Research News

James Cook, a professor in the Department of Psychological Science at UNC Charlotte, has received the 2019 Outstanding Educator Award, a top award given by the Society for Community Research and Action (SCRA), Division 27 of the American Psychological Association. The award recognizes Cook’s long-standing and far-reaching contributions to community psychology and community research and action through education.

UNC Charlotte bioarchaeologist Sara L. Juengst studies human skeletal remains to learn about and tell the stories of past communities and cultures. Bioarchaeologists study burial sites, items found at burial sites, and bones.

Bummed out by ongoing work stress? Tempted to reach for yet another cup of coffee to help you cope? Resist the temptation – unless you want to darken your already gray mood to pitch-black, according to a UNC Charlotte study by doctoral student Lydia G. Roosand Jeanette M. Bennett, associate professor in the Department of Psychological Science.

Antarctica’s McMurdo Dry Valleys region is one of the coldest, driest, and windiest places on the planet. Temperatures in this area can plunge to 58 degrees below zero. Its deposits and landforms contain records of past climate not accessible elsewhere in the world. Antarctica’s unique climate enticed UNC Charlotte earth sciences researcher Martha Cary Eppes and her research colleagues to spend weeks camping out in a tent in the sub-zero temperatures, in order to – literally – monitor and listen to rocks as they fracture.

UNC Charlotte Associate Professor of English Janaka Bowman Lewis will spend four weeks this summer in residency at the National Humanities Center in the Research Triangle Park, working on a project about “Black Girlhood and the Power of Belonging.” Lewis will join a select group of about 40 scholars from across the nation who have been chosen to do research in residency at the Center.

Men hold nearly all primary breadwinning positions in top income households, and the glass ceiling that has hindered women’s advancement in the workplace is more extensive than previously thought, a new study by UNC Charlotte researcher Jill Yavorsky and colleagues finds.

In his 2017 memoir At Home, Away From Home, UNC Charlotte’s Tanure Ojaide speaks of the indelible impressions from his early years in Nigeria. In his words, “One does not forget what one yearns for at heart.” At age 70, many of his poems, short stories, critical essays, and books serve as activist works calling out for justice and fairness for the people and the ecosystem of the Niger Delta.

Flu season is upon us once again. This October marked the 100th anniversary of the Influenza Epidemic (Spanish Flu) of 1918 in North Carolina, and we can learn lessons from the historic event. Lauren Austin, who earned her Public Policy Ph.D. and master’s degree in History from UNC Charlotte, researched this influenza pandemic, which left citizens “afraid to breathe,” as she describes it. Her research, with co-author Dr. William P. Brandon, appears in the book, “North Carolina’s Experience during the First World War,” co-edited by UNC Charlotte history professors Dr. Steven Sabol and Dr. Shepherd McKinley.

Bioarchaeologists like UNC Charlotte researcher Sara L. Juengst are part archaeologist, part biological anthropologist. They study human skeletal remains to learn about and tell the stories of past communities and cultures. While archaeologists more often study settlement patterns and artifacts like ceramics or stone tools from historical excavations, bioarchaeologists study burial sites, items found at burial sites, and bones.

Members of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg community have a new way to share their opinions on a variety of issues with the launch of YourVoiceCLT. Charlotte’s Community Survey Panel was founded by the UNC Charlotte Urban Institute, the Ph.D. in Public Policy Program, the Department of Political Science and Public Administration, and the Policy Opinion, Learning and Sentiment Lab.

The LYNX Blue Line Extension’s first trip in March 2018 signaled dramatic change for UNC Charlotte and the Charlotte community. For researchers Isabelle Nilsson and Elizabeth Delmelle, the new line and the neighborhoods it passes through between Uptown Charlotte and the main campus represent a living laboratory for research exploring how transit investments affect neighborhood change and the implications for residential mobility and income segregation.

UNC Charlotte historian Aaron Shapiro thinks deeply about the impact of society’s resting places and the importance of protecting and understanding them. In his co-teaching of a history class called “Preserving Memory in the Digital Age,” Shapiro strives to help students broaden their perspectives on cemeteries and their surrounding communities, through in-depth research and class work.

This summer, dozens of College of Liberal Arts & Sciences undergraduate students from varied majors and disciplines will gain experience in research through UNC Charlotte initiatives that emphasize learn-by-doing models. They also will benefit from professional development opportunities, mentoring and interactions with each other.

A new UNC Charlotte study with college-age football linemen suggests that the roots of a sleep breathing health problem in football players may begin early and points to the need to fully assess the potential consequences of college training, particularly for linemen who quit conditioning after college.

UNC Charlotte students in Karen Cox’s public history class learned about the magnitude of a historic schoolhouse’s place in history and its value to the local community. Through their hands-on research about the school, built in the early 1900s to educate African-American children, they are contributing to the planning process for the building’s potential preservation.

The acts of professional athletes who have “taken a knee” during the playing of the national anthem during sport events reflect something more than a momentary message was being sent by the players, research by Dan Grano suggests. Grano, an associate professor in communication studies who researches public advocacy and sports communication and culture, says, “It’s a different moment in the history of sport.”

UNC Charlotte researcher Roslyn Mickelson is providing context for a debate about legislation to allow towns near Charlotte to create charter schools. She is drawing from her decades’ long research into segregation and re-segregation of schools and commenting in local and national media accounts.

Faculty authors in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences at UNC Charlotte in 2017 edited and published 42 books that were diverse in topic ranging from language and culture studies to physics and optical science. Texts also included topics such as public relations, history, religious studies, and African American studies. The books included textbooks, research publications, novels, and other forms.