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Featured Scholar of 2026
Jamie Oslawski-Lopez, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Sociology
Coordinator of the Social Justice and Community Engagement Minor
Indiana University Kokomo
A New York Times article, “Fighting Over Chores? Spend Some Money, Save the Marriage,” suggests that Americans might be happier both individually and in their relationships if they outsource time-consuming, unpleasant household chores (Frakt 2018). While “buying time” might “promote happiness” (Whillans et al. 2017), several questions about outsourcing household labor, especially cross-nationally, remain. Jamie Oslawski-Lopez (2024) provided insight into a few of these questions, including the frequency of outsourcing, the tasks most likely to be outsourced, and how country-context shapes these rates in her research published in the Midwest Social Sciences Journal titled, “Measuring Families’ Outsourced Household Labor in Country Context: Accounting for Country-Level Gender- and Class-Based Inequality,” which was selected as the recipient of the 2025 George C. Roberts Award from the Indiana Academy of Social Sciences. The findings, spanning 41 countries that contributed data to the 2012 International Social Survey Programme’s Family and Changing Gender Roles Module IV, suggested that outsourcing rates were low, with only about 12% of families reporting outsourcing any task. In general, small repairs and cleaning were the most frequently outsourced tasks. Perhaps most interestingly, however, were the country-level findings on gender- and class-based inequalities. Outsourcing was more common in less egalitarian countries relative to both gender and class, findings that hint at how broader social structures shape individual lives. As it relates to gender inequality, outsourcing may be a feasible strategy for women to reduce housework loads when they are unable to renegotiate the division of household labor with their partners. Further, class-based inequality may provide the conditions under which outsourcing household labor is feasible, with a low-skill domestic workforce on one end and families with financial resources to pay for help on the other.
Jamie Oslawski-Lopez’s recent publications are listed below. Although her projects vary in scope, they share a common focus on gendered beliefs, inequality, and family life. Additionally, she is engaged in research on the scholarship of teaching and learning, using social science methods to investigate how students learn and best practices in teaching.
Tabor, Jaclyn A., Cassie Mead, Jamie Oslawski-Lopez, and Rebecca Grady. 2025. “Division of Labor over the Life Course: Structural or Symbolic Pressures?” Journal of Marriage and Family. https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.70023 (Online first)
Oslawski-Lopez, Jamie, and Gregory T. Kordsmeier. 2025. “Examining Engagement, Note-Taking, and Multitasking in Podcast-Based Learning.” Teaching Sociology 53(3):191-208. https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X251327956
Oslawski-Lopez, Jamie, and Jaclyn A. Tabor. 2024. “Who Can Refuse? Attitudes About the Fertility Decisions of Wives and Husbands.” Journal of Family Issues 46(4):681-705. https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513X241299421 (Original work published 2025)
Oslawski-Lopez, Jamie. 2024. “Measuring Families’ Outsourced Household Labor in Country-Context: Accounting for Country-Level Gender and Class-Based Inequality.” Midwest Social Sciences Journal 27(1):103-135. https://doi.org/10.22543/2766-0796.1132
References
Frakt, Austin. 2018. “Fighting over Chores? Spend Some Money, Save the Marriage.” The Upshot: The New Health Care, New York Times, April 2. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/02/upshot/fighting-over-chores-spend-some-money-save-the-marriage.html.
Whillans, Ashley V., Elizabeth W. Dunn, Paul Smeets, Rene Bekkers, and Michael I. Norton. 2017. “Buying Time Promotes Happiness.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 114(32):8523–27.
Featured Scholars of 2025
John Paulson, MSW
Associate Professor of Social Work
University of Southern Indiana
J. David Thomas, Ph.D.
Professor and Program Chair of Social and Behavioral Sciences
Ivy Tech
One of these pathways suggests that high levels of arousal, which he describes as confrontational tension and fear, leads people to react to conflicts in very impulsive and aggressive ways. This becomes especially true if they do not possess previously developed skills for competently recognizing, mediating, and responding to such arousal. They are also interested in applying this theory to practical interventions in violence prevention. What if there were ways to develop attributes for skillfully managing the arousal created by confrontational tension and fear and helping people to feel more confident in their ability to handle the situation without violence? The work of Dr. J. David Thomas and John Paulson explores this possibility. Their work continues to look at how the study of martial arts might be one possible approach for understanding aspects of pathway five in Collins’ theory related to the influence of confrontational tension and fear on violence and explores how aspects of martial art training might help individuals more successfully navigate moments of arousal and interpersonal conflicts without resorting to violence.
Below are some of their recent publications:
Nguyen, N., Paulson, J., Maynard, Q., & Ha, T. T. (2025). The impact of religiosity and violence prevention programs on violence amongst adolescents in the US. Midwest Social Science Journal, 27(2), Article 9. https://doi.org/10.22543/2766-0796.1122
Nguyen, N.N., Paulson, J., & Pease, M.O. (2024). Examining the relationship between religiosity and E-cigarette smoking and alcohol drinking among college students in Vietnam. Journal of Religion & Spirituality in Social Work, 43(2), 195-207. https://doi.org/10.1080/15426432.2024.2331538
Paulson, J. (2023). Review of Myths of Mindfulness. Journal of Human Services, 42(1), 1–4. https://doi.org/10.52678/001c.74223
Thomas, J. David. "Randall Collins’ micro-sociology, the Southern culture of honor, and the codes of violence pathway: Toward a general theory of violence." Social Sciences & Humanities Open 6, no. 1 (2022): 100352. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590291122001061
Thomas, J. David. "Jeff Foxworthy’s redneck humor and the boundaries of middle-class American whiteness." Sage Open 6, no. 2 (2016): 2158244016647772. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2158244016647772
Featured Scholar of 2024
Denise Lynn, Ph.D.
Professor of History, Interim Chair of History, Director of Gender and Sexuality Studies and Africana Studies
University of Southern Indiana
Joseph McCarthy, the bombastic and cloying Wisconsin Senator, has become the namesake for the anti-communist witch-hunts during the Cold War. But historians have challenged this misnomer for decades arguing that McCarthy’s career lasted only four years while anti-communism has undergirded US politics since the end of the Civil War. Dr. Lynn argues that not only is McCarthy the wrong person to blame, but it ignores that J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI was the most consistently anti-communist institution which contributed to an “omnipresent Hooverism” that has lasted well-beyond Hoover’s death. The red scares that targeted Hollywood, government agencies, and educational institutions are only the tip of the iceberg. Hoover’s agency, backed by local law enforcement, veteran’s groups, and corporate interests, violated the constitutional rights of everyday citizens, and perpetuated the belief that progressive politics, like anti-racism, are radical conspiracies to undermine the US. Dr. Lynn’s research has shown that anti-communist politics has had far-reaching consequences, including the expansion of the militarized penal state, the contraction of social welfare programs, and the disabling of worker’s power in favor of capitalist wealth concentration. Anticommunism is not an unfortunate anomalous event of the past; it resonates in the present as social justice movements are dismissed as radical communists and moderate progressive reforms ignite reactionaries. Below are some of Dr. Lynn’s most recent publications.
Lynn, D. “‘Dirty War: Claudia Jones and Opposition to the Indochina War.’” American Communist History 23, no. 1–2 (2024): 19–34. doi:10.1080/14743892.2023.2255498.
Lynn, D. Claudia Jones: Visions of a Socialist America. London: Polity Press, 2023
Lynn, D. “Native Fascism: Evansville’s 1948 Wallace Riot,” Indiana Magazine of History, Vol. 119, 3 (September 2023): 233-263.
Lynn, D. “Shirley Graham Du Bois, Claudia Jones, and the Liberatory Potential of Peace,” In Battle for Peace special issue, American Communist History, Denise Lynn and Phillip Luke Sinitiere, editors, Vol. 21, 3-4 (2022): 187-199. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/14743892.2022.2125251.
Featured Scholar of 2023
Yllka Azemi, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Marketing
Indiana University Northwest
Misunderstanding of online customer behavior leads to retailers’ unsuccessful application of digital marketing. Dr. Azemi tries to decode the behavior of online customers through research that enhances knowledge in the contemporary field of marketing and supports practitioners’ application of marketing techniques. For instance, her recently published co-authored article titled “How does retargeting work for different Gen Z mobile users? Customer expectations and evaluations of retargeting via the expectancy-theory lens explores mobile retargeting and consumer purchasing decisions. This article presents a framework that showcases usage of retargeting that leads to customer purchasing on the second round of retargeted advertisements. Dr. Azemi has published numerous articles in highly ranked journals such as Psychology & Marketing, and Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services. You can find some of her research articles here:
Azemi, Y. and Ozuem, W. (2023) How does retargeting work for different Gen Z mobile users? Customer expectations and evaluations of retargeting via the expectancy-theory lens. Journal of Advertising Research, DOI: 10.2501/JAR-2023-023
Azemi, Y., Ozuem, W., Wiid, R. and Hobson, A. (2022) Luxury fashion brand customers’ perceptions of mobile marketing: Evidence of multiple communications and marketing channels. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 66, 102944.
Azemi, Y. and Kini, R. (2022) An investigation of customers’ recovery expectations after service failure: Evidence from e-commerce settings at different stages of maturity. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 34(5), 537-551.
Azemi, Y., Ozuem, W. and Howell, K. E. (2020) The effects of online negative word-of-mouth on dissatisfied customers: A frustration-aggression perspective. Psychology & Marketing, 37, 564-577.
Featured Scholar of 2022
Melissa Stacer, Ph.D.
Professor of Criminal Justice and Director of the Master of Arts in Criminal Justice
University of Southern Indiana
Do you fondly remember a field trip you took in elementary school? Although field trips in college may be less frequent, they are no less memorable, and research illustrates that field trips in college can have positive impacts on student learning. IASS Vice President Melissa Stacer (University of Southern Indiana) and IASS President Monica Solinas-Saunders (Indiana University Northwest) recently published the final of four peer-reviewed articles examining the impact of field trips in criminal justice education. Their work examined the impact of taking undergraduate students on tours of correctional facilities, finding that such field trips improved student perceptions of correctional officers (Stacer et al., 2017), generally increased student interest in corrections careers (Stacer et al., 2019), allowed students to question their assumptions about inmates and the correctional environment (Stacer et al., 2020), and illustrated how students’ perceptions of corrections were shaped by the media (Stacer et al., 2022). Their research highlights the importance of carefully planning and preparing students to go on field trips as well as the necessity of post-field trip reflections and discussion in order to maximize the connections between the field trip and the curriculum. Longer term experiential learning such as internships or service learning may be inaccessible to some students; this work by Stacer and Solinas-Saunders illustrates that even short-term field trips such as a tour of a jail or prison can have important impacts on student learning. You can find copies of these articles below:
Stacer, M.J., Moll, L.M., & Solinas-Saunders, M. (2022). Student perceptions of corrections: The influence of media and correctional facility tours. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 22(1), 1-16.
Stacer, M.J., Moll., L.M., & Solinas-Saunders, M. (2020). The impact of correctional facility tours on student perceptions and realizations of the correctional environment: A research note. Journal of Criminal Justice Education, 31(3), 400-420. DOI: 10.1080/10511253.2020.1784449.
Stacer, M.J., Moll, L.M., & Solinas-Saunders, M. (2019). New opportunities or closing doors? How correctional facility tours impact students’ thoughts about careers. Journal of Criminal Justice Education, 30(1), 114-135. DOI: 10.1080/10511253.2018.1448094.
Stacer, M.J., Eagleson, R.C., & Solinas-Saunders, M. (2017). Exploring the utility of correctional facility tours in undergraduate criminal justice education. Journal of Criminal Justice Education, 28(4), 492-513. DOI: 10.1080/10511253.2016.1254266.
Featured Scholar of 2021
Selena Sandefer Doss, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of History
Western Kentucky University
Dr. Selena Sanderfer Doss, Associate Professor of History at Western Kentucky University and a board member of the Academy published a paper titled, "Looking for Better: A History of Black Southern Migration" in the Midwest Social Sciences Journal.
Her paper is a broad overview of migrations affecting black southerners, including the Atlantic slave trade, the domestic slave trade, colonization movements to Sierra Leone and Liberia, the Exoduster movement, the Great Migration, and the Return South migration.
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