Fordham University: DigitalResearch@Fordham
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Jacobs, Feygele
No full textFeygele Jacobs recounts her family\u27s journey from Poland to the Bronx, detailing her parents\u27 refugee experience post-World War II. Her parents initially settled in Newark, New Jersey, before moving to the Bronx. Feygele describes her education at PS 26 and Hunter College High School, involvement in Yiddish school and activities, and her parents\u27 diverse backgrounds. Her mother, a late bloomer in education, pursued a career in social work after raising her children. The family moved to Co-Op City in 1972 due to neighborhood changes. Feygele highlights her parents\u27 community involvement and her educational and career choices, including a brief stint in a PhD program. Miss Jacobs fondly recalls growing up in the Bronx, highlighting warm memories of family, community, and local life. She reflects on learning the Bronx\u27s geography and history later in life, including the impact of Robert Moses\u27s urban planning. Despite the challenges of the 1968 teacher strike and the subsequent gentrification, which she acknowledges as a double-edged process, she maintains positive feelings about her upbringing there. She also mentions the close-knit relationships with family and local businesses, contributing to their positive experiences in the Bronx
Cohen, Cheryl
No full textSummarizer: Sophia Maier
Cheryl Cohen grew up on Kruger Avenue and Pelham Parkway South, which she describes as 95% Jewish during her time there. Her parents were both born in the United States, her mother of a nonreligious background and her father attending a small Orthodox shul on the holidays. Cohen herself did not have a Jewish education but dressed up for the holidays with her friends and closely associates her Jewish identity with Zionism, moving to Israel in her 20s. Her father, who first worked for his father-in-law’s factory, opened a small store, where her mother worked as well as a bookkeeper.
Cohen recalls many delicatessens and candy stores on nearby Lydig Avenue and White Plains Road. She and other children would be constantly outside, yelling up to their apartment windows. They roller skated, rode bikes, and played games with spaldeens, including “A my name is Alice,” as her grandmothers and other older women watched on. Cohen was in the SPs and eventually went on to Bronx High School of Science and City College, working as a religious educator and teaching assistant for many years until getting a master’s degree in library science.
Cohen listened to Motown and soul while others were listening to the Beatles, and, while she attended some rallies, did not consider herself a real activist during the Vietnam War. As a child and teenager, she attended various summer camps, including through Bronx House, and continue to work at some of the camps as an adult. She describes her environment as almost entirely Jewish, almost as much as her time in Israel, and how they interacted with the few non-Jewish kids on the block.
Cohen left the Bronx with her parents and moved to Westchester while in college in 1970. Her grandmothers still lived in their old building, but once they passed away Cohen stopped returning to the Bronx. She describes the changes in the neighborhood witnessed in visits over time, and how the Bronx has improved since that low period with more co-ops and Russian immigrants in the area. Cohen is very proud to be from the Bronx, considering herself fortunate to have had an experience as a city kid that she doubts exists anymore.
Keywords: Pelham Parkway, High Holy Days, Zionism, Israel, religion, kosher, food, Kruger Avenue, Lydig Avenue, White Plains Road, Fordham Road, PS 105, Bronx High School of Science, City College, street games, education, Bronx House, summer camp, Camp Cejwin, antisemitism, rac
The Abyss of Abundance: Consumer Overconsumption and the Road to Environmental Collapse
No full textThe pattern of consumer overconsumption, fueled by relentless economic growth and the internal desire for material goods, has emerged as a prominent driver of environmental degradation, pushing our planet to collapse. This paper examines the cause-and-effect relationships between consumer behavior and its catastrophic environmental implications. By unraveling the root causes of overconsumption and its detrimental effects, this study attempts to underscore the urgency of immediate action to prevent irreversible environmental collapse. Chapter 1 will discuss the problem of consumer overconsumption, including an analysis of the detrimental environmental effects of our current consumption levels to highlight why the issue of consumer overconsumption needs to be addressed. Chapter 2 will explore the psychology of human behavior, namely, the mechanisms that cause us to purchase the way we do, explicitly highlighting the role of social media and marketing in driving consumer consumption patterns. Chapter 3 will examine obstacles within the current sustainable business movement in The United States, unpacking the privilege of sustainable living through issues of class and deceptive marketing practices in place, capitalizing on individuals\u27 willingness to pay for environmentally focused products. The fourth chapter will implement environmental politics to analyze what various political players, including the government, environmental organizations, sustainable business organizations, and consumers, are doing about the problems outlined in the previous two chapters. Finally, Chapter 5 will probe what I believe is necessary to solve the issue of consumer overconsumption, including strong legislation for encouraging sustainable production and consumption, a circular economy system, implementing environmental regulations, taxes, subsidies, or incentives, and environmental education regarding the consequences of overconsumption. Urgent and collaborative efforts from the business industry, the government, and the everyday consumer are necessary to curb overconsumption and ensure our planet\u27s preservation for many generations
Cultivating Hope: The Influence of Positive Outlooks in K-12 Climate Change Education
No full textAbstract
Students studying the environment know and feel the emotional toll that it can take. This can easily contribute to mental health issues and utter defeat. This paper addresses the exclusion of optimism from environmental education and the impacts this has on childhood development and students as they advance to higher levels of education. Through this analysis, the goal is to find a role for hope in a topic typically framed in an apocalyptic manner. The shift from denying the existence of climate change to denying that it can be addressed, particularly through the usage of “doomsday language,” has created a culture of pessimism, hopelessness, and despair in environmental education, and led to further mental health issues among adolescents. Climate optimism is often looked down upon as naive; however, few studies have actually analyzed the potential utility of hope in environmental education. This paper aims to bridge that gap in data with a case study on Fordham students majoring in environmental studies and how their childhood environmental education affected them. chapter 1 defines climate pessimism and presents quantitative and qualitative data on the issue using past studies. This chapter talks a little about environmental psychology, and how harmful doomsday language can be. chapter 2 provides the history of childhood environmental education and the role climate views have played in the past. Further, it discusses past studies that have been done on the role of hope in environmental education. chapter 3 evaluates the effect of pessimistic and optimistic approaches in childhood education and the impact they have on childhood development, and expands on chapter 1, proposing a framework for climate change that psychologists recommend. chapter 4 introduces the current governmental and school policies on environmental education, and chapter 5 expands on this, diving into critical dialogue about future recommendations for redesigning the curriculum and proposing changes and alternatives to better address the crushing defeat that many students feel in environmental education.
Keywords: environmental policy, environmental education, environmental history, developmental psychology, climate optimism, climate pessimism, environmental psychology, educational psycholog
“I Learned to Bottle Up My Feelings From a Young Age”: A Narrative Analysis of Latina Young People’s Family Mental Health Socialization
No full textLatina young people report high levels of mental health problems and low levels of help-seeking compared with their white peers, but little research has examined factors influencing their mental health views. Inductive analysis of 25 participants’ narratives revealed that Latina young people described three stages in the development of their mental health-related beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors: undergoing a process of family mental health socialization, suffering in silence, and attaining a new perspective. Within each of these phases, participants shared stories that attest to their agency and resilience. This research uncovers a novel theoretical construct, “family mental health socialization,” which elucidates how young people internalize mental health-related beliefs, behaviors, and norms within their cultural and family context. Implications for social work practice include the need for culturally sensitive, family-centered interventions that promote open communication about mental health
À la comment du peuple — How youth communicated, connected, and collaborated online around the French presidential election of 2022
No full textHow are French youth communicating online with themselves and how are they interacting with the information they consume? This study considers the question by examining YouTube comments from the comment sections of two interviews done on presidential candidates during the 2022 presidential election by 26-year-old influencer, Hugo Decrypte. These comments were compared with comments from interviews done by traditional TV news sources on the same candidates (BFMTV, a privately owned broadcaster, and Touche pas à mon poste!, an originally public broadcast hosted by a Gen-X TV personality). The comments were scraped using Octoparse web data extraction software and then sorted by ‘likes’. Based on their rankings, a close reading was done of the top five to ten comments and these comments were further compared to public polling and survey data on political motivation and ideology. The findings show that despite increasing polarization in the online space, French youth actively seek neutral information about and on both sides of the political spectrum. French youth also primarily connect over ideological similarities instead of connecting under political parties. French youth online use comment sections as places to share, collaborate, and connect over their political beliefs and share their opinions freely
Changes in Motivation and Self-Efficacy to Quit Smoking Among People With Serious Mental Illness Who Smoke: A Latent Class Growth Analysis
No full textPeople with serious mental illness (SMI) smoke at exceedingly high rates, and have low rates of cessation success. Motivation and self-efficacy to quit smoking are important predictors of cessation success. While motivation and self-efficacy are dynamic constructs that change with time, little is known about the effects of the changes in motivation and self-efficacy to quit over time on smoking cessation among people with SMI. This study investigated: 1) latent classes of patterns of motivation and self-efficacy to quit smoking, 2) factors predicting latent class membership, 3) effects of latent class membership on smoking abstinence. Participants were 300 adults with SMI in inpatient psychiatric care who smoked at least 5 cigarettes/day pre-hospitalization who were randomized to receive either a tailored smoking cessation intervention for people with SMI (motivational counseling, post-discharge nicotine patches and telephone quitline counseling) or usual care (brief counseling). Participants completed baseline, 1, 3 and 6-month assessments. We conducted four separate latent class growth analysis (LCGA) based on: 1) desire to quit smoking, 2) willingness to work hard at quitting smoking, 3) perceived difficulty in quitting smoking, 4) perceived success in quitting smoking. We assessed whether treatment condition, nicotine dependence and mood symptoms predicted class membership as well as the effects of class membership on 6-month smoking abstinence. Across all four LCGA models, the two-class model showed the best model fit. For all four models, two classes were differentiated by overall levels (high vs. low). The rates of change over time in desire to quit, willingness to work hard, and perceived success did not differ across the two classes. For perceived difficulty, one class showed a reduction while the other class remained stable. Only desire to quit (both classes) showed an increase over time. Higher baseline anxiety and receiving treatment predicted higher desire to quit smoking. Higher baseline anxiety, depression, and nicotine dependence predicted lower perceived success and higher perceived difficulty in quitting. Class membership of all four constructs predicted 6-month abstinence. Individuals with SMI reported relatively stable motivation and self-efficacy to quit over 6 months after hospitalization while an increase in desire to quit and a decrease in perceived difficulty were also found. Higher sustained motivation and self-efficacy predicted cessation success. Identifying ways to elevate and sustain motivation and self-efficacy may facilitate cessation success for people with SMI
From Invisible to Visible: Phenomenological Analysis of Living With Concealable Chronic Conditions
No full textLong COVID has contributed to the unveiling of invisible chronic conditions, which, while not necessarily life-threatening, profoundly affects an individual’s physical and psychological wellbeing. Concealable chronic conditions (CCCs) encompass incurable, long-term health conditions characterized by symptoms that are difficult to visibly detect, thereby classified as concealable stigmatized identities due to the invisible nature of symptoms and the health stigma. The current study aimed to introduce the lived experiences of young adults with CCCs, with a particular focus on their disclosure experiences and coping with CCCs in times of Long COVID. A total of 14 individuals across the United States participated in semi-structured interviews. Findings illustrated the following themes in their lived experiences of CCCs: (a) early disclosure and medical gaslighting, (b) selective disclosure process, and (c) navigation of resources and support post-pandemic. Implications for counseling young adults with CCCs and future research directions are discussed
The Religiosity of the Philosophical Life: Plato on Eros and the Human Soul
No full textIn this dissertation, I argue that Plato understands the nature of philosophy to be a religious discipline in which love (eros) is what determines, in absolute fashion, what we know and how we act.In Chapter 1, I argue that for Plato, reason is a human faculty which images the Divine. The divine Ideas represent structures within our mind which reveal the Divine to human beings. Thus, reason, in granting self-knowledge, also grants knowledge of the Divine.I argue in Chapter 2 that Plato believes two simple desires run within human nature. One represents an innate rational desire to better know the Divine, the other an irrational desire to satisfy the desires of the body for their own sake.In Chapter 3, I look at the analogy of the charioteer in Phaedrus. I argue the analogy reflects the aforementioned bifurcated desires set before the intellect, and that in the analogy, eros, represented as a choice between these desires, is what determines what a person believes absolutely: granting knowledge (episteme) or opinion (doxe).In Chapter 4, I discuss philosophy as the religious life for Plato. This life begins with conversion, in which the soul comes to erotically desire the Divine, but it is also one of slow, continual growth towards knowledge of the Divine.In chapter 5, I discuss the nature of knowledge for Plato. I argue that knowledge represents a moment of insight into the Divine. Real knowledge is existential knowledge : something so deep and abiding that we never act contrary to it.In Chapter 6, I argue that since knowledge is only derived from what we love, and since eros is a sovereign act of the soul, knowledge is incommunicable. Thus a soul can be aided by a teacher towards knowledge, but the teacher cannot instigate or control it.A final takeaway which I open up for future research follows: it is unsurprising that Plato as writer would take on the role of the teacher, and not to communicate knowledge directly, but rather to simply spur the reader to convert and to take on the philosophical life themselves