Sociology Research Works
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/1646
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Item Connecting Spaces: Gender, Video Games and Computing in the Early Teens(Sage, 2023-04) Ashlock, Jennifer; Stojnic, Miodrag; Tufekci, ZeynepInformed by evidence that computing attitudes may be uniquely constructed in informal contexts and that the early teens are a key period for academic decision-making, we investigate lines of practice that connect computing skills, attitudes, and videogames. We compare the relationship between computer skill, computer efficacy, and activities associated with gaming using a data set of 3,868 children in middle school. The time that children spend gaming has very modest association with skill and efficacy. Accounting for the frequency with which children modify games, engage in social gaming activities, and the salience of gamer identity explains the gender gap in computer skill and significantly narrows the gender gap in computer efficacy. We find support for the argument that computer skill and efficacy are dependent on children connecting often isolated social contexts, a socially embedded characteristic of the digital divide.Item The Social Movement Social Club: How Activists Form Tiny Publics(Wiley, 2023-10-02) Johnson, J. L.Before sociology, I aspired to be a good writer. Those like me will love Gary Alan Fine's prologue to his new ethnography, in which he draws a movingly adventurous scene of elderly Chicagoans questing to Wisconsin through a snowstorm in 2016. Using canes and walkers, these senior activists arrive and march through snow, protesting right-wing threats to social security emanating from then-Speaker of the House Paul Ryan's offices in Racine. The vividity with which Fine narratively weaves together his fieldnotes makes an implicit argument, certainly against ageism, but also for the importance of the craft of writing in sociology. Fine illustrates the angst and agency of his septa-, octo-, and a few nonagenarian subjects. Elderly progressives will require bathroom breaks, but they can fire up much like the young folk that occupied our screens during The Resistance. “Senior protest can smell like teen spirit (p. 5),” quips Fine, signposting the book's puzzle: How do the limits and possibilities of senior activism reveal the everyday particularities, promises, and limitations of attempting to make social change?Item Rethinking marriage metabolism: The declining frequency of marital events in the United States(Population Research and Policy Review, 2023) Cohen, Philip N.Previous research has used the concept of marriage metabolism to represent churning in the marriage system, but the measurements used to date have been inadequate. This paper addresses changes in the incidence of marital events in the United States from 2008 to 2021. I offer a measure, the Total Rate of Marital Events (TRME), of the projected lifetime experience of marital transitions (marriage, divorce, and widowhood) for life table cohorts. I find that the TRME declined steeply over this relatively short period: 22% for men and 19% for women. All three components declined in every age group below 90. The decline in divorce was most pronounced. More accurately than the term "retreat from marriage," I describe the slowing churn of the marriage system as reflecting the diminished social presence of marriage in daily life. Rather than a retreat, this coincides with the increasingly selective status of married life. A higher status marriage system is a smaller, slower, and more stable marriage system.Item Growing Uncertainty in Marriage Expectations among U.S. Youth(Socius, 2024-03-26) Cohen, Philip N.; Pepin, Joanna R.Marriage rates are falling in the United States. The authors ask whether today's young adults are likely to continue this trend. Using Monitoring the Future Public-Use Cross-Sectional Datasets (1976-2022), this visualization presents U.S. 12th graders' marriage expectations. It shows declining optimism that they will be "very good" spouses and declining expectations that they will eventually marry. Both trends are prominent in the last 10 years of the survey, and both are more dramatic among young women than among young men. If these trends hold, it may foretell further declines in marriage rates in the coming years.Item Whither Shall We Go? The Past and Present of Black Churches and the Public Sphere(MDPI, 2015-03-18) Barber, Kendra H.In this paper, I analyze the contemporary role of the Black Church in the public sphere. Some argue that despite the historical role of the Black Church in addressing racial inequality, it should not be involved in the public sphere, as there should be a clear separation between church and state. I argue that black churches are filling a gap created by the self-help ideology of a neo-liberal era where addressing the outcomes of contemporary racial inequality is left to private sector organizations, such as churches, rather than the federal government. I assert that the Black Church should remain engaged in the public sphere for two reasons: first, black churches are operating in the absence of state welfare rather than as an alternative to it and second, black churches are among the few institutions providing race-specific remedies that have been abandoned in a colorblind era.Item Hybrid Arrangements as a Form of Ecological Modernization: The Case of the US Energy Efficiency Conservation Block Grants(MDPI, 2016-01-18) Galli, Anya M.; Fisher, Dana R.How are environmental policy goals implemented and sustained in the context of political stagnation surrounding national climate policies in the United States? In this paper, we discuss Ecological Modernization Theory as a tool for understanding the complexity of climate governance at the sub-national level. In particular, we explore the emergence of hybrid governance arrangements during the local implementation of federal energy efficiency programs in US cities. We analyze the formation and advancement of programs associated with one effort to establish a sub-national low carbon energy policy: the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) program administered by the US Department of Energy. Our findings highlight the diverse range of partnerships between state, private, and civil society actors that emerged through this program and point to some of the challenges associated with collaborative climate governance initiatives at the city level. Although some programs reflected ecologically modern outcomes, other cities were constrained in their ability to move beyond the status quo due to the demands of state bureaucracies and the challenges associated with inconsistent funding. We find that these programs cultivated hybrid arrangements in an effort to sustain the projects following the termination of federal grant funding. Overall, hybrid governance plays an important role in the implementation and long-term sustainability of climate-related policies.Item System management and compensatory parenting: Educational involvement after maternal incarceration(Wiley, 2023-06-27) Branigan, Amelia R.; Ellis, Rachel; Jacobsen, Wade C.; Haskins, Anna R.Research has demonstrated that paternal incarceration is associated with lower levels of educational involvement among fathers and primary caregivers, but little is known regarding caregiver educational involvement when mothers have been incarcerated. In this study, we present the first analysis of variation in school- and home-based educational involvement by maternal incarceration history, pairing survey and interview data to connect macro-level group differences with micro-level narratives of mothers’ involvement in their children's education. Our survey data demonstrate that children of ever-incarcerated mothers experience increased school-based educational involvement by their primary caregivers, regardless of whether the caregiver is the mother herself. Our interview data point to compensatory parenting as a key motivating factor in educational involvement, wherein a caregiver endeavors to “make up for” the child's history of maternal incarceration. Findings add to the literature demonstrating maternal incarceration as a distinct experience from both paternal incarceration and material disadvantage alone, and they suggest the need to explore the role of schools as potential points of productive institutional involvement for mothers with an incarceration history.Item Upstream Policy Changes to Improve Population Health and Health Equity: A Priority Agenda(Wiley, 2023-04-25) Ray, Rashawn; Lantz, Paula M.; Williams, DavidPOLICY POINTS: Upstream factors—social structures/systems, cultural factors, and pub-lic policy—are primary forces that drive downstream patterns and in-equities in health that are observed across race and locations. A public policy agenda that aims to address inequities related to thewell-being of children, creation and perpetuation of residential segre-gation, and racial segregation can address upstream factors. Past successes and failures provide a blueprint for addressing upstreamhealth issues and inhibit health equity.Item Local violence and transitions to marriage and cohabitation in Mexico(Wiley, 2022-10-20) Caudillo, Mónica L.; Lee, JaeinObjective To assess whether local violence is associated with the timing and type of women's first union formation. Background Local violence may cause disruptions to marriage markets and psychological and behavioral changes that may affect union formation patterns. Method The authors exploited the variation in homicide rates caused by a shift in national drug-enforcement policy in Mexico in December 2006. Competing-risks Cox models and union histories from a nationally representative survey of women (N = 33,292) were used to assess whether a recent increase in violence was associated with the timing of the first union transition, which could be either marriage or cohabitation. Analyses were conducted separately by education level. Results A recent increase in the local homicide rate was associated with delayed first marriage formation for less educated women. Supplementary analyses suggested that a decrease in the number of employed men per women, as well as reduced social interaction due to fear of victimization could be plausible causal mechanisms. No statistically significant associations were found between a recent increase in violence and transitions to first cohabitation for the less educated, or with any first union transition for the moderately and more educated. Conclusion Among less educated women, a recent increase in violence was associated with a delayed entrance into marriage as a first union transition. Implications By increasing their barriers to marriage, local violence may contribute to the accumulation of disadvantage among disadvantaged women and families.Item Transformative family scholarship: Introduction to the special issue(Wiley, 2022-09-26) Dow, Dawn M.; Few-Demo, April L.; Williams, Deadric T.This introductory essay situates this special issue within the context of antiracism and social justice for family scholars. The editors underscore the political and social context that led the National Council on Family Relations' three flagship journals—Journal of Family Theory & Review (JFTR), Family Relations (FR), and Journal of Marriage and Family (JMF) to collectively invite submissions for separate special issues on Transformative Family Scholarship: Theory, Practice, and Research at the Intersection of Families, Race, and Social Justice. This special issue focuses on scholarship using cutting-edge theory, research, and practices to investigate racial injustice and confront white supremacy within the context of the family. The guest editors synthesize the dominant themes cross-cutting the 13 articles, including parenting, racial stratification, health and economic well-being, and racial identity. The guest editors explain how these articles contribute to a more robust analysis of structural racism within families. The introduction closes with an invitation to scholars doing scholarship using critical theoretical approaches to continue their efforts and consider the Journal of Marriage and Family as a potential publication outlet for their research.
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