Hackworth Research Grant Winners, Spring 2010

Faculty Grants

Yekaterina Bezrukova, Assistant Professor, SCU Psychology, $4,000 for a project called "When No One is Watching: Ethical Behavior in Groups." Professor Bezrukova will work with a group of SCU undergraduates to study " what would you do when no one (not even your peers, group members, or boss) is watching? We will examine the relationships between group membership, social context, and ethical behavior. We will use a 2 x 2 experimental design, crossing group membership (groups vs. individuals) and social context (opportunistic vs. non-opportunistic) as between-subjects variables."

John Ifcher, Lecturer, SCU Economics, $3,000 for a project called "Happiness Inequality and Income Growth." With this project, Professor Ifcher will expand research he has been doing on the ethical and economic bases for happiness. An increasing number of scholars have questioned the use of income alone as a measure for happiness. But there has not been a comparable examination of the relationship between the distribution of happiness and income growth. Preliminary results indicate, Professor Ifcher said, that "increased per capita GDP does lead to decreased subjective well-being dispersion."

Chad Raphael, Associate Professor, SCU Communication, $4,000 for a project called "A More Deliberative Union: Equality and Publicity in Deliberative Democracy." Professor Raphael will be undertaking this work as part of a book on the theory of deliberative democracy that he is writing with Professor Chris Karpowitz of Brigham Young University. He will be studying how to address two major obstacles to the establishment of a more deliberative political system. The first obstacle is the "problem of how to establish equality in the face of stark differences in power within and between deliberative groups." The second obstacle is the challenge of improving the "quality of communication between different elements" of an entire, societal deliberative system.

Student Grants

Rochelle Stowe, SCU '10, $1,700 for a project called "Research Ethics and the Reduction of Ecological Footprints of Biological Research Stations." Ms. Stowe will be using the grant money to pay for travel and research this summer to Costa Rica, where there are many biological research stations. She will be assessing the ecological practices of such research stations -- how do they dispose of their waste? how do they impact the surrounding land? etc. -- in light of the literature on research ethics for those working in such stations. She will also be making recommendations for the development of an ethics code to govern the conduct of research at such stations.
Reducing the Ecological Impact of Field Research," American Journal of Primatology 1-9 (2012)

Adelene Gallego Ramos, SCU MBA Student, $750 for a film project called "Social Entrepreneurs, Ethics, and Making a Profit on the Bottom Billion." Ms. Ramos, who has extensive experience in video production, will be making a film looking at social entrepreneurs and the Santa Clara University community. She will be examining the ethical dilemmas that social entrepreneurs face when working to improve the lives of those living in great poverty in situations ripe both for improvement and for exploitation