Digital Commons Network^™

Combining Marketing And Behavioral Research To Develop And Evaluate A Healthy Vending Intervention On A College Campus, Morgan Faulk Sowers

Doctoral Dissertations

Objective: To utilize a comprehensive approach for developing and evaluating a healthy vending intervention introducing a healthy bean snack product in campus vending machines to positively impact factors related to college students’ dietary behavior. Methods: The full project included five sequential phases to inform, develop, and implement a vending intervention that introduced a specific healthful dried bean snack product in campus vending machines. First, we conducted multiple-methods cognitive interviews with 60 college student vending users to select the most liked, preferred, and influential product, price, and promotion for the intervention. Next, we used observations and intercept surveys to describe and …

School Counselors Meeting High School Students’ Social And Emotional Needs, Lorrie-Anne Monte

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this research is to understand how school counselors are meeting the social and emotional needs of their ninth through twelfth grade high school students. The Delphi Method was used to create consensus among school counselor experts to identify the most prevalent social and emotional needs of their high school students, as well as the prevention and intervention techniques that school counselors are using to meet those needs. Twenty school counselors who work in high schools that have an American School Counselor Association (ASCA) Recognized ASCA Model Program (RAMP) agreed to participate as experts in this study (Round …

Self Hypnosis For School Success: Empowering Adolescents With Anxiety And Stress, Nilani Shankar

Doctoral Dissertations

Self-hypnosis is a treatment that has been utilized to address the social-emotional concerns of adolescents with high levels of anxiety and stress. In this study, a multiple baseline design across three high school-aged participants was implemented to examine whether self-hypnosis could decrease symptoms of anxiety and stress and help to improve health-related quality of life (HRQoL). The results of the study indicated that the treatment resulted in decreases in trait and state anxiety for two out of three participants, improvements in stress levels for two out of three participants, and improvements in HRQoL for all three participants. Participants reported that …

“It’S Like A Mountain”: The Lived Experience Of Homeless College Students, Valerie Karen Ambrose

Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to describe the experience of college for homeless students. Using a phenomenological approach, the researcher completed interviews in which participants were asked to describe what college was like for them. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using a hermeneutic approach. All interviews were analyzed within the contexts of each other to identify themes. The participants all lived in a world of homelessness that they could never fully ignore. The world of homelessness was grounded in the contexts of the body and other people. An encompassing central theme of “Escaping the Homeless World through …

Effect Of Cultural Background And Training On Stigmatized Attitudes Among Healthcare Professionals: A Randomized Study Of Medical Students’ Attitude And Behaviors Toward Alcohol Dependent Individuals In The Middle East, Salman Alzayani

Doctoral Dissertations

Background The consumption of alcohol or drugs, as well as substance dependence do exist in the Middle East despite the religious, social and cultural constraints in the region. Stigma seems to exist in every area of life for individuals with mental illness and represents a major barrier to effective rehabilitation and reintegration of these patients. Aim To better understand the reasons behind stigmatizing attitudes toward persons with alcohol dependence and to evaluate the role of stigma in medical diagnosis and care. Methods The study consisted of two phases; Phase 1 examined whether medical students demonstrate stigmatized attitudes according to the …

An Examination Of The Effectiveness Of The Louisiana Gear Up Program In Promoting Self-Efficacy, Improving Academic Achievement And Increasing Teachers' Aspirations For Their Students, Candi Hill

Doctoral Dissertations

Students are likely to avoid academic pursuits if they lack academic self-efficacy (Bandura, 2000). Furthermore, past poor academic performance contributes to the development of low academic self-efficacy. Students who participate in extracurricular activities, like LA GEAR UP, demonstrate better academic achievement and less risk-taking behaviors than non-participating students (Barber, Stone, & Hunt, 2003). Research supports the notion that LA GEAR UP is an effective way to improve students' academic performance and to reduce the number of disciplinary referrals students receive (Beer, 2009). Additionally, within the academic literature research has demonstrated that teachers' attributions about students are based upon their perceptions …

Psychopathy And The Hexaco Personality Model, M. Todd Lobrano

Doctoral Dissertations

Within the recently published DSM-5, alternative diagnostic criteria for personality disorders have been offered (American Psychiatric Association [APA], 2013). These changes allow for a more dimensional diagnostic system than has been previously used while maintaining some aspects of a categorical system (Skodol et al., 2011). These changes also include a description of specific traits that characterize personality disorders and make it possible for measures of normal personality to have a more significant impact in their diagnosis. Relevant to the present study are the changes in the diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder and psychopathy, considered by many to be an extreme …

On The Same Page: The Experience Of Instructors And Students As They Give And Receive Written Feedback In Higher Education, Michele Heide Williams

Doctoral Dissertations

Academic writing in higher education remains a chief means of assessing student understanding, making instructor response to student writing an important way of providing summative and formative feedback for students. Writing and response offer insights into the ways in which students construct understanding within disciplinary contexts and the ways in which instructors facilitate those efforts. The present study explores two aspects of writing in higher education:1) the experience of faculty members who require and respond to writing from students, and 2) the experience of students as recipients of instructor responses to their academic writing. To explore the experience of response, …

Listening To Undocumented Mothers: The Experiences Of Undocumented Mexican Mothers Of High School Students Living In The U.S. And Receiving Social Services, Maria Alejandra Lopez

Doctoral Dissertations

The present dissertation is based on a phenomenological study on undocumented Mexican immigrant mothers of high school students who have lived in the U.S. for at least five years and received social services. Most of these mothers have emigrated from rural areas of the central and southern Mexican States of Guanajuato, Michoacan, Queretaro, among others. According to the participants, socio-economic conditions forced them to leave their homelands hoping to find a better life in the U.S.

Ten undocumented mothers of high school students living in the U.S. were interviewed from a phenomenological perspective. They were monolingual Spanish speakers (only one …