A Phenomenological Study Examining the Journey of Identity Development for Internationally Adopted Adolescents in the United States

The purpose of this transcendental phenomenological study was to understand the perspectives of young adults who were internationally adopted to the United States during their adolescent years and to describe the experiences that contributed to their identity development. Erikson’s psychosocial development theory guided this study as it examined the relationships, roles, and values that humans commit to during the critical period of adolescence. Social identity theory furthered insight as to how individuals have defined themselves and their social categorization within groups, while the multiple dimensions of identity model helped define the key categories, themes, and contextual influences that have contributed to the adoptee’s psychological and social adjustment in their search for self. Thirteen participants were a purposefully selected sample of international adoptees who were ages 12–17 years at the time of adoption and have since graduated from high school or have obtained a General Equivalency Diploma (GED). Individuals were ages 18–26 years at the time of participation and had been residents of the United States for at least five years. Surveys, adoption records, semi-structured interviews, identity models, and advice letters were methods for collecting data of the adoptees’ experiences and perceptions. Significant statements were captured from the data and clustered into themes. The synthesis of textural and structural descriptions provided a basis for understanding the essence of the phenomena (Moustakas, 1994). Through this process, barriers to self-development, the impact of relationships, the international adoptee’s sense of purpose, as well as the resulting complex identity dimensions they perceive, came to light

Reform-Based Science Teaching: A Mixed-Methods Approach to Explaining Variation in Secondary Science Teacher Practice

The purpose of this two-phase, sequential explanatory mixed-methods study was to understand and explain the variation seen in secondary science teachers\u27 enactment of reform-based instructional practices. Utilizing teacher socialization theory, this mixed-methods analysis was conducted to determine the relative influence of secondary science teachers\u27 characteristics, backgrounds and experiences across their teacher development to explain the range of teaching practices exhibited by graduates from three reform-oriented teacher preparation programs. Data for this study were obtained from the Investigating the Meaningfulness of Preservice Programs Across the Continuum of Teaching (IMPPACT) Project, a multi-university, longitudinal study funded by NSF. In the first quantitative phase of the study, data for the sample (N=120) were collected from three surveys from the IMPPACT Project database. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis was used to examine the separate as well as the combined influence of factors such as teachers\u27 personal and professional background characteristics, beliefs about reform-based science teaching, feelings of preparedness to teach science, school context, school culture and climate of professional learning, and influences of the policy environment on the teachers\u27 use of reform-based instructional practices. Findings indicate three blocks of variables, professional background, beliefs/efficacy, and local school context added significant contribution to explaining nearly 38% of the variation in secondary science teachers\u27 use of reform-based instructional practices. The five variables that significantly contributed to explaining variation in teachers\u27 use of reform-based instructional practices in the full model were, university of teacher preparation, sense of preparation for teaching science, the quality of professional development, science content focused professional, and the perceived level of professional autonomy. Using the results from phase one, the second qualitative phase selected six case study teachers based on their levels of reform-based teaching practices to highlight teachers across the range of practices from low, average, to high levels of implementation. Using multiple interview sources, phase two helped to further explain the variation in levels of reform-based practices. Themes related to teachers\u27 backgrounds, local contexts, and state policy environments were developed as they related to teachers\u27 socialization experiences across these contexts. The results of the qualitative analysis identified the following factors differentiating teachers who enacted reform-based instructional practices from those who did not: 1) extensive science research experiences prior to their preservice teacher preparation; 2) the structure and quality of their field placements; 3) developing and valuing a research-based understanding of teaching and learning as a result of their preservice teacher preparation experiences; 4) the professional culture of their school context where there was support for a high degree of professional autonomy and receiving support from educational companions with a specific focus on teacher pedagogy to support student learning; and 5) a greater sense of agency to navigate their districts\u27 interpretation and implementation of state polices. Implications for key stakeholders as well as directions for future research are discussed

Interdisciplinary Research Journeys

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Interdisciplinarity' has become a rallying cry among funders and leaders of research. Yet, while the creative potential of interdisciplinary research is great, it poses many challenges. If you don't have disciplinary boundaries, how do you decide what to include or leave out? And what are the parameters for evaluating the research? This book provides a practical guide for researchers and research managers who are seeking to develop interdisciplinary research strategies at a personal, institutional and multi-institutional level. The book draws on examples from across the social and natural sciences but also offers valuable lessons for other combinations of more proximate disciplines. At a time when interdisciplinary research is increasingly centre stage in the research agenda, this book offers a crucial practical guide for researchers, research funders and managers from all backgrounds and contexts

Redefining parenting : the process of raising adopted children with fetal alcohol effects (FAE)

This thesis examines the experiences of parents who are raising their adopted children who have Fetal Alcohol Effects (FAE). Four married couples, and one single mother, who married after she had raised her sons participated in this study. All are white and middle or upper-middle class. Five adoptive mothers and one adoptive father were interviewed, while their spouses contributed to the study by reviewing the interview transcripts, and discussing issues raised within them. Eight children with diagnosed or suspected FAE are discussed. They are Cree or Saulteaux, and are between the ages of nine and 23 . Through multiple in-depth interviews, and the demographic profile form, richly detailed information was recorded on these families' day-to-day lives: the children's school experiences, learning disabilities and behaviour problems, their strengths, their health and interactions with peers; parents' interactions with professionals, treatments and behaviour management strategies they sought or devised, their use of support groups and other forms of social support and encounters with the criminal justice and mental health systems. Grounded theory methodology was used to analyse the data and a conceptual model was constructed to outline the process of redefining parenting which describes the practical and psychological tasks parents perform as the family evolves over time. A central role is taken by the mothers who become advocates for their children as they undertake a quest for the meaning of their children's behaviour, seek a diagnosis, and try to secure services for them. It was found that people with FAE are misunderstood and misdiagnosed because of their anomalous nature, which often leads to stigmatisation. This thesis attempts to dispel these misconceptions, document the parents' and children's struggles, and identify the types of services these families desperately need

What Can I Do? Preservice Elementary Teachers Developing Understandings of Self as Mathematics Teacher and Teaching in Context

In order to prepare preservice teachers (PSTs) to enact teaching practices that best support all students in learning mathematics, elementary mathematics teacher education must prepare PSTs to navigate the many social, political, and institutional dynamics in today's classrooms. In this research, I theorized that successful negotiation of these dynamics requires that teachers have an understanding of themselves as mathematics teachers, including an examined vision of their goals of mathematics teaching, the social and political contexts of schooling, and the realities of their school contexts. In this study, I explored how PSTs understood themselves as mathematics teachers and teaching through participation in a seminar designed to support critical examination of themselves as mathematics teachers, particularly as within complex realities of schooling and attention to equity and access. The theoretical perspective of performativity (Butler, 1999) was used to understand and support PST identity work and specifically guided the design of the seminar and the case analysis. Each of the four cases offers a unique perspective on how PSTs understood themselves as mathematics teachers and mathematics teaching and how these understandings shifted. The first of three findings across the cases was that PSTs understood themselves and their teaching differently. Specifically, as articulated in the second finding, they understood teaching for equity differently and in relation to their own self-understandings. The third finding is that PSTs' understandings of themselves as mathematics teachers and mathematics teaching shifted. Thus, understanding PSTs' mathematics teacher identities through a theoretical premise of performativity and supporting PSTs in deconstructing these contexts, expectations, and constraints supported some PSTs in repositioning themselves in relation to dominant discourses that framed their understandings of mathematics teaching and in problematizing mathematics teaching. These findings have implications for mathematics teacher education, offering new tools and specific concrete resources to support mathematics teacher critical self-examination. Findings also suggest the need for PSTs to engage in continued identity work and in facilitated opportunities to work at the intersections of mathematics teaching with issues of race, class, and institutional discourses of testing. Further research on operationalizing a critical pedagogy in mathematics teacher education is also needed

Interdisciplinary Research Journeys

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. Interdisciplinarity' has become a rallying cry among funders and leaders of research. Yet, while the creative potential of interdisciplinary research is great, it poses many challenges. If you don't have disciplinary boundaries, how do you decide what to include or leave out? And what are the parameters for evaluating the research? This book provides a practical guide for researchers and research managers who are seeking to develop interdisciplinary research strategies at a personal, institutional and multi-institutional level. The book draws on examples from across the social and natural sciences but also offers valuable lessons for other combinations of more proximate disciplines. At a time when interdisciplinary research is increasingly centre stage in the research agenda, this book offers a crucial practical guide for researchers, research funders and managers from all backgrounds and contexts

The linguistic construction of character relations in TV drama : doing friendship in Sex and the City

Die vorliegende Arbeit ist im Bereich der angewandten Gesprächsanalyse angesiedelt und beschäftigt sich mit der Frage, wie Freundschaftsbeziehungen zwischen den Charakteren in Fernsehserien erfasst werden können. Sie fokussiert damit zum einen auf konstruierte Dialoge und zum anderen auf Beziehungsarbeit im Gespräch. Um mediale Beziehungsarbeit zu untersuchen, wird ein Modell zum screen-to-face discourse entworfen. Freundschaft wird als dialektischer Prozess zur Herstellung einer angemessenen Balance zwischen Assoziation und Dissoziation verstanden, der anhand von Gesprächsmustern deutlich gemacht werden kann. Zuschauer/-innen gleichen vernommene sprachliche Muster mit ihrem Wissen über das Gesprächsverhalten in bestimmten Beziehungskonstellationen ab und ziehen daraus Schlüsse über die sozialen Bande zwischen den Charakteren. Die Muster, die auf verschiedenen Gesprächsebenen Beziehung generieren, bezeichnet man als interaktionale Ausrichtungen (alignments / disalignment bzw. affiliation / disaffiliation). Zwei Praktiken, die solche Ausrichtungen bewerkstelligen, werden näher untersucht: Formen der Anrede und Frage-Antwort-Sequenzen. Die Adressiertheit der Rede (Kosenamen/Vornamen) häuft sich in Kontexten, in denen die Beziehung in irgendeiner Weise bedroht ist, und ermöglicht eine affiliation im Zuge von disaffiliative moves. Fragen werden hauptsächlich als pro-aktives Mittel zur affiliation eingesetzt und bilden das Kernstück vieler typischer Freundschaftsaktivitäten. Die interaktionalen Ausrichtungen unter den Sex and the City Charakteren wechseln ständig, wobei die Komplexität der Muster mit steigender Zahl der Gesprächsteilnehmerinnen steigt, bis hin zur Ausbildung interaktionaler Teams. Sich permanent verschiebende Muster der Interaktionsordnung auf der sozialen Mikroebene führen zur Aus- und Umbildung sozialer Beziehungen auf der gesellschaftlichen Makroebene. Durch die flexiblen Ausrichtungsmuster sind dabei auch Kritik und Widerspruch möglich und es kann zu einer inneren Differenzierung des Freundschaftskreises im Sinne einer community of practice kommen. Die vorliegende Arbeit leistet damit nicht nur einen Beitrag zur Stilistik und medialen Kommunikation, sondern auch zur soziologisch orientierten Diskursanalyse.This study attempts to answer the question how the audience in front of the screen knows what kind of relationship characters on screen have from overhearing their talk. Hence, it has two major focal points: dialogue scripted for the screen and the linguistic construction of interpersonal relations. Assuming a process view of friendship relations and developing a model of screen-to-face discourse, which takes Goffman\u27;s notion of the "overhearer\u27; as a starting point and stresses the audience\u27;s central role in the co-construction of meaning, this study pins down the textual cues which lead to the viewer\u27;s formation of a relationship impression. The patterns of the interaction order commonly termed "alignments\u27; are shown to be fundamental to the friendship process in which a balance between association and dissociation needs to be achieved. Focusing on the conversational contexts in which they accumulate, the workings of two particularly interesting and versatile alignment practices are described: familiar terms of address used in direct address and question-answer-sequences. Familiar terms of address occur in contexts characterised by a temporary suspension of some fundamental component of friendship relations and function to assuage this disequilibrium by signalling affiliation. Questions predominantly initiate and maintain extended affiliative sequences such as intimacy pursuits and humorous exchanges and have thus a more active part in friendship processes. Analyses of the complex alignment practices in the women\u27;s conversations reveal that the women shift between aligning and disaligning — often even creating temporary interactional teams — and that these shifts accomplish micro-transformations of social structure, which in turn construct social relations on the macro-level. The study shows that the flexibility of the interaction order brought about by shifting alignments allows for criticism and disagreement in a friendship group and also for an intragroup differentiation with more central and more marginal members in the sense of a community of practice. The study hence not only contributes to the fields of linguistic stylistics and media studies, but also to relational communication and discourse analysis, in particular through revising the concept of alignment