The purpose of the investigation was to determine if participant attitudes toward recreation program elements varied significantly according to racial origin of the individual. The subjects were adults involved in structured and unstructured recreation programs at six community recreation centers operated by the Dallas Recreation Department. The chi-square test was used to determine significance of the difference among participant attitudes. The results of the investigation revealed a statistically significant difference among the three racial groups with regard to their attitudes toward various program elements. Conclusions were that participants from these three racial groups appear to be more different than alike in their attitude toward recreation programming.

This study deals with the analysis of public opinion about crime and attitudes regarding criminal justice issues along two major dimensions. The first part concerns how respondents rank crime among a list of nine social problems (unemployment, high interest rates, inflation, crime, the high cost of living, moral decline, taxes, dissatisfaction with the government, and Reagan). The second dimension examines some research questions. These are whether there was any association between the respondents' perception of crime trends and each of the following: demographic background, neighborhood safety, the death penalty, gun ownership, frequency of locking doors, avoidance of teenagers, and the evaluation of police job performance; and also whether there was any association between the respondents' victimization experience and seriousness of crime and police job performance. The data were obtained from the archives of the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research in Michigan.

The problem of this study is a comparison of minimum competencies needed for high school graduation as perceived by local professional educators to those perceived by the local school community. The source of data is Community Survey of Essential Student Skills. This survey instrument is a rating of the importance of minimum competencies by 1,931 patrons in the local school community. A total number of 401 professional educators had previously rated these competencies. The following conclusions are based on the analysis of each hypothesis and observations during the study. 1. There is an increasing amount of emphasis in the literature that major perceptual differences exist between professional educators and school communities. Educators need to identify and act upon the perceptions of their patrons. Increased emphasis upon community involvement is supported by findings of this study. For example, the community could be involved in curriculum development for life skills. Patrons, students and parents could serve on advisory committees to school boards. 2. There is evidence that increased communication efforts are needed to narrow the gap between perceptions of educators and school communities. Educators perceived the reading and writing skills in this study as Essential but patrons did not. Better clarification to patrons relating to why and how skills are taught would be helpful. Otherwise, it will appear to patrons that schools are out of step with requirements for coping in today's society. 3. Inflation has increased the cost of education, and taxpayers are not willing to support a system that they feel may not be doing an effective job. While there is a large majority of the American public that still has confidence in schools as indicated by the 1978 Gallup Poll, there needs to be a bolstering of support. It behooves educators to set and monitor expectations of achievement, provide resources to meet needs of diverse students, inform and involve patrons and promote a caring, disciplined atmosphere in all classrooms.

No description available.

This dissertation examines three different subjects underpinned by one common approach— the survey experiment—and, broadly, one common aim: to better understand heterogeneity in public opinion in the United States and Canada. Specifically, it focuses heterogeneity as it relates to minorities and the cultural dynamics that emerge in multiracial and multiethnic countries. Contexts with diverse racial and ethnic compositions, diverse immigration and equity policies, and complex sociohistorical lineages are bound to be underpinned by deeply fragmented attitudinal dynamics. Yet only recently has research taken a deep dive into what the contours of this fragmentation might look like. As diversity increases in the West and cultural complexities deepen, understanding heterogeneity in public opinion toward and among different cultural, racial, and ethnic groups will become increasingly pressing. Luckily for the research community, the ability to study such heterogeneity is increasing as well. Fielding large-scale surveys has been facilitated by both the vast penetration of the Internet in the 21st century and the explosion of online marketplaces that allow researchers to buy survey respondents relatively cheaply and quickly. This dissertation exploits these contextual developments to field three online survey experiments among a total of 40,000 respondents in Canada and the United States.

The evidence from both international and local literature reviews shows that, informal settlement upgrading is a global practice. The adoption (although at a minimal scale) of informal settlement upgrading programs and related policies in developing countries (South Africa included), should in the main be understood within a twofold context- first, is a failed policy on conventional public housing model, second, is a subsequent role and influence of theoretical writings of JFC Turner on informal settlement upgrading as a possible policy alternative to conventional public housing in 1960s and 1970s. Furthermore, evidence from empirical study findings in Soshanguve Extension 3 area present some interesting results. Amongst others, is the extent to which implementation of upgrading project in Soshanguve Extension 3 area seems to have promoted a generally acceptable access level to certain basic service and housing infrastructure. This despite the project implementation being criticized for its deviation from certain key housing policy principles including those (principles) underpinning theoretical writings of Turner on informal settlement upgrading. Using both literature and empirical findings, the study has, in a nutshell, succeeded in presenting a balanced reflection on strengths and weaknesses in the general performance of informal settlement upgrading projects in developing context particularly South Africa. / Development Studies / M.A. (Development Studies)

In an attempt to shed light on the further sophistication of opinion leadership in online communities, this study examined the forces and structures that affect their formation in the League of Legends subreddit. By investigating what users thought about the various types of individuals with which the communicate, the researcher hoped to begin to understand and record how those forces work bother on this particular subreddit and in mass media beyond. Opinion leadership continues to be an integral force in deciding what information is consumed by a public and under what frames and agendas it is contextualized. If researchers can operationalize formal definitions for the influences and structures that occur online, they can better navigate the deep waters that are global communication on the internet.

Forms in pocket. / Digitized by Kansas State University Libraries

Call number: LD2668 .T4 1965 P947 / Master of Science

Call number: LD2668 .T4 1965 W117 / Master of Science