<p>Interrogating the concept of power is ethical social work practice. This research aims to investigate the manner in which visible minority women social service providers perceive the concept of power as non-managerial employees in the women’s shelter system. Therefore, the necessity to delineate the ongoing challenges and contradictions that shape the work experiences of visible minority women social service providers contributes and furthers our understanding of social justice, critical social work practice, and strategies to enhance workplace equity. In addressing the phenomenon of power from the viewpoint of those affected, this ultimately helps to broaden the understanding how as social workers it remains pivotal to raise awareness about the ongoing power imbalances in social services settings. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews with visible minority women employed in the women’s shelter system in southern, Ontario were conducted and complement the author’s own personal reflections as a visible minority woman previously employed in the Violence Against Women’s shelter system. This research suggests that due to ongoing power differentials, neoliberal restructuring and discriminatory incidents, continued attention is required in order to address social inequality and enhance workplace equity.</p> / Master of Social Work (MSW)

In 2016, the U.S. Census Bureau indicated only 39.1% of women occupied management and leadership occupations. The absence of women in leadership roles minimizes career aspirations, reduces the benefits of gender diversity, and lowers growth opportunities for women. The purpose of this interpretive hermeneutical phenomenological study was to unveil the lived experiences of a sample of minority women managers and leaders in the finance and insurance sector in Central Florida who encountered general career barriers and self-imposed career impediments that hindered them from advancing. The conceptual framework that guided this study was the social cognitive career theory coupled with the self-efficacy theory. Data were collected through semistructured interviews with 8 minority mid-level managers and leaders in the finance and insurance industry in Central Florida. Data were analyzed using the modified van Kaam method reformed by Moustakas. Five themes emerged from the data: General career barriers, self-imposed career impediments, career challenges, career management strategies, and career barrier counsel. These results may contribute to social change by raising awareness about career impediments that can discourage career paths of women and illuminating strategies regarding how to maneuver through interferences. Women can take control of their lives and modify their career paths. When organizational managers and leaders become more self-aware of the perceived career obstructions, they can initiate the appropriate training to help their employees maneuver, overcome, and navigate through difficulties.

Thesis (M.S.)--Eastern Illinois University, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 92-97).

Thesis (Ed. D.)--Oregon State University, 2009. / Printout. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 115-126). Also available on the World Wide Web.

No description available.

Background: Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, women carried, birthed, and cared for infants in a drastically changed world. For perinatal women, the sudden increase in stressors compounded an already vulnerable time where they are at an elevated risk of developing symptoms of psychopathology. Moreover, the pandemic exacerbated pre-existing racial health disparities and disproportionately impacted Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC)— particularly perinatal BIPOC women, due to the intersection of their race and perinatal status. This study investigated the relationships between COVID-19-related stressors and postpartum psychopathology using network analysis. Network analysis is used as an alternative technique for investigating the activation and maintenance of psychopathology and is increasingly used to examine the influence of external variables (e.g., stressors) on network dynamics. The relationship between psychological symptoms and stressors is typically examined in a unilinear manner—that is, stress causes psychopathology or vice versa. By using network analysis, we were able to investigate the bidirectional relationship between COVID-19-related stressors and postpartum psychopathology to reveal new insights into the individual stressor-symptom interactions that may underlie the emergence of psychological disorders for the perinatal population during the pandemic. Methods: Participants (N=630) were recruited via social media and listservs and completed an online Qualtrics survey. Data quality measures were used to identify repeated, incomplete, and potentially fraudulent responses, which were removed prior to data analysis. Goldbricker, inter-item correlations, and variance inflation factor analyses were used to address topological overlap and identify statistically unique items to be included in the networks. A comorbidity symptom network was estimated to investigate the relationship between postpartum depression and anxiety symptoms in all participants. Bridge symptoms between the two conditions were identified using bridge analysis and clique percolation analysis. Next, an expanded model was estimated to investigate the relationship between postpartum symptoms and COVID-19-related stressors. Node-wise predictability and moderation analyses were used to investigate the effects of adding external variables (i.e., positive experiences, maternal functioning domains, and predictors of psychopathology) to the expanded model. Finally, moderated networks were estimated to investigate differences in the structure of the comorbidity network and the expanded network for mothers from different racial and ethnic groups. Results: Fear-based symptoms were central in both the comorbidity and expanded networks and bridged postpartum anxiety and depression symptoms in the comorbidity network. The Depressed Mood and two Home Stress domains were central in the expanded network. Additional bridge symptoms in the comorbidity network included feeling overwhelmed, concentration difficulties, and feeling disliked by others, and in the expanded network included the Postpartum Stress, Emotional Stress, and Difficulty Adjusting domains. Moderation analyses revealed that the more mothers felt competent and the less challenging they perceived their infant’s temperament, the weaker the node connections were in their expanded networks. Furthermore, mothers with a history of prenatal depression, prenatal anxiety, or baby blues had denser expanded networks (i.e., stronger and more unique edges) compared to mothers with no history of these conditions. Contrary to expectations, moderation analyses revealed that: 1) social support and engaging in positive experiences during the pandemic strengthened connections between stressors and symptoms; 2) middle-income mothers had denser networks compared to low- and high-income mothers. Finally, racial network comparisons revealed that Black mothers' comorbidity and expanded networks were denser compared to all other racial groups. Conclusions: Our findings highlight the influence of major contextual changes, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, on network dynamics—that is, previously established peripheral network nodes (e.g., fear) may shift to the center during large-scale events. Therefore, researchers cannot assume that previously identified central nodes will remain as the main drivers of psychopathology irrespective of changes in context, as this may lead to a misdirection of prevention and intervention efforts. Further, our findings underscore that people with multiple intersecting vulnerabilities may be disproportionately impacted by these major events.

No description available.

This dissertation is a history of Accra residents’ memory and experiences with family planning programs in the capital of Ghana from national independence in 1957 through the 1990s. In the final chapter I extend my analysis to the present to explore the ways that the NDC Generation, the youngest generation in this study, are currently navigating fertility decisions and parenting. Beginning my analysis at independence allows me to explore how the discourses of nation-building reignited existing, and facilitated new, negotiations over gender, sexuality, fertility and family as the government and everyday people sought to build prosperous lives as individuals, families, communities, and as a nation. Examining family planning discourses and programs through the 1990s is useful because members of this generation were adolescents and young adults during a particularly dynamic moment in population, family planning, and sexual health. During this decade, international paradigmatic shift in population programs, renewed government emphasis on curbing population growth and corresponding attention on women’s rights and contributions to nation-building, and increased government promotion of sex education and HIV/AIDS programming for children. Including the perspectives of Accra residents who grew up in the 1990s allows us to examine how contestations over the course of several periods of political and economic stability and instability have led to the current moment as members of this cohort build their own families.In this dissertation I ask: how have government and NGO actors promoted family planning as useful for particular ideas of economic development, national prosperity, biomedical reproductive health, and promoting gendered roles in nation-building? how have Ghanaians interpreted and engaged with these discourses and family planning programs throughout their lives from adolescence to adulthood as they navigated decisions regarding their reproductive health, family size, roles as parents and spouses? how have Ghanaians seen family planning in relation to their own ideals of gender, sexuality and family, and how have these ideals have shifted over the course of their lives? And finally, how have those that did not fit the presumed model of family planning discourses and programs—monogamous, heterosexual marriages—seen family planning as relevant to their sexual and reproductive health and desires? I utilize oral histories to analyze shifts in women and men’s perspectives regarding fertility, reproduction, and health across their own life course and in the context of broader political, social and economic change. With assistance from Theodora Agyeampong Oduro and Steven Danso, I conducted 206 life history interviews with Ghanaians aged 35+, who grew up in, and/or raised their children in Accra, with the vast majority being low-income with a middle-school education or less. Centering life history interviews was crucial for moving beyond a focus on state and institution-led population, health, and social initiatives, and instead evaluate the perspectives of everyday people as they experienced reproductive health and family planning campaigns. I investigate the ways that peoples’ views of what it means to be a woman or man at various phases of life between adolescence, adulthood, parenthood, and old age have shifted as they have navigated these stages themselves, and watched their elders and children do the same. Analyzing these ideas in relation to peoples’ perspectives on and engagement with the family planning movement over the course of their lifetimes allows me to examine how gender and age have impacted their approaches to parenthood, spousal relationships, fertility, reproductive health, family, and sexual behavior. I include 26 interviews with lesbian and bisexual women as part of this dissertation to investigate the perspectives of people who have historically been marginalized or altogether ignored in discourses of family planning, population, and nation-building. I examine how these women have seen family planning as valuable to their own lives and the LGBT+ community more broadly. My analysis of government policies using archival sources is in service of better understanding the frameworks that shaped government interventions in population and family planning that Ghanaians experienced. When possible, I privileged government and NGO sources that were directly aimed at the public, such as advertisements and documents that reveal program strategies, rather than those that illuminate the inner workings of these institutions. I made this choice to ensure that my exploration of government efforts concentrated on aspects that were visible to the public, and that would potentially have been reflected in peoples’ memories of population and family planning efforts. By tracing the life histories of women and men alongside government interventions in the realm of family planning, I merge life histories with national history to examine how everyday people and government actors have engaged with this idea and influenced each other to form ideas about the future of women, men, families, and the nation. The first major argument of my dissertation is that the family planning movement was a turning point in the history of reproduction in Ghana. Everyday people and early family planning advocates distinguished between existing fertility management methods and family planning programs. Each group contributed to local definitions of these concepts and highlighted that the latter was new and distinct. The second argument is that in their views of the value of family planning movement, people across generations have been primarily concerned with the impact on their own health, social, and religious lives rather than the broader community, and were mostly uninterested in dictating other peoples’ participation. The third argument is that Accra residents’ openness about discussing sex education and family planning has increased over time despite the fact that questions of women’s and men’s sexual’ morality have remained. However, concerns over morality have shifted from focusing on women’s sexual behavior towards more general worries of increased social vices such as petty crime, loitering, and drug use. The fourth argument is that the family planning movement has been interpreted by both governments and everyday people first and foremost in terms of economic impact rather than potential to shift social norms regarding gender, family and sexuality. Ideals of family and gender roles have remained similar across all generations with the exception of the youngest generation in this study. Moreover, people have articulated support for shared financial and childcare responsibilities between spouses and small family sizes in terms of economic circumstances rather than interest in women’s rights or gender equality.

published_or_final_version / Medical Sciences / Master / Master of Medical Sciences

Plusieurs enquêtes états-uniennes et canadiennes montrent que les personnes de la diversité sexuelle et de genre sont plus vulnérables face aux problèmes de santé mentale (détresse psychologique, dépression, troubles anxieux, problèmes de consommation, etc.) et plus à risque d’être victimes de violences conjugales au cours de leur vie. Mais cette population n’est pas homogène : parmi les différents sous-groupes de la communauté LGBTQ+ (lesbienne, gai, bisexuel·le, trans, queer et autre), les femmes de la diversité sexuelle sont particulièrement vulnérables face à ces problématiques. Le modèle du stress minoritaire explique cette vulnérabilité par le fait que les personnes de la diversité sexuelle et de genre souffrent de facteurs de stress spécifiques qui peuvent avoir des conséquences sur leur santé mentale et leurs relations. Ces facteurs peuvent être exogènes, c’est-à-dire provenir de l’extérieur de l’individu, comme les préjudices vécus dus à son identité sexuelle et de genre (harcèlement, discrimination, violence physique, etc.). Mais ils peuvent aussi être endogènes, c’est-à-dire provenant de l’individu lui-même. Ils sont alors plus subjectifs, comme le fait de s’attendre à être stigmatisé (la stigmatisation anticipée), le non-dévoilement de son identité sexuelle et/ou de genre et l’homophobie ou la transphobie intériorisée. L’objectif principal de ce mémoire est d’examiner l’impact des facteurs de stress minoritaire et des différentes formes de victimisation conjugale sur les symptômes de dépression et d’anxiété chez les femmes de la diversité sexuelle, en fonction de leur identité sexuelle et de genre. Pour réaliser cette étude, 209 personnes qui s’identifient comme femme (âge moyen = 33,9 ans), vivant au Canada et qui ont vécu des violences dans une relation intime avec une femme par le passé ont répondu à notre questionnaire en ligne. Nous avons mesuré l’identité sexuelle et de genre, la victimisation conjugale, les facteurs de stress minoritaire, et les symptômes de dépression et d’anxiété. Des régressions hiérarchiques montrent que les sentiments négatifs sur son appartenance à la diversité sexuelle sont positivement associés aux symptômes de dépression et d’anxiété, même après avoir contrôlé pour l’âge, l’ethnie, l’identité sexuelle et de genre et la victimisation. La victimisation psychologique est également positivement associée aux symptômes d’anxiété et la victimisation sexuelle aux symptômes de dépression. L’âge est négativement associé aux symptômes d’anxiété et ne pas être attiré strictement par les femmes (s’identifier comme bisexuel·le, pansexuel·le, queer ou autre) est positivement associé aux symptômes de dépression dans notre échantillon. Ces résultats apportent de nouvelles informations sur l’association entre les violences conjugales, le stress minoritaire et la santé mentale. Ainsi, ce mémoire montre l’impact de la victimisation conjugale sur la santé mentale des femmes de la diversité sexuelle ayant été victimes de violences conjugales. Il met également en avant l’impact significatif des sentiments négatifs sur son appartenance à la diversité sexuelle, une composante de l’homophobie intériorisée, sur les symptômes d’anxiété et de dépression. Il vient souligner la nécessité d’évaluer les besoins de cette population, et plus largement de toute la diversité sexuelle et de genre, et d’adapter les interventions auprès des victimes de violences conjugales à ces besoins. / Canadian and American population surveys show that people from the sexual diversity and gender-diverse people are more at risk of mental health problems (psychological distress, depression, anxiety disorders, substance use problems) and of being victims of intimate partner violence (IPV) in their lifetime. But the LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and other) community is not homogeneous: between the different subgroups of this population, sexual minority women (SMW) are at particularly high risk of experiencing stigma, mental health problems and being victims of IPV. This vulnerability can be explained by the sexual and gender minority stress model, stating that sexual and gender minority people suffer from specific stress factors added to general stressors, leading to more mental health and relationship problems. Those stress factors can be distal, such as prejudice events one suffers from based on their sexual or gender identity (harassment, discrimination, physical violence, etc.). But they can also be proximal, and therefore more subjective, such as expecting to be rejected or discriminated (also called stigma consciousness), concealing one’s sexual or gender identity, or suffering from internalized homophobia or transphobia. The main goal of this Master’s thesis was to assess the impact of minority stress factors and of different forms of past IPV victimization on the current mental health of Canadian SMW, as a function of their sexual and gender identity. In total, 209 individuals identifying as women (M age = 33,9), living in Canada and who lived in a violent intimate relationship with a woman in the past answered our online survey. Questionnaire assessed sexual orientation and gender identity, IPV behaviors, minority stress factors, and symptoms of depression and anxiety. Hierarchical regressions showed that psychological aggression was positively associated with anxiety symptoms and sexual coercion with depressive symptoms. Not being strictly attracted to women (i.e. identifying as bisexual, pansexual, queer or something else) was also associated to high symptoms of depression and age was negatively associated to anxiety symptoms. After controlling for age, race/ethnicity, sexual and gender identity and IPV victimization, having negative feelings about being a SMW was strongly associated with both depression and anxiety symptoms. This Master’s thesis provides new information on the interconnected associations among IPV, minority stress and SMW’s mental health. It shows the importance of LGBTQ+ specific stress factors, particularly of negative feelings about being a SMW, on the mental health of SMW IPV survivors. It highlights the necessity to evaluate the needs of SMW IPV survivors and, more broadly, of all sexual and gender minorities. This could allow clinical intervention to be more adapted to the needs of LGBTQ+ IPV victims and therefore help buffer against victimization they are faced by.