The effects of two measures of alienation on political participation were examined. The hypotheses were contained in a theoretical model which predicted a relationship between powerlessness, meaninglessness, knowledge seeking and participation.Powerlessness was found to be an inadequate prediction of participation and was subsequently excluded from the model.Political knowledge seeking was found to be highly related to participation.Meaninglessness contributed only moderately to the predictive ability of the model.The thesis suggests that an individual's ability to comprehend his political environment and/or the comprehensibility of the political environment must be improved in order to boost citizen participation.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Michigan, 1982. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (p. 164-170).

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The focus of this research was to ascertain the indirect effects upon activism of intervening variables and recognized exogenous influences upon activism. In addition, this research also focused upon the differences and similarities of a recruited activist model and spontaneous activist model. Regression and path analysis were used to measure the direct and indirect effects of the exogenous and intervening variables. This research found that when the intervening variables, political interest, political awareness, exposure to media, altruism, and self-interest were introduced to both the recruited and spontaneous models, the direct effects of the variables were enhanced.

The feminist beliefs of abortion service providers and the effects of these beliefs on the delivery of health care to patients is examined by the author who is herself a feminist and member of an abortion clinic staff. Discussion includes abortion rates, abortion safety, characteristics of patients, and accessibility of abortion, particularly as affected by legislation and anti-abortion activism. The research consists of the author's personal experiences as a counselor and patient advocate, conducting patient health history interviews, supporting patients in the operating room, and attending patients during recovery. The data is presented in a personal narrative including autobiographical material, a methodological style supported by feminist theories which question the supposed objectivity and neutrality of conventional scientific methods. Three means by which feminist beliefs are expressed in the delivery of abortion services to patients are identified: the language used to refer to abortion and abortion-related services, the choice of abortion related topics addressed during clinic visits, and the reconfiguration of the conventional provider/patient relationship. / Graduation date: 1999

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Our public culture is rapidly shrinking: our nation is replete with residents instead of citizens. Part of the blame for the impoverishment of public life is the retreat and subsequent almost total isolation of intellectuals, those who put their deep training and experience to work in sociopolitical contexts in a public vernacular. The failure of most traditional intellectuals to reach a public audience is a failure of rhetoric; public intellectuals, on the other hand, mark rhetorical success in connecting the worlds of the public and the intellectual to advance change. This dissertation explores the interconnections between public intellectuals, rhetorical style and the public sphere to understand how and why public intellectuals are able to do what they do such that we may be able to encourage this work from others. Most importantly, this intersection may help explain how we can reclaim an active, democratic public sphere in the United States.

This qualitative research focused on the political knowledge holdings of adults. The research was conducted from the perspective and for the field of adult education. A purpose of this dissertation research was to provide a new and expanded footing for future inquiry and to enhance the further development of both theory and practice. The methodology was selected with that in mind.This study involved two distinct components. Part one involved a systematic random sample of 30 adults from a small midwestern city. A 16 question telephone survey was administered to each of the 30 adults. The survey consisted of the type questions used by previous researchers to measure political knowledge. The questions required respondents to identify political figures and election issues. Respondents were also asked to answer political parties questions and civics questions.The qualitative component, part two, was the primary thrust of this research. Seven informants were identified from different life circumstances. The informants and the 30 randomly selected adults resided in the same community. A minister, a law enforcement officer, a small business person, a retired person, a minimum wage worker, a factory worker, and an adult college student were individually interviewed on twoseparate occasions. Each interview was transcribed and analyzed by the researcher. At the conclusion of each informant's final interview, the 16 question survey, previously given to the 30 telephone respondents, was administered to each informant.Conclusions of this study were not generalized beyond the study's research participants. The informants were found to have varying areas of political knowledge. These varying areas of political knowledge arose from the informants varying personal experiences and life circumstances. Informants were not well informed, nor were they equally informed, across multiple areas of political knowledge. The seven informants performed virtually the same as did the thirty telephone respondents on the sixteen question survey.This study demonstrated that qualitative research methodology can illuminate and make meaningful that which is undetected through the use of questionnaires. Where the results of the questionnaires reflected a sameness between and among the informants and telephone respondents, the seven case studies uncovered distinct differences. / Department of Educational Leadership

The decline thesis proposes that political participation among young people has declined steadily and alarmingly since the 1960s. New research proposes that young people have not been simply abstaining from political participation but that they have been engaging in new or alternative forms of participation like demonstrating, signing petitions and expressing themselves politically in the market. This paper asks two questions---who are these alternative participators and what explains why they have turned to these new forms? The results indicate that young people engage with alternative forms of political participation more than they engage with more traditional forms like joining political parties and lobbying Congress. Furthermore, the results show that the theory of postmaterialism does explain in part what leads some young people to participate in these alternative forms more than others.