VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Prejudice at the Intersection of Ambiguous and Obvious Groups: The Case of the Gay Black Man

We often think of stigmatized individuals as encountering only one stereotype set at a time. Yet, many individuals belong to multiple stigmatized groups, and stereotypes associated with these groups jointly influence how perceivers evaluate targets. Research suggests that perceivers integrate stereotypes about targets’ obvious identities during impression formation; however, no work has examined whether targets’ obvious (e.g., race) and ambiguous (e.g., sexual orientation) identities jointly influence impressions. Given that gay stereotypes are activated automatically, I expected the co-activation of contradictory Black (e.g., aggressive) and gay (e.g., warm) stereotypes to arouse conflict, weakening activation of negative stereotypes and improving evaluations of Black gay targets compared with Black straight targets. Participants in Study 1 rated faces of White straight men as more likable than White gay men, but rated Black gay men as more likable than Black straight men. Participants in Study 2 performed a race-categorization task designed to make race salient; nevertheless, sexual orientation still influenced impressions, producing a pattern similar to Study 1. Participants in Studies 3A (approach-avoidance task) and 3B (evaluative priming task) formed implicit impressions that converged with the explicit evaluations in Studies 1 and 2. In 3A, participants approaching Whites responded faster to straights than gays, whereas participants approaching Blacks responded faster to gays than straights. In 3B, participants recognized positive words somewhat (but not significantly) faster when primed with White straight (versus White gay) and Black gay (versus Black straight) faces. Studies 4A – C suggest that ambiguous categories modify the activation of obvious stereotypes, but do not make targets’ features look less prototypical of their obvious groups. In 4B, participants were slower to recognize Black-stereotypic words (piloted in 4A) when primed with Black gay (versus Black straight) faces. In 4C, participants rated Black straight and gay faces as similarly prototypical of Black phenotypes. Taken together, this work presents implications for stereotyping in the case of multiply-categorizable targets and for impression formation involving ambiguous categories.

Keywords: prejudice
stereotyping
cross-categorization
face perception
ambiguity
Advisor: Chasteen, Alison L.
‘Lit For Life’: Using Literacy Intervention to Foster Meaningful Life Changes for High-risk Youth with Reading Disabilities

Substantial evidence indicates that maltreatment places abused children at great risk for illiteracy and damaging self-perceptions of competency and worth. Given that academic ability and self-concept are reciprocally related and mutually reinforcing, it was hypothesized that participation in an intensive literacy intervention would positively impact the reading, writing, and related self-perceptions of maltreated Struggling Readers from the Ontario Child-Welfare system. Using a mixed methods approach, 24 participants (ages 14-24) completed achievement and self-perception measures and were interviewed about their literacy experiences and views, pre and post intervention. Repeated measures analyses and pairwise comparisons measured the impact of intervention on the literacy skills and related self-evaluations of these youth and assessed how the literacy skills and related self-evaluations differed from maltreated youth without reading difficulties (n = 22). Interviews were analyzed thematically. Results converged to provide empirical support for the benefits of literacy intervention on skill and self-perception development for this high risk group of youth. Qualitative analyses further revealed unanticipated, dramatic and meaningful life changes. Participants manifested improved communication and metacognitive skills, increased autonomy and internal motivation, and amplified feelings of empowerment and hope for the future.

Keywords: literacy
maltreatment
adolescents
intervention
reading
writing
self-perception
disability
Advisor: Willows, Dale
African/Caribbean-Canadian Women Coping with Divorce: Family Perspectives

In this dissertation, African/Caribbean-Canadian women’s experiences of coping with divorce were explored using a qualitative methodology. This study was approached from a Black Feminist paradigm using the lived experiences of Black women as a source of knowledge. Divorce and coping literature provided a theoretical framework for understanding the issues related to divorce in the Black community and effective coping efforts among Black women, particularly as it pertains to divorce. Six separated/divorced women from the same family, representing two generations, were interviewed individually and as a group using a semi-structured interview guide. The participants discussed their reflections on marriage and marital disruption, their post-separation experiences and challenges, and the coping resources they accessed during the divorce process. The participants also discussed how their own marriages and divorces were influenced by the marriages and marital disruptions of their family members. The results from the interviews were reported in a case study format using the voices of the participants to tell their own stories. A grounded theory analysis found that Black women faced the common challenges of starting over, single parenting, financial loss, lifestyle adjustment, and emotional adjustment during the divorce process. To cope with these challenges, the majority, if not all, of the women cited a support network, a sense of responsibility, a positive perspective, spirituality, and independence as effective coping resources. It was the hope of the participants and the researcher that this study would help other women experiencing divorce by illustrating how effective coping efforts can lead to greater happiness after divorce.

Keywords: African
Caribbean
African-Canadian
Caribbean-Canadian
Black women
Women
Divorce
Coping
Separation
Family
Autoethnography
Case Study
Qualitative Research
Family Group Research
Grounded Theory
Caribbean-Canadian Women
Black Feminist Thought
Black Feminism
Family influence
Advisor: Guttman, Mary Alice
Subcortical Hyperintensities in Alzheimer's Disease and the Elderly: An MRI-based Study Examining Signs of Cerebrovascular Disease and Dementia

Subcortical hyperintensities (SH) are believed to be observable signs of cerebrovascular disease, indicating some form of subcortical vasculopathy. Also commonly referred to as leukoariosis, these hyperintense signals on proton density, T2-weighted and fluid attenuated inversion recovery magnetic resonance images, are commonly observed phenomena in Alzheimer’s disease patients and elderly persons. Several SH sub-types with differential brain-behavior associations have been proposed in the scientific literature: periventricular, deep white, cystic fluid filled lacunar-like infarcts and perivascular Virchow-Robin spaces. This study will present Lesion Explorer (LE): a comprehensive tri-feature MRI-based processing pipeline that effectively and reliably quantifies SH sub-types in the context of additional brain tissues volumetrics in a regionalized manner. The LE pipeline was validated using a scan-rescan procedure. Finally, the LE pipeline was applied in a cross-sectional study of Alzheimer’s disease patients and normal elderly controls. Brain-behavior relationships were demonstrated with regional SH volumes and executive functioning, speed of mental processing, and verbal memory.

Keywords: Alzheimer's disease
Cerebrovascular disease
aging
MRI
Advisor: Black, Sandra
Psychological and Social Factors related to Physical Activities and Everyday Activities among South Asian High School Girls in the Toronto Area

Background: South Asian girls have reported low levels of physical activity (PA) compared to other Canadian adolescents. Potential explanations include omissions in existing PA measures that don’t capture all types of PA, and factors discouraging PA in this group. Purpose: This study examined the quality and quantity of PA; compared PA participation using two self-report methods; and, examined psychosocial and cultural factors associated with PA in adolescent South Asian girls. Methods: 113 participants were recruited from community sources in Toronto. Data were collected using a structured electronic diary (3 weekdays; 2 weekend days) and a self-administered online questionnaire that included the Leisure Time Exercise questionnaire. Diaries were content analyzed and compared to PA reports in the questionnaire. Bivariate and multivariate regression analyses identified factors associated with PA. Results: Diaries revealed that when a range of PA types were captured, like walking activities and chores, PA levels were similar to representative data for Canadian youth. 92% of respondents reported at least 30 minutes of PA per day across their diary entries. However, 19% did not report any PA at the vigorous intensity level, and PA levels were lowest on weekends. Reports of PA in the diary and questionnaire were inconsistent, with considerably higher levels of PA reported in the questionnaire. Enrolment in physical education, enjoyment, control, fewer barriers, and social provisions were associated with greater PA. Conclusions: Physical activity levels were low, but results did not suggest that South Asian girls are more vulnerable to low levels of activity compared to other Canadian girls. Findings from the diary suggest that PA questionnaires would benefit from including a broader range of activity types with a variety of walking activities, and structured reflections to enhance data quality and minimize the potential for over-reporting. PA levels may be increased through mandatory physical education, curricula that emphasize how girls may engage in vigorous activities outside of classes, and changes to neighbourhood environments that would promote walking.

Keywords: physical activity
adolescents
psychosocial factors
diary method
cultural factors
Advisor: Gignac, Monique
Synthetic and Theoretical Investigations of [3,3]-Sigmatropic Rearrangements and Development of Allylboration Reactions

A summary of research conducted since September 2007 at the University of Toronto in the laboratory of Professor Robert A. Batey is presented in this thesis, which is divided into four chapters. The first chapter contains a two-part introduction, where aryl- and aliphatic-Claisen rearrangements are discussed in part 1, and the nucleophilic addition of organoboron reagents to unsaturated C–N functionalities is described in part 2. Chapter 2 contains research involving synthetic and theoretical studies of aryl-Claisen rearrangements and other sigmatropic reactions. The work towards developing the lanthanide-catalyzed domino aryl-Claisen rearrangement for the synthesis of contiguous aryl–C(sp³) moieties is presented first. This is followed by computational studies involving E/Z-selectivity differences for the aryl-Claisen rearrangement, which was an issue noted for the domino aryl-Claisen reaction of a linear substrate. The mechanistic origins of E/Z-selectivity differences for the mono aryl-Claisen rearrangement, which was experimentally ambiguous for over 40 years, is resolved through computational methods. A theoretical analysis of selectivity differences for the allylic azide rearrangement is also described. The third section contains a discussion of Eu(fod)3-catalyzed aryl-Claisen rearrangements on vinyl bromide systems and preliminary studies involving application of the substrates in cross-coupling reactions, and other attempted mono- and domino sigmatropic rearrangements are presented in the fourth section. In chapter 3, the search for computational methods that can accurately predict experimental free energy of activation barriers for the aliphatic-Claisen rearrangement through benchmarking studies with a priori kinetic barrier and kinetic isotope effect data is described. Methods were found to predict new valid transition states and predict ΔG‡ values with a mean unsigned error of 0.3 kcal/mol relative to experimental values. In chapter 4, the development of new allylboration reaction is outlined, involving the double allylboration of nitriles and anhydrides, and initial studies towards the first aminoallylboration reactions of N-aluminoaldimines to form 1,2-diamines.

Keywords: Organic chemistry
Sigmatropic rearrangement
Allylation
Claisen
Boron
Computational chemistry
Allylboration
Density functional theory
Domino reaction
Lanthanide
Advisor: Batey, Robert A.
Changes in School Results in EQAO Assessments from 2006 to 2010

Many accountability systems use data from large-scale assessments to make judgements about school performance. In Ontario, school performance is often assessed using the percentage of proficient students (PPS). The purpose of this study was to shed light on the degree and frequency of changes from year to year in the percentage of proficient students, at a school, in the areas of reading, writing and mathematics for both grades 3 and 6 in Ontario from 2006 to 2010. A second purpose was to assess the influence of cohort size on the variability in scores from year to year. Once schools not having data for 5 consecutive years and outliers were omitted secondary data analysis was used to examine nearly 3000 schools in each subject and grade. For the first part of the study, descriptive statistics and frequencies were the main method of examination. In the second part of the study, variance scores and correlations were used in order to understand the relationship between changes in PPS and cohort size. Findings revealed that changes in school scores from year to year are very large for many schools. Approximately 50 percent of schools experienced changes in PPS greater than 10 percent in any given year. When examining how often, from 2006 to 2010, a school experienced a similar amount of change – generally, both the smallest and largest change categories had a larger percentage of schools experiencing a similar amount of change for two and three years. Very seldom did schools experience the same degree of change in PPS across all 5 years. Results from correlations revealed a significant and inverse relationship between average cohort size and variability in PPS. Considering over 80 percent of schools have 60 or fewer students in a cohort the unpredictability in PPS may prove to be quite frustrating to schools and confusing to stakeholders. Annual PPS scores appear to be a poor indicator of real school performance, and their use to rank or rate schools should be avoided. Recommendations are made about using PPS to report school level results for EQAO, schools and the public.

Keywords: EQAO assessment
fluctuations
percentage of proficient students
large-scale assessment
cohort size
annual change in PPS
Advisor: Levin, Ben
The Milky Way's Most Luminous Star Clusters: Engines of Galaxy Evolution

Massive young star clusters and OB associations (M > 10 000 Msun) dominate the energetic feedback from stars into the interstellar medium. They contain the most massive and luminous stars in the Galaxy, which shape their environments through winds, ionizing flux, radiation pressure, and eventually supernovae, destroying their natal molecular clouds and inflating superbubbles. Few such clusters have been identified in our Galaxy. We systematically investigate the most luminous H II regions, which we identify using the WMAP foreground maps. We find that the 13 most luminous sources produce one-third of the Galaxy’s total ionizing luminosity, all with expected powering populations of M > 40 000 Msun. These populations are grouped in small numbers of clusters or associations for each WMAP source. The emission from these regions is dominated by the diffuse component at large radii (∼10-70 pc) indicating a high leaking fraction of ionizing photons. Using 8 μm maps from Spitzer GLIMPSE and published radio recombination line observations, we resolve the large (> 1◦) WMAP sources into 40 star forming complexes (SFCs) exhibiting shell morphology with evidence of expansion due to a central powering source. We develop a method, based on differential extinction of the galactic disk, to identify the SFC’s powering cluster candidates with 2MASS. We identify 22 cluster candidates within the 40 SFCs having extinctions consistent with their distances. With near-infrared spectroscopy from the New Technology Telescope, we have confirmed the existence of the most massive of these associations, the Dragonfish Association, with M = 100 000 Msun. Of the 50 sampled stars, we identify 2 Luminous Blue Variable candidates, a Wolf-Rayet, and 15 O-type stars, consistent with the yield expected from the candidate contamination rate, verifying the candidate cluster identification method. This investigation doubles the number of massive young star clusters and OB associations known and produces the most complete picture of the upper end of the Galaxy’s cluster mass function to date.

Keywords: Star Formation
Star Clusters
OB Associations
Milky Way
Dragonfish Association
Spectroscopy
Advisor: Matzner, Christopher D.
Moon, Dae-Sik
Temi, strutture e linguaggi nel canzoniere di Isabella Andreini (1601)

This study seeks to present a philologically accurate and complete edition of Isabella Andreini’s collection of lyric poetry published in 1601. The collection comprises a total of 368 poems: 196 sonnets, 125 madrigals, 6 canzoni, 10 canzonette morali, 2 sestine, 2 epithalamia, 2 centoni, 3 capitoli, 9 scherzi, 4 versi funerali and 9 egloghe boscherecce. The investigation conducted on Andreini’s poems has led us to discover that the variety of metrical structures that make up her collection are perfectly in line with the trends of the century, as confirmed by both Chiabrera’s lyric poetry and the second part of Marino’s Rime. The present study highlights Isabella’s unique poetic personality and her innovative position in literary history. The interpretation of Isabella Andreini’s poetry in the entire thesis revolves around the statement of poetics she makes in the very first poem of the collection. In fact, in her proemial sonnet Andreini declares the non-autobiographical nature of the fervours expressed by her poems, thus declaring that her compositions are simply a poetic exercise. This is made clear further when she states that following her ability as an actress, she wrote in varying style a thousand pages, thus making reference to the variety of styles and metrical schemes she adopted in her poems. Using similar language, she warns the readers of the different narrating voices in the collection, stating that just as on stage she played different parts as woman and others as man, so she did in her poems. It is clear that the special feature of Andreini’s lyrical style is amenable to her talent as an actress, and it was in fact due to her acting skills that she could ably impersonate a man, or conceal the identity of the narrator in her poems, using this ‘invention’ as a key element in her creative process.

Keywords: Literature
Poetry
Romance
Italian
Baroque
Advisor: Guardiani, Francesco
Social Spaces, Symbolic Power and Language Identities: A Case Study of the Language Use of Chinese Adolescents in Canada

Research has shown that late-arriving teen English language learners (ELLs) are deeply rooted in the sociocultural and educational system of their home country for a majority of their schooling time (Duff, 2001; Minichello, 2001). In their transition to a new society in North America, this group encounters sociocultural and linguistic differences in their daily lives. Through a lens entitled Critical Multiple Social Spaces, which combines the Multiple Worlds Model (Phelan et al., 1991), the concept of Third Space (Bhabha, 1994) and a sociocultural perspective on language use (Fairclough, 2001; Pennycook, 2010), this qualitative case study focuses on 10 Chinese ELL adolescents who came to Canada after the age of 15, and examines their cross-trajectory experiences of English practice in their daily lives and their language identities. At the time of this study, they were at the stage of completing high school and applying for admission to higher education institutions. Findings showed that this group’s language use in daily life is full of conflicts, negotiation and consolidation, not only at school as a usual space of contested language practice, but also at home, with peers and in other spaces. At school, social division existed both in and out of class, yet such social division was not merely due to ELLs’ reluctance to integrate. Participants positioned themselves differently in English Literature courses and core classes in accordance with their perceived proficiency. Home, generally regarded as a traditionally stable space of language practice, became another site of complex dynamics. Peer networks also emerged as embodying similar complications. In addition to racial and ethnic factors, age on arrival and length of residence played a significant role in social interaction, impacting both same-ethnic and cross-ethnic peer networks. Based on these findings, four categories are identified pertaining to participants’ cross-trajectory language experiences, in which English spaces are positioned differently in relation to other spaces. Equally noteworthy are the dynamics between social spaces, social relations and language use, which shape – and are shaped by – symbolic power, investment and language identities. The implications of these findings on ELL adolescents’ language use in a broader migration space are also discussed.

Keywords: Social Spaces
Immigrant adolescents
Chinese ELL adolescents
Language identities
home, peer networks, and school
social networks
symbolic power
social and symbolic capital
Advisor: Gagne, Antoinette