Digital Commons Network^™

The Interpersonal Foundations Of Anti-Atheist Prejudice, Michael W. Magee

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Anti-atheist prejudice in the U.S. is socially accepted and rife—and not just because most Americans are religious. This research suggests that hostility toward atheists is related in part to protecting parental relationships. To the extent that they are established within parental relationships, shared reality theory implies that religious beliefs and associated attitudes will be psychologically defended to the extent that the parental relationships engaged are strong, healthy, and vital (Magee & Hardin, 2010; see also Hardin & Higgins, 1996). Three experiments examined the regulation of anti-atheist prejudice in the defense and protection of religious shared realities with parents, as implied …

The Relationship Of Race And Social Integration On The Health Status Of Older Adults In An Urban City, Thomas T. Jordan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Durkheim argues that an individual is more vulnerable to self-destruction the more s/he is detached from the collective. This dissertation will explore the relative impact of social integration on older adults who have transitioned into their new roles in the social structure in relationship to their physical (obesity) and psychological (stress) health status. Additionally, the dissertation examines how social integration varies in its impact from one racial group to another, and how such variations influence the health status of the older adults who are members of these groups.

This dissertation employs data from the Brookdale Center for Healthy Aging and …

Education Policy And The Mathematics Curriculum In New York City Middle Schools, 1958 To 2002, Joseph Valley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study investigates how mathematics education policy and curriculum in New York City changed over the period from 1958 through 2002. It looks at the events leading up to the 퉌new math era, the back to basics movement, and the Standards movement initiated by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) in 1989. Since this period is bounded by two important pieces of legislation, the National Defense Education Act (NDEA),1958, and the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) 2001 an assessment of the arguments for and against the federal intervention in education is essential.

The research methodology used for …

Meanings Of Old Age: A Story In Three Voices, Rivka Tenenbaum-Precel

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

As the population of the Western world grows older, the need to understand the meaning of this stage in life grows in importance. Psychological research into the meaning of old age is posing questions on diverse levels, from that of individual ontogenesis to those of the family, community and society at large. Traditionally, developmental psychology has investigated different aspects of aging using measures of cognition, emotion, self-concept and well- being. Other approaches have examined the meaning of old age as embedded in cultural and social relations.

The present study uses a narrative approach to elicit the particular voices and interpretations …

A Systematic Review Of The Literature On The Effects Of School Bullying From The Framework Of Jurgen Habermas’S Theory Of Communicative Action, Gabriel Cohen

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This project is a systematic review of the US quantitative, empirical studies on the effects of school bullying for the purpose of determining the degree to which Jurgen Habermas’s social theory, the theory of communicative action, can be used to understand the constellation of measured effects. School bullying is defined as a systematic abuse of power: the empirical literature on school bullying, therefore, provides a large data set on the abuse of power. The review finds strong consistency between the theory and the results of selected studies suggesting that Habermas’s theory of communicative action can explain and predict the mechanisms …

Experiences With Infant Mortality As Reported By Middle Class Black Women In Their Own Words, Lisa Paisley-Cleveland

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Black Middle-Class Women and Pregnancy Loss: A Qualitative Inquiry is the first qualitative research case study of its kind on Black Infant Mortality (BIM) to focus on a target group of black American-born middle-class professional married women who have all lived through the experience of infant loss. This target group allows Lisa Paisley-Cleveland to examine the BIM phenomenon outside the poverty paradigm and issues attached to teenage pregnancy, as well as to explore contributing factors attached to the persistent black and white disparity in infant mortality rates, which according to CDC’s January 2013 report are 12.40 and 5.35 respectively.

This …

Skin And Redemption: Theology In Silent Films, 1902 To 1927, Susan Craig

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation analyzes theological concepts in silent moving pictures made for commercial distribution from 1902 to 1927, and examines how directors and scenarists sorted through competing belief systems to select what they anticipated would be palatable theological references for their films.

A fundamental assumption of this study is that, the artistic and aesthetic pretensions of many silent-era filmmakers notwithstanding, directors generally made decisions in the conception, production and marketing of films primarily to maximize profits in a ruthlessly competitive environment. As such, directors needed to walk a fine line between alienating the lucrative working class and immigrant audiences that were …

Semi-Supervised Learning For Connectionist Networks, Rebecca Robare

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

At the computational level, language is often assumed to require both supervised and unsupervised learning. Although we have a certain understanding of these computational processes both biologically and behaviorally, our understanding of the environmental conditions under which language learning takes place falls short. I examine the semi-supervised learning paradigm as the most accurate computational description of the environmental conditions of lexical acquisition during language development. This paradigm is assessed for task learning and generalization and I argue that its real ecological validity and occasional improvements in performance over supervised learning make it an ideal candidate for modeling of language acquisition …

Synesthetic Landscapes In Harold Pinter’S Theatre: A Symbolist Legacy, Graça Corrêa

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the light of recent interdisciplinary critical approaches to landscape and space, and adopting phenomenological methods of sensory analysis, this dissertation explores interconnected or synesthetic sensory "scapes" in contemporary British playwright Harold Pinter's theatre. By studying its dramatic landscapes and probing into their multi-sensory manifestations in line with Symbolist theory and aesthetics, I argue that Pinter's theatre articulates an ecocritical stance and a micropolitical critique.

Chapter One explains the dissertation's theoretical framework (landscape theory, Symbolist theory, ecocriticism, phenomenology, and sensory analysis), while arguing for an ecophilosophical reading of Pinter's landscapes that engages not only with spatial patterns but …

The Interaction Of Intensity And Deviance On Auditory Event-Related Potentials: Findings Using Principal Component Analysis (Pca) Of Current Source Densities (Csds), Nathan A. Gates

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Mismatch negativity (MMN) studies provide insights into the brain's ability to perceive and/or detect deviations from established sensory patterns. Clinical studies investigating the loudness-dependency of auditory evoked potential (LDAEP) have shown a relationship between the intensity of an auditory stimulus and neuro-physiological or -chemical activity of the primary auditory cortex. Unfortunately, these two bodies of literature remain disjointed. The present study integrates elements of each body of literature to a) investigate the impact of varying levels of intensity deviance on N1/P2 with a standard set of intensities used in LDAEP paradigms, and b) assess the extent to which deviance-related processes …

"Because I'M Neither Gringa Nor Latina, Because I Am Not Any One Thing": Children Of Colombian And Dominican Immigrants Negotiating Identities Within (Trans)National Social Fields, Debora Upegui-Hernandez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores how Colombian and Dominican children of immigrants living in New York City negotiate multiple identities, selves, cultures, and histories within transnational social fields. In other words, children of immigrants grow up in the midst of multiple cultures and juggle multiple sets of cultural norms, values, and expectations, their parents' and those of mainstream `American' culture, while they maintain transnational ties to the home country of their parents. This study contributes to the social psychological literature about Dominican and Colombian children of immigrants by introducing a transnational framework to understand their experiences growing up in-between cultures and borders. …

The Impact Of Mood Disorders On Cognitive Function In Post-Menopausal Women Undergoing Treatment For Early-Stage Breast Cancer, Margery E. Frosch

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

PURPOSE: Many post-menopausal women who are treated for early-stage breast cancer report experiencing cognitive difficulties following adjuvant chemotherapy. However, the generalizability of the results of a number of studies that have attempted to document the association between adjuvant chemotherapy and cognitive dysfunction has been limited due to inconsistencies in the investigative methods used, thus introducing the possibility that other factors are contributing to reports of cognitive problems. The current study examines the possibility that a history of mood disorders in post-menopausal breast cancer patients predisposes them to cognitive difficulties following adjuvant treatment. METHODS: Sixty-five postmenopausal women with non-metastatic breast cancer …

Modern Time: Photography And Temporality, Kris Belden-Adams

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores the fluid relationship of photography to time. Many theorists have noted that photography has a distinctive manner of representing temporality. Roland Barthes, for example, wrote that the photograph has a peculiar capacity to represent the past in the present, and thus to imply the passing of time in general. As a consequence, Barthes argued, all photographs speak of the inevitability of our own death in the future. Moreover, he linked photography's peculiar temporality to its capacity for a certain kind of realism: "false on the level of perception, true on the level of time." Barthes's analysis poses …

Children's Tolerance Of Word-Form Variation, Paul Reeves Breuning

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study compared children's (N=96, mean age 4;1, range 2;8-5;3) and adults' (N=96, mean age 21 years) tolerance of word-onset modifications (e.g., wabbit and warabbit) and pseudo affixes (e.g., kocat and catko) in a label extension task. Trials comprised an introductory phase where children saw a picture of an animal and were told its name, and a test phase where they were shown the same picture along with one of a different animal. For `similar-name' trials, participants heard a word-form modification of the previously introduced name (e.g., introduced to a dib, they were asked, `which animal is a wib?'). For …

Moderator Effects Of Working Memory On Symptom Stability In Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder By Dopamine D1 And D2 Receptor Polymorphisms During Development, Joey W. Trampush

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: Developmental changes in dopaminergic pathways in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) that are important for working memory have been hypothesized to play a central role in the trajectory of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), but not the initial onset of the disorder. This dissertation research examines whether dopamine receptor D1 (DRD1) and dopamine receptor D2 (DRD2) gene polymorphisms moderate the association between improvements in working memory and declines in attention problems in ADHD from childhood to adolescence/young adulthood. Methods: Participants were 76 racially/ethnically diverse youth diagnosed with ADHD in childhood and followed prospectively for almost 10 years. Stability of ADHD symptomatology …

"If You See Something, Say Something": The Power Of The 'War On Terrorism' To Name What We See, Polly Sylvia

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation seeks to understand the cultural politics of the "war on terrorism" through a case study of the "If You See Something, Say Something" campaign within the New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority Subway System. Drawing upon literature that focuses on an understanding of the affective transmission of culture, this research seeks to understand this particular campaign as a technique of social control. Through a content analysis of the advertisements of this campaign and a performative methodology that analyzes the performance of security within the subway system, an understanding of the connections this local campaign (as a security campaign) …

Madness, Sexuality, And Gender In Early Twentieth Century Music Theater Works: Four Interpretive Essays, Megan B. Jenkins

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Diagnoses of madness are inextricably entwined with social and cultural beliefs about gender and sexual behavior. The portrayal of characters in music theater as mad relies on contemporaneous understanding of mental illness, as often resulting from, or expressed in transgression of normative gender roles or heteronormativity, and this may apply either to male or female characters. Such transgressions are explored--with regard to recent reconceptualizations of madness within Disability Studies--in four works: Arnold Schoenberg's monodrama Erwartung (1924); Richard Strauss's opera Salome (1905); Kurt Weill's ballet chanté, Anna-Anna (1933), also known as The Seven Deadly Sins; and Igor Stravinsky's neo-classical …

A Critical And Cultural Poetics Of The End: Self, Space, And Volatility In Los Angeles, Pamela Albanese

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

A Critical and Cultural Poetics of the End: Self, Space, and Volatility in Los Angeles delineates the correspondences between Los Angeles spaces--exterior, topographical, architectural, and imaginary--and aspects of the self--interiority, identity, experience, and desire--in fictional and non-fictional depictions of Los Angeles. Through close readings of key Los Angeles novels, essays, and films, this project emphasizes how the narrative "I" traverses urban space, focusing on the dissolution of boundaries between self and place. Los Angeles' sprawling, decentralized layout and rapidly-shifting landscape have a profound influence on narrative identity, generating a volatile and disquieting sense of self; this project also explores how …

Mensura Incognita: Queer Kinship, Camp Aesthetics, And Juvenal's Ninth Satire, Michael Broder

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The dissertation addresses four problematic aspects of scholarship on Juvenal 9. The first two are matters of reception history: first, the poem has been understudied; and second, most major extant studies of the poem have been grossly or subtly homophobic. The other two problems are matters of literary criticism: Juvenal's ninth satire has traditionally been read as an attack on homosexuality, when in fact it is neither an attack, nor is it about homosexuality. The current study addresses each of these problems, reassessing the ninth satire in the context of queer theory and camp aesthetics. Chapter One traces the homophobic …

The Effect Of Teaching Attending To A Face On Joint Attention Skills In Children With An Autism Spectrum Disorder, Tina Rovito Gomez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Autism spectrum disorders are characterized in terms of behavioral deficits in areas of social behavior and language development. A failure to attend to the faces of others is the single best discriminator between 1-year-old children later diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and those with typical development. Attending to the face of another provides the opportunity for episodes of attention sharing and is important to the development of communication, joint attention, and social behavior. A more advanced form of attending to a face is joint attention which has been defined as the ability to coordinate attention between an object …

Forget Burial: Illness, Narrative, And The Reclamation Of Disease, Marty Melissa Fink

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Through a theoretical and archival analysis of HIV/AIDS literature, this dissertation argues that the AIDS crisis is not an isolated incident that is now "over," but a striking culmination of a long history of understanding illness through narratives of queer sexual decline and national outsiderhood. Literary representations of HIV/AIDS can be read as a means of resistance to the stigmatization of people of color, women, immigrants, and queers, debunking the narratives that vilify these subjects as threats to national security and health. In drawing connections between illness, history, and the African diaspora, my work adopts a queer theoretical approach to …

“We Went To The Hills": Four Afghan Life Stories, James M. Weir

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines four Afghan life stories for prevalent micro-historical perspectives on shared Afghan macro-historical experiences. The introduction explains my background, motivations and objectives for conducting life history research in Afghanistan in 2004 and 2005. The first chapter outlines an approach applied to examining life stories that addresses three interrelated questions: first, how the narrator's presentation is related to the memory of the actual events narrated (biographical chronology), second, how a narrative image/s of a person's past is established in relationships to individually significant audience/s (narrative self / audience), and third, how interrelationships between the individual …

The Influence Of Cross-Linguistic Input And L2 Proficiency On L2 Reading Comprehension Among Spanish-Speaking Adults Learning English As A Second Language, Astrid Sussette Rodríguez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Developing literacy and language proficiency in English is essential to thrive in school and in the workforce in American society. Research on cross-linguistic influences on text-level skills is scant, especially studies investigating reading comprehension among language-minority adults. The present study investigated the effects of cross-linguistic input and second language proficiency on second language reading comprehension among Spanish-speaking adults enrolled in English as a Second Language (ESL) classes at a community college in New York City. The main research question was whether language-minority adults would comprehend printed text better if they read it in Spanish (L1) followed by English (L2) than …

Raising Children The American Way: Court-Mandated Parenting Education In Alameda, California, Nicole D. Laborde

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Based on ethnographic research in Alameda County, California, this dissertation examines the parenting practices and knowledge that are taught in court-mandated parenting classes along with those of parents enrolled in these classes. In California, two of the primary reasons that parents would be mandated to take classes are because of involvement with Child and Family Services (CFS) or in a custody dispute that reaches the courts. I argue that the different forms of knowledge and the practices advanced in the classes, at times consistent with, at times in conflict with those of the parents, reflect the demands and social responsibility …

The Social Construction Of Racial And Ethnic Identity Among Women Of Color From Mixed Ancestry: Psychological Freedoms And Sociological Constraints, Laura Quiros

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In the context of the 21st century, when an increasing number of people cannot be classified by an archaic system based on race, an awareness of the complexities of ethnic and racial identity is more important than ever. This study assists in the development of a critical understanding of the complexity of racial and ethnic identity by exploring the construction of racial and ethnic identity among women of color from mixed ancestry. These women are the offspring of parents from multiple racial and ethnic backgrounds. As a result, their identities—both internally and externally constructed—belie traditional racial and ethnic categories. This …

Navigating The Gaze: Young People's Intimate Knowledge With Surveilled Spaces At School, Patricia Krueger

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The 1980s introduced numerous state and federal policies that created a similar ideology of discipline and punishment in the educational system and the criminal justice system, a phenomenon known today as the school-to-prison pipeline. Several critical elements are involved in the production and maintenance of the school-to-prison pipeline, such as zero tolerance regulations, surveillance technologies, and strengthened in-school discipline practices. In this dissertation I argue that these elements of the pipeline maintain a strong presence and occupy the physical spaces of public schools. Moreover, surveillance cameras and police officers are most often installed in the cities' most under-resourced public schools, …

Forsaken Generation: Stress, Social Suffering And Strategies Among Working-Class Pensioners In Post-Socialist Moldova, Romania, Gerard A. Weber

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines the lives of working-class pensioners in post-socialist, Galati, Romania. Its central thesis is that the transformation of Romania from socialism to capitalism beginning in 1989 has led to an "epidemic of stress" among retired, working-class people in the city. Marginalized by their age, class and location in the relatively economically underdeveloped region of Moldova, they have been among the hardest hit by the changes brought about with the introduction of neoliberal capitalism. Long familiar with life in a relatively stable economy, they have faced dramatic changes in this area since the revolution, including massive price instability and …

"Zum Einsatz Des Leben Fuer Deutschland": Girls' Popular Fiction During The Third Reich, Kathryn L. Payne

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Recent research in the field of Cultural Studies has shown that popular fiction, more than any other genre, provides a way for readers to regulate and structure their lives. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the popular fiction which girls living in Nazi Germany read in an attempt to see how current events and policies are reflected in the novels in an effort to acclimatize girls to life under National Socialism and gain their complete support of the Third Reich. Popular fiction was expected to portray a mirror of life for young readers under National Socialism, with …

Creating Collaborative Partnerships To Support Teacher Growth: Mapping The Partnership Process, Lynda Kennedy

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The urban setting has tremendous resources for the support of teaching and learning social studies and history but many teachers do not know how to make use of them. Collaborations centered on teacher professional development between cultural institutions such as museums, historical societies, historic houses, libraries, etc., universities and k-12 schools can create wider communities of practice that can support the professional growth of history and social studies teachers from their pre-service education throughout their careers.

This qualitative case study - grounded in the social/historical context of teacher education and a century of history/social studies pedagogy both in school and …

"A Kind Of Construction In Light And Shade": An Analytical Dialogue With Recording Studio Aesthetics In Two Songs By Led Zeppelin, Aaron Liu-Rosenbaum

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines how the sound of a recording contributes meaning to the song, working in conjunction with the song’s lyrics, harmonic and rhythmic structures, album artwork, and within its cultural context. Two songs by the rock group Led Zeppelin, “When the Levee Breaks” and “Stairway to Heaven,” are taken as analytical examples in which special attention is paid to the acoustic properties of the recordings, that is, where the instruments are situated within the stereo sound field; how they are timbrally manipulated with effects such as reverb, echo, distortion, and chorus; their relative levels of prominence; and how these …