The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate perceptions and experiences of four Latino male students who obtained their high school diploma despite considerable adversity. An in-depth examination of the participants' academic experiences, familial impact on their education, and societal acculturation were explored to elucidate Latino male academic achievement in public high school. The dropout conundrum has serious economic and societal implications for the United States. In addition, the explosion of the Latino population in the southwestern portion of the U.S. adds another dimension to this dilemma since Latinos have a greater dropout rate than their white counterparts. However, there has been minimal qualitative literature that has given voice to students and their perceptions of academic success. Therefore, this study was conducted with individual, semi-structured interviews to give the students' voice to their story and create rich, thick descriptions for educators to understand the reasons these students were successful in school. Participants were selected from a randomized purposeful sample from the same high school. In addition, each student was interviewed three times to ensure prolonged engagement. Interviews were audio-taped and then transcribed by the researcher. Member checking, peer debriefing, artifact collection, and reflexive journaling were utilized to establish trustworthiness. The transcribed interviews were categorized to establish patterns and themes in the data. Even though the four participants were very different from each other in generational status, family environment, and personal interests, they were all able to obtain their high school diploma despite the hardships that have played a role in the failure in school of others much like these four. The students clearly articulated that treatment by the staff at school was a major factor in their academic achievement, and, even though they all came from non-traditional families, education was valued and encouraged in their homes. Recommendations for future studies include research on Latino college achievement and the role of Latino parents in their children's education.

Sociology at its core has always been interested in understanding how society works. Previous studies on social stratification have sought to outline who gets what, when, and why. This project introduces the where element to advance our understanding of how resource distribution affects life chances. The research question is: Does the percent of Latinos in the area of residence have an influence on Latino?s individual poverty over and above the influence on poverty of the person characteristics? The study ascertains how micro-level inequality is influenced by macro-level attributes and explores how spatial non-stationarity plays a role in these mechanics. This sociospatial inequality investigation will delineate how individual-level stratifying mechanisms are influenced by context-level structural attributes and how sociospatial non-stationary processes play a role in these mechanics. The dissertation is conceptually driven by Hubert M. Blalock's 1970 theory on minority relationships. Blalock posited the testable hypothesis that discrimination against oppressed groups increases when their population rises. Using theoretical propositions inspired by Blalock leads to the testing of the following two formal hypothesis: the multilevel hypothesis (H1) focuses on macro-level effects, I hypothesize that as the percent of Latinos/as in the area of residence increases, the odds of being in poverty will increase for Latinas/os; on the spatial hypothesis (H2), I hypothesize that the statistical association between percent Latina/o and percent poverty is spatially nonstationary. I find that H1 cannot be falsified. The models reveal, as Blalock predicted, that as the percent of Latinos/as in the area of residence increases, the odds of being in poverty increase for Latinas/os (even after controlling for various level-1, level-2, and GWR-level-2 factors). I also find that H2 could not be falsified. I find that the statistical association between percent Latina/o and percent poverty is spatially nonstationary. My multilevel and spatial modeling investigation was unable to falsify Blalock's minority group threat theory. Hierarchical models indicate that as the percent of Latino/a increases, the likelihood of being in poverty for Latinas/os increases. This statically significant relationship holds constant even after spatial nonstationarity level-2 control factors are introduced.

Cultural competence, mandated by Federal law since 1964, has not been appropriately addressed due to its lack of specifics and the lack of specifics within subsequent mandates. This study was designed to determine specific key elements of cultural and linguistic appropriateness which would "operationalize" cultural competence in the provision of healthcare services. Knowing the elements of cultural and linguistic appropriateness will assist non-Hispanic healthcare providers to remove personal barriers of cultural and linguistic differences for Texas' Hispanic population. The problem of cultural competence gained national focus during the Civil Rights movement of the '60s. Current research revealed that Hispanics continue to have the worst healthcare outcomes of any minority population. Census data reflecting that Hispanics are the fastest growing segment of the population, with Texas having the nation's second largest Hispanic population, make it imperative for healthcare providers to determine methods to improve healthcare for Texas' Hispanic population. A Delphi Technique was used to extract expert opinions from 26 highly qualified, Texas Hispanic healthcare providers regarding the key elements of cultural and linguistic appropriateness for Texas' Hispanic population. The ultimate goal of the research was to determine essential information which would assist non-Hispanic healthcare providers in removing personal barriers of cultural and linguistic appropriateness to the delivery of healthcare services for Texas' Hispanics. Through the approximately 16-month process of the Delphi Technique, the Panel produced 249 distinct elements in 11 groups of cultural appropriateness and 8 groups of linguistic appropriateness. Members of the Panel ranked the groups for importance, indicated the level of agreement/disagreement with each element, and rated each element for its individual importance. This study is important because it is the first time an expert panel of solely Hispanic healthcare providers has spoken collectively about what constitutes cultural and linguistic appropriateness. This research can provide a framework for professional practices, grant providing organizations, or evaluation teams to assess professionals and programs to determine their degree of cultural and linguistic appropriateness. The work can also form the basis for curricula to be used in Texas' healthcare professions preparatory schools or continuing education for practicing healthcare professionals.

Texte remanié de: Dissertation--Leipzig--Universität, 2003. / Bibliogr. p. 229-245.

Texte remanié de: Diss.--Frankfurt am Main--Universität, 2006. / Notes bibliogr. Bibliogr. p. 157-169.

This dissertation analyzes the effects of Latino immigration on the representation of Latinos and African-Americans on local school boards and attempts to explain under what conditions Latino immigrants provoke opposition among whites. I consider two measures of representation based on representative bureaucracy—the membership of Latinos and African-Americans on school boards and bias in the responsiveness of white school board members toward these two groups. Whites as the major racial group in the U.S. have been the subject of much intergroup relations research focusing on competition for scarce resources, perceived threat and group biases (e.g., Evans and Giles, 1986; Giles and Evans, 1985, 1986; Esses, Jackson and Armstrong, 1998), and I also focus on their racial behaviors as voters in school board elections and as school board members. I consider Latino immigration in this research because emerging evidence suggests that Latino immigration poses a growing threat to whites, leading them to shift their support from Latinos to a countervailing group, such as African-Americans (e.g., Meier and Stewart, 1991; Rocha, 2007). First, I examine whether Latino immigration into a community affects the support of white citizens for Latino or African-American membership on school boards. Second, I examine whether white school board members also are influenced by Latino immigration in their responsiveness to Latino and African-American parents. It is likely that the reactions of whites to Latino immigration are conditioned by their preexisting racial attitudes, so this dissertation also tests competing theories of community racial climate—group threat and group contact. I expect that racial tensions within a community should moderate the influence of Latino immigration on these two forms of Latino and African-American representation. Overall, this dissertation expands the study of representative bureaucracy by combining past research on community racial climates with conditions influencing minority representation. In addition to examining the determinants of passive representation, this dissertation links expectations of the racial behavior of white citizens with the behavior of white school board members by considering the possibility that school board members express “discriminatory intent” (Mendez and Grose, 2014) on non-policy related matters. A better understanding of the determinants of public officials’ personal biases should help to explain the targeting of substantive policy benefits to minorities, which is the focus of much other representative bureaucracy research. While I base my analysis of school board membership on inferences of white voter behavior from aggregate election results, I directly measure white school board member responsiveness using data gathered from a novel randomized field experiment and e-mail audit design. Representative bureaucracy researchers have called for more of this type of individual-level data to help explain minority advocacy (Bradbury and Kellough, 2011).

To learn how to address health issues specific to Hispanic cultures in an effort to address health disparities, learning from cultural aspects that affect health from the countries of origin would be most useful. Community programs built on rigorous and systematic research prove to be more powerful than ad-hoc programs. Qualitative research techniques offer powerful alternatives for public health professionals to develop adequate and directed programs at the community level, especially among underserved communities and those represented by oral/spoken traditions. The study was conducted among 132 working class single and married Mestizo women between the ages of 20-40 living in Panama City, Panama. This group of women has the highest incidence of HPV in Panama so are at the highest risk of cervical cancer. Using social construction as the theoretical framework, this study uses four different qualitative research techniques: free listing, pile sorting, individual semi-structured, and group interviews. Key findings include the importance of religion and family, women's understandings of the relationship between sexuality and health, influence of media, other women, and husbands help construct screening knowledge among women in the study. Culturally relevant health education interventions and programs delivered in a group format at the community level in a participatory mode would be most effective in reaching women in Panama and other Hispanic populations. Future quantitative studies and influences of social networks are suggested.

This study seeks to expand the scope of assimilation theory by integrating it with elements of routine activities theory to better understand what influence assimilation has in regard to violent victimization. Specifically, the purpose of this study is to determine whether or not differences in victimization rates between foreign-born and native-born Hispanic youth are related to variations in emotional guardianship. Emotional guardianship refers to the aspect of relationships (i.e., affection and communication) between Hispanic youth and their parents that serve to protect the youth from being victimized. I hypothesize that foreign-born Hispanics have greater emotional guardianship than native-born Hispanics, and as a result foreign-born Hispanics have lower probabilities of victimization. To test this hypothesis and others, the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) is utilized, as it provides data about the various aspects of assimilation (e.g., country of birth, language spoken at home), routine activities (e.g., sports, clubs, and family outings), and emotional guardianship (e.g., communication of problems, expectations, and satisfaction of parental bond), which are each believed to contribute to the likelihood of being victimized.

Much of the research on illness focuses on how people, particularly white men, cope with chronic/life threatening illnesses often adopting a "sick role" identity. For Latinos this type of identity transformation is complex as there is no place for dependency and passivity in traditional depictions of Latino masculinity. Latino men take pride in their manhood. As a result, they have trouble accepting their illness and the sick role. They do not tend to take their illness seriously, nor are they comfortable admitting to others the seriousness of their illness. My research focuses on how Latino men renegotiate a sense of masculinity that provides more variation in how they enact their roles as men. The four Latino men I interviewed are all battling chronic/life threatening illnesses. The concept of gender work provides a theoretical tool for analyzing the various identity transformations experienced during a long-term chronic/life illness. Although this concept has been typically applied to women and how they reenact a vision of femininity through daily work and interaction, it becomes useful for seeing how Latino men must renegotiate their masculinity which is one of the most fundamental parts of their senses of self. They redefine even the smallest tasks, ones typically defined as female oriented as a sense of masculine pride and accomplishment. Although these men's illnesses have meant major compromises in their traditional vision of masculinity, the men with whom I spoke demonstrate the creative and social processes involved in doing gender.

This paper presents a framework for literacy skill development relating to both monolingual and dual language learners. The purpose of this study was to identify the differences that may exist between monolingual and dual language learners' performance on literacy tasks, before having a significant amount of exposure to the preschool curriculum. The sample included 78 monolingual language learners and 44 dual language learners who were assessed using the Woodcock Language Proficiency Battery-Revised (WLPB-R). The researcher used scoring methods that took into consideration split vocabulary in dual language learners where a conceptual scoring technique was used (Bedore, Pena, Garcia, & Cortez, 2005). The research design employed was casual comparative where the effects of dual language learning on letter knowledge, concepts of print, vocabulary, listening comprehension, and broad language development were investigated. Findings from two Multivariate Analysis of Variances indicated that there were significant differences between monolingual and dual language learners on early language and literacy skills. This study contributes to the literature regarding dual language development and the use of appropriate scoring methods. Particularly, the outcomes from this study provide guidance regarding best practices for assessment of dual language learners to identify learning and language difficulties.