Are we all equally at home socializing online? Cyberasociality and evidence for an unequal distribution of disdain for digitally-mediated sociality

Online social media are an increasingly important arena of social interaction. This rapid transition to digitally mediated sociality is far from trivial in both the consequences it engenders and the tensions it generates. In this paper, we find that some people do not take as readily to accepting digitally mediated sociality as others, and that this mode of connectivity appears fulfilling and engaging to some while it appears hollow and vacant to others due to variations in a personality disposition which we dub ‘cyberasociality' which was defined as the inability or unwillingness of some people to relate to others via social media as they do when physically present by Tufekci [2010. Who acquires friends through social media and why? Rich get richer versus seek and ye shall find. Proceedings of the fourth international conference on weblogs and social media, Washington, DC]. Using two purposive samples of college students (n?=?410 and n?=?417 completed surveys), we develop a scale to test cyberasociality as a construct. We show that cyberasociality is neither a mere reflection of offline sociability nor a proxy for other well-studied traits such as extraversion or neuroticism, nor a simple reflection of Internet experience or cohort effects. We find that cyberasociality impacts how people use digital social tools more than whether they use them, and that the cyberasocial are less likely to use platforms for digitally mediated social interaction to broaden their social networks or to forge new social ties online while they are equally likely to use digital channels for utilitarian purposes such as coordinating plans or finding out about class assignments. Such differences in dispositions toward online sociality hint toward new wrinkles, advantages and disadvantages for consequences of variations in Internet use.     

Sincere but Naive: Methodological Queries Concerning the British Columbia Polygamy Reference Trial

Academics frequently serve as expert witnesses in legal cases, yet their role as transmitters of social scientific knowledge remains under‐examined. The present study analyzes the deployment of social science within British Columbia's polygamy reference trial where research is used to support the assertion that polygamy is inherently harmful to society. Within the trial record and the written decision, the protection of monogamy as an institution is performed in part through the marginalization of qualitative methodology and the concurrent privileging of quantitative studies that purportedly demonstrate widespread social harms associated with the practice of polygyny. Les universitaires servent souvent témoins experts dans les cas juridiques, mais leur rôle comme les transmetteurs de connaissance en sciences sociale restent sous‐examinés. La présente étude analyse le déploiement de sciences sociale dans l'essai de référence de polygamie de la Columbia britannique où la recherche est utilisée pour soutenir l'assertion que la polygamie est naturellement malfaisante pour la société. Dans le record de procès et la décision écrite la protection de monogamie comme une institution est exécutée partiellement par la marginalisation de méthodologie qualitative et le privilégier d'études quantitatives qui démontrent que la polygamie est intrinsèquement néfastes pour la société.     

Land and leña: linking transnational migration, natural resources, and the environment in Guatemala

This article examines the relationships between international migration, natural resources, and the environment. Rather than looking at environmental change as a cause of population movements, the article reveals how migration affects the environment in sending countries. Empirically, we rely on a case study in Guatemala. Although migrants and cash remittances make significant contributions to Guatemala’s changing economy, little is known about the relationships between migration and the environment in this Central American country—a country, which continues to have a large rural population and that relies heavily on its natural resources. Drawing on ethnographic research and household surveys in a Maya community, we reveal how migrants and their earnings, as well as their ideas, behavior and attitudes, affect land use, land cover, and firewood use. We reveal, for example, how in addition to investments in land for home building and pick-up trucks to help improve agricultural production, some migrant households purchase more land and often dedicate it to the cultivation of vegetable crops for local and foreign markets. Cultural practices and beliefs directly linked to land and the environment, particularly maize cultivation, also alter due to migration processes. And, despite the ability of migrant households to transition to more efficient fuels like liquid propane gas (LPG), we show how they continue to use firewood. In all, the study contributes important insights into the environmental implications of migration.     

Get a job and keep it! High school employment and adult wealth accumulation

Wealth inequality receives substantial scholarly attention, but mounting evidence suggests that childhood and adolescent traits and experiences contribute to financial disparities in the United States. This study examines the relationship between adolescent labor force participation and adult wealth accumulation. I argue that employed high school students gain practical life skills, abilities, and knowledge from work experience and business exposure that shape investment decisions and affect overall net worth. I use the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979 cohort, to empirically explore this idea. This study extends the wealth literature by identifying adolescent employment as an important mechanism that improves adult net worth and financial well-being.     

The impact of immigration on child health: experimental evidence from a migration lottery program

This paper uses a unique survey designed by the authors to compare migrant children who enter New Zealand through a random ballot with children in the home country of Tonga whose families were unsuccessful participants in the same ballots. We find that migration increases height and reduces stunting of infants and toddlers, but also increases BMI and obesity among 3- to 5-yr-olds. These impacts are quite large even though the average migrant household has been in New Zealand for less than 1 yr. Additional results suggest that these impacts occur because of dietary change rather than direct income effects.     

创办全新一流学府探索

100余年来,我国的大学教育一直是在借鉴欧美、前苏联等的经验中发展壮大起来的。尤其从20世纪80年代开始,我国＂创办全新的世界一流大学＂的探索步伐明显加快。     

The Janus‐Face of Whiteness: Toward a Cultural Sociology of White Nationalism and White Antiracism

While the sociological study of white identity has traversed many stages, its most recent turn emphasizes the contextual heterogeneity of whiteness. Because of this increased attention to context and locality, the study of whiteness has never been more amenable to cultural analysis than it is today. Hence, an emphasis on different white racial formations that span a political spectrum from conservative to liberal and racist to antiracist is now dominant. In this vein, white nationalists and white antiracists represent the distinct polarities of contemporary inquisitions into white identity formation. Motivated by this academic milieu, this article first reviews the common perception that whiteness is in ‘crisis’ and polarizing into antagonistic political projects. Second, the article scans the literature on white nationalist and white antiracist groups, making explicit the relation to cultural theory. Third, the article questions why these two groups are consistently juxtaposed against one another and how such a conceptualization hinders, rather than advances, cultural analysis. Fourth and last, the article advanced a cultural sociological framework for understanding white racial identity formation that neither collapses white identities into a monolithic collective nor reifies white formations as a static typology. Such an approach considers the general processes and contexts which produce ‘whiteness’ and give it meaning, as well as illuminates the social relationships and practices in which white racial identity formations become embedded.     

Beliefs About Cues to Deception: Mindless Stereotypes or Untapped Wisdom?

In this longitudinal study, senders told truths and lies to same-sex friends (judges) at both one month and six months into the relationship. Judges guessed whether the stories were truths or lies, and described the cues they used to make their decisions. These cues were coded into categories according to the nature of the cue (verbal, visual, or paralinguistic). Judges mentioned more verbal cues when the story was truthful than when it was fabricated, and mentioned more visual nonverbal cues when it was fabricated than when it was truthful. Therefore, perceivers' stated beliefs about cues discriminated the truths from the lies, although their explicit judgments of deceptiveness did not. Perceivers who mentioned visual or verbal cues more often were not more accurate at detecting deception (explicitly), but those who mentioned paralinguistic cues more often were more accurate.     

Existence of Equilibrium in Single and Double Private Value Auctions1

We show existence of equilibria in distributional strategies for a wide class of private value auctions, including the first general existence result for double auctions. The set of equilibria is invariant to the tie‐breaking rule. The model incorporates multiple unit demands, all standard pricing rules, reserve prices, entry costs, and stochastic demand and supply. Valuations can be correlated and asymmetrically distributed. For double auctions, we show further that at least one equilibrium involves a positive volume of trade. The existence proof establishes new connections among existence techniques for discontinuous Bayesian games.