Digital Commons Network^™

Exploring Associations Between Mental Disorder And Creativity, David A. Romero Mora

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Mental disorder has been misunderstood and misrepresented throughout history, leading mental health research to be severely behind where it needs to be. Years of misinformation, over-medicalization, negative rhetoric, and stigmatization at the hands of the very same institutions that were believed to care for mental disorder have kept this misunderstanding alive. Further, studies throughout history have failed to look at the nuances of mental health, prioritizing generalizability. This thesis explores the relationship between mental disorder and creative expression, how other factors like cultural discourse and cognitive processes inform this relationship, as well as how analyzing this relationship can provide a …

Bilingualsim In The Workplace: How Work Attitudes Influence Burnout And Turnover Intentions, Andrea Del Aguila

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Understanding whether language status functions as a risk or protective factor for employee well-being and retention is essential for developing organizational policies that support workers from varied demographic backgrounds. This study examined how work attitudes such as job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and work engagement are seen among bilingual and monolingual workers and how these outcomes relate to employee burnout and turnover intentions. An outside researcher from Talent Metrics Consulting collected data via an online survey utilizing previously validated measures of job satisfaction, organizational commitment, burnout, work engagement, and turnover intentions. Participants were recruited through online advertising and social sampling obtaining …

From Recruitment To Breach: The Impact Of Employment-At-Will On Psychological Contracts, Krystal N. Porlles

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Employment-at-will is the default legal framework governing most private-sector employment relationships in the United States, yet little research has examined how explicit employment-at-will language influences applicants’ psychological expectations before organizational entry. Drawing on signaling theory and psychological contract theory, the present study investigated whether the inclusion of an employment-at-will statement in a job advertisement affected relational psychological contract development, anticipated job insecurity, organizational attractiveness, perceptions of psychological contract breach, emotional reactions, and withdrawal intentions. Undergraduate students (N = 253) were recruited through the University of Central Florida’s SONA research participation system. After data screening, the final analytic sample consisted of …

Investigating The Role Of Traditional Chinese Herbal Medicine For Cancer Symptom Management In Older Adults: A Rapid Review, Isabelle C. Karshner

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Background: Patients with cancer often experience symptoms related to disease, complications, and treatment. One potential method of alleviating these symptoms is traditional Chinese herbal medications (TCHM). This rapid review explores the role of traditional Chinese herbal medications in treating cancer-related symptoms in older adults.

Purpose: The purpose of this rapid review is to gain and provide a better understanding of the effects of TCHM on cancer-symptom management in the older adult population. This review explores the association between TCHM and effects on cancer symptoms in older adults, including interactions, toxicity, and signs/symptoms of TCHM use that may be useful information …

Myth To Mindset: Comparing Perceptions Of Feminine Leadership In Hinduism And Christianity, Maya Arangath

High Impact Practices Student Showcase Spring 2026

This research project investigates the intersection of religion and feminine leadership by comparing barriers in Hinduism and Christianity found in their sacred texts. The purpose of the study is to identify if the customs followed in each tradition affects women in positions of authority in modern day. To uncover that, this project will use a two-part mixed methods approach. First, a primary source comparative analysis will be completed, followed by an in-depth interview focusing on the living theology. A key takeaway from the study so far is the nuanced ways each religion shows feminism. The study suggests that feminism is …

Constrained Freedom: Economic Strain, Time Control, And Perceived Autonomy In Life, Lorena E. Black

High Impact Practices Student Showcase Spring 2026

Autonomy is often framed as an individual capacity rooted in personal choice, discipline, and self-determination, with dominant cultural narratives positioning freedom as something earned through effort and responsibility. This study challenges that assumption by examining autonomy as a socially structured and unequally distributed condition shaped by material and temporal constraints. Drawing on classical and contemporary sociological frameworks—including Marx’s analysis of labor and material dependence, Weber’s account of disciplined rationality, and Antonio Gramsci’s concept of cultural hegemony—this research positions perceived autonomy as an outcome produced through economic and institutional arrangements rather than solely through individual will. While existing literature has extensively …

Helping The Whole Heart, Aashna A. Shah

High Impact Practices Student Showcase Spring 2026

My service-learning project, “Helping the Whole Heart,” focuses on my second semester volunteering with Shepherd’s Hope, a nonprofit organization that provides free healthcare to uninsured and underinsured adults in Central Florida. The purpose of my project was to support the clinic while learning more about healthcare access, service, and community responsibility. During my shifts, I helped greet patients, check them in, prepare charts, organize paperwork, and assist the clinic team wherever I was needed. Through this experience, I learned that healthcare is about more than just medical treatment. It is also about patience, communication, compassion, and making patients feel respected. …

Women In Industrial Engineering Leadership And Barriers To Advancement, Fiorella Barney

High Impact Practices Student Showcase Spring 2026

This research investigates how organizational and cultural barriers influence the advancement of women into leadership positions within industrial engineering. Despite being one of the more gender-balanced engineering disciplines at the entry level, industrial engineering remains largely male-dominated in leadership, and this project set out to understand why that gap persists and what sustains it.

To explore this question, I conducted a review of seven peer-reviewed sources organized around five themes: the scope of underrepresentation, organizational barriers, gendered workplace culture, early career pipeline effects, and attrition. I then conducted a qualitative, semi-structured interview with a woman who began her career as …

How Do The Interrogation Strategies Of Women Detectives Differ In Style And Efficacy From Their Male Counterparts?, Sarah M. Quinones

High Impact Practices Student Showcase Spring 2026

This research proposal seeks to examine recorded interrogation footage and in-depth interviews of professional interrogators to analyze how their interrogation styles and efficacies differ between men and women. There is an imminent need for a reformed, standardized, and research-backed interrogation system to improve the efficacy and discriminatory habits of the justice system. The proposed hypotheses include:

• Transformational interrogation styles yield more cooperative and informative responses than transactional interrogation styles. 

• Because women’s interrogation styles more often align with transformational leadership patterns, their interrogations exhibit higher efficacies.

These hypotheses were drawn following an extensive literature review of the current academic contributions, both …

The Adjustment Of Autistic First-Generation Students To Higher Education, Paris J. Cumba

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The purpose of the current study is to investigate how first-generation students on the autism spectrum adjust to higher education compared to their continuing generation and neurotypical peers through the lens of intersectionality. Previous research has studied how first-generation students and autistic students transition into college environments, but little research has explored how these identities intersect and affect college adjustment.

For this study, 189 undergraduate students completed a survey that measured different dimensions of college adjustment, such as academic motivation, self-efficacy, and current life satisfaction. ANOVA tests showed that there was no significant interaction between first-generation status and autism status …

Barriers To Healthcare For Traditionally-Aged Lgbq+ College Students, Parker Long

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Seeking and receiving high-quality healthcare are key components of healthy living. Greater access to high-quality healthcare is associated with higher quality of life (Bunker, 2001). Despite the many benefits of quality healthcare, many people face barriers to accessing quality healthcare, resulting in poorer physical and mental health outcomes (Jatrana & Crampton, 2021). Individuals who identify as LGBQ+ face serious health disparities as a marginalized group. The current research was designed to examine and address these specific barriers to accessing high-quality healthcare among LGBQ+ traditionally-aged college students in order to inform ways to improve access to care. Specifically, this study investigated …

Fear, Uncertainty, And The Chilling Effect: A Case Study Of Organizational Racialized Omission, Annie Jones

Graduate Studies Theses and Dissertations 2026

Florida passed House Bill 7 in 2022 and Senate Bill 266 in 2023, both policies that restrict how race and racism are discussed and taught in the public higher education setting. Although scholars of race and racism contend that colorblind ideology drives the “new racism,” the U.S. is experiencing a resurgence in similar curriculum bans explicitly based on topics related to race and racism. With these trends has emerged a need to understand how explicitly racialized policies fit within the “new racism” framework. Using Victor Ray’s Theory of Racialized Organizations, this study analyzes how colorblind ideology and racialized threat are …

Developing A System Dynamics Framework For Sustained Digital Transformation, Quintal Battle

Graduate Studies Theses and Dissertations 2026

Despite significant organizational investments, more than 70% (Ellmer et al., 2025) of digital transformation initiatives fail. The existing literature evaluates transformation mechanisms as separate factors rather than as interacting, evolving feedback systems. This dissertation addresses this gap by developing and validating a system dynamics framework for sustained digital transformation. Guided by three research questions, the study examined the mechanisms that enable or constrain transformation, identified mechanisms distinctive to digital transformation contexts, and evaluated how existing change management frameworks guide transformation efforts. The study followed a six-phase methodology that combined a systematic literature review of peer-reviewed studies, empirical cases, causal loop …

Perspectives Of Poetry: Peering Into Poetry And Aphasia, Kristian M. Perez

Graduate Studies Theses and Dissertations 2026

People with aphasia often experience significant barriers to communication, emotional expression, and participation in meaningful life activities following stroke or neurological injury. Although poetry and creative expression have been explored in broader therapeutic contexts, limited research has examined how people with aphasia perceive poetry. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the perspectives of people with aphasia regarding definitions of poetry, level of interest in poetry and the factors influencing said interest. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with adults with aphasia recruited through convenience sampling. Participants responded to questions before and after exposure to the poem Trust by Mark …

Examining Patient Safety Culture Trends In U.S. Healthcare Through A Multi-Year Analysis, Hassan Alabdullah

Graduate Studies Theses and Dissertations 2026

Patient Safety Culture (PSC) is recognized as a cornerstone of healthcare quality and a key determinant of patient outcomes. Despite the Institute of Medicine’s early calls to establish safety-oriented systems, evidence on the long-term stability of PSC in U.S. hospitals has remained limited. This dissertation addresses this gap through a multi-year evaluation of PSC using the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture (HSOPSC v1.0) and advanced statistical methods. Drawing on one of the largest national datasets—comprising over 993,000 healthcare providers from 1,601 U.S. hospitals across three survey cycles (2013–2020)—the study employed a longitudinal repeated cross-sectional design. Analyses combined descriptive statistics, …

Mental Health Effects Of Post-Intensive Care Syndrome In Adult Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome Survivors Hospitalized During Or After The Covid-19 Pandemic, Brooke M. Leggiero

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Introduction: Post-Intensive Care Syndrome (PICS) is "new or worsening problems in physical, cognitive, or mental health status arising after a critical illness and persisting beyond acute care hospitalization.” This study examined the prevalence of PICS mental health conditions in adult ARDS survivors hospitalized between 2020 and 2025 and differences in mental health conditions between those hospitalized during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods: This retrospective, descriptive, cross-sectional study enrolled adult survivors hospitalized between 2020 and 2025 who required mechanical ventilation and were at least 1 month removed from the intensive care unit (ICU). Individuals with prior brain injury were excluded. …

Illuminating Those Who Lurk In The Shadows: An Examination Of The Use Of Psychological Profiling In Identifying Violent Criminals In The Modern Age, Skylar R. Holmes

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This study examines the role of psychological profiling in apprehending violent criminals. Psychological profiling involves analyzing behavioral patterns at crime scenes, exploring the relationships between victims, and identifying characteristics and tendencies of offenders. It is currently used by many law enforcement agencies across the country to narrow down a pool of potential suspects and direct researchers, making the most of the limited manpower available. There is, however, a significant limitation in the literature and available evidence that suggests its tenets may be based on intuition and anecdotal evidence purported by investigators, subject to internal bias and thus should not be …

An Investigation Of The Impact Of Gender And Race On The Stigmatization Of Borderline Personality Disorder, Joshua Samet

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Stigma surrounding mental health reduces treatment-seeking behaviors and can worsen symptoms. Research on stigma surrounding borderline personality disorder (BPD) has shown that race and gender can impact the nature of the stigma associated with the disorder; however, less is known about the interaction between the two. This study investigated if stigma varies when considering both the race and gender of the stigmatized individual simultaneously. 218 undergraduate students read one of four vignettes describing either a Black male, White male, Black female, or White female, then completed the Attribution Questionnaire-20 (AQ-20) stigma scale. The results indicate that there is a statistically …

Perceptions, Expectations, And Attitudes About Adolescent Telepsychiatry Among Indian American Family Caregivers, Udayvir Jalf

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Adolescent mental health concerns have risen sharply in the United States. The COVID-19 pandemic marked a significant turning point in mental health care access, with telehealth having become a central mode of care delivery. With adolescent telehealth, caregiver involvement has shown to improve treatment adherence and outcomes. Little is known, however, about how Indian American caregivers experience and navigate their adolescent’s virtual mental health care. This qualitative study investigated the perceptions, expectations, and attitudes of Indian American family caregivers regarding adolescent telepsychiatry and caregivers’ involvement. In depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with Indian American caregivers of adolescents who completed at …

Factors Related To Deviant Behavior, Chiara S. Popp

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Understanding the factors that contribute to deviant behavior across the life span remains an important goal in psychology and criminology. Guided by life course theory, the present study examined whether childhood trauma, social connectedness, perceived childhood socioeconomic status, and key life transitions are associated with deviant behavior in adulthood. The purpose of this research was to better understand how early life experiences and social relationships may shape behavioral outcomes later in life. A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with adult participants in the United States, aged 18 to 55. Participants completed measures assessing adverse childhood experiences, perceived childhood socioeconomic status, …

Industrial And Organizational Psychology Researchers’ Positive And Negative Experiences With The Peer-Review Process, Alexa Weaver

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Peer review plays a critical role in advancing the field of psychology; however, limited empirical research has examined psychologists’ experiences with the peer review process. The present study investigated both positive and negative peer review experiences among industrial and organizational (I/O) psychologists and assessed the prevalence of specific reviewer behaviors. A two-phase survey design was administered via Qualtrics. Study 1 employed open-ended questions to identify recurring themes in researchers’ experiences with peer review. Thematic analysis revealed distinct positive and negative patterns of reviewer behavior, which informed the development of Study 2.

Study 2 quantitatively assessed the prevalence of behaviors associated …

Studying Chronotypes And Their Role In Sleep And Mental Health: A Scoping Review, Evan Nguyen

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Sleep patterns remain a significant public health concern globally, impacting several aspects of life, including mental health. This scoping review examined how chronotype and circadian typology predict mental health, with sleep quality serving as a crucial mediator. While the importance of sleep is widely acknowledged, there is a lack of studies specifically investigating chronotype-aligned interventions to reduce psychological distress. To address the shortage, a comprehensive review of the peer-reviewed literature was conducted, identifying six papers for analysis. These studies mostly utilized cross-sectional designs to assess diverse global groups, including university students, healthcare workers, and military personnel. The results indicate that …

Honor Of Culture, Gender Socialization And Behavioral Outcomes In College Students, Ana Maria Moreno Henriquez

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Honor of culture is a culturally based concept that involves holding a strong defense for  the dignity and reputation on one’s family and self. This thesis focuses on the relationship between this honor of culture and gender socialization in the behavioral outcomes of college students, who are in a highly important learning phase of discovering their identity and independence from familial values. Participants were University of Central Florida (UCF) students who completed an online Qualtrics survey, which included an Honor of Culture Scale (Rodriguez Mosquera et al., 2016), Gender Role Beliefs Scale (Kerr & Holden, 1996), the Short Dark Triad …

The Role Of Resistance Training In Managing Menopause-Related Changes, Alyson K. Strauss

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Resistance training serves as a critical non-pharmacological strategy for mitigating the physiological and psychological declines associated with the menopausal transition. This natural biological phase, marked by declining estrogen levels, typically leads to accelerated bone mineral density loss, sarcopenia, metabolic regulation disturbance, and heightened mood disturbances. To evaluate the efficacy of targeted exercise interventions, a systematic review was conducted following PRISMA guidelines. From an initial pool of 60 relevant articles, 13 studies met the specific inclusion criteria, focusing on structured resistance training protocols for perimenopausal, menopausal, and postmenopausal cohorts.

The synthesis of these studies indicates that resistance training is a highly …

Life In Laughter: Comedy’S Impact On Student Health And Success, Julia Weinstein

Honors Undergraduate Theses

College students face rising rates of anxiety, depression, and stress, highlighting the need for accessible, stigma-free wellness interventions. While comedy is often seen as entertainment, research indicates laughter produces measurable psychological and physiological benefits, including reduced cortisol and increased endorphins. Life in Laughter, a creative-research hybrid project, investigates how live and digital comedy experiences affect college students’ mood, stress, and sense of belonging. Using mixed methods, data were collected through anonymous audience surveys, app-based reflections via JoyScroll, and interviews, supplemented by a mini-documentary. Findings suggest humor functions as both an emotional regulation tool and a means of fostering …

Looking Beyond Traditional Therapy: The Promising Alternative Of Ketamine-Assisted Treatments In Improving The Quality Of Life Of Veterans, Noa Gutmann

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in United States veterans has a long history of treatment with standard care interventions and therapies. Unfortunately, many modern-day veterans experience treatment resistance and comorbid depressive symptoms that have yet to be resolved. This results in suicidal ideation, hospital readmission, and high treatment dropout rates of care plans. Recent evidence has shown a positive impact of ketamine, and esketamine, therapy on PTSD and depressive symptoms severity. Although, the outcomes and generalizability of this emerging therapy, compared to standard care, are not fully elucidated on. The purpose of this literary review was to further examine the current …

Lenses Of Faith And Culture: Christian College Students' Perspectives On Infertility, Mary Samuels

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This thesis investigates the perspectives of Christian college students on infertility, adoption, and assisted reproductive technologies through focus group discussions. Following the 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Supreme Court decision, 13 states have established a total abortion ban, and 28 states have established abortion bans based on gestational duration. This study materializes because recently developed state-level abortion laws may impact in vitro fertilization (IVF) access if states expand legal protection of fetal personhood. Previous research has described that while Christian traditions demonstrate cultural pronatalism and opposition to abortion, Christian individuals’ concepts of infertility and views of treatments such …

Cultural Schemas Regarding Resilience And Strength In Blacks: Implications For Well-Being And Academic Success, Aniya G. Ashford

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Culturally shaped strength-based coping frameworks among Black college students, particularly the Strong Black Woman Schema and John Henry’s Active Coping, are associated with responses to racism-related stress and academic pressure, yet the ways these internalized expectations interact with emotional regulation, perceived cultural norms, and academic functioning remain unclear. Prior research has primarily examined these constructs in isolation or focused on psychological distress or physical health outcomes, often relying on single-method self-report designs that do not capture how culturally embedded coping processes are reflected in lived experiences; as a result, limited work has integrated identity-based schemas, behavioral coping strategies, and narrative …

Assessing Physiological Arousal During A Standard Versus Inverted Vigilance Task Using Heart Rate Variability, Taha Riaz

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Background: Vigilance tasks require sustained attention over long periods of time while monitoring for rare critical signals. Inverted or reverse vigilance/sustained attention response tasks (SART) may impose greater response-control demands. Although prior studies have compared these tasks behaviorally, there are fewer investigations examining whether they differ in physiological arousal as indexed by heart rate variability (HRV).

Method: Undergraduate students from UCF completed a variation of either the X-CPT (standard vigilance task) or the CPT-3 (inverted/SART) task. Electrocardiogram data was recorded continuously. Data from 40 participants were analyzed. HRV was indexed using frequency domain analysis using the low-frequency to high-frequency ratio …

The Relationship Between Heteronormativity, Shame- Proneness, Shame-Withdrawal, And Empathy In College- Aged Men, Megan M. Tang

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Due to rising social discourse regarding “the male loneliness epidemic,” this study aims to examine possible predictors of empathy in cisgender, heterosexual, college-aged males. Empathy promotes prosocial behavior and is necessary for healthy interpersonal interactions, which may be limited in male experiences due to adherence to heteronormative values and lower levels of self-disclosure in men. Shame is more likely to occur when men stray from traditional gender roles, and people are more likely to engage in social withdrawal behaviors when experiencing shame. Shame-proneness has also been shown to inhibit empathetic behavior. This study explores two hypotheses, the first of which …