Initial Publication Date: May 1, 2023

Joseph M. Simpson

Associate Professor of Sociology, Texas A&M University-San Antonio

About Me

I grew up in Lawton, Oklahoma, and was the son of a Political Science Professor. I had the ambition to be a bass player in a heavy metal band, but it did not work out. I dropped out of college on my first attempt, but eventually, it took. Starting as a computer information science major, I soon realized I disliked programming and loved sociology. Now, after a Ph.D. in sociology, I find myself writing programs for quantitative analysis. Life is funny that way. In my spare time, I am a game master for role-playing games. I have been a Dungeon Master for Dungeons & Dragons for more than 25 years, but recently, I have taken on the mantle of Keeper of Arcane Secrets for the Call of Cthulhu RPG. If that sounds strange, no worries. I'm usually the biggest geek in the room, literally and figuratively.

Focus of current FEW-Nexus-based education work

My current work contributes in two significant ways. First, I am Co-PI on an NSF SSTEM scholarship grant studying the role of mentorship as an intervention in forming STEM identity generally and water leader identity specifically. We are in the second year of a five-year grant and welcome collaborative opportunities. We are evaluating best practices for project-based mentorship relationships. Our team is always looking for opportunities for funding to support water education, leadership, and research. We also come from a Hispanic Serving Institution and support a large, historically underserved urban community. Linking our current project to a national network of educators and scholars is an exciting opportunity. Second, I am analyzing data from an urban water conservation survey I developed which was funded by a university research grant. The university funding encourages pilot programs that could be developed into larger grant-supported research projects. Extending my work to include the FEW-nexus would be interesting since most survey research centers on one domain.

FEW-Nexus-based education experience, expertise and interests

Our research team is doing work that aligns with the NC-FEW. Our current NSF SSTEM grant is a qualitative case-based research project on the mentees and mentors involved in water resources research across STEM disciplines. This work can directly contribute to a model of investigation or an opportunity to collaborate on issues with researching mentorship relationships. My PhD is in sociology, with expertise in environmental sociology, social psychology, technology, quantitative research, and higher-education pedagogy. I can construct surveys, conduct various forms of quantitative analysis, and help develop project research designs.

I also have some experience with interviewing and ethnographic research. I have a passion for the topic of water. I have taught several courses on the sociology of water, including a course on water resources in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands and a study abroad course on the sociology of water taught on location in London about the River Thames. I have developed creative pedagogical projects. With a co-author, I developed Choices and Chances: The Sociology Role-Playing Game for use in an introductory sociology course. My current research applies an integrated value-belief-norm theory and the theory of planned behavior model to predict water conservation behavior. These frameworks are often utilized to find deficits in social determinants of behavior from which to design educational programs. I would like to partner with researchers that can provide experience and expertise I do not have. My NSF research team is interdisciplinary, including engineers, biologists, geologists, and education researchers. I would seek out a similar level of interdisciplinary in addition to other scholars from the social sciences.

Publications, presentations, and other references

  • https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/nature-and-culture/17/1/nc170101.xml
  • https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08941920.2020.1725203
  • https://online.ucpress.edu/socdev/article-abstract/5/4/381/109353/The-Treadmill-of-InformationDevelopment-of-the