Digital Commons Network^™

Finding Freedom In Appalachia: Evaluating A Mental Health Intervention In West Virginia, Elizabeth A. Claydon, Karen Haring, Jessica Haring, Kelsey Riggi, Beth Currence

Journal of Appalachian Health

Introduction: Rural areas have limited capacity to provide comprehensive mental health treatment and resources. This creates the need for interventions to ensure individuals with mental health concerns have access to resources to improve their mental health.

Purpose: The purpose of this mixed-methods evaluation was to assess the effectiveness and impact of Libera, a mental health program tailored for girls and women within the Appalachian region.

Methods: Quantitative surveys, including validated measures for depression, anxiety, and eating disorder symptoms, and life satisfaction, were collected pre- and post-Libera intervention for participants. Simultaneously, annual surveys were sent to Listeners in addition to qualitative …

Cartoon Kinship, Kelsey Bell Quinn

Master's Theses

Most people view cartoons as mindless entertainment exclusively for children. They dismiss the genre as if it only contains zany and overzealous characters who deal with simple, predictable challenges, easily resolved by the end of the episode. The negative attitude towards cartoons—or seemingly anything animated—undermines the importance of the lessons and the themes many shows do impart on their viewers, regardless of their age. Shows like Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airbender cover a plethora of complex themes, but due to its status as an animated work, it has been disregarded as a show for children rather than being appreciated as …

Exploring Contributions Of Partnerships Between Employers And Disability Organizations On Recruitment, Hiring, Training, Retention, And Accommodation Of Individuals With Disabilities In Mississippi, Peter Oluwadare Kalejaiye

Dissertations

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 provides equal employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities (IWDs) by prohibiting discrimination in employment. However, one out of four IWDs face discrimination in employment in the United States (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2023). Additionally, despite establishing the Office of Disability Employment Policy and enacting the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act to help integrate IWDs into the workforce, IWDs face barriers to equal and equitable employment (NASEM, 2017). Previous studies recommend partnerships between employers and disability organizations (DOs) to provide employment opportunities and benefits for IWDs through recruitment, hiring, training, retention, and …

Redefining Ritual: Navigating The Intersection Of Transgender And Jewish Identities, Orly R. Wolf

Department of Sociology

Jewish practices vary widely across denominations and individual communities, reflecting diverse cultural influences and interpretations of Jewish law and tradition. For transgender Jews, navigating the intersection of their gender identity and Jewish identity can be challenging, and individuals may struggle to find a community where all aspects of their identity are fully accepted. Studying their narratives and learning from their experiences is vital for understanding how to create spaces that support these intersectional identities.

The purpose of my research is to learn more about the experiences of transgender Jews and how individuals navigate the intersection of their gender identity and …

Public Comment: Using Critique-Like Mediating Artifacts To Democratize Discourse At City Council Meetings, Piper Schuerman

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Are local governments designed for equitable citizen participation? While civic engagement aims to empower citizens and support representative governance, barriers to participation can hinder those outcomes. City council meetings, key venues for public input, pose specific challenges such as long durations, dense content, and intimidating formalities. These issues disproportionately affect Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2012), who frequently report feeling underinformed or having limited time to engage. This thesis explores how city council meetings might use multimodal mediating artifacts, inspired by design critique practices, to make public discourse more accessible for Gen Z adults.

Grounded in activity theory and …

Frontier Healthscapes: Competing Narratives Of Disease, Environment, And Wellbeing In Early Minnesota, Aidan Reynolds

Geography Honors Projects

Across settler societies, health narratives were shaped by evolving tensions between lay and expert knowledge, frameworks of disease causation, and perceptions of the environment as both a source of health and a threat. In the decades following Euro-American settlement (1860-1900), Minnesota became a focal point for these debates, with its landscape fostering complex and competing narratives on health, wellbeing, and disease. This paper explores how public health discourse developed in Minnesota through the perspectives of institutions, the public, and economic interests. Combining environmental history with critical discourse analysis of archival materials, this study examines shifts within the Minnesota State Board …

Famílias Indigenas Entre Mundos: Standing In Pachakuti, Living In Chi’Xi Within The Constellation Of Their Comunidad De Saberes, Ymasumac Marañón Davis

Dissertations

To be Indigenous is to be la luz del mundo, to stand in your light and spread your sunrays, no matter winds or clouds of colonization that strive to dim you. This qualitative study explored ways Indigenous Latine families negotiate a sense of place within onto-epistemological realities and their home culture of learning and Western education. This research is desire-based (Eve Tuck, 2009), creating our own project of modernity, grounded in one Indigenous family’s experience within their Andean community. Drawing from Critical Latine Indigeneities Framework (Blackwell et al., 2017) and Chicana Feminist Epistemologies (Bernal, 1998), using an Entre Mundos methodology, …

Developing And Validating An Emotion Recognition Test For Policing, Kyle Mclean, Trey Bussey, Justin Nix, Jeff Rojek, Abigail Curran, Vivian Ta-Johnson, Geoffrey P. Alpert

Sociology Publications

Purpose: Police executives and criminologists alike have advocated for the incorporation of emotional intelligence in the hiring and training of police officers. Despite general consensus that emotional intelligence is important for a variety of outcomes in policing, most published studies on the topic have relied on crude measures, such as self-report assessments. While self-report tests are validated for many uses, their applicability as an objective measure of skills is limited.

Design/Methodology: Using three studies, this paper outlines the development and validation of an emotion recognition test specifically intended for policing. The first study outlines the construction of the …

The Role Of Geographic Area On Juvenile Delinquency: Evidence From The 2023 National Survey On Drug Use And Health, Sara G. Remy

Sociology and Criminology Undergraduate Honors Theses

This study explores the relationship between geographic area and juvenile delinquency, with particular attention to how this relationship varies across the following settings: large metropolitan areas, small metropolitan areas, and rural areas. Using nationally representative data from the 2023 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), the analysis focuses on youth under the age of 18 and incorporates additional social factors such as parental involvement, gender, grade level, and race/ethnicity. Results from my negative binomial regression models demonstrate that geographic area did not play significant role in delinquency overall. Income showed notable variation by geographic setting: in rural areas, …

Prosecuting The Material Support Of Terrorism In The Post-9/11 Era, Kathryn C. Hammonds

Sociology and Criminology Undergraduate Honors Theses

Before the attacks of September 11th, material support of terrorism using the 18 U.S.C § 2339B statute was hardly investigated and prosecuted. In the years following 9/11, however, the government began to charge and prosecute material support offenders at an increasing rate. Structural-contextual theory is used to explain this phenomenon by analyzing how the government utilized tightened coupling to expand what they looked for and charged under 18 U.S.C § 2339B. The current study furthers past literature by analyzing 2339B offender demographics, case outcomes, counts outcomes, conviction rates, and the length of sentences. The findings solve discrepancies in past literature …

Women And Gender Non-Conforming Introductory Stem Students Navigating Gender, Faculty Expectations, And College Support Systems., Trisha A. Douin-Manning

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Women and gender non-conforming students remain underrepresented in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) majors within higher education, and gender disparities persist in advancement to high-paying STEM careers (Maloy et al., 2021; NSF, 2015; Riegle-Crumb et al., 2018). This three-article style dissertation uses qualitative interviews with 29 women and gender non-conforming introductory STEM students and 11 STEM faculty to investigate how these students navigate through their introductory STEM courses. Women and gender non-conforming students in this study faced academic, familial, and gendered pressures to succeed in introductory STEM courses. Many of the students in this study described feelings of oppression …

Investigating Factors That Influence Rural Student Degree Attainment At Urban Institutions., Kevin Kelleher Buckley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Decades of research have shown that rural students attend college at rates lower than their non-rural peers. When they do attend college, they tend to stay closer to home. Considering that over two-thirds of higher education institutions in the United States are in urban areas, this presents two challenges—rural students limit their options for where to attend college, and urban institutions face difficulty attracting and retaining rural students. Very little quantitative research is available that explains what may make a rural student more likely to be successful at an urban institution or if the geographic origin of a student plays …

Navigating The Tides Of Change: Girls’ Experiences In Scouts Bsa, Alexandra Rush, Olivia Kochis, Beth Belanger, Jennifer Brown Urban, Miriam R. Linver

Journal of Youth Development

On February 1, 2019, Boy Scouts of America officially accepted girls into its signature program (ages 11–18) and changed its name to Scouts BSA. This historic shift provided a novel opportunity for researchers to investigate the experiences of some of the first 13 girls to enter this traditionally all-boy space and examine how participation influenced sense of self and purpose. A qualitative phenomenological approach was adopted to explore girls’ experiences and perceptions and meanings they constructed, using secondary data consisting of 38 transcribed interviews from all 13 girls. Girls ranged in age from 12–18 years old (M = 13.72, SD …

Baby, Did You Get Your Diploma?: The Lived Experiences Of Formerly Incarcerated African American Men In The Pursuit And Attainment Of College Degrees, Charles D. Gidney

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the lived experiences of formerly incarcerated African American men in the pursuit and attainment of college degrees. This qualitative study examined the post-incarceration educational journeys of eight men. Formerly incarcerated African American men were selected based on the limited amount of academic research that exists targeting this student demographic. A broad cross section of educational attainment was represented in this study with two participants possessing PhD’s; one doctoral candidate; two doctoral students; and three undergraduate students (one freshman, one sophomore, and one junior). At the time of the study their ages ranged …

Contracted Wars, Compromised Oversight: Private Military Companies In Iraq, Afghanistan, And The Decline Of U.S. Accountability Standards, Brianna N. Buzzell

International Studies (MA) Theses

The Global War on Terror, beginning in 2001, started U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, facilitating the expansion of Private Military Contractors (PMCs) through a combination of operational necessity, strategic policy decisions, and systemic oversight failures. Despite their growing role, PMCs operate in legal and oversight grey zones. Despite a growing body of work on PMC accountability, there remains little agreement on how U.S. military interventions created conditions for their proliferation. This paper examines how U.S. military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan facilitated the expansion of PMC influence, resulting in reduced oversight and accountability for both the U.S. government …

Echoes Of Radicalization: The Political Right And The Internet Through The Lens Of Moral Panic, Gabrielle Renee Mathus

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

In the past decade, the prevalence of social media has become a part of everyday life. Alongside this, these issues have gained a unique venue for discussing identity-based political issues that were not previously given mainstream attention and, ultimately, contribute to panic among portions of the American public. In this study, I conducted a digital ethnographic content analysis to explore how Reddit and X act as venues for discussions of transgender issues, immigration, and racial discrimination and how these issues have manifested in mainstream discourse. Using Stanley Cohen’s moral panic theory and grounded theory practices, I found that these spaces …

Career Aspirations And Gender Norms: How Socialization Influences Women’S Professional Choices, Emily Rose Hunt

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

While legal frameworks grant women equal rights and opportunities to participate in any occupation, gender inequality continues in part due to the persistent gender segregation within the workforce. Gender socialization places women into roles that limit their occupational opportunities, so this study explores women’s understanding of their career options based upon the potential constraints that come from their identity as a woman. This study uses a qualitative approach, using semi-structured interviews conducted with students at Butler University to gather information on women’s personal perspectives on how their gender impacted their perceived career options. A sample of nine undergraduate women were …

"A Miniature Replica Of Life": Reality, Critique, And The Burden Of Representation In Oscar Micheaux's Body And Soul, Maria Lagomarsino

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

With the release of his controversial silent film Body and Soul (1925), filmmaker Oscar Micheaux elicited strong reactions from censors, critics, and audience members alike. While some praised the work as a triumph of Black filmmaking, others were horrified by Micheaux’s corrupt preacher storyline and supposedly negative characterizations. The creation of this film occurred during a particularly fraught period of history, which saw some Harlem Renaissance figures argue that only positive depictions deserved a place in the public discourse. With Body and Soul, however, Micheaux refused to be limited by this undue burden of representation. In this thesis, I further …

Improving Brain Health: Exercise As A Tool For Enhancing Executive Function And Reducing Stress In Older African Americans, Destiny Ellise Ramos

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Older African American (AA) adults face disproportionately higher risk of stress and Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias (ADRD) compared to other racial and ethnic groups, yet they remain underrepresented in intervention-based research. Previous research has suggested aerobic exercise may reduce stress and benefit executive functioning, which is among the first cognitive domains to be affected in ADRD; however, no studies to date have directly tested the impact of aerobic vs. non-aerobic exercise in older AAs at high risk for developing ADRD. The current study evaluated the effects of a group-based cardio dance fitness (CDF) exercise intervention versus a strength, flexibility, …

Minority Stress And Working Memory, Ahmed Salem

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Minority Stress Theory posits that sexual minority status leads to unique stressors related to stigma, prejudice, and discrimination that create worse mental health outcomes for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ+) individuals (Meyer, 2003). The present study investigated working memory in LGBTQ+ and non-LGBTQ+ samples after a minority stress induction, as stress has been linked to cognitive difficulties in the context of memory retrieval in both short- and long-term memory (Klier & Burrata, 2020). The present study incorporated a recently validated film-based minority stress induction created by Seager van Dyk et al. (2023). 184 participants (66 LGBTQ+) viewed this …

Women Disrupting The "Roundness" In "No Name Woman" And Sula: How Maxine Hong Kingston's And Toni Morrison's Titular Characters Combat Restrictive Communal Norms Surrounding Sex, Michelle Victoria D'Alessio

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

This thesis examines how Maxine Hong Kingston’s “No Name Woman,” the opening chapter of her memoir, The Woman Warrior, and Toni Morrison’s novel, Sula, portray communal perceptions of women who contradict traditional gender norms surrounding sex. The titular characters in each of these stories express their sexualities in ways deemed unfit by their people and are accordingly demonized and outcast from their communities. These characters are afforded some subtle admiration for their personal power by the artists who are portraying them, but this reverence is inevitably rescinded and replaced by the disdain of the tight-knit communities surrounding them. This tension …

Indirect Cost Cap: Perspectives On Efficiency, Waste, And Equity, Neel B. Patel, Lakshman Segar

Rowan-Virtua Research Day

Background: On February 10, 2025, the NIH enacted a 15% cap on indirect costs, reallocating $4 billion from institutional overhead to direct research within a $35 billion funding framework. The policy follows longstanding concerns about unchecked growth and inefficiencies in indirect cost reimbursements, which rose from 15% in the 1950s to over 70% at some institutions by the 1990s. Notable examples include a $200 million overcharge at Stanford and millions in questionable expenditures identified in federal audits.

Objective: To evaluate the financial, operational, and equity-related impacts of the NIH’s indirect cost cap on U.S. research institutions.

Methods: …

Assessing The Impact Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On Health Literacy In Patients Presenting To A Student-Run Free Clinic, Sabah Iqbal, Kirsten Carlberg, Krisha S. Patel, Ashlyn Mcclelland, Sarah Marotta, Rebecca Moore

Rowan-Virtua Research Day

Background

Health literacy as defined by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), refers to an individual’s ability to find, understand, and use health information and services1. This definition has evolved with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and increasing emphasis on preventative healthcare. We aimed to observe the impact of the pandemic on the health literacy of patients in a free community clinic run by medical students.

Hypothesis

This study aims to assess the effect of various demographic and socioeconomic factors and the COVID-19 pandemic on health literacy levels estimated by the NVS assessment in the patient population …

Beyond The Label: Understanding And Addressing Occupational Stigma In Psychiatry, Mahesh Vasudevan, Madeeha Sheriff

Rowan-Virtua Research Day

Introduction:Stigma is a social classification that devalues individuals or groups, and occupational stigma targets entire professions. Psychiatry is particularly affected, often viewed by the public and medical community as lacking scientific rigor and prestige. This negative perception has far-reaching consequences.

Methods:A narrative literature review was conducted to explore the scope, sources, and impact of occupational stigma toward psychiatrists. Peer-reviewed articles and professional resources published between 2002 and 2023 were selected based on relevance to psychiatric stigma, education, and public perception. Databases searched included PubMed, Google Scholar, and professional association websites using keywords such as “psychiatry stigma” and “psychiatrist …

Exploring The Effects Of Target Race, Gender, And Weight On Pain Perception, Catherine Awad, Theresa Miller, Azer Tuerxuntuoheti, Peter Mende-Siedlecki

Rowan-Virtua Research Day

Healthcare equity is an essential right, and while the quality of care is assumed to be uniform, notable disparities in care are associated with factors of race, gender, and weight-particularly in the domain of pain evaluation and care. In experimental work, target race and gender have varying, and interacting effects on visual thresholds for perceiving painful expressions. Racial bias in pain perception is well established as participants see pain on black faces less readily than pain on white faces; gender also impacts pain treatment, where women are susceptible to having their pain discredited. Across two experiments, the influence of weight …

"Bad Things Happen In Philadelphia": Managing Stigma And Threats In The Wake Of False Criminal Accusations, Steven Windisch

Sociology and Criminology Faculty Publications and Presentations

In the aftermath of the 2020 U.S. election, the boundary between activism and extremism blurred, with election officials reporting violent threats and false accusations of election fraud. From a symbolic interactionist perspective, these attacks provide a unique lens for examining the consequences of being falsely labeled a criminal. This study utilizes data from in-depth interviews with 15 election officials to explore the nature of informal false accusations, participants' subjective interpretations of these labels, and their behavioral and emotional strategies for managing their "spoiled identity." The findings highlight the criminalizing and dehumanizing effects of these accusations, with officials enduring verbal abuse, …

Do Voters Shake Off Policy Stances? A Look Into The Impact Of Celebrities On Policy Recall, Alyssa A. Noe

Department of Political Science: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Celebrities try to influence politics by leveraging their ability to command attention. But does a celebrity’s endorsement of a policy impact citizens’ ability to recall the policy? This paper examines if people’s information processing, specifically policy recall, is impacted by a celebrity’s endorsements. Data was collected at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln during the fall 2024 semester using a student sample. Participants were randomly assigned into three experimental groups. I hypothesize that the more recognizable a celebrity is the more likely people are to be able to recall the policy they posted. By using Taylor Swift as the well-known celebrity and …

Heartbeat Of The Heartland: Sonic Engagement With Hip-Hop In The American Midwest, Lauren R. Millhorn

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This project analyzes Hip-Hop artists from the American Midwest through the context of the Midwest’s construction as a nostalgic, peaceful area where conflict seems nonexistent. This study applies Adam Ochonicky’s concept of nostalgic spatiality, or “instances in which nostalgia is projected onto a physical environment, thereby altering the perception, understanding, and/or experience of that space and its accompanying cultural sphere” (Ochonicky 29) to close readings on Midwest Hip-Hop texts. In the case of the Midwest, projected nostalgia is rooted in whiteness and propels the narrative that the Midwest is predominantly occupied by white people who maintain its peace and serenity …

“But Where Are Those Good Old-Fashioned Values?”—The Racial Politics Of Animated Satire In Family Guy, Jordanne Greenidge

Master's Theses

Few animated shows have shaped American pop culture quite like Family Guy. Known for its rapid-fire cutaway gags and irreverent humor, the series has remained a television mainstay since its debut in 1999, despite frequent criticism and even two cancellations. Created by Seth MacFarlane and based on his 1995 student film The Life of Larry, Family Guy has built its reputation on pushing the boundaries of taste, especially when it comes to race, gender, and politics. Though often defended as satire, the show’s use of racial humor raises questions about its true impact: Do its portrayals of Black characters challenge …

Examining The Perceptions Of Restorative Practices In A Non-Profit Organization: A Comparative Analysis Of Staff And Youth Attitudes, Autumn N. Alicea, Anne Hobbs Dr

Theses/Capstones/Creative Projects

This study examines the attitudes toward restorative justice (RJ) among staff and youth at a non-profit residential organization. Using the Restorative Justice Attitude Scale, data was collected from 14 staff members and 14 youth participants (N=28). Results indicated that staff members reported significantly higher mean scores (M = 84.50, SD = 8.38) on the Total Restorative Justice Attitude Scale than youth participants (M = 67.93, SD = 15.81). ANOVA results revealed statistically significant differences between the two groups on attitudes toward restorative justice, F (1, 26) = 12.007, p = .002. Effect size analysis (η² = .316) indicates that approximately …