Professor Galaskiewicz is currently working on several projects.
- Phoenix Neighborhood Organizations
Professor Galaskiewicz received a research grant in 2016 from the NSF to complete work on a project started in 2003 on the spatial distribution and use of organizational resources by families in the Phoenix metropolitan area (“The Spatial Mobility of Communities’ Organizational Resources,” National Science Foundation Research Grant, SES 1560544, 2016-18).
He now has household data of what children did on Saturday in 2003 and 2013, the organizations that provided activities and services in both years, and a complete census of for-profits, nonprofits, government agencies, and congregations that provided activities and services to children on Saturday for 2003, 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2013. Most importantly these households and establishments are geo-coded.
The first paper he’s working on examines how race, class, and gender affects what children between the ages of 5 and 12 do on Saturday, e.g., playing around the house, playing organized sports, running errands with parents, etc. He finds that it is dictated both by their positionality as well as what is located around them. Some areas are devoid of sports clubs, fitness centers, etc. while others aren’t. Thus, even if families want their children to do different things, it is difficult because facilities are not equitably distributed across the urban landscape.
The second paper looks at changes in the organizational demography of Phoenix area neighborhoods and suburbs over a ten-year period, 2003 to 2013. Because the Great Recession happened during this time, he is able to assess which neighborhoods were more ‘resilient’ to this economic meltdown and which were not. He is also interested in the comparative resilience of government, nonprofit, and for-profit organizations.
- Neighborhood Establishments, Spatial Networks, and The Spread of the Coronavirus Across a Metropolitan Landscape
Neighborhood establishments, e.g., barber shops, bars, restaurants, etc. are often seen as helping to build social capital in neighborhoods, however, they can also be vehicles to transmit contagious diseases, e.g., SARS-CoV-2. There is considerable debate about shut-downs, masking, restricting travel, and the spread of the coronavirus. Using SafeGraph data (which tells us where visitors to local establishments live) and data from the AZ Department of Health Services on Phoenix area zip codes for the last 20 months, we test three hypotheses using hierarchical growth curve models.
The growth in a neighborhood’s infection rates should be a function of 1) the number of visitors to these establishments in a neighborhood, 2) how many residents visit similar establishments in other neighborhoods with high infection rates, and 3) how many people from neighborhoods with high infection rates visit local establishments. Professor Galaskiewicz has submitted a proposal to the National Science Foundation to extend this research to three more metropolitan areas.
- Social Influence Networks and the Ratification of Global Environmental Treaties
A third project examines the ratification of environmental treaties by 166 countries from 1980 to 2016. This research was funded by the National Institute for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba, Japan. This project utilized network (peer effect) models developed by Friedkin and Johnsen (1999) to describe the importance of social influence and social learning on ratifications and the role that power played in the process between 1981 and 2008. (See Yamagata, Yang, and Galaskiewicz 2013, 2017 below). We are now working on a dynamic network analysis using the R program, Network Dynamic Temporal Visualizations, to visually depict how the network of ratifications changed between 1980 to 2016. We explore the implications of these findings for the future of global environmental initiatives.