Joe L. Lott

Doctoral student attrition in the stem fields: An exploratory event history analysis.

The STEM fields, otherwise known as the Sciences, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics areas, have become the focus of multiple studies and funding initiatives in recent years. Despite these efforts, lingering concerns exist about who enters, who is retained, and who completes the doctorate in STEM fields. This study utilizes discrete-time event history analysis to model doctoral attrition for 10,088 individuals, in 56 STEM departments, at one research-extensive institution, located in the South, over a 20-year period. Results show that the odds of attrition are the greatest in the first year. Additionally, the odds of attrition are greater for females, Asians, and for those who belong to a hard-applied science major (versus a hard-pure major). The odds of attrition are lower for married students and for those who have higher relative GRE scores than their peers in the same program. The findings of this study provide a deeper understanding of the relationship between particular characteristics of doctoral students and programs on attrition rates over time.

Reinforcing Deficit, Journeying Toward Equity Cultural Brokering in Family Engagement Initiatives

Families are key actors in efforts to improve student learning and outcomes, but conventional engagement efforts often disregard the cultural and social resources of nondominant families. Individuals who serve as cultural brokers play critical, though complex, roles bridging between schools and families. Using an equitable collaboration lens with boundary-spanning theory, this comparative case study examined how individuals enacted cultural brokering within three organizational contexts. Our findings suggest a predominance of cultural brokering consistent with programmatic goals to socialize nondominant families into school-centric norms and agendas. However, formal leadership and boundary-spanning ambiguity enabled more collective, relational, or reciprocal cultural brokering. These dynamics suggest potential stepping stones and organizational conditions for moving toward more equitable forms of family-school collaboration and systemic transformation.

Assessing the Psychometric Properties of Civic Values

There is limited research about the validity and reliability of civic engagement indicators. This study examines the measurement invariance of a Civic Values construct based on students’ responses on the 2000 Freshman Survey and 2004 College Senior Survey, which are both part of the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP). Results show that eight items best estimate Civic Values, and these items are stable across time points. Also, Civic Values are more diffuse during students’ freshman year and more correlated during their senior year. Explanations about elements of the collegiate environment that may affect growth on the items that measure Civic Values are also discussed.

Volunteerism: Latina/o Students and Private-College Experiences

Using data from the Cooperative Institutional Research Program from University of California Los Angeles (n = 523), this study investigates curricular and co-curricular experiences that influence t...Using data from the Cooperative Institutional Research Program from University of California Los Angeles (n = 523), this study investigates curricular and co-curricular experiences that influence the odds of volunteering for Latina/o students who attend private institutions. Results show that Latinas/os who rated themselves highly on leadership ability, attended religious services, voted in a student election, had taken an Ethnic Studies course, and/or participated in study abroad had significantly higher odds of volunteering while in college. The implications of these results are relevant to policy and practice, as colleges provide opportunities that shape civic attitudes and behaviors.

Evidence-Based Reading and Writing Assessment for Dyslexia in Adolescents and Young Adults.

The same working memory and reading and writing achievement phenotypes (behavioral markers of genetic variants) validated in prior research with younger children and older adults in a multi-generational family genetics study of dyslexia were used to study 81 adolescent and young adults (ages 16 to 25) from that study. Dyslexia is impaired word reading and spelling skills below the population mean and ability to use oral language to express thinking. These working memory predictor measures were given and used to predict reading and writing achievement: Coding (storing and processing) heard and spoken words (phonological coding), read and written words (orthographic coding), base words and affixes (morphological coding), and accumulating words over time (syntax coding); Cross-Code Integration (phonological loop for linking phonological name and orthographic letter codes and orthographic loop for linking orthographic letter codes and finger sequencing codes), and Supervisory Attention (focused and switching attention and self-monitoring during written word finding). Multiple regressions showed that most predictors explained individual difference in at least one reading or writing outcome, but which predictors explained unique variance beyond shared variance depended on outcome. ANOVAs confirmed that research-supported criteria for dyslexia validated for younger children and their parents could be used to diagnose which adolescents and young adults did (n=31) or did not (n=50) meet research criteria for dyslexia. Findings are discussed in reference to the heterogeneity of phenotypes (behavioral markers of genetic variables) and their application to assessment for accommodations and ongoing instruction for adolescents and young adults with dyslexia.

Testing the Factorial Invariance of the Black Racial Identity Scale Across Gender

Given that over 50 studies have been published using the Black Racial Identity Scale (BRIAS), the study of its dimensions and structural components are important to understanding Black people and the evolution of Black racial identity theory. Unconstrained and constrained confirmatory factor analysis models were estimated across males and females to test the hypothesis that Black men and Black women will respond similarly on the BRIAS. Findings suggest that items on the BRIAS scales are not invariant across groups through interpreting fit indexes and the Lagrange multiplier test. The results of this study supports past research that found inconsistent psychometric qualities of the BRIAS.

The Ecology of Volunteerism Among College Women: Identifying Campus Environments that Inform Volunteering Behaviors

This study explores the relationship between campus environments, female college student peer culture, and the tendency to volunteer while in college. The authors used Bronfenbrenner’s ecological model of human development (1977, 2005) as a framework to (a) identify one multi-faceted campus environment that is linked to volunteerism among college women and (b) investigate the experiences of both those who do and do not volunteer in college. Findings suggest that females who participate in student clubs/groups, leadership training, and racial/cultural awareness workshops are over 10 times more likely to volunteer compared to students who do not engage in these three specific campus environments. The authors also show that the relationships between some academic and co-curricular experiences are vastly different between women who volunteer and women who do not volunteer. The results of this study not only shed light on the importance of using a more nuanced approach toward examining patterns of volunteerism but also offer a template for researchers and practitioners to apply the ecological model to their own unique campus populations and settings.