Digital Commons Network^™

Toxic Stress Among Black And African American Oregonians, Roberta Hunte, Margaret J.F. Braun

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Toxic stress is a reaction to ongoing adversity such as abuse, neglect, poverty, racism, discrimination, and exposure to violence; it is powerful enough to change brain chemistry and architecture. Toxic stress and associated changes to the brain can lead to poor health outcomes later in life. Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), racism*, and discrimination can trigger toxic stress and have long term consequences for the health of many people, particularly those in the Black and African American community.

The current project examined toxic stress and its impact on the health of Black and African American Oregonians. We looked at two indicators …

"We Had To Rely On Each Other": Voices Of Latinx Foster Youth With Experiences In Care With Siblings, Isabella B. Ginsberg

University Honors Theses

Relationships between members of sibling groups have been found to impact well-being for children who enter foster care. Being placed in stranger foster care is often challenging and can be traumatic with children reporting confusion, worry, and loss of identity and sense of belonging. While there is some research that explores the experiences of siblings groups in foster care and others separately that examines Latinx children in foster care, there is very little information that looks into the potentially unique experiences of Latinx individuals who were in care with siblings that also accounts for cultural nuance.

This study used a …

Online Survey Of Driver Comprehension Of The Flashing Yellow Arrow For Right-Turn Signal Indications, Sirisha Kothuri, Christopher Monsere, Hisham Jashami, David Hurwitz

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper presents the results of an online survey of licensed driver comprehension of the right-turn signal displays with a focus on the flashing yellow arrow (FYA) and also including the circular green and red and red arrow. Recruitment postcards were mailed to a random sample of 9,872 residents in Oregon. The online survey yielded 399 responses. The open-ended responses were coded for comprehension and analyzed. The results suggest that FYA for right turns is well understood by Oregon drivers despite its current novelty (only two locations at the time of the research). Importantly, survey respondents were more likely to …

The Trailhead, Tigard, Oregon, Freddie Bulzan, Melvin Sharp, Aurora Charouhas, Alex Lovre, Zoe Johnson, Tyler Reeves

Real Estate Development Workshop Projects

The Trailhead Team (“Sponsor”) is pleased to present qualified individuals (or entities) the opportunity to invest $8,124,231 (“Equity”) in a Qualfied Opportunity Fund, which will purchase membership interests in Urban Flight LLC (“UFL”), a Qualfied Opportunity Zone Business, for the development of two speculative mixed-use buildings located in the industrial core of Tigard, Oregon (“The Trailhead” or “Project”).

Total Project costs will be $35,731,297 with the remainder of the Equity being contributed by the current property owner (“Property Owner”) in the amount of $3,381,723.1 The Sponsor will also invest $1,000,000 of Equity. UFL will secure $23,225,343 in construction debt, at …

Undergraduate Biology Education Research Gordon Research Conference: A Meeting Report, Erin L. Dolan, Michelle Borrero, Kristine Callis-Duehl, Miranda M. Chen Musgrove, Joelyn De Lima, Isi Ero-Tolliver, Laci M. Gerhart, Emma Goodwin, Lindsey R. Hamilton, Meredith A. Henry, Jose Herrera, Bethany Huot, Stacey Kiser, Melissa E. Ko, Marcy E. Kravec, Mark Lee, Lisa B. Limeri, Melanie E. Peffer, Debra Pires, Juan S. Ramirez Lugo, Starlette M. Sharp, Nicole A. Suarez

Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations

The 2019 Undergraduate Biology Education Research Gordon Research Conference (UBER GRC), titled “Achieving Widespread Improvement in Undergraduate Education,” brought together a diverse group of researchers and practitioners working to identify, promote, and understand widespread adoption of evidence-based teaching, learning, and success strategies in undergraduate biology. Graduate students and postdocs had the additional opportunity to present and discuss research during a Gordon Research Seminar (GRS) that preceded the GRC. This report provides a broad overview of the UBER GRC and GRS and highlights major themes that cut across invited talks, poster presentations, and informal discussions. Such themes include the importance of …

Comparison Of Chemotherapeutic Activities Of Rhodamine-Based Gumbos And Nanogumbos, Nimisha Bhattarai, Mi Chen, Rocío L. Pérez, Sudhir Ravula, Robert Strongin, Karen Mcdonough, Isiah M. Warner

Chemistry Faculty Publications and Presentations

Rhodamine derivatives have been widely investigated for their mitochondrial targeting and chemotherapeutic properties that result from their lipophilic cationic structures. In previous research, we have found that conversion of Rhodamine 6G into nanoGUMBOS, i.e., nanomaterials derived from a group of uniform materials based on organic salts (GUMBOS), led to selective chemotherapeutic toxicity for cancer cells over normal cells. Herein, we investigate the chemotherapeutic activity of GUMBOS derived from four different rhodamine derivatives, two bearing an ester group, i.e., Rhodamine 123 (R123) and SNAFR-5, and two bearing a carboxylic acid group, i.e., rhodamine 110 (R110) and rhodamine B (RB). In this …

White ‘Alliahs:’ The Creation & Perpetuation Of The ‘Wise Indian’ Trope, Jessica Mehta

PSU McNair Scholars Online Journal

Search engine optimization (SEO) and search engine auto-fill features allows us to see how people search online, and the words they use, in real-time. Anonymous querying equates to anonymity, and by nature when we input key words or key phrases in search engines like Google we use succinct, brief, and to-the-point queries. What does this mean for how we search for Native American or “Indian” results? A 2019 SEO and keyword/phrase analysis revealed that the notorious “wise Indian trope” (similar to the “magical negro” trope) is still very prevalent today, particularly when comparing the keyword “wise” paired with non-Native races. …

Examining The Narratives Of Military Sexual Trauma Survivors, Maria Carolina GonzáLez-Prats

Dissertations and Theses

Background: The return of military sexual trauma (MST) to the national spotlight has been fueled by a combination of continued reports of sexual assaults across the various military branches, increased visibility of sexual abuse scandals in the media, and mounting calls for accountability from veteran advocacy groups and legislators. Although there have been numerous reforms implemented by the military, there still exists a significant gap between the military's official efforts and the reality of the survivors' experiences. Consequently, more research is needed to understand how survivors perceive the military's efforts, how these efforts affect their experiences, and how future …

“Keep Portland Weird”? Carnivalesque Elements In The Rebranding Of The Portland Book Festival, Rachel Noorda, Kathi Inman Berens

English Faculty Publications and Presentations

The Portland Book Festival, originally known as “Wordstock,” is the main annual literary event in Portland, Oregon. It is also an increasingly prominent literary festival in the United States. The branding shift from “Wordstock” to “Portland Book Festival” in 2018 unearths key tensions, hierarchies, subversions, and cultural changes in the communicative and social functions of the Festival. The essay identifies transactional and transformative aspects of the Festival. Bank of America’s festival-naming “title” sponsorship, the partnership of cultural heritage organizations, and Portland place branding offer transactional stability for the Festival, where parties give and get in kind. The Festival’s temporary affective …

Self-Disclosure And Physiological Responses Among Adults Who Stutter, Sulema Rodriguez, Megann Mcgill

PSU McNair Scholars Online Journal

Purposes: (1) To explore self-disclosure, physiological and affective responses in easy and difficult speaking situations, (2) to investigate physiological and affective responses in self-disclosure and no self-disclosure speaking contexts, (3) to examine types of self-disclosure statements used along with physiological responses, (4) and to gain an understanding of reasons why and how adults who stutter choose to self-disclose or not self-disclose about their stuttering.

Method: Four adults who stutter were randomly assigned to self-disclosure and non self-disclosure speaking contexts. Heart rate, skin conductance, and affective responses were measured during the following focus areas: 1) start baseline, 2) anticipation of the …

Follow The (Electronic) Money: How Bitcoin And Blockchain Technology Are "Shaking The System", Jim Robert Mignano

Dissertations and Theses

Bitcoin is the first digital medium to allow global, "purely peer-to-peer" exchange. At the height of the Great Recession, Bitcoin's pseudonymous creator introduced the electronic cash to sidestep political and economic institutions. Today, it is praised as an opportunity for the unbanked, a liberating force, and a pioneering technology. It is also infamously associated with volatility, illicit activities, and profligate energy consumption.

Bitcoin has also flown under the radar of political science, whereas computer scientists, economists, and legal scholars have written extensively about it. To address the gap in the literature, I describe Bitcoin as an actor in global affairs, …

2020 Commencement Program And Video Highlights, Commencement

Commencement Archives 2020-29

The complete program for Portland State University's 2020 virtual Commencement ceremonies.

Streaming video (.mp4, 32 minutes) includes Portland State University congratulations and messages from the President, Provost, Board of Trustees, Alumni Association, and keynotes from a graduate and faculty member.

Examining Mindfulness Training For Teachers: Theoretical And Methodological Extensions Of Intervention Effectiveness, Jaiya Rae Choles

Dissertations and Theses

This dissertation seeks to extend the field of mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) for teachers, both theoretically and methodologically. The first study is a systematic review conducted of randomized controlled trials examining the effectiveness of MBIs for school teachers. The purpose of Study 1 was to determine theoretical and methodological next steps for the field. Results of the theoretical review indicate more empirical evidence is needed examining mindfulness practices used in the interventions, distal impacts on classrooms and students, and mediation tests connecting proximal and distal outcomes. The methodological review indicates that more studies should focus on measuring the fidelity of implementation …

The Hidden Paths Of Category Research: Climbing New Heights And Slippery Slopes, Giusseppe Delmestri, Filippo Carlo Wezel, Elizabeth Goodrick, Marvin Washington

Business Faculty Publications and Presentations

Category research has flourished over the last decade. While this body of work has prioritized the behavioral and economic consequences of stable classification systems, the papers in this special issue challenge this orientation by highlighting the importance of category dynamics for improving our understanding of markets and fields. We show how these papers support the emergence of category maintenance, the recategorization of mature categories, and the consolidation of new categories as understudied phenomena and as the next research challenges to pursue. After connecting the main findings of the papers in this special issue into a unified process model, we discuss …

Weekend Spanish Immersion Camp: A Non-Traditional Teaching World Language To Middle School American Students, Jorge Oscar Ramirez

Dissertations and Theses

The nature of today's global economy demands that students demonstrate high levels of proficiency in foreign languages. To meet global demand, most countries around the world are including comprehensive world language instruction in their educational systems beginning at an early age. The increasingly multi-lingual nature of culture within and beyond the Unites States. is escalating the importance of immersing students in world languages as early as possible to ensure a high level of written and oral foreign language skill proficiency by the time students graduate from high school. However, most American students do not have the opportunity to study a …

Cascade 30: Historic Columbia River Highway Active Transportation Network Plan, Jeff Broderick, Timothy Dubois, Seth Healy, Henry Miller, Elisha Ransom, Justin Sherrill

Master of Urban and Regional Planning Workshop Projects

While Apiary Planning Group created design concepts for the Oregon Department of Transportation, it should be noted these are only design concepts, not a final proposal. Funding to commence formal planning, engineering, and construction processes to implement these ideas has not been identified. No timeline to build any of these concepts has been established. Apiary Planning Group hopes these preliminary concepts will encourage and inspire jurisdictions, community groups, residents and businesses to work together to create a gateway to Hood River that honors the past while creating new, safer and accessible transportation opportunities in the future.

Settler Colonial Curriculum In Carlisle Boarding School: A Historical And Personal Qualitative Research Study, Patrick Gerard Eagle Staff

Dissertations and Theses

This dissertation research study brings together a historical account and one scholar's personal and family stories of how Indigenous children were stolen and sent to the first Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) boarding schools and tribal schools. In the case of the researcher's family, the educational experiences at Carlisle Indian Industrial School immediately started a traumatic assimilation process on Indigenous children that instilled generational trauma for them and their descendants. At these schools, Indigenous children were forced to conform to a foreign European school designed to abolish their Indigenous identity that demanded they give up their language and culture to …

The Role Of Strategic Governance In Reducing Infant Mortality Under Crisis Conditions, Lynn Christine Finley

Dissertations and Theses

The infant mortality rate (IMR) in some developing countries has decreased faster than the global average even though these countries lack strong economic growth, good governance, and democracy (often acknowledged precursors to improved health outcomes). What accounts for the improvement of the IMR in the absence of these traditional pathways to health gains? Some scholars suggest that the concept of "strategic governance" might help direct attention to intermediary factors that reduce neonatal deaths in countries that experience crisis conditions. The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate the set of governance practices that have reduced IMR in two such …

Factors Affecting Clinical Research Enrollment Among Individuals With Alzheimer's Disease And Related Dementias, Nicole Grace Bouranis

Dissertations and Theses

The need to increase ADRD research participation has become more pressing as the prevalence of ADRD increases. Nearly 70,000 Oregonians and 7 million people in the United States live with ADRD, and this number is expected to increase by 200% by 2050 without identification of an intervention to halt its increase. Developing mechanisms for effective care and treatment depends on implementing research with numerous participants. Historically, ADRD research programs have had difficulty recruiting and enrolling individuals into studies for a variety of reasons. Given low recruitment rates, the interest in researching and evaluating effective strategies to recruit specifically for ADRD …

Animal Magic, Secret Spells, And Green Power: More-Than-Human Assemblages Of Children's Storytelling, Angela Molloy Murphy

Dissertations and Theses

Early childhood settings have become contested spaces, or sites of struggle, between economic and sociocultural interests disputing their purpose. Recent years have shown increased pressure on children in early education settings to demonstrate predetermined learning outcomes, which (a) limits the scope of what is possible in the classroom, (b) narrows the range of what learning is considered valid, and (c) privileges the experience and values of the dominant culture, thereby determining who and what matters in early childhood settings. Thus, in the current education climate where conventional knowledges are routinely privileged, unconventional knowledges and small stories from children's lives are …

Assembly 2020, Portland State University Art And Social Practice

Assembly

Since 2014, the Portland State University Art and Social Practice MFA students have put on an annual multi-day gathering of participatory events, discussions, and presentations highlighting our collaborative work and inspirations. To create this gathering, students select various sites around Portland, OR, in which to make and cultivate projects through existing relationships, curiosity, and chance encounters. Typically this has led us to many places around the city including a community center, city hall, a school, a panadería, a river, a senior center, and more.

This year is different.

This book archives a moment in which we can’t create that in-person …

The Library Has Infinite Streaming Content, But Are Users Infinitely Content? The Library Catalog Vs. Vendor Platform Discovery, Jian Wang, Elsa Loftis

Library Faculty and Staff Publications and Presentations

Despite the widespread adoption of streaming video by academic libraries, there has been little discussion about how video content is discovered and accessed through the library catalog as compared to vendor platforms. This article explores the current status of video resources in the library catalog to better understand how users find and access streaming content. MARC records were evaluated, and searches were performed to gauge issues related to metadata quality and its impact on discovery. The study reveals new trends in how users access streaming content for teaching, learning, and research.

Academic Library Instruction, Evidence-Based Practice, And Social Workers: An Exploratory Survey, Kimberly D. Pendell, Ericka Kimball

Library Faculty and Staff Publications and Presentations

When social work students graduate and move into their professional practice, they also move into a vastly different information landscape than that of the academic environment. To better understand the use of evidence-based practice (EBP) and information sources in practice, the authors performed a national survey of social workers. This survey provides a snapshot of how frequently social workers employ EBP, their use of research articles and other information resources, and their prior library instruction. The researchers make recommendations for increased consideration of the practice environment in library instruction, open access advocacy, and outreach to the field.

Teacher As Stranger: Unfinished Pathways With Critical Pedagogy, Caroline Sinkinson

Communications in Information Literacy

In 2010, Accardi, Drabinski, and Kumbier published the edited collection Critical Library Instruction, which marked a turn to more broadly integrate critical theory into the practice and literature of librarianship. This article looks back ten years to trace how critical pedagogy continues to provoke librarians' reflective measurement of the coherence between theory and practice, whether in the classroom or in advocacy for open education. With Paulo Freire’s notion of unfinishedness and Maxine Greene’s metaphor of ’teacher as stranger,' the article explores the nature of teaching as a continuously reflective and creative act.

That Was Then, This Is Wow: A Case For Critical Information Literacy Across The Curriculum, Margaret Rose Torrell

Communications in Information Literacy

This article applies a Writing across the Curriculum approach to Critical Library Instruction. The information landscape has drastically shifted over the past ten years, altering the ways we perform, interact with, access, and understand research. These changes call for critical library instruction programs that are more robust and sustained than the one- or two-shot critical library instruction lesson I had described in 2010. However, college classroom practices, due to a variety of challenges, have been slow to adapt to this need. In this article written from my perspective as an English teacher, I identify the central place of critical information …

Building A Critical Culture: How Critical Librarianship Falls Short In The Workplace, Jennifer A. Ferretti

Communications in Information Literacy

Critical librarianship, or critlib, has made its way into the mainstream of library and information science through conferences, scholarly publications, social media, and other outlets. Over the past 10 years critical library instruction specifically has continued to be a much presented and published topic. Classes and other groups that come through our libraries are opportunities for us to teach, learn, and empower. The care and critical perspectives we bring into the classroom are necessary, but are we also fostering this type of environment in the workplace? Are we doing enough to turn the critical lens on ourselves? As a woman …

Practicing Distance, Jeff Kasper

Practicing Distance

Practicing Distance is a multi-part guide for preparing for our futures together post-quarantine. Each part offers a series of short practices* beginning with an introduction to the four proxemic distances: intimate, personal, social, public. What follows are guided creative exercises to engage with solo, with a partner, or a small group, in imagined physical proximity during the time of the pandemic and beyond. This guide is adapted from the ongoing development of art and design-based tools used in peer-to-peer care circles, workshops, and social spaces for queer and disabled folks, survivors and allies, from 2016-present. Jeff Kasper also leads workshops …

The Pacific Sentinel, June 2020, Portland State University. Student Publications Board

The Pacific Sentinel

Editor: Jake Johnson

Articles in this issue include:

• Letter from the Editor
• The Shift to Remote Learning
• Added Punishment (Analysis)
• Oregon Reopens
• Remarks from the Author on “Josh Cohen”
• Kill the Death Penalty
• Grateful PowerPoint Grad
• Virtual Commencement Blues
• Postpone Don’t Cancel
• Neoliberalism Is the Disease
• No Time to Change
• Why You Should Bake Sourdough
• Skateboarding During Quarantine
• Virus of Nihilism
• The Trolls Have Killed Cinema… Maybe
• Tiger King for a Day
• Cultural Food Appropriation
• Unions on the Silver Screen

Iterable Ciphers For Insurrection, Dolsy Smith

Communications in Information Literacy

This piece situates the project of critique in relation to the idea of library instruction as labor and the library as an organization. If the laborer can come to reflect on the conditions of their labor, thereby achieving a measure of autonomy even at the grindstone, it's also possible that the critical subject can be induced or coerced to labor on behalf of the organization. In the attenuation of organized forms of solidarity at the workplace, the organizations that employ us demand more and more of their workers' time, energy, and commitment. In this piece, I surface these tensions in …

Critical Library Instruction, Causing Trouble, And Institutionalization, Maura Seale

Communications in Information Literacy

This essay considers the institutionalization of critical library instruction in the decade since the publication of Critical Library Instruction: Theories & Methods. Drawing on the work of Sara Ahmed and Rod Ferguson, I suggest that because library instruction is marginalized within librarianship, critical library instruction can and has become institutionalized within the profession. The institutionalization of critical library instruction represents the management of the wider-ranging and more troublesome critiques of critical librarianship. The marginality of critical library instruction, however, means that it continues to function as a site of troublemaking.