Digital Commons Network^™

Perception Or Reality? The Perception Of Abusive Supervision In The Workplace, Paul M. Amari

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Most previous research on workplace mistreatment has proceeded under the assumption that the various forms of mistreatment are uniformly perceived as negative by recipients. Abusive supervision is one form of mistreatment that has rarely ever been examined through a lens of ambiguity. The question many researchers have failed to ask is whether it is reality that every questionable act labeled as abusive is truly abuse, or such perceptions vary across individuals. And for the individuals perceiving the act (the target), what individual differences are influencing their judgement? The purpose of the study was to explore the influence of individual differences …

Rural Disparities In Lung Cancer Mortality: An Ecologic Study In Florida, Batel Amouyal

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in the United States and worldwide. The higher mortality among patients with lung cancer is related to cases being diagnosed in late stage where treatment is limited. Urban and rural health outcomes are potentially influenced by differences in accessibility to health care services. We are unaware of existing research examining geographic differences in or factors related to lung cancer mortality in Florida. Therefore, this study aims to examine lung cancer mortality differences between urban and rural counties in Florida. We examined all 67 counties in Florida to investigate if a rural …

Women As Nontraditional Terrorists, Giorgi Beruashvili

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Terrorist organizations have always been predominantly dominated by male members in numbers of participants, supporters, and leaders. Despite men having the majority of the roles, oftentimes the world witnesses attack executed by female terrorists which deal a substantial amount of damage to the infrastructure and the peaceful civilians surrounding them. Furthermore, the sense of unpredictability and unpreparedness from the counterterrorist forces and the general public adds up to the overall advantage women possess in the field of terrorism over men. Considering these observations, one can argue that women have grown to be far more dangerous and successful in the field …

Public Opinion On Intellectual Property, Danielle K. Buckles

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Several studies have tracked the rise in music piracy following the creation of Napster, analyzing the attitudes and behaviors associated. But new developments, such as streaming services and social media, have transformed the relationship between creators and users. This paper seeks to revisit the topic, reexamine past results, and evaluate public opinion in this current technological landscape. Understanding the new attitudes and behaviors associated with illegal music downloading through a questionnaire reveal important implications for the future of intellectual property legislation. These findings give some insight into the perceptions of ownership over intangible property to hopefully improve consumer and industry …

Inter-Rater Reliability And Intra-Rater Reliability Of Synchronous Ultrasound Imaging And Electromyography Measure Of The Lumbopelvic-Hip Muscle Complex, Courtney Caputo

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine inter-rater and intra-rater reliability of synchronous ultrasound imaging and electromyography measures of lumbopelvic-hip muscle activity performed by a novice and an experienced investigator in healthy individuals. Electromyography (EMG) has served as the gold standard for quantification of onset of muscle activation; however, ultrasound imaging can visualize muscle activity when collected simultaneously. Methods: A novice and experienced investigator collected a series of 3 ultrasound images at rest and 3 M-mode clips during contraction of each muscle while EMG electrodes collected muscle activity. Muscles collected included: external oblique, erector spinae, rectus abdominis, gluteus …

Development Of An Environmental Disposition Scale: A Guide For Fostering Sustainable Behavior, Jady Chen

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Promoting sustainable behavior or environmentally responsible behavior poses challenges because there is no overarching solution for behavior changes. Both surveys and interventions are context specific, meaning behaviors do not necessarily influence other behaviors and the same values, norms, and beliefs do not necessarily translate to the same level of sustainable behavior. Because there are regional differences in ideologies in the United States, a country level approach to encourage sustainable behavior would not be as effective as having interventions that directly correlate with the motivations that encourage environmentally responsible behavior. A survey will be conducted with University of Central Florida undergraduate …

Who Participates In Academic Services?, Richard Colón

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Throughout the years the admission of Hispanic and or Latinx students to colleges and universities has risen dramatically. So much so that the relatively new concept of an HSI (Hispanic Serving Institute) was created; meaning that at least 25% of the student population of a university is Hispanic. This advancement for this Hispanic community is a huge advancement for the overall community, but how many of these Hispanic students are aware of the academic services that these universities offer. The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between the awareness of academic services and the participation and or …

Lights, Camera, Inaction: Relationship Management In The Film Industry Following Sexual Misconduct Accusations, Autumn Crouch

Honors Undergraduate Theses

In the wake of the #MeToo movement, how society responds to sexual misconduct allegations has greatly changed. It has had an effect on policy from the federal to the organizational level. Looking at overarching changes that came about after the movement is one thing but taking a look at consequences brought upon certain individuals who had allegations put against them is another. This thesis explores public relations (PR) strategies executed by prominent individuals in the film industry and their publicity teams following sexual misconduct accusations. PR at its core is about relationship management. So, this line of thought leads one …

Exploring Arts Integration In Language Arts Instruction For Elementary Education, Mary A. Dehner

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The purpose of this thesis is to provide insight on how arts integration in English language arts education increases engagement and achievement in students and teachers alike. Throughout my analysis of literature, local field research in two Central Florida public elementary schools, and my creation of a five-day arts-integrated writing unit, I found that arts integration, especially when utilizing Leonard Bernstein’s Artful Learning Method was observed to show a positive impact on students. Arts integration allowed for a child’s natural curiosity and instinct to create to take over, which created authentic learning experiences for the students. The research also demonstrated …

Effort Reward Imbalance In The Nursing Profession - A Novel Way Of Gathering Data, Dorailys Fagundo

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The effort-reward imbalance model allows us to see disparity in effort and reward and how this can be a predictor for a variety of constructs. The present study seeks to gather data utilizing the ERI modal in the nursing profession. Previous research has utilized the ERI model but methods for gathering data were not quick and efficient. This study seeks to utilize a database called Glassdoor to rapidly and effectively gather data. The researchers are interested in seeing the likelihood of nurses to recommend their company to a friend based on perceived effort and rewards. The sample included a random …

Using Integrated Thematic Units To Teach Social Studies In The Intermediate Grades Classroom, Noelle Frantz

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Teachers are asked every day to teach a variety of subjects to their students, but it is often challenging to find enough time in the day to teach every subject. Often, social studies is the subject that gets left out of the curriculum. The purpose of this project was to examine the research behind thematic units and determine their role as a strategy to teaching social studies in the intermediate grades classroom. I researched thematic units including how to create them and their benefits and challenges. Using the research, I then made a resource for teachers to create their own …

A Model Experiment To Investigate The Possibility Of Glyphosate Contamination In St. Kitts And Nevis, Winston Fu

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Glyphosate is a broad-spectrum herbicide that is used globally to combat the spread of weeds among crops. Not all countries around the world have been using the herbicide. For example, island countries such as Dominica and St. Kitts and Nevis do not use the herbicide on their crops. However, St. Kitts and Nevis imports food and other agricultural products from around the world, leading to the hypothesis that glyphosate is contaminating the soil through those imported products. The aim of this research project was to determine if glyphosate is present in the island country of St. Kitts and Nevis. A …

Underpricing In The Fintech Industry Compared To Non-Fintech Ipos, Kelsey A. Goss

Honors Undergraduate Theses

In this thesis, I investigate the amount of underpricing in FinTech companies compared to non-FinTech companies. Both data sets contain thirty companies spanning from 1993 to 2018. Each FinTech company is matched to a non-FinTech company by year and comparatively similar revenue. Prior research explores underpricing on different industries, but it hasn’t yet explored underpricing in the FinTech segment. The variables considered in this paper are offer price, close price, shares offered, number of banks involved, fees per share, and money left on the table. I find some evidence that the average amount of underpricing in both dollars and by …

Musical Cryptography Using Long Short-Term Memory Networks, Curtis Helsel

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Musical cryptography is a technique in which plain text messages are enciphered into a musical composition. Recently, a surge of music composition by means of machine learning have produced natural-sounding music that can be deemed as composed by humans. The combination of machine-generated music and enciphering a message into the composition is a logical step in musical cryptography. Outlined in this thesis is a method that incorporates the use of a specific type of recurrent neural network, Long Short-Term Memory, and a variant of the substitution cipher to form of symmetric-key cryptography system. Exploration was also completed to determine how …

The Welfare State In The Twentieth Century: A Case Study Of The Swedish Public Pension System, Oumaima Jaayfer

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This is an attempt at depicting welfare state developments in one of its most notable success stories: Sweden. As a major subsector of the Nordic country’s welfare state, this paper focuses on the evolution of social insurance, particularly the public old-age pension system from its liberal beginnings in 1913 all the way to 1998, when the novel three-tiered pension system was introduced. In addition to its policy emphasis, this paper examines the relationship between the welfare state and social democracy by studying the implications that cross class alliances and social reformism had on the political viability of the Swedish Social …

Variations In Diet Quality Among Undergraduate Students, William Johnson

Honors Undergraduate Theses

In order to prevent the onset of several chronic diseases, populations that exhibit poor dietary practices must be identified and educated on proper nutritional habits. This study used the pre-validated Rapid Eating Assessment for Participants – Shortened version (REAP-S) survey and a four-question demographic questionnaire to identify these populations among undergraduate students at the University of Central Florida. The participants were 171 students of at least 18 years of age who completed the 17-question online survey. The data collected indicated that significant differences in diet quality regarding consumption of fats and saturated fats exist between ages, class standings, and sexes …

The Role Of Expertise In Perceiving Emotions Through Kinematics, Kendahl E. Krause

Honors Undergraduate Theses

There has been much debate about how we perceive other people’s minds. Some theories, such as Theory of Mind, are based on the presumption that the minds of others are closed and inaccessible, requiring some form of inferential processing and mentalizing to understand. On the other hand, Direct Social Perception says that information about the mental states of others is readily available to perceive and requires no internal processing to understand. Taking either theory into account, it remains an open question if expertise plays a role in social perception. This study aimed to identify if experience in portraying emotions through …

Investigating The Effect Of Ethanol On Wnt7a And Its Potential Implications In Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, Erika Lytle

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASDs), are caused by maternal alcohol consumption during pregnancy [3]. FASD encompasses a wide variety of cardiac and neural anomalies, while also associated with improper limb development, abnormal craniofacial features, problems within the central nervous system (CNS), and disabilities in learning and communication. Gene-regulating FASDs have not been well studied during the crucial phases of early embryonic development. Genes within the Wnt/Beta-catenin pathway control a vast amount of embryonic developmental processes. Among them is the Wnt7a gene, a significant downstream gene regulator which positively controls neural stem cell proliferation and cardiomyocyte differentiation on a large scale …

The Evolution Of Substantive Due Process Throughout Time, Vitoria Olivo Factor

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Substantive due process has been of great importance to the decision of many Supreme Court cases since its beginning. Since its inception in Lochner v. New York,[1] the Supreme Court has used the theory of substantive due process in order to grant numerous rights to individuals and this theory has been interpreted differently by each Justice that has crossed its path.

This thesis will explain how recent changes in the composition of the United States Supreme Court make it likely that judicial opinions involving substantive due process will be decided differently. The United States Supreme Court’s future substantive …

Ensuring Positive Definiteness In Linear Viscoelastic Material Functions Based On Prony Series, Christopher D. Rehberg

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This thesis presents a method to correct for non-positive-definiteness in linear viscoelastic material functions. Viscoelastic material functions for anisotropic materials need to be interconverted in a matrix coefficient prony series form, with a requirement of positive definiteness. Fitting is usually done as a uniaxial prony series, resulting in scalar coefficients. When these uniaxial coefficients are placed in a coefficient matrix, the required positive definiteness cannot be guaranteed. For those matrices that do not meet this requirement, finding the nearest symmetric semi-positive definite form of the matrix results in a viable prony series matrix coefficient with the required positive definiteness. These …

Seaweed As A Carrier For Microplastics, Stephanie M. Rodriguez

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Analysis of seaweed as a vector for microplastics is an integral part of understanding the formation and deposition of micro-sized plastic waste in seawater. The project itself originated due to the influx of seaweed (and mismanaged plastic waste) residing on the shores of St. Kitts and Nevis and the constant deposition of plastic pollution intertwined within the seaweed. The natural occurrence of the two together lead to the consideration of fragmented plastics remaining on the seaweed. The objective of this research is to stain, identify, and quantify the concentration of microplastics sourced from both store-bought and environmental seaweed samples. A …

Creating A Sentence Frame Toolkit Based On Third Grade Writing Standards To Support The Writing Instruction Of Spanish-Speaking English Learners, Tanisha J. Rosa Le Bron

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Third grade general education teachers, particularly in Florida, will teach English learners (ELs) in their classroom who must participate in their English Language Arts writing classes at roughly the same pace as native English speakers in order to perform grade-level, standards-based writing tasks. For this reason, general education teachers must be equipped with helpful, research-based resources to support the ELs to become equally successful in writing instruction as their native-speaking peers. This thesis explored the use of sentence frames for improving the English skills of ELs as they start to understand and use the syntax of Standard English. As a …

Can General Strain Theory Be Used To Explain The Relationship Between Recidivism And Secure Placement?, Alessia R. Shaw

Honors Undergraduate Theses

There has been extensive research conducted on recidivism among serious juvenile offenders. This study examines juvenile recidivism through the lenses of General Strain Theory (GST). GST has been used in previous studies to explain recidivism, however, secure placement and its effect on juvenile mental health, has not been studied. The purpose of this study is to test for a relationship between emotional responses like anger and hostility and secure placement, utilizing the Pathways to Desistance data. I will also examine if anger and hostility act as a mediator between secure placement and recidivism. Pathways to Desistance was a prospective study …

Regulation Of The Egfr Epigenetic Landscape In Glioblastoma Multiforme, Anishaa Sivakumar

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) is the most lethal subtype of glioma (brain tumor), with a 5-year survival rate of merely 5.6% post diagnosis¹. The traditional study of glioblastoma has investigated the role of multiple genes in advancing its progression, including the upregulation of Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor (EGFR). However, there is at yet little research into the epigenetic factors that control EGFR, both in the precursor astrocytes and in glioblastomas themselves². EGFR and its regulation may play a significant role in the progression and development of GBM from astrocytes. Through modification of genomic pathways as observed in …

Genetic Control Of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Colonization In Helianthus Annuus, Katherine Stahlhut

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Plant symbiosis with arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi provides many benefits for plants, including increased nutrient uptake, drought tolerance, and belowground pathogen resistance. In order to have a better understanding of the genetic architecture of mycorrhizal symbiosis, we conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) by phenotyping a diversity panel of cultivated sunflower (Helianthus annuus) for root colonization under inoculation with the AM fungus Rhizophagus intraradices. This mapping panel consists of 261 inbred lines that capture approximately 90% of the genetic diversity present in the cultivated sunflower germplasm. Using a mixed linear model approach with a high-density genetic map, we …

Degradation From Cmas Infiltration In 7ysz Eb-Pvd Thermal Barrier Coatings, Zachary Stein

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The lifetime of the high temperature ceramic coating 7 wt.% yttria-stabilized zirconia (7YSZ) is reduced when calcium-magnesium-alumino-silicate (CMAS) particulates enters aero-engines during operation in a sandy or dusty environment, melts, and infiltrates into the coating. 7YSZ undergo both chemical and mechanical degradation from CMAS infiltration during cycling. Characterization methods with synchrotron X-ray diffraction (XRD) provides a non-destructive means to measure the impact of time and temperature on coating degradation with high spatial resolution of 7YSZ coatings infiltrated and annealed by CMAS for 1 hour and 10 hours as well as at 1225 °C and 1250 °C. Additionally, qualitative results of …

How Free Is "Free?": Restrictive Agency And Optimism, Mel A. Tornin

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This study explored the effect of restricting participants’ agentic choice on their levels of optimism. This study used the pre-test, post-test design to investigate the impact of non-agentic choice in meaningful scenarios on feelings of optimism. 147 participants completed a measure of optimism, were assigned to conditions of simulated choice, and were instructed to freely write about their decisions. The association between personality traits and optimism was also explored. Study findings showed that assigning participants to restrictive and agentic conditions had no effect on optimism. However, a significant negative correlation trait neuroticism and optimism was found. Content analyses run on …

Racial Bias And Juror Selection In Death Penalty Cases, Kaitlyn D. Wallace

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Across the country, African American defendants are being discriminated against in the criminal courts and by juries, particularly in capital cases.[1] This assertion is supported by two lines of research. First, an analysis of Supreme Court decisions focusing on the racial impact on voir dire. Second, social-legal studies on juror decision making have demonstrated legal and socio-legal histories providing evidence that demonstrate there is a racial bias in our system. Based on these findings, this paper sets forth several legal and policy recommendations to improve the fair adjudication of African American defendants charged with capital crimes.

[1] Jack Glaser, …

Obergefell V. Hodges: Majority Opinion Got The Analysis Wrong, But The Answer Right, Rumor Watts

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Although the U.S. Supreme Court reached the correct result in Obergefell v. Hodges, its substantive due process and equal protection analyses were wrong. First, the majority opinion discusses the concept of equal dignity, which has no legal definition nor has it been used in prior Supreme Court jurisprudence. The majority made another mistake in using substantive due process when Obergefell could have been decided on the basis of equal protection alone.

Despite these mistakes, there were parts of the opinion the Court did decide correctly. The end result -- that same-sex couples have the right to marry -- was the …

Ob/Gyn Women In A #Metoo World: Unraveling Agency, Gender Bias, And Gender Inequity In The Workplace, Corey L. Bazemore

Honors Undergraduate Theses

This research explores the visibility of women physicians, specifically in gynecology and obstetrics. It focuses upon their perspectives of gender inequity and sexual harassment within their broader profession and individual daily workplace. This study explores the medical and STEM women’s awareness and understanding of sexual and gender microaggressions within their professions by interviewing six women physicians. I analyze these narratives in relation to the #MeToo movement and how this movement gives visibility to the voices of women across workforces, including medicine, STEM, and other academic areas. This study shows the ongoing need to develop deeper conversations and interventions about women …