Digital Commons Network^™

“Joy In My Body:”An Exploration Of Queer Drug Use, Sam Baker

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

The Auteur As A Critic: Amy Taubin Reviews Steven Soderbergh, Maria B. Bernedo

Senior Projects Fall 2023

In this project, we seek to understand the role of the film critic in the modern world through my favorite film critic: Amy Taubin. As a throughline, we use Steven Soderbergh’s most notable works: Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989) and The Knick (2014-15)

We additionally study the role of the auteur, and what its impact is on the development of film criticism. We focus on Taubins career over the last 30 years and its impact on the concepts we have around filmmaking, criticism, and auteurism. Mostly, this is a piece about what passion for cinema will lead different creators to. …

Lessons From Cowboys And Nature's Narratives: Symbolic Interactionism And The Cowboy's Environmental Encounter, Isabel Piper Danishmend

Senior Projects Fall 2023

This paper analyzes both the ‘myth’ of the cowboy, as well as the real life experiences of one. Through the lenses of symbolic interactionism, naturework, and myth and meaning making, this paper looks into how cowboys see themselves in relation to the land and to nature. Drawing on insights from in person interviews and analysis of historic cowboy ballads, these concepts were defined through their personal experiences that became intertwined with their culturally linked identities. For cowboys, the concepts of 'land' and 'nature' not only represent words but also constitute lived realities that profoundly shape their self-perception.

The Right Sign For The Right Time: A Look At The Effectiveness Of Different Types Of Signage, Samantha Emily Feldstein

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Warning signs are present in the day to day lives of most individuals. While there has been past research into what makes a warning sign more or less effective, there is still no clear answer as to what the most effective warning sign looks like. This study looks at specifically the words being used on a sign and the sign's color to determine which has a larger impact on the hazard perception of the sign. An online study was conducted in which participants were shown different signs and asked to rate how hazardous of a situation they thought each sign …

Spirituality As A Coping Mechanism For Academic Stress, Zurab Kherodinashvili

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Current research has emphasised the adverse effects of stress on well-being and mental health. This paper explores the aspect of stress and well-being in the college student population. Students face multiple stressors during their academic life, such as isolation from family, academic stress, social interactions, financial difficulties, love, and a list of requirements for their future careers. During this period, individuals develop skill sets, ideas, mental prototypes, and coping mechanisms that may be used as a guiding point and retrieved later in life. Coping is mobilizing ideas and behaviors to manage internal and external stressful events. It is a word …

Implementing A Smart Campus Chatbot Using Tf-Idf, Erica Lee

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Science, Mathematics and Computing of Bard College.

The Relationship Between Semantic Search And Semantic Priming, Lily Rachel Mencarini

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Memory is an essential skill for survival but also very complicated. Semantic memory is an aspect of long-term memory that consists of words and facts about the world. This study aims to see if there is a relationship between semantic priming and semantic search. There were 57 participants with full data who took both the Remote Associates Test (RAT) and a primed lexical decision task (LDT). The RAT tests for semantic search abilities and the primed LDT tests semantic priming ability. It is hypothesized that participants who get faster reaction times (RTs) on correct trials of the RAT will have …

The Effect Of Increasing Number Of People, Rumor-Threshold, Liking-Factor, And Influence On The Spread Of Rumors: An Agent-Based Modelling Approach, Abdul Matloob Naweed

Senior Projects Fall 2023

This paper examines the effect of increasing the population density (number of people), rumor threshold, liking factor, and influence on the rate of the rumor spread in an agent-based model. A rumor is a piece of information disseminated without official verification and it is very difficult to stop it from propagation once it begins. Dissemination takes place when individuals of powerful influence are within a population and have close face-to-face interactions with other individuals. The nature of the rumor is such that it will survive even if the adoption percentage is minimal. Using two agent-based models and statistical tools such …

The Dazzled Rope Of Lightning Against The Cloud Is Not The Downward Bolt But The Compelled Upstroke Through The Heated Ether: Stories, Jack S. Muth

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Set Wide The Window, Olivia Tristan Ramo

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Tracing The Dispossession Of The Enslaves Black Woman And A Potential For Resistance., Lila R. O'Conell

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Analysing Flow Free With Pairs Of Dots In Triangular Graphs, Silin Chen

Senior Projects Spring 2023

In the puzzle game Flow Free, the player is given a n x n grid with a number of colored point pairings. In order to solve the puzzle, the player must draw a path connecting each pair of points so that the following conditions are met: each pair of dots is connected by a path, each square of the grid is crossed by a path, and no paths intersect. Based on these puzzles, this project examines pairs of points in triangular grid graphs obtained by hexagons for which Hamiltonian paths exist in order to identify which point configurations have solutions. …

True Random Number Generators, Jade Geng

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Quantum Random Number Generators(QRNGs), or True Random Number Generators, generate random numbers based on naturally unpredictable(or hard-to-predict) sources. Their unpredictability results in a broad application in cryptography and technology. Their sources range from nuclear decay gamma rays to cosmic rays, then to quantum optics. This thesis aims to explore various randomness sources and compare their efficiency by running a series of randomness tests. The specific setup for each random number generator will also be presented.

The Truth Behind Fast Fashion: A Solution To The Issue, Kevin Trung Le

Senior Projects Spring 2023

This paper acknowledges the dominance of large fast fashion retailers in the clothing market. Due to globalization, there have been significant changes over the years as a result of their implementation of the clothing industry. This paper reveals that retailers have held enormous amounts of wealth and power without any oversight. Permitting them to profit from the absence of rules and laws everywhere in the world. A market with perfect competition has been drastically changed to one where maximizing opportunities for profit is the only goal. The industry has suffered greatly as a result of their willingness to pursue such …

Death By Delusion: Representations Of Mental Illness In Gogol, Dostoevsky, And Nabokov, Bryan Reed

Senior Projects Spring 2023

This paper is dedicated to an analysis of representation of mental illness in 19th-20th century works of Russian writers: Fyodor Dostoevsky (The Double), Nikolai Gogol (“Nevsky Prospect”, “The Overcoat”, and “The Diary of a Madman”), and Vladimir Nabokov (Despair). My analysis is primarily focused on the approaches these authors employ to represent mental illness. When I began my research, I also set out to trace the evolution of portrayals of mental illness in Russian literature, from one of its founders, Alexander Pushkin, to Nabokov as an émigré writer living in Germany during the 1930s and representing the literary tradition in …

Every Screen Is A Window And A Mirror: How Social Media Strengthens Ties Within The Lgbtq+ Community, Jourdan Sadir Pérez

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

This Is A True Love Story, Yiwen (Catherine) Lyu

Senior Projects Spring 2023

THIS IS A TRUE LOVE STORY is my attempt to understand love as someone who has never fallen in love. Witnessing romantic love around me makes me want to understand it, but all I can do is speculate about it based on love that is platonic and familial, love that I’ve been taught, consumed, and desired. In this body of work, I explored bodies’ movement and interactions with themselves and each other while wearing something that is limiting our senses. The different media I used – video, photograph, drawing, print, and embroidery – are different pathways for me to record …

The Modern Golem: The Jewish Imaginary, Emma Galley

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Languages and Literature of Bard College.

Behind Closed Doors: How Remittance Flows Changed Repression Dynamics In Beneficiary States During Covid-19, Ketevan Tsurtsumia

Senior Projects Spring 2023

The COVID-19 pandemic affected the global world in a lot of ways. Extensive research has been done on its effect on the economic growth of states, the effectiveness of government responses, the efficacy of different vaccines, and vaccine diplomacy. However, changes in state repression have been a neglected topic in research focused on understanding and analyzing the processes that took place during the pandemic. This paper will take on the topic of state repression dynamics during COVID-19 and further develop this relationship using remittances as an additional variable that affects state repression, taking state repression as a dependent variable. Finally, …

Exploration Of The Public School Education: Still Perpetuating Indoctrination In Our Modern World, Shaniqua B. Bowden

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Maya Lavender's Senior Project In Theater And Performance (Part 3): Reflections From Playtime, Maya E. Lavender

Senior Projects Spring 2023

This project is an exploration of metatheatre in an attempt to understand and portray the feelings surrounding coming of age. Part one was A Play, performed in LUMA theater in fall of 2022. Part two was More Play, performed in the Old Gym in spring of 2023. This is part three, a reflection on my time playing.

Philosophy Of Agency In Studies Of Alcoholism: A Generalizable Paradigm For Overcoming Spiraling Habits, Paul Patrick De Tournemire

Senior Projects Fall 2023

This study considers several of the most successful attempts to understand alcoholism and some of the more successful rehabilitation strategies from the perspective of the philosophy of agency. Puzzling behaviors of the alcoholic are clarified by considering how an individual’s associations between behavior and reward are impacted by the delay of the particular reward, and how this relation is situated by the sober life that serves as a motivation for the alcoholic to drink. Far from being niche interventions, George Ainslie and Hanna Pickard present notable rehabilitation strategies that could have broad applications, particularly in relation to behaviors that involve …

Moving Forward: Studying The Impact Of Future Self-Continuity And Active Commuting On Depression, Anxiety, And Stress, Max William Gehr

Senior Projects Fall 2023

The current research delves into the relationship between Future Self-Continuity (FSC) and mental health, particularly in the context of commuting behaviors. It employs a cross-sectional, observational design and relies on self-reported data. While this approach provides helpful perspicuity into the nature of the observed phenomena, it also expresses methodological limitations in terms of causal inference and variable control and manipulation. The study utilizes established psychometric tools as a basis for modified measures for the sake of brevity and digestibility by recruited online participants: the Truncated Future Self-Continuity Questionnaire (FSCQ-T) and the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale-10 (DASS-10), to measure the …

On Space, Joseph S. Mcvicker Iii

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Our architecture is becoming more and more abstract; financial speculation, square-footage, zoning, taken-for-granted shapes, and the repetition of trivially differentiated prefabricated components represent an increasingly (supposedly) adequate description of our architecture - a description largely divorced from the lived reality of its social inhabitation or, in other words, what it means to us and how we use it. Meanwhile, the extraction of more new materials and the production of more, new, and different buildings has always been unsustainable. A practice is needed that reverses and resists this force of abstraction and that does not involve new construction but instead involves …

Machine Learning For Video-Based Event Detection: A Cnn-Lstm Model, Nam Alex Nguyen

Senior Projects Fall 2023

In recent years, the application of machine learning methodology into event detection has become increasingly prevalent, with examples ranging from surveillance to entertainment and healthcare. This project aims to explore the classification of events in video content with practical implication of content management and archival. To develop a method for event detection, we will utilize the VidLife dataset — a dataset that captures a wide array of life events from the popular American television sitcom series 'The Big Bang Theory'. This project focuses on the development of a hybrid model that combines Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) with Long Short-Term Memory …

Infinity On Trial: Michael Heizer And The Post-War American Avant-Garde, George Fleming Sutton

Senior Projects Fall 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Arts of Bard College.

Renaissance Self-Destruction: The Virtue And Danger Of Chess In European Literature, Kaleth Marcus Torrens-Martin

Senior Projects Spring 2023

This thesis will argue that in the western European tradition, chess in literature represents both a pedagogical tool which instructs one in the art of living well, through allegory and Platonic dialogue, but also a Narcissan mirror uncannily similar to reality. As a tool and intellectual pastime, chess is virtuous, but latent with depths dangerously enthralling as an end in itself. Thus, chess carries inside its squares a lesson for living virtuously in the world but the danger arises when the chess mirror becomes a world unto itself. It is a game of self-fashioning and self-destruction. Instead of remaining confined …

She To The Sea And In Sun And Rain, Danielle Vada Cohen

Senior Projects Spring 2023

She to the Sea and In Sun and Rain, the titles of my two recitals, encapsulate the essence of the music performed in each installation. The first recital, She to the Sea, was a presentation of classical vocal repertoire including art songs by Ralph Vaughan Williams and Claude Debussy, German lieder by Johannes Brahms and Clara Schumann, and Italian arias by Francesco Cilea and Pietro Mascagni. These selections demonstrated my vocal abilities through a classical lens. Giving myself permission in this recital to be expressive and evocative through classical music allowed me the freedom to go forth boldly in performance. …

The Impact Of Psychiatric Labels And Sexual Orientation On Attitudes Toward People With Pedophilic Attractions, Gabriel Traub

Senior Projects Spring 2023

This study explores whether framing pedophilic attractions as a mental disorder and/or manipulating the sexual orientation of these attractions impacts attitudes toward people with pedophilic attractions (PPA). This study used an experimental 2 (Pathological Language vs. Non-Pathological Language) by 2 (Heterosexual vs. Homosexual) between-subjects design, in which online participants read a vignette describing a fictional subject’s pedophilic attractions. Both independent variables were manipulated within the vignette, in that the subject’s attractions were either given a pathological or non-pathological explanation, and were either heterosexual or homosexual. To assess stigmatizing attitudes, participants reported their affective responses, agreement with beliefs/stereotypes about the individual, …

The Path To Development And Democracy, Does It Matter Which Comes First? Nicolas, Nicolas Soucy

Senior Projects Spring 2023

In this paper I have looked into the relationship between economic development and the type of political regime used to achieve development. Throughout my research I approach the idea that economic development is more related to the initial conditions of the state independent of the regime style in place. I have looked at states that achieved development through a democracy, states that achieved development through more of an authoritarian regime, and states that have not achieved development yet. When looking at the process of economic development the initial conditions of macroeconomic and political stability, equality of opportunity, and a collective …