Category: Publications

Feasible Peer Effects: Experimental Evidence for Deskmate Effects on Educational Achievement and Inequality by Tamás Keller & Felix Elwert (2023)

Sociological Science Abstract Schools routinely employ seating charts to influence educational outcomes. Dependable evidence for the causal effects of seating charts on students’ achievement levels and inequality, however, is scarce. We executed a large pre-registered field experiment to estimate causal peer effects on students’ test scores and grades by randomizing the seating charts of 195 …

Making BIPOC Lives Matter: A Qualitative Analysis of Managerial Resistance to Racial Exclusions in US Homeless Systems by Garrett L. Grainger & Erin Gaede (2023)

Housing, Theory, & Society Abstract: The way racial disparities get re/produced or challenged by homeless systems is an underexplored subject in housing studies. This paper advances scholarship on that topic by examining how homeless system managers in the USA are responding to demands for colour-conscious vulnerability screenings. The VI-SPDAT is a popular tool for measuring …

Peeking under the Hood of Job Stress: How Men and Women’s Stress Levels Vary by Typologies of Job Quality and Family Composition by Grace Venechuk (2023)

Journal of Health and Social Behavior Abstract: Changes to work and family norms and polices over the last several decades have reshaped both the job quality and the nature of job and family formation in the United States. Neoliberal policies have generated a slew of flexible but precarious working conditions; labor force participation is now …

Rearranging the Desk Chairs: A Large Randomized Field Experiment on the Effects of Close Contact on Interethnic Relations by Felix Elwert, Tamás Keller, and Andreas Kotsadam (2023)

American Journal of Sociology Abstract: Contact theory predicts that interethnic exposure reduces antiminority discrimination. By contrast, conflict theory predicts that interethnic exposure worsens discrimination. Received scope conditions, however, are vague and do not properly differentiate between the domains of the theories. Furthermore, prior evidence is mostly correlational, and supportive field experiments for contact theory have …

Are Neighborhood Effects Explained by Differences in School Quality? by Geoffrey T. Wodtke, Ugur Yildirim, David J. Harding, and Felix Elwert (2023)

American Journal of Sociology Abstract: It is widely hypothesized that neighborhood effects on academic achievement are explained by differences in the quality of schools attended by resident children. The authors evaluate this hypothesis using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study and a diverse set of measures to capture a school’s effectiveness, resources, and climate. …

Internal Displacement and Subjective Well-Being: The Case of Ukraine in 2018 by Brienna Perelli-Harris, Jane Zavisca, Nataliia Levchuk, & Theodore P Gerber (2023)

Social Forces Abstract: Ukraine is currently experiencing the largest human displacement crisis in the world. However, armed conflict that started in 2014 had already displaced nearly 1.8 million people in Ukraine, resulting in the largest internally displaced population in Europe. Although ethnically and culturally similar to the local population, Ukrainian Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) encounter …

Effect of ADHD medication on risk of injuries: a preference-based instrumental variable analysis by Tarjei Widding‑Havneraas, Felix Elwert, Simen Markussen et al. (2023)

European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Abstract: ADHD is associated with an increased risk of injury. Causal evidence for effects of pharmacological treatment on injuries is scarce. We estimated effects of ADHD medication on injuries using variation in provider preference as an instrumental variable (IV). Using Norwegian registry data, we followed 8051 patients who were diagnosed …

Experienced Racism and Discrimination and Psychological Distress amid Different Phases of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence from Wisconsin by Mariétou H. Ouayogodé & Sarah S. Salas (2023)

Journal of Racial & Ethnic Health Disparities Abstract:  The SARS-COV-2 pandemic created an unprecedented crisis and raised concerns about racial discrimination and psychological distress. We assessed trends in COVID-19-related racism and discrimination irrespective of infection status and changes in emotional health and mental well-being outcomes due to experienced racism and discrimination. Using three waves of …

Constructing Residential Histories in a General Population-Based Representative Sample by Wei Xu, Megan Agnew, Christina Kamis, Amy Schultz, Sarah Salas, Kristen Malecki, & Michal Engelman (September 2023)

American Journal of Epidemiology Abstract: Research on neighborhoods and health typically measures neighborhood context at a single point in time. However, neighborhood exposures accumulate over the life course, influenced by both residential mobility and neighborhood change, with potential implications for estimating the impact of neighborhoods on health. Commercial databases offer fine-grained longitudinal residential address data …

Polyoccupationalism: Expertise Stretch and Status Stretch in the Postindustrial Era by Léonie Hénaut, Jennifer C. Lena, & Fabien Accominotti (September 2023)

American Sociological Review Abstract:  Past research has posited that occupations are distinct and exclusive communities of workers and used single-entry questions in surveys to measure occupational self-identification. Our study challenges that view by reporting the existence of polyoccupationalism, or workers’ simultaneous identification with multiple occupations. We predict this phenomenon co-occurs with postindustrial forms of work …