Digital Commons Network^™

Systematics And Evolution Of The Ronnbergia Alliance (Bromeliaceae): History Of Disjunct Diversification In Three Biodiversity Hotspots Of The Neotropics, Julian Andres Aguirre Santoro

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The systematics, biogeography and evolution of the 'Ronnbergia Alliance,' a nested lineage within the Core Bromelioideae, were investigated. In the first chapter, the phylogenetic relationships of the Ronnbergia Alliance were reconstructed using three chloroplast and three nuclear DNA sequence markers in combination with a wide species sampling across the Core Bromelioideae and a nearly complete species-level sampling of the five species complexes that likely comprise the Ronnbergia Alliance. The analysis indicates that the Ronnbergia Alliance is a robust monophyletic group sister to the remaining Core Bromelioideae, and it is composed by species of the polyphyletic genera Aechmea, Hohenbergia and Ronnbergia. …

The Insanity Defense, Public Anger, And The Potential Impact On Attributions Of Responsibility And Punishment, Chioma Ajoku

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Research indicates that the general public perceives the insanity defense negatively and inaccurately despite the infrequency with which it is pled and the realities often surrounding those who plead the defense. The negative and inaccurate perception of the insanity defense, combined with the potentially increased punitive judgments the defense elicits, suggests that emotion may play a role in perception of the insanity defense. In particular, the psychological literature on anger may contain answers to reactions toward the insanity defense. The current research explored the role of anger on punitive judgments toward a defendant pleading not guilty by reason of insanity …

/N/:/R/ Correspondences In Albanian Dialects: Understanding The N>R Sound Change, Katie Albany

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Albanian language is an Indo-European language that constitutes a separate branch in the Indo-European language family. There are two major dialects, Geg and Tosk, spoken in present day Albania that are mutually intelligible. There are morpho-syntactic differences between the two dialects and shared words provide evidence for a number of sound changes applying in certain contexts in Tosk. The focus of this paper is n > r sound change in Tosk applying to the nasal /n/ in an intervocalic position followed by an unstressed vowel. The lenition rule has been prolific diachronically, but stopped applying some time between the 13 …

The Geometry And Combinatorics Of Closed Geodesics On Hyperbolic Surfaces, Chris Arettines

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this thesis, we obtain combinatorial algorithms that determine the minimal number of self-intersections necessary for a free homotopy class $[\gamma]$ on an orientable surface, using algebraic input. Using this same input, we describe another algorithm which determines whether or not a minimally intersecting curve in $[\gamma]$ is \textit{filling}, that is, whether or not the complement is a disjoint union of disks or punctured disks. Next, we use these algorithms as inspiration for proving the existence of filling curves which self-intersect $2g-1$ times, which is the minimal number of intersections possible. The combinatorial viewpoint that is developed can then be …

The Role Of Dependence In Alcohol Reinforcement: Neurobehavioral Mechanisms, Michal Atzram

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The motivation to consume alcohol is complex, though physiological dependence has long been implicated in alcohol reinforcement and alcoholism. The research presented here was conducted to examine the role of alcohol dependence on voluntary alcohol consumption and preference, the validity of the Lieber-DeCarli (LD) liquid diet as a procedure to induce dependence, and the effect of alcohol administration on dopamine and endocannabinoids. While the LD diet has been used extensively to induce alcohol toxicity and teratogenic effects, there has not been research that has examined its use in the development of dependence and alcohol reinforcement. This research utilized varying periods …

A Merchant-Banker's Ascent By Design: Bartolomeo Bettini's Cycle Of Paintings By Michelangelo, Pontormo, And Bronzino For His Florentine Camera, Richard Aste

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This project examines the early art patronage of a sixteenth-century Florentine merchant-banker, Bartolomeo Bettini, an ambitious anti-Medici Republican with aristocratic pretensions. Bettini was a nobleman, but he aspired to join the city's elite patrician class, and about 1532 he commissioned Florence's leading painters to decorate a camera, or private chamber, in his family palazzo. Through his first major commission, a cycle of paintings by Michelangelo, Pontormo, and Bronzino, he began his ascent through the city's slippery social order. Florence's hierarchy was then being redefined by the newly reinstalled Medici in the wake of the siege of Florence and collapse of …

Basic Cable: A Reluctant American Perspective On The Arab Spring Through Revolutionary Art, Philip Ayoub

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Supported by a critical component that traces back the Egyptian revolution of 2011 to its roots in the post-Nasser era when the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces assumed nearly complete political and economic control over the country, this novella, based in New York City, looks at the crisis through an American lens. As the story progresses the protagonist learns that the conditions which precipitated the events in Egypt can be viewed at once as both a product of American capitalism and Egyptian complicity, as well as act as a mirror, albeit on a magnified scale, of the changing socio-economic …

Toward An Argumentation-Based Dialogue Framework For Human-Robot Collaboration, Mohammad Quamrul Azhar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Successful human-robot collaboration with a common goal requires peer interaction in which humans and robots cooperate and complement each other's expertise. Formal human-robot dialogue in which there is peer interaction is still in its infancy, though. My research recognizes three aspects of human-robot collaboration that call for dialogue: responding to discovery, pre-empting failure, and recovering from failure. In these scenarios the partners need the ability to challenge, persuade, exchange and expand beliefs about a joint action in order to collaborate through dialogue.

My research identifies three argumentation-based dialogues: a persuasion dialogue to resolve disagreement, an information-seeking dialogue to expand individual …

Molecular-Genetic And Behavioral Analysis Of The Functionality Of Patterning In The Trigeminal Neuraxis, Dana Bakalar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

A striking feature of the vibrissal representation in rodents is the presence; at brainstem (barrellettes), thalamic (barrelloids) and cortical levels (barrels) of a somatotopically organized pattern of neurons which is isomorphic, both morphologically and physiologically, to the pattern of vibrissae on the snout. The vibrissal system is required for several classes of behavior, including feeding and active vibrissal sensing, but the functional role of the patterning in these behaviors is unknown. We used two mutant animals lacking patterning in two areas of the vibrissal neuraxis to examine the functional role of patterning. We examined feeding behavior using a knockout of …

Imagining What Could Be: The Role Of Youth Leadership In Realizing College For All, Tara Bahl

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In New York City, there exists an uneven landscape of college guidance among high schools, creating a college "guidance gap". While some schools offer robust counseling that helps students contextualize college admissions information toward making relevant college decisions, other schools have elevated student-to-counselor rates and do not have access to other educational resources necessary to effectively support students. Using ethnographic research and survey data, anchored by dynamic narrative inquiry, this dissertation explores how young people enrolled in under-resourced schools can act as agents of change in the lives of their peers within the context of college planning. Youth Leadership for …

The Sensitive Psychopath: Assessing Construct Overlap Between Secondary Psychopathy And Borderline Personality Disorder, Trevor H. Barese

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The literature suggests substantial overlap between secondary psychopathy and Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). The current study evaluates the degree of construct overlap between BPD and secondary psychopathy within a sample of offenders mandated to treatment in the community. Diagnostic overlap and associations with clinically relevant correlates were assessed to estimate the degree of convergence between the two disorders and divergence from primary psychopathy. The goal of this study was to evaluate the pragmatic utility of maintaining discrete diagnostic categories for secondary psychopathy and BPD rather than identifying secondary psychopaths as offenders with BPD. The Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis …

Cuckolds And Codpieces: Early Modern Anxieties In Male Potency, Doris Barkin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

My dissertation is an exploration of male potency through a close examination of the tropes of the cuckold and the codpiece as presented in English dramatic works of the early modern period: I examine codpiece and cuckoldry discourses side by side, to see how one informs the other, and to perceive to what extent masculinity is affected and communicated by these discourses. My purpose here is to explore early modern views of masculinity, marriage, and sexuality through various theoretical frameworks, from Freud to Foucault.

My study argues that while the codpiece may emphasize or articulate sexual power and virility, that …

Trauma, Mental Health, And Substance Use Among Homeless Families: The Importance Of Shelter Environment, Nisha Nicole Beharie

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Homelessness is at historical levels in the United States and New York City has not been immune to this nationwide trend. Homeless populations are not only increasing in number but are remaining in the shelter for longer periods of time. Homelessness, itself has been shown to have negative consequences on mental health and physical health, but its effects are particularly significant for families with children who have greater needs and who are more susceptible to negative experiences at early ages that can have lifelong impact. Despite this recent data there has been very little to no research on the potential …

Effects Of Reproductive Experiences On Age-Related Neural And Behavioral Changes In Female Rats, Saranna Belgrave

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The experiences of motherhood, pregnancy, birth and postnatal care, are associated with neural and behavioral changes. Female rats undergoing multiple bouts of motherhood (multiparous) have been shown in some, but not all studies, to have a dampened HPA axis stress response, changes in some hormone levels and better performance on spatial memory tasks compared to age matched females who have not given birth (nulliparous). Moreover, some of these changes extend into old age, approximately 24 months old. Thus, parous rats provide a unique, physiological model in which to investigate neural and hormonal factors that may contribute to cognitive decline and …

Propagation Of Non-Stationary Noise In Waveguides, Jonathan Samuel Ben-Benjamin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis consists of research regarding pulse and noise propagation in dispersive media. The research consists of three parts. In Part I we develop an approach for the propagation of non-stationary noise in waveguides, and in particular, we focus on the two-plate waveguide, which is a standard model for the ocean. he fundamental aim is to obtain the propagation of the space-time autocorrelation function. In our formulation, the noise is described by a Wigner spectrum, from which the autocorrelation function can be obtained. We discuss how to obtain the Wigner spectrum of a noise field from the Wigner spectrum of …

Developmental Coordination Disorder: The Relationship Between Gait And Attention With Possible Implications For Early Identification And Intervention, Yocheved Bensinger-Brody

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The aim of this research was to evaluate how increased levels of challenge to attentional capacity would affect the motor planning and coordination in the gait of children at risk of Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) across developmental ages. The study incorporated a dual task paradigm requiring both motor and attention performance, with the primary hypothesis that children who are at risk of DCD across different ages (3- to 8 yrs.-of-age) would demonstrate an alteration in their motor strategies if they were simultaneously engaging in an attention task. A secondary hypothesis of this study was that there is an underlying deficit …

Mechanisms Of Vocal Coordination In Zebra Finches, Jonathan I. Benichov

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Social animals frequently emit communication calls. Although these calls are often innate in their acoustic structure, they can be used adaptably to coordinate behavior with other individuals. It is not known, however, what each animal needs to learn in order to achieve and maintain synchronized call patterns with others. To study this process, we have developed a vocal robot that can be programed to generate call patterns or to sense a bird's contact (short) calls and respond with precisely timed call answers. By varying the robot's vocal behavior, including call timing and rhythm, we tested how interacting zebra finches adapt …

Reconsidering Organicism In Milton Babbitt's Music And Thought, Zachary Bernstein

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation makes two related but distinct claims. The first explores the influence of organicism, particularly in the hierarchical formulation developed by Heinrich Schenker, on Milton Babbitt's thought. This influence is shown to inform Babbitt's writings on a range of issues, guiding his analyses, his view of music cognition, and his understanding of the tonal and twelve-tone systems, including his own compositional twelve-tone techniques. Analysis of Babbitt's compositions, however, reveals several complications with the organicist model: there are a number of pieces and situations that conflict with the expectations of hierarchical organicism. As a result, this dissertation advocates for a …

English Negative Concord, Negative Polarity, And Double Negation, Frances Kathleen Blanchette

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In Negative Concord (NC) sentences, single negative meanings are expressed by two or more negative words. English speakers that use NC also employ Double Negation (DN), where two negatives yield a logical affirmative. The same speakers also use Negative Polarity Item (NPI) constructions, where words like anything and anybody depend on a preceding negation (e.g. 'I didn't eat anything' vs. 'I ate anything'). This dissertation accounts for the distributions of NC, NPI, and DN constructions in English.

I apply the theory of NPIs in Postal (2005) and Collins and Postal (2014) to NC and DN. These authors argue that some …

American Dreamer: First-Time Homeownership And The Affective Geographies Of Dwelling, Stephen Boatright

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This research examines the experiences novice homebuyers in New York City and Oakland, CA have during the home search and decision-making processes. Using a mixed-method approach that combines ethnography with critical discourse analysis and non-representational theory, this work examines the ideology of homeownership as well as the tensions that stem from its emotional affordances. It addresses a lacuna in the housing literature regarding the turbulent everyday emotional tensions that buyers confront as they navigate the highly professionalized real estate industry. Homeownership is lauded for being a relatively low-risk tool for highly leveraged investment; however, using data drawn from a series …

Systematic Studies Of Elaphoglossum Section Polytrichia (Dryopteridaceae), Fernando Bittencourt De Matos

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Elaphoglossum is the largest genus of the largest family of ferns, the Dryopteridaceae. It has over 600 species distributed in the temperate and tropical regions of the world, but it is especially diverse in the Neotropics, where ca. 80% of the species occur. Morphologically, the genus is usually characterized by simple entire leaves, free veins, acrostichoid sori, and phyllopodia. One of the major clades within Elaphoglossum is the "subulate-scaled clade," which includes all species with subulate scales on the leaves. These scales are often patent and enrolled lengthwise, imparting a bristly or shaggy appearance to the plants. Previous studies have …

Social-Ecological Resilience In The Viking-Age To Early-Medieval Faroe Islands, Seth Brewington

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation aims to evaluate the development and maintenance of social-ecological resilience during the settlement-period (ca. 9th through 11th centuries CE) in the Faroe Islands. In particular, the core objectives include the identification of the key social and natural variables involved, the examination of how these variables contributed to overall resilience, and the investigation of the initiation of the Faroese domestic economy.

This research focuses primarily on an analysis of the 9th through 13th century archaeofaunal assemblage from the site of Undir Junkarinsfløtti, located on the island of Sandoy. This analysis represents the first detailed study of the Faroese settlement-period …

Of Truths, Secrets, And Loyalties: Political Belonging And State Building In Poland After State Socialism, Saygun Gokariksel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation is an ethnographic study of the accusations of 'collaboration' with the communist-era secret service in Poland's capitalist democracy. Situated in the global context of the 1989 'revolutions,' it examines the role of law in redrawing the moral and political boundaries of the new body politic and redefining the loyalties of the new citizen-subject of the neoliberalizing state. Specifically, my research concentrates on the legal process called 'lustration' (lustracja) in Poland, the state-centered purges of real or imagined secret communist agents, informers, and spies. Focusing on the contentious legal-political struggles from 2005 to 2008 and their aftermath, it explores …

Interactions And Complexity In Multi-Agent Justification Logic, Antonios Achilleos

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Justification cation Logic is the logic which introduces justifications to the epistemic setting. In contrast to Modal Logic, when an agent believes (or knows) a certain claim, in Justification Logic we assume the agent believes the claim because of a certain justification. Therefore, instead of having formulas that represent the belief of a claim (ex. □_ø or K_ø), we have formulas that represent that the belief of a claim follows from a provided justification (ex. t : ø). The original Justification Logic is LP, the Logic of Proofs, and was introduced by Artemov in 1995 as …

The Print Portfolio And The Bourgeoisie In Fin-De-Siècle Paris, Britany Lane Salsbury

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In fin-de-siècle Paris, the print portfolio experienced a popularity that was unprecedented over the course of its long history. Adapted sporadically by graphic artists from the Renaissance onward, prints were produced as series in greater numbers and by a wider range of artists than ever before between 1880 and 1900, and symbolized new, bold, and varied aspirations for the graphic arts as an original and experimental medium. In addition to its stylistic value, artists valued the print portfolio for the subject matter it could cultivate. A growing number of works produced at this time highlighted social issues and expressed political …

'May God Cure You': Contemporary Egyptian Therapeutic Landscapes Between Qur'anic Healing And Psychiatry, Ana Maria Vinea

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Based on 19 months of fieldwork research in Cairo, this dissertation investigates the constitution and the practice of a therapeutic technique known as Qur'anic healing (al-'ilāj bi-l-qur'ān). In contemporary Egypt, as throughout the Middle East, the past decades have witnessed the increased visibility and popularity of this revivalist, Salafi-based therapy of jinn exorcism and counter-sorcery that is rooted in centuries-old Islamic practices of healing, all the while developing them into new configurations. During the same period, heated public debates stirred by the emergence of Qur'anic healing have occurred, debates in which psychiatrists have played a prominent role.

By …

Housing And The Environment: Smoking Triggers And Tobacco Smoke Exposure, Shannon Farley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: Despite decades of smoking prevalence declines and more recent smoke-free indoor and outdoor air laws, smoking causes 400,000 preventable deaths and secondhand smoke (SHS) exposure leads to 40,000 deaths from respiratory and cardiovascular disease among non-smokers annually. Built and social environment factors linked to smoking include tobacco retailer density and neighborhood poverty. Housing environments including multiunit housing are linked to SHS exposure and adverse health outcomes.

Objectives: To investigate possible associations of different environmental factors with smoking, SHS exposure, and SHS-related health outcomes.

Methods: Many data sources were used: New York City Community Health Survey, Department of Consumer Affairs, …

Modernist Medievalisms And Medieval Modernisms: Auꝺr The Deep-Minded And Derdriu In Norse, Old Irish, Modernist Irish And Post-1945 Scottish Literature, Cori L. Gabbard

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores in a comparative manner the connection between female identity and war in medieval and twentieth-century literature, arguing that texts written before the early modern period acknowledge a relationship between women and conflict that modernist and post-1945 writing mitigates or expunges. Given the binary opposition of women to war that underlies traditional gender roles, my work therefore challenges common perceptions of the twentieth-century as an essentially progressive period in relation to the political and social status of women while addressing widely held notions of the medieval as backwards and irrelevant in order to demonstrate the lack of connotative …

The Hall Of Fame For Great Americans: The Evolution Of A Forgotten Memorial, Sheila Gerami

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The period between the Civil War and World War I was the first great age of public art in the United States. Outdoor sculptures were a part of a larger attempt to construct a didactic environment where shared American ideals could inspire and uplift citizens. It was within this climate that Dr. Henry MacCracken (1840-1918), Chancellor of New York University from 1891-1910, conceived the Hall of Fame for Great Americans (HOF) as part of a City Beautiful campus designed by Stanford White (1853-1906) in the Bronx. This dissertation is the only comprehensive examination of the HOF, beginning with its conception …

Immigration & Naturalization Policy Innovation Through Bureaucratic Reorganization, Neil Hernandez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

During the early 20th century, Congress and the presidency created new bureaucracies to liberalize the restrictive immigration laws then in effect. This dissertation expounds a process that is referred to as 'policy innovation through bureaucratic reorganization.' The case study method is utilized to examine the formation and evolution of the Bureau of Immigration & Naturalization from 1906 to 1913 and the Immigration & Naturalization Service from 1933 to 1940. In these periods, elected officials increased the numbers of immigrants and naturalized citizens. Such administrative results were produced by decreasing agency resources like funding, staffing, and infrastructure, as well as appointing …