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Commonwealth Times 2010-04-15

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Afro-German Biracial Identity Development, Rebecca R. Hubbard

Theses and Dissertations

An increase in the biracial population has heightened our awareness of unique issues that pervade the experience of these individuals. The importance of environmental influences on biracial identity development has been established, but investigations concerning racial socialization of biracial individuals are scarce. This study, utilizing a qualitative design, explores racial identity development of biracial Afro-Germans living in Germany. The purpose of the study is to understand the strategies that biracial individuals use to negotiate their racial identity, factors that influence their development, cultural influences, and racial socialization processes. Interviews with biracial Afro-Germans were conducted using phenomenological interviewing techniques. Twelve themes …

Dan Graham's Video-Installations Of The 1970s, Michael J. Shaffer

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the video-installations created by American artist Dan Graham in the 1970s. It investigates the artist's relationship to Minimalism by analyzing themes Graham highlights in his own writings and in interviews. In particular, I explore how the artist's understanding of Herbert Marcuse, Walter Benjamin, and R.D. Laing informed his post-Minimalist work and how concepts gleaned from these sources are manifest in his video-installations. Also undertaken are discussions of the artist's interest in aestheticized play, the just-past present, the debate between Behaviourism and phenomenology, surveillance, and Modern architecture. In addition, I investigate Graham's position in Conceptual art, use of …

With Or Without You: The Impact Of Partner Presence And Attachment On Exploration, Anthony Coy

Theses and Dissertations

Expanding upon past research demonstrating that attachment orientation influences adult exploration, this thesis examined the impact of both actor and partner attachment anxiety and avoidance as well as real or imagined partner presence on outcomes of exploratory behavior (study 1a) and the desire to explore (study 1b). Eighty six couples were randomly assigned to explore (i.e., a meditation activity) with or without their partner in the lab, and to imagine exploring with or without their partner when rating their desire to complete potential exploratory behaviors. The effects of actor anxiety and avoidance on exploration were moderated by partner presence for …

Modulation Of Cocaine-Like Behavioural Activity By Serotonin Uptake Inhibition Relative To The Effects Of The Novel And Selective Dopamine Transporter Inhibitor, D-84, Angela Batman

Theses and Dissertations

Cocaine dependence is a major health concern worldwide, but despite this high rate of abuse there are currently no approved therapies for cocaine dependence. Replacement pharmacotherapies are one possible approach for treating cocaine dependence, and identification of such therapeutics for cocaine abuse is the long-term goal of this research. Cocaine binds to, and inhibits uptake at the dopamine (DAT), serotonergic (SERT) and noradrenaline (NET) uptake transporters, but studies have shown that cocaine produces its strong behavioural and positive reinforcing effects through inhibition of the DAT. To this end a great number of diverse, non-selective DAT-inhibiting compounds have been investigated as …

Forgiveness And The Bottle: Promoting Self-Forgiveness With Alcohol Misuse, Michael Scherer

Theses and Dissertations

Forgiveness research has seldom been directed toward alcohol use, misuse, and abuse. To date, forgiveness research in the realm of alcohol use, misuse, and abuse has focused on interpersonal consequences (e.g., Lin, Mack, Enright, Krahn, & Baskin, 2005; Scherer, Worthington, Hook, Campana, West, & Gartner, 2009; Worthington, Scherer, & Cooke, 2006), but has paid minimal attention to intrapersonal consequences. Psychologists today are just beginning to explore the complex and murky waters of self-forgiveness (or lack of it) and the alcohol misuser (e.g., Webb, Robinson, Brower, & Zucker, 2006). In the current dissertation, I review the literature on self-forgiveness, drinking refusal …

Commonwealth Times 2010-04-08

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Commonwealth Times 2010-04-05 [Front Page Has 2010-04-01]

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Commitment And Antecedents Of Police Officers, First Level, And Mid-Level Supervisors In The Turkish National Police: An Empirical Study Of The Three-Component Model Of Organizational Commitment, Sedat Polat

Theses and Dissertations

The main focus of this study was to investigate the relationship between the dependent variables of affective, continuance, and normative commitment and job satisfaction, job characteristics, role characteristics, and selected demographic variables. This study also aimed to make a comparison between police officers and first and mid-level supervisors of the Turkish National Police in order to test whether there was a difference between their commitment levels. The final purpose was to examine the moderating role of growth need strength (GNS) and the mediating role of overall job satisfaction between the five job characteristics and three components of organizational commitment. A …

Polytrauma Family Needs Assessment, Schaaf Kathryn Wilder

Theses and Dissertations

There is a great deal of literature in civilian rehabilitation settings that documents the tremendous impact a brain injury has on both the injured person and the family as a whole. TBI is a leading cause of both death and disability world-wide and is often cited as the signature injury of the ongoing OEF/OIF conflict. In 2005, Congress recognized the severity of injuries that military personnel were encountering in the OEF/OIF conflicts and created the Polytrauma System of Care (PSC). While the PSC has made great efforts to provide innovative and effective treatment for active duty and veteran patients, little …

Hunger For Grace: The Association Between Eating Disorders And Religiousness, Janet Lydecker

Theses and Dissertations

Religiousness is one potential, understudied psychosocial correlate of eating disorders. To assess associations between religiousness and eating disorders, this study developed the Religious Attendance and Belief Scale (Rel-AB), and examined its psychometric properties. Women from a large population-based sample (N = 1510; M(age) = 42.5) completed subscales measuring (1) belief in a personal and loving God, and (2) attendance at religion-related activities, as well as eating disorder measures. Belief was negatively associated with eating disorder symptomatology among women meeting broadly defined criteria for bulimia nervosa. Eating disorders and religiousness were not associated in the overall sample, and associations were largely …

Teacher Absenteeism: An Examination Of Patterns And Predictors, Kristy Pitts

Theses and Dissertations

Since the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2001, public school systems have been engaged in a system of educational reform fueled by a level of accountability that includes not only the performance of the students, but also the performance of the teachers and the administrators. Recent studies have found that student achievement has been negatively impacted by teacher absenteeism; however, there have been scant studies conducted in the United States regarding teacher absence behaviors. The purpose of this study was to examine the teacher absence data of a school division in central Virginia in order …

Commonwealth Times 2010-03-08

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Shafer Court Connections (2010-03)

Shafer Court Connections, 1994-2010

For alumni of the Academic Campus of Virginia Commonwealth University.

Commonwealth Times 2010-02-22

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Commonwealth Times 2010-02-15

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Organizational Citizenship Behavior And Its Relationship With Major Attitudinal Factors: A Comparative Study Between Two Police Regions Of Turkish National Police, Orhan Bez

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study is to determine whether major attitudinal factors are among the predictors of Organizational Citizenship Behavior (OCB) in the Turkish National Police Organization (TNP). It investigates the influences of job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and organizational justice on OCB between two police regions (Region I and Region II) of the TNP. The results indicate that job satisfaction has a direct positive influence on employees’ OCB perception. Affective commitment is also positively related to OCB perception of TNP members. Only partial support was obtained for the relationship between normative and continuance commitments and OCB perceptions. Among organizational justice …

Commonwealth Times 2010-02-11

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Commonwealth Times 2010-02-08

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Examining Violent And Property Crimes In The Provinces Of Turkey For The Years Of 2000 And 2007, Mus Ekrem

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores the relationship between social, economical, and demographic variables and reported violent and property crime incidents in the provinces of Turkey between 2000 and 2007. The data on violent and property crimes comes from Turkish National Police. All other variables are secondary data gathered from open sources and Turkstat. The research is one of the first studies to examine this relationship in Turkey. The findings of the study suggest that family disruption rate and gross domestic product were significantly related to the violent crime rate while family disruption rate, gross domestic product, population, population density, and urbanization rate …

Commonwealth Times 2010-01-21

Commonwealth Times, 1969-

No abstract provided.

Virtual Reality In Art Education, Sohhyoun Yoon

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis project presents possible uses of Virtual Reality for art education. To understand VR, this thesis reviews the history of using technology in educational environments and explores the concepts, definitions, and characteristics of VR in general. Then, it shows diverse purposes of VR for education and art educational environments. For an art class, the units present the use of Teen Second Life, which is a free on-line virtual world. The units demonstrate how art educators may use Teen Second life for high school art classes to build students’ understandings of their identities by creating their avatars, clothing, objects and …

Hope And Worry Among Mothers Of Children With An Autism Spectrum Disorder Or Down Syndrome, Paula Ogston

Theses and Dissertations

The present study used quantitative and qualitative methodology to examine mothers’ hope and worry. Participants were recruited via autism and Down syndrome organizations. Two hundred fifty-nine mothers of children with autism spectrum disorders (n = 199) and Down syndrome (n = 60) responded to the online questionnaire. Most mothers were white (n = 230); eighty-seven percent were married and their average age was 39.06 years. Findings support previous research suggesting that hope is a protective factor against psychological distress: mothers with higher hope reported lower dispositional worry. Mothers were asked to describe what they worried about when they woke up …

The Effect Of Implicit Stereotypes On The Physical Performance In Older Adults, Gabriele R. Moriello

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore how stereotypes affect physical performance in older adults. A multigroup pretest post test design was utilized to determine whether implicit activation of positive or negative stereotypes has an effect on physical performance. Ninety six community dwelling older adults 65 years of age or older were included in the sample. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three groups: exposure to positive stereotypes of aging, exposure to negative stereotypes of aging, or a control condition. In order to simulate how older adults are exposed to stereotypes in real world settings, participants were primed …

Schizophrenia Gene Networks And Pathways And Their Applications For Novel Candidate Gene Selection, Jingchun Sun, Peilin Jia, Ayman H. Fanous, Edwin Van Den Oord, Xiangning Chen, Brien P. Riley, Richard L. Amdur, Kenneth S. Kendler, Zhongming Zhao

Psychiatry Publications

Background

Schizophrenia (SZ) is a heritable, complex mental disorder. We have seen limited success in finding causal genes for schizophrenia from numerous conventional studies. Protein interaction network and pathway-based analysis may provide us an alternative and effective approach to investigating the molecular mechanisms of schizophrenia.

Methodology/Principal Findings

We selected a list of schizophrenia candidate genes (SZGenes) using a multi-dimensional evidence-based approach. The global network properties of proteins encoded by these SZGenes were explored in the context of the human protein interactome while local network properties were investigated by comparing SZ-specific and cancer-specific networks that were extracted from the human interactome. …

Virginia Commonwealth University Commencement Program [2010], Virginia Commonwealth University

VCU Commencement Programs

No abstract provided.

Increased Interleukin-6 Activity Associated With Painful Chemotherapy-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy In Women After Breast Cancer Treatment, Angela R. Starkweather

School of Nursing Publications

Accumulating evidence suggests that neural-immune interactions are involved in the development of painful chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy, particularly through the increased release of proinflammatory cytokines. The purpose of this study was used to evaluate levels of interleukin [IL]-6 and IL-6 receptors in women with breast cancer after the conclusion of chemotherapy who either had painful symptoms of chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN group, ) or did not experience CIPN symptoms (Comparison group, ). CIPN participants had significantly higher levels of IL-6 and soluble IL-6R (sIL-6R) compared to women without CIPN symptoms ( for both). In addition, soluble gp130, which blocks the IL-6/sIL-6R …

Does Chinese Culture Influence Psychosocial Factors For Heroin Use Among Young Adolescents In China? A Cross-Sectional Study, Hongjie Liu, Jian Li, Zhouping Lu, Wei Liu, Zhiyong Zhang

Family Medicine and Population Health Publications

Background

Little empirical research has examined how cultural factors influence psychosocial factors for heroin drug use. The objectives of the study were to investigate the levels of individualism and collectivism among young adolescents and how cultural differences were associated with the constructs of the Theory of Planned Behavior and other psychosocial factors for heroin drug use.

Methods

A cross-sectional study was conducted among young adolescents in an HIV and heroin-stricken area in China. The Individualism-Collectivism Interpersonal Assessment Inventory (ICIAI) was used to measure cultural norms and values in the context of three social groups: family members, close friends, and classmates. …

Virginia Commonwealth University Fall Commencement Program [2010], Virginia Commonwealth University

VCU Commencement Programs

No abstract provided.

Virginia Commonwealth University Graduate And Professional Programs Bulletin Courses [2010], Virginia Commonwealth University

VCU Bulletins

Listing of professional and graduate courses for 2010-2011.