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 In the area of criminology/domestic violence:
For the past three years Drs. Wright, Jasinski and Mustaine have been collecting data for the National Institute of Justice Sponsored Florida Four City Survey. This study examines the experiences of violence among a sample of approximately 800 women in four large metropolitan cities in Florida. Data from a comparison sample of about 100 men were also collected. Initial analyses have found that an extremely large proportion of the men and women in this project have been victimized in their lifetime. Dr. Jason Ford has been studying the relationship between substance use and delinquency during adolescence and has found that substance use leads to stable patterns in offending behavior over time. He is also trying to find out whether or not higher education functions as a turning point in the life-course, leading to desistance from criminal behavior. Dr.'s Huff-Corzine and Corzine (along with several colleagues from around the country) are working on a textbook titled Pathways to Murder that will offer a comprehensive overview of homicide as a social phenomenon in the contemporary United States while also making a systematic effort to dispel common myths about homicide. The title indicates the primary contention of the book, namely that murder can be the end product of many different sequences of social interactions and is often a byproduct of otherwise normal activities. In the area of social inequalities:
Dr. Joan Morris and doctoral student Debra Marshall are looking at how gender ideology is portrayed in modern romance novels. They argue that, besides becoming increasingly more erotic, there has been little change in either the portrayal of gender roles or the mechanisms by which traditional ideology is reinforced in the romance novel over the last thirty years. Dr. Tracy Dietz is in the beginning stages of developing a book on Aging in the Mexican American community. The book will be based upon quantitative data and will explore topics such as family, health status and health care utilization, social services utilization, religion and religiosity, social class and finances as well as work and reitirement issues, living arrangments, etc. In addition, she is working on a project examining the cohort and period effects of attitudes associated with welfare state programs. Central Florida and the entire gulf coast were hit hard by hurricanes in the past year and Dr. Fernando Rivera thinks that by understanding the an individual's social networks he may be able to better understand their ability to cope. He is looking at social support networks among Florida residents with a special emphasis on Latino groups to see how they change or function during and after the disaster and whether they help in reducing PTSD symptoms. In the area of urban/environmental sociology:
Dr. Jim Wright is currently completing a large five-year study of the "covenant marriage" experiment in Louisiana and conducting research on the Hope VI redevelopment of Carver Court, a large public housing development in downtown Orlando, and continues to undertake research on Orlando's homeless population. Dr. Wright also serves as editor-in-chief of Social Science Research, a quarterly journal of research published by Elsevier. Dr. Brent K. Marshall is a Co-Principal Investigator
(with Dr. Martin Wanielista and Ms. Leesa Souto of UCF's
Stormwater Management Academy) on an interdisciplinary
project funded by the Florida Department of Environmental
Protection. The main purpose of this project is to implement
and evaluate public outreach techniques that promote
environmentally responsible behavior in an effort to reduce
nonpoint source pollution. A telephone survey of Central
Floridians was funded by this project and completed by the
department's Institute for Social and Behavioral Sciences.
The survey includes measures of environment attitudes,
environmental behaviors, place attachment, and support for
businesses that are environmentally responsible. At the Institute for Social and Behavioral Sciences:
The ISBS specializes in research relevant to public policy issues in the Orlando region. This past year has been a particularly busy one for the institute. At the core of SRL is an eight-station computer-assisted telephone survey laboratory. In addition, the lab also undertakes mail and personal interview surveys and various data entry projects. The Center for Qualitative Methodologies undertakes research involving focus groups, unstructured interviewing, and other more qualitative methodologies. CQM is often used in the developmental phase of our more formal survey operations. Finally, our Center for Outreach and Public Service expresses the Institute's commitment to social and human service agencies that serve the population of our community. Through COPS, Institute faculty and staff consult on matters of research design, sampling and evaluation to various non-profit organizations, and in cases where sufficient volunteer student labor can be enticed or conscripted, undertakes gratis research projects for these organizations. Recent and on-going ISBS projects include a survey for the city of Cape Canaveral looking at resident's feelings about businesses. A survey for Metroplan Orlando designed to get public opinion on the Lynx Paratransit Service and community perception surveys for the cities of Maitland and Casselberry. |
Dept. of Sociology: University of Central Florida | 4000 Central Florida Blvd | Orlando, FL 32816-1360Phone: (407) 823-3744 | Fax: (407) 823-3026