Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Hot Topic: Changes In Federal Reimbursement Rates For Travel, Dick Phebus

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

Summary of changes in the federal and state reimbursement rates for travel.

Hot Topic: Conducting Effective Roadblocks (2001), Melissa Ashburn

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

Roadblocks should be conducted in such a manner that will sustain the prosecution of charges brought against persons arrested in the operation.

Hot Topic: Social Security And Medicare Budget Data For Fiscal Year 2003-2004, Ralph Cross

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

A summary of the Social Security Administration's social security/medicare wage and tax data for the 2002-2004 budgets.

Base Closure Impacts And The General Effects Of Military Installations On Local Private Employment, Patrick E. Poppert

Doctoral Dissertations

This empirical study explores the general effects of military installations on local employment, and the special case of closure under the Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) proceedings of 1988, 1991, 1993, and 1995. Employment impacts are modeled in a partial adjustment construct, and both random and fixed effects specifications of the disturbance term are evaluated. The analysis also includes both levels and changes forms of the model. The latter approach facilitates decomposition of defense personnel changes into its positive, negative, and BRAC related components. These components are examined for asymmetrical effects attributable to the public goods and community infrastructure vacuum …

Managing Infiltration Inflow In Wastewater Collection Systems, Sharon Rollins

MTAS Publications: Full Publications

An overview of I/I problems caused by ground water and surface or rainwater.

Water & Wastewater Manual: A Training Manual For Board Members, Brett Ward, Steve Wyatt, Bill Young

MTAS Publications: Full Publications

This manual provides a resource for new or experienced water board members or municipal officials who have little or no formal training for the job.

Eeg Coherence And Amplitude Effects Of Rhythmic Auditory And Visual Stimulation With An Emphasis In Computational Methods, Jon Alan Frederick

Doctoral Dissertations

The photic driving response, the effect of a flashing light stimulus on the cortical EEG, has proven to be a sensistive neurometric that varies with differences in perception, mood, and physiological states. The diverse effects of photic stimulation have made commercially available "brainwave syncronizers" popular among consumers and even among some clinicians. It is common in the design of these devices to combine a rhythmic auditory stimulus with the visual stimulus. However, little if any experimental evidence supports the assumption that auditory stimulation enhances the photic driving effect. Therefore, this study compared the amplitude and coherence effects of three stimulation …

Csa: Not Just Science Anymore, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

ASK LIBRARIANS WHAT they think of when they hear "Cambridge Scientific Abstracts" and most, not surprisingly, would likely cite bibliographic databases in the sciences. That is probably why Cambridge Scientific Abstracts officially changed its name to CSA to reflect a broadened scope of topics and types of sources.

Part of the, Cambridge Information Group (CIG), CSA now publishes databases and journals on many subjects and provides access to these and other companies' products through its Internet Database Service (IDS). Even librarians who hadn't paid attention to changes at CSA took notice this year when CIG purchased the R.R. Bowker Co.

Electronic Journals: How User Behavior Is Changing, Carol Tenopir, Donald W. King

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

From 1977 through 2001 the authors have conducted a series of studies that examine reading and publishing habits of scientists in both university and non-university settings (including private companies and national laboratories). For the last decade the studies have measured the influence of ejournals on scholarly reading and publishing behaviours. These studies demonstrate that scientists continue to read widely from scholarly journals primarily for research and current awareness. Reading of scholarly articles has increased to approximately 120-13 articles per person per year, with engineers reading fewer journal articles on the average and medical faculty reading more. A growing amount of …

Pecos Revisited: A Modern Analysis Of Earnest Hooton’S, The Indians Of Pecos Pueblo, Katherine Elizabeth Weisensee

Masters Theses

The extensive data recorded by Earnest Hooton (1930) during his years of work on the analysis of the remains recovered from Pecos Pueblo provides an excellent database for reconsidering his conclusions within a modern context. The first issue addressed in re-examining Hooton’s data relates to the sex estimations made for the Pecos sample. Researchers, specifically Ruff (1991), questioned the highly biased sex ratio that Hooton reported for the sample. Using the craniometric and postcranial metrics data that Hooton collected it was possible to re-evaluate Hooton’s sex estimations by utilizing discriminant functionanalysis in order to establish a more accurate sex ratio …

The Prehistoric Use Of Hubbards Cave, Warren County, Tennessee, Erin Elizabeth Pritchard

Masters Theses

Hubbards Cave, in Warren County, Tennessee, contains evidence of a prehistoric gypsum mine. Such evidence is rare in the southeastern United States and few caves have been identified as prehistoric mineral extraction locations. Evidence of mining at Hubbards was documented using a total station laser transit and ArcView ã GIS program in order to identify and evaluate prehistoric activities throughout the cave. While much of the archaeological evidence pertaining to the prehistoric occupation of the cave has been removed as a result of later saltpeter (KNO 3) mining, traces of prehistoric evidence are documented in an attempt to interpret prehistoric …

Personality Differences Of First-Year Law Students Using The Theory Of Mental Self-Government, Charles Angelo Licata

Masters Theses

Thinking styles are described as ones conscious attempt to develop an awareness of stimuli within the surrounding environment. They reflect on the way we perceive, interpret, and integrate information, as well as influence the quality of information we supply to others. At the same time, personality traits have become important factors in understanding the preferences people may feel towards their careers, lifestyles, and quality of life. Furthermore, Myers and Briggs (1984) linked personality to the way we perceive and think about the environment by developing a new model of personality and thinking, which was based on the research and theories …

Hot Topic: Legislation Clarifies And Simplifies E-Commerce Procedures For Tennessee Municipalities, Ralph Cross

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

The 2001 legislative session resulted in several changes that affect electronic business in Tennessee. This hot topic highlights some of the more important changes.

Hot Topic: Supreme Court Limits Civil Penalties Over $50, Sid Hemsley

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

Municipal civil penalties in excess of $50 violate Article VI, Section 14 of the Tennessee Constitution if their purpose is punitive rather than remedial, the Tennessee Supreme Court held on Sept. 4 in City of Chattanooga v. Davis and Barrett v. Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County, ____ S.W.3d _____ (Tenn. 2001) [2001 WL 1005941]. The difficulty of showing that a municipality’s civil penalty is remedial rather than punitive means that most municipalities will find it in their interest not to levy civil penalties more than $50.

The Power Of Citation Searching, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

IT MAY BE EFFECTIVE to find relevant literature by searching for articles by subject descriptors or keywords, but subject searching is not the only way. When authors of scholarly pieces cite relevant sources in the references or notes sections of their articles, researchers can thus extend their literature searches.

Hot Topic: Uniformed Services Employment And Re-Employment Rights Act, Richard Stokes

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

Under USERRA, re-employment rights are required for any person who is absent from work because of service in the uniformed services.

Database And Online System Usage, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

A DECADE AGO I wrote a column called "The Most Popular Databases" (LJ 4/1/91, p. 96,98). I used data from a company called Information Market Indicators (IMI) that tracked usage in a wide sample of libraries, plus CD-ROM best sellers lists from popular computing magazines. It is harder now to track database and system usage over all types of libraries because IMI no longer collects the data, CD-ROM isn't as important in libraries, and there are now many more choices of systems and databases.

Tennessee Public Acts 2001: Summaries Of Interest To Municipal Officials, Dennis Huffer

MTAS Publications: Full Publications

Summarizes the year's public acts and provides date they become effective.

Your Municipal Code: Adopting It And Keeping It Up-To-Date, Steve Lobertini

MTAS Publications: Full Publications

This guide explains code adoption and requirements and how to keep municipal codes current.

Hot Topic: Public Acts Affecting Cities, Mtas

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

The 2001 Tennessee General Assembly passed into law several acts that affect Tennessee municipalities. This Hot Topic summarizes some of these acts. However, do not rely solely on these summaries before giving advice or taking action. Refer to the act itself. MTAS will publish the complete 2001 Tennessee Public Acts this month.

Still The Big Three In Special Libraries: Dialog, Factiva, And Lexisnexis, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

JUDGING FROM THE size of their booths, the number of activities sponsored, and the glitz of their parties at the Special Libraries Association (SLA) 2001 annual meeting in San Antonio, Lexis-Nexis, Factiva (Dow Jones/Reuters), and Dialog are still the big three for special librarians. In fact, all three lead in online system revenues. These mainstays in special libraries fiercely compete with each other, but none can afford to take its position for granted--witness Dialog's recent slip from market leader to number three.

Hot Topic: Animal Control Law Revised By Legislature, Don Darden

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

As of August 15, 2001: The Tennessee General Assembly recently enacted a new law that repeals the Dog and Cat Humane Death Act [Part 3] in its entirety. It was replaced with Chapter 70, referred to as the Non-livestock Animal Humane Death Act. According to Tennessee Code Annotated§ 39-14- 201, "non-livestock animals" refers to common household pets - dogs, cats, rabbits, chicks, ducks, and even potbellied pigs. The new law applies to public and private agencies, animal shelters, and other facilities operated for the collection, care, and/or euthanasia of stray, neglected, abandoned, or unwanted non-livestock animals. It does not apply …

Response Expectancy And Experimenter Bias As Factors Affecting Hypnotic Responsiveness, K. Shannon Wilson

Doctoral Dissertations

This study examined the effect of subjects' expectations regarding their hypnotizability, and the effect of experimenter bias, on subsequent levels of hypnotic responsiveness. Ninety undergraduate psychology students, none of whom had previously been hypnotized, participated in the study. Subjects were divided into four groups (two groups of 30 and two groups of 15), in a two by two design. The two experimental groups received a manipulation (subtle alterations of lighting conditions in the experimental room in order to confirm suggestions given under hypnosis) designed to increase their level of expectations regarding their hypnotic performance. Their actual hypnotic responsiveness was then …

'A Ship Leading Itself ... ': A Study Of Two Methods To Teach The Public Speaking Course, Rodney K. Marshall

Doctoral Dissertations

With the advent of the Internet, more and more classes are being moved to that medium. This study looks at using that medium to assist classroom instruction. Teaching the Public Speaking class with online-assistance requires placing the majority of the content online and using classroom instruction for individual conferences between the student and instructor to prepare for presentations. This study investigated the outcomes of this method of instruction and compared them to the traditional lecture/discussion method of teaching the class.

The outcomes investigated concerned student perceptions of course satisfaction and preparedness for speeches, their willingness to communicate, and their immediacy …

Technical Bulletins: Census Figures Help Cities Redistrict, Roy Eckert

MTAS Publications: Technical Bulletins

Description of the processes involved in redistricting due to census figures.

Technical Bulletins: Good Service-Request Systems Keep Customers Happy, Steve Wyatt

MTAS Publications: Technical Bulletins

Essential elements to ensure a successful system handling daily service requests and complaints.

The Involvement Of The Forensic Anthropologist In Human Rights Issues, Sarah Catherine Hughes

Masters Theses

The theme chosen for the 2001 American Academy of Forensic Sciences meeting, War Crimes and Other Acts Against Humanity, has highlighted the recent involvement of scientists in the investigation of gross human rights violations. Genocide, political murders, and mass killings rage throughout the world: Rwanda, Bosnia, the former Yugoslavia, Serbia, and Kosovo being only the most recent examples. Forensic anthropology is a field that was established to aid in the identification of human remains once visual recognition is lost. Most often this applies to medico-legal investigations of unexplained deaths. Of recent, however, forensic anthropologists have become involved in identifying …

Reassessment Of Cranial Plasticity In Man: A Modern Critique Of Changes In Bodily Form Of Descendants Of Immigrants, Corey Shepard Sparks

Masters Theses

The reconstruction of biological relationships in humans using the cranium relies on the assumption that the multivariate distances derived from cranial data have a genetic component. This notion has been criticized by some authors based mainly upon one study of Franz Boas. This study focused on the idea that within one generation the cranial form of a population can be significantly altered by a sudden change in the environment. Boas.s original study has been cited for the past ninety years as evidence of cranial plasticity.

A modern critique of Boas.s original study has been long overdue and is pursued herein …

Privies, Pigs, Rubbish, And Quacks: The Archaeology Of Late Nineteenth And Early Twentieth Century Public Health In Knoxville, Tennessee, Tanya Alexandra Faberson

Masters Theses

Progressive Era (circa 1890-1920) public health reformers attempted to regulate urban sanitation by supporting reactionary public health policies and laws. Archaeologists and historians have often assumed that legislation has immediate impact on behavior when the intended legislative outcome is beneficial. Even so, in Knoxville, Tennessee, the ethnohistorical and archaeological evidence does not strongly associate implementations of sanitation legislation and changes in behavior. This suggests complex social processes underlying the reform movement and people's reaction to it in the urban sphere.

Using sanitation ordinances drawn from Knoxville City Council minutes and sanitarian literature, findings indicate that sanitation reform targeted specific social …

Hot Topic: 2001-2002 State Revenue Estimates, Dick Phebus

MTAS Publications: Hot Topics

A summary of what cities can expect to receive from the state shared taxes for the 2001-2002 fiscal year.