Digital Commons Network^™

Communication Of Mental Health Diversity To The Early Childhood Age Group: “The Adventures Of Anxious Anderson, Distracted Daniel, And Organized Olive”, Jessica Gower

Honors Projects

In this project, I aim to explore various aspects of communication, cognitive ability, and mental health diversity in early child development. The three research questions guiding this project are: What cognitive and language abilities do children in the early childhood stage of development have? What are the most effective strategies for communicating information about mental health disorders to children ages 4 to 7 through storytelling? And lastly, how do anxiety, attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) manifest, particularly in children? The storybook's purpose is to create a sense of empathy and understanding of mental health diversity in children …

The Effects Of Communication, Knowledge Sharing, And Trust On Agile Virtual Team Effectiveness, Ivana Pino

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Ongoing globalization and the evolution of technology in the workplace reinforce the need for virtual teamwork. Individuals working together across the globe comprise virtual teams. Many teams across industries value and use agile methodology to manage their projects. Research shows that agile virtual teams face challenges based on social and organizational problems such as lack of trust, knowledge sharing, and suitable communication. Therefore, this quantitative study aimed to address a gap in the current literature on the effect that communication, trust, and knowledge sharing have on agile virtual team effectiveness. Additionally, the aim was to determine the moderating effect of …

The Impact Of Covid-19 On Collaboration Between School Psychologists And Board-Certified Behavioral Analysts, Taylor J. Bronaugh

Educational Specialist, 2020-current

The aim of this paper is to examine the impact of communication styles brought on by distanced learning and its effect on collaboration for school psychologists and Bord Certified Behavioral Analysts (BCBAs). Prior studies have addressed collaboration habits between these school-based professionals. The current study aims to analyze the impact that COVID-19 had on these practitioners’ collaboration habits and to investigate their current communication and collaboration habits. A mixed methods locally developed anonymous survey was created and used for data collection. Participants were recruited through social-media groups and via word-of-mouth sharing. 20 school-based practitioners shared their perceptions and experiences with …

Neural Mechanisms Of Lexical Semantics: Investigating The Roles Of Hubs And Distributed Action-Perception Systems, Nicholas Andrew Riccardi

Theses and Dissertations

Understanding the meaning of words and concepts is vital for communication, forming relationships, and navigating everyday life. Loss of this knowledge through brain damage can have drastic consequences for one’s health and well-being. It is therefore important to learn how this information is organized anatomically in the brain. In this dissertation, I report a series of structural and functional neuroimaging studies in healthy adults and survivors of stroke seeking to understand how lexical semantics are represented. Specifically, I used a variety of tasks to examine the contributions of putative ‘hubs’ and distributed action-perception systems. Results indicated that damage or disruption …

Destined Failure, Chengjun Pan

Masters Theses

I attempt to examine the complex structure of human communication, explaining why it is bound to fail. By reproducing experienceable phenomena, I demonstrate how they can expose communication structure and reveal the limitations of our perception and symbolization.I divide the process of communication into six stages: input, detection, symbolization, dictionary, interpretation, and output. In this thesis, I examine the flaws and challenges that arise in the first five stages. I argue that reception acts as a filter and that understanding relies on a symbolic system that is full of redundancies. Therefore, every interpretation is destined to be a deviation.

Community-Based Organization Leaders’ Communication Effectiveness And Effects On Performance Outcomes, Troy N. Nicholas

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The purpose of this study was to determine if effective leader communication builds employee relationships that improves organizational performance. Organizational communication is a prominent factor that impacts the outcome of an organization’s goals and assists in executing its mission. There remain some gaps in the current literature considering the work environment and the attitudes of employees as they relate to organizational communication. To address the gap, the constructive grounded theory model was used to construct and analyze a theory of organizational communication. The sample for the study included 12 participants who were leaders or employees in a community-based organizations in …

Analyzing The Effects Of Video Games On Social Anxiety And Communication, Ana S. Quigley

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Those with high levels of social anxiety can struggle with their communication skills, and confidence in communication. By using a virtual platform such as Zoom to communicate with others, individuals with social anxiety have shown decreased levels of anxiety, even noting that they prefer the virtual platform over face-to-face encounters (Yen et al., 2012). Video games can increase this level of anonymity that could be felt through zoom, by removing the ability to see the other individual’s face. This gives video games the opportunity to decrease anxiety levels while still requiring a degree of communication. Participants will be randomly sorted …

Religiosity, Family Sexual Communication & Gender As Predictors Of Attitudes Toward Oral Sex Among College/University Students In The United States, Antoinette Napier

Dissertations

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether religiosity, family sexual communication and gender were predictors of attitudes toward oral sex among college/university students in the United States.

Method

Participants completed several surveys, which measured participants' personal religiosity, family sexual communication, and attitudes toward oral sex. A path analysis model was used to analyze the relationship between the proposed variables.

Results

The path analysis hypothesized model resulted in a poor fit for the data. The model was respecified by removing three items which showed weak beta weights. The respecified model produced a good fit for the data. The …

A Life Lived With Schizophrenia: When Mother’S Love Is Kept In The Dark Exploring Maternal Communication And Attachment Organization In Families With Schizophrenia, Myrsini Stefanidou Marini

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, research into the transgenerational transmission of attachment styles has shown that a mother’sattachment style often predicts the attachment style of her infant. Fearsome parental behavior has been found to predict disorganized attachment in infants, which is further associated with a range of mental health disturbances in adolescence. Furthermore, regular patterns of disturbed communication between mother and child have also been found to lead to ‘schizophrenic’ thinking and behavior in the child’s life. While acknowledging that genetic and other biological factors contribute to the emergence of schizophrenia, this study focused on disorganized attachment and disturbed communication between mother …

Children’S Social Judgments Of Others On The Basis Of Dialect-Specific Vocabulary, Madison Myers-Burg

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Many studies suggest that young children prefer speakers who speak similarly to them. Children demonstrate social preferences for speakers of their own native language over speakers of a non-native language as well as for speakers of a familiar accent over speakers of an unfamiliar accent. Recent research suggests that young children will similarly show preference for speakers who use familiar dialect-specific vocabulary over speakers who use vocabulary specific to an unfamiliar dialect. The current study investigated potential motivations behind young children’s preferences for familiar dialect-specific vocabulary. Fifty participants ages fifty-one months to ninety-five months (Mage =72.6 months) viewed an animated …

Communication Fatigue Among Egyptian School Teachers, Nahla El Gendy

Theses and Dissertations

Communication fatigue is a situation when a person is no longer able to engage in communication. This study, which is one of the very first in the field, determines the antecedents and consequences of communication fatigue among Egyptian school teachers to be used as a guide for decision makers in the educational sector. Communication between teachers and students is fundamental in the learning process and understanding the antecedents and consequences of communication fatigue is meant to improve the communication between teachers and students and positively reflect on the learning process.

This study answers three main research questions: What is communication …

Examining Trust And Its Influence On Emotional Self-Disclosure, Demetria Thomas-Masso

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Communication is an important aspect of a relationship of any kind as thoughts, feelings, and ideas are conveyed from one party to the other. However, communication styles vary, which can contribute to lack of comprehension of content among individuals resulting in misinterpretation. This study focused on examining whether trust, an identified variable indicative of a secure relationship, could influence individuals’ willingness to emotionally self-disclose within a romantic relationship. One hundred fifty-eight individuals were randomly placed into one of three groups (two were priming groups) for the purpose of assessing whether trust influenced their willingness to disclose their emotions to their …

Interactional Synchrony In Romantic Couples: Linking Dynamic Systems Of Nonverbal Behavior With Outcome Data, Darren J. Garcia

Doctoral Dissertations

Abstract

The aim of this study was to bridge the growing body of research on interactional synchrony with variables reflecting relationship quality in romantic couples. Video data from 116 romantic couples who participated in a short-term relationship intervention (Gordon et al., 2019) and their self-report assessments of relationship satisfaction, emotional intimacy, and constructive communication patterns were used for analyses. Movement was objectively quantified for each partner using Motion Energy Analysis (MEA; Ramseyer & Tschacher, 2011), an automated frame-differencing method. Cross-lag correlations of the time-series data were then aggregated and operationalized as interactional synchrony. Empirical relationships between interactional synchrony and relationship …

Language As The Medium: A Literature Review. Harnessing The Prolific Power Of Dramatic Language As A Therapeutic Tool In Drama Therapy, Edward Freeman

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

Language in and of the theatre, with its palate of variegated writing styles and playwrights from throughout time, has the potential to be harnessed, focused, and systematized for use as a therapeutic tool within drama therapy – the field’s artistic medium. Drama therapy could benefit from having a specific medium germane to its artform which has the potential to provide practitioners with a common resource and means of communication, assessment, diagnosis, and treatment planning, as well as align the field with other creative arts therapies. Language encompasses all forms of human communication – speaking, writing, signing, gesturing, expressing facially – …

Early Communication Abilities Of 24-Month-Old Children With Williams Syndrome As Measured By The Communication Complexity Scale., Sean B. Woods

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Honors Theses

Williams syndrome (WS) is a neurodevelopmental disorder associated with intellectual disability accompanied by a distinct cognitive profile. Despite their socially outgoing nature, children with WS exhibit delayed communication development and specific deficits across various functions of communication. The purpose of this study was to describe the range of communication complexity observed in 24-month-olds with WS and determine relations between communication complexity and other areas of cognitive development. The communication complexity of 17 24-month-old children with WS was measured using the Communication Complexity Scale (CCS), which quantifies optimal and typical communication complexity, as well as optimal communication for Joint Attention (JA) …

Communication In Adult Children Of Alcoholics: The Problem, The Result, And The Solution, Audrey Barth

Communication & Media Studies | Senior Theses

In the United States alone, 25% of children live with an alcoholic parent (Haverfield et al., 2016). While there is extensive research on the psychological impacts of growing up with an alcoholic parent, research focused on communication is slim. This paper seeks to examine the communication characteristics in adult children of alcoholics (ACOAs) in three ways: (1) to determine how communication dynamics in alcoholic families are detrimental, (2) to determine the implications of these dynamics in adulthood, and (3) to determine how communication can be implemented as a solution for ACOAs. Several interviews were conducted on ACOAs based on those …

The Influence Of Parent-Child Relationships On Female Sexual Functioning: A Review Of The Literature, Laura Tillman

Dissertations

This literature review is an examination of the impact of parental communication of sexual functioning in women. Women have many commonalities of sexual experiences and receive similar messages as children and adolescents in regards to their sexual behavior. Current attitudes towards women’s sexuality and sexual functioning and the outcomes that a lack of communication can warrant are areas of importance for this literature review. This Clinical Research Project (CRP) examines how frequently parents communicate about sexual topics with their child, how parents communicate, and parental feelings surrounding discussions. Parenting models and attachment styles are reviewed and how childhood experiences shape …

Promoting Information Exchange: Open-Minded Group Cognition And A Function Of Motivation And Task Type, Jeremy Ryan Winget

Dissertations

Open-minded cognition is a cognitive processing style that influences the manner inwhich individuals select and process information. An open-minded cognitive style is marked by a willingness to consider a variety of intellectual perspectives, values, attitudes, opinions, or beliefs, even those that contradict the individual’s prior opinion. However, people also process information and make decisions within groups, and their individual cognitive styles can influence how the overall group processes and shares information. Therefore, the present paper integrates the open-minded cognition and group decision making literatures, proposes and agent- based model of open-minded group cognition, and empirically tests the antecedents and consequences …

Addressing Cultural Considerations Of African Americans In Interdisciplinary Care, Ashley M. Smith

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

Communication and appreciation for culturally significant factors are essential to the helping relationship between the patient and the interdisciplinary team members in the health care setting. Historically, the relationship between African Americans and health care professionals in the American health care system has been one of mistrust based on unequal treatment, stereotypes, and other factors negatively affecting rapport. The main purpose of this study was to identify the cultural considerations within the Black and African American communities and their impact on the relationship between interdisciplinary care team members and their African American patients. This study used a qualitative grounded theory …

Effective Weather Messaging: Applying The Bad News Response Model To Hurricane Warnings, April S. Carr

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Sweeny and Shepperd (2007, 2009) proposed the Bad News Response Model (BNRM), outlining three effective responses (i.e., Watchful Waiting, Active Change, Acceptance) as a function of the perceived controllability, likelihood, and severity of bad news. In the current study, we have adapted the BNRM, previously used in health-related scenarios, to explore the relationship between message content and responses in the context of hurricane warnings. Participants viewed hurricane warnings manipulated by severity (Category 1 vs. Category 5) and the inclusion of call-to-action statements (CTAs). The present study attempted to evaluate the effects of severity and controllability on participants’ engagement in desirable …

Junior Managers’ Perceptions Of Executives Leadership Styles And Communication Practices, Kaprina Townsend

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Ineffective communication and leadership practices continue to be an ongoing problem within organizations due to executives’ inability to effectively lead and communicate. The primary concern in this study was how junior managers perceive the effectiveness of executives’ communication practices as well as how executives’ leadership styles influence the junior managers. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to explore the lived experiences of junior managers. The leader-member exchange theory provides the framework for this study on exploring junior managers lived experiences and their perceptions on how executives’ leadership styles influence them and their perception of executive’s ability to disseminate top …

Veracious Verdicts: An Expansion Of Cognitive-Experiential Self-Theory In Jury Decision-Making Using Attribution Theory, Jade E. Larson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As a pillar in our judicial system, the courts utilize almost ten million citizens each year for jury service. As a result, the courts are faced with issues of inconsistency and unpredictability. This study aims to examine some factors that significantly influence jury decision-making by investigating cognitive experiential self-theory (CEST) as a jury decision-making model, unified with attribution theory to better predict verdict outcomes. An online survey was distributed to 121 participants. The respondents were asked to read a civil trial case presentation; they were then randomly divided into two conditions (high and low unrelated detail eyewitness testimony). The testimonies …

Coachmotivation: Developing Transformational Leadership By Increasing Effective Communication Skills In The Workplace, Megan L. Schuller

Industrial-Organizational Psychology Dissertations

Communication is an intrinsic part of the human experience and has been widely studied empirically and practically within organizations. It is the bedrock for many workplace behaviors and outcomes such as employee trust, engagement, job satisfaction, and transformational leadership. Nonetheless, effective communication continues to be a challenge for organizations across a variety of sectors. The current study examined whether a communications training, CoachMotivation (CM), increased perceived effective communication. CM is derived from clinical psychology skills for behavior change, namely, the Motivational Interviewing concepts of open-ended questions, affirmations, reflections, and summary statements. This study also considered the Big Five personality traits …

Family Communication Patterns During Recovery Maintenance: Relapse Prevention For Alcoholics & Addicts, Adam Pyecha

Communication & Theatre Arts Theses

The following thesis is research into the Family Communication Patterns (FCP) (McLeod & Chaffee, 1972) of “alcoholics and drug addicts” (ADA) with long-term recovery stages III and IV. Improving relapse rates of ADA in early recovery stage I and stage II may require knowledge about the family communication environment and family type of those ADA with extended recovery time. This is an exploratory descriptive of FCP and family typology of 81 ADA identifying as Twelve-step fellowship (TSF) members recovering from the disease of addiction (Jellinek, 1947; 1960). Data was collected via online questionnaire with adapted scales; AWARE 3.0 relapse awareness …

Therapeutic Assessment With Couples: An Intervention To Enhance Healthy Relational And Marital Practices, Alexis C. Kenny

Dissertations, 2020-current

This dissertation details the creation and implementation of a new model of psychological assessment with partnered dyads, Therapeutic Assessment with Couples (TAC). As research continues to document the link between individual and relational/marital well-being (Jaremka, Glaser, Malarkey, & Kiecolt-Glaser, 2013; Kiecolt-Glaser & Newton, 2001; Sollenberger, et al., 2013), the cultivation of healthy practices from an interpersonal, romantic context becomes ever more crucial. Reviews of the shifting landscape of love and marriage in the U.S. are offered, along with compelling data concerning both the positive and negative implications associated with processes of partnering as well as relevant literature concerning Collaborative / …

Social Justice: A Catholic Autistic Perspective, Rebecca Schneider

Honors Projects

This is a collection of short stories about social injustices impacting the autistic community and how Catholic Social Teaching supports a more just approach. It is written from an autistic perspective and informed by the stories of people who are actually autistic. Each story is followed by an analysis that explains the choices made, which are backed by both research and the experiences of the autistic writer and the autistic community. This collection also includes information on how justice can be attained on the individual level by allies and on the institutional level by organizations.

An Exploration Of Student Athletes Perception On The Athletic Trainer/Coach Relationship, Nikki Owens

Masters Theses, 2020-current

The goal of this study was to explore how the athletic trainer and coach relationship impacts the social support provided to Division I intercollegiate student—athletes. Through a qualitative-case study design, eleven participants were recruited and interviewed for the study. Criterion for inclusion included all NCAA sports at the university. This included males and females in various years of school and sport. After the completion of data analysis, four main themes were developed. These themes included social support, positive impact, negative impact, and unforeseen findings. Seven of the eleven student—athletes reported feeling that there was a direct relationship between the athletic …

Text Messaging Between School Counselors And Students: An Exploratory Study, Nicholas R. Gilly

Graduate Theses & Dissertations

This exploratory case study examines the impact of text messaging on mentoring relationships when used as an outreach between school counselors and high school students, where established relationships are lacking. An SMS gateway was used to mediate communication between school counselors (N=2) and students (N=5) over a three-month timeframe. The SMS gateway converted email, sent from counselors, to text messages, which were received on mobile devices of students and allowed students to respond back to counselors. Findings indicate that the use of text messaging may ease scheduling of face-to-face meetings between counselors and students, but evidence does not support any …

Developing Intercultural Communication And Understanding With Adolescents Through Virtual Exchange, Sarah E. Wilkinson

Public Administration ETDs

Globalization, advances in communication technology, and growing international contact have resulted in increased interconnection of populations from different social, ethnic, and cultural groups. Intercultural competency skills such as intercultural understanding and communication are now necessary requirements to function in culturally diverse communities, workplaces, and society. Adolescence has been identified as an opportune developmental stage for interventions aimed at improving intergroup attitudes. This study conducted pre- and post-program surveys with 313 U.S. students ages 10 to 17 to examine if participation in an intercultural global virtual exchange impacted attitudes of intercultural awareness, intercultural sensitivity, and perspective-taking. Paired samples t-tests were conducted …

The Effects Of Telehealth Training On Parents Of Children With Autism In Albania, Freskida Griffiths

Theses and Dissertations

The present study evaluated telehealth training with parents on techniques for working with their children with autism spectrum disorder in Southeastern Europe. The purpose of this study was to research the effects of telehealth training on the parents and the increase of mands on the children. The participants of this study included three mothers and three children, which totaled six participants. Parents were trained on how to increase functional communication in their child. Telehealth training was based on an effective training package called Behavior Skills Training (BST). BST consist of instructions, modeling, rehearsal, and feedback. The resources needed for the …