Digital Commons Network^™

Parental Involvement And The Academic Achievement Of Third And Fourth Grade Students During The 2014-2015 And 2015-2016 School Years, Rise’ D. Black

Dissertations

The purpose of this research was to find out if parental involvement in the study school helped to increase student academic achievement. Previous studies have shown that when parents are involved in the educational process of children, parents can expect a gain in academic achievement. This mixed method study examined the relationship between parental involvement and academic gains in reading at one suburban public school. The researcher examined how often parents met with teachers at their child’s school, conversations parents had with teachers about what they were learning in school, how often parents were involved with a parent group, how …

The Experience Of Non-Spousal Close Intimate Relationships For Women With Breast Cancer: A Journey Of Support, Erin B. Dooley

Dissertations

An estimated 331,530 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in 2019 ("American Cancer Society," 2019, p. 10). The purpose of this qualitative, phenomenological, descriptive study was to explore the lived experience of non-spousal close/intimate relationships of women with breast cancer. There are very few studies in the literature examining relationships between women with cancer other than those of partner or spouse. This study's participants consisted of six women, ages 32 to 68. Analysis of these data identified themes reflected along their breast cancer trajectory (1) The journey starts (2) Mid-journey passage, and (3) Journeys end/coming home, as well as …

Effects Of Exercise On Physiologic And Psychologic Outcomes In Patients With End Stage Renal Disease On Hemodialysis: A Quasi-Experimental Study In Lebanon, Ghada Ballout Dunbar

Dissertations

End stage renal disease (ESRD) is a public health problem that is expected to continue to rise and has overwhelming effects on individuals' psychological, physical, and emotional wellbeing. Treatment options include hemodialysis (HD), which is a lifesaving procedure for patients suffering from ESRD where a dialysis machine and a dialyzer are used to clean and purify the blood as their kidneys are not functioning normally. This patient population will suffer from muscle atrophy and weakness due to inactive lifestyle and lack of physical activity. They also question their existence, are extremely stressed, and are afraid of death.

Through The Looking Glass: The Lived Experiences Of Deaf People Communicating With Nurses, The Meaning Of Health, And Attitudes Toward Nurses, Kathleen Lenore Gilchrist

Dissertations

Approximately three million deaf people in the United States represent a significant portion of our population whose health care may be compromised from ambiguous communication. Written and spoken English is commonly used by nurses to convey health information, although American Sign Language (ASL) is the Deaf community's primary language. When a deaf person enters the hospital, communication is tenuous because of illness, unfamiliar environment, and medical terminology. The purpose of this research was to describe and interpret prevocationally deaf people's experiences communicating with nurses, the meaning of health, and their attitudes toward nurses.

The Relationship Between Nursing Students' Test-Taking Motivation And The Exit Examination Score, Lorraine Coalmer

Dissertations

A primary objective of nursing students and nursing programs includes first-time success on the NCLEX-RN®. As the nursing shortage continues, it is essential to have qualified nursing graduates pass the NCLEX-RN ®. One approach some nursing programs have chosen to implement regarding augmenting nursing students' probability of success on the NCLEX-RN® includes the administration of an exit examination. This exit examination is tailored to mimic the NCLEX-RN® blueprint; thereby this examination may reveal the nursing students' readiness for the NCLEX-RN®.

The purpose of this study was to determine if there was a relationship between nursing student test-taking motivation and exit …

Exemplary Practices Which Support Achievement Gaps In Reading And Writing For Hispanic Ell Learners In Title I Twenty-First Century Elementary Schools, Melinda Gonzalez

Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this phenomenological study was to identify and describe strategies used by public school 3rd, 4th, and 5th-grade teachers to support English language learners in Title I public schools.

Methodology: This phenomenological study identified and described 14 teachers' 3rd, 4th, and 5th-grade perceptions on effective strategies to support English language learners in reading and writing. Respondents were purposively chosen based on specific criteria and recommendations of an expert panel of experts and data was coded using NVIVO.

Findings: The expert panel members identified multiple strategies to support English language learners. Strategies include (a) Question higher level of …

Female Coping With Cardiac Rehabilitation After A Cardiac Event: A Qualitative Study, Patricia B. Quigley

Dissertations

Coronary heart disease is the leading cause of death in American women. Cardiac rehabilitation can reduce cardiac risk, but women underutilize cardiac rehabilitation. Research has not described how women who do participate cope with integrating cardiac rehabilitation into their lives. The purpose of this research study was to explore women's coping with a Phase II (12-week) cardiac rehabilitation program by analyzing interview data for common elements and other ways of coping. A secondary purpose was to explore to what extent the women's descriptions in their interviews corresponded with Lazarus' theoretical concepts of appraisal and coping.

Exploration Of Factors That Promote Continued Volunteer Engagement Of American Red Cross Disaster Health Services Nurses, Kathleen V. Eid-Heberle

Dissertations

The purpose of the research study was to explore factors that promote continued volunteer engagement of American Red Cross Disaster Health Services (DHS) nurses.

Older Hispanic Women With Health Care Provider Diagnosed Osteoarthritis: Experience And Perceptions Of Culturally Competent Care, Claudia A. Oglivie

Dissertations

Arthritis is the leading cause of disability among U.S. adults over the age of 65. Osteoarthritis, the most common form of arthritis, has an incidence rate that increases with age with the highest rates among women. Hispanic women are more affected than any other racial or ethnic group. Little is known about how Hispanic women respond to having osteoarthritis and how they manage its symptoms and limitations. Few studies have examined the specific experiences and perceptions of this population. We do not know how differences in incidence, access to care, disease burden, and activity limitations affect the treatment of Hispanic …

Comparing The Effects Of Two Debriefing Frameworks; Promoting Excellence And Reflective Learning In Simulation (Pearls) Framework And Structured And Supported Debriefing Model (Gas) Framework, Krista M. Prendergast

Dissertations

Essential learning occurs during the debriefing phase of simulation-based learning experiences. Despite this knowledge, evidence regarding the most effective debriefing method is insufficient. The primary purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of two debriefing frameworks, Promoting Excellence and Reflective Learning in Simulation (PEARLS) and Structured and Supported Debriefing Model using Gather, Analyze, Summarize (GAS) on student performance during simulation. This pilot study used a two group, pretest-posttest, experimental design with group randomization.

More Than Midnight Feasts?: A Gastrocritical Reading Of Enid Blyton’S Malory Towers, St. Clare’S And The Naughtiest Girl In The School Series, Rebecca Broomfield

Dissertations

Food is fundamental to life. It is also fundamental to culture; through our production, manipulation and consumption of foodstuffs, the way in which we eat has amassed a range of rituals and rules. This suggests that food can be used to indicate more than mere biological need. Food and foodways are a common occurrence throughout literature, not least children’s literature. This thesis applies gastrocriticism as a paradigm to investigate the use of food and foodways in Enid Blyton’s Malory Towers, St. Clare’s and The Naughtiest Girl school series. Gastrocriticism is an emerging form of literary criticism that considers the complex …

Improving Dysarthric Speech Recognition By Enriching Training Datasets, Sophie Cullen

Dissertations

Dysarthria is a motor speech disorder that results from disruptions in the neuro-motor interface and is characterised by poor articulation of phonemes and hyper-nasality and is characteristically different from normal speech. Many modern automatic speech recognition systems focus on a narrow range of speech diversity therefore as a consequence of this they exclude a groups of speakers who deviate in aspects of gender, race, age and speech impairment when building training datasets. This study attempts to develop an automatic speech recognition system that deals with dysarthric speech with limited dysarthric speech data. Speech utterances collected from the TORGO database are …

Measuring And Comparing Social Bias In Static And Contextual Word Embeddings, Alan Cueva Mora

Dissertations

Word embeddings have been considered one of the biggest breakthroughs of deep learning for natural language processing. They are learned numerical vector representations of words where similar words have similar representations. Contextual word embeddings are the promising second-generation of word embeddings assigning a representation to a word based on its context. This can result in different representations for the same word depending on the context (e.g. river bank and commercial bank). There is evidence of social bias (human-like implicit biases based on gender, race, and other social constructs) in word embeddings. While detecting bias in static (classical or non-contextual) word …

Market Segmentation Of Wine In Ireland: Are We Fostering A Desirable Consumption Culture?, Enea Bent

Dissertations

The aim of this research is to evaluate the wine sector in Ireland and its impact on the wine consumption culture that is being promoted here as a result. With supermarkets leading in terms of sales, this study evaluates the product offering of the various types of retailers and the attainability of the same to different demographics of consumer. A high level of government intervention in the industry is highlighted throughout the study, the intention and subsequent successes and failures are examined. A comparison to the rest of Europe and the United Kingdom is carried out to understand Ireland’s position …

Changes In Teacher Pedagogy And Student Engagement In Elementary 1:1 Classrooms, Adam Douglas Smeets

Dissertations

Technology advances at a pace that far exceeds the rate of change possible in education. Without adjustments to their pedagogy, teachers continue leveraging pedagogical practices that do not match the effective use of technology in classrooms. This qualitative, retrospective instrumental case study explores two areas of the connected elementary classroom: (1) how teachers adapt their instructional practices as a result of 1:1 device adoption at their school and (2) teacher perceptions of change to classroom communication and student engagement the adoption of 1:1 devices. The data for this study was collected through a questionnaire, three-part semi-structured interviews, and district document …

Deep Deification: Soteriology For A World In Ecological Crisis, Kathleen Mcnutt

Dissertations

What might an adequate soteriology look like for a world in ecological crisis? This dissertation constructively addresses this problem at the intersection of contemporary ecofeminist theology and Patristic soteriologies of theosis or deification. I examine ecofeminist soteriologies, drawing on the work of Rosemary Radford Ruether, Sallie McFague, and Elizabeth Johnson in particular, and deification soteriologies, especially that of Maximus the Confessor, arguing that each of these trajectories offers both fruitful possibilities for a reconstruction of soteriology but that each also raises some problems. In bringing these two trajectories into conversation, I suggest directions for a constructive theology of salvation that …

Development Of An Explainability Scale To Evaluate Explainable Artificial Intelligence (Xai) Methods, Stephen Mccarthy

Dissertations

Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) is an area of research that develops methods and techniques to make the results of artificial intelligence understood by humans. In recent years, there has been an increased demand for XAI methods to be developed due to model architectures getting more complicated and government regulations requiring transparency in machine learning models. With this increased demand has come an increased need for instruments to evaluate XAI methods. However, there are few, if none, valid and reliable instruments that take into account human opinion and cover all aspects of explainability. Therefore, this study developed an objective, human-centred questionnaire …

Scrolling Vs Paging: Reading Performance And Preference Of Reading Modes In Long-Form Online News, Richard Herlihy

Dissertations

This study explores the impact of scrolling and dynamic pagination in long-form online documents on reader performance and reader experience. Previous research has produced mixed results, indicating no difference between modes, or a positive effect favouring scrolling. Recent advances in web standards have enabled simpler, dynamic, performant methods of pagination to tailor content responsively to any screen, meriting renewed study in this area. This paper uses one such method to load subsequent online news pages instantly without buffering. In an online browser experiment with 38 participants, an increase in reading speed in the scrolling mode was found at a level …

School Leaders’ Assessment Of Teachers’ Preparedness For Culturally Responsive Teaching, Victoria Maria Siliunas

Dissertations

Societal and school inequities continue to be highlighted via widening achievement gaps that adversely impact historically marginalized groups of students and their communities. An acknowledgement of the importance of developing teachers who are prepared to work with students of culturally differing identities from their own in the day-to-day work of teaching has inspired a shift in language and practice from a more general multicultural approach to a culturally responsive teaching methodology in which a purposeful inclusion of the ethnic and cultural backgrounds of students is prioritized. Addressing challenges schools face related to cultural difference between teachers and the students they …

Racial Identity, Hair Esteem, Hair Texture, And Hairstyle Choice As Correlates Of Psychological Well-Being Among Afro-Latinas In The United States, Marielsy Esther Pimentel

Dissertations

Problem

During the Colonial period, hair was one of the designated phenotypic markers of racial group membership used to assign or deny privilege. Privileges are still assigned to people based on their racial group membership and their proximity to Whiteness. As such, Hair remains a salient part of Afro-Latina women’s lives and identities, with its influences seen in the personal, social, and mental realms. How an Afro-Latina wears her hair can have legal, social, and intrapersonal consequences. The subsequent treatment of Afro-Latinas because of their hairstyle can affect how they view themselves and even how they relate to others, especially …

Indicators Of Typology In The Narrative Of Elijah: An Investigation Into The Predictive Nature Of Biblical Theology, JôNatas De Mattos Leal

Dissertations

Elijah is among the most popular prophets in the Judeo-Christian tradition. In Judaism, the hope for his return has evolved into a plethora of legends in which he functions as a helper to the righteous in the present and avenger to the wicked in the future eschaton. In Christianity, the expectation involving his return has also a multitemporal dimension, but its fulfilment is typologically oriented. More often, scholars study the fulfilment of the Elijah typology from the NT perspective in a backward movement. This dissertation investigates this typology in a forward movement going from the OT to the NT while …

Childhood Obesity Interventions In The Republic Of Trinidad And Tobago: A Qualitative Study Exploring Government Policies And Their Implementation By Health Practitioners, Phyllis Woolford

Dissertations

Because of the rising prevalence of childhood obesity and overweight in the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, and the observation that efforts to address the problem were showing disappointing results, this study seeks to explore the experiences and views of policymakers, health practitioners, and parents of overweight and obese children, in order to inform leaders and policy makers regarding the current interventions.

Method

A qualitative research case study methodology is the research design used, which, with my research questions, I considered would best uncover knowledge and provide perspectives that would provide an increased understanding of the issues arising from the …

Evaluating The Performance Impact Of Fine-Tuning Optimization Strategies On Pre-Trained Distilbert Models Towards Hate Speech Detection In Social Media, Aidan Mcgovern

Dissertations

Hate speech can be defined as forms of expression that incite hatred or encourage violence towards a person or group based on race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation. Hate speech has gravitated towards social media as its primary platform, and its propagation represents profound risks to both the mental well-being and physical safety of targeted groups. Countermeasures to moderate hate speech face challenges due to the volumes of data generated in social media, leading companies, and the research community to evaluate methods to automate its detection. The emergence of BERT and other pre-trained transformer-based models for transfer learning in the …

Examining The Effects Of Disabilities On Vr Usage And Accessibility Issues For Persons With Disabilities, Sean Williams

Dissertations

Virtual Reality (VR) is an emerging technology that’s popularity has been increasing at a yearly rate. Despite this, concerns about the accessibility of VR devices are ever-growing as many users struggle to use the technology, especially users with disabilities. This study analyses how different types of disabilities affect how often a user uses VR and any associated re-occurring difficulties that are related to specific types of disability. To do this, a previous survey regarding VR accessibility run by Disability Visibility Project and ILMxLAB is examined. In this survey, 79 participants who identify as having a disability answered questions related to …

Development Of An Explainability Scale To Evaluate Explainable Artificial Intelligence (Xai) Methods, Stephen Mccarthy

Dissertations

Explainable Artificial Intelligence (XAI) is an area of research that develops methods and techniques to make the results of artificial intelligence understood by humans. In recent years, there has been an increased demand for XAI methods to be developed due to model architectures getting more complicated and government regulations requiring transparency in machine learning models. With this increased demand has come an increased need for instruments to evaluate XAI methods. However, there are few, if none, valid and reliable instruments that take into account human opinion and cover all aspects of explainability. Therefore, this study developed an objective, human-centred questionnaire …

The Case For Alternate Media Requirement Expressions In Systems Engineering, Jason Kolligs

Dissertations

“Requirements” are often presented as a necessary, if not mandated, component or tool of the systems engineering process. Despite their place in engineering, low quality requirements are the first potential mistakes of an engineering project and their effects are potentially felt downstream in the form of increased costs and schedule overruns. Innovations to improve requirements engineering have historically omitted the requirement media. This research provides the rationale and process heuristics to include alternate media requirement expressions within systems engineering which shifts accountability to higher context requirement expressions that may require less cognitive load while decreasing effort and schedule thereby potentially …

Climate Change Adaptation And Retrofit Planning For Coastal Residential Buildings Subjected To Hurricanes, Babak Salarieh

Dissertations

Hurricanes are considered one of the most destructive and costly events, posing a significant threat to coastal communities and infrastructures across the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of the U.S. This devastating phenomenon is an extreme weather event, and its intensity is known to be impacted by environmental parameters such as sea surface temperature. Due to the predicted increase in the sea surface temperature associated with climate change projected, the intensity of future hurricanes is expected to increase substantially. Additionally, the continued population growth of coastal regions and the accompanying increase in the number of residential buildings is increasing the potential …

Communal Storywork: Deaf Education And The Latine Community, Noralee Jasso

Dissertations

In order to challenge the dominant and deficit perspectives in deaf education, this study utilized a Critical Race Theory framework to examine Latine families with Deaf children as they are portrayed in literature across areas of policy, research, and practice. Through qualitative semi-structured interviews, this research project invited nine adult Latine family members with Deaf children to share their lived experiences with having a Deaf child as part of the family and within a California school. To center the experiences of Latine families with Deaf children as visible, legitimate and necessary constituents of their children’s educational journeys, this research required …

An Unconventional Pathway: A Qualitative Inquiry Into The Experience Of Racial Minority Transfer Students, Hanh My Mai Tran

Dissertations

Transfer students’ success is increasingly being discussed in higher education. A large population of transfer students includes racial minority, low-income, and first-generation college students. Due to the multiple layers of students’ identities, it has been difficult for educational leaders in institutions to grasp the essential elements needed to serve these students. As a result, this qualitative study contributes to this discussion and efforts to support the transfer student’s success. In this study, qualitative methods, including interviews with 14 students from 4-year universities and community colleges and a survey, were used to identify the steps and resources associated with supporting transfer …

Culturally Responsive School Leadership In Continuation High Schools: An Alternative Approach In Leadership Styles, Roberto C. Portillo

Dissertations

Continuation high schools and the students they serve are often invisible and ignored to most Californians. However, state school authorities estimate that over 115,000 California high school students will pass through one of the state's 519 continuation high schools each year, to either graduate with a diploma, or to drop out of school altogether (Austin & Dixon, 2008). Principals in these schools must be exceptional and well prepared. However, principals have been trained to implement culturally responsive school leadership at their sites. Eight continuation high school principals described their experiences regarding their preparation, supports, challenges and successes in implementing culturally …