Digital Commons Network^™

Testimonios Of Civic Pedagogy: Developing Critical Literacy Skills Using Civics And Holocaust Studies, Tameka Parenti

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Civics using Holocaust Studies offer a variety of pedagogical advantages. Regardless of the topic, Holocaust events can be used to build critical analytical skills and cultivate essential literacy skills about the social world. Further, the Holocaust can be used to introduce and grapple with the complex/abstract ideas of the civics content. Given the relationship that social studies has to critical literacy development, civics used in conjunction with Holocaust resources present teacher(s) (educators) with the opportunity to explore (theoretical) concepts foregrounding manifold relationships making up the social world.

This research aimed to examine how secondary students connect to the social world …

Diagnosis Of Neurodegenerative Diseases Using Higher Order Statistical Analysis Of Electroencephalography Signals, Seyed Alireza Khoshnevis

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The field of signal processing has many applications, one of which is in the field of biomedical engineering where it has improved the performance of biomedical devices and the accuracy of medical diagnosis. One of the areas that have benefited from this field is the diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease (PD). This disease is one of the most common neurodegenerative diseases of the central nervous system. Nearly one million Americans suffer from PD, and this number goes up to over ten million people worldwide. The main symptoms of PD include bradykinesia, rest tremor, rigidity, and impaired balance. There are many types …

Interlocking Directorates: How Interpersonal Relationships Build Corporate Boards, Matthew A. Forrester

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In an inductive network analysis research design, this dissertation seeks to understand the influence of the interlocking directorate networks on the selection of directors. Its intent is to understand both what the individual and organizational factors are and how those factors influence selection. A practice-inspired method was developed heavily influenced by my two decades within the United States Intelligence Community to create a common network structure to define an individual director’s relationship to a board in a given year. Then using manual approaches, I developed the networks of directors that form interlocking directorates from that network structure. I analyzed these …

Atrial Fibrillation In Aging: Mechanisms And Potential Therapeutics, Mengmeng Chang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is one of the most common cardiac arrhythmias seen in the clinics, and currently available antiarrhythmic pharmacotherapies in AF are not very effective. Although AF has been recognized as an aging-mediated disease, our understanding of the electrophysiological pathways that link aging and AF remain incomplete, which limits breakthroughs in the development of novel antiarrhythmic treatments for this disease. Studies have shown that aging increases the generation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the heart, and high levels of ROS have been associated with development of AF in animals and patients. Additionally, in some forms of AF, the …

Intermediate Algebra Students’ Perspectives Towards Learning Mathematics, And Technology, Caree J. S. Pinder

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Research states that many remedial mathematics learners possess low mathematics academic self-concept, negative attitudes, and high anxiety levels. These aspects can manifest in a lack of confidence, apprehension, reduced engagement, or academic failure (2007; Klinger, 2008; Larkin & Jorgensen, 2016; Parnis & Petocz, 2016;). However, if these learners successfully pass remedial mathematics courses like Intermediate Algebra, they are more likely to persist in mathematics and the university (Benken et al., 2015). Due to students' success in remedial mathematics, persistence in mathematics raises many questions. In many cases, these students have had unpleasant experiences, attitudes, or beliefs about mathematics but were …

Population Demography, Spatial Ecology, And Habitat Use Of The Florida Box Turtle (Terrapene Bauri) On A Barrier Island, Michael D. Mills

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Turtles are one the most threatened vertebrate groups in the world due to anthropogenic threats such as habitat loss and overexploitation. In addition to occupying a range that has been vulnerable to major habitat loss, the Florida box turtle (Terrapene bauri) is particularly at risk of overexploitation due to its popularity in the pet trade. Sanibel Island is a barrier island in southwest Florida that has experienced major habitat loss and is the site of a recent poaching event. In response to these threats, studies of both the population demography and spatial ecology were conducted on Sanibel’s Florida box turtle …

Building A Mentor-Mentee Maturity Model, Leroy A. Alexander

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In an exploratory, qualitative, traditional dissertation, this study proposes a framework for mentoring within federal government contractor firms. It seeks to understand how government contract firms draw value from their mentorship experiences and which aspects of mentorship programs are more important for this market segment. Two key issues have been identified: (1) government contractor firms are applying incompatible mentorship frameworks; and (2) managers responsible for developing their organizations’ capabilities through the implementation of mentoring programs are unaware of the characteristics unique to work groups within their firms. Observance of a federal government contractor firm struggling to implement a mentorship program, …

Does Time Equal Money? Temporal Discounting And Self-Control: Insight Into The Rationality Of Personal Financial Decision-Making, Joshua Epstein

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Exponential and hyperbolic intertemporal choice models have been widely investigated to measure an individual’s degree of impulsivity in behavioral economics. Hyperbolic discounting research identifies subject’s disproportionately high subjective value to immediate rewards, to the extent that it is not in their best interest. Furthermore, preference reversals have shown subjective value demonstrates an inversely relationship proportional to delay.

Investigation into whether visual representations influence conservative personal finance savings behavior was demonstrated in this study by presenting a multitude of visualizations before allocation of limited monetary resources. Evaluation of the neighbor effect was tested to determine whether comparing individuals to their peers …

Load And Resistance Factor Design (Lrfd) Resistance Factors For Tip Grouted Drilled Shafts, Anhar Sarsour

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Pressure grouting beneath the tip of drilled shafts, also known as postgrouting, has been used for more than fifty years throughout the world and has shown to be an effective means to enhance both the usable and ultimate end bearing resistance. In short, postgrouting is a form of compaction grouting beneath the shaft tip (performed after concrete has cured) that can improve the soil strength and increase the axial shaft stiffness. Until 2006, there was no published design methodology and hence the anticipated performance was speculated to be a function of injected grout volume, shaft uplift and/or the achieved grout …

Data Driven Approaches For Understanding And Improving Urban Mobility, Yujie Guo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

With the adoption of advanced information technologies, the transportation system keep innovating. It now offers more travel options, becomes smarter, but meanwhile gets more complicated and imposes more challenges to researchers and practitioners. For example, demand responsive public transit operates according to user demand instead of traditional timetable-based and fixed route services, which brings a lot of convenience to users. These emerging services also reshapes the way people travel. With the popularity of ride sharing services such as Uber and Lyft, people are more accessible to vehicle use without an ownership. Given the increasing popularity of emerging services, it is …

Neroimaging Of Brain Activaion Using Diffuse Optical Tomography, Jingyu Huang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research has two parts. The first part focuses on the use of non-invasive imaging technique, diffuse optical tomography (DOT), to study the brain activation during the stimulation in the clinical room. It further extends the application of DOT by using it to monitor the hemodynamic response during the TMS stimulation in different parameters. Diffuse optical tomography (DOT) is based on NIR light that exploits the relative transparency of biological tissue. The part two and three extends the application in the hospital for delirium patient study and arm muscle dystrophy by adding the sources and detectors to monitor the brain …

Biochar Amended Biological Systems For Enhanced Landfill Leachate And Lignocellulosic Banana Waste Treatment, Xia Yang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Biochar is an inexpensive and environmentally friendly carbonaceous pyrolysis byproduct with a high surface area, pore volume, and adsorption capacities for inorganic and organic compounds. The goal of this dissertation is to evaluate the feasibility of biochar application in biological treatment systems for enhanced waste management. Three major objectives guided this research to provide a compressive understanding of biochar enhancement effects on biological treatment systems for contaminant removal, energy recovery, and environmental impacts as well as essential factors influencing biochar production and properties.

In Objective 1 a low-cost hybrid Constructed Wetland (CW) system modified with biochar/zeolite was developed for enhanced …

Data-Driven State Estimation For Improved Wide Area Situational Awareness In Smart Grids, Md Jakir Hossain

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Wide area situational awareness (WASA) in smart grids includes automatic monitoring, perception and detection of anomalies in these systems. The goal of WASA is to make smart grids aware of their physical and operational state for more effective operational decisions and control. As such, tracking the system's state or state estimation is one of the key objectives of WASA. The extensive integration of cyber elements into smart grids, such as large deployment of various monitoring and measurement devices, provides new opportunities to improve WASA. However, the tight coupling of power grids with cyber components introduces vulnerabilities to cyber and physical …

A Multiple Input Multiple Output Framework For The Automatic Optical Fractionator-Based Cell Counting In Z-Stacks Using Deep Learning, Palak Dave

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Quantifying cells in a defined region of biological tissue is critical for many clinical and preclinical studies, especially in pathology, toxicology, cancer, and behavior. Unbiased stereology is the state-of-art method for quantification of the total number and other morphometric parameters of stained objects in a defined region of biological tissue. As part of a program to develop accurate, precise, and more efficient automatic approaches for quantifying morphometric changes in biological tissue, our group has shown that both deep learning-based and hand-crafted algorithms can estimate the total number of histologically stained cells at their maximal profile of focus in extended depth …

Quantifying A 21-Year Surface Water And Groundwater Interaction In A Ridge And Valley Lake Environment Using A Highly Constrained Modeling Approach, Richard T. Bowers Jr.

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Karst lakes are ubiquitous in ridge terrain settings in limestone aquifer coastal plain environments. In west-central Florida, these lakes are frequently connected to the Upper Floridan aquifer and have unique aquifer recharge characteristics. They have been selectively studied because they commonly have no or very limited surface water discharge and limited drainage areas, have appreciable surface water and groundwater interaction and leak to the deep aquifer. An innovative modeling approach was developed to collectively understand and more precisely quantify this vertical leakage, both from a lake-specific and regional water budget standpoint, for a 21-year study period (2000-2020). A unique, calibrated …

Quantifying Environmental Sensitivity Of Marine Resources To Oil Well Blowouts In The Gulf Of Mexico, Emily Chancellor

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focused on oil spill risk assessment techniques historically utilized for coastal resources (e.g., environmental sensitivity indices (ESIs), vulnerability assessments, species-specific vulnerability frameworks) and their application and expansion to offshore resources found in the Gulf of Mexico (GoM). Additional included techniques (e.g., multi-sector trade-off analysis, marine spatial planning (MSP) software) provide support in decision making processes regarding the potential siting of oil production sites and/or the withdrawal of areas from oil and natural gas production. Chapter 1 included an overview and justification for this study. Chapter 2 demonstrated an initial methodology for the creation of offshore ESIs and how …

Stochastic Models For Resilience Assessment And Improvement, Weimar Ardila Rueda

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Resilience refers to the ability of a system to absorb and mitigate the impact of potential disruptions and return to normal operational conditions. The above notion of resilience allows us to distinguish two stages in a system's post-disruption response, the absorptive dimension and the recovery dimension. The absorptive dimension is related to a system's robustness and capacity to mitigate initial loss posterior to a disruption. Meanwhile, the recovery dimension is the system's rapidity to return and reach an acceptable level of functionality after the disruption occurrence.

A social-physical (SP) system's post-disruption response is related to its resilience capacity so building …

Climate Action And Indigenous Land Relations: A Case Study In Nagaland, Northeastern India, Osensang Pongen

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research grew out of my interest in the implications of climate action, especially its effects in natural-resource-rich peripheral regions like my home state of Nagaland. This study will be of interest to anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the ways in which global ecodevelopment programs expand and mutate at the micro-scales in Indigenous communities. This includes structural transformations to their Indigenous socio-economic and political lifeworlds, their cosmologies, and their affective relations with their ancestral lands and environment. More broadly, the study draws attention to the growing challenges confronting Indigenous peoples in the Global South who are being seduced by …

Relationship Between Individual Characteristics And Received Social Support Among People With Serious Mental Illness, Samantha Dicorte

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Past research on social support has mainly focused on perceived social support. Relatively less research has been done on received social support and how it can promote positive behavior outcomes. This study examines the importance of received social support, including background on social support, social support outcomes, and a theoretical foundation overview of the social stress model. In addition to a literature review, this study investigates the association between individual characteristics (i.e., diagnosis and substance abuse including alcohol, race/ethnicity, gender, age, and marital status) and different types of received social support (i.e., daily, mental health, and adherence support). Simple linear …

Essays On Contributions In Social Knowledge-Sharing Platforms And Their Impact On Employee Performance And Job Mobility, Moe Esmaeili

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, the interest of practitioners and managers in social networking applications and social knowledge-sharing has increased. While these platforms allow individuals to collaborate, form/maintain social ties, and share/receive knowledge and expertise, and share/receive knowledge/expertise, they also provide a unique collaborative environment for organizations, enabling leaders to promote communication and collaboration among employee silos, engage them with others, and promote corporate core values once adopted internally.

Despite increasing efforts by scholars to uncover the underlying factors that influence members' participation in such platforms, there is still a lack of understanding of the fundamental motivating factor for such contributions and …

Reproduction In Relation To Heavy-Metal Contamination Along An Urbanization Gradient In Aninvasive Florida Lizard Species (Anolis Sagrei), Elizabeth Hauck

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Environmental contamination is accumulating rapidly worldwide due to increasing urbanization rates. Heavy metals are known to be particularly toxic to organisms, to accumulate in biological systems, and to be found in higher concentrations in animals located in areas of high urban levels. However, the physiological impacts of these toxic heavy metals in wildlife remain largely unknown. Lizards are excellent bioindicator species for environmental contaminants due to their trophic level as mesopredators and their susceptibility of exposure via air, water, diet, and soil through egg deposition. To assess the impacts heavy-metal contamination has on reproductive parameters in lizards and how these …

Decreasing Property Destruction And Self-Injurious Behavior With Dnro, Lauren D. Turenne

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Differential negative reinforcement of other behavior (DNRO) involves the delivery of reinforcement and the removal of an aversive stimulus contingent on the absence of problem behavior. HT was an 8-year-old female diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). She used an augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) device to communicate independently using typed sentences composed of three or more words. She frequently engaged in property destruction (PD) and self-injurious behavior (SIB) in the form of head banging when presented with a demand. The purpose of this case study was to decrease SIB and PD and increase on-task behavior using a DNRO procedure …

Reducing Screaming When Items/Toys Are Touched By Others, Talitha Vargas

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Differential and positive reinforcement are non-intrusive interventions that have proven to be successful in decreasing problem behavior. This study aims to decrease the screaming behavior exhibited by a four-year-old male diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) by using differential reinforcement without extinction alongside positive reinforcement in the form of edibles. The researcher hypothesized that the use of both interventions would be more effective than the use of one intervention. Using an AB experimental design, the intervention was successful in producing an 80% decrease from baseline screaming. Though successful, many limitations were presented throughout the study, affecting the consistency and replicability …

Evaluating The Effect Of Public Health Governance Structure And Public Opinion On Covid-19 Disease Control Interventions, Daniel Chacreton

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Background

Since the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, the responses to the pandemic varied greatly from nation to nation. In the US, state-level variance in responses has likely contributed to the disparate COVID-19 infection-related state-level outcomes such as incidence and case fatality rates. The large variances in national and sub-national responses to COVID-19 when combined with the abundance of factors that influence disease transmission rates has created a number of important research opportunities.

Methods

In this vain, this research study aims to describe the relationship that exists between public health governance structure and public sentiment and COVID-19 control measure effectiveness …

Volcano And Tectonic Hazard Modeling Using Interdisciplinary Geophysical And Geodetic Methods, Mitchell Scott Hastings

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Volcanic and tectonic hazards such as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes and tsunamis present risks to about ~45% of the global population. They have caused at least 1.5 trillion dollars in damages worldwide since the start of the 20th century, and the costs are accelerating as population increases. In this dissertation, new data are combined with existing information and novel modeling approaches to quantify volcanic, earthquake and tsunami hazards.

The Blackfoot Reservoir Volcanic Field (BRVF) is a bimodal volcanic field on southeastern margin of the Eastern Snake River Plain in Idaho. In the BRVF, gravity anomalies reveal two shallow silicic intrusions that …

Where We Live And Learn To Know: An Oral History Of The Rochelle High School Music Program, John Sargeant

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

For the greater portion of the 20th century Black Americans in the US South had severely restricted access to a high school education. Segregation Era Jim Crow laws effectively created two education systems in Southern US states, one for White students and another separate system for Black students. In Florida, elementary, junior high, senior high schools, and colleges were segregated by race. In Lakeland, Florida from 1928–1969 Rochelle Senior High School conferred high school diplomas to Lakeland area Black students. Rochelle Senior High School provided Black students in the Lakeland area an opportunity to partake in the 20th century American …

An Exploration Of Accelerated Student Perspectives On Participation Experiences And Making Career Choices, Jennifer Meier

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Acceleration program options have grown rapidly in Florida and have been used to help students pursue an associate or bachelor’s degree. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the experiences that former dual enrolled students had with selecting a major and a career. A snowball sampling approach was used to identify ten participants from the southwestern region of Florida with 12 or more credit hours from dual enrollment. Social Cognitive Career Theory (SCCT) was the conceptual framework used to help guide this study. The instrumentation for data collection included a short survey followed by a semi-structured interview. The …

The Effects Of Motivationally Enhanced Digital Game-Based Learning On Undergraduate Students’ Learning Motivation, Mathematics Achievement, And Learning Retention In College Algebra, Dennis Ward

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to design, develop, and test the effects of digital game-based learning on undergraduate students’ learning motivation, mathematics achievement, and learning retention in a college algebra course. Digital games utilize interactive digital media that offer rules-based challenges and react to the individual’s choices. Digital games have been used in preschool, K-12, higher education, and workplace environments in a wide range of subject areas, including language arts, secondary language acquisition, social studies, science, and math. Specifically, the effectiveness of digital game-based learning on students’ learning and motivation has been studied in college-level mathematics courses. However, previous …

Community Heritage: A Source Of Health/Medical Aspirational Capital For Black Males, Lafrance Clarke Jr.

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There is a recognized need for more Black male healers who pursue careers in medical fields.Thus, the purpose of this study was twofold: to explore historical documents to tell the histories of men of African descent who practiced healing in Florida and, from those histories, create a virtual heritage tour to support teaching about leadership through African American history and narratives of healing. The research questions were: How does the heritage curriculum history about Black men healers of FL provide a historical counter-narrative about Black men and their leadership in connection to health/medicine?How do historical counter-narratives about Black men support …

Corrosion Performance Of Carbon And Galvanized Steel In Calcium Silicate Cement, Maria Cardoso

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The concrete manufacturing industry has faced challenges with reducing carbon dioxide emissions as it currently produces about 8% of the world’s anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions. With global atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations being higher than ever, the solution is urgent. Due to this, a more sustainable type of concrete has been proposed.Calcium silicate cement (CSC) composed of essentially the same raw materials as ordinary portland cement (OPC) cures through the consumption of carbon dioxide rather than hydration like OPC. CSC is being explored as a potential alternative to OPC, however, there is little to no information on its corrosion related durability. …