Communication Commons^™

Word Recognition In Noise Among Young And Older Listeners: A Combined Behavioral And Electrophysiological Study, Victoria Ann Williams-Sanchez

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Word recognition is based on the complex interplay of bottom up processing of acoustic input and corresponding top-down processing based on linguistic redundancies (i.e., contextual cues). Friedrich and Kotz (2007) investigated the timeline of integrating top-down and bottom-up processes among young adults with normal hearing using sentences presented in quiet. As a follow-up study, also with young adults with normal hearing (Experiment 1 of this dissertation), we used sentences embedded in multi-talker background noise and found similar results to Friedrich and Kotz (2007); but, with the use of principal component analysis (PCA) unveiled additional effects of phonological and semantic integration …

Top-Down Processes In Simulated Combined Electric-Acoustic Hearing: The Effect Of Context And The Role Of Low-Frequency Cues In The Perception Of Temporally Interrupted Speech, Soo Hee Oh

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In recent years, the number of unilateral cochlear implant (CI) users with functional residual-hearing has increased and bimodal hearing has become more prevalent. According to the multi-source speech perception model, both bottom-up and top-down processes are important components of speech perception in bimodal hearing. Additionally, these two components are thought to interact with each other to different degrees depending on the nature of the speech materials and the quality of the bottom-up cues. Previous studies have documented the benefits of bimodal hearing as compared with a CI alone, but most of them have focused on the importance of bottom-up, low-frequency …

Climate Change, Situational Theory Of Problem Solving, And Issue Framing Effects, Michael Eddie Burch

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This is an exploratory study of the Situational Theory of Problem Solving applied to the context of climate change communication. Selective exposure to politically slanted media is explored as a referent criterion and framing effects are also tested. Relationships between consumption of media characterized as conservative or liberal with referent criterion, Situational Motivation in Problem Solving, problem recognition, involvement recognition, and constraint recognition are tested.

Love And (M)Other (Im)Possibilities, Summer Renee Cunningham

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a performative interrogation of the disagreement and (dis)interest, communication issues, surrounding motherhood in contemporary U.S. culture. Textual analysis of Mary Kelly's Post-Partum Document (PPD) plays a key role in my inquiry. I juxtapose documentation from my lived experiences and academic projects with Kelly's work to build upon the themes and ideas introduced throughout PPD. This project is guided by the concepts love and (im)possibility, and I will argue that, together, they are central to understanding mothering/caregiving as a site of communication inquiry. Love and (im)possibility are inherent to both mothering and communication, but they also are essential …

Scholarly Excellence, Leadership Experiences, And Collaborative Training: Qualitative Results From A New Curricular Initiative, Lori A. Roscoe, Allesa English, Alicia D. H. Monroe

Communication Faculty Publications

Objective: Developing effective leaders in medicine is an educational issue and requires a medical school culture that recognizes, develops, and rewards leadership. This study provides a qualitative evaluation of the initial outcomes from the Scholarly Excellence, Leadership Experiences, and Collaborative Training (SELECT) program, developed by the University of South Florida Health Morsani College of Medicine as a training model for physician leadership and patient-centered care based on emotional intelligence. Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 1st year students and faculty involved in program development and implementation to elicit descriptions of their experiences. Field notes were analyzed using a …

Changing Landscapes: End-Of-Life Care & Communication At A Zen Hospice, Ellen W. Klein

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines end-of-life experiences at a small Zen hospice in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Through an exploration of how end-of-life communication, sense-making, decision-making, and care in this setting differ from that of typical clinical settings, this project highlights and interrogates the experiences of dying as spiritually, rhetorically, narratively, relationally, and communally bound events.

Keywords: Zen hospice, end of life, narrative sensemaking, medical-ethical decision making, spirituality, healing rhetoric, communities of practice

Bridging The Work Of Field Scientists And The Needs Of Data Re-Users, Antonia Rosati, Lynn Yarmey

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

The National Science Foundation requires Principal Investigators to make the data they collect and create publically available. To assist PIs with this requirement, NSF funded the Advanced Cooperative Arctic Data and Information Service (ACADIS). ACADIS houses data from the Division of Polar Programs (PLR), provides data management assistance to PIs, and advances search and data discovery tools. In short, ACADIS exists for NSF Arctic researchers by providing a safe home for data and encouraging data reuse. ACADIS is a group of specialist organizations comprised to create a repository of Arctic data that encompasses spatial, temporal, and attribute granularity of data …

Risk Of Compliance: Tracing Safety And Efficacy In Mef-Lariam's Licensure, Julie Marie Gerdes

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Walter Reed Institute of Army Research developed the antimalarial drug mefloquine then collaborated with Hoffman-La Roche to produce the drug under its brand name "Lariam," after Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved licensure in 1989. For over twenty years, the Army used this pill as its "drug of choice" for soldiers deployed to endemic regions until 2009, and in 2013 the Food and Drug Administration warned that the drug's neurotoxic effects could be lasting, if not permanent. The sociopolitical exigence of developing a new biochemical antimalarial drug rushed the development and licensure processes, and the modern craving for certainty …

The Accidental Motivator: Florida's Medicinal Marijuana Ballot Initiative's Impact On The Youth Vote, Robert Winsler

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine single-issue voting in the youth population, specifically involving the upcoming medical marijuana ballot initiative to be voted on in Florida November, 2014. Single-issue voting is becoming a more prevalent trend in American politics. The young voter demographic has historically showed the lowest percentage of voter turnout thus giving it the highest potential to influence the outcome of an election if more voters showed up to the polls. This study sought to understand if a single issue such as medical marijuana could be that motivation to go vote. Data was gathered through conducting …

A Comparison Study On Violent Video Games: Explained By The Gamers Themselves, Christopher John Kneifer

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This qualitative focus groups analysis examines the harmful effects of violent video games on emotions and behavior by comparing violent video game player's responses to that of non-violent video game players of the same age group. Research on the effects of video games has been done since the 70s, yet more research is needed to better understand the potentially harmful emotional and behavioral effects of playing violent games, especially from the gamers' perspectives. This thesis presents a qualitative analysis of data obtained from focus group sessions among undergraduate college students. Results of the analysis supports the presence as well as …

Crisis Communication: Sensemaking And Decision-Making By The Cdc Under Conditions Of Uncertainty And Ambiguity During The 2009-2010 H1n1 Pandemic, Barbara Bennington

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

This study focuses on the process of communication between government agencies and the public during crisis situations, and the development of an effective response strategy when a significant threat to public health and/or safety is believed to exist. My specific research interests are (1) the nature of the decision-making process that influences the communicative choices made during such events, and (2) how decision-makers make sense of an evolving, ambiguous, and unpredictable situation, in order to establish credibility with the public, determine the appropriate response strategy, and gain the public's trust in order to influence its behavior. This is a …

"Is That What You Dream About? Being A Monster?": Bella Swan And The Construction Of The Monstrous-Feminine In The Twilight Saga, Amanda Jayne Firestone

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

This dissertation argues that Bella Swan is a representation of Barbara Creed's monstrous-feminine which serves to reinforce ideologies that insist women are abject, inherently dangerous to men, and threatening to a patriarchal status quo. Through close-textual analysis of The Twilight Saga, I demonstrate how the monstrous-feminine frames the hysterical teenage body, hypersexuality, and eternal motherhood as simultaneously unacceptable and unavoidable. These negative women's stereotypes continue to persist in dominant popular culture, and this doublebind is overcome only by the impossible perfection of vampirism. The monstrous-feminine invites constructions of teenage bodies as unstable and unreliable, women's sexuality as dangerous and …

The Rhetoric Of Corporate Identity: Corporate Social Responsibility, Creating Shared Value, And Globalization, Carolyn Day

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In today's global political and media climate, the stakes are high for corporations, local or otherwise, to create and maintain an `ethical' perception of not only their daily business activities and how they can benefit society or protect the environment, but also their enduring characteristics or `corporate identity' (Conrad, 2011) for numerous, sometimes conflicting stakeholder audiences (Cheney, 1983). This dissertation examines how such forms of `socially responsible' corporate identities are created and maintained through the use of persuasive language. In particular it examines the role and implications of rhetoric within the contexts of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), as well as …

Emergency Medicine Triage As The Intersection Of Storytelling, Decision-Making, And Dramaturgy, Colin Ainsworth Forde

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents a comprehensive qualitative study of the decision-making aspects of emergency department (ED) triage at a large urban Trauma I hospital in the Southeast. Specifically, this study addresses the following research questions: (1) What do triage nurses perceive as the primary role of the triage process? (2) How do triage nurses interpret patient performances? These questions are explored through illuminating the intricacies of triage decision-making by the use of semi-structured interviews and observations.

The findings of this study indicate: (1) a better understanding of the triage decision- making process yielding more practical insights related to the informal, emergent, …

Informing, Entertaining And Persuading: Health Communication At The Amazing You, David Haldane Lee

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This is a study of the communication environment at The Amazing You, an exhibition about health and wellness with over 400 different exhibits at the Tampa Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI). The purpose of this study is to describe a multi-media, multi-vocal health communication environment which incorporates forms of intervention from various medical communities of practice into a narrative about human life stages. Describing communication at a science center as circular, complex and multi-directional allows for notions of feedback to be considered in an otherwise unilinear and unidirectional process from message to receiver. This research is about science center …

Applying Public Relations Theory To Assess Service-Learning Relationships, Karen Strand

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In Service-Learning (S-L) partnerships, universities and community organizations exchange resources and influence. Community engagement scholars Cruz and Giles proposed that relationships within S-L partnerships serve as units of analysis for the study of community outcomes of engagement. Yet, the scholarship of engagement lacks a suitable instrument to assess such relationships. This study brings together two lines of scholarship-relationship studies within community engagement and cocreational studies within public relations-to address the problem of assessing the community outcomes of S-L relationships, and it applies Cruz and Giles' ideas about using relationship analysis to assess community outcomes when it considers the perspectives of …

Effects Of Country Of Origin, Country Animosity And Foreign Product Usage Experiences On Product Judgement: A Study Of Chinese Customers, Cong Sui

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

An experiment was conducted to test hypotheses the country-of-origin, country animosity and product usage experience jointly determine the intention of product purchase. One hundred and seventy Chinese students participated in the experiment and responded to advertisements designed to promot laptop computers manufactured in Germany, Japan, India and the Philippines. Regression analysis results indicate that general product purchase intentions were significantly influenced by participants' pre-existing COO and CA perceptions. The interaction effects between COO, CA and product usage experience were also confirmed, meaning that the effects of COO and CA on purchase intentions were moderated by the variety and frequency of …

Hermes, Technical Communicator Of The Gods: The Theory, Design, And Creation Of A Persuasive Game For Technical Communication, Eric Walsh

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

For my thesis, I have undertaken the creation of a persuasive game to advance a particular argument of the way that work is performed in the field of technical communication. Designed using procedural rhetoric, with an attention to aesthetics, fun, and the qualities that make games viable pedagogical tools, my game has been programmed using HTML5 and JavaScript, and made freely available online at RhetoricalGamer.com. This written document is meant to serve as a supplement to the game, providing a rationale for the use of games in education and in technical communication; a definition of procedural rhetoric and the necessary …

An Examination Of Motives, Experiences, And Behaviors Of Mmorpg Players, Theresa Lynn Woods

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) are growing in popularity and use worldwide. This study seeks to explore the motivations and experiences of MMORPG players through an extensive online survey with more than a thousand participants (n=1,422). The findings support a complex relationship between the variables, including the direct effects of motivations and flow on the time invested by players in MMORPG play, as well as the mediated effects of motivation via flow. Causal relationships are examined in addition to the significance of direct and indirect effects on frequency of play, yielding several significant results, including (1) the overwhelming importance …

Social Media Use During The College Transition, Kevin J. Yurasek

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Starting college is an exciting and pivotal time for students. During this time, the student will be faced with challenges of his or her social identity and will need to develop or modify identities based on new social situations. Previous research shows that social media play a role in identity development, but there is little information regarding the extent. Are new college students using Facebook during their transition to communicate their new identity/social group to new peers? Are they using Facebook to maintain nostalgia for previous identities/social groups? This information will be valuable to higher education professionals working with these …

Communication As Yoga, Kristen Caroline Blinne

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, I am in conversation with the following questions: How can individuals and communities teach and learn to engage more peacefully, nonviolently, and compassionately with each other? Further, how can one practice a style of communication that helps at least one person suffer less each day? In asking these questions, my goal has been to imagine as well as attempt to actualize a world where individuals and communities work together to create less suffering in each other's lives by first developing compassionate awareness of our interconnectedness, then "waking up" not only to our own divinity but also to …

Communication Behavior Study Of Support In The Arts Using The Situational Theory Of Publics And The Theory Of Reasoned Action, Ashleigh Gallant

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Arts in the United States has been a thoroughly studied topic, largely trying to substantiate its value to society, resulting in a plethora of research that positively correlates the arts and a more healthy and successful society. Findings from various studies over the years have shown declines in arts support in the form of funding, advocacy, education, and participation (National Endowment for the Arts, 2009). Additional studies have suggested that millennials are redefining what participation means in the arts, and even the definition of the arts. The primary research question of this study is why are support for the …

Organizing Disability: Producing Knowledge In A University Accommodations Office, Shelby Forbes

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As it is generally conceived, knowledge belongs to the individual: we imagine how a lightbulb suddenly illuminates above the scientist's head, a muse whispers in the philosopher's ear, cogs slide into place as wheels turn in the thinker's mind, and, "Eureka!" an idea is born. As an individualistic experience, knowledge is secure in the repository of the mind, a "steel trap" as it is so often referred, which can only be breached by the most sophisticated and precise methods. From these popular representations of knowledge, one can extrapolate further to conclude that knowledge is not made, it is received. All …

"We're Taking Slut Back": Analyzing Racialized Gender Politics In Chicago's 2012 Slutwalk March, Aphrodite Kocieda

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examined bodied activism in Chicago's Slutwalk 2012 march, a contemporary movement initiated in Toronto, Canada that publicly challenged the mainstream sentiment that women are responsible for their own rape and victimization. Adopting an intersectional approach, I used textual analysis to discuss photographs posted on the official Chicago Slutwalk website to explore the ways this form of public bodied protest discursively engages women's empowerment from movement feminism as well as third wave and postfeminisms. I additionally analyzed the overall website and its promotional materials for the Slutwalk marches as well as how Chicago's photographic representations privilege the white female …

How The Mass Media Use Numbers To Tell A Story: The Case Of The Crack Scare Of 1986, Jerome L. Himmelstein

Numeracy

Scholars, notably Joel Best and Milo Schield, have emphasized the importance of incorporating social construction into the study of quantitative literacy. Studying social construction involves examining how numbers are produced, how they travel into the mass media, and how the media use them to depict a social problem or discuss an issue. This article presents a case study in the last of these. It asks in particular how important numbers really are in media constructions of a social problem. It focuses on the “Crack Scare” of 1986 in the United States and a classic study in social construction, Orcutt and …

Robert Pierpoint: A Life At Cbs News., Tony Silvia

Faculty Books

This is the first biography of journalist Robert Pierpoint, a contemporary of Edward R. Murrow, hired by him to cover the Korean War for CBS. He went on to cover the White House, through six presidents. In more than 40 years with the network, he covered the Kennedy assassination, Watergate, Nixon's resignation, and the State Department, culminating in memorable reporting for CBS Sunday Morning. He was the winner of two Emmy Awards for investigative reporting and helped shape the careers of many of today's journalists, including Bob Schieffer, Dan Rather, Lesley Stahl, and Diane Sawyer.

British Cultural Narrative In Winston Churchill's Political Communication, Andres L. Faza

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study uses Winston Churchill's "We Shall Fight on the Beaches" speech, delivered to the House of Commons following the evacuation of Dunkirk, France in June 1940, as a source text by which to examine Churchill's use of British cultural narratives in political communication. Narrative and heuristic theories are proposed as means by which listeners process such messages. A number of rhetorical devices are defined, in order to inform a discussion of the narratives identified, particularly the means by which those narratives were rhetorically embedded in the text. After a careful examination of the source text, the narratives of knighthood …

(Dis)Abled Gaming: An Autoethnographic Analysis Of Decreasing Accessibility For Disabled Gamers, Kyle David Romano

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Within the context of culture, disability has long existed as a stigmatizing quality (Goffman, 1963). As a result, people with disabilities are often overlooked or completely omitted from various, cultural artifacts. This exclusion of people with disabilities is largely recognized as unproblematic because their disabilities imply an inevitable failing. Through my own experiences as a disabled gamer, I have recognized that video games have also framed gamers with disabilities as problematic. Video games are largely constructed in a one-size-fits-all mentality (Grammenos, 2014), where very specific people, with very specific kinds of bodies, are granted access to play them. Since disabled …