Digital Commons Network^™

Increasing Written Language Skills Utilizing Writing Software And Traditional Methods, Caroline Larson

Undergraduate Honors Theses

A grid based computer program, Clicker5, appeared to have many features that logically may assist struggling writers. It utilizes pictures, sound, speech synthesis, word banks and a spelling checker. Karemaker et al. (2008) examined the use of Clicker5 and observed increased attention and focus during reading, and greater gains in word recognition and rhyme awareness. Scattered research exists on some of the multimedia features that Clicker5 utilizes (e.g. auditory and visual instruction, specific feedback, student specific examples, Wissick & Gardner, 2000; composition processes and revision facilitation, MacArthur 2000; spell checkers with strategy instruction, and speech synthesis to increase error …

Writing Motivation Of Students With Specific Language Impairments, Kyle Lee Brouwer

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This study was designed to compare the writing motivation of students with specific language impairments with their non-disabled peers. Due to the cognitive and linguistic demands of the writing process, students with language impairments face unique difficulties during the writing process. It was hypothesized that students with specific language impairments will be more likely to report lower levels of perceived writing competence and be less autonomously motivated to write. Students in grades 3-5 in 11 schools (33 with specific language impairments, 242 non-disabled peers) completed self-report measures, designed from a Self-Determination Theory perspective, which measured the degree that students are …

Thinking Outside Of The Assessment Box: Assessing Social Communicative Functioning In Students With Asd, Janet L. Dodd

Communication Sciences and Disorders Faculty Articles and Research

The assessment of a student suspected of an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) diagnosis requires the integration of information collected by a variety of professionals across various domains of functioning. One of the core deficits of students with ASD is a deficit related to social communicative competence (SCC). SCC requires the integration of language, social cognition, and higher order executive functions (Coggins, Olswang, Carmichael Olsson, & Timler, 2003) This article will propose an assessment model of social communicative functioning that was developed based on the SCC framework of Coggins and colleagues as a component of the Comprehensive Multidisciplinary Assessment Protocols for …

Phenomenology Of Embodied Dreamwork With Puerto Rican Women: A Dissertation, Lourdes F. Brache-Tabar

Expressive Therapies Dissertations

The author investigated the experience of embodied dreamwork. Participants were eight Puerto Rican women who were chronically ill, of low socioeconomic status, who lived in Boston. The data were analyzed using transcendental phenomenology. Each participant engaged in one embodied dreamwork–unstructured interview session lasting approximately 1.5 hours. In addition, each participant drew a picture of how she felt after the dreamwork interview. This snowball, purposive sample gave detailed information about how they experienced embodied dreamwork. The participants’ statements were grouped into themes: (a) sense of place—environment, surroundings, spatiality; (b) the players—self, others; (c) plot; (d) in the sea of emotions—naming affective …

Sequential Incoherence In A Multi-Party Synchronous Computer Mediated Communication For An Introductory Health Informatics Course, Jorge R Herskovic, J Caleb Goodwin, Pamela A Bozzo Silva, Irmgard Willcockson, Amy Franklin

Faculty, Staff and Student Publications

Online courses will play a key role in the high-volume Informatics education required to train the personnel that will be necessary to fulfill the health IT needs of the country. Online courses can cause feelings of isolation in students. A common way to address these feelings is to hold synchronous online "chats" for students. Conventional chats, however, can be confusing and impose a high extrinsic cognitive load on their participants that hinders the learning process. In this paper we present a qualitative analysis that shows the causes of this high cognitive load and our solution through the use of a …

Evidence-Based Strategies And Techniques For Children With Asd, Tanya Walerius

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

To identify and research evidence-based Autism Spectrum Disorder strategies and techniques for working with children, particularly children aged 6 –10 years old, who receive In-Home Skills Services. Most therapeutic services are received through the school systems (Shapiro & Accardo, 2008), but Counseling Services of Southern Minnesota (CSSM) provides In-Home Skills Services that requires the Children’s Therapeutic Services and Supports (CTSS) staff to be knowledgeable and competent in the services they provide to clients.

The purpose of this project was to provide CSSM with specific strategies and techniques through a manual to be used by the CTSS workers. The information will …

Understanding Adolescent Girls' Protection Strategies Against Hiv: An Exploratory Study In Urban Lusaka, Joseph Simbaya, Martha Brady, Allison Stone, Maya Vaughan-Smith

Poverty, Gender, and Youth

This report provides a descriptive analysis of how adolescent girls and young women in Lusaka, Zambia construct notions of risk and safety, perceive reproductive health and HIV risks, and identify behaviors and actions they can take to protect themselves. Findings suggests stronger social support networks, improved access to the range of reproductive health services and products, and safe and supportive spaces for girls would be beneficial. The report points to several areas for potential program attention, including more focused attention on the structural and environmental drivers of girls’ vulnerability.

Exploring The Value Of Group And Traditional Obstetrical Appointments To Reduce Health Disparity, Helene M. Holbrook

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Projects

Disparity in health outcomes is influenced by socioeconomic factors that may include access to important healthcare information in a culturally sensitive way. Can a group appointment model like the CenteringPregnancy model provide a more effective means for engaging Spanish-speaking pregnant women? Research studies using the group prenatal appointment model show increased pregnancy knowledge, readiness for labor and higher satisfaction compared with individual prenatal appointments. This paper discusses the importance of reducing disparities in birth outcomes using a group appointment model conducted in partial fulfillment for the Doctor of Nursing Practice degree.

Guidelines For Pilot Study On Introducing Pay-For-Performance (P4p) Approach To Increase Utilization Of Maternal, Newborn And Child Health Services In Bangladesh, Directorate General Of Health Services (Dghs), Population Council, Unicef

Reproductive Health

The Population Council launched a pilot study to test two Pay-for-Performance (P4P) strategies to improve MNCH services in Bangladesh. This document presents guidelines for offering incentives to providers, distributing coupons, and forming P4P and/or Coupon Committees and Quality Assurance Groups. The guidelines were developed over the course of five policy-level and consensus-building workshops with national and local-level program managers and service providers, organized under the leadership of the DGHS, in consideration of the local context and sustainability in case of nationwide replication in the country. These guidelines will come into effect upon receiving approval from the DGHS, Ministry of Health …

Conversational Skills Of An Autistic Teenager : A Pragmatic Analysis., Che An Abdul Ghani

Student Works (2010-2019)

This study aimed to analyze the conversational skills of an autistic teenager. The sample of this study was a 16 year old male autistic boy; and was referred to a Y in this study. He was verbal and had completed primary school education and at the time of the study he was attending a special education program. He speaks English and Malay, able to read and write in both languages fairly and has high cognitive ability. He is considered relatively intelligent by his teachers and his therapists. This study engaged three theories as its framework. They were Grice’s Theory (l975), …

Language, Meaning, Context, And Functional Communication, Elizabeth Armstrong, Alison Ferguson

Research outputs pre 2011

No abstract provided.

Out Of The Mouths Of Babes: Prelinguistic Vocalizations In Infants At Risk For Autism Spectrum Disorders, Rhea Paul, Katyrzyna Chawarska, Yael Fuerst, Lauren Berkovits, Ami Klin

Communication Disorders Faculty Publications

Aims: To examine vocal production in infants at high risk for ASD due to the presence of an older sibling with ASD, To document changes in vocal behavior over the first year of life, To compare vocal behavior at 6, 9, and 12 months in children at high and low risk, To examine the relations between vocal behavior in the first year and outcome at 24 mo.

A Cultural Competence Guide For Occupational Therapists: Addressing Major Health Issues Of The Eastern Shoshone & Northern Arapaho Tribes, Crystal Nelson, Ashton Wilcox-Brown

Occupational Therapy Capstones

The authors have created a cultural competency guide on the history, culture, and beliefs of the Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone tribes as well as an overview of current health concerns and resulting health disparities. The creation of the guide is necessary in order to provide information about these cultures to occupational therapists (OT) working with them. However, there is considerable lack of resources for discussing cultural competency regarding these tribes in relation to occupational therapy.

In preparing to create the guide, an extensive literature review was conducted to determine cultural issues and health disparities of the two tribes. Secondary …

Communicative Competence In Persons With Aphasia: The Impact Of Executive Function, Judy Marie Mikola

Wayne State University Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between executive function and performance on selected linguistic tasks in persons with aphasia secondary to left frontal lesions.

A group of 15 persons with aphasia (PWA) completed three communication board tasks of varying levels of complexity and structure. The subject's functional use of the picture/word communication board was tested during a Story Retelling task. In addition, the PWA's executive function skills were examined using six nonverbal tests. The PWA group performance scores were compared to that of the neurologically healthy control group.

Results demonstrated that the control group performed significantly …

Developmental Expression Of Calcium Buffering Proteins In Central Auditory Pathways Of Normal Hearing And Congenitally Deaf Mice, Adam S. Deardorff

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

These experiments analyze differences in synaptic development in central auditory pathways between normal hearing (CBA/J) and congenitally deaf (dn/dn) mice, which provide valuable insight into central synaptic plasticity corresponding to human congenital deafness. Immunofluorescent analysis of the developmental expression of the calcium buffering proteins calretinin, calbindin d-28k, and parvalbumin at various postnatal time points was performed to assess the effects of altered neural activity on the level and/or pattern of protein expression within these nuclei. Results indicate that the pattern of calbindin and parvalbumin is unaffected by congenital deafness in dn/dn mice. However, the pattern of calretinin expression in the …

The Physiological Correlates Of Race-Related Stress And Health Among African Americans And Latinos, Daniel Cruz

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

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Indigenous And Mestizo Mexican Migrant Farmworkers: A Comparative Mental Health Analysis, William Donlan, Junghee Lee

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Mexican-origin migrant farmworkers using: (a) lifetime prevalence of culture-bound syndromes, (b) self-rated emotional/mental health, (c) depression measured by PHQ-9, (d) stress level. Demographic and psychosocial variables were examined by ethnicity and gender using Chi square and independent t-tests. Logistic and linear regression models were constructed for mental health variables. Indigenous participants reported significantly higher stress compared to mestizos, and indigenous women reported significantly higher stress compared to all groups. Prevalence of culture-bound syndromes and mean PHQ-9 severity score was highest for indigenous females. Mean self-rated emotional/mental health was lowest among indigenous females. Controlling for main effects and other interactions, (a) …

Aging And The Vulnerability Of Speech To Dual Task Demands, Susan Kemper, Ralynn Schmalzried, Lesa Hoffman, Ruth Herman

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Tracking a digital pursuit rotor task was used to measure dual task costs of language production by young and older adults. Tracking performance by both groups was affected by dual task demands: time on target declined and tracking error increased as dual task demands increased from the baseline condition to a moderately demanding dual task condition to a more demanding dual task condition. When dual task demands were moderate, older adults’ speech rate declined but their fluency, grammatical complexity, and content were unaffected. When the dual task was more demanding, older adults’ speech, like young adults’ speech, became highly fragmented, …

Specialty Care Use In Us Patients With Chronic Diseases, Jessica D. Bellinger, Rahnuma M. Hassan, Patrick A. Rivers, Qiang Cheng, Edith M. Williams, Saundra H. Glover

Faculty Publications

Despite efforts to eliminate health disparities, racial, ethnic, and geographic groups continue lag behind their counterparts in health outcomes in the United States. The purpose of this study is to determine variation in specialty care utilization by chronic disease status. Data were extracted from the Commonwealth Fund 2006 Health Care Quality Survey (n = 2475). A stratified minority sample design was employed to ensure a representative sample. Logistic regression was used in analyses to predict specialty care utilization in the sample. Poor perceived health, minority status, and lack of insurance was associated with reduced specialty care use and chronic disease …

Rule-Based Cell Systems Model Of Aging Using Feedback Loop Motifs Mediated By Stress Responses, Andres Kriete, William Bosl, Glenn Booker

Nursing and Health Professions Faculty Research and Publications

Investigating the complex systems dynamics of the aging process requires integration of a broad range of cellular processes describing damage and functional decline co-existing with adaptive and protective regulatory mechanisms. We evolve an integrated generic cell network to represent the connectivity of key cellular mechanisms structured into positive and negative feedback loop motifs centrally important for aging. The conceptual network is casted into a fuzzy-logic, hybridintelligent framework based on interaction rules assembled from a priori knowledge. Based upon a classical homeostatic representation of cellular energy metabolism, we first demonstrate how positive-feedback loops accelerate damage and decline consistent with a vicious …

The Role Of Socioeconomic Factors In Racial And Ethnic Disparities Among Child And Adult Tuberculosis Cases, Spatial And Non-Spatial Analysis: Alabama 1993-2007, Sharada Adolph

All ETDs from UAB

This study aimed to evaluate the role of individual and community/population level socioeconomic factors on racial/ethnic disparities among children and adults with TB, and used area-based socioeconomic measures (ABSMs) for the identification of high-risk geographic areas for populations-at-risk. Joinpoint, multivariable and Poisson regression, and spatial methods were used to determine the trends and risks of disease in a low TB incidence state. General disease trends declined significantly by factors of -0.044838 from 1993-1998, and -0.061821 from 2001-2007; but, were disparate and increased for the foreign-born, African Americans (AA) and Latinos, and in long-term care settings. The average annual percentage change …

Major Depressive Disorder Among Individuals Who Are Deaf: Implications For Rehabilitation Professionals, Sandra Hansmann, Shawn P. Saladin, Diana M. Fraser-Mendez

School of Rehabilitation Services & Counseling Faculty Publications

Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) is a potentially disabling condition which adversely affects psychosocial functioning in the lives of many people. Individuals who are prelingually and/or profoundly Deaf are especially at risk of misdiagnoses, which in turn may prevent them from receiving the treatment needed to reach their full potential in independent living or vocational rehabilitation. This article reviews general depressive symptomology, followed by a discussion of challenges associated with diagnosing MDD in individuals who are Deaf. Suggestions for therapeutic interventions are also included. The article concludes with a summary of the implications of Deafness and MDD for independent living and …

A Survey Of Variables Influencing Speech-Language Pathologists' Use Of Evidence-Based Practice In Clinical Settings, Ailbhe Tressan Cormack

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Although the need for evidence-based practice (EBP) in speech-language pathology has been well attested, multiple barriers hamper its implementation. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to compare variables influencing the use of EBP by practicing speech-language pathologists (SLPs). Method: Eighty-five SLPs based out of different primary work settings in El Paso, Texas responded to a survey addressing: 1. attitudes and perceived barriers toward EBP, 2. exposure to EBP, research methodology and statistics in graduate courses, 3. time in practice, 4. practice setting(s), 5. amount and nature of support for EBP in work settings, and 6. use of research literature …

Perception And Identification Of Voice Disorders: A Comparison Study Between Hispanic And Non-Hispanics, Jacqueline Nicole Lopez

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

The extent of public education in the Hispanic population regarding voice disorders has been unidentified thus far, motivating the current study to assess knowledge and perception of functional and organic voice disorders among Hispanic individuals in the El Paso region. The project involved an experimental research design to investigate whether demographic variables influenced the accuracy of knowledge of voice disorders in the general population residing in the Greater El Paso Region. Results indicate that the majority of the participants perceive articulation, fluency, and voice disorders as interchangeable and are unaware of the role of medical and rehabilitation professionals in the …

Health Risk And Health-Seeking Behaviors Of Migrant And Seasonal Farmworkers On The Us-Mexico Border, Claudia Delilah Saenz

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Background and Significance

The estimated 1–3 million migrant and seasonal farmworkers (MSFW) employed in the U.S. play a crucial role in assuring the success of the multi-billion dollar agricultural industry and the nation's access to a safe and nutritious food supply. This predominantly Mexican immigrant occupational group is documented to be at–risk for chronic and infectious disease morbidity and premature mortality but published studies are limited which describe their reproductive/sexual health, mental health, substance abuse, and workplace violence situation. Prior studies are especially scant regarding U.S.–Mexico border MSFW.

Objectives and Hypothesis

The major objective of the pilot study was to …

Hydrosalpinx And Hydrobursitis In Infertile Goats, Kaiser Dawood

Turkish Journal of Veterinary & Animal Sciences

Five adult female goats were brought to our veterinary hospital with infertility. Ultrasonography showed what seemed to be hydrometra or cystic lesion in the genital region of 18-month-old twin local breed female goats. After slaughter of the does and excision of the genital tract, a macroscopic examination revealed bilateral hydrosalpinx and extreme dilation of the ovarian bursa with complete capsulation of the active ovary in the cystic ovarian bursa on each side. Amber to dark brown fluid fully filled the oviduct and the cystic structure of the ovarian bursa. Microscopically, the ovarian bursa showed an obvious chronic inflammation and an …

The Development Of A Formal Preceptor Model To Improve Departmental Mentorship, Angela Lutz Bs, Rrt-Nps, Kenneth Miller Med, Rrt-Nps, Linda Cornman Bs, Rrt-Nps, Uma Bhatt Rrt, Bryn Surgeoner Rrt

Patient Care Services / Nursing

No abstract provided.

Bilingual Performance On Nonword Repetition In Spanish And English, Connie Summers, Thomas M. Bohman, Ronald B. Gillam, Elizabeth D. Pena, Lisa M. Bedore

Faculty Publications

Background: Nonword repetition (NWR) involves the ability to perceive, store, recall and reproduce phonological sequences. These same abilities play a role in word and morpheme learning. Cross-linguistic studies of performance on NWR tasks, word learning, and morpheme learning yield patterns of increased performance on all three tasks as a function of age and language experience. These results are consistent with the idea that there may be universal information-processing mechanisms supporting language learning. Because bilingual children’s language experience is divided across two languages, studying performance in two languages on NWR could inform one’s understanding of the relationship between information processing and …

Levels Of Acculturation And Resilience Among Southeast Asian Adolescents Who Have And Have Not Witnessed Domestic Violence, Skultip (Jill) Sirikantraporn

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

The central purpose of this research study was to elucidate the relationship between the levels of acculturation and resilience among Southeast Asian adolescents in the U.S. who have and have not witnessed domestic violence. There is a voluminous amount of research on resilience, acculturation, and domestic violence and their impacts on adolescents. However, there is virtually no research that investigates the relationship among these three major social constructs. Previous research on acculturation, resilience, and coping abilities showed that immigrant children and adolescents who were bicultural were found to be highly adaptive in the midst of stress. No previous studies were …

Citizenship In The Humanities And Social Sciences: A Selective Bibliography, 2000-2009, Wayne State University School Of Library And Information Science, Winter 2010 Lis 7160, James E. Van Loon, H.G.B. Anghelescu

School of Information Sciences Faculty Research Publications

Citizenship in the Humanities and Social Sciences is a selective bibliography consisting of citations to works published during the years 2000-2009 on citizenship-related topics in the humanities and social sciences. Primarily consisting of books/chapters and scholarly journal articles, the bibliography also includes other materials (case studies, reports, dissertations, and working papers) for which scholarship, authority and relevance have been established. Most cited works are published in the English language, although articles published in other languages using a Latin alphabet are also included. Citations were retrieved during January-March 2010 from a variety of aggregated databases accessed through the Wayne State University …