Digital Commons Network^™

Effect Of Bundled Payments As A Care Improvement Initiative On Hospital Care Of Total Joint And Sepsis: A Perspective On Organizational Effectiveness, Pearl Kim

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study investigates the potential impact of the Bundled Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI) initiative from Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services on hospital performance and behavior related to effectiveness and efficiency. The BPCI is under the Affordable Care Act and provides hospitals with a fixed amount of reimbursement for a total episode of care. Building on the agency theory, I argue that the BPCI initiative has the potential to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of hospital care. This quasi-experimental study examines the changes in hospital care outcomes of patients with replacement of the lower extremity or sepsis in BPCIparticipating …

Uncovering The Women In Ocean’S Eight: Understanding The Trends Of The Women’S Movement With The Portrayals Of Women In Film, Elyssa Michelle Day

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study seeks for a better understanding of the correlations between major milestones in the women’s movement and how that is reflected onto the silver screen. With the rise of sexual assault allegations against prominent figures in Hollywood, and the growth of the #MeToo movement, we in turn are beginning to see an influx of films being released, and older films being rebooted, with an all-female led cast. One of those all-female film reboots is Ocean’s Eight, a film coming from a male-dominated trilogy and genre. Because of this correlation, the question of whether the narratives within Ocean’s Eight reinforce …

Community Exposure To Particulate Matter And Its Impact For Students And Residents Near A Construction Asphalt Plant: A Case Study, Aman Gebremariam Gebreselassie

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Particulate matter (PM) consists of various small particles in the atmosphere that has been associated with environmental health risk factors for many deadly diseases. PM2.5 is particulate matter 2.5 micrometers or less in diameter, PM10 is particulate matter 10 micrometers or less in diameter and are both respirable particles that can penetrate the lungs and increase risk of cardiovascular problems and respiratory illness, among other health issues. Exposure to particulate pollution in the environment tends to cause lost income from work absence, students’ absences from school, hospital admissions as well as emergency and doctor room visits.

Although asphalt plants are …

On Muddy Banks: An Ecoethnography Of A River Island Community, Nicholas Baxter

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In this study, I examine the relationship between a river and a community. Specifically, I analyze the processes and patterns that organize the nature-society relationship and define the river town of Sabula, IA. To guide my historical and ethnographic analysis, I utilize a co constructionist posture (Rice 2013), which sees culture, community, economy, and physicality as much a product of bio-physical forces as social forces. My aim is to understand how Sabula is conjointly constructed and reveal the nuanced interconnections between human communities and nature through which social and environmental problems play out. My analysis clarifies patterns in residents’ identity …

Landscape Scale: Inter- And Intraspecific Variation In Plant Interactions Along A Stress Gradient In The Sheep Range Of Nevada, Jordan Dowell

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Impending threats to shrubland ecosystems, posed by climate change, necessitate niche modeling efforts to project vegetation range shifts. However, efforts often remain unguided by individual-scale interspecific plant interactions. The stress gradient hypothesis posits that facilitation should increase in areas of high abiotic stress, only if the individuals are able to ameliorate the surrounding area via functional traits. The Sheep Range of Nevada was used to assess the role of functional traits as predictors of plant association. Larrea tridentata, Coleogyne ramosissima, and Artemisia nova were selected as shrubs with variable life history strategies and ranges in order to identify general patterns …

Uncovering New Mechanisms Of Cdc34 And Cullin-Ring Activity, Spencer Hill

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Ubiquitylation is a cellular regulatory system found in all eukaryotic cells, which has managed to find a role in most pathways imaginable. The system works fundamentally through the ligation of a small protein known as ubiquitin onto a substrate. Depending on the context of the ubiquitin ligation, the substrate can be directed towards a number of cellular fates, the best-studied being degradation of the substrate. While originally thought of as a signal for cellular disposal units to degrade aberrant proteins, we now know that ubiquitin plays a highly nuanced role in cellular epistasis, controlling everything from the cell cycle to …

Utility Of Bench Scale Sand Tank Experiments At Assessing Permeable Reactive Barrier Design, Brandon Meier

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The objective of this work was to evaluate the utility of bench scale sand tank experiments at assessing permeable reactive barrier (PRB) design. Our criteria for meeting this goal was that differences between PRB designs could be identified solely by measuring concentration in outflow from the sand tank models. For our PRB designs (funnel-and-gate, staggered wells, and parallel bars), numerical simulations clearly showed that PRB design had a quantifiable effect on outflow concentration, provided that the solute reacted with the PRB materials. Conversely, use of a conservative (non-reactive) solute did not allow us to discern between PRB design alternatives. Employing …

Design Of Efficient Carbon-Based Adsorbents For The Removal Of Organic And Inorganic Water Contaminants, Sayedeh Soroosh Mortazavian Dehkordi

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Granular activated carbon (AC) and biochar (BC) are two carbon-based adsorbents commonly used for water and wastewater treatment. However, these adsorbents have drawbacks that suppress their aqueous contaminants removal efficiency. Their major disadvantages are that AC has low selectivity and reusability potential, and BC has a hydrophobic nature.

The scope of this dissertation is to enhance the performance of commonly-used carbon-based adsorbents for the removal of organic and inorganic water contaminants and to understand the interactive mechanism of contaminants’ ions/molecules with adsorbents. Hexavalent chromium (Cr(VI)) and trichloroethylene (TCE) are two types of inorganic and organic water contaminants, respectively, which are …

The Effects Of Background, Classroom Assessment Competence, Self-Efficacy, And Self-Perceived Assessment Skills On Classroom Assessment Practices Of Teachers In India, Manognya Murukutla

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Teacher-conducted assessments are necessary to gather important information to facilitate student learning and academic success. Unfortunately, there is an inconsistency in teacher knowledge of assessment and assessment practices. While previous research identified a gap in teacher competence and teacher perceptions of their competence, and this affects classroom assessment practices that then impact student learning, the research is limited, outdated, and not grounded in any theoretical framework. This study addresses gaps in literature and establishes self-efficacy as a theoretical framework in which classroom assessment can be studied. Data were collected in India, and a path analysis and a Kruskal Wallis non-parametric …

Balys Dvarionas: A Brief History, Analysis Of His Concerto For Horn And Orchestra, And The First Recording Of The Concerto, Jonathan Lewis Snyder

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This document will concentrate on the currently unpublished and incomplete manuscript of the orchestral version of Concerto for Horn and Orchestra [Koncertas valtornei su orkestru], composed by Lithuanian composer Balys Dvarionas (1904–1972). Despite his popularity and importance in Lithuania, Dvarionas’s music is not as well known throughout the rest of the world. This document aims to redress this situation.

The document provides a more thorough English-language biography about the composer than those that currently exist in print. It discusses various aspects of the concerto, including its place in Dvarionis’s output and a brief analysis, a core aspect of which is …

Blanche Dubois: A Woman's Journey From Belle Reve Through Tarantula Arms To The Elysian Fields, Raluca Daniela Comanelea

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This present thesis aims at deconstructing the main character of A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams: Blanche DuBois. Blanche’s journey is traced from Death to Desire and finally, to an ultimate envisioned destination, The Elysian Fields, which represents her physical and spiritual burial at sea, with her soul ultimately reaching heaven. Blanche’s most important quality - her ability to seduce audiences into perceiving the multifaceted layers of her feminine character all at once - marks her entry into Williams’s theatre of excess. Her theatricality springs precisely from her fascinating ability to reconstruct her persona in the course of the …

Empirical Justification For Supportive Other Involvement In Collegiate Athletes’ Mental Health Intervention, Elena Gavrilova

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Student-athletes have been identified to evidence similar or higher rates of mental health difficulties and lower levels of mental health engagement as compared with non-athlete peers. Along these lines, sport-specific mental health intervention has been justified by researchers, yet only one randomized clinical trial has been conducted in collegiate student-athletes who have been formally assessed for mental health disorders (i.e., a family behavior therapy as compared with traditional campus counseling as usual; Donohue et al., 2018a). Results of this outcome study demonstrated greater improvements for participants who received the family-based intervention up to 8-months post-randomization. In this clinical trial, the …

Examining The Effectiveness Of A 4d Schedule And A Virtual Reality Model On A Modular Project: Unlv Solar Decathlon Case, Rajarshi Ghimire

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The use of a 4D schedule as technological advancement has brought significant improvement to the planning and execution of construction projects, through visualizing stepwise construction progress, following a sequence of pre-planned activities, and finalizing a baseline schedule with necessary changes. Moreover, the application of virtual reality (VR) to create interactive 3D models of a planned structure has made it possible to make a detailed planning of any construction project. Because of these benefits, the use of 4D schedules and VR in the construction industry has increased drastically, leading to improved planning and execution. However, past studies have given little attention …

Ethnic Power Dominance In A Resource-Rich Sub Saharan African State: An Analysis Of Violent Conflict Accelerators And The Mitigating Influence Of Civil Society In Nigeria, Victor O. Fakoya

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

My dissertation research explores the impacts of ethno-regional power dominance, trust, and violent conflict in a resources-rich multiethnic, sub-Saharan African state. This dissertation examines the impact that ethnic power dominance has on the relationship between conflict and civil society in a resource rich sub-Saharan African (SSA) nation examined. Relying upon intra-state case study analysis of the socio-political climate in Nigeria, I argue that distrust in the national government, when motivated by ethno-regional cleavages has an accelerating influence on the incidence of conflict. Using cross-national survey data in conjunction with field interview data, this research finds that in the regions where …

External Voting In Developing Countries: Strategic Bargaining And The Role Of Remittances, Hafthor Erlingsson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study and numerous prior works have argued that remittances increase the likelihood that states will implement external voting. However, quantitative studies have generally failed to find a relationship between reliance on remittances and the adoption and implementation of external voting. In this study it is argued that the pooling of observations from developed and developing countries as well as autocracies and highly consolidated democracies has altered previous results. Most studies have also not investigated possible non-linearities in the relationship between remittances and external voting. The results of this study illustrate the non-linear influence remittances have on non-autocratic developing countries …

Infection Control: The Nurse's Responsibility, Marisa Francis

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Over the last century and a half, infection control measures implemented by nursing staff have continued to evolve, resulting in improved patient outcomes. While this progress is impressive, a decline in rates of hospital acquired infections (HAIs) seems to have slowed, with only a 0.5% decrease in the last seventeen years. Unfortunately, nurses are rarely provided educational support on infection control practices beyond undergraduate and new employee trainings. Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) is frequently updating their infection control practice recommendations.

The purpose of this project was to observe the current rate of infection control compliance by nurses, …

Lifting The Veil: Do Health Care Price Transparency Laws Actually Lower Costs?, Nora Michelle Irene Langendorf

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this research is to determine whether or not health care transparency laws, in the form of price transparency, lower the rate of increase paid out in health care expenditures in those states that have enacted these laws compared to those states that have not. By controlling for factors such as poverty, age, chronic illnesses, and income that may play a part in lowering or raising health care costs, the primary explanatory variable – health care price transparency laws – can determine if there is a strong relationship with the dependent variable (the rate of increase on health …

Development Of Natural Perlite Based Concrete For Sustainable Construction, Seyedmahmoud Motaharikarein

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study aimed to partially replace Portland Cement (PC) with environmentally friendly binders capable of improving the longevity of concrete. The new binders consisted of different proportions of natural pozzolan (perlite) with various fineness and particle size distributions. A step-by-step research program was designed to: (1) discover the optimum fineness of perlite powder and its optimum replacement level with cement; (2) investigate the rheological properties of the perlite-containing mixtures, and examine whether this binder can be used in selfconsolidating concrete; and (3) assess the weaknesses of the new binder, and improve its deficiencies by using nanomaterials such as nano-silica. The …

The Perplexing Paradox Of Clostridioides (Clostridium) Difficile Infection (Cdi) - Analysis Of Anti-Germinants As Part Of Cdi Prophylaxis, Christopher Yip

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Clostridioides (Clostridium) difficile infections (CDI) have become the leading cause of nosocomial antibiotic-associated diarrhea worldwide. Under normal circumstances, bacteria found in the gastrointestinal tract provide a barrier against C. difficile colonization. Upon antibiotic therapy, the protective barrier is lost as the microbial community becomes depleted thus providing the opportunity for C. difficile to colonize the human gut. Exposure to taurocholate, a bile acid produced within the mammalian gastrointestinal tract, causes C. difficile spores to begin their transition, a process known as germination, from metabolically dormant structures to toxin-producing cells. As germination is required for the onset of CDI, anti-germination compounds …

A Retrospective Survey Of Exercise Habits In Low-Income Female Senior Citizens, Kelly L. Bumgarner

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

American adults spend at least 50% of their time sedentary with the most inactive demographic being low-income women over 60. This is detrimental because routine physical activity benefits for senior women include balancing hormones, maintaining bone mineral density, and decreasing the risk of breast cancer. Statements like “good exercise habits begin during youth; children should play sports to establish healthy habits they’ll continue throughout their lives” are common, but not clearly supported by literature. Objective: The purpose of this retrospective, cross-sectional study was to identify whether physical activity/exercise habits during youth and young adulthood predict old age physical activity/exercise habits …

On Improving Performance Of The Binary Logistic Regression Classifier, Michael Chang

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Logistic Regression, being both a predictive and an explanatory method, is one of the most commonly used statistical and machine learning method in almost all disciplines. There are many situations, however, when the accuracies of the fitted model are low for predicting either the success event or the failure event. Several statistical and machine learning approaches exist in the literature to handle these situations. This thesis presents several new approaches to improve the performance of the fitted model, and the proposed methods have been applied to real datasets.

Transformations of predictors is a common approach in fitting multiple linear and …

International Faculty’S Lived Experience Of Teaching: A Multiple-Case Study Of Taiwanese Professors In The United States, Ching Hsu Kim

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In the context of higher education, a tenure-track faculty is expected to be actively engaged in scholarly activities including research, teaching and service activities. Finding a balance between personal and career lives is seen critical yet challenging especially to early-career international faculty members while they are in the face of differences and changes. Framed by theories of perezhivanie and resilience, the study examined international faculty members’ lived experiences of teaching. Interviews, blog prompts and reflection prompts were used to identify their major difficulties, perceptions and adjustments, and resilience development. Findings suggest that faculty members unavoidably encountered difficulties in their beginning …

Moisture Dynamics Of A Near-Surface Desert Soil, Yuan Luo

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Desert soils cover about one third of the Earth’s land surface. Despite their large extent, however, our understanding of desert soil hydraulic processes and properties is still rather limited. In particularly with respect to the near-surface (top centimeters) of the soil profile, which play a critical role for infiltration, redistribution and evapotranspiration of rainwater, the limiting resource for life in desert environments, but also hosts most of the biologic activity and controls runoff, erosion as well as the emission of dust (Nannipieri et al.,2003; Bradford et al.,1987). Additionally, deserts are ideal locations for electricity generation with solar energy using large-scale …

Static Malware Detection Using Deep Neural Networks On Portable Executables, Piyush Aniruddha Puranik

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

There are two main components of malware analysis. One is static malware analysis and the other is dynamic malware analysis. Static malware analysis involves examining the basic structure of the malware executable without executing it, while dynamic malware analysis relies on examining malware behavior after executing it in a controlled environment. Static malware analysis is typically done by modern anti-malware software by using signature-based analysis or heuristic-based analysis.

This thesis proposes the use of deep neural networks to learn features from a malware’s portable executable (PE) to minimize the occurrences of false positives when recognizing new malware. We use the …

An Analysis Of Teacher Training Concerning The Identification Of Students With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Brittany Jo Desnoyer

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Given recent revisions to the diagnostic criteria as it pertains to students with ASD (DSM-V; APA, 2013), several studies have raised concern that future diagnosis will be limited (McPartland et al., 2012). However, prevalence rates of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) have continued to rise since its release (Baio et al., 2018). Because special education referrals are subject to bias, and positively correlated with a high probably of subsequent diagnosis (Ysseldyke & Algozzine, 1981), the role of the educator warrants exploration.

This study investigated the level of training provided to pre-service and in-service general and special educators in the DSM-IV (APA, …

Adolescent Pregnancy: A Clinical Guideline For School Nurses In New Mexico, Karin Ludi

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The overall purpose of this project is to ensure that school nurses and health assistants are knowledgeable and have the resources to care for pregnant adolescents in the public school system. New Mexico has consistently ranked in the top 10 in the United States for teen births to women aged 15-19 years. The New Mexico School Health Manual is currently used to guide school nurses and health assistants in the care of pregnant adolescents, but it is vague and addresses emergencies such as labor and bleeding.

From this author’s experience as a school nurse in the public school system, it …

Effects Of Creativity Instruction In Science On Creative Thinking And Science Achievement In Chinese Students, Yun Peng

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study investigated the effectiveness of the 3eT instructional model designed by Hong (Hong, 2012a; Hong, O'Neil, Drobick, & Beisel, 2013) that focused on increasing students' creative-thinking ability. 120 seventh-graders in China participated in the study. Participants were randomly assigned to the experimental or the control group. They learned a segment of a science curriculum unit with instructional materials developed based on the 3eT model which aimed to encourage students to use creative thinking techniques.

Patterns of students' perceptions of a creative person were compared between the experimental group and the control group. Content analyses of students' narrative responses elicited …

Words As Weapons And Wisdom, Barbara Paige

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The Harlem Renaissance and the Black Arts Movement were two seminal eras in American history. The Renaissance also referred to as the New Negro Movement was a literary artistic, and cultural movement, centered in Harlem in which writers produced large bastions of literary works. African descended people began to identify with their African past and intellectuals adopted Black Nationalist and Pan-Africanist methodologies to overcome oppression. Their efforts laid a foundation for the Civil Rights movement. The Black Arts Movement, an era of intense literary artistic activism begun with the assassination of Malcolm X. Artist/intellectuals responded to a more hostile environment …

Using Positive Self-Talk And Goal-Oriented Thinking To Improve Behavioral Outcomes For Students With Learning Disabilities, Danielle M. Feeney

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Positive self-talk is the experience of carrying on an internal conversation with oneself in the form of praise and encourages the individual to persist despite risks or challenges. Goal- oriented thinking is a purposeful mental process used when solving a problem or working on a task and generally occurs when an individual is reasoning, problem solving and decision making. When engaged in goal-oriented thinking, individuals must interpret their current situation, determine their desired state, and then connect the two through a series of actions in an attempt to transform the former to the latter. Individuals who frequently use positive self-talk …

In Pursuit Of Social Justice At The Postmodern Turn: Intersectional Activism Through The Lens Of The Ecosexual Movement, Jennifer Jean Reed

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In this study, I examine the development of the ecosexual movement, a social movement that begins at the intersection of environmental and sexual struggles, from its inception in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Previous research suggests intersectionality in social movements often ends up being divisive because it emphasizes difference. Using a mixed qualitative methods design including ethnographic field work, interviews, and content analysis of related web and print materials, I analyze how the ecosexual movement negotiates intersectionality. I found the ecosexual movement links processual notions of environmental justice and sexual justice through a dominant collective action frame of queer, erotic, “irreverent …