Research
The Department of Sociology's faculty conduct research on a wide variety of topics and publish in some of the top journals in their fields. Below are several areas of particular strength and concentration among our faculty.
Race, Ethnicity, and Immigration
The study of race and ethnicity, along with immigration, is a special strength among our faculty. Sociology faculty conduct research on a wide range of topics in this area. Mexican American culture, religion, assimilation, and identity are of particular interest to sociology faculty members, a reflection of our unique location at the U.S.-Mexico border. Faculty also study racial and ethnic disparities in education, health, and in the labor market as well as processes of racial construction and racial attribution. Immigrant incorporation and ethnic relations also represent key areas of research among sociologists at UTRGV.
Faculty:
- Cecile Caddel
- Steven Foy
- Ramon Guerra
- Arlett Lomeli
- Leticia Nevarez Zavala
- Salvatore Restifo
- Bienvenido Ruiz
- Igor Ryabov
- Katarzyna Sepielak
- Alma D. Trevino-Garza
- Dawid Wladyka
Gender, Family, and Sexuality
Sociology faculty conduct research on the complexities of gender, family, and sexuality in the 21st century. Research areas among our faculty include family and gender roles, how gender intersects with class and race, and the relationship between household composition, family structure, and poverty. Other research focuses on sexuality and LGBT issues, such as the experience of LGBT young adults, and anti-LGBT sentiment and activism.
Faculty:
- Amie Bostic
- Cecile Caddel
- Arlett Lomeli
- Leticia Nevarez Zavala
- Salvatore Restifo
- Igor Ryabov
- Canan Tanir
Environmental Sociology and Disaster Studies
Research related to environmental sociology and disasters is a unique feature of sociology at UTRGV and facilitates the new Disaster Studies M.A. program. Faculty in our program conduct research on population and social vulnerability to disaster, as well as disaster/emergency management and preparedness.
Faculty:
- William Donner
- Dean Kyne
- Arlett Lomeli
- Marla Perez-Lugo
- Katarzyna Sepielak
- Canan Tanir
- Dawid Wladyka
Medical Sociology/Sociology of Health
Sociology faculty conduct research on a wide variety of topics related to the sociology of health and medicine. These topics include access to and utilization of healthcare services, processes of medicalization, mental health issues, eating disorders among adolescents, and obesity.
Faculty:
- Steven Foy
- Leticia Nevarez Zavala
- Igor Ryabov
Sociology faculty members conduct research on a range of other topics, including the sociology of religion, demography, social psychology, the sociology of education, and social movements.
Recent publications by sociology faculty
Amie Bostic
- "Social Spending, Poverty, and Immigration: A Systematic Analysis of Welfare State Effectiveness and Nativity in 24 Upper-and Middle-Income Democracies."
- "Measuring Ethnic Diversity."
- "Observing many researchers using the same data and hypothesis reveals a hidden universe of uncertainty."
William Donner
- "Information Seeking and Evacuation Decision Making in Hypothetical Hurricane Events in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas"
- “Who Will Stay, Who Will Leave: Decision - Making of Residents Living in Potential Hurricane Impact Areas during a Hypothetical Hurricane Event in the Rio Grande Valley."
- "The general use of outdoor warning sirens: A preliminary survey of emergency managers"
Steven Foy
- "Racism in America: A Reference Handbook"
- “Skin in the Game: Colorism and the Subtle Operation of Stereotypes in Men’s College Basketball.”
- “Beyond America: Cross-National Context and the Impact of Religious versus Secular Organizational Membership on Self-Rated Health.”
- “Reliably Republican? Shifts in U.S. Veterans’ Political Party Affiliation from 1974 to 2016.”
- “Nourish the Soul or Damage the Body?: Belief in the Connection between Christian Moral Failure and Diminished Health.”
- “The Rise of Rational Choice Theory as a Scientific/Intellectual Movement in Sociology¨
- ¨The Shade of a Criminal Record: Colorism, Incarceration, and External Racial Classification"
- "Challenges From and Beyond Symptomatology: Stereotype Threat in Young Adults with ADHD"
- "An Exploratory Study on the Association between Community Resilience and Disaster Preparedness in the Rio Grande Valley"
- "Willingness to Prepare for Disasters Among Individuals with Disabilities: An Essential Component for Building Disaster Resiliency"
- "A Bird’s-Eye View of Colonias Hosting Forgotten Americans and Their Community Resilience in the Rio Grande Valley"
- "Storm Surge Risk Assessment in Coastal Communities in the Rio Grande Valley: An Application of GIS-Based Spatial Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis with Analytical Hierarchy Process"
- "Winter Storm Uri 2021: A Litmus Test for Extreme Event Resiliency"
- "Social Connectedness, Physical Distancing and Anxiety in Complying with Shelter-in-Place Orders and Advisories during the Once-in-a-Century COVID-19 Pandemic in US: A Study of Social Media and Internet Users"
- "Kyne-Donner Model of Authority’s Recommendation and Hurricane Evacuation Decisions: A Study of Hypothetical Hurricane Event in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas"
- "Information Seeking and Evacuation Decision Making in Hypothetical Hurricane Events in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas"
- “Who Will Stay, Who Will Leave: Decision - Making of Residents Living in Potential Hurricane Impact Areas during a Hypothetical Hurricane Event in the Rio Grande Valley."
- ¨Nuclear Power Plant Emergencies in the United States¨
- "A Fukushima-Like Disaster in New York City and Possible Issues Associated with the Extreme Event Management System"
- "Living With the Invisible Risks in the U.S. Urban Areas: Potential Nuclear Power-Induced Disasters, Urban Emergency Management Challenges, and Environmental Justice Issues"
- "Emerging Environmental Justice Issues in Nuclear Power and Radioactive Contamination"
- "Public Exposure to U.S. Commercial Nuclear Power Plants Induced Disasters"
- "A Longitudinal Study of Human Exposure to Potential Nuclear Power Plan Risk"
- "Managing Nuclear Power Induced Disasters"
Arlett Lomeli
- "Ethnic Context, Education Policy, and Language Assimilation of Indigenous Peoples in Taiwan."
- "Information Seeking and Evacuation Decision Making in Hypothetical Hurricane Events in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas"
- “The Relative Influence of Legal Pressure on Outcomes in a Rehabilitation Aftercare Drug Court”
- “Who Will Stay, Who Will Leave: Decision - Making of Residents Living in Potential Hurricane Impact Areas during a Hypothetical Hurricane Event in the Rio Grande Valley.”
- “The Catholic Church and Mexican American Social Mobility in the Postwar Midwest”
- "Mexican Americans"
- "Social Context, Parental Exogamy and Hakka Language Retention in Taiwan"
Marla Perez-Lugo
- “Beyond the Ivory Tower: Exploring the Role of Universities Towards Sustainable Energy Transitions in Post Disaster Environments.”
- “Understanding Hurricane Maria: Disaster Response as Transition Management.”
Salvatore Restifo
- “Race, Gender, and Nativity in the Southwest Economy: An Intersectional Approach to Income Inequality”
- “Viewing Anti-Immigrant Hate Online: An Application of Routine Activity and Social Structure-Social Learning Theory.”
- "The Enthymemes of Supporting President Trump: Explaining the Association Between Structural Location, Supporting the President, and Agreeing with Online Extremism"
- "At a Crossroads: Economic Hierarchy and Hardship at the Intersection of Race, Sex, and Nativity"
- “Racial/Ethnic Hierarchy and Urban Labor Market Inequality: Four Poignant Historical Cases”
- “Reliably Republican? Shifts in U.S. Veterans’ Political Party Affiliation from 1974 to 2016”
- "Legitimation, State Repression, and the Sioux Massacre at Wounded Knee"
Chad Richardson
Ben Ruiz
- “The Relative Influence of Legal Pressure on Outcomes in a Rehabilitation Aftercare Drug Court”
- “Latino Group Consciousness as a Resource: The Case of Second and Third Generation Mexican Americans”
- “The Catholic Church and Mexican American Social Mobility in the Postwar Midwest”
- “Pan-Latino Neighborhoods: Contemporary Myth or Reality?”
Igor Ryabov
- "Conspicuous consumption among Hispanics: Evidence from the Consumer Expenditure Survey"
- "Educational outcomes of Asian and Hispanic Americans: The significance of skin color"
- "Examining the role of residential segregation in explaining racial/ethnic gaps in spending on fruit and vegetables"
Katarzyna Sepielak
- "A Review of Literature on the Usage of Low-Cost Sensors to Measure Particulate Matter."
- "Language proficiency and use of interpreters/translators in fieldwork: A survey of US-based anthropologists and sociologists."
- "Field Research in the Era of the Islamic State and Trump"
- "Using Low-Cost Sensors to Assess PM2.5 Concentrations at Four South Texan Cities on the U.S.-Mexico Border."
- "Fine Particulate Matter Concentrations during Independence Day Fireworks Display in the Lower Rio Grande Valley Region, South Texas, USA."
- "Football for All. The Quality of the Live Closed Captioning in the Super Bowl LII"
- "Subtitling Speed in Media Accessibility Research: Some Methodological Considerations"
- "Political parties and women's success in municipal elections in 2005 in Montérégie and Montréal (Québec, Canada)"
- "Unsung interpreters: The jumbled practice of language translation in contemporary field research. A study of Anthropological field sites in the Arab League Countries"
- "Synchronization techniques in multilingual feature voiced-over movies in Poland"
- "Synchrony in the voice-over of Polish fiction genres"
- "Translation techniques in voiced-over multilingual feature movies"
- "Synchronization techniques in multilingual feature voiced-over movies in Poland"
Canan Tanir
Dawid Wladyka
- "A Review of Literature on the Usage of Low-Cost Sensors to Measure Particulate Matter."
- "Language proficiency and use of interpreters/translators in fieldwork: A survey of US-based anthropologists and sociologists."
- "Field Research in the Era of the Islamic State and Trump"
- "Using Low-Cost Sensors to Assess PM2.5 Concentrations at Four South Texan Cities on the U.S.-Mexico Border."
- "Fine Particulate Matter Concentrations during Independence Day Fireworks Display in the Lower Rio Grande Valley Region, South Texas, USA."
- "International Immigration, Integration and Sustainability in Small Towns and Villages. Socio-Territorial Challenges in Rural and Semi-Rural Europe"
- "Unsung interpreters: the jumbled practice of language translation in contemporary field research – a study of anthropological field sites in the Arab League countries"
- "Challenges in achieving sustainability in Iberian rural areas and small towns: Exploring immigrant stakeholders’ perceptions in Alentejo, Portugal, and Empordà, Spain"
- "Immigrants’ Integration Challenges and Sustainability in Stratford-upon-Avon: Perceptions and Experiences from a ‘Global’ Small Town in Nationalistic Times"
- "War in the Feudal Zone: State Failure and the Abandonment of Anthropological Research in Mexico and Central America"
- "A sustainable touristic place in times of crisis? The case of Empuriabrava – a superdiverse Mediterranean resort"
- "The Impact of Researchers' Perceptions of Insecurity and Organized Crime on Fieldwork in Central America and Mexico"
- "The Queries to Google Search as Predictors of Migration Flows from Latin America to Spain"
- "Chinese immigrants in the Sagrada Familia neighbourhood of Barcelona, Spain: Their socio-economic viability and identity"
- "Inter-group perceptions and representations in Barcelona: A comparison of Poble Sec and Sagrada Familia neighborhoods"
Grants in 2022-2023
- Raysoni, A. U. (PI), Sepielak, K. (Co-PI), Wladyka, D. (Co-PI), Temby, O. (Co-PI), "Integration of Satellite data on Air Pollution with Socioeconomic Indicators to Assess the Impacts of Agricultural Burning on Local Communities in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of South Texas”. NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration), $249,999.00.
- Raysoni, A. U. (PI), Wladyka, D. (Co-PI), Temby, O. (Co-PI), "Empowering Air Quality Knowledge Base of the Lower RGV Citizenry in Brownsville- Harlingen – McAllen Metropolitan Area”, NADB / EPA (North American Development Bank / Environmental Protection Agency), $84,000.00.