Digital Commons Network^™

Systematics, Vertical Distribution, And Life History Of Anguilliform Leptocephali In The Bermuda Ocean Acre, Aimee A. Keller

Open Access Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Competition And Resource Partitioning In Two Species Of Cancer (Crustacea, Brachyura), Michael J. Fogarty

Open Access Master's Theses

Interspecific interactions of four decapod (Crustacea) species were assessed in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island using aspects of current community theory. Microhabitat distribution was analyzed for three brachyuran species, Carcinus maenas, Cancer irroratus and Cancer borealis and for the American lobster, Homarus americanus. Various microhabitats differed in spatial heterogeneity and ultimately in available shelter sites. Shelter may constitute a limiting resource and competition for this resource may be important in the structuring of the decapod community.

Habitat selection studies for two of the species, Cancer irroratus and Cancer borealis indicated s reduction in the fundamental niche of Cancer irroratus …

An Exploration Of The Relationship Between Self-Reported Anxiety And Belief In Internal Versus External Control Of Reinforcement, Caroline Salvatore

Open Access Master's Theses

The initial purpose of this study was to explore the reported relationship between subjective, debilitating anxiety and an individual’s perception that he lacks significant control over life situations.

While much previous research suggests the existence of' a positive relationship between anxiety and the variable Rotter has termed external locus of control (LC), these studies have utilized many different measures.

A more refined purpose of the present study thus became the clarification of these constructs through a factor—analytic approach to the following questions: (1) Precisely how are 'anxiety’ and perceived ‘locus of control’ operationally defined by some of the more widely …

An Aerial Photogrammetric Survey Of Long-Term Shoreline Changes, Southern Rhode Island Coast, Donald Robert Regan

Open Access Master's Theses

For shore protection analysis, the collection of data on coastal erosion by extensive field measurements is expensive and is complicated by the problem of extrapolating results obtained from short-term field observations into long-term erosional trends. On the other hand, surveys utilizing quantitative aerial photogrammetric techniques are less expensive than field surveys and accuracy on the order of three meters is possible. Aerial photographs show the location of the beach and features adjacent to the beach. These features can be used as stable locations to reference these shoreline and duneline photogrammetric measurements.

Photogrammetric measurements of the distance from a stable reference …

Effect Of Continuous Inhalation Of Ethanol Vapors In The Rat, Steven W. Mann

Open Access Master's Theses

Rats were exposed to continuous inhalation of ethanol vapors in an inhalation chamber plus daily injections of an alcohol dehydrogenase inhibitor pyrazole (68 mg/kg, i.p.). Ethanol vapors entered the inhalation chamber at flow rates of from o.45 liters/min. to 0.95 liters/min. which when mixed with a constant stream of air (5.0 liters/min) produced chamber concentrations of from approximately 8.8 mg/liter to 26.5 mg/liter. Rats exposed to these conditions for 5 to 7 days developed blood ethanol levels of 0.83± 0.09 mg/ml/blood to 2.19 ± 0.14 mg/ml/blood. Administration of pyrazole with or without ethanol caused weight loss in these rats. Rats …

The Solubility Of Calcium Oxalate As A Function Of Dielectric Constant, Justina A. Molzon

Open Access Master's Theses

The solubility of calcium oxalate inonohydrate was determined via atomic absorption spectroscopy in a series of 1-alkanols and ethanol-water mixtures at 25°C., having known dielectric constants. It was found that solubility was linearly related to the dielectric constant of the 1-alkanols. In the ethanol-water mixtures, the solubility isotherm was curvilinear and on a dielectric constant basis an apparent break occurred in the isotherm, at a dielectric constant of sixty. This can be considered to be the point of ionization of divalent cations. The solubility isotherms in the cosolvent mixtures can be considered as repressive ionization phenomena.

Infrared Photoconductivity In Thin Silver Sulfide Films, Paul Joseph Aceto

Open Access Master's Theses

A study of thermally generated conductivity and photoconductivity in thin layers of silver sulfide is presented.

Silver layers were vacuum deposited on sapphire substrates and transformed into silver sulfide in a sulfur atmosphere at 120° C. The dark current of single element sensors was investigated as a function of temperature and photocurrent was measured as a function of photon flux and wavelength . The samples were photosensitive to radiation in the spectral range 0.7 μm to 1 .8 μm. A maximum photoresponse occurred at a wavelength of 0.8 μm. The photocurrent in general increased with decreasing temperature. The absorption edge …

The Determination Of The Apparent Dissociation Constants For Arsenic Acid In Seawater, Douglas H. Lowenthal

Open Access Master's Theses

The object of this study was the determination of the first, second and third apparent dissociation constants for arsenic acid in seawater, based on a free molal hydrogen scale. This was accomplished through potentiometric monitoring of acid-base titrations of arsenate in artificial seawater and data analysis using a computerized curve fitting technique. Experiments were carried out at atmospheric pressure over a range of salinities and temperatures. Constants determined in artificial seawater and sodium chloride solutions at equal effective ionic strengths were compared in order to evaluate the effects of specific ion interactions on the dissociation of arsenic acid in seawater. …

School Climate And Career Commitment, Joyce P. Allen

Open Access Master's Theses

This study examines the relationship between school climate and career commitment among recruits to the merchant marine. In a crossnational sample of academies in England, Spain and the United States, commitment to a maritime career is found to be associated with the school climate in which training takes place. Specifically, recruits being trained in a climate of high structural rigidity are more likely than recruits being trained in less rigid environments to have made a career decision and to have made that decision in favor of a short career at sea.

Furthermore, the above relationship is shown to be contextual …

Participatory Metaphysics: A Study Of The Thought Of Gabriel Marcel, Theresa Tonon

Open Access Master's Theses

This thesis is concerned with the Philosophy of Gabriel Marcel. Specifically, the emphasis will be on what Marcel takes to be the unique epistemological demands of metaphysical subject matters.

Metaphysics, once considered the "Queen of the Sciences" has for some time been challenged in its position as a legitimate and/or viable philosophical discipline. This attitude toward metaphysics has been expressed in the philosophical community as either active, direct attack or, more recently, passive neglect -- ‘ignore-ance’ -- which perhaps suggests that the dominant feeling among members, the philosophical community may be that metaphysics simply no longer warrants any attention at …

Essentialism And Effluvia 1700-1740: A Thematic Study, Robert E. Barletta

Open Access Master's Theses

There have been many explanations offered for the transformation which occurred in natural philosophy during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. One such explanation was that this “scientific revolution” was philosophical, i.e. the chances which occurred in natural philosophy were marked by the transition from an essentialist to a non-essentialist view of nature. The validity of this explanation was investigated by selecting an essentialist theme, effluvial theory, and tracing its development from its origins in renaissance occult philosophy to the incorporation of effluvia into the physical theory of the 17^th and 18^th century natural philosophy. This was accomplished by …

Relationships Between Dynamic Nearshore Processes And Beach Changes At Napatree Beach, Rhode Island, Wayne John Coddington

Open Access Master's Theses

The purpose of this project was to study the relationships between dynamic nearshore processes and beach changes at Napatree Beach, Rhode Island. Beach surveys performed from December, 1974 to August, 1975 at six transects show that slight to moderate accretion of sediment occurred at all but one station. Although an overall seasonal cycle of erosion and accretion exists, erosional and accretional beach profiles are not unique to any one season. With the exception of glacial till in the vicinity of Napatree Point, sediment sampling indicated that the dominant sediment size was fine sand. There was little seasonal variation in sediment …

Hypnotic Susceptibility Of Undergraduates: Class Standing, Major, And Sex, Randall B. Plourde

Open Access Master's Theses

The present study in basic research designed to investigate the relationships among the variables of class standing, major, and sex and hypnotic susceptibility of undergraduate students. The results were also to be assessed for indirect indications of a relationship between age and HS and for indirect indications of an increase in HS of undergraduates as a result of contemporary trends such as the popularization of mind altering chemicals. From a pool of over 1,200 volunteers recruited from University of Rhode Island classrooms, 240 undergraduate participants were selected on the basis of specified criteria. The Harvard Group Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale: Form …

Perception And Evidence, Donald H. Wacome

Open Access Master's Theses

The question as to whether empirical knowledge has any foundations and, if it does, just what those foundations might be, has long been an important epistemological question. The problem with which I am concerned is that of taking primitive sensory experience as the ground of empirical knowledge. I consider three attempts on the part of 20th century British and American analytical philosophers to substantiate our ordinary knowledge claims about an extra-mental, empirical reality. The first of these is the sense-datum approach to the problem, in which by using the act-object analysis of simple sensations, the independent status of things sensed …

Recreation Matrix Study Manual, Charles Eric Abrahamson Jr., Craig Thomas Estes

Open Access Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Land Banking As A Redevelopment Tool For The City Of Providence, Joseph J. Seymour

Open Access Master's Theses

No abstract provided.