Digital Commons Network^™

Isolation, Athletic Identity, And Social Support: An Exploration Among Injured Collegiate Student-Athletes, Ally W. Claytor

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Season ending and career ending injuries make up a large portion of all injuries (Tirabassi et al., 2016). Among psychological consequences to these types of injuries, isolation is a social consequence that has been identified as occurring after injury (Gould et al., 1997). Isolation is related to loss of identity for an athlete (Mankand et al., 2009). Additionally, low levels of support have been shown to increase feelings of isolation in injured athletes (Mitchell et al., 2014). The purpose of the present study was to explore the experience of isolation as a psychological response to injury among athletes with career …

The Effects Of School Disciplinary Policies On Violence, Delinquency, And Disorder, Ernest E. Zittrouer Iii

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The occurrence of violent and disruptive behavior in schools has been present throughout most of American educational history. The disciplinary policies established to address these behaviors have changed over time, becoming only more severe. The deterrent effect these policies were intended to produce has seen to be minimal, and despite a reduction in violent school victimization since the mid-1990s, schools continue to rely on these harsh policies (Skiba, 2014). This study examines the relationship between incident counts and discipline action counts for Georgia public schools (N = 2,150) for the 2017-2018 academic school year. This research utilizes negative binomial regression …

Investigating The Interaction Between Memory Recall Content And Savoring Interventions On Openness, Caroline V. Young

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Openness is generally characterized by a stark curiosity for novel experiences and the ability to flexibly shift one’s attention and thinking processes to appreciate differing perspectives. Research suggests openness is a personal resource in terms of helping individuals effectively regulate emotions, cope with stress, and socialize with diverse populations. However, it is unknown what interventions specifically lead to an increase in openness. Positive affect appears to be associated with openness, yet the mechanisms by which positive affect promotes openness remain unclear. It is possible savoring, the ability to maintain and extend positive affect, may play an important role in clarifying …

The Effects Of Mood On Empathy, Openness To Diversity, Attitudes, And Willingness To Help Marginalized Groups, Angela J. Adams

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Members of marginalized groups such as lesbian women and gay men are often at an increased risk of threat or harm compared to their heterosexual counterparts. They may experience prejudice in the form of discrimination and stigma related behaviors. Due to the stigma lesbian women and gay men face throughout various stages of their lives, it is important to examine and discover which factors increase more acceptance and empathy. Additionally, it is important to examine ways to increase positive regard and reduce discrimination in order to promote psychological and overall wellbeing for lesbians and gay men. Given what we know …

Examining The Effects Of Energy Drinks On Academic Performance, Alyssa P. Roberson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Reports of energy drink (ED) consumption have grown among the United States population. Research suggests reasons for consumption vary across populations, including increased attention and enhanced endurance performance. However, ED consumers could suffer from negative effects of ED, including health problems, caffeine overdose, and death. Energy drink consumption is also linked to substance use. Despite risks of consuming ED, heavy use of EDs remains among college students, often to help with academic performance; however, research has not examined effects of ED consumption on perceived and actual academic performance. This study evaluated relationships among ED consumption, self-efficacy, and academic performance in …

Let Me Upgrade You: Common Measures In Public Health Accreditation Action Plans, Gurleen K. Roberts

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to understand the success rates for health departments pursuing and achieving accreditation in version 1.0 and 1.5 of the Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB) standards and measures. During the accreditation process, health departments that present performance gaps are asked to complete an Action Plan to specify how they plan to improve to meet the desired conformity. This study will highlight specific measures that are often included in Action Plans so that health departments pursuing accreditation can be better prepared to address these common pitfalls.

Methods: This study is a non-experimental, secondary …

Emotional Intelligence Instruction For Millennials In Undergraduate Education, Jason M. Pollett

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the improvement, if any, of emotional intelligence scores of students who participated in and completed the specified professional development seminar. In addition, this study aimed to examine the relationship between emotional intelligence subscales of students enrolled in a professional development seminar that focuses on enhancing the emotional intelligence. The research design for this study was an ex post facto, quasi-experimental correlational quantitative research design. Data from the 371 students who enrolled in the Professional Development Seminar course during academic years 2015-2017 served as the sample for this study.

This study focused on …

The Multicultural Center's Role In Black Male Success At A Predominantly White Institution, Stephan Tramaine Moore

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Many scholarly works have focused on the problems that Black males face in higher education at predominantly White institutions (PWI). However, few have explored specific factors that lead to the success of Black males. This study focuses on the Multicultural Center’s role in Black male success a PWI. There are a myriad of issues that Black men face when pursuing higher education ranging from a lack of financial resources to “invisibility” in the collegial environment. These challenges are further exacerbated for Black men who are enrolled at a PWI. The Multicultural Center (MC) is among the essential modalities that can …

Neo_Fluxus & Dragons, Zachary A. Kelley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

What is a viewer? Who can be a viewer? What is the purpose of a viewer? Is viewing an artwork a process? How does a viewer interact with an artwork? What is an artist? Are the formal elements or conceptual natures more important in art making? Why is that art? These questions and more direct me in how and why I make my art.

I will be discussing the relationship between the viewer and the artwork in an artwork experience. I will define an artwork experience using an analysis of Michael Fried’s notion of theatricality, relating the viewer to the …

The Impact Of Stress On Resilience: Examining The Moderated Effects Of A Savoring Intervention, Hannah L. Newman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Resilience is characterized by the ability to bounce back from stress (Bonanno, 2004; Ong et al., 2006; Smith et al., 2008). Research suggests resilience is a personal resource that helps individuals effectively cope with stress and provides protection from negative outcomes (Loh, Schutte, & Thorsteinsson, 2013). Exposure to stress is a prerequisite to building resilience across many different contexts (Graber et al., 2015; Hennessey & Levine, 1979; Rutter, 2006). Interestingly, a high accumulation of stress detracts from an individual’s abilities to build resilience (Ong et al., 2006; Tuguade & Frederickson, 2007). However, it is unknown what types of interventions explicitly …

Ego Depletion: Buffering Through Touch, Victoria E. Forgea

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Ego depletion theory states that self-control is tied to a limited resource and diminishes after repeated exertions; consequently, the current study sought to examine how to replenish self-control through touch. Due to the positive outcomes of touch, we expected touch to allow participants to persist longer on a geometric tracing puzzle task after becoming ego depleted. The current study implemented measures widely used in the ego depletion literature, and the experimenter implemented two brief touches to examine the effects of touch in the domain of self-control. We found that participants who received touch persisted significantly longer on the geometric tracing …

Gallai-Ramsey Number For Classes Of Brooms, Benjamin J. Hamlin

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Given a graph $G$, we consider the problem of finding the minimum number $n$ such that any $k$ edge colored complete graph on $n$ vertices contains either a rainbow colored triangle or a monochromatic copy of the graph $G$, denoted $gr_k(K_{3}:G)$. More precisely we consider $G=B_{m,\ell}$ where $B_{m,\ell}$ is a broom graph with $m$ representing the number of vertices on the handle and $\ell$ representing the number of bristle vertices. We develop a technique to reduce the difficulty of finding $gr_{k}(K_{3}:B_{m,\ell})$, and use the technique to prove a few cases with a fixed handle length, but arbitrarily many bristles. Further, …

Ambivalent Prejudice In News Media: Does Social Hierarchy Threat Change How We View Reporters?, Rebecca E. Burchette

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Despite research demonstrating the importance of news media, there remains a gap in the literature on how the reporter influences the perception of the information. This current experiment aims to fill that gap by evaluating how reporter race and social hierarchy threat alters perceptions of both the reporter and the information. White participants read an article with content that indicated that the current racial hierarchy is either under threat or likely to continue; the article was written by either a Black or White reporter. Participants then completed measures of perceptions of warmth and competence of the reporter, acceptance levels towards …

The Relationship Between The Nfl Scouting Combine And Game Performance Over A Five Year Period, Jordan Cook

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The National Football League (NFL) Scouting Combine offers good face validity however, there has been doubt on the ability of the NFL Combine to predict future success of athletes in relation to in game performance (i.e., predictive validity). This study analyzed the NFL Combine data of 1537 college football players who participated in the Combine between 2013 and 2017 and their subsequent year’s performance in the NFL. The measures used from the Combine were the six different measures of athletic performance; 40-yard dash, vertical jump (VJ), broad jump, shuttle run (PRO), 3-cone drill, and bench press (BP). The measure of …

Evaluating The Effects Of Antibody-Conjugated Multi-Walled Carbon Nanotubes In Combination With Microwave Irradiation, Amy Chall

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Cancer remains one of the largest public health concerns of our day, particularly in developed countries where technological advances have allowed populations to live well into their eighth decade. In America, those in their 80’s have a 1 in 2 chance of developing cancer in their lifetime. Prostate cancer, specifically is the second leading cause of cancer deaths in males. Traditional cancer therapies cause high levels of toxicity to the patient due to mechanisms of action that often attack cancer cells and healthy cells alike. The holy grail of cancer research is to find a treatment that targets the cancer …

Analysis Of Human Emf Exposure In 5g Cellular Systems, Imtiaz Nasim

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Increasing concerns of communications at a frequency spectrum higher than 6 GHz have gained international alarm that suggests more research is needed before it is deployed successfully. In this context, in the first part of this thesis, we investigated the human electromagnetic field (EMF) exposure in indoor and outdoor environments from fifth-generation (5G) downlink communications and compared its impacts with the present cellular technologies considering the features that the 5G will likely adopt. The second part focuses on mitigation of human exposure for both indoor and outdoor environments with two different methods adopted. Our simulation results suggest that while the …

Effects Of Mental Health Programs On School Violence, Lillian R. Gray

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Bullying, defined as any unwanted aggressive behavior(s) by another youth or group of youths who are not siblings or current dating partners that involves an observed or perceived power imbalance and is repeated multiple times or is highly likely to be repeated, is becoming an epidemic in our schools, with rates of victimization rising (Donegan, 2012). This thesis examines mental health programs already established within schools, as well as schools where students do not have access to mental health resources and compares the amount of violence that is perpetrated within these schools. Next, this study explores the relationship between bullying …

The Bioarchaeology Of The Tugalo Site (9st1): Diet, Disease, And Health Of The Past, Nompumelelo Beryl Hlophe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Tugalo site is a prehistoric and early historic Native American site located in northeast Georgia along the upper Savannah River basin, near the junction of Toccoa Creek and the Tugalo River. According to archaeological materials analyzed from the site it was occupied from ca. A.D. 1100 to 1600 (Anderson et al. 1995). Although archaeological investigations of the site revealed basic characteristics of its chronology and architecture, very little analysis and reporting of the skeletal remains from Tugalo has been completed. By analyzing data collected by Williamson (1998) concerning the age and sex of the burials, the presence or absence …

Using The Theory Of Reasoned Action To Analyze African American College Students Intentions To Participate In Bio Banking Research, Bethrand O. Ugwu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The proliferation of biobanks has created new opportunities for researchers to conduct cutting-edge research that was not possible a decade ago. The results of early studies using biospecimens in cancer research have been encouraging. However, researchers are concerned about the applicability of the new knowledge that is being produced to racially diverse subgroups because African American (AA) participation in biobanking research is low. The current study assessed how AA college students’ attitudes and social norms influenced their intentions to participate in biobanking research. This research was guided by Ajzen and Fishbein’s Theory of Reasoned Action as the analytic lens. Methods: …

Behavioral And Molecular Analysis Of Memory In The Dwarf Cuttlefish, Jessica M. Bowers

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Complex memory has evolved because it benefits animals in all areas of life, such as remembering the location of food or conspecifics, and learning to avoid dangerous stimuli. Advances made by studying relatively simple nervous systems, such as those in gastropod mollusks, can now be used to study mechanisms of memory in more complex systems. Cephalopods offer a unique opportunity to study the mechanisms of memory in a complex invertebrates. The dwarf cuttlefish, Sepia bandensis, is a useful memory model because its fast development and small size allows it to be reared and tested in large numbers. However, primary literature …

Differences In Lower Body Strength, Power Between Genders, Shonterious D. Williams

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

INTRODUCTION: Athletic individuals have many characteristics, which make them more elite than the average individual. When determining an individual’s physical fitness level, strength, power, and agility are commonly examined. When measuring strength, power, and agility in elite athletes the scores are compared to some portion of body composition such as muscle cross-sectional area and fat-free mass. When looking at the same factors in recreationally trained individuals the research mostly normalized to body weight. PURPOSE: To examine the differences in lower body strength, power, and agility in male and female recreationally trained individuals when normalized to body mass, fat-free mass, and …

Does Enhancing Mind Perception Affect Conspiracy Belief?, Jorge R. Noguera - Sepulveda

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study was conducted to determine the effectiveness of a novel mind perception manipulation. Mind perception is currently theorized to be an essential aspect of a number of human social psychological processes. Thus, a successful manipulation would allow for the causal study of those processes. This manipulation was created in an attempt to explore the downstream impact of mind perception on the endorsement of conspiracy theories. Conspiracy theories are steadily becoming more and more prominent in social discourse. Endorsement of conspiracy theories are beginning to show real world ramifications such as a danger to human health (e.g., in the anti-vaccination …

Finite Element Modeling Of Mechanically Stabilized Earth Walls Built With Welded Wire Wall Panels, Dejuan G. Solan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this thesis, a finite element modeling of Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) walls using welded wire wall panels was performed. The implementation of finite element modeling and analysis proved to be quite efficient in simulating the three-dimensional behavior of wall panels that are a part of MSE walls. The comprehensive finite element model included defined concrete and steel material properties in order to present both the realistic behaviors of each component in the model as well as better facilitating and increasing the accuracy of the simulation of numerous finite element analysis (FEA) cases. FEA was employed to simulate welded wire …

Bird Window Strikes On A College Campus: Mortality Estimates And Possible Mitigation, Antarius D. Mclain

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Understanding the impact that human development has on wildlife populations is essential to preserving biodiversity. Bird populations are a good indicator of anthropogenic threats because they are sensitive to environmental change. Window strikes are a major source of mortality for bird populations. Studies have begun to monitor factors that cause window strikes and estimate the amount of birds killed annually by strikes. However, these estimates can be greatly affected by site dependent variables and scavenging of carcasses. My study addresses this issue by answering four questions: First, how many birds are killed annually on campus? Second, what factors complicate making …

Determining Political Inclination In Tweets Using Transfer Learning, Mehtab Iqbal

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Last few years have seen tremendous development in neural language modeling for transfer learning and downstream applications. In this research, I used Howard and Ruder’s Universal Language Model Fine Tuning (ULMFiT) pipeline to develop a classifier that can determine whether a tweet is politically left leaning or right leaning by likening the content to tweets posted by @TheDemocrats or @GOP accounts on Twitter. We achieved 87.7% accuracy in predicting political ideological inclination.

Stakeholder Attitudes Toward Student Drug Testing, John Jordan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to identify the attitudes toward mandatory student drug testing from various school stakeholder groups in a Small Rural Southeast Georgia School District. This study employed a quantitative methodological research design along with descriptive analyses of two research questions for the sixth through twelfth grade population of students, parents, and school personnel. Survey data from the middle and high school stakeholder groups were received during the fall of 2019 and analyzed to determine the overall attitude toward the use of student drug testing as well as the differences that existed among various stakeholder groups.

This …

Inverse Problems Related To The Wiener And Steiner-Wiener Indices, Matthew Gentry

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In a graph, the generalized distance between multiple vertices is the minimum number of edges in a connected subgraph that contains these vertices. When we consider such distances between all subsets of $k$ vertices and take the sum, it is called the Steiner $k$-Wiener index and has important applications in Chemical Graph Theory. In this thesis we consider the inverse problems related to the Steiner Wiener index, i.e. for what positive integers is there a graph with Steiner Wiener index of that value?

The Subaltern As Surrogate: Identity And Gender In Contemporary Postcolonial Novels, Jackson T. Turner

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Postcolonial novel attempts to reveal the crimes and lasting effects of colonization. By looking at Season of Migration to the North by Tayeb Salih, The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje, and The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid, I intend to reveal how the inversion of the typical postcolonial gender dynamic changes the conversation about the relationship between the colonizer and the colonized. The male, colonized characters within these works are used as surrogates for something that the colonizer, female has lost or desires. This change in relationship draws attention to the way in which past empires still exert their …

In-Between Epistemic Paradigms Of Disablement: A Reflective Journey, Daniel James Mcnair

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The author explores feelings of in-betweenness, hybridity, and dislocation (Aoki, 2005; Bhabha, 2007/1994; Saïd, 1994) as he contemplates the meaningfulness of a liminal placement between two epistemic worlds—that of his more recent experiences as a curriculum studies scholar and his previous training as a postpositivist practitioner of school psychology. This self-study engages pedagogical possibilities of in-between spaces (Aoki, 2005; He & Ross, 2012; Baszile, 2006) to construct a lived curriculum that challenges traditional stereotypes of autism and postsecondary disability services. To guide this critical self-reflective inquiry, the author applies the concepts of Joseph Schwab’s (1973) curriculum commonplaces along with William …

Impact Of Seasonal And Host-Related Factors On The Intestinal Microbiome And Cestode Community Of Sorex Cinereus And Sorex Monticola, Katelyn D. Cranmer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The intestinal microbiome of mammals plays a significant role in host health and response to environmental stimuli and can include both beneficial native bacteria as well as parasitic worms. In this study, I examined the intestinal cestode and bacterial communities of two closely related species of shrew, Sorex monticola and Sorex cinereus, over a six month period in 2016. Specimens were collected approximately every three weeks from May to October from the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in Cowles, New Mexico. A total of 79 shrews were prepared with the gastrointestinal tracts removed and flash-frozen in liquid nitrogen. An additional …