A Sense of Community and Political Action Mary R
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Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2005 Beyond Membership: A Sense of Community and Political Action Mary R. Anderson Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] THE FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF SOCIAL SCIENCES BEYOND MEMBERSHIP: A SENSE OF COMMUNITY AND POLITICAL ACTION By MARY R. ANDERSON A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Political Science in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Degree Awarded: Summer Semester, 2005 The members of the Committee approve the Dissertation of Mary R. Anderson defended on May 9, 2005. __________________________ Jeffery J. Mondak Professor Directing Dissertation ___________________________ John J. Reynolds Outside Committee Member ___________________________ Charles Barrilleaux Committee Member ___________________________ Thomas M. Carsey Committee Member ___________________________ Carol S. Weissert Committee Member Approved: ___________________________________________ Dale L. Smith, Chair, Department of Political Science ___________________________________________ David Rasmussen, Dean, College of Social Sciences The Office of Graduate Studies has verified and approved the above named committee members. ii Dedicated to my father, Benito Ruggiero. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Many individuals and organizations contributed greatly to this project. First, this project would not have been possible without grants from the National Science Foundation, the LeRoy Collins Eminent Scholar Chair; Dr. Carol Weissert, and the DeVoe L. Moore Center at Florida State University. Data were collected for this project by Oppenheim Research in Tallahassee, under the supervision of Anneliese Oppenheim. Many people offered helpful comments on this dissertation. I wish to thank most sincerely Jeffery J. Mondak; his dedication, honesty, and commitment to this project has been incessant. His enthusiasm constantly kept me motivated and his timely feedback was instrumental in the completion of this dissertation. I am also thankful to Christopher Lewis who offered his time and expertise to this project, often at the expense of his own work; without his input this project would not yet be complete. I also wish to thank the members of my dissertation committee for their helpful comments and suggestions throughout this entire project; Charles Barrilleaux, Thomas M. Carsey, Carol S. Weissert, and John Reynolds. Thanks also to Mary Schneider for her assistance in taking care of the organizational procedures that brings this project to its final stages. Finally, I wish to thank my family—Mom, Dad, Neil, Judy and Keith—for their encouragement, patience, and sacrifice. This was truly a family affair; I could not have reached this point without their support. I especially wish to thank my wonderful husband Keith, his unwavering confidence in my ability to complete this endeavor despite setbacks along the way has made my dream possible. His patience and willingness to compromise on many of life’s toughest decisions has not gone unnoticed. To my children Grace, Joseph, and the baby boy to be named, you have provided the inspiration that has kept me motivated each day to finish this project. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Tables ................................................................................................vi List of Figures ................................................................................................viii Abstract ......................................................................................................x 1. Chapter 1: Introduction...................................................................................1 2. Chapter 2: Survey Design and Implementation..............................................16 3. Chapter 3: Measuring Sense of Community...................................................33 4. Chapter 4: Political Efficacy and Trust...........................................................55 5. Chapter 5: Political Participation....................................................................78 6. Chapter 6: Conclusion.....................................................................................107 APPENDICES ................................................................................................120 A Human Subjects Approval Letter..........................................................120 B Survey Questions ..................................................................................121 REFERENCES ................................................................................................128 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ..............................................................................131 v LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1A: Sense of Community by Context (Pilot Study) ...............................13 Table 1.1B: Sense of Community Scale ..............................................................14 Table 1.2: Sense of Community Index ................................................................15 Table 2.1: Demographic Characteristics of Counties in Jury Pool Survey ................................................................................................28 Table 2.2: Demographic and Political Characteristics of Jury Pool Sample .......................................................................................29 Table 2.3: Demographic and Political Characteristics of Jury Pool Respondents by County ....................................................................30 Table 2.4: Demographic and Political Characteristics-Context Survey ..............31 Table 2.5: Demographic and Political Characteristics-Phone Survey.................32 Table 3.1: Descriptive Statistics for Sense of Community Items- Jury Survey .......................................................................................48 Table 3.2: Factor Loadings for Sense of Community Items-Jury Survey ...........48 Table 3.3: Descriptive Statistics for Sense of Community Scales- Jury Survey ........................................................................................49 Table 3.4: Sense of Community Index ................................................................51 Table 3.5: Descriptive Statistics for Sense of Community by Context- Phone Survey ....................................................................................53 Table 3.6: Highest and Lowest Values for Sense of Community by Context- Phone Survey ......................................................................53 Table 4.1: Internal Efficacy Model......................................................................70 Table 4.2: External Efficacy Model.....................................................................72 vi Table 4.3: Personal Trust Model..........................................................................74 Table 4.4: Political Trust Model ..........................................................................76 Table 5.1: General Participation Model...............................................................98 Table 5.2: Participation by Political Act Model- Context Survey.......................99 Table 5.3: Participation by Political Act Model- Phone Survey..........................100 Table 5.4: Local Vote Model...............................................................................103 Table 5.5: Political Discussion Model.................................................................105 vii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1: Path Model for Participation ............................................................9 Figure 3.1: Hypothetical Scenario 1 ...................................................................46 Figure 3.2: Hypothetical Scenario 2 ...................................................................47 Figure 3.3: Histogram Context by Context- Jury Survey ...................................50 Figure 3.4: Distribution of Responses- Context Survey .....................................52 Figure 3.5: Distribution of Responses for Two Neighborhoods- Phone Survey ..................................................................................54 Figure 4.1: Graphical Representation of Predicted Probabilities for Sense of Community by Number of Contexts for Internal Efficacy ..............................................................................71 Figure 4.2: Graphical Representation of Predicted Probabilities for Sense of Community by Number of Contexts for External Efficacy ............................................................................73 Figure 4.3: Graphical Representation of Predicted Probabilities for Sense of Community by Number of Contexts for Personal Trust .................................................................................75 Figure 4.4: Graphical Representation of Predicted Probabilities for Sense of Community by Number of Contexts for Political Trust ..................................................................................77 Figure 5.1: Path Model for Participation ............................................................97 Figure 5.2: Graphical Representation of Predicted Probabilities for Sense of Community by Number of Contexts for Writing a Letter to the Editor ..........................................................101 Figure 5.3: Graphical Representation of Predicted Probabilities for Sense of Community by Number of Contexts for Signing a Petition ............................................................................102