Digital Commons Network^™

Professional Bereavement Of Oncology Nurses: A Literature Review, Nicole Ho

EVMS School of Health Professions Master's Level Capstones, Projects and Papers

The amount of resources for grief management for oncology nurses who experience professional bereavement is scarce. This review of literature found just four studies based on current solutions that have been provided for oncology nurses in addressing their patient related grief. All of the studies supported that providing resources to address bereavement helped in resolving grief, reflecting, expressing feelings, and healing. This thesis explores factors that exacerbate professional bereavement such as stressors within the work environment, the lack of supportive resources, and the scarcity of research pertaining to how oncology nurses process the death of their patients. Additionally, art therapy …

Working Through Unresolved Bereavement Through Fiber Arts And Reflective Writing: A Heuristic Study, Ashley S. Jenkins

EVMS School of Health Professions Master's Level Capstones, Projects and Papers

The purpose of this art-based heuristic study was to explore unresolved grief through various fiber art processes and reflective writing. According to existing literature, there are several grief therapy approaches, in addition to bereavement support groups for bereavement. Furthermore, many art processes are described in the literature as being valuable in the grieving process in art therapy. However, there are gaps in the literature describing the benefits and effects of fiber art processes for processing bereavement. A nine-week heuristic self-study was proposed to identify the potential therapeutic benefits and applicability of fiber arts within art therapy for those dealing with …

Art Therapy Assessment: A Study Of Males’ Bird’S Nest Drawings, Katherine A. Efimetz

EVMS School of Health Professions Master's Level Capstones, Projects and Papers

Attachment patterns in childhood have implications throughout an individual’s life. Relationship quality with the primary caregiver is said to influence how people interact with others and the world. Studies by prolific researchers such as John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth set the stage for continued research on attachment theory, and thus have lead others into investigating this most heavily researched subject in psychology. Attachment patterns have been identified through several assessments. Art therapy assessments may prove to be useful in differentiating patterns of attachment via graphic indicators present in drawings. The Bird’s Nest Drawing, developed by Kaiser (1996), is such an …

Materials And Processes In Art Therapy, Gabrielle Irvine

EVMS School of Health Professions Master's Level Capstones, Projects and Papers

This review of literature addresses the lack of literature concerning art processes and materials by synthesizing findings evaluating the effects of different processes and materials in the unpublished theses from the Eastern Virginia Medical School’s Art Therapy and Counseling Program. The theses evaluated the effect of the processes of clay work, printmaking, drawing, scribbling, and creating mandalas. The data contained in the theses address specific effects of various processes and materials on clients’ mental and physical states such as levels of anxiety, depression, stress levels, and heart rate. The samples studied vary from the adult inpatient adults to university students. …

Knowledge Of Assistive Technology And Services Available To Students With Disabilities, Mary J. Addison

Master's Level Papers/Projects

The purpose of this study was to investigate the knowledge of students and faculty regarding the assistive technology and services available to students with disabilities at a university in the southeastern United States. This study consists of 300 participants who were asked to respond to 8 questions which were designed to collect data aligned with the three research objectives. The findings may be used to determine if further education or communication is needed in order to better inform students, staff, and faculty of assistive technology and services available on campus.

Building A Conceptual Model Of Equine Integrated Art Therapy, Susan Garnett

EVMS School of Health Professions Master's Level Capstones, Projects and Papers

This study proposed to develop a conceptual model for equine integrated art therapy. A consensual qualitative research method was used to generate qualitative data. Five art therapists who were combining art psychotherapy and equine facilitated psychotherapy in their practices or were interested in discussing this hybrid form of art therapy were interviewed. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed by a research team for domains and key ideas. The results of the data analysis were triangulated with the literature and researcher’s immersion experiences to make recommendations for the conceptual model and implications for future research.

Proceedings, Msvscc 2017, Old Dominion University, Department Of Modeling, Simulation & Visualization Engineering, Old Dominion University, Virginia Modeling, Analysis & Simulation Center

Modeling, Simulation and Visualization Student Capstone Conference

Proceedings of the 11th Annual Modeling, Simulation & Visualization Student Capstone Conference held on April 20, 2017 at VMASC in Suffolk, Virginia. 211 pp.

Factors Influencing Distribution Of Prosthetic Devices In Iran: An Economic Analysis, Sarah Tensen

Virginias Collegiate Honors Council Conference

An estimated 177,622 Iranians have suffered an injury resulting in amputation. Prosthetic devices in Iran are scarce due to wealth disparity, wars, and lack of vital resources. Without prosthetic devices, amputees face unemployment, homelessness, a lowered self-esteem and cannot fully participate in society. I examined economic factors influencing the distribution of prosthetic devices and reviewed articles that focus on healthcare costs, distributions and services, relationships between Iran and other countries, etiology of amputation to find a solution for the prosthetic distribution issues. I concluded issues resulted from high costs, unequal distributions of wealth and resources, unsafe conditions, and a deficit …

The Use Of Rhyme, Rhythm, And Melody As A Form Of Repetition Priming To Aid In Encoding, Storage, And Retrieval Of Semantic Memories In Alzheimer’S Patients, Faiz Plastikwala

Virginias Collegiate Honors Council Conference

Treating Alzheimer’s disease, especially through non-pharmaceutical means, has become increasingly important over the past few decades. I examined the use of melody, rhyme, and rhythm as encoding mechanisms to aid in the retrieval of long term semantic information by juxtaposing previous experiments in the field. Melody, rhyme, and rhythm provide an organizational structure to facilitate the encoding of information. Specifically, chunking, the grouping of smaller units into larger ‘chunks’, helps facilitate long term encoding in patients, and is the byproduct of the organizational structure of a text. A major drawback of using these devices is the loss in the depth …

Social Awareness Campaigns: Raising Awareness On Human Trafficking In India, Neha Pondicherry

Virginias Collegiate Honors Council Conference

Human trafficking is a persistent international problem that results in the subjugation of over 1 million people annually. The mass exploitation and abuse of humans for personal gain has taken many different forms over the span of history, including slavery, domestic servitude, labor bondage, etc. Many social media campaigns are not successful in India because they do not take into account the lack of education and minimal access to technology and other methods of communication. Rural villages actually respond most effectively to media use. In my research, I devised an entirely new social awareness campaign to be executed in India …

Depression In Low-Income Adolescents: Guidelines For School-Based Depression Intervention Programs, Gopika Hari

Virginias Collegiate Honors Council Conference

Studies reveal that low income is a significant risk factor for depression and only roughly 25% of children with mental illnesses receive adequate help, the majority of which comes from schools. This study establishes guidelines for depression intervention programs in low-income high schools through a literature review of current practices. This study found that a multi-layered approach with screening, universal education, and high-risk intervention is most effective. Screening should be conducted with a modified PHQ-a test and timely clinical interviews by school psychologists. All students and teachers should receive universal depression education curriculum consisting of principles like depression literacy and …

2017 Conference Program, Virginias Collegiate Honors Council

Virginias Collegiate Honors Council Conference

Full conference program with abstracts and VCHC information, including officers, history, constitution, bylaws.

Department Of Psychology Newsletter, Department Of Psychology, Old Dominion University

Department of Psychology Newsletters

Spring 2017 issue of Old Dominion University's Department of Psychology Newsletter.

Why Do They Do It? A Case Study Of Factors Influencing Part-Time Faculty To Seek Employment At A Community College, Philip E. Pons, Dana Burnett, Mitchell R. Williams, Tisha M. Paredes

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Faculty Publications

The purpose of this qualitative study was to discover the motivational factors influencing part-time faculty employment within the community college from the perspective of the part-time faculty. The study examined these reported motivational factors for differences influenced by age, gender, and employment status. A survey was distributed to a random sample of part-time faculty members at a large metropolitan community college in the Southeastern United States. Participants were asked to respond to categorical demographic questions and survey questions to determine workplace satisfaction. Three open-ended questions were presented to obtain in-depth information about the motivational factors leading adjunct faculty to seek …

The Work Is Never Done: Women's Collaboration In The Workplace From Louisa May Alcott To Contemporary Chick-Lit, Laura Gronewold, Marlowe Daly-Galeano

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Madeline Albright must have been shocked when a comment she made in early 2016 went viral—for the wrong reasons. Albright was speaking in support of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign when by her own account, “I delivered a line I have uttered a thousand times to applause, nodding heads and laughter: ‘There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help each other’” (Albright). According to the former secretary of state, she has been repeating this call to arms since 1990; that is to say, she has spent a full 25 years publicly arguing for the importance of …

Foucault's Fantasy League: An Examination Of Power Relationships In Fantasy Sports, Michael Dennis

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

The massive rise in popularity of fantasy sports in the U.S. and around the world, from the first "Rotisserie" fantasy baseball leagues in New York to the more recent and wildly popular one-week leagues FanDuel and DraftKings, has been examined through a number of critical lenses: economic, legal, demographic, etc. However, very few words have been spent on the philosophical implications of fantasy sports and the abiding cultural choke-hold that they currently exercise. One of the preeminent philosophers and social critics of the 20th century, Michel Foucault (1926-1984), devoted the vast majority of his oeuvre to the concepts of power …

Reconceiving And Redeeming The Self: Passing, The Harlem Renaissance, And Zombies, Amanda Gradisek, Ron Scott

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

The borders that are built for us, and that we often cross seeking to establish our identities, come in many forms, and the mere act of passing through them entails risks of many sorts—physical, psychological, and cultural. The struggle to maintain these borders often plays itself out in popular culture. Consider one example, incorporated in the classic zombie film Night of the Living Dead (1968). Its iconography has become a well-known component of many American cultural narratives: an isolated farmhouse, barricaded against the shambling forms of the living dead, with the forces of martial walking armed through the …

Carrying The Border With You: Recalibrating Chicana/O Spaces From A Legacy Of Dislocation, Michael P. Moreno, Kristin C. Brunnemer

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

[First paragraph]

Los Angeles has long been known for its sprawling freeways, gentrifying landscapes, and loose networks of debilitating spheres partitioned by decentralizing freeway systems and deterritorialized communities. Caught within the historical, cultural, and political ebb and flow of the region’s transformations throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, the Chicana/o community has been exiled to and marginalized in these spaces, the city generating often a spatial incarceration of the Chicana/o to contest and re-inscribe Los Angeles as a matrix for Chicanismo. This article explores how central characters in Helena María Viramontes’ 2007 novel Their Dogs Came with Them and the …

Examining The Relationship Between Selected Grade 3-12 Teachers’ Perceived Assessment Literacy And Their Classroom Assessment Practices, Mark E. Hudson

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

The study examined the self-reported understandings of selected 3rd to 12th grade teachers had of assessment and the assessment practices they reported implementing in their classrooms along with evidence extracted from written lesson plans. The literature on classroom assessment supports the idea that teachers who create meaningful assessments, offer corrective action, and give students multiple opportunities to demonstrate success can improve their instruction and increase student learning (Guskey, 2003). McMillan, Myran, and Workman (2002) argued that teachers’ understanding of assessment matters are inadequate; although there is common use of standardized math and reading tests, there is limited knowledge of how …

New Elegies, Sarah Mccall

English Theses & Dissertations

This manuscript investigates a poetics of desire—how desire manifests in and around the self, the body, and the world. Bearing witness to desire has afforded me an opportunity to develop and refine my own sensibility in my poems, which are deeply personal and narrative by nature, and craft my work around these related themes: Spirituality, marriage, grief, home, identity, sobriety, love, and even racial and environmental concerns. In my work, desire represents a container for a broad consideration of yearning, and wanting—and how to manage such feelings every day, in the world.

Elegy motivates many of these poems, though like …

Cross-Racial Trust Factors: Exploring The Experiences Of Blacks Who Have Had White Mentors In The Counseling Profession, Eric Montrece Brown

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

The primary researcher conducted a phenomenological study on cross-racial trust factors between Black doctoral students (n = 10) and their White mentors within the counseling profession. Three participants identified having a White professor as a mentor; two participants identified having White supervisors as mentors; five of the participants reported having both faculty members and supervisors as White mentors. Through semi-structured interviews, the primary researcher sought to ascertain what factors engendered cross-racial trust between Black doctoral students and White mentors within the counseling profession. The research team identified four superordinate themes related to cross-racial trust: contributors to trust, reasons for mistrust, …

Digital Literacy Adoption With Academic Technology: Namely Digital Information Literacy To Enhance Student Learning Outcomes, Nancy Adam-Turner

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

This study explores Arts & Science faculty and librarians’ attitude of learning theory and perceptions of digital literacy (DL) and how digital information literacy (DIL) might improve and enhance student learning outcomes. Digital literacy (DL), information literacy (IL), and digital information literacy (DIL) consists of interaction with academic technology (AT) programs and tools. The objectives are: the rise of IL within the parameters of DL and discuss the birth of DIL, examine the modes of adoption and explore the levels of inclusion for faculty and librarians’ concepts of DL with DIL instruction with AT, define the IL phenomenon, and how …

Exploring The Relationship Between Depression And Resilience In Survivors Of Childhood Trauma, Marquis A. Norton

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

Although experiences of trauma are common, reactions vary due to a host of biopsychosocial and cultural factors that influence the individual reaction to the trauma (Nakai et al., 2015). One such factor is resiliency, the capability to adapt in adverse environmental circumstances (Basim & Cetin, 2011). This study used hierarchical multiple regression to examine the relationships between childhood trauma, recent experiences of depression, and resilience in adult university students. This study also examined the possible moderating effects on depression by resilience. Participants completed the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, Connor-Davidson Resilience scale, and PROMIS Depression survey. Small significant relationships were found for …

Proceedings Of The 95th Annual Virginia Academy Of Science Meeting, 2017

Virginia Journal of Science

Full proceedings of the 95th Annual Virginia Academy of Science Meeting, May 17-19, 2017, at Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA.

The Relationship Between Trauma Exposure And College Student Adjustment: Factors Of Resilience As A Mediator, Amber Leih Jolley

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

Adjustment to college is an important developmental task for students entering institutions of higher education. More than half of students who enter college report exposure to a potentially traumatic event (PTE), with many students reporting multiple event exposure (Banyard & Cantor, 2004). Many students adjust well to college despite experiencing PTEs, suggesting that certain factors may mitigate the effects of exposure. This study utilized archival data to explore the relationship between the type of PTE, accumulation of PTEs, underlying factors of resilience, and adjustment to college in a national sample of treatment-seeking college students. The data were analyzed using hierarchical …

Eye Tracking As A Control Interface For Tele-Operation During A Visual Search Task, Jeffrey Neal Levy

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

This study examined the utility of eye-tracking as a control method during tele-operation in a simulated task environment. Operators used a simulator to tele-operate a search robot using three different control methods: fully manual, hybrid, and eye-only. Using Endsely’s (1995a) three level SA model and a natural interface (e.g., eye-tracking) as a more user-centered approach to tele-operation, the study measured objective, electroencephalogram, and subjective (NASA-TLX) measures to reflect both workload and situation awareness during tele-operation. The results showed a significant reduction in mental workload, as reflected by EEG measures. However a significant effect was found where the operators’ perceived mental …

Sense Of Belonging, Emotion Regulation, Perceived Social Support And Mental Health Among College Students, Sara Bock Davis

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Perceived social support (PSS) is linked to a range of beneficial effects, but the factors that influence the effectiveness of PSS are less well understood. In their Relational Regulation Theory (RRT), Lakey and Orehek (2011) emphasize the importance of distinguishing the role of individual factors from relational influences on PSS. This study tested the RRT by examining whether the association of PSS to three mental health outcomes (i.e., aggression, binge eating, depressive symptoms) varies by two individual factors: sense of belonging and emotion regulation. With a non-clinical college sample, a series of hierarchical regressions tested whether sense of belonging and …

The Correlation Between The National Survey Of Student Engagement Indicators And First Year Student Achievement, Satisfaction, And Retention, Larry Peck

STEMPS Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to determine if the National Survey of Student Engagement indicators (NSSE), High-Impact Practices, demographic variables and non-involvement factors can significantly predict student achievement, satisfaction, and retention. The sample included data from 493 freshmen from a large public university in the Southeastern United States who participated in the National Survey of Student Engagement in 2015 and 2016. This study seeks to benefit instructional designers, educators, and educational institutions to maximize their resources and efforts to achieve maximum achievement, retention, and satisfaction.

The study concluded that achievement is highly correlated with higher-order learning, learning strategies, effective …

The Impact Of Help-Self And Help-Others Appeals Upon Participation In Clinical Research Trials, Susan Lewis Casey

Marketing Theses & Dissertations

The need for participants in medical research trials continues to grow yet the successful recruitment of volunteers remains a challenge. Much of the research regarding patient recruitment activities has been conducted in the social sciences. As such, the specific impact of advertising strategy to help recruit volunteers remains unclear. The proposed research is designed to help to fill this gap in the literature, generating insight for continuing academic research and helping practitioners gain efficiencies in developing new pharmaceuticals.

This research uses an experimental design to assess the impact of two variables upon clinical trial participation. These two variables were selected …

The Effects Of Delay And Probabilistic Discounting On Green Consumerism, Blake J. Bent

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

People have a tendency to discount outcomes that are delayed or probabilistic. In other words, people will sacrifice larger benefits for smaller benefits that are immediate or certain. For many environmentally-friendly (“green”) products, the financial benefits are both delayed and probabilistic. The current study examined how delay and probability, as well as frame and magnitude, influenced consumers’ decisions when comparing a conventional and green product. Participants were recruited from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk and completed one of two experiments. In each experiment participants chose between a conventional product (low initial cost, high operating cost) and green product (high initial cost, low …