
Twelve faculty researchers at St. Francis Xavier University have been awarded over $550,000 in federal funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) through its Insight Development Grants program. The funding supports research projects that range from how racial prejudice develops in childhood and how it can be interrupted early to exploring zero-alcohol products advertising on young people’s behaviors.
StFX faculty awarded SSHRC Insight Development Grants include Dr. Mickey Jutras, Dr. Wendy Mackey, Dr. Katelynn Carter-Rogers, Dr. Kara Thompson, Dr. Elvira Prusaczyk, Dr. Terry Beaulieu, Dr. Wellington Souza, Dr. Laura Estill, Dr. Marc Husband, Dr. Evan Throop-Robinson, Dr. Yen Nguyen, and Dr. Bhavik Parikh.
The funding was part of a series of major investments announced July 9, 2025, by the Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions. The grants foster excellence in social sciences and humanities research.
More details on each project follow.
SSHRC Insight Development Grants (All grants are two-year awards. The amounts shown are the total for the two years):
Dr. Katelynn Carter-Rogers (Management): Building Allies in Justice: Improving Police Relations with Communities Through Trauma-Informed Allyship Education and Training, $71,476 (with colleagues from Saint Mary’s University and Georgian College). This research project employs a trauma-informed and intersectional framework to assess and strengthen allyship within police services, with a focus on Indigenous and Black communities. Grounded in the Culturally Relevant Gender-Based Analysis (CRGBA) framework and the Paradigm of Organizational Inclusion (POI), the study will investigate how inclusive pedagogies, critical historical education, and organizational climate interventions can reduce prejudice and foster allyship among police foundations students. In partnership with Georgian College and Saint Mary’s University, the project includes a one-year intervention to evaluate shifts in attitudes, perceptions, and inclusion practices. This work responds to longstanding systemic inequities and rising public scrutiny of policing in Canada, offering timely insights into how critical education and inclusive structures can address intergenerational trauma and systemic harm.
Dr. Mickey Jutras and Dr. Wendy Mackey (Education): System-Level Equity Leaders in Canadian K-12 Education Systems: Roles, Responsibilities, Resistance, and Resilience, $53,140 (with Dr. Carmen Gillies from University of Saskatchewan). This project seeks to understand the extent to which system-level equity leaders (SELs) have led meaningful improvements to address the problem of ongoing racism and inequitable education outcomes in the public school system in Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia. The continuation of unconscious racist and colonial beliefs and practices in education systems necessitates the need for specialized educators in leadership positions. Nova Scotia and Saskatchewan present two examples of school systems where SEL positions have been created to address racial inequity. There is a clear gap in literature as these positions, and their impact, have not been studied in Canadian contexts.
Dr. Bhavik Parikh and Dr. Yen Nguyen (Accounting and Finance): How cross-border mergers and acquisitions contribute to technology transfer: The role of automation, $63,506 (with colleagues from RMIT Australia and Florida Atlantic University).
The rapid evolution of digital technologies, robotics, and artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming industries globally, driving economic growth and reshaping competitive landscapes. While these innovations enable firms to optimize processes, reduce costs, and create new market opportunities, they also expose a critical challenge: firms in low-automation countries risk falling behind in productivity and competitiveness. The purpose of this project is to assess whether cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&A) can serve as a viable mechanism for technology transfer and productivity enhancement, and if so, to identify the specific conditions necessary for success. This research has the potential to offer significant economic insights, demonstrating how cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M&A) can facilitate global technology transfer, enhance productivity, and modernize industries through automation. It addressed and explores how firms adapt to the demands of the digital economy and leverage cross-border strategies to bridge technology gaps.
Dr. Elvira Prusaczyk (Psychology): Breaking the Cycle: Examining the Roots of Racial Prejudice in Childhood, $45,531 (with a colleague from York University). Dr. Prusaczyk has been awarded a SSHRC Insight Development Grant to investigate how racial prejudice develops in childhood, and how it can be interrupted early. Over the next two years, her research will examine how children’s endorsement of ideological beliefs like social dominance orientation and right-wing authoritarianism predicts racial bias, and whether classroom-based interventions such as mindfulness and cooperative activities can reduce it. The findings will offer educators, parents, and policymakers practical, evidence-based tools for fostering more inclusive classrooms and reducing the long-term transmission of racial bias.
Dr. Wellington Sousa (Coady): Reimagining Power and Subjectivities in Community-University Partnerships: A Post-Structuralist Inquiry into Community-Based Research, $72,743 (with colleagues from UBC and University of Regina). This study examines community-university partnerships in Community-Based Research (CBR), addressing power imbalances that often marginalize community voices while prioritizing university-driven agendas. Drawing from poststructuralist theories of power, discourse, and subjectivity, the study engages with key debates in sociology, adult education and (as) community development to challenge “margin-center” relations in these partnerships. It aims to reimagine CBR as a practice that amplifies community agency, centres equity, and fosters community-led knowledge production for transformative social change. This research employs a qualitative multi-method approach across three Canadian sites, each representing unique contexts of community-university partnerships: the University of British Columbia, the University of Regina, and St. Francis Xavier University. Expected outcomes include four peer-reviewed publications, national conference presentations, and knowledge mobilization products such as toolkits, policy briefs, and infographics. Community forums and capacity-building workshops at each research site will further disseminate findings, enabling local adaptation and practical application of developed strategies. Ultimately, the study seeks to transform CBR into a more inclusive and democratic process that addresses systemic inequities and advances knowledge democracy for broader societal impact.
Dr. Kara Thompson (Psychology): The Influence of Zero-Alcohol Product Marketing on the Attitudes and Behaviours of Young Adults, $67,793 (with colleagues from Dalhousie, University of Victoria, and Public Health Ontario). Alcohol advertising has long been known to influence young people’s drinking habits. Recently, the alcohol industry has capitalized on the popularity of zero-alcohol products (ZAPs), which mimic traditional alcoholic beverages but contain little to no alcohol. These products present new marketing opportunities, especially in places where alcohol advertising is usually restricted. However, concerns are growing that ZAPs might normalize alcohol use, particularly among youth, by fostering brand loyalty and encouraging the transition to regular alcohol consumption. This research aims to explore the impact of ZAP advertising on young people’s perceptions and behaviors, providing insights to guide public health policy and regulations. If findings suggest that ZAP marketing contributes to normalizing alcohol use among youth, stronger regulatory measures may be needed, such as stricter advertising guidelines, age restrictions, or clearer labeling requirements. This study will play a key role in shaping future policies to reduce alcohol-related harm, particularly among vulnerable youth populations.
Dr. Terry Beaulieu (Anthropology): Challenging Colonial Archaeological Perceptions and Processes Along the Red Deer River, $66,040. This research addresses the erasure of Indigenous place on the Western Plains through the imposition of colonial conceptual and analytical frameworks on Indigenous cultural remains. It seeks to challenge the notion of the site as the base unit of analysis for the archaeologist (Dunnell, 1992; Dunnell &Dancy, 1983; McCoy, 2020), through incorporating a siteless approach (Kantner, 2008) informed by Niitsitapi teachings and knowledge along the Red Deer River. While there have been ongoing debates interrogating the concept of the archaeological site, until recently, Indigenous perspectives have been conspicuously absent from those conversations. One consequence of this exclusion is that Indigenous perspectives have traditionally been underrepresented in the ranks of archaeology, both academically and professionally. As a result, the “experts” archaeology has traditionally turned to when describing Indigenous cultures – both past and present – have generally existed outside the cultures they are presumed to be experts on. As a Michif (Métis) archaeologist, who has worked in Cultural Resource Management and academic archaeology, Dr. Beaulieu continues efforts to challenge limitations and erasures imposed by Western interpretations of archaeological findings.
Dr. Marc Husband and Dr. Evan Throop-Robinson (Education): Number Talks and YouTube: Helping students add, subtract, multiply and divide, $52,827 (with a colleague from York University). There is significant societal concern regarding children's proficiency in basic mathematics, particularly in the recent decline in PISA scores across Canada. Despite the common perception of basic mathematics as straightforward, research exposes its inherent complexity. Nevertheless, well-established theoretical recommendations suggest that the implementation of Number Talks (brief and regular group discussions about mental math) can address this issue. However, it is crucial to conduct research on Number Talks to delineate the nuances of effective implementation and provide substantial evidence that can encourage widespread adoption, ensuring all Canadian students learn basic arithmetic operations. This research aims to fill this gap by following the paths of well-funded projects that have tackled the divide between theoretical research recommendations and classroom activities, incorporating Communities of Practice (CoP). It also ventures into innovative directions by integrating YouTube videos to discuss and demonstrate Number Talks in action. The researchers have developed a YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@DrTina_DrMarc). Cross-provincial findings (Nova Scotia and Ontario) are expected to offer insights into the use of YouTube and the effective implementation of Number Talks in diverse classrooms, to enhance student learning and develop number fluency.
Dr. Laura Estill (English): Shakespeare and Taxonomy, $59,977. When undertaking humanities research today, the first stop is often a scholarly database, bibliography, or library catalogue. These resources, however, are not neutral: the search results are the product of their algorithms and the data these algorithms mine. While some metadata that accompanies articles is visible (and legible) to both scholars and search engines, some underlying information is not always as clear, such as how that research is categorized. Turning to early resources like lists of scholarship about Shakespeare reveals that these categories have been present as long as people have created these lists. Some categories might seem innocuous, such as categorizing research on Shakespeare: but even these categorizations have consequences, which grow larger when the categories are more contentious, bringing up issues of canon and authorship or scholarly approaches. The specific questions for "Shakespeare and Taxonomy" can be summed up as “how do we categorize research on Shakespeare? and why does it matter?” The objective of this project is to determine how the categories we apply to research about Shakespeare proscribe how we find and access scholarship such as journal articles, monographs, and book chapters. The nature of categories is to define and exclude: how have Shakespeare studies defined themselves (or been defined) for the past two centuries? The way research on Shakespeare is categorized, and how those categories (and our names for those categories) have changed will offer a bird's eye view of a thriving area of scholarship. It is only by learning about the existing structures that shape our research, and our lives, that we can be purposeful in how we want to shape those structures going forward.