Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration Commons^™

Envisioning Recovery: A Social-Ecological Systems Analysis Of Maine’S Co-Managed Sea Urchin Fishery, Kimberly L. Ovitz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Maine’s sea urchin resource has provided a critical source of income and cultural value to resource harvesters across the state, yet in the absence of adequate governance mechanisms, the urchin resource quickly succumbed to overharvest and persisting stock decline. Following collapse, the urchin fishery transitioned to an advisory co-management system characterized by increased collaboration between urchin harvesters and resource managers. As collaborative dialogue and decision-making continue, fishery participants are collectively envisioning a more sustainable future for this important natural resource.

This master’s thesis explores Maine’s urchin fishery as a complex and coupled social-ecological system (SES) and documents harvester and scientist …

Access To Healthy Foods: A Descriptive Analysis Of Farmers’ Markets, Food Deserts & Usda Food Assistance Programs In Tennessee Census Tracts, Twanda D. Wadlington

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Food deserts are a growing problem in the United States, and occur in areas of low-income where people have limited access to healthy foods. In response, the presence of farmers’ markets has grown exponentially, and improved healthy food access. Additionally, the USDA has strived to connect families to healthy foods through food assistance programs such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), and the Senior Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program (SFMNP). This study investigated the relationship between farmers’ markets, their acceptance of food assistance benefits, and their locations within Tennessee …

Lgbtq+ Nondiscrimination Laws In Kentucky., Christopher M Wales

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the political and demographic obstacles facing the Fairness movement in Kentucky in regards to local employment protection ordinances for LGBTQ+ persons (Fairness Ordinances). Using case studies on recent Fairness debates in Berea and Bowling Green, this thesis explores the concern some Kentuckians have about LGBTQ+ nondiscrimination ordinances in their communities. From these cases studies, it can be concluded that many of the concerns espoused by opponents of Fairness are simple scare tactics with no evidence supporting their claims. This thesis then utilizes a logistical regression to uncover what demographic characteristics increase the odds of a municipality possessing …

At The Intersection Of Politics And Higher Education: Policy, Power, And Governing Boards In Oklahoma, Kirk Rodden

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This quantitative study examined the perceptions of members of Oklahoma public higher education governing boards and legislators concerning higher education governance. The purpose of this study was to gain a greater understanding among the participants as to the role governing boards should play in the system. The population for the study comprised 142 members of the Oklahoma Legislature and 107 members of 15 Oklahoma public higher education governing boards. The principal investigator used a web-based survey development company to design, collect, and store survey responses.

Results from the study were examined using independent samples t tests and one-way ANOVAs. From …

Window Inserts And The People Adopting Them: Building Sustainable Communities In Maine, Daniel Sean Mistro

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Residents of Maine face a large monetary expense to heat their homes in the winter. In Maine it takes 540 gallons of heating oil each year to heat a typical home [1]. Interior window inserts may be a practical solution to improve comfort, save money, and consume less environmentally harmful fossil fuels during cold winter months. The window inserts discussed in this paper are custom measured to fit into a window and consist of a wooden frame that is wrapped in two layers of polyolefin film and weather stripped for a snug fit. Commercial inserts cost $20-$36/square foot, or approximately …

Exploring The Barriers To Effective Federal Flood Mitigation In The Mississippi River Region., Linda Kay Bailey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is a comprehensive study of flood mitigation in the Mississippi River region as it is impacted by federal flood policies and programs. The study begins with a historical narrative of flooding events and flood mitigation that provided the impetus for federal flood mitigation in the late 1920s. The historical narrative sheds light on issues related to federalism, path dependency, dynamic growth, and socio-culture influence during the development of flood mitigation policy. Growth machine theory is used to describe how inequality and disparate access to political power has worked to exacerbate flood disaster outcomes and how this dynamic is …

A Cross-Sectional Exploration Of Household Financial Reactions And Homebuyer Awareness Of Registered Sex Offenders In A Rural, Suburban, And Urban County., John Charles Navarro

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As stigmatized persons, registered sex offenders betoken instability in communities. Depressed home sale values are associated with the presence of registered sex offenders even though the public is largely unaware of the presence of registered sex offenders. Using a spatial multilevel approach, the current study examines the role registered sex offenders influence sale values of homes sold in 2015 for three U.S. counties (rural, suburban, and urban) located in Illinois and Kentucky within the social disorganization framework. Homebuyers were surveyed to examine whether awareness of local registered sex offenders and the homebuyer’s community type operate as moderators between home selling …

The Effects Of Employment On Recidivism Among Delinquent Juveniles, Leigh Kassem

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Current research indicates an association between intense adolescent work (twenty hours or more per week) and delinquent behavior. It has been widely speculated that this relationship is spurious, occurring only as a result of other factors which are common to both offending and intense employment. The current study attempts to fill a gap in the literature by utilizing the Pathways to Desistance dataset to examine the evolution of the relationship between work and self-reported offending in a longitudinal sample of juvenile offenders. Work intensity and consistency, social capital, and expectations for success were analyzed as potential predictors of recidivism or …

Governing The Urban Water Commons : Essays On Collaborative Policy Networks In A Polycentric Ecology Of Urban Water Policy Games., Emmanuel Frimpong Boamah

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Governing social-ecological systems, such as the urban water commons, is a multi-scale and multi-sector (polycentric) human-environment process. This dissertation interrogates this process by situating itself within the Ecology of Games Framework by Norton Long (and updated by Mark Lubell) and the literature on polycentric governance by the Bloomington School of Political Economy. The dissertation’s three essays 1) offer both theoretical and methodological means to enact polycentric public economies within the ecology of games framework, and 2) explicate the conditions under which interoganizational collaboration is fostered within a polycentric ecology of policy games in governing the Middle Rio Grande urban watershed. …

Grassroots Diplomacy And Vernacular Law: The Discourse Of Food Sovereignty In Maine, John Welton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis studies the discourse of food sovereignty in Maine, a coalition of small-scale farmers, consumers, and citizens building an alternative food system based on a distributed form of production, processing, selling, purchasing, and consumption. This distribution occurs at the municipal level through the enactment of ordinances. Using critical-rhetorical field methods, I argue that the discourse of food sovereignty in Maine develops a ‘constitutive’ rhetoric that composes rural society through affective relationships. Advocates engage the industrial food system to both expose its systemic bias against small-scale farming and construct their own discourse of belonging. Based upon agrarian values such as …

Urban Governance Reconsidered : Assessing The Roles Of Public-, Private-, And Third Sector Leaders In Governing The Modern City., Benjamin Colby Leamon

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As central cities redefine themselves after decades of commercial abandonment, “urban renaissance” movements, white flight, and the gentrification of their central urban neighborhoods, are cities still governed by the political-business coalitions conceptualized by urban regime theorists, or have new players emerged? Further, as cities continue to evolve within the post-Fordist landscape, do extant theories of urban governance, themselves built upon decades-old observations, continue to provide adequate models for urban governance as it actually exists in cities today? This dissertation is a quantitative and qualitative examination of contemporary urban governance in the United States, and the roles of CDCs and anchor …

Determinants Of Hospital Efficiency And Patient Safety In The United States, Madhu Shettian

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Hospitals engage in undertakings on a continual basis to enhance IT capabilities, diffusion of innovations, hospital-physician integration, and standardization to improve their performance. This empirical study explored the interdependence of three macro-level structural factors and their independent impact on the hospital performance measures efficiency and patient safety, with standardization as an important mediator. The researcher conducted a cross-sectional analysis of multiple data sets from public user files on the acute care hospital industry. The theoretical underpinnings of the study included the structure-process-outcome theory and institutional isomorphism theory. The statistical analysis comprised confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and covariance structural equation modeling …

Social Media And Stakeholders' Relationship In Nonprofit Organizations, Wanzhu Shi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Social media tools, as the advanced technology, have penetrated into nonprofit management field prevalently. Nonprofit organizations adopt social media tools, such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Pinterest for attracting potential supporters, raising advocacy, and running fundraising campaigns. Social media tools break the limitation of time and space through the Internet. They change the way of how people communicate and interact with each other. The philanthropy industry hopes that social media tools could bring them the new opportunities to engage with their stakeholders, such as donors, volunteers, and customers. However, since this technology is still developing, the studies of using social …

Factors Influencing Hypoglycemia Care Utilization And Outcomes Among Adult Diabetic Patients Admitted To Hospitals: A Predictive Model, Waleed Kattan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Diabetes Miletus (DM) is one of the major health problems in the United States. Despite all efforts made to combat this disease, its incidence and prevalence are steadily increasing. One of the common and serious side effects of treatment among people with diabetes is hypoglycemia (HG), where the level of blood glucose falls below the optimum level. Episodes of HG vary in their severity. Nevertheless, many require medical assistance and are usually associated with higher utilization of healthcare resources such as frequent emergency department visits and physician visits. Additionally, patients who experience HG frequently have poor outcomes such as higher …

The Impact Of Automation And Stress On Human Performance In Uav Operation, Jinchao Lin

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The United States Air Force (USAF) has increasing needs for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) operators. Automation may enable a single operator to manage multiple UAVs at the same time. Multi-UAV operation may require a unique set of skills and the need for new operators calls for targeting new populations for recruitment. The objective of this research is to develop a simulation environment for studying the role of individual differences in UAV operation under different task configurations and investigate predictors of performance and stress. Primarily, the study examined the impact of levels of automation (LOAs), as well as task demands, on …

Jail Mental Health Innovations: Factors Influencing Mental Health Services Innovations For Jails, Orville Clayton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The U.S. is recognized for uniquely high incarceration rates. Over recent decades, there has been a concurrent dramatic increase of jail detainees with mental disorders. Provision of adequate mental health services for jail inmates is constitutionally mandated, and has legal, ethical, quality of care, and fiscal implications for jails, families, communities, and detainees. Significant variation exists in the provision of mental health services across jails, and increased understanding of the factors that influence the adoption of such services may help guide jails to implement beneficial services, and ensure that such services reflect, reflect quality standards. This study used a mixed …

Assessment Of Tattoo And Silicone Wounds In Terms Of Time Of Treatment And Perceived Treatment Quality, M Pettitt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

At the point of injury, critical medical tasks include locating and identifying an injury as well as applying the appropriate initial care. Over the past decade, to increase the fidelity of wound representation and ultimately the quality of medical care, a considerable amount of research and development has occurred to improve simulated wounds during training, primarily at the point of injury. As material and techniques mature and as more relevant data is collected on tissue properties, examining what fidelity is required for training at the point of injury is crucial. The main objective of this effort was to assess a …

Use Of Performance Information By Local Government Administrators: Evidence From Florida, Tamara Dimitrijevska-Markoski

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the factors that facilitate and hinder the use of performance information by public administrators in local governments in Florida. Acknowledging the incompleteness of many theoretical and conceptual models in previous performance management studies and the absence of theory on the use of performance information; this study utilizes a grounded theory approach to develop and test a model analyzing the use of performance information. The research focuses on cities and counties, members of the Florida Benchmarking Consortium (FBC), and surveys public administrators whose tasks are related with the collection and/or reporting of performance information. The study examines three …

Dimensions Of State Fragility: Determinants Of Violent Group Grievance, Political Legitimacy, And Economic Capacity, Jason Christensen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

State fragility has severe political implications. In the literature, fragile states have been referred to as "chaotic breeding grounds" for human rights violations, terrorism, violent extremism, crime, instability, and disease (Patrick 2011, 3-4). International organizations have also expressed concern regarding the potential of "fragile states" to disrupt collective security as threats such as transnational terrorism and human displacement from violent conflict have the potential to permeate borders (Patrick 2011, 5). This research project aims at extending our understanding of state fragility by examining three distinct dimensions of state fragility proposed in the literature: i) state authority, ii) state legitimacy, and …

Local Health Department Adoption Of Health Information Technology And Its Impact On Population Health, Tina Yeung

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Since the enactment of the HITECH Act in 2009, the US has invested billions in building a robust health information technology (HIT) infrastructure that is secure, capable of the electronic transfer of data and allows for real-time access of patient medical data, among others. This empirical study explored the driving forces (coercive, mimetic, and normative) in the adoption of HIT (i.e. EHRs and HIEs) by local health departments (LHDs) and how it has impacted the population health of counties in the US. The researcher conducted a cross-sectional, quantitative study using secondary data sources. The study included data on 505 local …

The Effects Of Social Support And Working Alliance On Latino-American Male Combat Veterans, Lloyd Duran

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The negative effects of traumatic combat experiences on combatants' psychological functioning is well documented in the literature. The Global War on Terrorism (GWOT) has resulted in many veterans returning from deployments with mental health conditions related to trauma exposure, such as posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, general anxiety, and suicidality. Past researchers found significant ethnic differences in psychological functioning, with Latino-American veterans reporting more symptoms of PTSD. Furthermore, Latino-American cultural values place importance on collective orientation and secrecy of mental health concerns which may affect treatment. Thus, this study built on limited research about Latino-American male combat veterans by focusing on …

The Strategic Challenges Of Urban Warfare, Christian Aditya Niksch

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

With urbanization on the rise, policymakers cannot ignore urban conflicts. In the aftermath of the Cold War, several scholars were of the opinion that primitive modes of fighting, such as close combat, would cease to be used. However, as urban spaces have increasingly become battlefields in the 21st century, there has been a retrogression to a brutal and bloody mode of fighting. This return of primitivism affects the tactics that the military can use in urban warfare, which makes it a daunting strategic challenge. A combined focus on policy, strategy, and operations is necessary to improve thinking about how exactly …

In A Material World: Analyzing Religious Peacebuilding In Lebanon And Bosnia-Herzegovina, Catherine Ruth Orsborn

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

While intergroup peace is statistically far more common than is intergroup or inter-religious conflict, there has been a rise in recent years in conflict framed in religious terms. Peace and development practitioners have, in response, become increasingly interested in engaging religion, in various ways, in peace and development work. A theoretical field of religious peacebuilding has emerged simultaneous to this increased practitioner engagement of religion. Despite this increase in religious peacebuilding, at both practical and theoretical levels, we have not seen a measurable increase in social cohesion in contexts plagued by so-called religious conflict, as I show in my comparative …

Exploring Job Satisfaction And Preceptorship Capacity Among Applied Epidemiologists, Jessica C. Arrazola

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Job satisfaction is important to consider when developing strategies for recruitment and retention. The Public Health Workforce Interests and Needs Survey (PH WINS) conducted in 2014 was the first nationally representative assessment of the state public health workforce. Prior to this assessment, the job satisfaction of state agency public health workers and preceptor capacity had not been measured. This study fills the current research gaps by studying the job satisfaction among the applied epidemiology workforce, identifying factors influencing job satisfaction, and the describing the preceptorship capacity among epidemiologists. This research is based on the 2014 PH WINS data. The analysis …

Rail Rebound: The Impact Of Freight Rails On Regional Development In The United States, 1970-2010, Bishal Bhakta Kasu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Railroads have played a critical role in economic growth and development, and they exert a tremendous impact on the distribution and redistribution of the population. However, the impacts of railroads, especially freight rails, on population change and socioeconomic development are not well understood. This study fills the gap in the literature by examining the demographic and socioeconomic impacts of freight rails using county-level data in the continental United States from 1970 to 2010. The demographic and socioeconomic changes are measured by eleven dependent variables. Of those eleven, six are demographic (population, young, old, White, Black, Hispanic) and five are socioeconomic …

The Role Of Aid For Trade And Foreign Direct Investment In Poverty Reduction: A Panel Data Analysis Of 91 Developing Countries, Olivia Durowah

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Aid for trade (AFT) focuses on helping developing nations to overcome supplyside constraints in trade to maximize trade benefits and use trade to achieve economic growth and poverty reduction. Since its inception at the 2005 Hong Kong ministerial conference, AFT has become viewed as a crucial tool for helping developing countries and donors continue to shift their attention to AFT programs, even in times of prolonged global financial crisis. AFT programs ultimately seeks to achieve growth poverty reduction. Thus, this study focuses on assessing the role of AFT and foreign direct investment in poverty reduction using the headcount ratio (1.90 …