At the intersection of science,technology, engineering,and mathematics and business management in Canadian higher education: An intentional equity,diversity, and inclusion framework

In this study, the authors address the persistent discrimination cis women face in the Canadian science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) higher education context. Pulling on the notion of interrelationships that cross educational faculty boundaries and on intersectionality scholarship to unsettle the structural and disciplinary domains of power, the authors ask, “How can business education and STEM education work together with respect to social considerations, such as gender/race/ethnicity/etc., and social equity and inclusivity, within the Canadian higher education system?” This study aims to build on these interrelationships among diverse, complex individuals who participated in a graduate-level STEM and business management summer institute to provide an evidence-based and intentional equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) framework for STEM higher education contexts. Using a mixed-methods approach, which saw data collection via a survey instrument and semi-structured interviews, the subsequent quantitative analysis points to expanding interrelationships to broader areas beyond STEM and business management programs. The close reading of the collected qualitative data, via antenarrative spirals, elevates the participants' complexities beyond focusing “just” on their intersecting identities to looking at their perceptions of STEM fields, the order that ensues and the potential for the undoing of that order. The findings, results, and analyses of these collected data led to an intentional EDI framework, the main contribution of this study, constructed into three main pillars represented by the figure of a tree: the foundational elements (roots) built on individuals' complexities and experiences of Othering, the interrelationships (trunk) possible across various educational and professional dimensions, and a call to structural change initiatives (branches) with the possibility for growth in other areas. This work then contributes to not only filling a significant literature gap and building awareness regarding EDI concerns in STEM contexts via active interrelationship-building activities but also to unsettling the structural and disciplinary domains of power by embracing a holistic strategy to address systemic discriminatory practices in the Canadian STEM higher education context.     

Consistency of maximum likelihood estimators in a large class of deconvolution models

We consider the maximum likelihood estimator $\hat{F}_n$ of a distribution function in a class of deconvolution models where the known density of the noise variable is of bounded variation. This class of noise densities contains in particular bounded, decreasing densities. The estimator $\hat{F}_n$ is defined, characterized in terms of Fenchel optimality conditions and computed. Under appropriate conditions, various consistency results for $\hat{F}_n$ are derived, including uniform strong consistency. The Canadian Journal of Statistics 41: 98–110; 2013 © 2012 Statistical Society of Canada     

Accuracy and bias in self-perception of performance: Narcissism matters in Korea as well

Debates regarding the nature of self-enhancement versus accurate self-assessment have been active among psychologists for decades. More recently, researchers have become interested in the panculturality of self-enhancement. Some researchers argue that self-enhancement is universal and present within all cultures. Others declare self-enhancement to be a Western tendency, with self-diminishment being the norm among East Asians. Importantly, the majority of such studies have not compared self-perceptions against objective external criteria, especially those with East Asians. Furthermore, the link between narcissism and self-enhancement has been largely overlooked within Korean samples. To address such gaps, we utilized scores on an objective test as a criterion to investigate the accuracy of Koreans’ self-assessments of performance, as well as how individual differences in narcissism are related to such assessments. A sample of Korean students (N = 146; 71 women) completed self-report measures of narcissism and self-esteem, and took a listening comprehension quiz. Estimated and actual scores were collected and used to compute self-enhancement scores. Results demonstrated that Koreans’ self-perceptions of performance on the quiz were quite accurate. As has been found in Western cultures, narcissism was related to self-enhancement.     

Subjektivierung der Biographie. Lebensorientierungen und Anspruchshaltungen

Opposing the tendency within current analyses in the social sciences to draw a conclusion from present changes in people??s working and living conditions to corresponding social-psychic dispositions, this article both theoretically and empirically develops the thesis that people??by considering structural preconditions??put demands on themselves and structure their resources and possible courses of action. In order to understand how this is done, the article develops the concept of ??life-orientation??. By means of four exemplary typifications of life-orientations gained from a research project on employees?? demands on work, we will demonstrate that established beliefs about actual forms of subjectivity are in need of correction.     

The same and the other: male childcare workers managing identity dissonance

As childcare workers, men are in a contested position. On the one hand, they are in danger of being depicted as the pedophile; on the other hand, they are expected to bring something new and innovative to the thus-far female-dominated field. These men are experiencing ‘identity dissonance’ and have to find ways to manage and facilitate legitimate subject positions as both childcare workers and as men. Applying a perspective of discursive positioning, this article discusses men's positioning practices in nine qualitative interviews conducted with male childcare workers in German-speaking Switzerland. We identified a total of six discursive practices that men engage in to manage identity dissonance and construct a legitimate subject position. We found that men are engaging in a greater variety of practices than have been discussed so far. Unlike findings from other studies of men in female-dominated occupations, ours do not point to a clear-cut typology with regards to hegemonic and alternative masculinities; instead they show a variety of practices that are mobilized throughout all interviews.     

Of other movements: nonhuman mobility in the Anthropocene

ABSTRACT

This article has two broad aims. The first is to treat and write of nonhuman animals and their lives, deaths, and suffering at the hands of humans and human infrastructure as important to theory, politics, and policy. The second is to explore how social theory can think creatively about specific examples in which nonhuman animals are affected by and need more from human infrastructures – especially those built for human mobility. These two broad aims will be narrowed to consider nonhuman animal deaths upon roads, focused on the potential for enriching human and nonhuman animal life through creative thinking, ethically minded road design, and the acknowledgement of shared vulnerability. In pursuit of these aims it will necessarily focus attention on the experience of human mobility on nonhuman animals, forging an approach that keeps an ethics of entanglement and care at the forefront.     

"We'll Figure a Way": Teenage Mothers' Experiences in Shifting Social and Economic Contexts

The current economic and social context calls for a renewed assessment of the consequences of an early transition to parenthood. In interviews with 55 teenage mothers in Colorado, we find that they are experiencing severe economic and social strains. Financially, although most are receiving substantial help from family members and sometimes their children's fathers, basic needs often remain unmet. Macroeconomic and family structure trends have resulted in deprived material circumstances, while welfare reform and other changes have reduced the availability of aid. Socially, families' and communities' disapproval of early childbearing negatively influences the support young mothers receive, their social interactions, and their experiences with social institutions.     

Developing Health Lifestyle Pathways and Social Inequalities Across Early Childhood

Population Research and Policy Review - Lifestyles are a long-theorized aspect of social inequalities that root individual behaviors in social group differences. Although the health lifestyle...     

“Get to Know the Unknown”: Understanding Religion and Advertising

The relationship between religion and advertising has mostly been theorized in terms of “religion in advertising” or “advertising as religion.” This article pursues two goals: First, it offers a substantial critique of previous studies of advertising and religion in order to take stock and discern future directions of research. Second, it presents the results of an empirical qualitative study of print advertisements which responds to some of the open questions of previous research. It shows that advertising partially fulfills religious functions, focusing on those to do with self-actualization and meaning making within an immanent horizon, and less so on community-related functions. Based on these results, I argue that in the study of religion and advertising, “religion” cannot be limited to specific religious traditions, but has to be understood more broadly. Also, the conventional distinction between “religion in advertising” and “advertising as religion” has to be overcome in order to understand the phenomenon.