Digital Commons Network^™

2025 Estimates - Nonresident Visitation, Expenditures, And Economic Contribution, Kara Grau

Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research Publications

Montana welcomed an estimated 13.24 million nonresident visitors in 2025, generating $5.64 billion in traveler expenditures and contributing an estimated $7.11 billion in total economic output to the state's economy. Nonresident spending supported approximately 52,620 jobs and generated $360.4 million in state and local tax revenues. Fuel (21%) and restaurant/bar spending (20%) accounted for the largest shares of visitor expenditures, followed by lodging, outfitter/guide services, and groceries. Summer travel remained the dominant season, with the third quarter accounting for 45% of annual visitation and 54% of total expenditures. Vacation travelers represented the largest visitor segment (41%) and had the highest …

Montana Resident Report: Rural Montana And Tribal Communities And Activities, Q1 2026, Carter Bermingham, Megan Schultz

Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research Publications

This study was designed to better understand residents’ perceptions of smaller, rural towns in Montana, along with their level of interest in visiting and participating in activities in American Indian communities across the state. The Institute for Tourism and Recreation Research (ITRR) conducts resident studies on a quarterly basis to better understand current topics throughout the state, with resident travel routinely serving as one of those topics. Recent efforts at the state level have focused on expanding Montana’s tribal tourism industry to provide economic benefits and to inspire visitation to Indian Country.

Respondents were asked to comment on how much …

“Megadeal” Subsidies, Local Spillovers And Corporate Innovation, Yoojin Lee, Shaphan Ng, Aruhn Venkat

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine whether the largest place-based, firm-specific corporate subsidies (“Megadeals”) awarded by state and local governments affect local firms’ innovation. First, we document that 1) subsidy firms innovate in the subsidized county and 2) subsidy firms bring inventors from other counties into the subsidized county, consistent with subsidy firms generating new knowledge locally. In our main test, we use a stacked cohort design with stringent fixed effects to document that local firms increase patenting following a Megadeal. Cross-sectionally, effects are increasing 1) in subsidy firm innovativeness, 2) in the technological closeness of subsidy firms and local firms, 3) when subsidy …

Reimagining Power And Practice: Grantee Reporting For Greater Impact, Steven Lafrance, Jamae Morris, Lauri Valerio

The Foundation Review

The evaluation of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF) Written Reports Alternative Project (WRAP) pilot revealed that Oral and Alternative Reporting (OAR) options offer a practical, values-aligned pathway to equitable, trust-based reporting that reduces burden while improving usefulness with a pathway to scale.

WRAP participants reported strengthened relationships and two-way learning, especially when conversations complemented or replaced written materials.

Recommendations for others considering OAR include: offer and codify choice, center questions that matter, design technology to support multiple formats, compensate grantee time for evaluation or additional learning-related asks, and train staff for relational learning.

RWJF’s experience demonstrates how reporting can be …

Adaptive Learning Partnerships In Action: Insights And Reflections From The Macarthur Foundation’S Big Bet On Nigeria, Julian Williams, Michael Moses

The Foundation Review

This article explores the evolution of the authors’ strategic learning partnership during their work together with the MacArthur Foundation’s Big Bet On Nigeria. The authors share practical insights into how foundations can cultivate learning relationships grounded in trust, aligned with priorities of program staff and grantees, and calibrated to generate timely, actionable insights.

The authors highlight the key principles that enabled them to help the program and grantees identify and adapt to emerging challenges, lessons, and needs, both within the programming context and in the foundation. In doing so, they offer a roadmap for funders and evaluators seeking to embed …

Unpacking Assumptions: What Evaluation Capacity Building Looks Like When It’S Optional, Flexible, And Funded, Jennifer Marsack, Martena Reed, Robiel Abraha, Abby Triño, Sara Jones, Brita Blesi

The Foundation Review

Evaluation capacity building (ECB) in the philanthropic sector is often designed around a common set of assumptions: organizations need to be directed toward “correct” evaluation practices, compliance is the primary motivator for engagement, and funder-defined metrics are the most appropriate measure of success. This article challenges these assumptions by sharing insights from a multi-year ECB initiative funded by Houston Endowment called Harnessing the Power of Data.

Drawing on surveys, interviews, and program participation data, the authors explore how co-creating learning goals in a strengths-based structure shifts the evaluation culture of an organization. Key lessons include: (1) how flexibility and alignment …

From Framework To Practice: Insights About Aligning Foundation Impact And Strategic Positioning In A Trust-Based Philanthropy Era, Nancy Pole, Marie-Andrée Mbengue-Reiver, Anne Loranger-King

The Foundation Review

This article examines how a framework revealing foundations’ distinct orientations towards social impact has been used in practice, illustrating the tool’s utility and areas for refinement through one foundation’s experience.

Originally developed for Quebec’s philanthropic ecosystem, the heuristic positions foundations along two continua: strategic posture (problem-solving versus communitysupporting) and impact focus (grantee outcomes versus foundation outcomes), creating four impact orientation quadrants.

The case reveals productive tensions when different parts of a foundation occupy different quadrants. They are particularly acute for public foundations accountable simultaneously to donors, grantees, government funders, and communities.

These insights inform future framework iterations with a view …

Paying For Participation: Equitable Compensation Models For Community Co-Researchers, Jamie Zimmerman, Prabhneet Girn

The Foundation Review

Community-engaged research is increasingly central to philanthropic practice, yet funders rarely provide guidance for compensating community members who participate as co-researchers. This gap is especially pronounced for youth, who often face administrative, legal, and developmental constraints that complicate what “fair pay” looks like in practice.

This article presents findings from a mixed-methods comparative case study of three youth participatory action-research projects involving 44 youth ages 16–24 across varied organizational settings. Data were collected through youth surveys, focus groups, staff interviews, financial analysis, and document review.

Findings show that each model carries distinct trade-offs related to feasibility, transparency, and administrative capacity, …

How, For Whom, And Under What Conditions: Using A Causal Pathways Approach To Support The Goals Of Philanthropic Evaluation, Drew Koleros, Sophie Bright, Dana Harrison, Megan Shoji, Tina Fletcher

The Foundation Review

Causal pathways approaches are gaining traction as evaluators seek methods that move beyond descriptive analysis to rigorously explain how, for whom, and under what conditions change occurs in complex systems. Yet there remains limited practical guidance on how to operationalize these approaches in real-world philanthropic contexts or assess their quality.

This article addresses these gaps through a case study of an evaluation taking a causal pathways approach that examines students’ experiences in four virtual and hybrid K–12 learning models. Using a realist evaluation design within a broader causal pathways orientation, the authors collaboratively developed theories of change, iteratively tested and …

Full Issue

The Foundation Review

No abstract provided.

Effectiveness Of Monetary Policy Communication: Evidence From Textual Analysis Of Daily Newspaper Articles, Bisrat Abebe Woldesilassie

Dissertations

Monetary policy communication has become a crucial tool for central banks to shape market expectations and enhance transparency. The goal of this paper is to measure how effectively the Fed communicates monetary policy through FOMC minutes by analyzing the impact of the release of FOMC minutes on financial markets through textual sentiment analysis of daily newspaper articles. I measure the surprise in the daily news sentiment that is caused by FOMC minutes release. The surprise in the sentiment is calculated as the change in the news sentiment that is measured over three weeks prior to the release of the FOMC …

Durable Benefits Of Learning-By-Teaching For Research Question Generation Performance: A Field Experiment, Stephen Wee Hun Lim, Sarah Shi Hui Wong, Piyawan Visessuvanapoom

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Generating good questions is central to scientific inquiry. How can we improve this skill in classrooms? This field experiment showed that teaching others enhances students’ ability to generate higher-order research questions that create new knowledge. Whereas learning-by-teaching often involves delivering face-to-face or video-recorded lectures, we tested its efficient implementation via writing a verbatim (i.e., word-for-word) teaching script, exactly as how one would orate a lecture. In a research and statistical methods course, 199 undergraduates studied statistical concepts by writing verbatim teaching scripts or study notes. One month later, students’ long-term learning was assessed on a high-stakes test, whereby they explained …

Holistic And Systems Thinking Modelling For Strategic Agriculture Production Planning In Sub-Saharan Africa, Bonoukpoè Mawuko Sokame, Ghislain T. Tepa-Yotto, Henri E.Z. Tonnang, Sabra Lewis, Christopher Suh, Rachel Zozo, Jeannette K. Winsou, Alpha Kamara, Joel Cornelius Runyu, Elfatih Abdel-Rhaman, Laura Schmitt Olabisi, Tahirou Abdoulaye

All Peer-Reviewed Publications

CONTEXT: Agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) underpins food security, livelihoods, and economic growth, yet it faces mounting pressures from climate change, food insecurity, socioeconomic instability, and environmental degradation. While National Adaptation Plans (NAPs) and bioeconomic models are increasingly used to guide policy, most existing tools remain fragmented and fail to capture the complex interdependencies across agricultural, economic, social, technological, and environmental domains. OBJECTIVE: This study develops and applies a holistic bioeconomic systems model for strategic agricultural planning in SSA, aimed at identifying leverage points that enhance resilience, sustainability, and productivity. It specifically examines how climate-resilient crop variety (CRV) adoption and …

From Institutions To Families: Assessing The Progress Of Egypt’S National Strategy For Alternative Child Care Reform, Yasmine M. El Hagry

Theses and Dissertations

This study serves as a critical mid-term review of the Egyptian National Strategy for Alternative Care for Children and Youth without Parental Care (NACS) (2021-2030). The 10-year strategy overall goal is to shift from institutional care, such as orphanages, to family-based care, such as kafala, the Islamic alternative to legal adoption, for children deprived of parental care. While the global literature strongly advocates deinstitutionalization, empirical research on the operational risks and unintended harms that can arise during such complex transformations remains scarce.

Adapting the International Civil Service Effectiveness (InCiSE) Framework, this research uses a qualitative approach to diagnose the …

The Impact Of Corruption On Private Investment In The Mena Region: An Empirical Study On The Period Of 1996-2023, Mohamed A. El Regdawy

Theses and Dissertations

This study aims to examine and understand empirically the impact of corruption on private investment in the MENA region during the period of 1996-2023, as private investment is a key enabler for sustainable economic growth. To better understand such a relationship, a Pooled Mean Group estimator was implemented to figure out this relationship in both the short run and long run. The findings confirm that in the long run, within the context of MENA, corruption was used as a tool to overcome the lack of quality in the regulations that were supposed to enable the role of the private sector. …

Navigating Oer Support Without Drowning In Ai, Lydia Burrage-Goodwin, Christine Moynihan

Joseph P. Healey Library Publications

This was a presentation at the June 2026 Boston Library Consortium at Connecticut College.

UMB Healey Librarians Lydia Burrage-Goodwin and Christine Moynihan talk about what experiences they have had with faculty using OER and AI, which led them to develop ethics guidelines to support librarians who work with faculty authors. Attendees learned about creating AI use statements for OERs, using AI transparency logos, and applying open licenses to fully AI generated content as well as OER adaptations.

The Association Between Ethical Ai Use And Well-Being Among Young Adults In The Uae: A Structural Equation Modeling Approach, Areej Elsayary, Zeina Hojeij, Lames Abdul Hadi

All Works

This study examines the association between ethical AI use and young people’s emotional, social, and psychological well-being in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), where the number of hours spent on GenAI serves as a moderator. Framed within the Theory of Planned Behavior and aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-being) and SDG 13 (Climate Action), this research examines how responsible digital engagement is associated with both individual mental health and broader digital sustainability. A Structural Equation Modeling approach assessed how ethical AI behaviors are associated with well-being. A total of 204 participants, predominantly …

Parasocial Relationships With Artificial Intelligence (Ai): A Systematic Review Of Benefits And Risks, Jing Wen Hung, Charlotte K. Y. Lee, K. T. A. Sandeeshwara Kasturiratna, Andree Hartanto

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Advances in artificial intelligence (AI) have transformed AI systems into increasingly interactive and relational agents, raising questions about the consequences of the perceived sense of intimacy and reciprocity formed with AI systems. The present systematic review synthesised empirical evidence on the benefits and risks of AI parasocial relationships across diverse AI agents and contexts. Following PRISMA guidelines, 39 empirical records were identified and analysed using narrative thematic analysis. Through this, five key benefits of AI parasocial relationships were identified, namely personal development and adaptive functioning, emotional support, social needs fulfilment, enjoyment and entertainment, and community participation and social belonging. However, …

Japanese Learners And Mixed-Speech Styles, Nana Kawada

Dissertations and Theses

This study explores to what extent Japanese as a Target Language (JTL, henceforth) learners use mixed-speech styles. "Mixed-speech styles" refers to the phenomenon that occurs when speakers shift speech styles during the course of an interaction. The three primary speech styles are (1) the desu/masu forms, which are generally considered formal speech-level markers, (2) the non-desu/masu forms, considered informal speech-level markers, and (3) the Chūto shūryō-gata, which I translate to unfinished utterances that do not contain a clear style-marker.

The studies examined naturally occurring conversation point out that Japanese speakers often strategically manipulate and mix these speech styles …

The Effects Of Adverse Childhood Experiences On Female College Students' Social Emotional Development: Is Flourishing Possible?, Kaylee Kirkwood

University Honors Theses

Adverse childhood experiences are events of trauma and abuse that occur prior to age eighteen. High rates of sexual violence against girls and female undergraduate students inspired this study to explore how trauma may impact development and overall college experience. This thesis employed a small exploratory pilot study to investigate childhood trauma and social-emotional development among a small sample of female college students (ages 18-25; n = 41). Participants recruited through the Prolific Database completed an online Qualtrics survey consisting of screeners, demographic questions, measures of trauma history and emotional functioning, and optional open-ended experience-based questions. Measures were guided by …

Radical Social Work In The United States: An Integrative Literature Review, Anastasia Miller

University Honors Theses

Scholars have noted that social work in the United States is particularly dependent on, and tied to, the government. While frameworks that are popular in the U.S. explicitly provide social support, they also implicitly maintain social order. Thus, social work in the U.S. may provide immediate, short-term relief, but as a result of government-imposed limitations, dominant social work frameworks do not work towards the ultimate liberation of humanity. Radical social work methods both challenge and liberate service users, along with those who deliver them.  Existing scholarship has examined the development and implementation of radical social work across the globe– especially …

Familial Roles In Grief With A Focus On Eldest Daughters In Latinx Communities, Julianna Falcon

University Honors Theses

The way in which grief impacts an individual is something that varies from person to person. However how grief impacts eldest daughters within the Latinx community and their familial roles is a subject that has had little to no research done thus far. The four participants in this exploratory study describe their own experiences with the shift in familial roles and their experience navigating grief. They all shared their experiences through semi-structured interviews. Where the findings displayed key themes surrounding expectations, support, proximity, and academic impacts within each of the interviews. More detail is provided within this study on how …

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 …

Birth Satisfaction, As Measured By The Birth Satisfaction Scale–Revised (Bss-R), And Its Role In Predicting Breastfeeding Duration, Maternal-Infant Attachment, And Postpartum Depression, Molly Parker

University Honors Theses

Birth satisfaction has been consistently associated with improved maternal outcomes such as reduced postpartum depression (PPD), stronger maternal-infant attachment, and longer breastfeeding duration. However, the extent to which birth satisfaction independently predicts these outcomes remains unclear. This study examined whether birth satisfaction, as measured by the Birth Satisfaction Scale–Revised (BSS-R), predicts postpartum depression, maternal-infant attachment, and breastfeeding duration in a longitudinal cohort.

Data were drawn from the Prenatal Environmental And Child Health (PEACH) study. Birth satisfaction was assessed at 12 months postpartum using the BSS-R. Postpartum depression was measured using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS), maternal-infant attachment using the …

Rarely Asked: The Systemic Failure To Support The Mental Health Of Caregivers Of Medically Complex Children, Morgan Motsinger

University Honors Theses

Approximately one in four households in the United States cares for a child with special healthcare needs, yet the mental health of the caregivers providing that care is rarely addressed by the medical, faith, community, and social systems around them. This thesis examines the systemic gaps in mental health support for caregivers of children with life-limiting or medically complex diagnoses through a review of existing literature and an original mixed-method survey of 58 caregivers. Findings indicate that 50% of caregivers received no mental health support from their child's medical team at any point. Every respondent reported at least one clinically …

Looking Upwards And Out: Comparing Buddhist And Humanist Frameworks For Enlightenment, Mason Mckinney-Best

University Honors Theses

During the Zen Boom of the 1950's, Psychologists, Philosophers, and other western thinkers were exposed to Zen Buddhism and began to harness some of the principles for use in Psychology. In the last 3 decades, Psychologists have renewed their interest in Buddhism, especially as "fourth wave" cultural competence has become an important part of Psychological practice. While work has been done in developing clinical applications of Buddhist practices, more could be found in Buddhism for the person who wishes to become more healthy.

Within Psychology, one figure had exactly that objective: Abraham Maslow. His work on Self-Actualization has been …

The Social Construction Of Risk: How Media Socially Constructs Risk Perceptions Surrounding School Shootings Among College Students, Natalie Jobe

University Honors Theses

Although school shootings are statistically rare events, public fear surrounding them has continuously increased across the United States. This thesis explored how college students perceive the risk of school shootings despite the relatively low probability of experiencing these violent events, with particular attention to the role of media framing, sensationalized reporting, and repeated exposure to violent social and digital media. In order to examine how media framing, social and digital media exposure, as well as ongoing encounters with violent content affect risk perception, this research conducted six interviews with traditionally aged college students from Portland State University regarding their experiences …

Grief, Silence, And Surveillance In Academic Settings, Rakhi Grey

University Honors Theses

This study examines how grief is silenced, monitored, and regulated within higher education settings. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with undergraduate students who experienced the death of someone significant, this study explores how institutional expectations surrounding productivity, professionalism, emotional control, and academic functioning shape grief disclosure, emotional expression, and help-seeking behaviors. Using a critical theoretical framework informed by concepts of disenfranchised grief, legitimacy hierarchies, and surveillance, findings suggest that grief within higher education is not simply individually experienced, but socially and institutionally regulated. Participants described academic environments that often left little space for ongoing grief, requiring students to compartmentalize emotional distress, …

Psychological Architecture: Evaluating The "Greenhouse Model" As A Structural Standard For Lgbtq+ Well-Being, Ava Lee

University Honors Theses

Traditional LGBTQ+ mental health frameworks often conceptualize psychological safety as a matter of individual endurance. This paper critiques this focus on adaptive resilience, which systematically shifts responsibility from institutions to individuals. To counter this, the study introduces "Psychological Architecture," a framework viewing social environments as constructed infrastructures that can either support or undermine queer well-being. The model contrasts performative "Glasshouses," which prioritize visibility over safety, with engineered "Greenhouses" that nurture sustainable safety through three sequential pillars: Authentic Representation (walls), Emotional Validation (insulation), and Vocal Activism (ventilation).

Grounded in the findings of a 2024 qualitative pilot study of a queer roller …

The Cleansing Effect Of Technological Investment: An Empirical Analysis Of Episodic Labor Market Polarization (2000–2010), Adam Murphy

University Honors Theses

This paper investigates the episodic nature of labor market polarization in the United States between 2000 and 2010. While the Skill-Biased Technological Change (SBTC) framework may have successfully explained the rise of inequality in the 1980s, it struggled to account for the wage stagnation and hollowing out of the middle class that followed in the 1990s and 2000s. Utilizing Task-Biased Technological Change (TBTC) as a primary lens, this study examines how the codification of routine tasks allowed for the widespread substitution of middle-skill labor by technological capital. By synthesizing IPUMS-CPS occupational data with Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) investment statistics, …