Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This content analysis seeks to update and extend the literature regarding gender and the depiction of housework in television commercials by exploring not just the distribution of chores among male and female characters, but also the success or failure of their chore performance. Among all of the commercials appearing in a composite week of primetime television programming on ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, WB, and UPN, only those commercials featuring domestic chores taking place in a house, yard, grocery store or laundromat were coded, resulting in a sample size of 477 commercials. Among the key findings: About 2/3 of the commercials featured females performing chores rather than males. There were 108 commercials (22.6%) in the sample in which a character’s performance of a chore was a source of humor, and males were more likely than females to be the butt of such a joke. Males’ performance in chores was more likely to be met with a disapproving response from others (t = -6.88, p < .001), less likely to be satisfactory in both process (t = -7.01, p < .001) and outcome (t = -4.42, p < .001), and was generally less successful (t = –7.55, p < .001) than females’ performance of chores. The depictions examined in this study have important implications for how individuals can learn gender roles from television content, including the activities that individuals are presumed to excel at and the activities that they seem doomed to fail.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Are government employees lazier than private sector employees? Drawing from theories of work motivation and public service motivation, we examine three public-private differences that might produce different levels of work effort in the two sectors. First, government and business may offer different intrinsic and extrinsic rewards. Second, public and private workers may value and seek different rewards. Third, public and private workers may differ in their attachment to the Protestant work ethic (PWE) and in other personal characteristics that affect work effort. Using 1989 and 1998 data from the General Social Survey, we find that government employees report slightly higher work effort than those in the private sector. Public and private sector workers differ in the value they place on extrinsic and intrinsic motivators, in the rewards their jobs offer, and in some personal characteristics. Government jobs offering interesting work and opportunities to help others, combined with the greater age of public employees, explain most of the sectoral difference in self-reported work effort.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Previous research has found that students' efforts in high school affect their later educational attainment, but the efforts of low SES and minority students have less pay off. This paper investigates whether this social class difference may be mediated by teachers' perceptions, whether students and teachers are in consensus about school behaviors, and whose reports of effort are more accurate for predicting long-term educational outcomes. Using the NELS:88 data to compare students' reports of their school efforts (such as coming to class with homework done and working hard in classes) with their teachers' reports of their efforts, I find that for most students, teachers' reports correspond to students' reports of their own efforts. However, for 20 percent- of students, teachers perceive that students exert less effort than students themselves report. This occurs primarily for the most disadvantaged students and minority status students.
Multivariate analyses also show that teacher reports of effort are stronger predictors of grades and students' post secondary attainment two years out of high school than students' reports. Therefore, when teachers "deflate" the amount of work students are doing, there are very real consequences both for grades and for later outcomes net of grades. This is true even after controls for background, school type, test scores, and grade point average. This study finds that for some students, their diminished outcomes may be explained by failures of their perceived efforts to be recognized by teachers. Whether this indicates perceptual biases by the teacher, or ineffective actions by the student, I cannot say with the present data, but this indicates further that teacher-student relationships are an important lever for increasing the engagement of low SES or minority students.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The theoretical trajectory on pornography has shifted from earlier arguments about the harms of pornography toward arguments about pornography as a potential site of resistance against patriarchy (Butler 1997; Segal 1998; Williams 1989). Within this literature, it has also been argued that porn is a specifically working-class domain in terms of consumption, desires, and sexual practices (Kaite 1995; Kipnis 1996; McIntosh 1993; Nead 1992; Segal 1998). Although some of the literature has sought mainly to validate the porn consumption of working-class men, none of it has been based on empirical findings and has consequently, ignored the voices of working-class women. Based on in-depth interviews with working-class and middle-class women, I argue that contrary to existing claims, middle-class women on average have the most straightforward and positive experiences with pornography. In contrast, working-class women tend to have more negative experiences and contradictory approaches to the role of pornography. Women’s attitudes towards porn are shaped by two major issues: the “authenticity” of the porn actress’ pleasure; and the labor process involved in porn films and sex work in general. In turn, beliefs about both these areas are shaped by women’s class location and its overlap with their gendered experiences.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Emphasis on residential patterns rather than social resources has stalled the development of more complete theories of racial/ethnic segregation. While contact theory and spatial distance have dominated the discourse, other perspectives can be incorporated by emphasizing the physical, social, and psychological boundaries that deter social integration along racial/ethnic lines. This paper offers a conceptual model of such boundaries, showing how insights from studies of segregation, planning, immigration, ethnic identity, and social psychology contribute to clearer understandings of why cross-ethnic social ties and feelings of membership wax or wane in different contexts. Structural boundaries can be best understood by focusing on specific social spaces, such as residential environments. Situational boundaries can be best understood by following individuals across environments. We seek a more unified understanding of the ways in which these intersecting boundaries are manifested in contemporary life. The boundaries operating also change by scale of observation, with those between social spaces influencing contact and structured opportunities, and those within situations directly influencing social relationships and identity.