Date of Award
12-1-2013
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy
Department
Sociology
First Advisor
Sherkat, Darren
Abstract
This dissertation utilized cross-national and cross-sectional micro-data, internationally comparable macro-data, and hierarchical methodology to model variability in status attainment by religious factors, gender traditionalism, and contextual features of the fifty-seven countries included in the sample. The broad research goals were to ascertain gender differences in attainment outcomes, and to extend the scope of existing knowledge on the religion-attainment intersections, the bulk of which is based upon single-country and single-religion data. Cross-national findings validate that individuals' attainment outcomes are greatly shaped by contextual circumstances in terms of human development levels, public outlays on education, urbanization trends, and gross domestic product per capita. The random factors substantially reduce the fixed effects. Attainment variations exist within each religious group and religiosity level. This work illuminates the efficacy of adding `contexts' among the principal predictors in all research endeavors on attainment outcomes, stratification trends, social class mobility, and gender disparities with the purposes to discern individual-and country-level effects. In so doing, this dissertation in Sociology provides multidisciplinary analysis that may have implications for comparable research in Public Policy, Economics, and Gender Studies.
Access
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