Digital Commons Network^™

Examining The Effects Of Caregiver Coping Strategies On Care Recipient Outcomes, Joseph S. Wanzek

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Dementia is a progressive syndrome with declines in cognitive and functional abilities. As the world’s population becomes increasingly older, prevalence rates are expected to increase exponentially to over 80 million affected by the year 2040. Individuals with dementia and their caregivers experience various difficulties associated with progression that increases stress for both parties. Caregiving can be burdensome and caregivers may employ a number of strategies to manage problems as they arise. Renewed interest has been focused on the care environment as one way to modify dementia progression as caregivers can be an influential person in the care recipient’s life. Two …

Learning From The Teaching Practices Of Successful Teachers Of Latina And Latino Students, Glori H. Smith

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this study, sponsored by the Department of Teacher Education and Leadership at Utah State University, was to determine the classroom practices and attitudes of the teachers that had been identified as successful with Latina and Latino students at an urban middle school. Criteria for successful teachers were not determined by the researcher, but by those school stakeholders who were asked to nominate such teachers: the administrators, faculty, and parents of Latina/o students.

The difference between the achievement of White students and students of color has long been a concern of educators. It is well established that critical …

Lifestyle Intervention In Emerging Adulthood: A Brief Acceptance-Based Behavioral Intervention With Young Adults, Spencer M. Richards

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Across the U.S., obesity and overweight represent a rapidly growing public health concern that have been associated with expensive and debilitating outcomes such as depression, cancers, diabetes, and other metabolic disorders, cardiovascular disease, and significant disruption in quality of life, in addition to the tremendous public health costs. The current study examined a brief, randomized-controlled trial of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) with overweight and obese young adults.

Study participants were randomly assigned to a 4-week experimental ACT group or an information control group, which received psychoeducational materials regarding lifestyle behaviors recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention …

Detecting Experts On Quora: By Their Activity, Quality Of Answers, Linguistic Characteristics And Temporal Behaviors, Sumanth Kumar Reddy Nagarur Patil

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Question and answering sites are useful in sharing the knowledge by answering questions. It is a medium of sharing knowledge. Quora is the fastest emerging effective Q&A site, which is the best source of knowledge. Here you can ask a question, and get help in getting answers from people with firsthand experience, and blog about what you know. In this paper, we are investigating and identifying potential experts who are providing the best solutions to the questioner needs. We have considered several techniques in identifying user as an expert or non-expert. We have targeted the most followed topics in Quora …

The Colorado Plateau As A Virtual Laboratory For Mobile Games For Geoscience Education And Relations Between Rock Strength And River Metrics, Natalie Bursztyn

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This dissertation encompasses two studies: one developing virtual field trips for mobile devices for an innovative approach to lower-division geoscience education, and the other examining the role of rock strength in river erosion and landscape evolution.

The education study involves the development of three virtual field trip modules (Geologic Time, Geologic Structures, and Hydrologic Processes, all free on iTunes and Google Play) that lead students down a virtual Colorado River through Grand Canyon by physically moving around their campus quad, football field or other location, using their GPS-equipped smart phone or tablet. As students reach each location in the scaled …

Long-Term Study Of Crowdfunding Platform: Predicting Project Success And Fundraising Amount, Jinwook Chung

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Crowdfunding that is the combination word of crowdsourcing and funding makes people can start a business easily. Legislating JOBS act in US played a major role in removing restricted barriers of crowdfunding on public offerings of fence and private funds for small business. The growth speed of crowdfunding takes some beating. Through Kickstarter that is a popular crowdfunding platform and being considered the typical case of crowdfunding, 480 million dollars and more than half a billion dollars were invested in about 19 thousand and 22 projects for 2013 and 2014 respectively. But in spite of the rapid growth, the successful …

The Effects Of Interactive Computer Simulation And Animation On Student Learning Of Rigid Body Dynamics: A Mixed Method Study, Oai Ha

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Engineering Dynamics (ED) courses are known as challenging and demanding for undergraduate students majored in many engineering fields, such as mechanical and aerospace engineering and civil and environmental engineering. The course is built upon the foundation and framework of mathematics and physics and requires students to have strong abstract thinking and reasoning skills. Rigid body dynamics (RBD), the second part of ED, investigates kinematics and kinetics of rigid bodies and is considered as a difficult subject by many undergraduate students because the course requires them to visualize abstract objects in motions. Although there have been many studies reporting the uses …

Religious Outsiders And The Catholic Critique Of Protestantism In America, Bradley Kime

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, numerous new religious and irreligious groups arose throughout the United States. These groups were often radical in their assertions of religious authority, their interpretations of scripture, their predictions about Christ’s second coming, their practice of supernatural gifts, their rejection of traditional Christian doctrines, or their rejection of Christianity altogether. American Catholics watched and commented as these groups multiplied and gained momentum. Catholics believed that the growth of radical religious and irreligious groups was the fault of mainstream Protestantism. Over the centuries, Catholics had argued that the Pope’s authority was necessary to provide spiritual …

Influencing Acceptability Of Parent Training Interventions Through Treatment Rationales, Trisha Chase

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Parent training is an effective intervention for parents of children with a variety of childhood disorders, and parents often view behavioral parent training as acceptable. Explanations and rationales for parent training are commonly provided at the beginning of treatment. However, there is little research regarding how rationales may influence acceptability. There is also limited information on whether fathers and mothers judge the acceptability of parent training differently. The purpose of this study was to determine whether changing the description of a behavioral parenting intervention influenced parents’ acceptability ratings and whether mothers and fathers differed in their ratings.

Participants viewed one …

The Impact Of Academic And Teaching Self-Efficacy On Student Engagement And Academic Outcomes, Lesther A. Papa

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

As college classrooms increase in size, the challenge of keeping students engaged in the course becomes a greater challenge. Instructors are burdened with the task of managing larger classrooms while maintaining high levels of student participation. Research has shown that students tend to hide and are less likely to participate in larger classrooms. Research has also shown that student participation is affected by fear of judgment from their peers and the instructor. However it is unclear whether this fear is tied to students’ perceived ability or self-efficacy. In addition, it may be that students’ perception of the instructor may affect …

Dreams End: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy With Critical Introduction, Elizabeth Leavitt

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This two-section thesis explores the subjective nature of villainy. The larger section, "Dream’s End," is an urban-fantasy young-adult fiction piece I’ve written in epistolary form. I preface the fiction with a critical introduction in which I briefly examine existing definitional scholarship on 1) epistolary fiction, 2) the urban fantasy genre, and 3) the young adult genre. Epistolary fiction may be letters, diaries, or journal entries. Following this exploration, I examine the subjective nature of villains and antagonists in narratives. While "Dream’s End" does not specifically discuss or critique feminist theory, it considers criticism of existing female tropes in its portrayal …

School-Based Mental Health Practices In Utah: A Descriptive Study, Dina Hargrave

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

As psychological well-being, or mental health, is a key factor to academic performance, schools are in a pivotal position to provide needed services to improve the well-being of individual students, parents, and teachers, as well as school-wide wellness. This study explored the current and possible types of school-based and community services within a multi-tier service system approach at each tier level (universal, at-risk, and intensive) delivered to elementary and secondary students, the outcomes expected to be impacted by these partnerships, and the barriers and key factors associated with effective program implementation. Results revealed that 18 of the 21 districts are …

Relations Among Teachers' Implicit Theories Of Intelligence, Standardized Achievement Testing, And Classroom Goals, Sydnie W. Ringle

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

An achievement gap between ethnic minorities and White Americans continues to exist within the U.S., as well as between the U.S. and varying countries. Research has identified several factors that contribute to this gap, such as differences in curricula across countries, teacher quality, and school funding. In addition to these factors, teachers’ implicit theories of intelligence may also contribute to the achievement gap. Whether teachers view intelligence as fixed (entity theory) or malleable (incremental theory) can impact instructional practices, specifically the use of performance and learning goals. Performance goals focus on evaluation, ability, and performance rather than mastery of material, …

Factors Influencing Farmers' Utilization Of Auto-Guidance Technology In Northern Utah, Thomas A. Bleazard

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Few studies have documented the use of auto-guidance technologies in the western United States. This study sought to discover farmers’ training preferences and what drives adoption of auto-guidance systems in northern Utah. A presentation of auto-guidance systems was made to crop school attendees. Afterwards an auto-guidance simulator was used to demonstrate to participants how these systems worked and let them engage in an experiential learning experience with laptops. A survey was administered to collect information on farmers’ training preferences and use of auto-guidance technologies. Results of the survey showed that farmers have a large interest in learning about auto-guidance technologies, …

Understanding Westerners' Relationship With Public Lands And Federal Land Managers Through Attachment To Public Lands, Chris Sisneros

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The western United States contain large amounts of federal public lands, and those lands play an important role in both those states’ economies and the daily
lives of their residents. This study set out to understand how individuals interact with those public lands, how they become attached on a deeper level to those lands,
and whether or not that attachment has an effect on how they feel about the federal agencies that manage those lands. The term attachment to public lands is used to
describe how individuals can develop a bond towards public lands through both the recreational and economic …

The Effects Of Social Norms Feedback On Fruit And Vegetable Consumption And Skin Carotenoids Among College Students, Troy A. Bailey

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Fruit and vegetable consumption, which has been shown to have a protective effect against chronic diseases, often decreases during the first few years of college. Implementing public health interventions to improve consumption of these foods may be time-consuming, costly and burdensome. The aim of this study was to determine if a social norms intervention, examining the effects of normative and manipulated feedback of participants’ carotenoid scores compared to a no-norm control, could increase fruit and vegetable consumption among college students. Such a strategy could be a cost-effective method for promoting healthy diets in this population.

While self-reported increases in fruit …

Young Widows' Grief: A Descriptive Study Of Personal And Contextual Factors Associated With Conjugal Loss, C. Ryan Dunn

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Grief is a natural condition resulting from the death of a loved one, and one of the most grievous experiences a person can endure is the death of a spouse. Grief can be influenced by relationships, the setting, and the survivor’s personal and social resources. Despite many studies on widowhood, young widows have received little attention. This study of 232 young widows between the ages of 18 and 55 in their first 5 years following loss was done to better describe the personal and social factors associated with younger widows’ grief. An online survey was distributed through social network sites …

College Student Perceptions Of Secondary Teacher Influence On The Development Of Mathematical Identity, Kathryn Van Wagoner

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Through interviews with college students, this qualitative study explored how the students' experiences with their secondary mathematics teachers affected their relationship with mathematics, known as mathematical identity. The study was rooted in the idea that learning is an experience of identity and in John Dewey's theory that all experiences are inextricably linked to past and future experiences. The eight college students' interview responses were written into biographical narratives and then analyzed within preselected themes related to experiences with secondary teachers and dimensions of mathematical identity. These themes were determined through a review of previously published studies on those topics.

The …

Ego-Identity And Long-Term Moratoria: Associations With College Attendance And Religious Volunteerism, Mark A. Jackson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The objective of this study was to examine the extent to which college experiences and participation in religious missionary service for an extended period were associated with ego-identity development, specifically in terms of identity exploration and commitment. A sample of late adolescents (N = 425), all of whom had participated in at least some college and of whom 122 had volunteered as LDS missionaries, provided information about their college/missionary experiences that could be related to identity development and reported levels of identity exploration and commitment.

Results indicated that LDS postmissionaries and LDS non-postmissionaries differed significantly only in the variables …

A Translational Investigation Of Positive And Negative Behavioral Contrast, Megan A. Boyle

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Applied behavior analysts implement research-based techniques to improve behavior. However, research with nonhumans suggests that intervening to improve behavior in one context may result in a worsening of that same behavior in another context (behavioral contrast). Although there are clinical implications of behavioral contrast, the vast majority of research on contrast has been conducted with nonhuman animals. Results from basic research suggest that contrast is influenced differentially depending on whether a change in conditions follows versus precedes a given context. For example, a child might encounter three contexts each day: home, school, and daycare. An intervention to reduce the child’s …

Sources Of Authority For Leadership And Instructional Technology Coaches' Diffusion Of High Access Teaching And Learning, Gregory M. Proffit

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this qualitative study was to use a leadership theory to explore the professional work of three school-based instructional technology coaches. The leadership theory is drawn from Thomas Sergiovanni’s Moral Leadership: Getting to the Heart of School Improvement.

The study used typical qualitative data gathering techniques: participant observations, informal and formal interviews, and the collection of representative workplace professional documents. A single researcher spent two school years in district office meetings and in three secondary schools gathering qualitative data.

The data were analyzed for bureaucratic, psychological, technical rational, professional, and moral sources of authority for leadership. The data …

The Effect Of A Class-Wide Training On Prosocial Bystander Behaviors, Charity Deanne Barnes

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this study was to decrease school bullying by teaching defending steps and increasing incentives for bystanders, students who witness bullying but who are not necessarily involved in the violence. An established bullying prevention program was modified to increase the likelihood that bystanders would defend victims of bullying behaviors. The findings of the study suggested that bullying behavior decreased and defending increased. Further, acceptability of the intervention and the skills taught to children were rated as moderately high across all classrooms.

Effectiveness, Facilitator Characteristics, And Predictors Of The Premarital Interpersonal Choices And Knowledge (Pick) Program, J. Wade Stewart

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

There are two studies in this dissertation. Both are about a program called “PICK a Partner.” The first study looked at how the program went for 682 people from the community who were taught PICK. These people ranged in age from 18 to 25. Those in attendance were given questions at the beginning of the program about their thoughts, perceptions, and knowledge regarding dating relationships. They were given these same questions at the end of the program. The scores on the questions at the end of the program were compared with scores on the questions at the beginning of the …

The Use Of Feedback In Group Counseling In A State Vocational Rehabilitation Setting: A Pilot Study, Saara Grizzell

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Thirty individuals with disabilities receiving services at a vocational rehabilitation state agency attended a ten week skills based group counseling program. Participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: feedback or the treatment-as-usual. Prior to each session, participants filled out the Outcome Questionnaire-45, a questionnaire that provides measures of four different aspects of counseling outcomes: level of symptom distress, problems with interpersonal relationships, social role performance, and mental health functioning. Reports were then generated showing each participant’s scores and progress over time. Group counselors and participants in the feedback condition received these weekly reports. At the end of the …

Propaganda Powers Social Reform: The Visual Rhetoric Of Lewis Hine, Dorothea Lange, And Norman Rockwell, Shelly Stock Halling

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The scope of this thesis is an examination of visual rhetoric and its societal impacts. The framework is an historical timeline from the end of the 19^th century to the middle of the 20^th century. The thesis is an interdisciplinary activity that embeds Art History in American Studies. It is beneficial to scholars in a variety of fields, including, but not limited to: English, American Studies, Art History, Photography, Sociology, Anthropology, and History. It braids together the theoretical perspectives of propaganda, visual rhetoric, and advocacy. The thesis is based on library research with no outside funding.

Implementation Of Online Tutoring Program To Increase University Student Information Retention, April Litchford

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This thesis discusses an online tutoring program, MasteringNutrition©, that was implemented as a required portion of an entry level collegiate nutrition course. The tutoring program was introduced to test the ability of the program to improve memory of nutrition information taught during the course. The MasteringNutrition© program combines various teaching techniques that have been successful in increasing student learning. The major techniques discussed include: Socratic questioning, metacognition, and problem based learning. These techniques are incorporated into the MasteringNutrition© program.

To test the effect of the Mastering© tutoring program, ten questions specific to course learning objectives were asked of students in …

An Evaluation Of Demand Functions For Attention And Food In Children With Autism, Bistra K. Bogoev

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The dominant approach to treating social dysfunction in individuals with autism views that dysfunction as a skill deficit. However, another plausible interpretation is that social dysfunction in some individuals arises from motivational deficits. The proposed study presents a method to assess motivational deficits for social attention in individuals with autism. By borrowing methods from behavioral economics, we assessed the essential value for social attention and compared it to the essential value for food.

Five individuals diagnosed with autism were included in the project. First, we assessed preference for food by using paired-preference assessment. To identify preference hierarchy for attention, we …

Expert Rural Elementary School Teachers' Planning For Effective Instruction, Lance T. Hatch

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Learning how to plan for effective instruction is a critical part of the work performed daily by the elementary school teacher. While some new and struggling teachers in urban school districts have access to professional development on a variety of topics including instructional planning, teachers in rural school districts often struggle to find training opportunities. This study sought to gather information and insight from rural teachers who demonstrate expert instructional planning. The specific planning decisions they made and activities they engaged in while planning were studied. Not only were the planning practices identified, but the reasons said practices were employed …

Linking Marital And Parenting Quality In Parents Of Early Adolescents, Megan L. Sheldon

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Parents have a great influence on the lives of their children, even as children develop into adolescents seeking independent identity. Families may find the transition of their children into adolescence difficult as they renegotiate their parenting strategies to allow for their children’s growing desire for independence. Because marital quality has been found to be related to parenting outcomes, the link between the parental and marital roles of a married couple becomes important to understand during the transition of their children into adolescents.

The present study uses the Inventory of Father (Parent) Involvement, Social Connectedness Scale, Quality Marriage Index, Couple Commitment …

Relationship Of Nutritional Factors To Cognitive Decline In The Progression Of Dementia: The Cache County Dementia Progression Study, Chelsea Sanders

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Cache County Memory Study at Utah State University studied longitudinal changes in memory and aging in a population-based sample of 5,092 older adults in semirural Cache County, UT. Three hundred twenty-eight participants with dementia were identified through a multi-staged screening and assessment protocol and visited semiannually for up to 8 years in the Dementia Progression Study (DPS). The current project reviews data from the first 6 years due to attrition in later years. Researchers collected information regarding the participants’ demographics, health, lifestyle (nutrition and physical activity), cognitive abilities and neuropsychiatric symptoms as well as their caregivers’ demographics, health, and …