College major choice is a much-neglected yet highly signifi cant topic in sociological research. This article focuses on family socioeconomic status (SES) and parental involvement to examine potential family influences on patterned college major choice by gender, race/ethnicity, and nativity. Using data from the National Education Longitudinal Study 1988-1994, this study confirms old gender patterns and finds new racial/ethnic patterns in college major choice. Lower SES children are found to favor more lucrative college majors. Family SES is found to have differential effects on men and women and for racial/ethnic minorities and whites. Parental involvement in children's domain-specific education exerts significant effects on children's college major choice. These together suggest important theoretical and policy implications.

Chinese students in the U.S. are confronted with the double jeopardy of virus and stigma amid the COVID19. This study focuses on their choice and impact of mask wearing during this pandemic. How do they navigate and negotiate the troubling and contradictory directives about masks coming from their home and host countries during this pandemic? What are the impacts of their experiences on their attitudes towards the American society? Drawing from stigma theory, we argue that what Chinese students experience when it comes to mask wearing is an exemplar of how stigma is socially constructed by power. Through 30 semi-structured and in-depth phone interviews with Chinese students, we find that Chinese students cope with such stigma through various mechanisms, and most notably, through the counter-narrative of discrediting the American mainstream belief in the usage of masks. However, they harbored these thoughts privately. In addition, we conclude that escalating geopolitical tensions between the U.S. and China, coupled with the lack of social integration of Chinese students in America, will continue to alienate them, despite the subsequent destigmatization of mask-wearing in America.

Objectives. Many have wondered why U.S. women continue to shun certain STEM fields, including science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. This study investigates this question and examines the pathways that women and men follow in attaining their STEM bachelor's degrees. Methods. Using NELS 88-00 and the postsecondary transcript data, the descriptive analysis examines gender differences in the three stages of the STEM pipeline: expected college major, first major, and bachelor degree major. The multivariate analysis examines the outcomes of STEM degree attainment, the subfields attainment and the pathways in a series of logical steps. Results. Drawing from the pipeline model and its associated cumulative disadvantage theory, and the alternative framework of revolving door theory, analyses from this study indicate that men are more likely than women to follow the complete persistence pathway to attain STEM degrees, but women are as persistent as men once they expect a major in STEM as high school seniors. High school achievement, attitudes, and course taking are related to the subfields attainment, as well as the pathways of the STEM degree attainment. Conclusions. Taken together, the results are more aligned with revolving door theory and support the contextual variability in the salience of gender to understand gender differences in attaining STEM fields. Women have achieved substantial success in postsecondary education for the past few decades (Buchmann, DiPrete, and McDaniel, 2008). However, women do not enjoy the parallel success in STEM fields, including science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. While women have surpassed men in college attendance and completion rates, women received only 19 percent of bachelor's degrees in engineering, and 19 percent in computer science and 21 percent in physics in 2007 (NSB, 2010). Jerry Jacobs (1995) has termed the persistent underrepresentation of women in certain STEM fields as "the most stubborn basis for gender segregation." In this increasingly technologically advanced world, women's underrepresentation in STEM is widely considered as one of the bottleneck issues facing women's advancement into leadership

Women have achieved substantial success in postsecondary education (Buchmann & DiPrete, 2006;England, 2010) and are now the majority of college attendees and graduates. However, women's relative success in postsecondary education has not translated into parallel labor market gains. Indeed, the gender pay gap for college graduates is larger than that of non-college graduates. According to a recent report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (2011) Highlights of Women's Earnings in 2011, the ratio of women's median weekly earnings to men's median weekly earnings is about .82 for the general population, whereas the ratio among those with bachelor's degrees and higher is about .75.To understand the gender pay gap among the college graduates, we need to consider the key factors contributing to the income disparity among the college graduates generally, and their roles leading to the gender pay gap in particular. Studies have shown that fields of study and institutional selectivity are two of the most important sources of income disparity among the college educated (

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Autotoxic ginsenosides have been implicated as one of the major causes for replant failure of Sanqi ginseng (Panax notoginseng); however, the impact of autotoxic ginsenosides on the fungal microbiome, especially on soilborne fungal pathogens, remains poorly understood. In this study, we aimed to investigate the influence of the ginsenoside monomers Rg1, Rb1, and Rh1, and that of their mixture (Mix), on the composition and diversity of the soil fungal community, as well as on the abundance and growth of the soilborne pathogen Fusarium oxysporum in pure culture. The addition of autotoxic ginsenosides altered the composition of the total fungal microbiome, as well as the taxa within the shared and unique treatment-based components, but did not alter alpha diversity (α-diversity). In particular, autotoxic ginsenosides enriched potentially pathogenic taxa, such as Alternaria, Cylindrocarpon, Gibberella, Phoma, and Fusarium, and decreased the abundances of beneficial taxa such as Acremonium, Mucor, and Ochroconis. Relative abundances of pathogenic taxa were significantly and negatively correlated with those of beneficial taxa. Among the pathogenic fungi, the genus Fusarium was most responsive to ginsenoside addition, with the abundance of Fusarium oxysporum consistently enhanced in the ginsenoside-treated soils. Validation tests confirmed that autotoxic ginsenosides promoted mycelial growth and conidial germination of the root rot pathogen F. oxysporum. In addition, the autotoxic ginsenoside mixture exhibited synergistic effects on pathogen proliferation. Collectively, these results highlight that autotoxic ginsenosides are capable of disrupting the equilibrium of fungal microbiomes through the stimulation of potential soilborne pathogens, which presents a significant hurdle in remediating replant failure of Sanqi ginseng. IMPORTANCE Sanqi ginseng [Panax notoginseng (Burk.) F. H. Chen] is geoauthentically produced in a restricted area of southwest China, and successful replanting requires a rotation cycle of more than 15 to 30 years. The increasing demand for Sanqi ginseng and diminishing arable land resources drive farmers to employ consecutive monoculture systems. Replant failure has severely threatened the sustainable production of Sanqi ginseng and causes great economic losses annually. Worse still, the acreage and severity of replant failure are increased yearly, which may destroy the Sanqi ginseng industry in the near future. The significance of this work is to decipher the mechanism of how autotoxic ginsenosides promote the accumulation of soilborne pathogens and disrupt the equilibrium of soil fungal microbiomes. This result may help us to develop effective approaches to successfully conquer the replant failure of Sanqi ginseng.

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