Blueprints: Building Universityindustry Talent Pipelines In Colleges Of Continuing And Professional Education, Tyler D. Reeb, Stacey Park

Mineta Transportation Institute

The rapid adoption of transformational technologies along with other economic and cultural shifts, have created a gap between workers and the skills and knowledge necessary for in-demand occupations. Trade and Transportation Talent Pipeline Blueprints: Building University-Industry Talent Pipelines in Colleges of Continuing and Professional Education identifies the steps required to build talent pipelines that target in-demand trade and transportation occupations requiring specific degrees, certificates, and non-credit professional development. This report provides a literature review and labor market data analysis. It also includes documentation of methodology in planning a pilot program for Colleges of Professional and Continuing Education housed within each …

To Be Or Not To Be: The Relationship Between Economic Diversity And Unemployment Rates In Canadian Cities During The Covid-19 Induced Shock, Yahaya Alphonse

Major Papers

Regional scholars have broadly studied the role of economic structure in shielding a community from economic shocks. This research has generally involved comparing diversity against specialization. This study compares differences within varying degrees of economic diversity in Canadian cities. Canada has received very little attention in this field despite the importance this knowledge could provide in shaping Canadian economic policy. This paper aims to fill in this gap by analyzing the role economic diversity played in acting as a structural buffer to the COVID-19-induced economic shock. This analysis is done utilizing a Herfindahl Hirschman Index to measure economic diversity and …

Covid-19, Digitization, And The "New Normal" For Municipal Government: A Study Of Three Ontario Cities, Justin Lee Grainger

Major Papers

The COVID-19 pandemic is viewed as both an unprecedented challenge and an impetus for digital transformation. During the pandemic, a “new normal” discourse emerged predicting a surge in digitization that would radically and permanently change organizations. This paper examines how the pandemic has affected municipal governments through case studies of the City of Windsor, City of Kitchener, and City of Burlington. It compares how each city adapted to the pandemic through digitization and investigates if such changes have transformed citizen participation and governance in the cities under study. The paper focuses on two ways citizens engage with local government: voting …

Decolonizing Municipal Policing: Indigenous Discrimination And Institutional Approaches, Terran Morris

Major Papers

For decades, there have been growing calls to address systemic Indigenous racism in Canadian police institutions. However, progress in this area has remained troublingly slow as recent movements have had little impact on institutional reform. Indigenous Peoples are left disproportionately victimized and overrepresented in the criminal justice system due to discriminatory policing practices. In recent years calls for institutional reforms have been amplified with the completion of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls as well as countless other scathing reports from oversight bodies into racism within municipal police services. Given this newfound urgency, municipal police …

Making And Unmaking Collective Memory Through Food: A Case Study Of Windsor, Ontario’S Yugoslav Diaspora, Amanda Skocic

Major Papers

The preparation and consumption of food is not merely a physical act, but a deeply social one, conveying cultural meaning that functions to tie us to our identity and profoundly influence our memory. Drawing upon interviews done with members of Windsor’s Yugoslav diaspora community, this research seeks to explore the ways in which this group has negotiated its collective memory within the host society through the use of food. I identify four central aspects of food’s relation to collective memory within the diaspora. First, the use of food as a means of connection to the homeland, and therefore, to collective …

A Grounded Theory Of Counselors’ Post-Graduation Development Of Disability Counseling Effectiveness, Michele Rivas, Nicole R. Hill

Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision

Many persons with disabilities engage in counseling services in a variety of settings. However, the development trajectories of counselors who seek to compensate for the lack of training and advance their post-graduation skillset to work effectively with clients with disabilities has not been explored. This grounded theory study illuminated several dimensions involved in twenty-one Licensed Professional Counselors’ post-graduation development of disability counseling effectiveness. In this study, counseling effectiveness refers to self-perceived improved skillset rather than a benchmark (i.e., competence). The core category, Evolving Commitments, was common to all participants’ trajectories when developing disability counseling effectiveness. The other categories (causal conditions, …

Recommendations For Counselor Education And Supervision Programs To Improve Gatekeeping Processes Developed From Doctoral Student Experiences, Evan C. Smarinsky, Cian L. Brown, Erin Popejoy

Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the experiences of eleven doctoral students at three CACREP accredited programs to address issues in counselor education and supervision programs and faculty face regarding gatekeeping. The information was used to develop and provide recommendations for gatekeeping procedures that can be implemented at the departmental and classroom levels. Ways programs can improve the training of doctoral students for gatekeeping roles and responsibilities, steps faculty can take to create an environment which supports gatekeeping at their institution, as well as support doctoral students as they grow into future gatekeepers of the profession are …

An Exploration Of Authors’ Circle: A Scholarly Writing Peer Feedback Process, Jacqueline M. Swank

Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision

Doctoral students need to develop scholarly writing skills if they plan to work in academia. This study focused on the lived experiences of five counselor education doctoral students engaging in a peer feedback activity throughout a course designed to help them develop writing skills. The researcher identified five main themes from the data: (a) hesitancy and normalizing the experience; (b) development as a writer; (c) learning about, developing relationships with, and collaborating with peers; (d) self-confidence; and (e) areas to consider. The author discusses implications for teaching and research.

From Exploration Of Classism To Anticlassist Counseling: Implications For Counselors And Counselor Educators, Lucy Parker-Barnes, Suzanne Degges-White, David A. Walker, Scott Wickman, Bellamy Linneman, Courtney Rowley, Robert Giansante, Noel Mckillip

Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision

Classism is a recently studied, but historically present, form of oppression. Despite much attention to inclusion of underrepresented clients in counseling literature, there has been little focus on the presence of classism in academic settings. In an effort to close this gap, a study of 202 individuals, aged 18 to 38, was conducted to explore the relationships among perceived classism, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Only 4.5% of the participants had never experienced any incidents of classism. African American individuals were more likely to experience interpersonal classism and working class/poor individuals were more likely to experience interpersonal and systemic classism. Recommendations …

Exploring Clinician Attitudes Towards Treating Eating Disorders: Bridging Counselor Training Gaps, Adriana C. Labarta, Taylor Irvine, Paul R. Peluso

Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision

Eating disorder (ED) clinicians may face various challenges in practice, including burnout and feelings of incompetence. Several deficits may contribute to these challenges, such as graduate education and treatment gaps. In this study, 109 interdisciplinary clinicians were surveyed regarding their personal attitudes, experiences, and challenges in treating EDs. Among the various results, quantitative and qualitative findings highlighted the lack of graduate education as the primary challenge to effectively treating EDs, as well as the need for more ED research and culturally responsive care. Recommendations to enhance ED education and counselor training are provided, including managing countertransference and advocating for specialized …

Counselor Trainees’ Development Of Self-Efficacy In An Online Skills Course, Kristin Vincenzes, Ashley Pechek, Matt Sprong

Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision

COVID-19 significantly changed the parameters and imaginations of those in higher education. Face-to-face courses swiftly transitioned to completely remote learning; though, that came with many anxieties in relation to students’ competency levels in practicing counseling skills. The results of this study found that students’ self-efficacy significantly increased after participating in an online skills course. A total of 39 graduate-level clinical mental health counseling students completed both the pre and post-test questionnaires, and findings showed that completing the online skills-based course was important in improving self-perception of increasing one’s skills, t(38) = -5.088, p < .000.

Review Of Metadata For Digital Collections: A How-To-Do-It Manual, Elyse Fox

Journal of Western Archives

Review of Metadata for Digital Collections: A How-To-Do-It Manual, Second Edition by Steven Jack Miller.

Getting To Know Digital Collections Users, Emily Lapworth

Journal of Western Archives

Use and user studies can provide valuable information to archivists and librarians who wish to improve their services and systems. However, studying the use and users of digital archival collections can be challenging. This study describes the methods and findings of a study conducted by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) to explore questions such as, who is using UNLV Digital Collections? How are they using the materials? What are their user interface preferences? Are they satisfied? The methods used include web analytics, an online survey, and interviews. The author shares lessons learned to aid other repositories in designing …

Gender & Sexuality In New York Politics, Bianca M. Guerrero

Open Educational Resources

No abstract provided.

The Nexus Between Leadership And Implementation Of Education Infrastructure Development Policy Goals In Tanzania: Reflections From Kinondoni Municipal Council, Theresia Mdanya, Mrisho Malipula Dr

BISNIS & BIROKRASI: Jurnal Ilmu Administrasi dan Organisasi

This study assessed the association between leadership attributes and qualities in the implementation of education infrastructure development policy goals in Tanzania using Kinondoni Municipal Council as a case. A concurrent mixed-method triangulation of qualitative and quantitative data was employed to explore the nexus between leadership attributes and qualities in implementing education infrastructure development policy goals in Tanzania. The data used in this study was garnered from face-to-face interviews with 92 respondents recruited from a population of 288 Kinondoni Municipal Council workers and a review of documentary sources relevant to the study. The application of primary data from interviews and desk …

Assessing Ecosystem Health Through Contaminants In The Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve, Nancy Torres

Theses

Although the Tijuana River Estuary (TRE) remains the largest, most-intact coastal wetland in Southern California, it has a history of major changes, much of this related to its location immediately north of the US / Mexico Border. One of the primary challenges is cross-border flows from the rapidly growing city of Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico, and the delivery of wastewater, debris, and sediment to sensitive coastal wetland ecosystems. There is a need to more fully investigate these environmental changes to assess the ecosystem health of the Tijuana River Estuary over time, especially related to pollution impacts. This can inform an …