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- Creators: Arizona State University
- Creators: Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication
- Member of: Theses and Dissertations
- Member of: Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection
Description
Wage theft is a national epidemic that only recently became the focus of increasing research, critical public questioning, and activism. Given the socio- political climate in Maricopa County, Arizona and the heightened national attention on the state, this study answers important questions about the work experiences of immigrant workers in the region. Through an analysis of interviews with 14 low-wage Mexican workers from a local worker rights center, I explore workers' access to traditional recourse, the effects of wage theft on workers and families, and the survival strategies they utilize to mitigate the effects of sudden income loss. By providing an historical overview of immigration and employment law, I show how a dehumanized and racialized labor force has been structurally maintained and exploited. Furthermore, I describe the implications of two simultaneous cultures on the state of labor: the culture of fear among immigrants to assert their rights and utilize recourse, and the culture of criminality and impunity among employers who face virtually no sanctions when they are non-compliant with labor law. The results indicate that unless the rights of immigrant workers are equally enforced and recourse is made equally accessible, not only will the standards for pay and working conditions continue to collapse, but the health of Latino communities will also deteriorate. I assert that in addition to structural change, a shift in national public discourse and ideology is critical to substantive socio-political transformation.
ContributorsSanidad, Cristina (Author) / Téllez, Michelle (Thesis advisor) / Adelman, Madelaine (Committee member) / Gomez, Alan E (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
This research is about urban homeless people's vulnerability to extreme temperatures and the related socio-spatial dynamics. Specifically, this research investigates heat related coping strategies homeless people use and how the urban environment setting impacts those coping strategies. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with homeless people in Phoenix, Arizona during the summer of 2010. The findings demonstrate that homeless people have a variety of coping strategies and the urban environment setting unjustly impacts those strategies. The results suggest a need for further studies that focus spatial environmental effects on homeless people and other vulnerable populations.
ContributorsSanchez, Cory (Author) / Johnson, John M. (Thesis advisor) / Harlan, Sharon L (Committee member) / Lauderdale, Pat (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
The purpose of this quantitative study is to test the validity of a behavioral theory, value-belief-norm theory (Stern, 2000), in the context of environmental hotel management. The lack of theoretical consideration in previous studies on environmental attitudes of hotel/resort managers warrants an investigation of a theory with the potential to better explain behaviors that support the goals of environment management systems. The goal of this research was to document the values, beliefs, personal norms, and environmental management support behaviors of managers in a hospitality setting. Data were collected from a sample of hotel and resort managers in the Phoenix metropolitan area by using a survey of well-documented items from previous research on the theory. Results suggest the value-belief-norm theory is successful in explaining environmental management support behaviors. Implications for practitioners as well as researchers are discussed.
ContributorsRubin, Simon (Simon David) (Author) / White, Dave D (Thesis advisor) / Lee, Woojin (Committee member) / Basile, George (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
This study addresses the landscape connectivity pattern at two different scales. The county-level analysis aims to understand how urban ecosystem structure is likely to evolve in response to the proposed development plans in Maricopa County, Arizona. To identify the spatio-temporal land pattern change, six key landscape metrics were quantified in relative to the urban development scenarios based on the certainty of the proposed urban plans with different level of urban footprints. The effects of future development plans from municipalities on landscape connectivity were then analyzed in the scaled temporal and spatial frame to identify in which urban condition the connectivity value would most likely to decrease. The results demonstrated that tremendous amount of lands will be dedicated to future urbanization, and especially urban agricultural lands will be likely to be vulnerable. The metro-level analysis focuses on a group of species that represent urban desert landscape and have different degrees of fragmentation sensitivity and habitat type requirement. It hypothesizes that the urban habitat patch connectivity is impacted upon by urban density. Two underlying propositions were set: first, lower connectivity is predominant in areas with high urbanization cover; second, landscape connectivity will be impacted largely on the interfaces between urban, suburban, and rural areas. To test this, a GIS-based connectivity modeling was employed. The resultant change in connectivity values was examined for exploring the spatial relation to predefined spatial frames, such as urban, suburban, and rural zones of which boundaries were delineated by buffering method with two criteria of human population density and urban cover proportion. The study outcomes provide a practical guidance to minimize connectivity loss and degradation by informing planners with more optimal alternatives among various policy decisions and implementation. It also gives an inspiration for ecological landscape planning in urbanized or urbanizing regions which can ultimately leads urban landscape sustainability.
ContributorsPak, So-hyŏn (Author) / Cook, Edward (Thesis advisor) / Crewe, Katherine (Committee member) / Wu, Jianguo (Jingle) (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
ABSTRACT The Phoenix Four Rivers Flora is an inventory of all the vascular plants growing along the Salt, Gila, New and Agua Fria Rivers, and their tributaries in the Phoenix Metropolitan Area during the years of the study (2009-2011). This floristic inventory documents the plant species and habitats that exist currently in the project area, which has changed dramatically from previous times. The data gathered by the flora project thus not only documents how the current flora has been altered by urbanization, but also will provide a baseline for future ecological studies. The Phoenix Metropolitan Area is a large urbanized region in the Sonoran Desert of Central Arizona, and its rivers are important for the region for many uses including flood control, waste water management, recreation, and gravel mining. The flora of the rivers and tributaries within the project area is extremely diverse; the heterogeneity of the systems being caused by urbanization, stream modification for flood control, gravel mining, and escaped exotic species. Hydrological changes include increased runoff in some areas because of impermeable surfaces (e.g. paved streets) and decreased runoff in other areas due to flood retention basins. The landscaping trade has introduced exotic plant species that have escaped into urban washes and riparian areas. Many of these have established with native species to form novel plant associations.
ContributorsJenke, Darin (Author) / Landrum, Leslie R. (Committee member) / Pigg, Kathleen B. (Committee member) / Makings, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
Many studies have shown that access to healthy food in the US is unevenly distributed and that supermarkets and other fresh food retailers are less likely to be located in low-income minority communities, where convenience and dollar stores are more prevalent grocery options. I formed a partnership with Phoenix Revitalization Corporation, a local community development organization engaged in Central City South, Phoenix, to enhance the community's capacity to meet its community health goals by improving access to healthy food. I used a community-based participatory approach that blended qualitative and quantitative elements to accommodate collaboration between both academic and non-academic partners. Utilizing stakeholder interviews, Nutrition Environment Measures Surveys (NEMS), and mapping to analyze the community's food resources, research revealed that the community lacks adequate access to affordable, nutritious food. Community food stores (n=14) scored an average of 10.9 out of a possible 54 points using the NEMS scoring protocol. The community food assessment is an essential step in improving access to healthy food for CCS residents and provides a baseline for tracking progress to improve residents' food access. Recommendations were drafted by the research partnership to equip and empower the community with strategic, community-specific interventions based on the research findings.
ContributorsCrouch, Carolyn (Author) / Harlan, Sharon (Thesis advisor) / Eakin, Hallie (Committee member) / Aftandilian, David (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
This study explores how newspapers framed the weight-loss drugs Xenical®(orlistat) and Alli® (over-the-counter orlistat) during the time period of three months prior to their approvals by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration until one year after each became available on the market. As of June 2011, orlistat is the only weight-loss drug available for long-term use in the U.S. Newspapers are influential sources of information about health issues. Agenda-setting, framing, and priming in news articles can have a powerful effect on public perceptions and behaviors. To conduct the content analysis, researchers first developed a codebook containing variables that described the sources of attribution and the features of each drug. They tested the codebook in a series of pilot tests to ensure inter-rater reliability. The sample of texts for the content analysis, drawn from LexisNexis Academic, contained 183 newspaper articles composed of 85 Xenical articles and 98 Alli articles. The overlap was 25% for inter-rater reliability as well as intra-rater reliability. Frequencies were tabulated using Predictive Analytics SoftWare, version 18.0.3. Results demonstrated that Xenical and Alli were framed differently in some critical ways. For example, there were twice as many quotes from the manufacturer for Alli than for Xenical. Researchers concluded that the reporting on Alli was heavily influenced by the manufacturer's multi-media public relations campaign in the months prior to the market-release date.
ContributorsLehmann, Jessica (Author) / Hampl, Jeffrey S. (Thesis advisor) / Bramlett-Solomon, Sharon (Committee member) / Hall, Richard (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
This thesis examines the immediate post-World War II operational strategy of Valley National Bank of Arizona, a Phoenix-based institution in operation from 1899 until its 1992 acquisition by Ohio-based Banc One Corporation (now JPMorgan Chase). For the purposes of this study, the immediate post-war period is defined as 1944 to January 20, 1953, a span that opens with the bank's wartime planning efforts for the post-war period and ends with the 1953 retirement of bank president Walter Bimson. By the end of World War II, Valley National ranked as the largest financial institution in the eight-state Rocky Mountain region, as measured by total deposits. However, post-war regulatory issues, competitor expansion, and an inability to generate deposit volume sufficient to meet subject period loan demands challenged bank leaders seeking to maintain market share and grow company profitability and stock value. In response to these difficulties, the bank focused on a three-pronged operational strategy emphasizing advertising, market-appropriate deposit and loan product offerings, and an aggressive branching and acquisition campaign. This strategy did not result in unmitigated success as the bank did experience a decrease in average deposit account balances, lost mortgage market share, and undertook acquisition activity that later resulted in federal antitrust action. However, by the end of the subject period, the three-pronged strategy employed by the bank did result in an increase in deposit dollar market share, as measured by deposits controlled directly and indirectly by the institution, rising annual net profits, and substantial share price appreciation. The findings related to bank strategy and results presented in this thesis are based primarily upon information found in the 169-box Valley National Bank Collection housed at the Arizona Historical Society. Extensive newspaper research conducted using targeted date range and keyword searches and careful consideration of secondary source materials relating to the bank, the banking industry, and state, regional, and national politics, economics, and culture during the subject period provided additional information used in this study, and corroborated much of the material found in the Valley National Bank Collection files.
ContributorsSouthard, John (Author) / Warren-Findley, Jannelle (Thesis advisor) / Vandermeer, Philip (Committee member) / Gammage, Jr., Grady (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
Civic leadership in Phoenix, Arizona promoted the city's performing arts as part of a deliberate plan towards the larger growth agenda after World War II. From the 1940s through the late 1960s, the business and professional leaders who controlled city government served on boards for performing arts groups, built venues, offered financial support, and sometimes participated as artists in order to attract high-technology firms and highly skilled workers to the area. They believed one aspect of Phoenix's urban development included a need for quality, high-culture performing arts scene that signaled a high quality of life and drew more residents. After this era of boosterism ended and control shifted from business and professional leaders to city government, performing arts support fluctuated with leadership's attitudes and the local, state, and national economies. The early civic leaders were successful in their overall mission to expand the city - now the sixth largest in the nation - and many of the organizations and venues they patronized still serve the community; however, the commitment to developing a quality arts and culture scene waned. Today's public, private, and arts and culture leaders are using the same argument as Phoenix tries once again to become a high-technology center. The theory that arts and culture stimulate the economy directly and indirectly is true today as it was in the 1940s. Although the plan was effective, it needed fully committed supporters, strong infrastructure, and continued revising in order to move the vision into the twenty-first century.
ContributorsBickert, Michelle (Author) / Vandermeer, Phiip (Thesis advisor) / Dallett, Nancy (Committee member) / Warren-Findley, Jannelle (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
Chris Miller's Souvenirs of Sleep is as serious as it is whimsical, if this is a possibility. The "Museum of the Zoo-real" may be an equally appropriate title as animals are often in performance. In this visual and spiritual investigation, childhood, dream, and the loss of a mother to suicide are the currents. Miller's work is informed by the cinema of Werner Herzog, Andrei Tarkovsky, Robert Bresson and beyond. Miller believes in the power of implication. The poems begin with intense focus, but are often in the business of expansion. Souvenirs of Sleep is a journey toward sense-making, a search for language that might allow it.
ContributorsMiller, Christopher (Author) / Dubie, Norman (Thesis advisor) / Hogue, Cynthia (Committee member) / Ball, Sally (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013