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Publication Minority Support: School District Demographics and Support for Funding Election Measures(SAGE Publications, 2019-09-20) Alvord, Daniel; Rauscher, EmilyIn the context of tight state budgets, local education funding is increasingly important. This article examines the relationship between district-level demographic characteristics and voter support for tax increases to fund the local school district. Using district-level panel data on California school district elections and demographics from 1995 to 2014, we ask the following questions: (1) What is the relationship between demographics and support for school district tax measures? and (2) Does this relationship vary by the type of tax measure? Results suggest that voter support varies by district demographics. However, results differ for bond and property tax measures and suggest that the proportion of Black students increases the likelihood of passing a bond measure but reduces the likelihood of passing a property tax measure. This heterogeneity offers one potential explanation for contradictory evidence in the literature. Results have implications for racial inequality of educational resources between districts.Publication Is hyper-selectivity a root of Asian American children's success?(Elsevier, 2023-04-14) Kim, ChangHwan; Kim, Andrew TaehoAsian immigrants' children, even those from lower-backgrounds, tend to acquire higher levels of education than other ethnoracial groups, including White natives. Asian culture is often cited as a conventional explanation. The hyper-selectivity hypothesis challenges conventional wisdom by arguing that Asian American culture is an outcome of the community resources associated with hyper-selectivity. In this study, we assess the validity of the hyper-selectivity theory by examining the association between the magnitude of hyper-selectivity measured by the proportion of the BA + degree holders among the 1st generation Asian immigrants across communities and the likelihood of school enrollment for 1.5 and 2nd + generation Asian American children. Our results cast doubt on the hyper-selectivity theory. Asian American children's school enrollment is associated with the magnitude of educational selectivity among Asian immigrants for neither high school nor college. The benefits of hyper-selectivity do not seem to be cross-class or cross Asian ethnic groups. The higher the hyper-selectivity in a community is, the larger the education gap between upper- and lower-background Asian American children. The implications of these findings are discussed.Publication Member Checking Gerontology: The Case of Retirement(Oxford University Press, 2022-12-20) Ekerdt, DavidGerontology has long been a public-facing field with an applied focus. As such, the credibility of gerontology’s conclusions and guidance about aging are crucial, our advice having relevance and impact in proportion to its popular resonance. In 2021 I authored an article for a large-circulation newspaper that generated over 500 reader replies, creating an opportunity for member checking of a kind. The article reported my personal experience of having retired—what I expected and what was a surprise. All of my observations about emotions and lifestyle, while my own, were nonetheless grounded in the research literature. Public comments on the article came from a readership that skews male and highly educated, i.e., people like myself. Many comments affirmed my observations (e.g., about time use, awareness of finitude) as experiences we had in common. Some comments disputed my authority, as an academic, to say anything valid about the “real world.” Opinion split on the value of continued work: it gives life meaning, it invites corrosive stress. Likewise, some retirees endorsed surrender to leisure while others urged engagement. One research takeaway: with no standard way to be retired or regard it, the quality of retired life remains a measurement challenge. Another takeaway: Retirees with partners commonly describe experience in the first-personal plural (we, us), suggesting that dyads are often apt units of analysis for retirement studies. This is but one case study, but it indicates that we must continually assess whether gerontology’s knowledge is valid and whether the public is grateful for it.Publication “Anything that benefits the workers should benefit the client”: Opportunities and Constraints in Self-Directed Care during the COVID-19 Pandemic(SAGE Publications, 2022-12-05) Wendel-Hummell, Carrie L.; LaPierre, Tracey A.; Sullivan, Darcy L.; Babitzke, Jennifer; Swartzendruber, Lora; Barta, Tobi; Olds, Danielle M.Self-directed care (SDC) models allow Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) consumers to direct their own care, thus supporting flexible, person-centered care. There are many benefits to the SDC model but access to resources is essential to successful outcomes. Considering the autonomy and flexibility associated with SDC, it is important to understand how SDC responded to the COVID-19 pandemic and the resources available to help manage this situation. We conducted 54 in-depth interviews with HCBS consumers, direct support workers, family caregivers, and providers to examine the impact of COVID-19 on HCBS services in Kansas. Findings illuminate how self-directed consumers carried a lot of employer responsibility, with limited resources and systemic barriers constraining self-determination and contributing to unmet care needs, stress, and burden. Policy flexibilities expanding the hiring of family members were beneficial but insufficient to address under-resourced working conditions and labor shortages that were exacerbated by the pandemic.Publication Immigrant Resentment and the Republican Vote: A Comparison of Voting Behavior in the 2012 and 2016 U.S. Presidential Elections(2020) Oliver, BrendenDonald Trump’s rhetoric in the 2016 presidential election focused on an attack toward latinx immigrants. Much of the literature argues that racial resentment, authoritarianism, education, and class allowed Trump to obtain enough support from white voters to win the election. Some research discusses immigrant resentment, but it lacks necessary control variables and an understanding if immigrant resentment actually helped Trump. Therefore, an important question has yet to be answered: Did immigrant resentment help Trump win the election, or did it hurt him among white voters? Using the ANES survey and logistic regression, this research compares the 2012 and 2016 presidential elections. Specifically, I compare white Romney, the Republican candidate in the 2012 presidential election, and Trump voters to Obama and Hillary Clinton voters, respectively, in terms of immigrant resentment. I hypothesize that those with greater immigrant resentment are more likely to vote for Trump instead of Clinton, and this likelihood is stronger compared to the matchup between Romney and Obama. Furthermore, I explore whether Trump lost more votes, proportionally, instead of gaining compared to the 2012 election by way of immigrant resentment even when controlling for important factors such as racial resentment, sexism, and demographics. Although immigrant resentment was a much stronger predictor of voting behavior in the 2016 election compared to 2012, Trump lost white votes, proportionally, because of asymmetrical polarization as white American voters became more progressive toward immigrants relative to 2012.Publication Strengthening the primary health care response to COVID-19: an operational tool for policymakers(Cambridge University Press, 2021-12-16) Johansen, Anne S.; Shriwise, Amanda; Lopez-Acuna, Daniel; Vracko, PiaAims: The aim of this paper is to introduce an operational checklist to serve as a tool for policymakers in the WHO European Region to strengthen primary health care (PHC) services and address the COVID-19 pandemic more effectively and to present the results from piloting the tool in Armenia. Backgrounds: PHC has the potential to play a fundamental role in countries’ responses to COVID-19. However, this potential remains unrealized in many countries. To assist countries, the WHO Regional Office for Europe developed a guidance document – Strengthening the Health Systems Response to COVID-19: Adapting Primary Health Care Services to more Effectively Address COVID-19 – that identifies strategic actions countries can take to strengthen their PHC response to the pandemic. Based on this guidance document, an operational checklist was developed to serve as a tool for policymakers to operationalize the recommended actions. Methods: The operational checklist was developed by transforming key points in the guidance document into questions in order to identify potentially modifiable factors to strengthen PHC in response to COVID-19. The operational checklist was then piloted in Armenia in June 2020 as part of a WHO mission to provide technical advice on strengthening Armenia’s PHC response to COVID-19. Two WHO experts performed semi-structured, face-to-face interviews with nine key informants (both facility managers and clinical staff) in three PHC facilities (two in a rural and one in an urban area). The data collected were analyzed to identify underlying challenges limiting PHC providers’ ability to effectively and efficiently respond to COVID-19 and maintain essential health services. Findings: The paper finds that making adjustments only to health services delivery will be insufficient to address most of the challenges identified by PHC providers in the context of COVID-19 in Armenia. In particular, strategic responses to the pandemic were missed, due, in part, to the absence of COVID-19 management teams at the facility level. Furthermore, the absence of PHC experts in Armenia’s national pandemic response team meant that health system issues identified at the facility level could not easily be communicated to or addressed by policymakers. The checklist therefore helps policymakers identify critical challenges – at both the facility and health system level – that need to be addressed to strengthen the PHC response to the COVID-19 pandemic.Publication The Role of Neighborhood Experiences in Psychological Distress among African American and White Smokers(Springer, 2020-01-11) Scheuermann, Taneisha S.; Onge, Jarron M. Saint; Ramaswamy, Megha; Sanderson Cox, Lisa; Ahluwalia, Jasjit S.; Nollen, Nicole L.Residential area characteristics and discrimination have been associated with psychological distress. Differences in these relationships across racial groups are not well understood. We examined the relative role of perceived discrimination, neighborhood problems, and neighborhood cohesion/trust in explaining differences in psychological distress (indicated by anxiety and depressive symptoms) between 224 African American and 225 white smokers (income ≤ 400% federal poverty level) in a smoking cessation intervention study. Surveys were linked to US census tract data. We conducted random intercept Poisson multilevel regression models and examined interactions between race and neighborhood experiences. African Americans had greater risk of anxiety and depressive symptoms and greater individual and neighborhood disadvantage than whites. Controlling for objective neighborhood characteristics, when perceived discrimination and perceived neighborhood characteristics were added to the regression models, the association between anxiety symptoms and race were no longer statistically significant; the association between depressive symptoms and race decreased, but remained statistically significant. Lower neighborhood social cohesion/trust and greater neighborhood problems increased depressive symptoms for African Americans, but not for whites. Perceived discrimination and neighborhood social cohesion/trust outweighed the importance of race in explaining anxiety symptoms. These findings underscore the need for multilevel interventions addressing social and environmental contexts.Publication Up in smoke or down with worms? older adult environmentalist’s discourse on disposal, dispersal, and (green) burial(Taylor and Francis, 2021-01-26) Stock, Paul V.; Dennis, Mary KateEnvironmentalists target their own behaviour choices as part of their identity, including recycling, transportation, and clothing. Based on interviews with older adult environmentalists, we investigate whether their environmentalism extends beyond their lives. That is, do they want to be disposed of or dispersed upon their death? In terms of environmentalism, then, considering the materials involved, including one’s body, how might we explain older adult environmentalists’ thoughts on their own death care? Is there a gap between one’s identity as an environmentalist and one’s anticipated choices about death care? We examine the death care discourse of 20 older adult environmentalists to examine Rumble et al.’s 2014 debate between disposal and dispersal. We conclude that environmental activists maintain their identity as environmental activists through their death care deliberations, but that both the ecological science of burial choices and the knowledge about green burial options is evolving.Publication Dialogic Essentialism and Protecting Against Stigma within the Fat Admirer Community(Taylor & Francis, 2020-07-29) Neumann, ElyseFat Admirers (FAs) represent a group of stigmatized individuals who challenge Western ideals of beauty. Using an internet ethnography, I analyze the sharing of stigmatizing experiences among FAs on the Dimensions forum, an online community for FAs and FFAs (female Fat Admirers). This research explains how individuals shape their understanding of an FA identity and how the use of self-protective strategies promote increased importance, validation, and protection of a stigmatized identity. This research adds to previous work on self- protective strategies against stigma. I argue that a new strategy, dialogic essentialism, is employed. Dialogic essentialism describes the process by which FAs converse with similarly situated others in attempts to normalize their essentialist beliefs, thus protecting against possible stigmatization.Publication Health and well-being for all: an approach to accelerating progress to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in countries in the WHO European Region(Oxford University Press, 2020-05-11) Menne, Bettina; Leon, Emilia Aragon de; Bekker, Marleen; Mirzikashvili, Nino; Morton, Stephen; Shriwise, Amanda; Tomson, Göran; Vracko, Pia; Wippel, ChristophBackground Forty-three out of 53 of the WHO European Member States have set up political and institutional mechanisms to implement the United Nations (UN) 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. This includes governance and institutional mechanisms, engaging stakeholders, identifying targets and indicators, setting governmental and sectoral priorities for action and reporting progress regularly. Still, growing evidence suggests that there is room for advancing implementation of some of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and targets at a higher pace in the WHO European Region. This article proposes the E4A approach to support WHO European Member States in their efforts to achieve the health-related SDG targets. Methods The E4A approach was developed through a 2-year, multi-stage process, starting with the endorsement of the SDG Roadmap by all WHO European Member States in 2017. This approach resulted from a mix of qualitative methods: a semi-structured desk review of existing committal documents and tools; in-country policy dialogs, interviews and reports; joint UN missions and discussion among multi-lateral organizations; consultation with an advisory group of academics and health policy experts across countries. Results The E—engage—functions as the driver and pace-maker; the 4 As—assess, align, accelerate and account—serve as building blocks composed of policies, processes, activities and interventions operating in continuous and synchronized action. Each of the building blocks is an essential part of the approach that can be applied across geographic and institutional levels. Conclusion While the E4A approach is being finalized, this article aims to generate debate and input to further refine and test this approach from a public health and user perspective.Publication KEEPING THINGS, BUT ONLY FOR A WHILE(Oxford University Press, 2019-11-08) Ekerdt, David J.The life course is accomplished by material culture held as a convoy of possessions, but also sustained by public affordances and amenities that include the artifacts and artworks to be found in museums. In both places—household and museum—objects come and go, but there is mainly keeping. The difference lies in the capacity to keep things indefinitely: it is virtue for museums but a predicament for households of aging adults. Museums model ideals of permanence and responsibility toward things, ideals that, in the long run, households can only faintly attain. For older adults and for gerontologists, preservation is the wrong lesson to take away from the galleries. Rather, what we can learn there is how single, selected things can show, in a thoughtful way, an entire world of ideas and universe of meaning. No need to keep it all—and forever—but we can honor things while we can. Publication THE INTERSECTION OF RELIGION AND SES IN MANAGING CHRONIC CONDITIONS AMONG OLDER PERSONS IN NIGERIA(Oxford University Press, 2019-11-08) Mahmoud, Kafayat O.Increased life expectancy in Nigeria has corresponded with higher rates of chronic diseases among older persons. Consequently, this is a new experience that older persons progressively have to deal with. In this study, I explored how religion and social support helped older persons cope with their chronic disease conditions, in light of the prevailing socio-cultural and economic circumstances in Nigeria. The research was conducted in two state-owned medical institutions, in a city in the North-Central part of Nigeria. In-depth, qualitative interviews were conducted among 19 purposively selected chronically ill persons aged between 50 years and over, during clinic days. The study revealed that religion is central to peoples’ management of feelings of despair, and acceptance of chronic disease conditions, as well as their adherence to prescriptions. This is explained by the theme “God as the Bestower and Reliever.” Also, some respondents perceived their coreligionists to be financially supportive. Although, some participants expressed that they depended on their families for their upkeep and emotional well-being, dire socio-economic conditions and lack of governmental support in chronic care meant that financial support was limited. This is explained by the theme “Times are Hard.” Subsequently, most respondents bore a dual burden of coping with chronic conditions even as they were financially responsible for themselves and their families. This was particularly stressful because it meant that most respondents were constantly worried about being able to meet basic daily needs, as well as manage the financial costs of their treatments, which proved expensive to manage.Publication THE INTERNET IS A BOY’S CLUB?: ANALYZING GENDER DIFFERENCES IN COMPUTER & INTERNET ADOPTION BY OLDER ADULTS(Oxford University Press, 2019-11-08) Wilson, Derek A.The realization of technology’s exponential advancement has been noted in recent years. With ever advancing technologies becoming more integrated in our everyday lives, we must adapt and learn to utilize these new technologies in order to maintain a presence in society. One group that has been stereotyped as struggling to adopt and learn the processes involved with advancing technologies is that of the older adult population. However, previous literature tends to suggest that there are also gendered differences in the adoption of different forms of modern and advancing technologies among older adults. While some articles state that older adult women have been reported to use social media than their male counterparts, conflicting previous literature states that older adult women use newer technologies less, but are more creative in their uses. With these conflicting reports, there comes a need for proper analyses on the gendered use of modern technology among older adults. Using data from the 2015 Current Population Survey (CPS) Computer and Internet Use Supplement, different demographic factors are analyzed for influences on use of technologies. The older adult age cohorts analyzed include the Baby Boomer and the Silent Generation age cohorts. This analysis includes of controlling for additional factors such as regional residence, educational attainment, and other social location variables. Contrary to much of the existing literature, there is little difference in the adoption of computer and internet technologies by older adults. Additionally, the analyses are performed on the Generation X and Millennial age cohorts for comparison.Publication ECONOMIC INEQUALITY AND FUTURE THOUGHT AMONG OLDER ADULTS(Oxford University Press, 2019-11-08) Adamson, Erin M.; Ekerdt, David J.; Adamson, Erin M.Publication Women’s Schooling and Religious Mobility: Joining, Switching, and Quitting Church in a Christian Sub-Saharan Setting(Oxford University Press, 2017-07-10) Agadjanian, VictorIn dialogue with mainly western literature on determinants of religious mobility and the evidence on the transformative role of mass education in developing settings, I examine the relationship of educational attainment with religious reaffiliation and disaffiliation in the context of rural and small-town sub-Saharan Africa. Adapting western scholarship to the realities of that context, where most people do not complete primary school, I conceptualize both basic education and religious belonging as parts and expressions of profound societal transformations in the sub-continent. I use data from a survey of women aged 18–50 years conducted in a predominantly Christian area in Mozambique to test this relationship from both the lifetime and dynamic perspectives. I find a strong positive association between educational level and the probability of church switching, with modest variations by denominational destination of and main reasons for reaffiliation. Disaffiliation is negatively related to schooling level. These findings are situated within a broader discourse on religion, development, and social change in the sub-Sahara.Publication Collectivism and the Intellectuals: Svend Ranulf, Emile Durkheim, Fascism, and Resistance(Indiana University Press, 2017) Smith, David N.Ideals of collective solidarity and community are often affirmed by authoritar-ians as well as by democrats. That double fact has seemed paradoxical to many thinkers, some of whom conclude, or suspect, that the pursuit of collective initiatives and solidarities is reactionary in principle. The fact that Nazi Germany sought to revive the Volksgemeinschaft (folk community) has fueled this suspicion. One con-sequence has been that thinkers whose views are regarded as collectivist have often been charged with setting the stage for fascism. Accusing fingers are often pointed at philosophers (Hegel, Schopenhauer) and sociologists (Weber, Durkheim). Lately, a subterranean current of accusations against Émile Durkheim in particular has gained renewed attention. Charges by Svend Ranulf and Marcel Déat in the prewar era have been resuscitated. But closely examined, the views of Ranulf, Déat, and their latter-day successors reveal deep confusion about democracy, solidarity, community, fascism, and resistance to fascism.Publication Health lifestyle behaviors among U.S. adults(Elsevier, 2017-12) Saint Onge, Jarron M.; Krueger, Patrick M.Existing research that studies individual health behaviors and conceive of behaviors as simplistically reflecting narrow intentions toward health may obscure the social organization of health behaviors. Instead, we examine how eight health behaviors group together to form distinct health behavior niches. Using nationally-representative data from U.S. adults aged 18 and over from the 2004–2009 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), we use Latent Class Analysis to identify classes of behavior based on smoking status, alcohol use, physical activity, physician visits, and flu vaccination. We identify 7 distinct health behavior classes including concordant health promoting (44%), concordant health compromising (26%), and discordant classes (30%). We find significant race/ethnic, sex, regional, and age differences in class membership. We show that health behavior classes are associated with prospective mortality, suggesting that they are valid representations of health lifestyles. We discuss the implications of our results for sociological theories of health behaviors, as well as for multiple behavior interventions seeking to improve population health.Publication Reducing Low Birth Weight among African Americans in the Midwest: A Look at How Faith-Based Organizations Are Poised to Inform and Influence Health Communication on the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD)(MDPI, 2017-02-04) Lumpkins, Crystal Y.; Saint Onge, Jarron M.Low birth weight (LBW) rates remain the highest among African Americans despite public health efforts to address these disparities; with some of the highest racial disparities in the Midwest (Kansas). The Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) perspective offers an explanation for how LBW contributes to racial health disparities among African Americans and informs a community directed health communication framework for creating sustainable programs to address these disparities. Trusted community organizations such as faith-based organizations are well situated to explain health communication gaps that may occur over the life course. These entities are underutilized in core health promotion programming targeting underserved populations and can prove essential for addressing developmental origins of LBW among African Americans. Extrapolating from focus group data collected from African American church populations as part of a social marketing health promotion project on cancer prevention, we theoretically consider how a similar communication framework and approach may apply to address LBW disparities. Stratified focus groups (n = 9) were used to discover emergent themes about disease prevention, and subsequently applied to explore how faith-based organizations (FBOs) inform strategic health care (media) advocacy and health promotion that potentially apply to address LBW among African Americans. We argue that FBOs are poised to meet health promotion and health communication needs among African American women who face social barriers in health.Publication The Architecture of Feminicide: The State, Inequalities, and Everyday Gender Violence in Honduras(Latin American Studies Association, 2017-08) Menjívar, Cecilia; Drysdal Walsh, ShannonIncreasing exclusion and inequality in Honduras have posed escalating security risks for women in their homes and on the streets. In this article, we examine gender-based violence against women, including gender-motivated murders (feminicides), the everyday acts that can result in their deaths, and impunity for these crimes. Rather than analyzing these murders as interpersonal acts or linking them to economic deprivation, we examine the actions and inactions of the state that have amplified violence in the lives of Honduran women. We distinguish between the state’s acts of omission and acts of commission in order to identify the political responsibility and failures that create a fertile ground for these killings. A context of multisided violence that facilitates extreme violence in the lives of women is present in Honduras, especially considering the diminishing power of civil society groups and increased political repression after the 2009 coup. We identify root causes of the wide (and widening) gap between laws on the books—which have been passed mostly to satisfy international and domestic organizations pushing for change—and laws in action, that is, implementation on the ground. Although we focus on Honduras, we note similar experiences of extreme violence in Guatemala, El Salvador, and in other countries in the Latin American region.Publication Depression, Executive Dysfunction, and Prior Economic and Social Vulnerability Associations in Incarcerated African American Men(SAGE Publications, 2018-07-01) Scanlon, Faith A.; Scheidell, Joy D.; Cuddeback, Gary S.; Samelsohn, Darcy; Wohl, David A.; Lejuez, Carl W.; Latimer, William W.; Khan, Maria R.Low executive function (EF) and depression are each determinants of health. We examined the synergy between deficits in EF (impaired cognitive flexibility; >75th percentile on the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test perseverative error score) and depressive symptoms (modified CES-D) and pre-incarceration well-being among incarcerated African American men (N=189). In adjusted analyses, having impaired EF and depression was strongly associated with pre-incarceration food insecurity (OR=3.81, 95% CI: 1.35, 10.77), homelessness (OR=3.00, 95% CI: 1.02, 8.80), concern about bills (OR=3.76, 95% CI: 1.42, 9.95); low significant other support (OR=4.63, 95% CI: 1.62, 13.24), low friend support (OR=3.47, 95% CI: 1.30, 9.26), relationship difficulties (OR=2.86, 95% CI: 1.05, 7.80); and binge drinking (OR=3.62, 95% CI: 1.22, 10.80). Prison-based programs to treat depression and improve problem-solving may improve post-release success.