Hierarchical regression was used to determine if high school community type is an effective predictor of academic success when controlling for demographics, prior academic achievement, socioeconomic status, and current commitment or work habits for students entering Austin College in 1992,1993, and 1994 . Findings revealed that there is a relationship between attending high school in community types of rural and independent town controlling for the effects of SAT scores, high school rank, sex, and late application deposit on first semester grade point average.

Objective: Differences between biologic and non-biologic parents' acceptance and use of ordinary corporal punishment and use of explaining/reasoning as a disciplinary tool are examined from a sociobiological theoretical perspective. Method: Cross tabulations are used on data from a national survey conducted by the Gallup Organization in 1995. Results: Contrary to predictions, differences between biologic and non-biologic parents' acceptance of ordinary corporal punishment and the use of explaining/reasoning are not statistically significant. In addition, biologic parents are found to use ordinary corporal punishment significantly more often than non-biologic parents. Conclusions: The sociobiological theoretical perspective likely underestimates the influence of culture and social structure on parent-child interactions.

This study investigates the recovery efforts provided for low income and ethnic minority populations by organizations during the permanent housing phase of recovery in Watsonville, California, following the Loma Prieta earthquake of October 17, 1989. The case study format is used to discover what activities were performed and why each organization chose to perform them. Dynes and Quarantelli's (1968) typology of organization is used to explain how and why established, expanding, extending and emergent organizations participated in the recovery efforts. The findings indicate that the type of organization dictated the kind of tasks each organization performed. Organizations maintained activities during recovery for which they had experience, expertise and proficiency.

The purpose of this study is to examine the problems that pregnant teenagers encounter at school and at home while they are trying to complete their high school education. Data were collected by in-depth interviews. Twenty pregnant adolescents, who were between the ages of 15 through 18, and were participants in a special teen pregnancy program were interviewed. The major findings in this study included the respondents': 1) unstable family life histories, 2) denial that they were pregnant, 3) need for self-identity as an adult, 4) conflict with parents and 5) motivation to complete their high school education. This study points to the need for more research on the problems that pregnant adolescents encounter in their everyday lives.

This study used the Health Belief Model to examine the predictors of AIDS preventive behavior. The independent variables were the variables of individual perception, modifying factors (psychological variables), and likelihood variables. The respondents, the Taiwanese students of the University of North Texas, were influenced both by Chinese sexuality and Western values in their AIDS-risk behavior. The results revealed that 90% of the respondents were misinformed on the availability of AIDS vaccine. In addition, a majority of the students were either abstaining from sex or practicing monogamy. Using Pearson's correlation coefficient and multiple regression analysis, this study found that the psychological variables rather than cognitive variables significantly influenced the respondents' AIDS preventive behavior. Finally, suggestions were made for future research on AIDS, and for AIDS preventive behavior campaigns.

The purpose of this pilot study was to examine the characters portrayed on "prime-time" television drama in an attempt to determine how they compared, with the distribution represented in U. S. Census Bureau data for sex, marital status and occupational status. In pursuing this objective, it was also concerned with the development of a method of content analysis that would not require use of a videotape recorder.

The development, content, societal and individual effects of selected myths toward the aged in American society were reviewed and analyzed. Emphasis was placed on factors associated with the development of the myths . The myths were compared with facts or reality relative to the major dimensions of the lives of the aged. The functions and dysfunctions of the myths for the aged as a group, for the individual, and for society were analyzed. Secondary sources of data were utilized in the preliminary identification of the selected myths. The sources were also used to justify the selection and analyze the development of myths within their socio-cultural milieus. Myths were utilized in the analysis of the attitudes toward the aged, and the effects.

This study examined the opinions of university students about the current situation of the headscarf dispute on the wearing of headscarves in Turkey. The influence of gender, the level of secularism, socioeconomic status and encounter with women wearing headscarves on opinions about the wearing of headscarves were analyzed in this study. The sample of this study was composed of 400 university students among whom there were 240 female and 160 male students. Moreover, the sample comprised university students from 50 universities from Turkey. The results indicated that the level of secularism and encounter with women wearing headscarves were distinguished as two determining factors of the diverse opinions of the university students on the topic. No association was found between the perceptions of university students about the issue and the independent variables of gender and socioeconomic status.

A comparison of social elitist concepts in the works of Karl Marx, Vilfredo Pareto, and Karl Mannheim reveals similar patterns in the uses of these concepts. By listing seven criteria that were developed and by the use of a topical analysis method, similarities are presented and explained. Additional comparisons according to schools of thought and specific national setting are also presented. Structural similarities were identified among the theories; however, content patterns are not evident because of the lack of an accepted definition of the elite. The analysis and the comparison of the concepts of the elite in the works of these major thinkers facilitate and deepen the understanding of this concept in sociological work.

The present study examines the relationship of diagnosis and denominational affiliation in light of the work of Charles Glock and Rodney Stark. The major hypothesis of the study was that diagnoses of first admissions to Timberlawn sanitarium would vary by denominational affiliation.

This investigation is concerned with perceived detrimental aspects of land use and the desirability of extending government participation in land use goals. Interviews with 179 persons were conducted. The data reveal a possible direct relationship between social class and the acceptance of land use and economic controls. The project endorses the following proposals: Local regulations should require housing developers to provide the streets and utilities and to dedicate land for parks and schools. Taxation should be used as a regulatory tool for the attainment of public policy objectives. A federal commission is needed to encourage comprehensive land management programs. It is also suggested that future land management questionnaires should use random samples and ask questions about specific land use problems.

The purpose of this study is to make a survey of the efforts that have been made to secure world peace and to present some basic elements necessary in any workable world peace organization. Stress will be placed not on military power or economic difficulties but on the fundamental human relationships of mankind.

This research advances the literature on interracial marriage by using variables that align with the social contact hypothesis. The purpose of this project is to accurately gauge the exact social predictors influencing current attitudes towards Black and White interracial marriage. Multiple regression models containing social contact predictors are analyzed using data from the 2018 General Social Survey. The conclusive review of the literature summarizes age, region, and education as essential social contact predictors of attitudes towards interracial marriage. Therefore, the formulated hypotheses and multiple regression models measure this specific relationship controlling for other predictors such as sex and income. For Whites, the two most significant factors are age and living in the south vs. the west. Interestingly, a college education is not significant. For Blacks, the key contact variable that seems to matter is age. Baby boomers are less likely to favor interracial marriage. Overall, results show areas of convergence. Therefore, one's age is significant predictor for White and Black acceptance. However, it also shows divergence-region appears to only matter for Whites. Accordingly, younger Blacks and Whites were more likely to favor close relatives marrying individuals of the opposite race. Older Blacks and Whites were less likely to support interracial …

This follow-up study involved college women seven years after graduation. The purpose was to investigate the predictability of women's career behavior from career aspirations at senior year of college. Some data were derived from The Role Outlook Study senior year questionnaire. In addition, a second questionnaire, The Role Outlook Follow-Up, was utilized which focused upon various events occurring in women's lives following college graduation, namely marriage, graduate school attendance, receipt of advanced degrees, and work experience. No significant association was found between women's career aspirations senior year and actual career behavior. Instead, marriage and the absence or presence of children differentiated working and non-working women. However, a significant association was found between women' s occupational preferences at senior year and their current occupations.

The purpose of this qualitative interview study is to examine the lives and experiences children of incarcerated parents from a theoretical perspective through an application of the social stress process. Previous research on children of incarcerated parents has neglected to add a theoretical component to their research, which is the intention of this research. The results will be organized around the theoretical domains of the stress process applied to findings from the analysis of eleven qualitative interviews of mothers and/or caregivers of youth(s) of an incarcerated parent. Guided by analytic induction, the themes that emerged from the transcripts were applied to the theoretical propositions of the social stress process: stressors, mediators, and manifestations. Stressors experienced by children of incarcerated parents include: the incarceration of a parent, financial difficulties, and residential instability. Stress mediators include: coping mechanisms and the importance of maintaining familial ties during parental incarceration. The manifestations or outcomes include: internalizing and externalizing behaviors.

Most of the research relating to children and death has been psychological or psychoanalytic in nature and has employed case studies or projective methodology. This study utilized a sociological perspective and was aimed at discovering the socialization processes that shape children's attitudes in this area of inquiry. The children's attitudes were examined in terms of four variables, their definitions of death, the relationship of age and death, their reaction to self-destruction and the destruction of others, and the affects of the media on them. Findings from this study of twenty-five children provided further support for the contention that attitudes are the result of learning experiences, i.e., socialization, involving significant others. For the most part, the children's responses were reflections of dominant social values and might therefore be considered the result of socializing factors.

Abstract: The civic life-styles typology of Charles Adrian and Oliver Williams was tested as to its theoretical utility in explaining empirical patterns of civic life-style items, and its comparability to other forms of urban behavior. The data are from a 1970 survey of 3,025 families by the City of Dallas, Texas. An exploratory factor analysis was done on civic life-style items. The factor index scores were used as dependent variables, and demographic and associational items were independent variables in a step-wise regression analysis. Only two of ten factors were found to be civic lifestyles; both were interpretable using the Adrian and Williams typology. Civic life-style behavior was found to be similar to other patterns of differential participation in urban structures.

Highly educated and skilled Indian nationals are the largest recipients of H-1B visas in the US. An employer must be willing to sponsor an H-1B work visa for the worker to continue to live and work in the US. This stipulation has granted US employers unprecedented power over H-1B visa holders, which can be understood as status coercion; employers have state-sanctioned power to threaten or discharge a worker from their status, i.e., visa status, which interconnects work and migration status. While the expansive power of employers to curtail a worker's status is one factor driving the ongoing coercive conditions, the other factor is precarious work. There is a gap in the literature in understanding what occurs at the intersection of status coercion and precarious work, especially within high-skilled information technology (IT) jobs. For instance, how does status coercion operate for employer-sponsored H-1B visa holders? Is it similar for dependent visa workers on H-4 EAD visas that rely on their spouse's H-1B, and F-1 OPT visa workers who have employment authorization from USCIS? Lastly, do these visa workers ever resist status coercion? In this study, I draw on twelve in-depth, semi-structured interviews of Indian nationals in the IT sector on H-1B, …

Patterns of participation in formal organizations by residents of a rural non-farm community are compared with those of residents in an urban community. Multi-stage random sampling is utilized in Denton to select those interviewed. In Krum, each residence was numbered and a table of random numbers was used to select households. Chapter One includes the study's purpose, review of the literature, and statement of the hypothesis. Methodology is discussed in the second chapter. Chapter Three focuses on findings and discussions. Data indicate that in the urban community social class, age, homeownership, and length of residency are related to amount of participation. In the rural non-0farm community social class is related to participation. Residents in the urban community participate more than those in the rural non-farm community.

One hundred American teenagers and 84 Israeli teenagers were interviewed by open-ended questionnaires in order to study their attitudes toward death, holding variables like religion, socio-economic status, and education constant. All the respondents are Jewish, members of a youth movement, high school students, and are fifteen to sixteen years old. The results show a strong tendency to avoid discussions and thoughts about death, more so by the Israelis. Death is strongly feared and associated with war and car accidents, more so by the Israelis. Americans associate army service with death. Death is generally viewed as physical and spiritual cessation of life. The avoidance approach and fear of death that were found suggest the need to offer special courses on man and death in high schools.

The primary purpose of this thesis is to determine whether or not time perspective can be represented by a relatively simple unitary measure in the form of a questionnaire. More specifically, the aim is to determine whether or not time perspective can be represented as a scalable attitude in accordance with the Guttman scalogram model.

The following premise is based on the ideas of social theorists who have contributed to understanding the importance of image in society. This proposal argues that political participation is susceptible to exploitation in the form of conspicuous consumption as defined by Thorstein Veblen. The analyses that follow will test the degree to which Americans who demonstrate more traditional forms of conspicuous consumption also tend to show more activity in political venues. While the correlation of these two variables is not sufficient to demonstrate cause and effect, it may be significant enough to attract more researchers to this question: are Americans using political involvement to positively influence the way that their social status is perceived by others?

The purpose of this research was to describe the content of information surrounding a significant sporting event presented by sportswriters through the printed medium. The event chosen for analysis was Superbowl XVI. Three metropolitan newspapers were selected as the sample representatives of the urban style of sports reporting. Two of these newspapers were chosen because of their geographical representation of a participating team. The third selection was taken because of its large circulation and relative unbiased reporting. From a pilot study conducted on Superbowl XV, content categories were found to fit in either one of two basic domains: cognitive or affective. The sample population for Superbowl XVI yielded 5,759 individual category entries based on 215 articles. The cognitive category comprised 94 percent of all items categorized, thus clearly demonstrating the dominant theme used by sportswriters for this event.

In this study, I examine how self-reported religiosity predicts political opinion toward abortion and gun control. In particular, I examine how self-reported religiosity relates to individuals' inconsistent attitudes on these two issues where liberal attitudes are held toward one issue, but conservative attitudes are held toward the other. Most commonly, these inconsistent attitudes are found among individuals who hold pro-life (conservative) and pro-gun control (liberal) views. Using data from the 2018 General Social Survey, I find that religiosity significantly predicts these inconsistent attitudes regarding abortion and gun control. This suggests that religious ethics regarding life and death can offer a partial explanation for inconsistent attitudes toward partisan issues.