Digital Commons Network^™

Parent And Guardian: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis Of Sexual And Gender Minority-Affirming Caregivers, Kelly Marie Davis

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Studies consistently demonstrate that sexual and gender minority (SGM) youth experience mental health disparities when compared to their heterosexual, cisgender peers due to identity-based stressors (Meyer, 2003). Given the startling rates at which this population experiences mental health challenges, there has been an ever-increasing focus on prevention and intervention efforts to promote resilience and well-being among SGM youth. Over the past several decades, scholars studying resilience in development have identified the importance of effective caregiving in buffering against adversity. However, little is known about the specific practices that caregivers of SGM youth might employ to strengthen their relationships and to …

Defining Lgbtqia2+ Specialized Substance Use Treatment Services From A Client-Informed Approach, Chonghui (Gabriella) Ji

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Background: This study explored the concept of specialized substance use treatment services among a sample of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer and/or Questioning, Intersex, Asexual, and Two-Spirit (LGBTQIA2+) individuals: their definition, perceived barriers to receiving these services, and ways of improving such services. Having direct input from past and potential treatment-seeking LGBTQIA2+ individuals could help to deepen our understanding of how to meet the unique treatment needs of these populations.

Method: Data were collected from 219 LGBTQIA2+ individuals within the United States through an online and anonymous survey. Inclusion criteria for participation were self-identifying as LGBTQIA2+, being 18 years of …

Testosterone Administration In Premenopausal Women, Kaeli Nichol Shockley

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Testosterone administration is a relatively uncommon practice in the United States. Women are at risk of having health issues that could be remedied by low-dose testosterone administration via transdermal patch or topical cream. This paper explores the potential health and wellness benefits of administering low-dose testosterone to premenopausal women. Low-dose Testosterone may improve depression scores as well as upregulate markers of bone formation in women with anorexia nervosa. Higher testosterone was associated with increased muscle mass and muscular strength in collegiate female athletes. Testosterone given at lower doses increases muscle mass and exercise performance in college-age women. Overall, testosterone supplementation …

Motivating Math Students Through Socratic Pedagogy, Leslie Berg

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This study investigated the impact of implementing the Socratic method in teaching logarithms on the motivation levels of high school Algebra 2 students. Drawing on foundational research by Hirsch and Pfeil (2012), the research involves two classes totaling 28 students, with surveys administered before and after the Socratic lessons to gauge motivation, engagement, and participation levels. The meticulously designed four-day lesson plans employ cooperative dialogue and critical inquiry to foster student understanding of logarithmic concepts. With the teacher serving as a facilitator and students actively participating in the learning process, the study aimed to replicate and build upon previous findings, …

Transforming 3rd-Grade Instruction: Six Practical Lesson Plans Framed Around Ai And Udl To Promote Inclusive Learning Spaces, Ailsa J. Gilbert

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This paper examines how Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and artificial intelligence (AI) can be combined to support diverse learners in third-grade classrooms. The paper begins with a literature review, including sections on inclusive education, multicultural education, teacher burnout, and the current use of AI in educational settings. Building off of this foundation, readers are presented with six UDL-framed lesson plans designed for a hypothetical third-grade class of 25 students. Using children’s literature such as Charlotte’s Web, Jim Thorpe’s Bright Path, and Just Ask: Be Different, Be Brave, Be You, these lessons incorporate AI-generated accommodations from platforms …

An Institutional And Policy Analysis Of Adaptive Capacity To Climate Change Of The Agricultural Sector Of Bangladesh, Calvin Wood Martin

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This thesis evaluates the adaptive capacity of Bangladesh’s agricultural sector in the context of climate change, focusing on policy and institutional capacities. An analytic framework is applied to assess policy coherence, resources, and implementation effectiveness of key national and international policies. The study also examines aspects of institutional capacity, such as administration, technological innovation, protective infrastructure, and access to benefits and resources. Through expert interviews and a comprehensive literature review, the research identifies both strengths and challenges in current efforts to enhance climate resilience. The findings highlight areas for improvement, particularly in strengthening policy coherence, resource needs, and institutional support …

Effectiveness Of An Evolution-Based Serious Game On Motivation And Achievement Of Secondary-Level Science Students, Bradford John Fruechte

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Motion And Rest, Claire M. Tuna

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Motion and Rest is a collection of lyric, experimental, and hybrid poems that feature transit as a recurring trope. The speaker of these poems travels through town on a bicycle, through the sky on a plane flying backwards in time, on a train through the countryside, and, among water aerobicizers, from one end of the pool to the other. Along with physical space, the speaker traverses emotional space, moving through boredom, worry, curiosity, aching, inertia, presence, and play, slowing at times, but avoiding a full stop.

Conveyance is also investigated as it pertains to communications sent and received. The speaker …

“Should Wellbeing Be The Same As Perfection?” A Case Study On Student Wellbeing In Higher Mathematics Education, Marcelo Alonso Almora Rios

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Previous research has given the impression that reticent is our hunt for optimal teaching practices, educational goals, and nature of mathematical workings. In this regard, we have (seemingly) ended up with the following inquiries:

• What could the math classroom be for? and
• What has the math classroom been for?

These two questions touch on the scary horns of two other charged philosophical dandruffs. Namely:“What are the aims of teaching mathematics?” and “What should be our objectives in learning it?”

The term ‘positive education’ refers to an educational system engendering both the skills of positive wellbeing and traditional, academic achievement (Seligman …

Making Mochi!, Shannon 'Owo' Crystal Webb

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Making mochi (rice cakes) is a metaphor for making a way of life for myself through spiritual and cultural practice. I navigate the complexities of cultural mixing and identity as someone who is half Korean and half white. Rather than one or the other, I have always felt mixed, so my path to understanding my place in the world is also mixed. On one level, I am honoring my heritage by referencing Korean customs, folktales, and mythology. On another, I address how my needs are based on my current state, which includes my location, pop culture, and society at large. …

Black Deathways: An African Methodist History, 1829-1916, Christina M. Varney

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

This study will focus on the transformations of death practices and the shifting roles of death workers from 1829-1916. The Postbellum portion of this study will focus on African Methodist communities in the states of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee as practices and people moved West to the states of Montana, Colorado, and California. These practices experienced changes as a result of rising literacy rates, the establishment of Black churches, and from the movement of Black people within the South. More changes occurred with the creation of mutual aid societies and Black-owned funeral homes. Black funeral directors …

Asked For Another Mountain, Nichole Lynn Moore

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Overgeneral Memory: An Investigation Of The Defensive Exclusion And Functional Avoidance Hypotheses, Mark David Primosch

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

and PTSD generate overgeneral autobiographical memories. It has been proposed that this phenomenon is the result of functional avoidance—actively avoiding thoughts that would elicit unwanted negative affect. Curiously, the functional avoidance hypothesis of overgeneral memory (OGM) overlaps conceptually with attachment theory’s concept of defensive exclusion. The current study tests whether a model of defensive exclusion predicts the presence of OGM and whether variables underlying the functional avoidance hypothesis (i.e., trauma exposure, PTSD, and depression) account for a significant amount of variance in OGM above and beyond the defensive exclusion model. Threehundred and thirty adults completed an untimed version of the …

Reterritorialization And Enclavic Tourism Development: A History Of Zoning And Its Impacts In Corbett Tiger Reserve Landscape, India, Rajiv Bhartari

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Zoning has become the sine qua non in protected area management around the world. Yet zoning as an assemblage of policies, practices and especially politics is not well understood, especially through a critical geographical/political ecology lens. In this research, I used the concepts of territorialization, reterritorialization and enclavization as a framework for examining the creation and impacts of zoning in the Corbett Tiger Reserve (CTR) landscape over past five decades (1973-2023). The Corbett Tiger Reserve landscape has the largest wild tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) population in any protected area in the world. The framework helped to understand successive …

Theory Of Care, Gabriella Ann Graceffo

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

With a backdrop of the body and its inner forms, Theory of Care is a collection of poems and lyric excerpts that explores themes of queer sexuality, physical and mental health, etymology, desire, and physicality. It coheres moments of internal reckoning with an exploration of how trauma lives in the body, particularly the queer femme body. By accessing various landscapes including the medical sphere, family dynamics, and the social environments of the South, the collection grapples with different vernaculars to question how the language used to discuss (or dismiss) trauma dramatically alters the perception of those experiences.

Evaluation Of Physiological Responses To Woodsmoke Inhalation During Exercise In Blood Pressure Sensitive/Chronotrope Stratified Individuals, Joseph Alan Sol

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The aim of this dissertation was to evaluate the acute physical reaction to WS exposure and identify potential fingerprints of physiological responses that may better illustrate the process leading to pathology from chronic exposure to particulate matter (PM). Study 1 developed a cost-effective, reproducible methodology for obtaining larger volume and pH-stable exhaled breath condensate (EBC) samples. Notably, the novel EBC device, compared to a commercially-available device, collected a larger sample volume, permitting an expansion in the number of biomarkers that could be examined in future WS exposures. The EBC device was then incorporated in Study 2, along with measuring key …

Queering Adolescent Ecology: A Minority Stress-Informed Exploration Of Risk And Protective Factors Related To Anxiety Symptoms In Gender And Sexual Minority Adolescents, Kinsie Jean Dunham

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Substantial epidemiological research (Talley et al., 2016; Burton et al., 2013; Institute of Medicine [IOM], 2011) indicates that gender and sexual minorities (GSM; non-cisgender and non-heterosexual, respectively) disproportionately experience health disparities, including anxiety disorders (e.g., panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, social anxiety disorder; Cochran et al., 2003; Gillman et al., 2001). Disparities in anxiety symptoms and disorders for GSM adults may begin to emerge in adolescence (Fish & Pasley, 2015; Needham, 2012; Ueno, 2010). In particular, GSM adolescents report higher rates of anxiety symptoms and anxiety disorders (Kosciw et al., 2014; Mutanski & Liu, 2013) than heterosexual, cisgender adolescents. Minority …

Suppress Not: Examining The Relationship Between Prospection And Emotional Suppression In A Depressed Population, Chelsey M. Maxson

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The aim of the present study was to elucidate the relationship between two transdiagnostic mechanisms of psychopathology: prospection (i.e., one’s ability to imagine the future), and emotional suppression, a maladaptive emotion regulation (ER) strategy. Specifically, we proposed that when individuals engage in emotional suppression, it interferes with prospection, which might then contribute to the development of depressive symptoms.

To assess the relationship between emotional suppression and prospection in individuals with depression we used an online experimental paradigm with an MTurk sample of 128 participants (64 depressed; 64 non-depressed) randomly assigned to one of two conditions: the depressed suppression induction condition …

The Impact Of Cognitive Function On Patient Language And Quality Of Life Outcomes For Stroke Survivors With Aphasia Who Participate In An Intensive Comprehensive Aphasia Program (Icap), Kortney M. Krieger

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Background: Aphasia is an acquired language disorder that impairs communication, across all modalities of language (i.e., reading, writing, speaking, and comprehension). Aphasia most commonly results from damage to the left hemisphere of the brain (e.g., stroke, traumatic brain injury). Cognitive function including attention, memory, and executive functioning may negatively impact patient outcomes during post-acute rehabilitation of aphasia. Intensive Comprehensive Aphasia Programs (ICAPs) provide intensive, evidence-based and holistic treatment for a cohort of stroke survivors. The impact of these cognitive functions on language outcomes following participation in an ICAP has not been explored.

Aims: To investigate the impact of extralinguistic cognition …

The Influences Of Bias-Based Bullying And Teacher-Student Relationships On School Belonging, Charlotte J. Moss

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

School belonging is an important factor to examine when considering the well-being of school-aged children. Factors that may influence a student’s sense of school belonging include bias-based victimization and the quality of teacher-student relationships. Many studies have examined these three variables independently or have analyzed the interaction of two of these variables. However, there are very few studies that have specifically looked at the effects of bias-based victimization and the quality of teacher-student relationships on school belonging. In order to fill these gaps in the research, this study sampled participants using Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), an online crowdsourcing platform that …

Teacher Turnover And Retention The Choice To Leave: Lived Experiences Of Teachers In Rural Montana, Brittany Elizabeth Julie Katzer

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

School districts across the United States are grappling to fill, and to keep, their classrooms operating with qualified teachers, especially in rural communities. To ensure a quality education for the millions of students in the nation in the coming years, educational leaders and government officials need to evaluate what can be done to increase the number of teachers staying in their positions. Schools must be better equipped to understand what contributes to high turnover rates and the inability to retain their teachers. It is necessary to create conditions that will keep fully trained and qualified teachers in the field. The …

Beliefs About False Allegations Of Sexual Violence: Intergroup Contact Theory And Rape Myth Acceptance At A Rocky Mountain University, Alexandra Marie Buscaglia

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

False allegations of sexual assault represent approximately 2% to 10% of all sexual assault allegations reported to law enforcement (Lisak et al., 2010). Despite this low prevalence rate, people tend to overestimate the occurrence of false allegations, and give false allegations excessive weight in arguments about rape myths and policy-making decisions. This excessive weight is given despite a lack of research evidence that false reports of sexual violence occur more frequently than those of any other crime (Ask, 2010; McMillan, 2018; Stabile et al., 2019). This overestimation is likely influenced by the overrepresentation and sensationalization of false allegations in the …

Spirited Debates: Montana Prohibition, Politics, & Repeal, 1925 - 1938, Hunter A. Richardson

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

No abstract provided.

Tree Line, Eric Joseph Jensen

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

I was raised under a doctrine of extreme truth that cast a shadow over all reality. Upon rejecting that dogma, my life became a search to replace that truth. I’ve looked for it by immersing myself in the natural world and exploring my relationship with it through paint. My landscape painting practice has brought me a wealth of experiences; however, it has not given me an answer that fills the void of my upbringing. My thesis paper is an account of the questions, research, and paintings that surround my search. Nothing, it turns out, is absolute. There is a beauty …

Ancient Migrations In West Mexico: Mtdna Analyses, Patricio Gutiérrez Ruano

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Despite the mounting evidence that suggests The Aztatlán tradition in West Mexico was a major cosmopolitan region during the Postclassic period (AD 900-1521) with connections to the rest of what is now Mexico, archaeologists have characterized items in West Mexico as culturally distinct from the rest of Mesoamerica. Recently, endogenous, and exogenous material culture has been interpreted as movement and exchange of goods and ideas between subregions and surrounding areas, all of which mention physical contact and trade were involved between Aztatlán and elsewhere. This has included interacting with areas as far as the U.S. Southwest, as well as in …

Does Behavioral Synchrony Extend To Robots? Children’S Sharing, Mentalizing, And Social Attributions To Synchronous Others, Sarah E. Sweezy

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Behavioral synchrony, or the act of keeping rhythm with others, has many implications on children’s interactions with others, from prosocial behaviors to feelings of affiliation with synchronous people. However, little is known about how behavioral synchrony applies to non-human entities. From robots leading movement-based learning in classrooms or being engaged in cultural settings, a new series of questions arise for how children view synchronizing with non-human others. The current study aimed to investigate how broadly synchronization effects would extend in a child sample: Are behavioral synchrony effects limited to synchronizing with humans or do they extend to social agents (e.g., …

Healthcare Provider Uncertainty And Communicative Management Strategies, Katie Benson

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Uncertainty exists ubiquitously within provider-patient interactions. Healthcare providers (HCPs) often face uncertainty during patient-provider interactions, for reasons including inconclusive test results, ambiguous communication, and lacking the resources to make diagnoses. When healthcare providers experience uncertainty, their behavior and communication can be negatively impacted. For example, prior research suggests when HCPs experience uncertainty, they may engage in authoritative, prejudiced and assumption-ridden behavior towards patients (Dietta & Rand, 2007; Drewniak et al., 2017: Portnoy et al., 2013; Poteat et al., 2013). To date, research on HCP uncertainty has been limited to specific health conditions and contexts such as cancer, vascular anomalies, and …

Umfc 140 A Comprehensive Case Report, Daniel D. Warila

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

UMFC 140 Is a teaching specimen from purchased from China assigned To Daniel Warila B.A. for the purpose of a Forensic case study. This case study covers a wide variety of forensic procedures that can be applied to these remains. The forensic procedures used consist of past as well as current procedures were applied to the remains with the resulting findings discussed and analyzed. This case study was focused on finding as many forensic answers as possible on the remains in their current condition.

A Comparison Of Barriers To Traditional And Home-Based Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitation Participation: Potential Implications For The Maintenance Phase, Erin Rose Madison

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Cardiac rehabilitation provides medically supervised therapeutic exercise and multifaceted risk factor modification as a form of secondary prevention for cardiovascular disease, a persistent leading cause of morbidity and mortality in the United States and internationally. Despite robust evidence of compelling patient outcomes, decreased disease recurrence, and the indications from the ACC/AHA endorsing phase II cardiac rehabilitation (CR) as a crucial aspect of recovery from cardiac events and qualifying conditions, CR is widely underutilized. A variety of patient barriers can serve as mitigating factors to CR referral, enrollment, participation, and completion contributing to, in part, the underutilization of CR. Barriers to …

Subjective Well-Being And Intergenerational Mobility In South Africa, Alison J. Monroe

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Using data on individuals from the National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS), this paper analyzes the relationship between intergenerational mobility and subjective well-being for two cohorts of South Africans. Subjective well-being has been measured using a multitude of factors, but the impact of changing economic mobility on reported life satisfaction has been less explored in the context of South Africa. Education and social mobility are the two mobility variables used to understand how changes in economic status relative to one’s parents affect self-reported well-being. This paper utilizes three methods of regression analysis for comparisons: cross-sectional, pooled cross-sectional, and panel (fixed effects …