Digital Commons Network^™

Legends, Lies, & Rewritten Lives: After The Little Bighorn: Forgotten Struggles Of Those Who Walked Away, 2nd Edition, Thomas B. Davidson

DU Textbooks

This Story surrounds an event that occurred one summer on June 25, 1876, along the banks of the Little Bighorn River in what is now the state of Montana. Seen from a 21st century perch, it is a story of a collision between two very different civilizations or empires. Both empire’s military fought in the manner of their society. This narrative will attempt to balance the believable truth of what happened in that contest between the military representatives of both societies while also trying to tell an engaging story, without drifting into naked partisanship, purple prose, or sensationalism. The narrative …

A Simulation To Compare Models For A Longitudinal Ordinal Response With A Multilevel Cross-Classified Data Structure, Rachel S. Perlin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This is a simulation study that compares four models for analyzing three-level longitudinal cross-classified data with an ordinal outcome, treatment effect and a category-specific effect. The models include the cumulative model, the sequential model, the adjacent category model, and a metric model. Data were generated for each of the first three models with 27,000 generated datasets each, totaling 81,000. The datasets vary along three continuous variables: the number of level-3 units, the ratio of treatment groups to control groups, and the treatment effect size. The outcome has four ordinal response categories. Each model had two predictor variables: treatment and time. …

Intellectual Play And Its Relationship To Teacher Self-Efficacy, Gregory William Kile

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study set out to explore what can be done to improve outcomes for students in Indiana public schools and beyond by exploring ways in which educational leaders might be able to increase levels of teacher self-efficacy in their existing staff. It looked specifically at intellectual play, defined as the behaviors associated with metacognition, play, and innovation, and analyzed its relationship with teacher self-efficacy. Student achievement and overall success in school is critically important to them as individuals and to our society as a whole. If there are innovative ways to improve those outcomes for students, they should be explored. …

4‑H Efforts Toward Demographic Representation, 1980–2025: A State‑Of‑The‑Art Review (Part 1), Jeremy Elliott-Engel, Jeff Wayne Howard

Journal of Youth Development

This state-of-the-art review synthesizes 45 years of scholarship (1980–2025) to assess how effectively the 4-H program has worked to serve a demographically representative youth population. Drawing on academic and gray literature (n=99) sources, the review traces 4-H’s evolution from its segregated land grant origins to contemporary efforts focused on access, equity, inclusion, and belonging. It documents progress in culturally responsive programming and national diversity, equity, inclusion (DEI) initiatives while highlighting persistent disparities in participation and benefit distribution. The review identifies effective strategies, enduring structural barriers, and areas where research and practice remain limited, offering a comprehensive foundation for understanding 4-H’s …

Interrupted By Design: The Impact Of Push Notifications On Stress And Task Performance, Mia Hohmann

University Honors Theses

As digital communication becomes unavoidable at work, notifications have become one of the most common and overlooked sources of interruption. Drawing from current technostress literature, this study investigates how notifications impact acute and perceived stress as well as task speed and accuracy. In an experimental setting, employed university students (N = 35) completed a data-entry task while receiving either no notifications, task-relevant notifications or task-irrelevant notifications to examine how different types of digital interruptions influenced stress and performance. Stress was measured through a pre- and post-task survey and performance was assessed through both speed and accuracy. Although results showed significant …

From Process Retrieval To Understanding: A Look Into Curiosity And Metacognition In My Physics Classrooms, Nahuel Acosta Burroso

Critical and Creative Thinking Capstones Collection

In the modern high school physics classroom, the rapid proliferation of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has created a unique educational challenge. While these tools can solve complex problems quickly, they often lead to cognitive offloading, where students bypass the internal dialogue and deep thinking needed for true understanding. This project follows an action research journey that shifts the focus from restricting technology to cultivating curiosity and metacognition. I define curiosity as the gap identifier that appears when a student realizes they do not know something, while metacognition acts as the navigator that helps them decide what to do next. By …

Temwayaj: An Exploration Of Intergenerational Trauma And Resilience Through The Wisdom Of Haitian Elders, Niara J. Carrenard

Graduate Masters Theses

Haitian people have a unique history of trauma shaped by colonial violence, the brutal legacy of slavery, and political instability all of which intersect to create a complex and multifaceted experience of trauma across generations. This study explores how intergenerational and historical trauma are understood, carried and expressed across generations in the Haitian community. Drawing from grounded theory, this research examines the layered effects of colonial violence and chronic instability on Haitian people. While trauma is typically described as an individual phenomenon, this project is examining trauma as a relational process that manifests amongst different generations. Through in-depth qualitative interviews, …

Anti-Mattering And Negative Core Beliefs In The Association Between Internalized Racism And Social Anxiety, Alicia K. López

Graduate Masters Theses

Internalized racism is associated with adverse mental health conditions, including anxiety. However, research examining the relation between internalized racism and social anxiety remains limited. The primary purpose of this current study was to explore the relation between internalized racism and social anxiety and whether cognitive processes, such as negative core beliefs about the self or interpersonal factors, such as anti-mattering help explain this relation.  Specifically, this study examined anti-mattering as a potential mediator linking internalized racism and social anxiety and whether negative core beliefs about the self, mediate the relation between internalized racism and anti-mattering. Lastly, the study examined a …

Racism, Coping, And In-Race Heterosexism Among Asian American Sexually Expansive People: A Moderated Moderation Analysis, Miah Theresse A. Sabas

Graduate Masters Theses

Asian American sexually expansive people (AA SEP) are at elevated risk of psychological distress at the intersection of racism and heterosexism (Takeda et al., 2021). Less is known about how AA SEP cope with intersectional oppression, including experiences of in-race heterosexism. With a sample of 105 AA SEP, correlations indicated a positive link between psychological distress (PD; DASS-21, Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995) and racism-related stress (RRS; Brief PEDQ-CV, Brondolo et al., 2005), but not in-race heterosexism (Perceived Racism in Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Communities Scale, Sarno et al., 2015). Moderation analyses indicated only active coping buffered the relation between RRS …

Applying A Neurodiversity-Informed Approach To Understanding Resolution In Families Raising A Child With Autism, Emma Manole

Honors College Theses

The first known documentation of the syndrome we today refer to as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) was published by Austrian psychiatrist Leo Kanner (1943), who identified a cluster of disordered symptoms among 11 young children, which he termed “early infantile autism”. Consequently, the psychiatric world became aware of autism as its own disorder separate from schizophrenia or “childhood psychosis” (Wing, 1997). Since then, the ways in which autism is studied, diagnosed, referred to, defined, and treated have seen drastic changes (Blacher & Christensen, 2011) over the course of almost a century. It is only natural that the perceptions held by …

Analyzing The Impact: Foster Grandparent Program, Shanetta Weatherspoon, Miyue Chen, Monica Pereda

The Scholarship Without Borders Journal

The Foster Grandparent Program (FGP) is a multigenerational approach to community volunteerism. The study uses intergenerational solidarity to conceptualize the impact of the FGP. The study aims to examine the impact of two dimensions by analyzing data from the Assignment Assessment Forms and the New General Self-Efficacy Scale. Paired t-tests were conducted to determine whether there is a difference in the mentees’ behavior pre- and post-intervention over four years and by way of three priority areas. Results indicated that the FGP has an impact on both the mentees and volunteers. Findings suggest that the program’s activities are the vehicle for …

When The Therapist Is An Algorithm: Understanding Autism Spectrum Students’ Acceptance Of Generative Ai As A Mental Well-Being Tool Through The Technological Acceptance Model, Jossy P. George, Peter Muttungal, Benny Jeyekumar Davidson, Nishi Priya

Northeast Journal of Complex Systems (NEJCS)

This study examines the psychological and technological factors of the acceptance and emotional well-being of 349 college students with autism who use generative artificial intelligence tools as sources of psychological and emotional support. Grounded on the model of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), the research studies relationships among perceived empathy, perceived usefulness, ease of use, emotional trust, continuance intention, and overall well-being. Structural equation modelling found that the perceived empathy was a significant predictor of ease of use and usefulness, while emotional trust and continuance intention proved to be significant predictors of emotional well-being. To reinforce these results, predictive modelling performed …

Cognitive Predictors Of Functional Recovery After Traumatic Brain Injury, Disha A. Thakkar, Charles J. Golden

Archives of Assessment Psychology

This study examined whether the Brief Test of Adult Cognition by Telephone (BTACT), administered during acute rehabilitation, improved the prediction of 5-year functional outcomes after traumatic brain injury (TBI) beyond standard demographic and injury-severity variables. Data were obtained from the Traumatic Brain Injury Model Systems (TBIMS) National Database (N = 6,880; enrolled 2017 onward). Missing data were handled using multiple imputation (20 datasets). Hierarchical multiple regressions were conducted with the Functional Independence Measure (FIM) and the Glasgow Outcome Scale–Extended (GOS-E) as outcome measures. Demographics (age, sex, education, race) were entered in Block 1, injury severity indicators (post-traumatic amnesia [PTA] duration, …

Prior Traumatic Brain Injury As A Predictor Of Cognitive Deficits After Moderate-To-Severe Injury, Disha A. Thakkar, Charles J. Golden

Archives of Assessment Psychology

Prior traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) are common among individuals who later sustain a moderate-to-severe TBI (msTBI), and cumulative injury models suggest repeated TBIs may worsen long-term cognitive outcomes. This study tested whether prior TBI history independently contributes to cognitive performance one year after an index msTBI beyond demographic and injury-severity factors. Data were drawn from the Traumatic Brain Injury Model Systems National Database (N = 6,880 enrolled since 2017). 2,773 participants completed the Brief Test of Adult Cognition by Telephone at one-year follow-up. Hierarchical regression models evaluated whether prior TBI history accounted for incremental variance in overall cognitive status and …

The Kaleidoscope At Work: Examining Women’S Employee Engagement Through The Kaleidoscope Career Model, Alyssa Hope Lopez

Industrial-Organizational Psychology Dissertations

Employee engagement among women has historically been subsumed within general employee engagement research. Additionally, employee engagement is often conceptualized as independent from one’s career stage. The present study explored these assumptions by examining employee engagement among women and how organizational factors may differentially promote engagement across career stages. The Kaleidoscope Career Model served as the theoretical foundation, proposing that authenticity, balance, and challenge are particularly salient for women in early-, mid-, and late-career stages, respectively. The current study evaluated how career stage moderated the relationship between these three factors and employee engagement. A sample of women (N = 360) …

Impact Of Eating Disorder Type On General Population Perceptions Of Stigma And Likelihood Of Comorbidity, Gabri Notov, Grace Schroeder, Kaz Skelton, Kevin Summers, Sarah Huff

DU Undergraduate Research Journal Archive

Eating disorders carry a significant risk of mortality, necessitating further research. Previous work has examined how stigma influences treatment seeking in other mental health conditions, creating a potential area for improving disordered eating outcomes. Additionally, prior meta-analyses have discovered high comorbidity of other mental health diagnoses with disordered eating. Some work has attempted to examine the perception of comorbid mental health problems alongside eating disorders, but this construct has not been studied in depth within general populations. To date, no work has simultaneously examined stigmatization and knowledge of common mental health problems with disordered eating in this population. This study …

Treatment Providers’ Perspectives On Reintegration Of African American Registered Sex Offenders With Intellectual Disabilities, Laneka Sherelle Smith

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

No abstract provided.

Investigating The Moderating Roles Of Adolescent Peer Relationship Difficulties And Prosocial Behavior On The Relationship Between Triangulation And Adolescent Emotional Symptoms During Parental Divorce, Taylor Kalei Demotta

Clinical Psychology Dissertations

The divorce process is a stressful, transitional period that is widely experienced by families in the United States. This process incites a variety of stressors and deleterious family dynamics that impact children and adolescents. The divorce literature has identified parental conflict as a significant contributor to youth outcomes following divorce. Therefore, researchers have aimed to investigate the specific dynamics occurring during interparental discord that may influence youth. Triangulation, or the involvement of children in parental disagreements, has been found to mediate the relationship between parental conflict and adolescents’ internalizing symptoms. Adolescents may be particularly vulnerable to triangulation due to increases …

The Impact Of Mnar Attrition On Estimation Of Latent Growth Curve Models With Binary Observed Variables, Jason T. Newsom, Brian T. Keller, Mallory R. Kroeck, Nicholas A. Smith

Psychology Faculty Publications and Presentations

A Monte Carlo simulation was used to evaluate the performance of latent growth curve (LGC) modelswith binary observed variables when the attrition pattern was missing not at random (MNAR) for fivetime points. Parameter and standard error biases for three estimation methods were compared:weighted least squares with mean and variance adjustment (WLSMV), categorical robust marginal max-imum likelihood (categorical MLR), and Bayes. The results indicated that robust diagonal weightedleast squares paired with multiple imputation (MI) performed best when values were missing at ran-dom. When data were missing not at random, Bayesian estimates performed best.

Lessons Learned In Providing Infant And Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Rashele Wade

Journal of Global Awareness

Access to quality childcare is a protective factor from lifelong issues such as school failure, school drop-out, and incarceration. Conversely, preschool suspension and expulsion are significant risk factors. Evidence-based interventions, such as Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation, aim to reduce and eliminate the incidence of preschool suspensions and expulsions. The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted access to quality childcare for many children across the country and globally. This study utilized a qualitative action research approach and generic qualitative inquiry to examine the research question, “How can we improve Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation through lessons learned during the …

Heroism As Emotional Integration: A Process Model Of Emotion-Driven Heroic Action, Scott T. Allison

Heroism Science

Heroism is often framed as the expression of prosocial motivation fueled by positive emotions such as empathy, compassion, and moral elevation. This perspective, however, overlooks the complex emotional dynamics that characterize high‑risk, morally consequential action. This article advances a process model of heroism as emotional integration, involving the dynamic coordination of multiple and often competing emotions—including fear, anger, compassion, and moral concern—under conditions of uncertainty and threat. Drawing on research in heroism studies, positive psychology, and affective science, the model distinguishes heroism from ordinary helping by emphasizing emotional conflict, regulatory processes, and identity‑based commitment. It further differentiates rapid, intuitive …

Numb., Anna Rapson

Masters Theses

Social media platforms, from their conception, posed a break in the lived experience of the average human being’s day to day routines. Although access to information has always been shaped by portals into other lived realities—through photojournalism, print legacy media, news broadcasts both on radio and television—social media has posited a novel phenomenological architecture where borders between embodied reality and perception of lived experience are simultaneously blurred and reinforced. This morphed duality of consciousness positions the body and mind in tension, deconstructing pre-social media conceptions of the ontology of lived experience. In a digital world shaped by limitless input by …

Until The Ground Breaks, Annie Hu

Masters Theses

Until the Ground Breaks explores the complex relationship between personal memory, embodied experience, and internalized "archival logic." By examining long-term cross-cultural diasporic experiences and the shifting dynamics of family narratives—including the sensory experiences and fading memory of a grandmother, a father's correspondence that acts as a textual record of emotional logic, and the continuous revision of family history—this thesis dissects the psychological tremors that occur when the illusion of a singular, stable memory archive collapses. This research rejects the view of memory as a static container of truth, revealing it instead as a dynamic, unstable, and constantly rewritten living system. …

Care Ecologies Between Knots, Eliza R. Marris

Masters Theses

Discarded fibers like raw wool behave the way harm reduction does. Harm reduction resists stigma and works to move beyond assumptions and oversimplifications of substance use and addiction. Wool is irregular, complicated, and emotionally charged. It resists compression and maintains its own being even when pulled apart. Working with raw wool is in relationship with complexity, as is harm reduction.

At its core, harm reduction is grounded in thoughtfulness and empathy towards people, their lived experience, and its nuances. It is a witness to lives, memories, and imprints, acknowledging the entangled realities of addiction. Our detachment from fiber remainders, materials …

Where Each Step Lands: Reconnecting And Reparenting Through Visual Narrative, Skye Wang

Masters Theses

This research begins with lived experiences of dissociation and a persistent sense of disconnection between body and consciousness. It explores the potential of visual narrative as an embodied practice. Through daily walking and sketching, bodily sensations are translated into visual language through a synesthetic process, forming the foundation for a picture book as the central outcome of this project.

The picture book adopts the perspective of a jumping spider positioned beneath a five-year-old girl’s shoe, creating a shifting, downward-facing viewpoint. The spider functions as a viewing position, while the girl represents the inner child. The narrative is constructed around the …

Open_______, Eitan Boiarsky

Masters Theses

This thesis examines how ambiguity can function as a deliberate design strategy rather than a condition to eliminate. While modern design traditions have prioritized clarity, efficiency, and immediate legibility, this work revisits Umberto Eco's concept of the Open Work and Oskar Hansen's Open Form to argue that openness is not a failure of design but a method within it.

Through a series of workshops and object-based experiments, ambiguity is structured as a design instrument that invites interpretation rather than delivering fixed meaning. Participants encounter unfamiliar forms with deliberately withheld information, producing moments of hesitation, speculation, and reinterpretation. These encounters demonstrate …

Experiences Of Female Executives Using Coaching Services In Hybrid Workplaces To Mitigate Burnout And Turnover Intention, Dalini Ragoonanan

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

No abstract provided.

Purity Culture And Sexual Shame, Dr. Amanda Gray, Dr. Kat R. Klement

Journal of Counseling Sexology & Sexual Wellness: Research, Practice, and Education

We investigated the relationship between Christian purity culture (PC) exposure/endorsement and sexual shame in 1,273 participants. Purity culture (PC) is a belief system predicated on sexual abstinence until heterosexual marriage and traditional gender roles. Correlational data showed that PC exposure was associated with higher sexual shame, particularly among women, and only among those who no longer endorsed PC. However, we did not find a causal relationship between PC exposure and sexual shame. Based on these findings, we provide recommendations for countering sex-negative messages during adolescence to improve healthy sexual development and better health and relationship outcomes.

Beyond "Bad Apples": Political Identity, Moral Interpretation, And Institutional Response To Abuse, Laura Werner

Student Theses

This thesis examines how psychological explanatory frameworks and structural institutional response interact to shape how domestic violence and sexual abuse are understood and addressed. Drawing on behavioral design theory and John Dewey's transactional approach to experience, I argue that harm is interpreted through mental models that simultaneously shape both individual perception and institutional action. Using survey data from 736 participants, I demonstrate that endorsement of the "bad apples" explanatory framework, attributing abuse primarily to a small group of deviant individuals, is predicted by psychological essentialism, belief in a just world, social dominance orientation, and political conservatism. These findings suggest that …

Instrumentality Of Developmental Coaches’ Self In Building The Coaching Relationship With Clients Seeking Leadership Development, Leslie Ann Rodríguez Díaz

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

No abstract provided.