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Editor:
Tonya Allen
allen@pop.psu.edu
PRInformation
Spring 2005
New External Research Funding
Center on Population Health and Aging
Dr. Mark D. Hayward, Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Demography, has received funding for five years from NIA for a Center on Population Health and Aging. Co-investigators are Dr. Duane Alwin, McCourtney Professor of Sociology, Demography, Human Development and Family Studies; Dr. Melissa Hardy, professor of human development and family studies and sociology and director, Gerontology Center; Dr. Linda M. Burton, professor of human development and family studies, sociology and demography; Dr. Leif Jensen, professor of rural sociology and demography and director, PRI; Dr. Peter Kemper, professor of health policy and administration; and Dr. George Vogler, professor of biobehavioral health and director, Center for Developmental and Health Genetics. The Center on Population Health and Aging (CPHA) is one of fifteen such NIA-funded centers, which are intended to serve as a research infrastructure to address the major issues in population aging in the U.S. and worldwide.
Coaching and Gender Equity (CAGE)
Dr. Robert Drago, professor of labor studies and industrial relations and women's studies, with Dr. Jackie Rogers and Dr. Teresa Vescio, received funding from the National Collegiate Athletic Association, The National Association of Collegiate Women Athletics Administrators, and PSU Athletics and The Commission for Women to identify causal factors related to the entry, retention and promotion of women coaches. A larger project will involve national sample surveys of women student/athletes and men and women coaches/athletic administrators, and exit interviews for coaches/administrators. This pilot project addresses the theoretically prior issues of the broad range of relevant issues, ranging from career pathways to scheduling, to stereotyping and discrimination, relevant resources, school and athletic department climate and policies, understandings of fairness, and potential conflicts between work and family. In conjunction with an analysis of Census data regarding coaches, focus groups have been administered to women student/athletes at Division I, II and III institutions, and to women and (separately) men coaches/administrators at meetings of the NCAA and NACWAA.
Economic Hardship, Family Life and Voter Turnout in Developmental Perspective: Longitudinal Research on High School Class of 1992
Dr. Eric Plutzer, associate professor of political science and sociology, received funding from the Russell Sage Foundation to explore the impact of economic hardship, family structure, race and ethnicity in fostering or inhibiting civic development among the nation's youngest eligible voters. The project examines over 12,000 citizens who were 8th graders in 1988 and explores how their family and economic status as teenagers contributes to their development as voters or abstainers during their first four national elections.
Integrating Qualitative and Quantitative Methods for Measurement and Analysis
Dr. Linda M. Burton, professor of human development and family studies, sociology and demography, received funding from NIH/NICHD/University of North Carolina for a study which will demonstrate the feasibility and utility of integrated analyses by extending the data collection and analysis in three large, recently funded, longitudinal studies of child development during the first five years of life of low and middle-income children in rural and urban settings, including children from diverse ethnic backgrounds. Information about developmental processes collected in qualitative data through cultural models analysis and structural discovery approaches will be combined with information about developmental trajectories collected in the quantitative data through growth curve and latent profile analyses.
Integrating Work-Family Research, Policy and Practice for Faculty through the 2005 CUWFA Conference
Dr. Robert Drago, professor of labor studies and industrial relations and women's studies, received funding from the Alfred Sloan Foundation to create a convergence of work-life practitioners at the 2005 College and University Work/Family Association (CUWFA) conference in order to share information and findings, to network individuals and organizations who can serve as mutual resources, and to generate new strategies for improvement.
International Conference on the Future of Cognitive Aging Research
Dr. Duane Alwin, McCourtney Professor of Sociology, Demography, Human Development and Family Studies and Dr. Scott Hofer, associate professor of human development and family studies, received funding from NIA to hold a multidisciplinary working conference on the future of cognitive aging research. The conference, co-sponsored by the Population Research Institute and the Gerontology Center at Penn State, and the Center for Demography of Health and Aging of the University of Wisconsin, and supported by Penn State's College of the Liberal Arts, College of Health and Human Development, and Social Science Research Institute, will be held at the Penn Stater Conference Center, May 20-22, 2005. Building upon the mandates set by the National Research Council's Committee on Future Directions for Cognitive Research on Aging, articulated in The Aging Mind: Opportunities in Cognitive Research (National Research Council, 2000), the conference will explore further the state of our knowledge with an eye toward developing a shared multidisciplinary agenda for the next few decades of research on cognitive aging.
Marriage, Birth and Divorce after Terrorist Attack
Dr. Catherine Cohan, research associate, and Dr. Robert Schoen, Hoffman Professor of Family Sociology and Demography, received funding for two years from NICHD to expand the disaster and historical demography literatures by examining whether a man-made disaster and a unique sociocultural event--the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack--is related to family development. Specifically, the study will examine whether the terrorist disaster led to changes in marriage, birth, and divorce rates in New York City, Washington, D.C., and the surrounding counties and states using vital statistics data to examine spatial associations between the disaster and change in pre- and post-disaster rates. Dr. Cohan's previous research on natural disaster and family transitions showed an increase in marriages, births, and divorces the year following Hurricane Hugo in the affected areas of South Carolina. Drs. Cohan and Schoen will examine whether or not people respond similarly to a man-made terrorist disaster.
Moving Up or Getting Stuck? Former Welfare Recipients' Job Retention and Advancement
Dr. Rukmalie Jayakody, associate professor of human development and family studies and demography, received funding for one year from the Upjohn Institute to examine how some former welfare recipients are able to advance into better paying jobs while others remain in low wage or unstable employment. This study uses a nested quantitative-qualitative design. Data will be analyzed from the Women's Employment Survey (WES), a nationally recognized panel survey of current and former welfare recipients, and the WES Qualitative Supplement, which provides qualitative data from focus groups and semi-structured interviews on a sub-sample of the survey respondents.
Student Voices
Dr. Constance Flanagan, professor of agricultural and extension education, received funding for one year from the University of Pennsylvania/Annenberg to conduct a randomized field study of the implementation of Student Voices in classes in Pennsylvania schools. Co-investigators are Dr. William Boyd, Dr. Dana Mitra, Dr. Mary Beth Oliver, and Dr. S. Shyam Sundar.
Well-Being of Youth/Migrant/Seasonal Farmworker Families
Dr. Jill Findeis, professor of agricultural, environmental and regional economics and demography, Dr. Anastasia R. Snyder, assistant professor of rural sociology and demography, and Dr. Leif Jensen, professor of rural sociology and demography and director, PRI, received funding for two years from NICHD for a pilot project which will focus on the youth of migrant and seasonal farmworkers in America, investigating educational attainment, labor force participation and family formation outcomes.
What's Special About Special Education? Modeling the Determinants and Consequences of Special Education Placement Using the ECLS-K
Dr. George Farkas, professor of sociology, demography, and education, and Dr. Paul Morgan have received funding for two years from the American Education Research Association to investigate the factors driving the increasing placement of children into special education and the consequences of such placement on children's ongoing cognitive and behavioral development, using ECLS-K data.
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