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Perceived Stress And Self-Efficacy As Correlates Of Satisfaction With The Dissertation Process Among Doctoral Students In Educational Psychology In Selected Universities In The United States, Gabriela A. Dumitrescu

Master's Theses

Purpose of the Study

The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of perceived stress and self efficacy on student satisfaction with the dissertation process among doctoral students in educational psychology in selected universities in the United States.

Method

Survey research method was used as the research platform for this study. Online surveys using Survey Monkey were administered to doctoral student in Educational Psychology from selected universities in the United States. Dissertation self-efficacy was measured with the Dissertation Self-Efficacy Scale (DSES; Varney, 2003). Perceived Stress was measured with the Perceived Stress Scale-10 (PSS-10; Cohen, Kamarch & Mermelstein, 1983). …

Diagnostic Study For The Internship Program For A Bachelor School Of Business, Francine Pacheco

Master's Theses

Purpose

This study sought to propose actions to improve the internship program in the curriculum plan in the Business course of a private higher educational institute (HEI) in the countryside of São Paulo, from the analysis of the expectations of students and organizations involved in the students’ admission to the Job Market.

Method

To serve this purpose, a research-action was performed in three steps: analysis, intervention and evaluation. In the first stage, conducting interviews with those involved enabled us to understand the needs of the students, identify their expectations for the HEI, and what they are looking for in this …

Wide-Band Gap Devices For Dc Breaker Applications, Olukayode O. Sodipe

Master's Theses

With the increasing interest in wide-band gap devices, their potential benefits in power applications have been studied and explored with numerous studies conducted for both SiC and GaN devices. This thesis investigates the use of wide-band gap devices as the switching element in a semiconductor DC breaker. It involves the design of an efficient semiconductor DC breaker, its simulation in SPICE, construction of a hardware prototype and the comparative study of SiC and Si versions of the aforementioned breaker. The results obtained from the experiments conducted in the process of concluding this thesis show that the SiC version of the …

An Qualitative Study Of The Meaning High School Students Ascribe To Occult Media Consumption, Jalisha Tolbert

Master's Theses

This qualitative research design explored how high school students ascribe meaning to occult media in pop culture, and it explore possible effects of occult consumption impacting their life aspirations. The research conducted at a high school located on the west side of Chicago, Illinois with a sample size of 10 students from the eleventh grade. First, an exploratory assessment will show how youth ascribe meaning to occult media consumption, and in turn, qualitative interviews presented whether it imposed any effects on life aspirations. The qualitative methods included a qualitative interview, where the researcher asked each participant to explore the meaning …

Global Human Trafficking: New Insights On An Old Crime, Joanna Surma

Master's Theses

Thousands of men, women, and children become victims to human trafficking each year. Almost every country in the world is affected by this heinous crime. Human trafficking exists in many different forms including sexual exploitation, slavery, forced labor or servitude, the removal of organs, child soldiers, etc. Despite the age-old practice being traced back to the 13th century, it continues to exist and even grow today. Unfortunately, not much research is available on the topic. Combating human trafficking is a growing priority for many governments; however, certain obstacles to data collection and analysis continue to exist. Recently, a new study …

Group-Level Differences Of Moral Foundations, Jeremy Winget

Master's Theses

Previous research has started to map the moral domain for individual actors. In particular, Haidt and colleagues (Haidt, 2007, 2008; Haidt & Graham, 2007; Haidt & Joseph, 2004) have extended the moral domain beyond the traditional notions of justice and rights concerns. From this line of research, moral foundations theory emerged, which holds moral intuitions derive from innate psychological mechanisms that co-evolved with cultural institutions and practices. However, to date, there has not been a systematic demonstration of how these moral foundations operate within intergroup settings. Janoff-Bulman and Carnes (2013) have proposed a comprehensive model of the moral landscape that …

In Plain Sight: How Social Images In Education Shape The Social Identity Of Black Students, Kandyce Cabacar

Master's Theses

This thesis will postulate social identity development in Black students is shaped by their school experience. Reviewing how racial grouping is a critical factor in how we engage with others socially, this study will curate the variables of society that assembles the Black image. Social construction influenced by media messages and the neighborhoods that determine our respective schools will also be analyzed. By borrowing from the research of social psychology and contributions of sociologists on race relations, this thesis will demonstrate how expectations influenced by racial stereotypes of Black students create a correlation to social identity. These findings are discussed …

Haitian Representation In The Media: A Comparative Analysis Between An African American Owned Newspaper And A Mainstream Newspaper, Stephanie Jean-Baptiste

Master's Theses

Are the portrayals of Haitian immigrants in an African-American owned newspaper, different from their portrayal in a white owned newspaper? In this paper I examine newspaper articles covering Haitian immigrants and refugees. The articles selected were published in 2004 and sampled from the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Defender. Although the journals have distinctive goals and market reach, there were similarities in their portrayal of Haitian immigrants. Both journals referred to Haitian immigrants as victims of Haiti’s failed democracy. However, each journal advertised the reception of this migrant group differently. The African American owned newspaper advertised inclusion, while the white-owned …

Troubadours Of The Disaster, Peter Christian Caravalho

Master's Theses

Following the death of his father, San Francisco-based music critic Manuel “Manny” Soares is sent by his editor to Amsterdam to find the next big thing in music. Manny hopes that the physical distance from his home will help him work through his father’s passing. Manny finds himself on a late-night flight to Schipol Airport. On a layover in Frankfurt, Manny manages to cause a small riot in the airport bar and escapes. Once he makes “groundfall” in Amsterdam as his editor, Ian, puts it, Manny is on the hunt. Globalization mixed with culture shock follow him as he navigates …

Deconstructing Exploitative Systems And Restoring A Balanced Biosphere: An Ecofeminist Posthumanist Reading Of Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres And Barbara Kingsolver's Prodigal Summer, Aubrey A. Laughlin

Master's Theses

Although many scholarly articles have provided ecofeminist insights and

critiques of A Thousand Acres that connect the abuse of women to the abuse of the land, few have dealt specifically with the link between the treatment of women and the treatment of nonhuman animals. In the first chapter of this paper, I argue that associations between women and nonhuman animals in A Thousand Acres sustain the constructed reality of patriarchal communities. Similarly, Prodigal Summer’s narratives center around females and nonhuman animals, but also provide a broader focus that emphasizes the interconnectivity of the entire biotic pyramid and optimistically holds that …

Crying Wolf: An Analysis Of The Use Of Sensational Content Within The Media And The Desensitizing Effects It Has On Audiences, Lindsey Lowe

Master's Theses

This thesis examines the development and use of sensational media content to analyze this growing phenomenon and the effects that it has had on audiences. This research focuses primarily on specific examples of sensational media content including: The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat, The Great Train Robbery, the “War of the Worlds” broadcast, the Hindenburg disaster, footage of the Vietnam War, Apollo 11 and the first moon landing, and The Day After. These examples were chosen to chronicle the development and use of sensationalism and to illustrate that media audiences of today are desensitized to sensational content because …

A Framing Analysis Of Latinos In The Facebook Pages Of News Organizations, Juliana Zapata Acosta

Master's Theses

This study of the Facebook pages of six legacy media organizations extended framing theory to apply to social media. In the study of 557 articles, four new frames and 10 new subframes were identified. The immigration frame and its two subframes, deportation and undocumented, dominated the coverage of Latinos during the period of the study. The politics frame was the second most dominant frame. This study updated the old data and found that no progress has been made, with the exception of a lesser use of the criminal frame. This improvement could be because the study included six months of …

Enhancing Scalability And Performance In Software-Defined Networks: An Opendaylight (Odl) Case Study, Priyanka Neelakrishnan

Master's Theses

One of the main attributes of software-defined networking (SDN) is the ability to make networks programmable and virtualizable. The SDN controller is the brain that sends instructions to the data plane and can be programmed via application APIs. The scalability and performance of the controller is of paramount importance to support large networks, such as the ones found in modern settings. This research work focused on exploring the ways in which the controller design could be scaled while maintaining sustainable performance using the OpenDaylight (ODL) SDN controller as a case study. This thesis shed light on a method of modifying …

Pretty Maps: Evaluating Gis Adoption Of Cartographic Design Standards And Best Practices In Professional Publications, David Medeiros

Master's Theses

The nature of GIS maps, as tools designed for visual communication, puts them in the realm of art that is in many ways unique among scientific tools. As a visual form of communication, maps are responsive to methods of visual design, affecting the map’s appeal and function. Through cartography, a well established body of standards and best-practices exists to help GIS users avoid common design errors and create effective and meaningful maps that support their work. This research examines the adoption rate of those standards amongst professionals using GIS software for creating maps for journal publications. A selection of 80 …

Learning Delays In A Mouse Model Of Autism Spectrum Disorder, Amanda R. Rendall

Master's Theses

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a heterogeneous neurodevelopmental disorder with core symptoms of atypical social interactions and repetitive behaviors. It has also been reported that individuals with ASD have difficulty with multisensory integration, and this may disrupt higher-order cognitive abilities such as learning and social communication. Impairments in the integration of sensory information could in turn reflect diminished cross-modal white matter connectivity. Moreover, the genetic contribution in ASD appears to be strong, with heritability estimates as high as 90%. However, no single gene has been identified, and over 100 risk genes have been reported. One of these genes -- contactin-associated-like-protein …

Photooxidation Reactions Of Small-Chain Methyl Esters, Aerosol Photoelectron Spectroscopy, And The Photodissociation Of Ethylenediamine, Giel Muller

Master's Theses

Research conducted at the University of San Francisco is presented within this masters thesis, including the Cl-initiated photooxidation reactions of methyl propanoate, methyl butanoate, and methyl valerate (pentanoate), the aerosol photoelectron spectroscopy of isoprene and gamma-valerolactone, and the TPEPICO investigation of ethylenediamine. Experiments were conducted at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab Advanced Light Source (ALS), the National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center in Hsinchu City (NSRRC), and the University of Stockton in California, respectively.

Power, Subjectivity, And Life In Spain: A Continuation Of Elite Power, Matthew Mason

Master's Theses

On December 20, Spain will hold national elections to determine the new prime minister and national and local parliaments. These elections will be another crossroads in the long history of Spain. The elections come about in a political and social atmosphere of ‘change’ and ‘regeneration,’ marked by the rise of two new political parties, Podemos and Ciudanos. These parties are the new forces in the political scene in Spain. This atmosphere of change is the result of the 2008 economic crisis. The economic crisis of 2008 was not only an economic crisis in Spain, but it provoked a political and …

The Tunisian Revolution: Empire And The Power Of The Multitude, Caroline A. Burns

Master's Theses

The self-immolation of Mohammed Bouazizi ignited the revolution that would oust Tunisian dictator Ben Ali in 2011. The momentum of the revolution in Tunisia spread ideas, tactics, and revolutionary chants across borders to various parts of the globe. The speed and intensity of the revolution dominated the attention of the unsuspecting global community. In order to understand the conditions under which this revolution transpired, I use Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri's theory of Empire to show how the contemporary global system functions. Through the historical development of Tunisia and concurrent rise of Empire emerges "the multitude," the heterogeneous manifestation of …

The German Army At A Crossroads Of Modernization, Sarah E. Liebig

Master's Theses

This thesis examines the German civil-military relationship and the challenges the country is facing amidst modernizing reforms to the German armed forces. Over the last quarter of a century, new international security threats have manifested and continue to transform requiring Germany to adapt its military and defense policies in order to effectively protect itself and serve as a capable ally to other member states of international organizations such as NATO and the EU. The adaptations and reforms required of Germany have led to concern that the cornerstone civil-military relationship concepts are at risk. In this thesis I identify the major …

“How Do You Define Yourself?” Mobilizing Leadership In The Graduate Employee Union Movement, Kathleen Ragon

Master's Theses

Social movement scholars agree that leadership plays a crucial role in the emergence, structure, and outcomes of social movement organizations (SMOs) and is thus an indispensable area of research. The vast majority of theories of leadership to date have been developed in contexts where participants’ movement identities are relatively stable (e.g., gender, sexual, or occupational) and engagement in the site of contestation will be long-term (e.g., workplace or nation state). However, the recent proliferation of graduate student employee unions poses a challenge to this literature because graduate students’ employment is by its very nature temporary and variable; graduate assistantship appointments …

Three Degree-Of-Freedom Parallel Actuator Telescope Mount, Garrett Daniel Gudgel

Master's Theses

This thesis contains the design, implementation, and testing of an original, small-scaled two degree-of-freedom telescope mount and a medium-scaled three degree-of-freedom telescope mount inspired by the six degree-of-freedom Stewart-Gough platform telescope mount. The end product is intended to achieve research-standard resolution of targeted sky coverage for binary star research. The scaled prototype was carried through concept design, manufacturing, software development, and testing. The mount software development and electronic design is applicable to a full-scale mount as the drivers have been designed to be easily adapted to different actuator configurations. It is recommended that this design be implemented into a telescope …

Ergonomics Analysis Of Touchscreen Utilization As A Function Of Preferred Hand And Gender, Jordan E. Odell

Master's Theses

The growth of touchscreen technology has changed the way users interface with a wide range of computing and communication products and systems. Examples range from personal tablets and laptops to industrial applications such as process control, point-of-sales, and ticketing kiosk systems. An important area of application is the automobile industry which is designing cars with touchscreen control panels to replace the previously designed mechanical knobs and buttons. However, interacting with touchscreens does not provide the same tactile feedback as physical mechanisms, therefore they require more precise movement and visual attention, which distracts the user from the primary task.

The purpose …

Inductive Monitoring Systems: A Cubesat Ground-Based Prototype, Michelle Haddock

Master's Theses

Inductive Monitoring Systems (IMS) are the newest form of health monitoring available to the aerospace industry. IMS is a program that builds a knowledge base of nominal state vectors from a nominal data set using data mining techniques. The nominal knowledge base is then used to monitor new data vectors for off-nominal conditions within the system. IMS is designed to replace the current health monitoring process, referred to as model-based reasoning, by automating the process of classifying healthy states and anomaly detection. An IMS prototype was designed and implemented in MATLAB. A verification analysis then determined if the IMS program …

Una Legua Cuadrada: Exploring The History Of Swanton Pacific Ranch And Environs, Jeanine Marie Scaramozzino

Master's Theses

Swanton Pacific Ranch is an educational and research facility owned by the Cal Poly Corporation and managed by the Cal Poly State University (Cal Poly) College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences. Located about 180 miles north of campus and just 14 miles north of Santa Cruz, California on Highway 1, the property was first leased to and then donated to Cal Poly by the late Albert E. Smith in 1993. The rancho’s original inhabitants included Native Americans, Spaniards, Mexicans, as well as various European immigrants and their descendants; currently, the staff, faculty, and students of Cal Poly occupy the …

Analyzing General-Purpose Computing Performance On Gpu, Fanfu Meng

Master's Theses

ABSTRACT

Analyzing General-Purpose Computing Performance on GPU

Graphic Processing Unit (GPU) has become one of the most important components in modern computer systems. GPUs have evolved from a single -purpose graphic rendering hardware to a powerful processor that is capable of handling many different kinds of computing tasks. However, GPUs don’t perform well on every application, and it takes a lot of design effort to get good performance on a GPU.

This thesis aims to investigate the relative performance of a GPU vs. CPU. Design effort is held minimum for both CPU implementations and GPU implementations. Matrix multiplication, Advance Encryption …

Spatial Variability Of Soil Velocity Using Passive Surface Wave Testing, Daniel Raymond Wagstaffe

Master's Theses

Lifelines such as highways, pipelines, telecommunication lines, and powerlines provide communities with vital services, and their functionality is dependent upon the foundation soil that supports them. However, when designing the infrastructure, it can be difficult to know where to test the soil in order to give spatially representative sampling, particularly for long, lifeline structures. Finding this distance requires knowledge of the spatial correlation and/or the spatial variability of the soil parameter (stiffness, cohesion, etc.). But this correlation distance is not typically found in practice because it requires large amounts of data and the costs of retrieving that data can be …

Preschool Creative Drama: A Curriculum And Its Effects On Learning, Erin Kelli Lindberg

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Bioarchaeological Analysis Of Oak View Landing (40dr1): An Archaic Population In The Kentucky Lake Reservior, Katy D. Grant-Mclemore

Master's Theses

The biocultural examination of the Archaic population recovered at Oak View Landing (40DR1) investigates the lifeways and adaptations of prehistoric people as they reflect sociopolitical and subsistence strategies.

A comprehensive bioarchaeological analysis was conducted on the adult individuals (18 males, 16 females, 16 of indeterminate sex) excavated from a multiple occupation site located along the Tennessee River in Decatur County, Tennessee. Skeletal indicators used to understand biocultural phenomena were assessed macroscopically on cranial and postcranial elements. Furthermore, mortuary data, for adults and subadults, were used to determine any patterns of preferential treatment at death.

Results from this study indicate that …

An Integrated Drought Index (Idi) Incorporating Physical And Social Aspects, Rebecca L. Lanier

Master's Theses

The purpose of this research was to determine significant bio-physical (physical and environmental) and social variables that can be integrated into a drought index to predict areas susceptible to drought. Severe drought events are capable of causing millions of dollars in damage. The 1988 drought caused the United States approximately $40 billion in damage. Drought forecasting, modeling, and detection have, therefore, become imperative to understand the social, economic and environmental impacts of droughts, and also to explore how these impacts play a role in the occurrence of a drought. A number of drought indices widely used in the U.S. rely …

Development And Validation Of A Survey Of Knowledge Of Autism Spectrum Disorder, Laura Katherine Hansen

Master's Theses

As autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is more commonly diagnosed, having knowledge of the disorder becomes increasingly important for educators, parents, and the general public. Previous research regarding knowledge of ASD, focused mainly on knowledge possessed by those in the educational field, has found that individuals may perceive themselves as possessing average knowledge regarding ASD but have low actual knowledge (as defined by the researchers) regarding specific aspects of the disorder (Williams et al., 2011). Studies support the notion that there is a general lack of knowledge of different aspects of ASD among teachers; however, there has been little research regarding …