American Research Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

Ghoneim Elmehrath*, Ortega Tirado

Socioeconomic status (SES) and teacher–student relationships (TSR) have consistently been identified as important predictors of students' academic performance. Despite this, the placement and interpretation of TSR within multilevel research designs remain subjects of methodological debate. This study conceptualizes TSR as a student-level construct, reflecting individual perceptions of interactions with teachers rather than school-level characteristics. Using multilevel linear modeling, data from 4,978 students enrolled in 162 schools participating in the 2012 Programmed for International Student Assessment (PISA) in the United States were examined. A structured analytical framework was implemented, including model specification, research question development, diagnostic testing of level 1 and level-2 assumptions, model estimation, and interpretation of findings. The results confirm that higher socioeconomic status and more positive teacher–student relationships are independently associated with stronger academic achievement. However, no statistically significant evidence was found to indicate that teacher–student relationships alter the association between socioeconomic status and academic performance. To improve the accuracy of parameter estimation, plausible values were combined using Rubin's Rules, increasing the reliability of the reported results. The findings highlight the importance of distinguishing between direct and interaction effects in multilevel educational research and suggest that future investigations should adopt carefully designed sampling strategies and rigorous analytical procedures to strengthen the validity and generalizability of evidence on educational inequality.

Lucas Askew*

Existing literature extensively debates the CNN effect and the role of the media in prompting U.S. foreign policy; however, no prior research has investigated how political orientation influenced the framing of RH at the local news level, leaving a significant gap in the political communication literature. This study addresses that gap by employing a quantitative conceptual content analysis of 50 newspaper articles drawn randomly from local news outlets all across the United States. Articles were coded using a codebook along two dimensions: outlet political affiliation (left, center, or right-leaning) and portrayal of the U.S. military (positive, factual reporting, or negative). A chi-square goodness-of-fit test was performed and returned no statistically significant relationship between political affiliation and military portrayal, χ² (8) = 13.00, p = .112. Descriptive statistics, however, suggest that pro-military framing nevertheless dominated coding across all ideological categories. These findings are in line with other studies that suggest that institutional factors, including military media pooling, exert greater influence over local reporting rather than political orientation. This complicates the shared understanding of ideological bias in foreign policy journalism, providing a baseline for future comparative research on conflict coverage in other time periods or geographical areas.

Gil Alterovitz* and Sophia Yuditskaya

Globalization has reshaped economic opportunities and social conditions, but its effects on children remain uneven. This communication examines the relationship between economic globalization, poverty, and child labour, with particular attention to the difficulties faced by children in vulnerable households. It considers how economic pressures can increase families’ dependence on children’s earnings and, in turn, limit children’s access to education, safety, and healthy development. The discussion also reviews the role of national and international legal measures in protecting children from exploitation and argues that legislation alone cannot address the economic conditions that sustain child labour. The Indian context is considered in relation to poverty, educational exclusion, and the legal regulation of child employment. The paper argues that effective protection of child rights requires measures that address household poverty, improve access to quality education, strengthen social protection, and provide safer livelihood opportunities for families. A balanced approach is therefore necessary to protect children’s rights while addressing the economic hardships that contribute to their involvement in work.

Hossain Sanghi*, Sforza Maggi, Sryropoulou Dellis, Frank Jones, Gomberg Maitland, Jackson Leyrer

This study examines how Universal Design for Learning (UDL) can support engagement, understanding, and creative development in visual arts education among students in Grades 6–8 at a private school in Mongolia. A total of 169 students participated in UDL-informed visual arts lessons designed around culturally relevant topics, including Mongolian Ornament in Grade 6, Animal Form Creation in Grade 7, and Artists of Mongolia in Grade 8. A mixed-methods research design was employed, combining student surveys, classroom observations, and structured examination of students’ artistic work. Classroom observations and artwork analysis indicated that varied forms of instructional representation, including demonstrations, visual references, hands-on resources, and digital materials, helped students interpret artistic techniques and culturally significant concepts more effectively. Opportunities to select materials, techniques, and methods of presenting their work also encouraged experimentation and individual artistic choices. Students demonstrated stronger participation, greater independence in completing tasks, and increased confidence when learning activities offered multiple pathways for engagement and expression. The findings suggest that UDL can provide a practical framework for making visual arts instruction more responsive to differences in students’ abilities, interests, and learning approaches. In the Mongolian context, its use may also strengthen connections between inclusive teaching practices and culturally relevant arts education. The study highlights the importance of teacher preparation, flexible instructional planning, and institutional support for incorporating UDL principles into visual arts curricula.

Christopher Rosario, Sinclair Lindsey*

Identity emerges through the stories individuals and communities create to interpret experiences, relationships, and social realities. Rather than serving solely as a means of communication, narratives provide a framework for constructing, expressing, and reshaping the self across changing cultural and technological environments. This article examines the relationship between narrative and identity by integrating perspectives from philosophy, linguistics, communication studies, psychology, and translation studies. Attention is given to digital platforms, where online participation has transformed identity into an ongoing and interactive process. Social networking environments such as X and Facebook enable users to present, revise, and negotiate multiple identities through posts, conversations, and shared content, while simultaneously contributing to broader collective narratives. The study also considers the methodological complexities associated with investigating fragmented, multimodal, and rapidly evolving digital narratives, highlighting the need for research approaches that capture their dynamic nature. By bringing together contemporary interdisciplinary scholarship, the article demonstrates that narratives remain fundamental to understanding how personal and collective identities are continuously constructed, interpreted, and redefined in both physical and digital contexts.

Amel G Linde*

Recent advances in real-time monitoring of gene expression and protein abundance enable unprecedented opportunities for personalized pharmacodynamics, gene therapy, and patient assessment. However, the sheer complexity of multidimensional genomic and proteomic datasets poses significant challenges for immediate interpretation. Here, we present a novel approach that transforms high-dimensional gene and protein dynamics into auditory representations, or sonification, facilitating intuitive real-time monitoring. Using principal component analysis (PCA), we reduced thousands of gene dimensions to a manageable number of principal components, which were mapped to musical notes and instruments. Application to colon cancer datasets revealed that normal samples produced harmonious sequences, whereas cancer samples exhibited discordant musical patterns reflecting underlying network perturbations. This work demonstrates that sonification provides an effective modality for detecting temporal changes in gene and protein networks, offering a promising tool for clinical and research applications.

Carrasco Escobar*, Hernández Montrreal

Machine translation (MT) has become increasingly accessible to students of translation, creating new opportunities for academic work while also raising questions about accuracy, contextual interpretation, and the continuing role of human translators. This study investigates how undergraduate translation students use MT tools, the difficulties they experience during their use, and their perceptions of the differences between machine-generated and human-produced translations. The study was conducted among 30 male undergraduate students enrolled in the Department of Translation and English Language at Imam Muhammad Bin Saud Islamic University. A mixed-methods research design was employed, with questionnaire data used to examine students’ patterns of MT use, experiences, and perceptions. The findings indicate that students regularly use MT, particularly Google Translate, to support academic translation tasks involving unfamiliar vocabulary, specialized terminology, and linguistically demanding texts. At the same time, participants reported several weaknesses in MT output, including grammatical and semantic inaccuracies, inadequate treatment of cultural references, limited sensitivity to textual context, and variations in translation quality. Financial considerations, particularly the cost of premium translation services and specialized dictionaries, were also identified as a practical constraint. Despite the usefulness of MT as an academic support tool, students generally regarded human translation as more reliable for tasks requiring contextual interpretation, appropriate tone, cultural understanding, and nuanced meaning. The findings underscore the importance of developing MT literacy within translation education so that students learn not only how to operate digital translation tools but also how to assess, revise, and validate their outputs through informed human judgment.

Sinclair Brown*, Calder Busby, Hilda Dempsey, Sarah Haaren

The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 has encouraged architecture colleges in India to rethink how they manage faculty, staff, and academic processes. Human resource management (HRM) in these institutions now involves academic planning, leadership development, digital readiness, and long‑term institutional stability. This study examines HRM practices in architecture education using a SWOT framework, drawing insights from policy documents, regulatory guidelines, and academic literature. The review shows that institutions benefit from multidisciplinary learning environments, increased autonomy, and growing acceptance of digital tools. However, gaps in leadership preparation, slow administrative processes, and inconsistent HR planning continue to affect institutional performance. The paper also highlights emerging opportunities created by technological growth, environmental responsibility, and collaboration with professional bodies. Persistent issues such as policy implementation delays and faculty retention remain important concerns. The study argues that architecture institutions can strengthen HRM by adopting evidence‑based planning, supporting continuous learning, improving governance, and conducting regular evaluations. These measures can help institutions become more resilient and better prepared for future academic and professional demands.

Lee Wood*

The existing evidence for symbol-based communication in hearing-impaired learners is descriptive rather than inferential. Picture-book exposure has been linked to gains in social communication and imaginative language [1], and visual aids more broadly to improved reading comprehension [2]. The Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS), originally developed for learners on the autism spectrum, has been extended to hearing-impaired populations with reported improvements in vocabulary and communicative initiation [3,4]. These findings are real and useful, but they rest heavily on means, frequencies, and practitioner testimony rather than on tests of association between symbol exposure and language outcomes. The Kenyan study is one of the few in this literature to run that test directly - and its weak correlation is a useful check on how strong the underlying claim should be taken to be.