Digital Commons Network^™

Crime Legends In Old And New Media, Pamela Donovan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This project explores the contemporary meanings and persistence of the "crime legend." A case study approach was used: three crime legends with a considerable history of public debunking were chosen. These cases were: the market in snuff films, the theft of vital organs for black-market transplant, and the abduction of children from theme park restrooms. Current versions circulating in Internet newsgroups and via electronic mail lists were collected. Discussions in Internet newsgroups were examined and twenty regular newsgroup participants were interviewed. The public newsgroup communication environment is such that salience is established by the interlocutors themselves, rather than by the …

The Emergence Of Dialogic Identities: Transforming Heteroglossia In The Marquesas, F.P., Kathleen C. Riley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Te 'Enana 'the people' of the Marquesas, French Polynesia, have been engaged for some time in the dialogic negotiation of their heteroglossic identity. Based on an ethnographic study of language socialization in the Marquesas, this dissertation examines how communicative forms are acquired within a changing socio-cultural matrix, as well as on how cultural habits and beliefs are produced and reproduced via verbal interaction.

My first two months of fieldwork were spent in Tahiti (the capital of French Polynesia), living and studying the language use and cultural patterns of an 'enana family. Subsequently, I spent ten months in a village in …

L1 Lexical, Morphological And Morphosyntactic Attrition In Greek-English Bilinguals, Linda Ann Pelc

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study investigated first language attrition in Greek-English bilinguals. Three areas of attrition were identified and tested in grammaticality judgment tasks. They include the lexical, morpholexical and morphosyntactic domains of Greek. Rejection of Greek grammatical sentences and acceptance of English grammatical sentences characterize the attrited state of these bilinguals.

The first area of attrition involves metaphorical senses of perno, 'take,' and spazo, 'break.' These verbs were chosen for this study because of the wide range of senses or meanings associated with them. As predicted, metaphorical senses were found to be vulnerable to attrition.

Another form of lexical attrition comprises opaque …

The Influence Of Family And Community Ties On The Demand For Home Equity Conversion Mortgages, Kenneth Allen Knapp

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Reverse mortgages are loans against home equity that do not have to be repaid until the borrower moves, sells the home, or dies. The loans generally are available only to older homeowners, usually aged 62 or over. This paper explores whether demand for reverse mortgages is influenced by the strength of area’s family and community ties. One type of reverse mortgage is analyzed: the FHA-insured Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM). Several researchers have estimated the potential demand for reverse mortgages. To my knowledge, this is the first study of how actual demand may be determined, and of how it may …

The Police Officer As Survivor: The Psychological Impact Of Exposure To Death In Contemporary Urban Policing, Vincent E. Henry

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

All human encounters with death, whether they involve a casual contact with the death of another person or the realistic threat of one's own demise, have important psychological consequences that result in new modes of adaptation, thought and feeling. In the course of their duties, contemporary urban police officers frequently encounter the deaths of others and some participate in mortal combat situations that credibly threaten their own lives. The psychological dimensions of police officers' professional exposures to the deaths of others are to a large extent shaped by the specific duties and responsibilities prescribed by their formal task environment, while …

Blue Vaudeville: Sex, Morals, And The Mass-Marketing Of Amusement, 1895-1915, Andrew L. Erdman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Vaudeville was the most popular form of entertainment in the United States, from roughly the 1890s through World War I. In fact, it can reasonably be called the first truly mass form of entertainment in the United States, and perhaps the world. This dissertation examines how vaudeville grew as the first national, large-scale form of amusement in America. It attempts to locate the rise of this first form of mass entertainment within an era when powerful businessmen in many industries were beginning to market products and services to a national market as well.

Furthermore, this dissertation examines some of the …

Clinical Process Related To Outcome In Psychodynamic Psychotherapy For Panic Disorder, Cara F. Klein

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study identified psychotherapeutic processes that relate meaningfully to psychotherapeutic outcome for patients with panic disorder undergoing Panic-Focused Psychodynamic Psychotherapy ([PFPP]; Milrod, Busch, Cooper, & Shapiro, 1997). Subjects were 21 patients who participated in an open clinical trial of PFPP (Milrod et al., in press; Milrod et al., 2000). Patients received 24 sessions over approximately 12 weeks. Each patient was diagnostically screened by an independent evaluator and completed a battery of outcome assessments at baseline, termination and 6-month follow up.

The present study utilized two process measures: the Interactive Process Assessment ([IPA]; Klein, Milrod, Busch, 1999), developed specifically to identify …

Mothers Of Sexually Abused Children And The Concept Of Collusion, Patricia A. Joyce

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study reports the perspectives of clinical social workers on the mothers of sexually abused children whom they saw for treatment. The subjects were 15 masters-level social workers in an urban child treatment program. The study used qualitative methods based on grounded theory to examine professionals' social constructions of mothers of sexually abused children. The child's disclosure of incest provided the study's conceptual focus, since historically professionals constructed the "collusive mother," even though prior empirical research never supported maternal collusion or culpability for incest.

Respondents were interviewed for approximately one hour using a semi-structured interview guide; nearly one hundred hours …