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Thermo-Mechanical Characterization Of High-Temperature Shape Memory Ni-Ti-Pd Wires, Matthew Fox Jan 2009

Thermo-Mechanical Characterization Of High-Temperature Shape Memory Ni-Ti-Pd Wires, Matthew Fox

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Actuator applications of shape memory alloys have typically been limited by their phase transformation temperatures to around 100 degrees C. However, recently with a focus on aerospace and turbomachinery applications there have been successful efforts to increase the phase transformation temperatures. Several of these alloy development efforts have involved ternary and quaternary elemental additions (e.g., Pt, Pd, etc.) to binary NiTi alloys. Experimentally assessing the effects of varying composition and thermo-mechanical processing parameters can be cost intensive, especially when expensive, high-purity elemental additions are involved. Thus, in order to save on development costs there is value in establishing a methodology …


Beliefs Of Graduate Students About Unstructured Computer Use In Face-To-Face Classes With Internet Access And Its Influence On Student Recall, Gregory Johnson Jan 2009

Beliefs Of Graduate Students About Unstructured Computer Use In Face-To-Face Classes With Internet Access And Its Influence On Student Recall, Gregory Johnson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The use of computers equipped with Internet access by students during face-toface (F2F) class sessions is perceived as academically beneficial by a growing number of students and faculty members in universities across the United States. Nevertheless, some researchers suggest unstructured computer use detached from the immediate class content may negatively influence student participation, increase distraction levels, minimize recall of recently presented information, and decrease student engagement. This study investigates graduate students’ beliefs about computer use with Internet access during graduate face-to-face lecture classes in which computer use is neither mandated nor integrated in the class and the effect of such …


Assessment Practices Inelementary Visual Art Classrooms, Jennifer Betz Jan 2009

Assessment Practices Inelementary Visual Art Classrooms, Jennifer Betz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research study was to investigate the attitudes and usages of assessment methods by elementary visual art teachers in two southeastern school districts. Data consisted of responses to a mailed survey instrument that included relevant demographic information pertaining to respondent's educational preparation experiences, tabulation of classroom activities, assessment usage, and a construct set of questions which addressed an attitudinal scale about the effectiveness of evaluation and measurement within their visual art classrooms. The primary focus of attitudinal orientation toward assessment centered upon the types of role models respondents encountered regarding assessment during initial teacher preparation and the …


Privacy, Surveillance And The State: A Comparison Of U.S. And British Privacy Rights, Angelina Lander Jan 2009

Privacy, Surveillance And The State: A Comparison Of U.S. And British Privacy Rights, Angelina Lander

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study investigates the effects of institutional structure on the privacy rights regimes in the United States and the United Kingdom, from 2000-2006. The goal of this research is to analyze how variation in the institutional arrangements across these two countries allowed for more or less protection of privacy rights for citizens. Domestic terrorist attacks during the time period represent a catalyst for changes in police and government surveillance activities. Veto points literature provides the framework for institutional comparison. The first part of the research provides a discussion of the historical evolution of privacy rights in both states, focusing on …


The Clash Of Thoughts Within The Arab Discourse, Chadia Louai Jan 2009

The Clash Of Thoughts Within The Arab Discourse, Chadia Louai

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Clash of Civilization thesis by Samuel Huntington and the claims of other scholars such as Bernard Lewis reinforced the impression in the West that the Arab world is a homogeneous and rigid entity ready to clash with other civilizations. In fact, some in the West argue that world civilizations have religious characteristics, for that reason the fundamental source of conflict in this new world will be primarily cultural and religious. However, other scholars argue that there is no single Islamic culture but rather multiple types of political Islam and different perception of it. Therefore, the monolithic aspect of Islam …


Perceived Parental Characteristics And Neighborhood Support: How Do They Relate To Adolescents' Externalizing Behavior Problem, Rachel White Jan 2009

Perceived Parental Characteristics And Neighborhood Support: How Do They Relate To Adolescents' Externalizing Behavior Problem, Rachel White

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Externalizing behavior problems are related to many problematic outcomes for children and adolescents in their home, school, and community settings. Given the ramifications of difficulties related to externalizing behavior problems, the present study examines the relationships among adolescents' externalizing behavior problems, characteristics of adolescents' families, and their perceived neighborhood support in a sample of adolescents who are in the Sixth through Eighth Grades. As part of this study, adolescents were assessed one time in their school setting with a set of brief questionnaires. In particular, adolescents completed measures assessing their levels of externalizing behavior problems, characteristics of their families, their …


Listening To The Applause And Boos: Television, Online Message Boards, And A Call To Action, Shanna Dinobile Jan 2009

Listening To The Applause And Boos: Television, Online Message Boards, And A Call To Action, Shanna Dinobile

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the relationship between television shows and their corresponding websites featuring interactive message boards looking at the motivations and gratifications that users cited as reasons for being connected to a program. Information found provides knowledge on why viewers are drawn to TV, and what rewards they gain from the actions they perform beyond viewing the show. Specifically, this study examines if viewing a television show and discussing it on an online message board created the gratification of a greater sense of emotional attachment with the show, and if this sense of heightened emotional connection encouraged the board user …


Game Assessment For Miltary Application, Patricia Mcneese Jan 2009

Game Assessment For Miltary Application, Patricia Mcneese

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The primary purpose of conducting this research was to establish game assessment guidelines and characteristics for integrating elected characteristics of games into ongoing instructional approaches. The cost of repurposing commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) games could offer a considerably lower cost alternative than the cost of creating a new instructional game developed for a specific instructional goal. The McNeese Game Assessment Tool (MGAT), created for the assessment of games in this usability study, is currently in a beta stage and was found to have potential for future game assessment. The overall assessment indicated that the tool was effective in analyzing game products for …


Native Fire Regime As A Reference For Establishing Management Practices, Brean Duncan Jan 2009

Native Fire Regime As A Reference For Establishing Management Practices, Brean Duncan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Our understanding of natural fire regimes in human-dominated landscapes is limited. Fire regimes operating in the pyrogenic ecosystems of Florida have been altered by fire suppression and fuel fragmentation. This is especially true of North Merritt Island, Florida, where human impacts have led to an incomplete knowledge of current fire regimes. We know that growing season fires frequently occurred within general return intervals and that many native terrestrial species require fire to remain viable. A 20-year plus period of fire suppression caused structural and compositional changes to vegetation/fuels that led to catastrophic fires and the decline of native species populations …


Beliefs Of Graduate Students About Unstructured Computer Use In Face-To-Face Classes With Internet Access And Its Influence On Student Recall, Gregory Johnson Jan 2009

Beliefs Of Graduate Students About Unstructured Computer Use In Face-To-Face Classes With Internet Access And Its Influence On Student Recall, Gregory Johnson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The use of computers equipped with Internet access by students during face-to-face (F2F) class sessions is perceived as academically beneficial by a growing number of students and faculty members in universities across the United States. Nevertheless, some researchers suggest unstructured computer use detached from the immediate class content may negatively influence student participation, increase distraction levels, minimize recall of recently presented information, and decrease student engagement. This study investigates graduate students' beliefs about computer use with Internet access during graduate face-to-face lecture classes in which computer use is neither mandated nor integrated in the class and the effect of such …


A Reason For Lynching : The Media's Portrayal 1880-1940, Carroll Gunn Jan 2009

A Reason For Lynching : The Media's Portrayal 1880-1940, Carroll Gunn

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


It's Funny 'Cause It's True, Laurie G. Fisher Jan 2009

It's Funny 'Cause It's True, Laurie G. Fisher

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Automatic Graphics And Game Content Generation Through Evolutionary Computation, Erin Hastings Jan 2009

Automatic Graphics And Game Content Generation Through Evolutionary Computation, Erin Hastings

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Simulation and game content includes the levels, models, textures, items, and other objects encountered and possessed by players during the game. In most modern video games and simulation software, the set of content shipped with the product is static and unchanging, or at best, randomized within a narrow set of parameters. However, ideally, if game content could be constantly and automatically renewed, players would remain engaged longer in the evolving stream of content. This dissertation introduces three novel technologies that together realize this ambition. (1) The first, NEAT Particles, is an evolutionary method to enable users to quickly and easily …


Variable Resolution & Dimensional Mapping For 3d Model Optimization, Joseph Venezia Jan 2009

Variable Resolution & Dimensional Mapping For 3d Model Optimization, Joseph Venezia

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Three-dimensional computer models, especially geospatial architectural data sets, can be visualized in the same way humans experience the world, providing a realistic, interactive experience. Scene familiarization, architectural analysis, scientific visualization, and many other applications would benefit from finely detailed, high resolution, 3D models. Automated methods to construct these 3D models traditionally has produced data sets that are often low fidelity or inaccurate; otherwise, they are initially highly detailed, but are very labor and time intensive to construct. Such data sets are often not practical for common real-time usage and are not easily updated. This thesis proposes Variable Resolution & Dimensional …


Modeling Scenes And Human Activities In Videos, Arslan Basharat Jan 2009

Modeling Scenes And Human Activities In Videos, Arslan Basharat

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, we address the problem of understanding human activities in videos by developing a two-pronged approach: coarse level modeling of scene activities and fine level modeling of individual activities. At the coarse level, where the resolution of the video is low, we rely on person tracks. At the fine level, richer features are available to identify different parts of the human body, therefore we rely on the body joint tracks. There are three main goals of this dissertation: (1) identify unusual activities at the coarse level, (2) recognize different activities at the fine level, and (3) predict the …


Geometric Invariance In The Analysis Of Human Motion In Video Data, Yuping Shen Jan 2009

Geometric Invariance In The Analysis Of Human Motion In Video Data, Yuping Shen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Human motion analysis is one of the major problems in computer vision research. It deals with the study of the motion of human body in video data from different aspects, ranging from the tracking of body parts and reconstruction of 3D human body configuration, to higher level of interpretation of human action and activities in image sequences. When human motion is observed through video camera, it is perspectively distorted and may appear totally different from different viewpoints. Therefore it is highly challenging to establish correct relationships between human motions across video sequences with different camera settings. In this work, we …


The Only Place On Earth / Clarissa Romano, Clarissa Romano Jan 2009

The Only Place On Earth / Clarissa Romano, Clarissa Romano

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Mitigating Risk For Anxiety Among Preschool-Age Children Living In Poverty: Evaluating The Impact Of Adult-Provided Social Support On Autonomic Stress Reactivity, Brian Cory Wolff Jan 2009

Mitigating Risk For Anxiety Among Preschool-Age Children Living In Poverty: Evaluating The Impact Of Adult-Provided Social Support On Autonomic Stress Reactivity, Brian Cory Wolff

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Poverty increases children's exposure to stress, elevating their risk for developing patterns of heightened sympathetic and parasympathetic stress reactivity. Repeated patterns of high sympathetic activation and parasympathetic withdrawal place children at risk for anxiety disorders. This study evaluated whether providing social support to preschool-age children during mildly stressful situations helps reduce reactivity, and whether this effect partly depends on children's previously assessed baseline reactivity patterns. The Biological Sensitivity to Context (BSC) theory proposes that highly reactive children may be more sensitive than less reactive children to all environmental influences, including social support. In contrast, conventional physiological reactivity (CPR) theory contends …


Some Things About Love, Magic, And Hair, Chris Kammerud Jan 2009

Some Things About Love, Magic, And Hair, Chris Kammerud

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Rochdale (22bo654) And Dry Bayou (22co666) : A Study Of Lower Mississippi Valley Hopewell Interaction, Joshua Engle Jan 2009

Rochdale (22bo654) And Dry Bayou (22co666) : A Study Of Lower Mississippi Valley Hopewell Interaction, Joshua Engle

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Red River Styx, Chris Hayes Jan 2009

Red River Styx, Chris Hayes

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Geophysical Prospection And Excavation At An Early Woodland Ceremonial Circle In Bourbon County, Ky, Edward R. Henry Jan 2009

Geophysical Prospection And Excavation At An Early Woodland Ceremonial Circle In Bourbon County, Ky, Edward R. Henry

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Appropriation And Expulsion : Jewish Presence In Late Medieval English Drama, Matthew Lindsey Jan 2009

Appropriation And Expulsion : Jewish Presence In Late Medieval English Drama, Matthew Lindsey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Finally, Your Love Poem, Elizabeth Stephenson Bohlke Jan 2009

Finally, Your Love Poem, Elizabeth Stephenson Bohlke

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


The Garden Legacy, Alicia Casey Jan 2009

The Garden Legacy, Alicia Casey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Computational Modeling Of Passive Cooling Of Light Emitting Diodes, Oluwatosin A. Orimogunje Jan 2009

Computational Modeling Of Passive Cooling Of Light Emitting Diodes, Oluwatosin A. Orimogunje

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Assessment Of The Tissue Distribution Of A Novel Binding Site For Angiotensins Ii And Iii In The Mouse, Felicia Rabey Jan 2009

Assessment Of The Tissue Distribution Of A Novel Binding Site For Angiotensins Ii And Iii In The Mouse, Felicia Rabey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Damage Detection Investigation In Steel Beams And Towers / By Ling-Yu Su, Ling-Yu Su Jan 2009

Damage Detection Investigation In Steel Beams And Towers / By Ling-Yu Su, Ling-Yu Su

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Me And My Shadow, Danita J. Beck Jan 2009

Me And My Shadow, Danita J. Beck

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.


A Phenomenological-Hermeneutic Analysis Of Experimental Infant Research, James L. Yu Jan 2009

A Phenomenological-Hermeneutic Analysis Of Experimental Infant Research, James L. Yu

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This project challenges the dualistic conceptions in infant research literature by reexamining a collection of infant research records from a phenomenological, non-dualistic perspective. Grounded in the recent convergences between phenomenology and cognitive sciences, this project utilizes a combined phenomenological-hermeneutic method. This model of analysis is applied to three major areas in infant research: physical knowledge, memory-based learning, and social behaviors. The primary pool of data is drawn from written research records from both primary and secondary sources. To reinterpret empirical findings the analysis includes a systematic reexamination of the ontological presuppositions of infant researchers/scholars, and a reflective, experience-near approach. The …