Digital Commons Network^™

Factor Analysis Of Online Instruction Self-Efficacy Using The Tennessee Online Instruction Survey, Frederick Augustus Randall

Doctoral Dissertations

As the use of online instruction continues to rise in post-secondary education and corporate training, a better understanding of one's beliefs, attitudes, and confidence regarding online instruction is necessary to increase the quality and effectiveness of online instruction. This study investigated self-efficacy beliefs related to online instruction. Self-efficacy, a psychological construct, is defined as self-appraisal of one's capabilities to plan and undertake a course of actions required for a specified task.

The objectives of this study were to (a) develop a survey instrument to measure the psychological construct of self-efficacy related to online instruction; (b) identify the salient factors of …

Beta-Adrenergic, Arachidonic Acid And Potassium Channel Associated-Regulation Of Human Breast Cancer Cell Lines, Yavuz Cakir

Doctoral Dissertations

During the late stages of breast cancer progression, breast cancer cell growth switches from steroid hormone to growth factor dependence, and it is assumed that invasive breast cancers are growth factor receptor positive and estrogen hormone resistant. The cellular arachidonic acid (AA) pathway is upregulated in a variety of cancer types, and it may play an important role in the growth regulation of breast cancer cells.

Recent evidence suggests that beta-adrenergic receptors (β-ARs) are expressed in some estrogen receptor (ER) negative breast cancers and that beta agonists not only can trigger AA release via the activation of cytosolic PLA2 or …

A Study Of Selected Non-Pending, Supreme Court Cases Held Between 1965-2000 On K-12 Public, Intradistrict, Race-Based, Dual Systems Of Education, Laronda J. Conley-Townsend

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the Supreme Court's rulings between 1965 and 2000 focusing on the legality of intradistrict, race-based, dual systems of education. The study applied the theory of Equal Protection as a rationale for the actions and determinations of the Court made in the kindergarten-twelfth grade public school segregation cases during this period. This theory was chosen because the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was used to prohibit the operation of segregated systems (Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka, Kansas, 1954) which were held to be detrimental to minority students. The Civil Rights …

The Aesthetic Diversity Of American Proletarian Fiction, Walter Edwin Squire

Doctoral Dissertations

Almost as soon as a certain movement in early twentieth-century American literature began to be labeled "proletarian," numerous literary critics defined the genre as propagandistic, formulaic, and prescribed by a hegemonic and totalitarian American Communist Party. Recently, scholars of 1930s leftist literature have challenged previous dismissals of proletarianism by noting the diversity of participants and the complexity of individual works. Frequently, however, too much emphasis is placed upon the Communist Party, shared political and literary projects, and temporal parameters, all of which would suggest that proletarianism was an isolated phenomenon within the history of American literature. This study reveals that …

Living With A Machine : The Experience Of The Child Who Is Ventilator-Dependent, Sharon Isenhour Sarvey

Doctoral Dissertations

Children who are ventilator dependent have been living at home for some time now. Current research has considered home care to be the most appropriate environment for care of technology-dependent children with special health care needs. Research also has revealed much about the families who care for the children, the therapeutic management of their care and the efficacy of home care. No studies, however, have explored the experience of the child who has special needs, specifically those children who are ventilator dependent. There is an absence of first-hand knowledge about the experience of the children. The purpose of this study …

Women, Work, And Retirement : Issues And Questions For Policy And Practice, Mixon Ware-Hargis

Doctoral Dissertations

Advances in both the quantity and quality of life, unparalleled over the past 45 centuries, shaped a longevity revolution in the 20th century. At the same time, a similar revolution in gender occurred in the workforce as women entered the paid labor market in unprecedented numbers. With women now representing almost half of the United States labor force, women's work-family challenges across the developmental stages of adulthood have far-reaching social and economic implications. The extent to which working women stay in or leave the labor force as they age, changes in their work-family needs and concerns, and aging-related issues facing …

Development Of A Model For The Evaluation Of Web-Based Distance Education Courses, Suzan Jacqueline Vogel

Doctoral Dissertations

The development and use of Web-based and Web-enhanced courses have increased at a rate that is exceeding the ability of researchers to keep up with this intense pace. The issues in evaluating these new Web-based courses are complex and need to be addressed. Using data collected from surveys, interviews, document reviews andliterature reviews, the researcher developed a practitioner-oriented model for evaluating institutional, instructor, and student readiness for Web-based instruction and the results of Web-based courses. Survey participants were administrators and faculty who are members of the twenty-two institutionsrepresented by the East Tennessee Consortium for Higher Education. Additional interviews were also …

Fcc Minority Broadcast Ownership Policies-- A Critical Race Theory Analysis Of Judicial Assumptions In Court Decisions : The Convergence Of Race And Law, Kadesha Defrance Washington

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation used critical race theory as a basis to probe legal and regulatory transitions in the area of minority ownership and their implications for marketplace diversity and public interest. Through the examination of judicial decisions involving minority broadcast ownership this dissertation analyzed the expressed or implied assumptions of the judiciary in reaching those decisions, provided a critical analysis of those assumptions, discussed the implications and results of those assumptions on minority broadcast ownership, and suggested approaches to promote diversity and minority ownership in a deregulated media environment. Both primary and secondary authorities were integral to this research. Overall, analysis …

Living With A Machine : The Experience Of The Child Who Is Ventilator-Dependent, Sharon Isenhour Sarvey

Doctoral Dissertations

Children who are ventilator dependent have been living at home for some time now. Current research has considered home care to be the most appropriate environment for care of technology-dependent children with special health care needs. Research also has revealed much about the families who care for the children, the therapeutic management of their care and the efficacy of home care. No studies, however, have explored the experience of the child who has special needs, specifically those children who are ventilator dependent. There is an absence of first-hand knowledge about the experience of the children. The purpose of this study …

Determination Of Demographic And Motivational Characteristics Of Red Cross Volunteers And The Development Of Suggested Strategies For Volunteer Recruitment And Retention For The Johnson City/Washington County, Tennessee Chapter Of The American Red Cross, James Michael Stoots

Doctoral Dissertations

In this study suggested strategies for improving the volunteer recruitment and retention program for the Johnson City/Washington County Chapter of the American Red Cross were developed. Previous recruitment and retention efforts by this Red Cross Chapter were based on historical methods with limited theoretical foundation. These new strategies are based on demographic and motivational profiles of chapter volunteers, survey of the Tennessee American Red Cross management's perception of their recruitment and retention programs. The combination of these data yielded a recruitment and retention format and nine suggested strategies. The format consists of three levels, recruitment and retention communication, recruitment and …

Theory Becomes Practice : Combining Reader-Response Theory And The New Rhetoric In Describing The Meaning-Making Processes Of College Freshmen As They Respond To Poetry, Sandra Lee Tompkins

Doctoral Dissertations

For my study, I investigated the meaning-making processes of college freshmen as they interpreted and discussed poetry. Operating from a theory base involving Reader-Response Theory and the New Rhetoric, I studied the students' individual construction of meaning and their social construction and negotiation of meaning, respectively, as they interpreted poems. I used the methods of qualitative researchers in gathering the data: participant observation; a collection of artifacts that included student compositions, written notes, and audiotaped discussions from small-group work; purposive sampling of these artifacts; questionnaires; and field notes. I placed myself as a full participant observer, since I served as …

Development Of A Model For The Evaluation Of Web-Based Distance Education Courses, Suzan Jacqueline Vogel

Doctoral Dissertations

The development and use of Web-based and Web-enhanced courses have increased at a rate that is exceeding the ability of researchers to keep up with this intense pace. The issues in evaluating these new Web-based courses are complex and need to be addressed. Using data collected from surveys, interviews, document reviews andliterature reviews, the researcher developed a practitioner-oriented model for evaluating institutional, instructor, and student readiness for Web-based instruction and the results of Web-based courses. Survey participants were administrators and faculty who are members of the twenty-two institutionsrepresented by the East Tennessee Consortium for Higher Education. Additional interviews were also …

Fcc Minority Broadcast Ownership Policies-- A Critical Race Theory Analysis Of Judicial Assumptions In Court Decisions : The Convergence Of Race And Law, Kadesha Defrance Washington

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation used critical race theory as a basis to probe legal and regulatory transitions in the area of minority ownership and their implications for marketplace diversity and public interest. Through the examination of judicial decisions involving minority broadcast ownership this dissertation analyzed the expressed or implied assumptions of the judiciary in reaching those decisions, provided a critical analysis of those assumptions, discussed the implications and results of those assumptions on minority broadcast ownership, and suggested approaches to promote diversity and minority ownership in a deregulated media environment. Both primary and secondary authorities were integral to this research. Overall, analysis …

The Diagnosis Of Depression Using Psychometric Instruments And Quantitative Measures Of Electroencephalographic Activity, John Hancock Askew

Doctoral Dissertations

Depressive disorders are among the most common and familiar of all psychiatric disorders, ironically, individuals suffering from depressive disorders are likely to never be diagnosed or treated. With the depressive disorders now being considered the source of an emerging public health crisis, a variety of public and private sector agencies have sought to address the issues of under-diagnosis and under-treatment. Despite their best efforts, about half of individuals with depressive disorders are not accurately diagnosed. The absence of a "gold standard" biological marker that can be used adjunctively with psychometric diagnostic instruments may be a factor that hinders primary practice …

Role Of Intracellular Ca²⁺ In Modulation Of Adiposity, Hang Shi

Doctoral Dissertations

Intracellular Ca2+ ([Ca2+]i) plays a key role in metabolic disorders associated with obesity and insulin resistance. Previous data from this laboratory demonstrated that increasing [Ca2+]i via stimulation of either receptor or voltage-mediated calcium channels stimulates the expression and activity of fatty acid synthase (FAS), a key enzyme in de nova lipogenesis, and inhibits basal and agonist-stimulated lipolysis in both human and murine adipocytes. Therefore, increasing [Ca2+]i appears to promote adipocyte triglyceride accumulation by exerting a coordinated control over stimulation of lipogenesis and inhibition of lipolysis. These data suggest that adipocyte [Ca2+]i is a logical target for pharmacological/nutritional regulation of adiposity. …

Reconciling Utility With Liberal Justice : John Stuart Mill's Minimalist Utilitarianism, John Robert Fitzpatrick

Doctoral Dissertations

Many philosophers have argued that there are two John Stuart Mills. There is the rights supporting liberal Mill of On Liberty; and then there is the author of Utilitarianism. This reading often presupposes that there is no possibility of reconciling these two Mills, since it is purportedly impossible to be both a supporter of liberal justice and utilitarianism. I propose specific readings of On Liberty and Utilitarianism that make this claim far from credible.

In Chapter One, I address the most common objection to utilitarianism, namely, that utilitarianism cannot support rights at all. Properly understood, utilitarianism is at its core …

Private Practice, Personal Expectations: An Exploration Of Factors Influencing First Job Choice Of Law School Graduates, Karen Reagan Britton

Doctoral Dissertations

This descriptive study was designed to add to the body of knowledge upon which the various players in the law career services and legal recruitment fields may draw when considering factors which influence law graduates to begin their careers in private practice and in their choice of a first legal employer upon graduation. This researcher incorporated concepts from the relevant literature and developed an instrument which was used to gather data from students at nine public law schools in the southeastern United States. Various statistical techniques were employed to answer three research questions: to describe the criteria that third-year law …

Theory Becomes Practice : Combining Reader-Response Theory And The New Rhetoric In Describing The Meaning-Making Processes Of College Freshmen As They Respond To Poetry, Sandra Lee Tompkins

Doctoral Dissertations

For my study, I investigated the meaning-making processes of college freshmen as they interpreted and discussed poetry. Operating from a theory base involving Reader-Response Theory and the New Rhetoric, I studied the students' individual construction of meaning and their social construction and negotiation of meaning, respectively, as they interpreted poems. I used the methods of qualitative researchers in gathering the data: participant observation; a collection of artifacts that included student compositions, written notes, and audiotaped discussions from small-group work; purposive sampling of these artifacts; questionnaires; and field notes. I placed myself as a full participant observer, since I served as …

Role Of Intracellular Ca²⁺ In Modulation Of Adiposity, Hang Shi

Doctoral Dissertations

Intracellular Ca2+ ([Ca2+]i) plays a key role in metabolic disorders associated with obesity and insulin resistance. Previous data from this laboratory demonstrated that increasing [Ca2+]i via stimulation of either receptor or voltage-mediated calcium channels stimulates the expression and activity of fatty acid synthase (FAS), a key enzyme in de nova lipogenesis, and inhibits basal and agonist-stimulated lipolysis in both human and murine adipocytes. Therefore, increasing [Ca2+]i appears to promote adipocyte triglyceride accumulation by exerting a coordinated control over stimulation of lipogenesis and inhibition of lipolysis. These data suggest that adipocyte [Ca2+]i is a logical target for pharmacological/nutritional regulation of adiposity. …

Women, Work, And Retirement : Issues And Questions For Policy And Practice, Mixon Ware-Hargis

Doctoral Dissertations

Advances in both the quantity and quality of life, unparalleled over the past 45 centuries, shaped a longevity revolution in the 20th century. At the same time, a similar revolution in gender occurred in the workforce as women entered the paid labor market in unprecedented numbers. With women now representing almost half of the United States labor force, women's work-family challenges across the developmental stages of adulthood have far-reaching social and economic implications. The extent to which working women stay in or leave the labor force as they age, changes in their work-family needs and concerns, and aging-related issues facing …

Homosexuality And The Black Church : Perceptions Of Church Leaders, Dutchess Renee Jones

Doctoral Dissertations

With more gay men and lesbian women seeking to become fully involved in the Christian church community, churches are beginning to grapple with the issue of the role of the homosexual within the church. Many churches, however, appear to try to ignore the issue; or turn to abusive or neglectful behavior toward homosexuals. The black church, in particular, has a reputation for being especially careless when it comes to issues of sexuality in general, and homosexuality in particular. For those reasons, the purpose of this study is to explore the thoughts, feelings, and attitudes of pastors and church leaders within …

Factors Affecting The Transfer Of Related Training In A Trade Union Apprenticeship Program, Mark Stuart Farris

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine how five previously identified factors (Blair, 1996) related to the transfer of training among the national population of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers apprentices. To accomplish the purpose of the study, certain independent variables were selected and studied that were believed to either inhibit or facilitate the efficacy of transfer of training.

To better understand the transfer process, it was necessary to investigate the perception of identified factors and the extent their contributions positively or negatively affected the transfer of training. A panel of experts and an extensive literature review were used …

"Because That's Where My Roots Are": Searching For Patterns Of African-American Ethnicity In Arrow Rock, Missouri, Timothy E. Baumann

Doctoral Dissertations

This archaeological study investigates a postbellum African-American community in Arrow Rock, Missouri. Archaeological excavations have been conducted each summer between 1996 through 2001, and have attempted to explore the entire African-American community including multiple households, an African Methodist Episcopal Church, a school house, a speakeasy, an emancipation day picnic field, a restaurant/bar, and a Masonic lodge, called the Brown Lodge No. 22 of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons. This dissertation focuses on the 1996 and 1997 field seasons at the Brown Lodge/Caldwell Pottery site (23SA451), which has five major historic components: an Euro-American homestead (1836-1854), an Euro-American stoneware factory (1855- …

--"Something More Exactly Related Then A Fixion" : Lady Mary Sidney Wroth's Urania And Jacobean Religio-Political Controversy, Jennifer Wallace Hall

Doctoral Dissertations

The Sidney family has long been recognized for its literary endeavors and for its involvement in the religio-political debates of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Studies of Mary Sidney Wroth, however, have cast only sidelong glances at the religio- political level of Wroth's The Countess of Montgomery's Urania (1621). This dissertation examines how Wroth, within the boundaries of Urania, investigates her own questions and convictions regarding the religio-political debates of Jacobean England. Wroth witnessed King James's attempts to promote the unification of Christian Europe through pacific negotiation and strategic marriage alliances. Ultimately, the goal of a unified Christian Europe was …

The Aesthetic Diversity Of American Proletarian Fiction, Walter Edwin Squire

Doctoral Dissertations

Almost as soon as a certain movement in early twentieth-century American literature began to be labeled "proletarian," numerous literary critics defined the genre as propagandistic, formulaic, and prescribed by a hegemonic and totalitarian American Communist Party. Recently, scholars of 1930s leftist literature have challenged previous dismissals of proletarianism by noting the diversity of participants and the complexity of individual works. Frequently, however, too much emphasis is placed upon the Communist Party, shared political and literary projects, and temporal parameters, all of which would suggest that proletarianism was an isolated phenomenon within the history of American literature. This study reveals that …

Determination Of Demographic And Motivational Characteristics Of Red Cross Volunteers And The Development Of Suggested Strategies For Volunteer Recruitment And Retention For The Johnson City/Washington County, Tennessee Chapter Of The American Red Cross, James Michael Stoots

Doctoral Dissertations

In this study suggested strategies for improving the volunteer recruitment and retention program for the Johnson City/Washington County Chapter of the American Red Cross were developed. Previous recruitment and retention efforts by this Red Cross Chapter were based on historical methods with limited theoretical foundation. These new strategies are based on demographic and motivational profiles of chapter volunteers, survey of the Tennessee American Red Cross management's perception of their recruitment and retention programs. The combination of these data yielded a recruitment and retention format and nine suggested strategies. The format consists of three levels, recruitment and retention communication, recruitment and …

Causing Students To Choose More Language Arts Work : An Educationally Valid Investigation Of The Interspersal Procedure, Sadonya F. Meadows

Doctoral Dissertations

The current study extended research on assignment choice and the interspersal procedure by exposing seventh-grade students to educationally valid, grade-level English assignments and requiring students to complete assignments with 20% more work. In Experiment 1, students were asked to work on control English assignments containing 20 discrete complex target tasks and experimental assignments containing 24 equivalent target tasks plus eight interspersed briefer/easier items. Students worked on each assignment for 10 minutes and did not complete either assignment. In Ejq)eriment 2, assignments were reduced to five target items (i.e., control assignment) and six target items plus two interspersed easy items (i.e., …

Demographic Shifts And Green Values In Rural America : A Southern Appalachian Case, James Robert Talley

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines changing environmental values in rural America, specifically as it applies to differences in support for environmentalism between inmigrants and non-migrants who live in rural places. As a means to this end, we closely examine hypothesized differences across several measures of environmentalism between rural in-migrant and non-migrant residents of the Norris Lake watershed area, in East Tennessee. We also explore the suggestion that the social bases of environmental concern may have changed over time due to a general greening trend that seems to be cutting across all social groups. Stem et al's (1995) working model of environmentalism is …

Demographic Shifts And Green Values In Rural America : A Southern Appalachian Case, James Robert Talley

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines changing environmental values in rural America, specifically as it applies to differences in support for environmentalism between inmigrants and non-migrants who live in rural places. As a means to this end, we closely examine hypothesized differences across several measures of environmentalism between rural in-migrant and non-migrant residents of the Norris Lake watershed area, in East Tennessee. We also explore the suggestion that the social bases of environmental concern may have changed over time due to a general greening trend that seems to be cutting across all social groups. Stem et al's (1995) working model of environmentalism is …

Experiential Aspects Of Neglect: A Phenomenological Inquiry, Kurt D. Openlander

Doctoral Dissertations

A review of the empirical literature on maltreatment points to the need for more knowledge about neglect, especially the subjective aspects of neglect. In order to gain information about this topic, twelve adult volunteers were interviewed in detail about various times in which they had experienced themselves as neglected. In accordance with the principles of existential phenomenology, a qualitative methodology for research within the social sciences, the transcribed interviews were thematized, in this case with the aid of a group of scholars trained in phenomenological interpretation. Three interrelated themes emerged against the ground of Interpersonal Relationships: Feeling Alone, Feeling Invisible …