Digital Commons Network^™

Sensing With Integrity: Responsible Sensor Systems In An Era Of Ai, David Eisenberg

Dissertations

Deep and machine learning now offer immense benefits for consumer choice, decision-making, medicine, mental health and education, smart cities, and intelligent transportation and driver safety. However, as communication and Internet technology further advances, these benefits have the potential to be outweighed by compromises to privacy, personal freedom, consumer trust, and discrimination. While ethical consequences for personal freedom and equity rise from these technological advances, the issue may not be the technology itself but a lack of regulation and policy that allow abuses to occur. A first study examines how emerging sensor-based technologies, limited to only accelerometer and gyroscope data from …

Orienting Volunteers On Cultural Awareness And Empathy While Working With Refugees, Sangya Dhungana

Critical and Creative Thinking Capstones Collection

It is imperative to recognize that effective volunteer engagement in refugee resettlement hinges upon a deep understanding of cultural dynamics and sensitivities. This paper explores the challenges and complexities of volunteer engagement with refugees, offering insights from the author's experiences, scholarly literature, and theoretical frameworks. The writing highlights the importance of cultural awareness, empathy, and reflective practice in supporting refugees during resettlement while acknowledging the need for ongoing learning and evaluation of volunteer approaches. Relevant concepts and theories from the Critical and Creative Thinking courses are included, integrating perspectives into the author’s analysis of volunteer experiences. Additionally, the paper incorporates …

Breakout - Esg: Co-Designing Sustainability Solutions For The Wa F&B Manufacturing Sector, Min Teah

Turning The Dial conference

This workshop is tailored for participants interested in exploring global best practice sustainability in food and beverage manufacturing, and connecting with likeminded stakeholders to co-design their own solutions for greener value chains.

Professor Min Teah will present leading examples from around the world and offer opportunity to hear perspectives from local businesses on their different approaches to tackling common challenges, improving sustainability outcomes, and moving from sustainability as a niche concept and additional expense to a requirement for market access and basis for improved business and commercial outcomes.

Participants will be able ask questions; identify, brainstorm and problem-solve shared challenges; …

A Review Of Socially Responsible Hrm Practices In The Lebanese Healthcare Sector, Maya Issam Houri, Abdul Rahman Beydoun

BAU Journal - Creative Sustainable Development

This study reviews the existing literature on Socially Responsible Human Resource Management practices on both nurses' performance and their intention to stay which constitute important factors of nurses’ decisions to stay in the healthcare sector in Lebanon. It also focuses on the current knowledge about existing literature in socially responsible HRM. This literature review highlights on the current knowledge about the determinant factor and the importance of socially responsible HRM practices and key outcomes for nurses. It suggests that socially responsible HRM practices, covering initiatives such as training, performance evaluation, compensation, work-family balance and occupational health and safety practices, may …

A Qualitative Inquiry Into Female International Doctoral Students Challenges And Stressors, Sameer Ahmed, Maya Jaber

Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development

Objective: A qualitative inquiry to explore the challenges and stressors female international doctoral students experience. Background: Student challenges and stress result in attrition and non-completion of doctoral programs. Using Urie Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory framework, the study connected the theory subsystems to the challenges and stressors female international doctoral students experience. Method: The study analyzed the lived experiences of five female international doctoral students at an Illinois research institution, using a qualitative approach (phenomenology). The participants were interviewed using themed theoretical framework questions. Results: The results identified concerns related to all subsystems. Academic (microsystem and mesosystem) challenges included a lack …

The Carbonara Case: Italian Food And The Race To Conquer Consumers’ Memories, Marco Ginanneschi

Dublin Gastronomy Symposium

Can a recipe divide historians, gastronomes, and chefs? The answer is yes if we are dealing with carbonara, an iconic Italian dish, famous throughout the world. However, so much animosity could have deeper roots than the recently renewed controversy over its authorship suggests. This article aims to study the case of carbonara as an example of the race to conquer consumers’ memories. Following a transdisciplinary methodology, the author identifies three main approaches to the making of carbonara: glocal, regional, and creative. These approaches reflect distinct schools of thought regarding food within the diverse spectrum of Italian society. Their supporters - …

Enhancing Customer Support Operations Through Gpt & Q-Learning: A Model Study, Adam Alidra, Bob O'Brien, Dalton Young

SMU Data Science Review

Abstract. “Growth strategies that are purpose-led, customer-centric, experience-driven, data/AI-enabled, and technology-scaled require new mindsets…” (Cornfield, 2021). What can we take from this? Business growth and customer experience are inextricably tied together. Therefore, thriving, as an organization, is dependent on reimagining enterprise operations through modern, scalable data and AI technologies. Our study aims to enhance support operations with emerging AI capabilities, including OpenAI’s LLM models, built on self-attention mechanism transformer architecture, and tailored for business needs through prompt engineering. Our research uses Markov Decision Process and the Q-learning algorithm to evaluate synthetically created support incidents. Through this set of methods, our …

1 A Phenomenological Study Of The Lived Experiences Of Hospital-Based Physical Therapy Department Leaders’ Most Successful Change Management Initiative, Joseph Patanella

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

ABSTRACT

A phenomenological study of the lived experiences of hospital-based physical therapy department leaders’ most successful change management initiative

Problem: Change management initiatives are consistently employed in healthcare to promote quality care. Of concern is that not all initiatives are successful. Individuals involved in successful change management can offer insight to those approaching initiatives.

Purpose: The purpose of this phenomenological study is to describe the lived experiences of hospital-based physical therapy department leaders’ most successful change management initiative.

Methods: The research design was a qualitative approach. A phenomenological research design was employed, using the voice of a group that has …

An Empirical Study Of Student Satisfaction At Selected Private Universities In Bangladesh, Mubina Khondkar, Abureza M. Muzareba

Journal of Educational Research and Practice

Satisfying students in higher education has proven to be a difficult task, although universities are striving to meet student needs and expectations. Private universities are trying to become more student-oriented and are seeking to understand students’ perceptions of higher education facilities. This research was designed to measure the gap between students’ expectations and perceptions of various aspects of private universities in Bangladesh. It uses a SERVQUAL framework and the Gaps Model of Service Quality. The population of students at private universities in Bangladesh is represented by a sample of 412 respondents from five top-tier private universities. Findings indicate that the …

Digital Technology Affordances Reshaping Entrepreneurship Development Process: A Systematic Review, Emmanuel Okoro Ajah

The African Journal of Information Systems

Digital technology has brought about the emergence of digital entrepreneurship, which has significantly disrupted existing products and services and the way that they are marketed. This new wave of entrepreneurship has piqued the interest of scholars from various disciplines, including Information Systems. However, in the literature, there are insufficient theoretical explanations of digital technology's role in the processes involved in digital entrepreneurship development. To address this, a systematic review was conducted to comprehensively explore digital technology affordances in digital entrepreneurship development. Such affordances are the factors that cause the digitalization of the events that characterize digital entrepreneurship development. The outcome …

Crisis Management: Unveiling Information And Communication Technologies’ Revamped Role Through The Lens Of Sub-Saharan African Countries During Covid-19, Ruthbetha Kateule, Egidius Kamanyi, Mahadia Tunga

The African Journal of Information Systems

The management of COVID-19 pandemic has revealed inefficiencies in coordinating global response, particularly in African countries. Therefore, creating an urgent need to examine the literature on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in crisis management to appreciate its contextual role. Employing a systematic review, using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA), this paper critically assessed the extent of the use of ICT in crisis management in Africa’s response to COVID-19 to reconstruct its resilience against future crises. Findings indicate that while countries with limited ICT infrastructure faced considerable challenges in utilizing ICT solutions in COVID-19 management, countries …

Elevate Organizational Survival: Introducing An Adaptability Assessment/Test In Organizational Premortem Strategies Toward Developing Performance-Based Navigation, John Pourdehnad, Phd, Larry Starr, Phd, Vincent Barabba, Lld

School of Business Faculty Papers

No abstract provided.

Back To The Office: Us Employee Reluctance And Re-Engagement Strategies, Khin Thaw Ta Chit

Student Theses and Dissertations

When the pandemic era was concluded, organizations were facing difficulties in bringing employees back to the office. The purpose of this study is to investigate dynamics influencing employee reluctance to be back to the office and to explore the effective re-engagement strategies aiming to propose effective strategies. Although there is a good amount of literature exploring the employee reluctance to be back to the office, there are gaps such as the need for post-pandemic studies and inclusive communication strategies, underscore the timeliness and relevance of the proposed thesis. By using a qualitative method, a survey utilizing Qualtrics Online Survey Software, …

Nostalgia Marketing: An Integrative Framework, Yasamin Mehdian Rad

University Honors Theses

Nostalgia is a longstanding yet evolving concept in marketing, employed to evoke sentimental longing for the past. It is a complex emotion that can invoke warmth, happiness, sadness, and melancholy, and can be directed towards both personal memories and imaginative pasts--times and places that one has never experienced. This dual nature of nostalgia, categorized into personal and imaginative nostalgia, offers a powerful emotional appeal that marketers leverage to influence consumer behavior. Since the 1950s, the use of nostalgia in marketing has increased significantly, allowing brands to forge deep emotional connections with consumers. Despite its prevalent use, research on nostalgia's impact …

The (Limited) Competitive Advantage Of Tax Planning, Gang Pan

Olin Business School Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation documents that corporate tax planning innovations, proxied by decreases in effective tax rates, contribute to excess shareholder returns and, thereby, a competitive advantage. Compared to other improvements in firm performance, tax planning innovations have smaller factor loadings and explain fewer variations in excess returns. Notably, sales growth explains more than seven times the variations in excess returns compared to tax planning innovations. Tax planning even falls behind interest expense reductions, given the challenge of altering firm capital structure. To address the concern that changes in firm performance drive the association between tax planning innovations and excess returns, I …

The Political Economy Of The Igbos Of Southeastern Nigeria: Analyzing The Igbo Entrepreneurship Model (Iem), Eze Simpson Osuagwu

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

This study examines the relationship between culture and economic development using the case of the Igbo ethnic group of Southeastern Nigeria. The Igbo traditional apprenticeship system has been widely described in contemporary political economy literature as a model for stakeholder capitalism and shared prosperity for sustainable entrepreneurial development. This study draws a sample of 2,000 entrepreneurs from five business clusters across Nigeria in Aba, Onitsha, Nnewi, Lagos and Abuja to ascertain if there is a significant difference between the entrepreneurs who passed through the traditional apprenticeship system and those who did not. The study employs a Propensity Score Matching technique …

The Safest Suburbs In The Mountain West, 2023, Ivan Sun, Zachary Billot, Caitlin J. Saladino, William E. Brown Jr.

Cities & Metros

This fact sheet presents data from the Smart Asset report, “America’s Safest Suburbs – 2023 Study,” which examines the 370 safest suburbs in the United States and the 35 most affordable safest suburbs. This fact sheet focuses on data for the nine safest suburbs and most affordable safe suburbs in the Mountain West states of Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, and Utah ranking among the top 100 safest suburbs in the United States.

Authenticity In Fashion And Beauty: Influencer Marketing And The Development Of Parasocial Relationships On Social Media, Catherine Goodheart

Student Theses and Dissertations

Social media influencers are more accessible than celebrities, making their audience form strong connections with them through their niche content. The parasocial relationship formed between influencers and their followers through the followers' media literacy of the influencer’s authenticity enables influencers to market themselves promoting products; without a perceived authenticity, a parasocial relationship will struggle to form. This parasocial relationship is typically to generate profit for the influencer, as many influencers are paid to promote and advertise products specific to their niche(s) on their profiles or on the brand’s profiles. A media analysis was used to study 5 beauty and fashion …

The Effects Of The Tax Credit On The Used Electric Vehicle Market, My Tu T. Tran

Undergraduate Economics Working Paper Series

In the past few years, tax credits have become the fundamental policy instrument to incentivize the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) in the United States. However, contemporary research primarily focuses on new EVs, while the impact of tax credits on the used EV market remains obscure. This research aims to enhance the knowledge of EV adoption by examining the potential effects of the Used Clean Vehicle Credit, a federal program providing up to $4,000 credit to eligible consumers. We have collected sales data of used cars from 245 CarMax locations in the U.S. between 2021 and 2023 to assess the …

Designing Future Agriculture: Design For Complex Systems And Cross-Cultural Interactions, Karina Madzari

Dartmouth College Master’s Theses

Climate change is now recognized by businesses as a major challenge, prompting the agribusiness sector to transform to meet sustainability goals. However, there are many ways to achieve sustainability. Precision agriculture and agroecology are two concepts that evolved from conventional and regenerative approaches respectively, and offer distinct perspectives on sustainability attainment. Precision agriculture relies on technological solutions like artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, gene editing, and carbon dioxide removal technologies (CDR) and aims to revolutionize industry operations through automatization. Agroecology, on the other hand, creates a symbiotic relationship between farming practices and ecosystem services. It aims to replace non-renewable resources with …

Sentinel Surveillance Of Sars-Cov-2 Rates And Equity Impacts Using Labor And Delivery Patients In Phoenix, Arizona, Caitlyn J. Linehan, Trisalyn Nelson, Celeste V. Bailey, Esma Gel, Dean V. Coonrod, Cheryl K. Roth

Department of Supply Chain Management and Analytics: Faculty Publications

Proactive management of SARS-CoV-2 requires timely and complete population data to track the evolution of the virus and identify at risk populations. However, many cases are asymptomatic and are not easily discovered through traditional testing efforts. Sentinel surveillance can be used to estimate the prevalence of infections for geographical areas but requires identification of sentinels who are representative of the larger population. Our goal is to evaluate applicability of a population of labor and delivery patients for sentinel surveillance system for monitoring the prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 infection. We tested 5307 labor and delivery patients from two hospitals in Phoenix, Arizona, …

Characteristics Based Factor Models - Comparison Of Estimation Procedures, Henri Ohl

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Understanding cross-sectional and time series variation of asset returns is fundamental in finance, particularly in asset pricing. This thesis explores the integration of factor theory with machine learning to deepen our comprehension of these dynamics. Characteristics based factor models offer a systematic framework for quantifying an asset's underlying risk-return structure, leveraging time-varying conditional information on model parameters carried by firm-specific characteristics. These models serve as valuable tools for discerning the driving components of an asset's expected excess return. Recent research established a novel methodology for consistent parameter estimation within this framework, only requiring a large cross-section but not a long …

How Incentives Help Us Do Hard Things First, Patrick Matthew Healey

Olin Business School Graduate Student Theses and Dissertations

When facing tasks of differing difficulty, do people choose to tackle harder ones first or easier ones first? I show that the answer depends on how motivated they are to complete all of the tasks. I examine situations in which people must complete both a harder task and an easier one by the same deadline. When I incentivize people for completing both tasks by that deadline, they are more apt to complete the harder task before the easier task, compared to when they are not incentivized. This change results from two factors. First, the incentive leads people to care more …

A Comparative Analysis Of Deaf Entrepreneurs In China And The United States, Wei Wu

Undergraduate University Honors Capstones

This paper compares the challenges that Deaf business people face in the US and China. The goal is to understand the experience of Deaf people in each country and to see what each country can learn from the other. To understand the experience of Deaf people in these countries, I will first look at the history of disability in each country and the challenges Deaf people face with gaining employment or becoming entrepreneurs. Then, I compare the cultural attitudes of each country towards Deaf people and the policy frameworks each country uses to create opportunities for Deaf people. Finally, this …

Proctor & Gamble’S Irreverent Wartime Marketing Campaign, Mary Gifford

History & Classics Student Scholarship

In the early twentieth century, Ivory Soap was renowned in America as a “dependable, old fashioned house-hold soap,” but by mid-century they began to face struggles with the rise of competition from similar soap companies and needed to differentiate themselves. The market was at capacity, with the “sales of soap to consumers rapidly reaching the saturation point and synthetic detergents coming into wider use, soap manufacturers face the ‘keenest competition in years.’” This saturation coincided with economic challenges stemming from World War II. During this turbulent period, marketing for non-essential products declined, prompting Procter & Gamble, Ivory Soap’s parent company, …

A Flavorful Adventure: Interning At Old Dutch Foods, Ashton Olson, Jonathan Ibisch, Jeff Port

Science Symposium

This is an internship in which I worked at Old Dutch Foods for a summer working as a lab technician. I performed many daily tasks as well as larger projects for just my boss as a form of "research" and data analytics. I learned many things about lab etiquette and analysis, professionalism, as well as workplace communication.

Professional Learning Communities During The Pandemic, Elizabeth Nichols

ATU Theses and Dissertations 2021 - Present

In 2019 the world experienced a medical emergency that impacted education across the world. Several states in the United States had professional learning communities introduced into their schools as a means to enhance academic achievement prior to COVID 19. In order to show support to the schools and increase student achievement, a state introduced a specific professional learning community (PLC) model to be followed as a guideline to improvement and sustainability during a crisis. This study compares the state specific PLC model schools to schools who did not follow the state specific PLC model to examine the statistically significant difference …

The Santa Clara, 2024-05-10, Santa Clara University

The Santa Clara

No abstract provided.

Bursting At The Seams: An Examination Of The Enrollment Changes At The University Of Mississippi, Carrol Trent Imbler

Honors Theses

Enrollment at the University of Mississippi is at an all-time high. As one of the smallest public universities within the Southeastern Conference (SEC), Ole Miss has faced many changes within the past few years because of its growing population. This research answers the question: “How are offices and departments on campus managing their efforts to accommodate an increased number of students?” Through interviews with faculty, staff, and students on campus, I identified multiple departments who had to adjust their usual practices. These include housing, parking and transportation, advising offices within each school, admissions, and other student services. All these factors …

Board Of Trustees Minutes, May 10 2024, Indiana State University Board Of Trustees

Board of Trustees

No abstract provided.