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Investigating The Intersection Of Teachers' Mathematical Anxiety According To Experience And Instructional Grade Level, Molly Greer Jan 2022

Investigating The Intersection Of Teachers' Mathematical Anxiety According To Experience And Instructional Grade Level, Molly Greer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Teacher instruction in mathematics is a critical cornerstone for effective student learning (Aldrup et al., 2020). Teaching mathematics is essential for the development of student mathematical thinking; a foundational skill required for the majority of careers (Ramirez et al., 2016). Researchers have demonstrated that mathematical anxiety (MA) is prevalent among the general population and is estimated to impact 42% of teachers in elementary education (Aldrup et al., 2020). The impact of MA on teaching, student learning, and overall teacher performance is just beginning to emerge. Yet, researchers have shown MA has implications on the function (Pizzle et al., 2020) and …


The Lived Experiences Of Faculty In The Covid-19 Pandemic Shift In Instruction, Alison Hammack Jan 2022

The Lived Experiences Of Faculty In The Covid-19 Pandemic Shift In Instruction, Alison Hammack

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This study sought to understand the lived experiences of mathematics faculty teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic's rapid shift from on-campus instruction to online education. Faculty are the primary influencers at a college. Their perspectives on the challenges and changes to teaching practices may determine a college's response to improving teaching and learning during a crisis. At the time of the COVID-19 transition, many faculty had no experience creating and teaching an online course, and some had previously been resistant to teaching online. Using a phenomenological approach, nine participants at a large state college were interviewed using the Teacher-Centered Systemic Reform …


Assessing Public Perception And Proposing An Organized Questionnaire For The Deployment And Adoption Of Autonomous Vehicles, Md Rakibul Islam Jan 2022

Assessing Public Perception And Proposing An Organized Questionnaire For The Deployment And Adoption Of Autonomous Vehicles, Md Rakibul Islam

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Since the general public will play a central role in the evolution of AVs, research has been performed to assess their perception and acceptance of AVs. Nevertheless, the most potential users of AVs, i.e., young, students, and more educated people, have not received any particular focus in those studies. This research gap has motivated us to assess their perceptions. Extensive data analyses of the survey at the University of Central Florida with a sample of 315 reveal that on average 57% of the respondents were familiar with AVs, and about 44% of the respondents felt positive perceptions toward AVs. Around …


The Fluid Dynamics Of A Spanwise-Morphing Wing: An Experimental And Analytical Study, Kamlesh Joshi Jan 2022

The Fluid Dynamics Of A Spanwise-Morphing Wing: An Experimental And Analytical Study, Kamlesh Joshi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The unsteady forces and fluid flow structure of a morphing wing are investigated for low Reynolds number (Re) flows, i.e., Re < 20,000. The morphing wing is designed to change shape in the spanwise direction in a controlled manner using internal actuation. The two types of wing morphing are studied in this work, i.e., spanwise bending and spanwise twisting. The wing morphing is named based on the overall shape of the wing after it is dynamically morphed.


A Survival Analysis Examining Risk And Protective Factors Of Foster Care Reentry For Children Aged 0 To 5 Within A Social Ecological Framework, Samantha Klaver Jan 2022

A Survival Analysis Examining Risk And Protective Factors Of Foster Care Reentry For Children Aged 0 To 5 Within A Social Ecological Framework, Samantha Klaver

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Although the fundamental goals of the child welfare system include establishing and ensuring the safety, permanency, and well-being of affected children, child reentry into the foster care system has emerged recently as a substantial and growing concern (Jedwab & Shaw, 2017). Utilizing archival, statewide administrative data collected from Florida's Department of Children and Families (DCF), a series of multivariate Cox regression models were conducted on a sample of young children between the ages of 0- and 5-years (N = 3,970) to examine various socioecological risk and protective factors of foster care reentry. Several individual factors (i.e., child age at initial …


Translations To Support Loop Invariant Generation In Jml, Kohei Koja Jan 2022

Translations To Support Loop Invariant Generation In Jml, Kohei Koja

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Software is used in many critical systems in the real world such as autonomous cars and medical devices. Such software must be reliable to protect the general public. One standard way to make reliable software is to use Hoare-style verification techniques. However, for Hoare-style verification of loop correctness, loop invariants are necessary but are difficult for people to write themselves. Since Java is one of the most popular programming languages in the world, it is useful to have a tool to generate loop invariants for Java programs. OpenJML is a widely used program verification tool for Java. However, it does …


Examining The Relationship Between Alcohol Expectancies And Behavioral Economic Theory, Tatiana Magri Jan 2022

Examining The Relationship Between Alcohol Expectancies And Behavioral Economic Theory, Tatiana Magri

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

PURPOSE: Alcohol consumption and related problems are common among college students. Prior research links behavioral economic constructs of alcohol demand (relative valuation of alcohol; analyzed using area under the curve) and relative reinforcement (RR; proportionate reinforcement obtained from alcohol-related activities relative to other activities), as well as alcohol expectancies, with alcohol consumption and problems. However, research has yet to examine the associations between behavioral economic and expectancy theories or how they influence alcohol use outcomes. METHOD: College students who endorsed drinking in the past 30 days (n= 287) completed an online survey assessing demand, RR, alcohol expectancies, alcohol problems, and …


The Empathy Reading Project: Supporting Parents And Their Children Living With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Sarah Mendoza Jan 2022

The Empathy Reading Project: Supporting Parents And Their Children Living With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Sarah Mendoza

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Children with ASD benefit from interventions that are interactive and focus on developing social skills, and the parent-child relationship plays a vital part in the development of empathy and social skills. The Empathy Reading Project: Supporting Parents And Their Children Living With Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) explored whether parent-led bibliotherapy with therapeutic support from the researcher helped children ages three to five living with ASD improve cognitive empathy and social-emotional development and their parents gain parental acceptance. All participants were parent and child dyads (N=4), and all child participants were male. The Empathy Reading Project was a multiple baseline (A-B-A-B), …


Investigating Covariate Selection Criteria: To Draw Causal Inferences From Observational Data In The Presence Of Unmeasured Covariates Using Regression And Propensity Score Methods, Uday Nair Jan 2022

Investigating Covariate Selection Criteria: To Draw Causal Inferences From Observational Data In The Presence Of Unmeasured Covariates Using Regression And Propensity Score Methods, Uday Nair

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The aim of causal effect estimation is to find the true impact of a treatment or exposure. Observational data is employed in social sciences to estimate causal effect but is susceptible to self-selection and unobserved confounding biases. Covariates included in analysis should strive to address these biases. This research focuses on investigating covariate selection approaches––common cause criterion (CC), Disjunctive Cause Criterion (DCC), Modified Disjunctive Cause Criterion (MDCC), and modified cause criterion (MCC)––in linear regression (LR) and propensity score methods (PSM) causal effect estimation in the presence of unmeasured confounding. Realistic social science scenarios such as––inclusion of proxy variables with varying …


Exploration Of Shock-Droplet Ignition And Combustion, John Patten Jan 2022

Exploration Of Shock-Droplet Ignition And Combustion, John Patten

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Liquid fuels are desirable in aerospace applications due to their higher energy density when compared to gaseous fuels. With the advent of detonation-based engines, it is necessary to characterize and analyze how liquid fuel interacts with detonation waves as well as shocks to ignite. While liquid fuel sprays have been proven to successfully aid and sustain detonations, the physical mechanism by which the individual liquid droplets accomplish this is yet to be understood. Such knowledge allows for more predictable detonation properties, which in turn can let detonation-based engines be sustained more easily. This research seeks to quantify and characterize interactions …


Effficient Graph-Based Computation And Analytics, Bingbing Rao Jan 2022

Effficient Graph-Based Computation And Analytics, Bingbing Rao

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

With data explosion in many domains, such as social media, big code repository, Internet of Things (IoT), and inertial sensors, only 32% of data available to academic and industry is put to work, and the remaining 68% goes unleveraged. Moreover, people are facing an increasing number of obstacles concerning complex analytics on the sheer size of data, which include 1) how to perform dynamic graph analytics in a parallel and robust manner within a reasonable time? 2) How to conduct performance optimizations on a property graph representing and consisting of the semantics of code, data, and runtime systems for big …


Remote Learning During Covid-19 On Internal Medicine Residents' Education: Barriers And Enhancements Through Lived Experiences, Stephanie Rivera-Velazquez Jan 2022

Remote Learning During Covid-19 On Internal Medicine Residents' Education: Barriers And Enhancements Through Lived Experiences, Stephanie Rivera-Velazquez

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The COVID-19 pandemic uncovered instructional changes within higher education. Accommodations for continued instruction included a transition to remote learning. However, little research exists regarding the experiences of medical residents during this transition in their education while combating the COVID-19 pandemic. This qualitative study, phenomenological in nature, aimed to explore the lived experiences of internal medicine medical residents at one medical college in Central Florida regarding the transition from face-to-face instruction to remote learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Eleven participating medical residents underwent semi-structured interviews via Zoom. Garrison's Community of Inquiry conceptual model and Hall and Hord's Concerns-Based Adoption Model …


Implicit Emotion In Decision-Making: Examining Emotional State Differences In Educational Leaders When Engaged In A Special Education Computer Simulation, Lynn Scott Jan 2022

Implicit Emotion In Decision-Making: Examining Emotional State Differences In Educational Leaders When Engaged In A Special Education Computer Simulation, Lynn Scott

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The researcher investigated 17 participants, ten novices' and seven experts', scores of facial emotion and decision-making while engaged in a special education simulated case conference, SchoolSims. Educational leaders' facial emotions during decision intervals were examined to determine if differences existed between novice and expert computer evidence scores of decision-making and facial emotion. Results indicated no significant differences between groups, but mean evidence scores of joy, surprise, anger, and disgust were expressed at higher levels by novice leaders. While expert leaders' scores of facial emotion were expressed less frequently scores of each emotion remained close to the group mean as indicated …


Space-Time Photonics, Abbas Shiri Jan 2022

Space-Time Photonics, Abbas Shiri

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Many of the features of photonic devices, including some of the most ubiquitous components such as resonators and waveguides, are usually thought to be intrinsically dependent on their geometry and constitutive materials. As such, the behaviour of an optical field interacting with such devices is dictated by the boundary conditions imposed upon the field. For instance, the resonant wavelengths and linewidths of a planar cavity are expected to be set by the mirrors' reflectivity, cavity length, and refractive index. Henceforth, satisfying a longitudinal phase-matching condition allows for incident light to resonate with the cavity. As another example, consider the planar …


Towards Secure And Trustworthy Iot Systems, Lan Luo Jan 2022

Towards Secure And Trustworthy Iot Systems, Lan Luo

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The boom of the Internet of Things (IoT) brings great convenience to the society by connecting the physical world to the cyber world, but it also attracts mischievous hackers for benefits. Therefore, understanding potential attacks aiming at IoT systems and devising new protection mechanisms are of great significance to maintain the security and privacy of the IoT ecosystem. In this dissertation, we first demonstrate potential threats against IoT networks and their severe consequences via analyzing a real-world air quality monitoring system. By exploiting the discovered flaws, we can impersonate any victim sensor device and polluting its data with fabricated data. …


Quantification Of The Aerodynamic Drivers Of A Deployable Propeller, David Malyszek Jan 2022

Quantification Of The Aerodynamic Drivers Of A Deployable Propeller, David Malyszek

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

With the use deployable drones becoming more common research into their improvement is necessary. Deployable drones that are launched from tubes have size limits on the diameter of the propeller during launch and storage. The purpose of this research is to develop deployable propeller blades for practical uses, such as tube launched propeller driven drones and easier to transport wind turbine blades. A deployable propeller will allow for the utilization of larger propellers when a large non-deployable blade isn't an option. Because deployable propellers need to fold, the deployable propeller blades were designed to be hollow and with a slit …


Hydrogen And Peer-To-Peer Energy Exchanges For Deep Decarbonization Of Power Systems, Hamed Haggi Jan 2022

Hydrogen And Peer-To-Peer Energy Exchanges For Deep Decarbonization Of Power Systems, Hamed Haggi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Decreasing costs of renewable energy resources and net-zero emission energy production policy, set by U.S. government, are two preeminent factors that motivate power utilities to deploy more system- or consumer-centric distributed energy resources (DERs) to decarbonize electricity production. Since, deep energy decarbonization cannot be achieved without high penetration of renewable energy sources, utilities should develop and invest in new business models for power system operation and planning during the energy transition. Considering the pathways to deeply decarbonize power systems, first, this dissertation proposes a novel hierarchical peer-to-peer (P2P) energy market design in active distribution networks. The framework integrates the distributional …


Avatar Identification Methods In Skyrim And Dragon Age: Origins, Andrew Futcher Jan 2022

Avatar Identification Methods In Skyrim And Dragon Age: Origins, Andrew Futcher

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Video games as a medium have always focused on having their players interact with their game worlds and narratives regardless of genre. However, a repeatedly debated concept is whether players are able to feel a sense of identification with their avatars. The majority of this debate revolves around studying works with a multiplayer focus, such as MMOs, where players can interact with one another. This paper seeks to explore if players can identify with their avatar in single-player role-playing games (RPG), as this genre focuses on the player's direct influence on the narrative through various mechanics that allow the player …


The Impact Of Social Capital On U.S. Based Destination Marketing Organizations And Interorganizational Relationships, Jeremy Fairley Jan 2022

The Impact Of Social Capital On U.S. Based Destination Marketing Organizations And Interorganizational Relationships, Jeremy Fairley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Previous literature echoes the notion that destination marketing organizations (DMOs) play a critical role in ensuring a desired tourism development scenario. To date, the performance measurement of destination marketing organizations is paralleled to financial indicators or operations, ignoring the presence and quality of relationships among DMOs and tourism stakeholders. Based on the premise of social capital theory, it is argued that social capital and the inter-organizational relationships between DMOs and tourism stakeholders can influence the success of tourism efforts in a destination, which in return is a contributing factor to the DMOs success as an organization. Furthermore, broader literature indicates …


¿Dónde Están? Latin American Representation In Theatre For Young Audiences, Ximena Gonzalez Toledo Jan 2022

¿Dónde Están? Latin American Representation In Theatre For Young Audiences, Ximena Gonzalez Toledo

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

¿Dónde están los Latinos? As a Latina theatre practitioner born and raised in Venezuela now studying Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA) in the United States, I perceive a generalization and oversimplification of Latin American culture or culturally specific pieces across available TYA dramatic literature and other forms of children's entertainment, with Mexican culture as a monolith for all Hispanics and Latin Americans. My thesis asks: What tropes exist within the representation of Latin American cultures? What might those tropes offer about authentic representation, and opportunities for broadened representation, within the field of TYA? My research pulls from two formative experiences …


Designing The Electrochemical Interface To Enable Lithium Metal Batteries, Supriya Koul Jan 2022

Designing The Electrochemical Interface To Enable Lithium Metal Batteries, Supriya Koul

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Although Li-ion battery is one of the most widely used energy storage devices, there have been extensive efforts to push its limit to meet the ever-increasing demands to improve its energy density for applications such as electric vehicles, portable electronics, and grid storages. Here, Li metal anode plays a key role in the next generation energy storage devices, ultimately enabling the anode-free configuration. However, there are major challenges that need to be overcome for a successful deployment of anode-free batteries. These include designing a competitive SEI, low Coulombic efficiency, and the formation of dendrites. To realize an effective anode-free configuration …


How Small Organic Osmolytes Modulate Actin Filament Assembly Kinetics And Mechanics, Pavlo Kravchuk Jan 2022

How Small Organic Osmolytes Modulate Actin Filament Assembly Kinetics And Mechanics, Pavlo Kravchuk

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Actin filament assembly and mechanics are crucial for muscle contraction, maintenance of cell structure, motility, and division. Actin filament assembly occurs in a crowded intracellular environment consisting of various types of molecules, including small organic molecules known as osmolytes. Ample evidence highlights the protective functions of osmolytes such as trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO), including their effects on protein stability and their ability to counteract cellular osmotic stress. Recently, TMAO has been shown to counteract the denaturing effects of urea on actin filament assembly based on bulk fluorescence assays. Yet, how TMAO affects individual actin filament assembly dynamics and mechanics is not well …


A Study Of Microgravity On Fluid Transport Through Porous Structures In Microfluidic Devices, Sylvain Le Henaff Jan 2022

A Study Of Microgravity On Fluid Transport Through Porous Structures In Microfluidic Devices, Sylvain Le Henaff

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The objective of this study is to refine the understanding of micro-fluidics subject to micro-gravity in an attempt to support future space exploration efforts. A combination of experimental and numerical approaches were utilized to build a validated assessment approach. A quasi-pore geometry, inspired by CT scans of rat bones, was used in lieu of human bone structures. A quasi-1D assessment of the conservation of momentum was used to identify the dominant forces acting on the fluid at the operating length-scales. The dominant forces were surface tension, gravity, and shear stress. Experiments were conducted to visualize the flow moving through the …


Computational And Experimental Studies Of Adsorption And Reactions On Molybdenum Nitride And Silica Covered Ruthenium Surfaces, Muhammad Sajid Jan 2022

Computational And Experimental Studies Of Adsorption And Reactions On Molybdenum Nitride And Silica Covered Ruthenium Surfaces, Muhammad Sajid

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Fundamental studies of material surfaces are of continued interest to the development and improvement of many modern technologies, e.g. catalysis, energy efficient electronics, and high-capacity batteries etc. This dissertation targets two distinct sets of molecule-surface interactions relevant to the continued development of structure-property correlations using tools from Density Functional Theory with added verification from ultrahigh vacuum surface-science experiments. These include Haber-Bosch interactions at molybdenum-nitride surfaces and separation-dependent interactions between simple aromatics and Ru(0001) used to model a metal contact of Organic Electronic Devices (OEDs). In the first study, we focus on computational modelling of nitrogen fixation reactions on Mo- and …


Interactions Of Aerosol Droplets With Ventilated Airflows In The Context Of Airborne Pathogen Transmission, Steven Schroeder Jan 2022

Interactions Of Aerosol Droplets With Ventilated Airflows In The Context Of Airborne Pathogen Transmission, Steven Schroeder

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This multidisciplinary study provides a comprehensive visualization of airborne aerosols and droplets coming into contact with a crossflow of moving air utilizing both experimental particle measuring methods and multiphase computational fluids dynamics (CFD). The aim of this research is to provide a Eulerian visualization of how ventilation can alter the position and density of an aerosol cloud, with the goal of applying this information to our understanding of social distancing ranges within outdoor settings and ventilated rooms. The results indicate that even minor perpendicular crossflows across the trajectory of an aerosol cloud can greatly reduce both the linear displacement and …


Innovation Resistance? Understanding Officer Attitudes Toward Police Innovation, Justin Smith Jan 2022

Innovation Resistance? Understanding Officer Attitudes Toward Police Innovation, Justin Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

Over the years, innovations such as community-oriented policing, problem-oriented policing, and crime analysis have helped police agencies control, reduce, and prevent crime and disorder, and improve police and community relations. However, research shows that some officers are resistant to using these innovations in practice. Few studies have examined the causal mechanisms behind innovation resistance. This doctoral dissertation details a study that utilized a mixed method approach to partially test a framework that encompassed two theories to explain officer resistance to innovation: The Model of Consumer Resistance to Innovation from the consumer psychology and marketing fields (Ram & Sheth, 1989), and …


Investigating A Psychoeducational Job Search Intervention Among Unemployed Individuals, Galaxina Wright Jan 2022

Investigating A Psychoeducational Job Search Intervention Among Unemployed Individuals, Galaxina Wright

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of Project P.A.T.H., a job search psychoeducation intervention, on unemployed individuals' levels of job search knowledge, job search self-efficacy, employment hope, and group therapeutic factors. To contribute to the knowledgebase in the counseling and counselor education fields, the researcher examined (a) if Project P.A.T.H. influences job search knowledge, job search self-efficacy, and employment hope over time; (b) the potential relationship between outcome variables and participant demographics; and (c) the potential relationship between the outcome variables and the group therapeutic factors. A multi-group pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design was utilized in this study. …


Towards Leveraging Sparse Infrared Datasets For Multiple View Synthesis, Few Shot Learning And Background Invariant Recognition, Maliha Arif Jan 2022

Towards Leveraging Sparse Infrared Datasets For Multiple View Synthesis, Few Shot Learning And Background Invariant Recognition, Maliha Arif

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This dissertation presents a study of various machine learning techniques for recognizing vehicular objects in infrared images. State of the art methods for computer vision have not been widely explored for this part of the electromagnetic spectrum (EM). Challenges that arise due to the dearth of infrared training images, terrain clutter, and thermal phenomenology have not been fully addressed. Infrared dataset collection and annotation is both difficult and expensive. What if there is a way we can generate infrared images and diminish the need for collecting data out in the field? Our first research study encompasses an encoder-decoder model that …


The Concept Of The Populus Romanus In The Late Republic And Augustan Period, Nicklaus Bobertz Jan 2022

The Concept Of The Populus Romanus In The Late Republic And Augustan Period, Nicklaus Bobertz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

This study was undertaken to explore how the concept of the definition of Roman identity changed over the course of the late Roman Republic and into the early Empire culminating with the death of Augustus in 14 AD. Since the 1970's the historiography surrounding the late Roman Republic and early Empire has had to contend with what exactly the populus Romanus and its power basis was. From these questions concepts of power, gender, group formation, and even nationalism have emerged. However, few academics have targeted the nucleus that all of these questions revolve around, how did the identity of the …


The Parker Problem In Hall Magnetohydrodynamics Analytical And Numerical Solutions, Chad Malott Jan 2022

The Parker Problem In Hall Magnetohydrodynamics Analytical And Numerical Solutions, Chad Malott

Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2020-2023

In this thesis we follow on the mathematical aspects of the previous work of Shivamoggi (2009) on the Parker problem in Hall magnetohydrodynamics (MHD). We will present an analysis involving detailed analytical and numerical solutions to the Parker problem in Hall MHD. We give an analytical formulation for the Parker problem in Hall MHD, involving an initial value problem (IVP) associated with a first order Riccati equation (RE). We present Mathematica software exact solutions directly with special functions and more straightforward solutions that use the change of variables and power series methods without special functions. We give an asymptotic formulation …