Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Exploring Proximal And Distal Psychosocial Stressors Influencing The Health Outcomes Of Urban American Indians In The Midwest, Alina Aloma

Theses and Dissertations

Researchers have theorized that colonization and forced assimilation of American Indians/Alaska Natives (AI/AN) in the U.S. are associated with the current health outcomes of AI/AN groups. The literature has begun to link a number of negative health outcomes such as chronic illnesses, substance abuse, grief, depression, and anxiety with distal stressors associated with historical loss, as well as with proximal stressors that are continued reminders of historical trauma such as present day discrimination. The present study utilized a quantitative methodology along with a community informed framework through collaboration with multiple urban AI/AN-serving agencies in a metropolitan area of the Midwest …

The Effects Of Gender Role Conflict, Stigma, And Social Support On Help-Seeking In Male Service Members, Lindsay Erika Danforth

Theses and Dissertations

It is a well-documented fact that men tend to seek professional help less frequently than women. Several factors might affect one’s help seeking behaviors, including gender role conflict, stigma, and perceived social support. This study served to examine help-seeking in male service members; more specifically, it explored how the above mentioned factors influenced attitudes and intentions towards seeking help. It also assessed whether or not the Gender Role Conflict Scale acts as a microcontextual primer. The data was analyzed using a structural equation modeling procedure. Results indicated a poor fit of the model to the data. Results also suggested that …

The Feminist Voice In Mainstream News Discourse, Rachel Kinnard

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyzes the work of six self-identified feminist women who wrote opinion pieces for mainstream news and cultures sites in 2014. The internet and the widening public sphere has opened up new spaces for feminist writing that has allowed this writing to be published and read on a large and easily accessible platform. This group of women is an example of a broader generational development born out of third wave feminism, postfeminism, and the rise of online platforms for political commentary. By introducing traditionally private matters into the public sphere, their columns challenge dominant cultural discourse about political issues …

Large-Scale Urban Impervous Surfaces Estimation Through Incorporating Temporal And Spatial Information Into Spectral Mixture Analysis, Wenliang Li

Theses and Dissertations

With rapid urbanization, impervious surfaces, a major component of urbanized areas, have increased concurrently. As a key indicator of environmental quality and urbanization intensity, an accurate estimation of impervious surfaces becomes essential. Numerous automated estimation approaches have been developed during the past decades. Among them, spectral mixture analysis (SMA) has been recognized as a powerful and widely employed technique. While SMA has proven valuable in impervious surface estimation, effects of temporal and spectral variability have not been successfully addressed. In particular, impervious surface estimation is likely to be sensitive to seasonal changes, majorly due to the shadowing effects of vegetation …

Concurrent Polysubstance Use In College Students: A Brief Social Norms Intervention To Abate Use, Jennifer Lynn Hernandez-Meier

Theses and Dissertations

Introduction: Many college students engage in marijuana and alcohol use, as well as concurrent and simultaneous polysubstance use of both of these substances (CPU, SPU). The literature on CPU and SPU in this population has not been comprehensively reviewed. It is also unclear whether when compared with concurrent users, simultaneous users experience increased risk of substance-related problems (problems), and if a brief normative feedback (NF) intervention is feasible for and can impact marijuana and alcohol use by concurrent users. Methods: This study involved: Paper 1) a narrative review of literature on marijuana and alcohol use and CPU and SPU in …

Examining Heightened Sense Of Incompleteness As A Candidate Endophenotypic Marker For Skin Picking Disorder, Ivar Snorrason

Theses and Dissertations

Excoriation (skin-picking) disorder (SPD) shares genetic underpinnings with obsessive-compulsive disorder, and the phenomenology of both disorders is characterized by heightened sense of incompleteness or “not just right” experiences. The aim of the study was to examine if a general tendency for heightened sense of incompleteness (trait incompleteness) can serve as an endophenotypic maker of SPD. Individuals with SPD (n=32) and matched healthy controls (n=42) completed two validated self-report measures of trait incompleteness and rated photographs designed to evoke a sense of incompleteness. Additionally, unaffected first-degree relatives of the SPD group (n=18) and the control group (n=22) completed the same set …

Assessing The Effect Of Parks On Surrounding Property Values Using Hedonic Models And Multilevel Models, I-Hui Lin

Theses and Dissertations

The various kinds of park benefits have been extensively discussed in the literature in order to suggest a better living environment for urban residents. Among them, the economic benefit has been suggested as the crucial one to support park development and management. A number of studies have been studied the economic impact of parks on surrounding property values and suggested that park proximity brings increment in property values. Some studies further considered park characteristics. The general suggestion from the literature was that parks primarily for passive recreation tend to have a positive impact on nearby property values and parks mainly …

Relationships To Video Game Streamers: Examining Gratifications, Parasocial Relationships, Fandom, And Community Affiliation Online, Michael G. Blight

Theses and Dissertations

Advances in media consumption and viewership have expanded the use of virtual communities such as streaming platforms (e.g., Twitch,tv, Azubu.tv, YouTube Gaming, AfreecaTV) and the ways individuals satisfy individual and social gratifications within these communities. Further, the connection viewers make with streamers as both fans and parasocially (i.e., a perceived friendship with media figure) has a number of implications for the communities that support them. This dissertation tested fandom and parasocial relationships (PSR) as mediators of the relationship between sense of community (SOC) and gratifications. Users of streaming platforms (N = 624) were surveyed regarding the gratifications they seek from …

A Hero A Minute: The Manufacture Of Aura And Rarity In The World Of Sports Memorabilia And Rapid Commemoration, Roger C. Draeger

Theses and Dissertations

This is a study of the contemporary sports memorabilia industry and its surrounding culture through the analysis of a pair of its biggest providers. The following research explores the business model of Steiner Sports and examines its methods concerning pieces of game-used memorabilia and personal artifacts. The workings of Fanatics Authentic are also evaluated through the analysis of its specific line of In-Focus photographs and its sports memorabilia show held in the spring of 2016. The examination of both companies reveals techniques of manufacturing both rarity and aura that exist in the sports memorabilia industry. Steiner’s focus on providing intimate …

Evaluating Attentional Bias In Shame Using The Dot Probe Task, Kathleen Marie Grout

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Cognitive theorists have long held that attentional biases are a central feature of psychopathology (Beck, 1976). Although shame plays a key role in psychopathology, research and theoretical models on information processing in shame is lacking. Objective: The considerable overlap both functionally and topographically between shame and negative affective states of anxiety and depression prompted our investigation in to whether there are attentional biases in shame. Method: We compared individuals with low, moderate, and high levels of shame on the dot probe task. We investigated the effect of valence and time course of such biases by exposing stimuli portraying disgust, …

The Mechanisms Underlying Cocaine-Induced Overexpression Of Basic Fibroblast Growth Factor (Bfgf, Fgf2), An Effect Reversed By Extinction, Madalyn Hafenbreidel

Theses and Dissertations

Drug addiction is characterized by compulsive drug use and chronic relapse despite negative consequences. Drug-induced structural and functional changes in the brain are thought to underlie these characteristics. One mechanism that may mediate these characteristics are growth factors, such as basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF or FGF2), as they are necessary for cellular growth, survival, differentiation, and have roles in memory, mood, and anxiety disorders. bFGF mRNA and protein expression is increased following stimulant administration and is necessary for stimulant-induced changes in dendrites and behavioral sensitization. Moreover, addiction is maintained by cues associated with the drug, as they can can …

The Impact Of A Gratitude Intervention On Health: A Psychophysiological Approach, Morgan Hodge

Theses and Dissertations

Gratitude has been shown to be beneficial for self-reported positive health measures in previous research (Aghababaei, & Farahani, 2011; Algoe & Stanton, 2012; Emmons & Stern, 2013; Hill & Allemand, 2011; Hill, Allemand, & Roberts, 2013; Hyland, Whalley, & Geraghty, 2007; Lin, 2014; Lin & Yeh, 2014). However, previous research had not evaluated a gratitude intervention in conjunction with physiology. The current study attempted to evaluate the impact of a 14-day gratitude intervention on self-reported health measures, positive emotions, and heart rate and pNN50 in a sample of undergraduate college students. Self-reported health measures were taken before and after the …

Growing Food Equity: A Participant Observation Exploring The Role Of Communication In A Nonprofit Organization’S Work To Improve Food Access In Urban Areas, Samantha Jane Kaufman

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the concept of food equity and a nonprofit organization in Milwaukee, Victory Garden Initiative, that is working towards food equity by increasing food access in the city. The work explores issues of inadequate food access, urban development, and other nonprofit organizations working towards food equity. Through participant observation and interviews with VGI, the researcher found that a small nonprofit organization like Victory Garden Initiative is still bound by time, financial, and staffing constraints. In order for nonprofit organizations to market and run effective programming, they need to be efficient with limited resources, take advantage of any research …

Spectral Domain-Optical Coherence Tomography For The Assessment Of Cerebrovascular Plasticity, Jacob James Michael Kay

Theses and Dissertations

Vascular pathologies represent the leading causes of mortality worldwide, accounting for 31% of all deaths in 2012. Cerebral hypoxia is a condition that often manifests as a result of these medical conditions. Remarkably, the nervous system has evolved mechanisms to compensate for oxygen deprivation. The dilation of existing vessels and the growth of new blood vessels are two prominent physiological responses to hypoxia, both of which play a critical role in maintaining cerebral homeostasis. More recently, exercise has been shown to induce a mild state of hypoxia in the brain, leading to several robust morphological changes within the cerebrovascular system …

Is The Therapeutic Alliance Associated With And Predictive Of Treatment Retention And Outcome Among Latinos?: A Secondary Analysis Of An Rct Of Behavioral Activation For Latinos With Depression Versus Treatment-As-Usual, Maria Magdalena Santos

Theses and Dissertations

A robust association between the therapeutic alliance and various forms of psychotherapy outcome has been demonstrated. The therapist-client alliance has been shown to be associated with and predictive of dropout and depression symptom change with primarily U.S. White samples. The current study examines whether the alliance is associated with retention, as measured by dropout and session attendance, and depression change in a sample of low-income Spanish-speaking Latinos in the U.S. who received Behavioral Activation for Latinos (BAL) with depression or treatment-as-usual (TAU). Given the proposition that BA treatment fosters the alliance systematically throughout treatment, and that usual treatment was not …

Development Of A Systemic Lupus Erythematosus Knowledge Questionnaire: The Relationship Among Disease Proximity, Educational Exposure And Knowledge, Shelbie Sullivan

Theses and Dissertations

There are an estimated 1.5 million people living with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), a multisystem autoimmune disorder with a high risk of co-morbid health concerns. The psychological consequences of an SLE diagnosis result in increased daily stress, anticipated stigma, fears of rejection, and increased self-consciousness, all of which can decrease a patient’s quality of life. In order to combat these negative experiences, attempts to increase accurate knowledge of SLE and extinguish SLE misconceptions must be made. The current study aimed to 1) create a medically informed SLE knowledge questionnaire; 2) determine the rate of community members’ SLE knowledge; and 3) …

Neural Plasticity Of Extinction: Relations With Anxiety And Extinction Retention, Emily Louise Belleau

Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

NEURAL PLASTICITY OF EXTINCTION LEARNING: RELATIONS WITH ANXIETY AND EXTINCTION RETENTION

by

Emily L. Belleau

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2016

Under the Supervision of Associate Professor Christine Larson

Anxiety is a significant public health problem characterized by substantial psychological, physical, and economic burden. A key feature of anxiety is the inability to regulate fear. Aberrant extinction of conditioned fear is one prominent model of the etiology of anxiety disorders. Previous studies have shown that the neural circuitry underlying anxiety pathology overlaps with that mediating fear extinction learning. Recently, more precise pathways supporting the expression (CMA-aMCC) and inhibition (BLA-vmPFC) of …

Clarifying The Influence Of Comorbid Depression On Response Inhibition In Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder And Trichotillomania, Gregory Berlin

Theses and Dissertations

Response inhibition performance in Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders (OCRDs) is emerging as a potential neurocognitive endophenotype of these disorders. A point of needed clarification, however, is how unique such performance is to the OCRD spectrum. Specifically, it is unknown whether comorbid depression, a disorder that frequently occurs with OCRDs (60-80%) (Pallanti et al., 2011) and is also associated with cognitive deficits, can influence response inhibition observed in OCRDs. We sought to clarify whether response inhibition performance could be reliably accounted for OCRD symptomology (in obsessive compulsive disorder and trichotillomania specifically) even when taking into consideration the influence of comorbid depression. …

Gender Norm Conformity, Uncertainty, Communication, And Satisfaction Within Romantic Relationships: A Dyadic Model, Ashley Kristine Billig

Theses and Dissertations

Marital satisfaction is associated with better overall life satisfaction (Holt-Lunstad, Birmingham, & Jones, 2008) and myriad positive health outcomes (Beach & O’Leary, 1993; Kiecolt-Glaser & Newton, 2001). Sexual script theory suggests that within heterosexual romantic relationships, scripts are “the mechanism through which appropriate identities are made congruent with desired expectations” (Simon & Gagnon, 1984, p. 53). To examine how gender norm conformity within heterosexual relationships may be influenced by situational cues and to measure how norm conformity is related to interpersonal outcomes, I recruited 35 dyads for participation in a date description task and a questionnaire which measured gender norm …

The New Orleans Festival Arts Community: Embodying Culture, Performing Afrocentric Identity, Shukrani Keisha Gray

Theses and Dissertations

Anthropologists have evaluated art as indices of culturally specific intentions that express the artist’s view of his or her social relations. New Orleans Festival Arts (NOFA) community is filled with art objects and other forms of cultural expression that express artists’ social relationships, historical contexts, and cultural beliefs. Social aid and pleasure clubs, Black Indians and other organizations orchestrate elaborate parades that incorporate costumes, street decorations, banners, music, dance and song. These artistic expressions index identity within the community. This research, based in New Orleans, Louisiana, is focused on the city’s vibrant Afrocentric community and its festival arts community. Using …

Sound And Vision: Marketing Recorded Music In The Age Of Radio, Daniel Martin Murphy

Theses and Dissertations

In the early 1930s, the popularity of radio and the economic austerity of the Great Depression threatened to make the phonograph record obsolete. However, by the time the United States entered World War II in 1941, records were returning to popularity. This return coincided with the first instances of the appearance of unique cover artwork on record albums. This thesis explores the cultural and industrial factors that converged in the late 1930s to make album artwork viable in ways that it would not have been earlier. This thesis also investigates how RCA Victor and Columbia, two record companies that had …

Young Adult Authors, Readers, And Feminized Social Media, Margaret R. Kohlmann

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis looks at YA literature, a feminized genre that continues to gain momentum in publishing and popular culture. Specifically, I look at YA authors and their readers’ interactions on social media and the manner in which these conversations are gendered. I argue that YA authors are expected to utilize feminized traits on social media with their readers and fellow authors, but they use same traits to create social change in the genre and industry. This project analyzes three different types of readers: Readers, Reader-Creators, and Bloggers and their interactions with YA authors on social media. My interviews with five …

The L2 Perceptual Mapping Of Arabic And English Consonants By American English Learners, Zafer Lababidi

Theses and Dissertations

There has been rapid growth in Arabic learning in the United States. With that increase, many learners of Arabic often experience difficulties in learning some Arabic sounds. Among these are the Arabic plain sounds /t, d, ð, s/ and emphatic sounds /tʕ, dʕ, ðʕ, sʕ/. Many studies have proposed that these difficulties are related to the relationship between sounds in learners’ first language (L1) and those in the target language (L2) (Flege, 1987 and 1995; Best, 1995 and 1999; Best, McRoberts, & Sithole, 1988; Best & Tyler, 2007). Previous studies have examined the perceptual patterns of these sounds by relying …

“To Each Their Own”: Comparing Satisfaction, Money Management, And Financial Communication Across Couple Types, Anne Nicole Zmyslinski-Seelig

Theses and Dissertations

Negative outcomes associated with poor money management and financial communication prompt research that provides fresh theoretical perspectives with the ultimate goal of providing concrete advice to both couples and practitioners. Contributing to scholarship regarding finances in committed relationships, the current study examined connections among relationship satisfaction, financial management, and financial communication. Results demonstrated positive associations between: (a) relationship satisfaction and financial management as well as (b) relationship satisfaction and financial communication.

Further, utilizing Fitzpatrick’s (1988) couple types, the investigation tested whether or not the typology explained differences in individuals’ and dyads’ relationship satisfaction, financial management, and financial communication. Regarding differences …

Strategic Inventories In A Supply Chain With Vertical Control And Downstream Cournot Competition, Vijayendra Viswanathan

Theses and Dissertations

Strategic Inventory (SI) has been an area of increased interest in theoretical supply chain literature recently. Most of the work so far however, has only considered a supply chain without downstream competition between retailers. Competition is ubiquitous in most market situations, hence, interactions between SI and retailer competition merits study as a first step in bringing the conversations and insights from this stream of literature to the real world.

We present here a two-period and a three-period model of one manufacturer supplying an identical product to two retailers who form a Cournot duopoly. We also study a Commitment contract, where …

Essays On Two Implications Of The Affordable Care Act (Aca), Esmaeil Salem

Theses and Dissertations

ESSAYS ON TWO IMPLICATIONS

OF THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT (ACA)

by

Esmaeil Salem

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2016

Under the Supervision of Professor Scott J. Adams

The main objective of my dissertation is to investigate some of the causal effects of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) on U.S. healthcare system. After an overview about some of the new provisions enacted by the ACA and their components and timelines, effects of the ACA on immunization coverage for children under age of three and its impact on retention of the insureds receiving newly established rebates would be assessed.

Chapter 2 evaluates changes …

A Brief Rational Disputation Exercise Enhances Cardiovascular, Anxiety, And Affective Recovery Following Worry-Recall, Michelle Rosalie Di Paolo

Theses and Dissertations

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) (Ellis, 1958), educates a client on the relationship between one’s irrational beliefs (IBs) and the dysfunctional emotional/behavioral consequences of maintaining those beliefs such as symptoms of anxiety, depression, and sleep dysfunction (Ellis, Gordan, Neenan, & Palmer, 1997), symptoms also commonly correlated with high trait perseverative cognition (PC; Verkuil, Brosschot, de Beurs, & Thayer, 2009). In addition to symptoms of anxiety and depression, high levels of PC, a construct comprised of measures of trait worry and rumination, have been linked to acute cardiovascular (CV) health concerns that overtime when left unmitigated may lead to chronic conditions …

Collective Management In A Cooperative: Problematizing Productivity And Power, Avery Edenfield

Theses and Dissertations

Since the mid-twentieth century, the structure of the workplace has undergone a transformation. While the conventional firm with its rigid bureaucracies is still in use, many businesses have grown increasingly flexible, flat, and polycentric: “empowerment” and “innovation” are the coin of the realm. As the way we work changed, professional communication scholarship pivoted to consider communication practices in these structures.

While professional communication scholars have long discussed these kinds of organizations, they have not discussed an increasingly popular alternative: cooperatives. Owned and operated by the people who use them, these organizations can significantly affect the communities in which they operate. …

Voting Radical Right In Europe: A Comprehensive Explanation For Vote Choice, Michael Allan Hansen

Theses and Dissertations

Although the radical right in liberal democracies have received a wealth of attention in the literature, the mechanisms explaining individual radical right vote choice are unclear. This analysis provides the first comprehensive theoretical framework and empirical modeling of individual radical right vote choice. The choice to vote for a radical right party is a function of several factors. First, the opportunity structure in the form of external supply-side factors must be conducive for radical right success. Second, parties must make crucial decisions in order to take advantage of the opportunity structure (internal supply-side factors). Then, macro-social force illicit the adoption …

The Dangerous Side Of Social Media: Manipulating Bystander Aggression And Support To Cyberbullying Victims Through An Application Of Side, Clare M. Gross

Theses and Dissertations

Cyberbullying constitutes a complex social problem that is understudied among college students. A crucial factor contributing to the severity of cyberbullying is the level of bystander (un) involvement, or individuals who witness cyberbullying. A possible explanation for the different behaviors of bystanders is found in the theory of the Social Identity Model of Deindividuation Effects (SIDE), which suggests that CMC alters perceptions of the self and others. The current investigation (n = 442) employs an experimental design testing the SIDE model and predicted that individuals in more anonymous conditions would be more likely to adopt a disconfirming or a confirming …