Digital Commons Network^™

The Effectiveness Of Experiential Environmental Education: O'Neill Sea Odyssey Program Case Study, Lauren Elizabeth Hanneman

Master's Theses

Environmental education programs aim to develop participant awareness, sensitivity, and understanding of their affective relationship to the natural environment through conceptual knowledge and personal experiences. Previous findings have suggested that participation in environmental education programs leads to short-term positive increases in environmental knowledge, pro-environmental attitudes, and intentions to act in environmentally responsible behaviors; however, few studies have included long-term, follow-up assessment. This research provided an analysis of the effectiveness of the O'Neill Sea Odyssey (OSO) education program in fostering a long-term awareness of personal responsibility about ocean pollution among student participants.

A survey administered to 261 students from the greater …

Unmanned Aircraft System (Uas) Delegation Of Separation In Nextgen Airspace, Caitlin Ailis Kenny

Master's Theses

The purpose of this thesis was to determine the feasibility of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) performing delegated separation in the national airspace system (NAS). Delegated separation is the transfer of responsibility for maintaining separation between aircraft or vehicles from air navigation service providers to the relevant pilot or flight operator. The effects of delegated separation and traffic display information level were collected through performance, workload, and situation awareness measures.

The results of this study showed benefits related to the use of conflict detection alerts being shown on the UAS operator's cockpit situation display (CSD) and to the use of full …

My Team Drinks: An Analysis Of Alcohol Consumption Norms Among Adolescent Athletes, Laura Beth Jones

Master's Theses

Alcohol use among adolescents results in a greater risk of lifetime alcohol abuse and dependence. Some research suggests that perceived peer norms about drinking are the strongest predicting factor of alcohol–related behaviors (ARBs) among adolescents. Previous research on whether sports participation is related to adolescent alcohol consumption has resulted in mixed findings. For this study, perceived norms were further delineated between descriptive and injunctive norms. The goal of this research was to determine whether there were differences between sport types (team vs. individual) in alcohol consumption patterns and whether sport type moderated the predictive strength of perceived norms on alcohol …

Relationship Between Cognitive Functions And Hormones, Daniel C. Miao

Master's Theses

Stress has been implicated by recent research to significantly contribute towards many cognitive and physiological deficiencies. One of the most popular topics of study is the effect of stress on inhibition, the all-or-none decision about an action or inaction. However, only recently have scientists begun investigating neuroendocrine molecules that link stress and inhibitory processing. Participants included San José State University undergraduates (27 male, 63 female, 1 unstated) who were exposed to the Trier Social Stress Test, an established stress task, and who were assessed before and after stress exposure for cortisol levels. Participants were also given a pre- and post-test …

The Effects Of Psychological Contract Breach On Job Outcomes, Nichole Simone Ballou

Master's Theses

The present study examined the effects of psychological contract breach on attitudinal and behavioral job outcomes including job satisfaction, intention to remain with one's organization, perceived organizational support, and organizational citizenship behaviors. Additionally, the present study also examined whether the effect of the psychological contract breach on these job outcomes varied based on the type of psychological contract an employee had (i.e., transactional or relational). A total of 89 part- and full-time employees participated in this study. Results showed that the breach of one's psychological contract had a significant effect on one's job satisfaction, intention to remain, and perceived organizational …

Ethnic Continuity And Change At Gezer, Philip Webb

Master's Theses

This project examines the issue of social identity, particularly ethnicity, in the ancient world. It focuses on one site, Gezer, and how ethnic identities there evolved between the Middle Bronze Age and the end of the Iron Age. Modern anthropological perspectives on ethnicity and methods used by archaeologists for identifying ethnicity archaeologically are examined. In light of these studies, the history of Gezer is inspected.

The site is chronologically divided into three periods, the Bronze Age, the Early Iron Age, and the Late Iron Age. Using both historical and archaeological sources, the occupational history of Gezer is outlined, highlighting ethnically …

Ncaa Division I Coaches And Athletic Trainers: An Examination Of Professional Relationships And Knowledge Of The Athletic Training Profession, Laura Alexander

Master's Theses

The goal of this study was to explore coaches' experience with athletic trainers (ATs) and knowledge of their roles and responsibilities at the NCAA Division I level. The data collection involved a questionnaire and follow-up phone interviews. The survey was sent out to all 144 official head coaches of NCAA Division I universities in the Bay Area region of California, as defined by the California Department of Social Services in 2002, and there was a 22% (n=31) return rate. Nearly 60% (n=18) of coaches said they communicated with their athletic trainer over five times per week. Another ~60% (n=20-n=28) of …

Use Of Stair Prompts To Encourage Physical Activity, Nima Chhay

Master's Theses

Stair prompts can encourage stair use in both public and private settings and thereby increase overall physical activity. Stair visibility in multilevel buildings increases stair use. For this study, an intervention using a modified New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene stair prompt was implemented to encourage stair use in an academic setting. The modification included a time management theme, chosen because individuals in this setting may find taking the stairs to be faster than taking the elevator. To evaluate the effectiveness of the modified stair prompt, two buildings--one with hidden stairs and one with visible stairs--were selected …

Embedded Cloud System For Ann-Cod Analysis Using Uv Spectroscopy, Kaushik Patra

Master's Theses

One of the many parameters indicating water quality is chemical oxygen demand (COD), which is an indirect measurement of the amount of organic compound material in water. There have been many studies, in both academia and the industry, to analyze the COD content of water using spectral analysis. The proposal of this thesis was to study, analyze, and identify methods to determine the presence of COD using UV spectroscopy data and an artificial neural network (ANN) in a cloud-connected embedded system. The system was implemented using an ARM11 board and a portable spectrometer. Light in the UV range was used …

L'Oeuvre Littéraire Et Plastique D'Eugène Fromentin : Parallèle Et Complémentarité, Arnaud Bergerol

Master's Theses

Eugène Fromentin was an accomplished man of art. A cultured writer, painter,and critic, he dedicated his life to conveying through the use of the pen and the brush his passion for travelling in faraway countries. His literary works include two travel books(Un été dans le Sahara and Une année dans le Sahel), a psychological and autobiographic novel (Dominique), and a critical analysis of the 16th century Flemish school of painting (Les Maîtres d'autrefois). As a painter, he was best known for his orientalist artwork and the visual translation of his travel experiences in Algeria …

Assessing The San José State University Simultaneous Polydrug Use Questionnaire -- Online (Sjsu Spuq -- Online) A Pilot Study, Joseph P. Hennessee

Master's Theses

Alcohol use is one of the most prevalent forms of drug use among college students. Because of the near ubiquity of college drinking, additional research is needed to determine whether such alcohol use is related to any cognitive impairment. Furthermore, many of those who use alcohol consume one or more additional drugs simultaneously, and little research has assessed whether such simultaneous polydrug use (SPU) has a further effect on cognitive functioning. This study was developed to bridge these two gaps in the literature and aid in the development of the SJSU SPUQ - Online.

Through the use of computerized tasks …

Designing Affordances On Embedded Interfaces, Gabriela Madalina Istan

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of a user interface on users' performance during an online shopping checkout task. Two interfaces were developed using the principles of Rasmussen's SRK model: a high-affordance and a

low-affordance interface. Seventy undergraduate and graduate students performed a simulated online shopping task with the two interfaces. It was hypothesized that the high-affordance interface would require less time and fewer clicks to conduct the shopping task when compared to a low-affordance interface. In addition, it was predicted that participants would prefer the high-affordance interface. The findings revealed participants spent more time on …

An Examination Of The Representation Of Irish Catholic Priests In Contemporary Irish Theatre, James Patrick Jeans

Master's Theses

Modern Irish theatre can trace its origins to the creation of The Irish Literary Theatre by W.B. Yeats and Lady Gregory in 1899, which later became the Irish National Theatre Society, and eventually, the Abbey Theatre. For more than 100 years, Irish theatre has served as a mirror for reflecting Irish identity and as an oracle of future possibilities. A decade into the Twenty First Century found Irish identity challenged by a child abuse scandal of tragic proportions whereby over 30,000 children suffered at the hands of a duplicitous and negligent Catholic Church. The purpose of this thesis is to …

Effects Of White Space On Consumer Perceptions Of Value In E-Commerce, Sin Lee Loh

Master's Theses

As e-commerce becomes an increasingly large industry, questions remain about how the isolated effects of design elements on websites influence consumer perceptions and purchasing behavior. This study used a quantitative approach to measuring the effect of a ubiquitous element of design, white space, on the perception of the monetary value of individual items. White space is a key component of design and website usability, yet it has been shown to be related to the perception of luxury. Little is known about the direct relationship between manipulation of white space and the outcomes on consumer perceptions of value in an e-commerce …

The Relationship Between Job Embeddedness And Work Engagement, Raymond William Ringl

Master's Theses

Research on job embeddedness has focused on explaining why employees choose to stay with their organizations rather than why they leave. Recently, research on job embeddedness has expanded to predict other employee behaviors such as organizational citizenship behaviors and innovation-related behaviors. To date, no research has been conducted to investigate the relationship between job embeddedness and work engagement. The purpose of this study was to add to the literature on job embeddedness by investigating relationships between the six dimensions of job embeddedness and the three dimensions of work engagement. Based on 213 participants, the study results showed that organizational embeddedness …

Fostering Affective Commitment And Work Engagement Through Mentoring, Luis Portillo

Master's Theses

Past research on mentoring has focused primarily on the benefits that protégées and mentors derive from their mentoring relationships. However, little research has been devoted to revealing the ways in which mentoring can benefit organizations. To address this void, a sample of 124 protégées was used to investigate the relationships between satisfaction with a mentor, affective commitment (AC), and work engagement. Perceived organizational support (POS) was hypothesized as the mediator of the aforementioned relationships. Further, in order to identify the factors contributing to satisfaction with the mentor, this study examined the relationship between satisfaction with the mentor and mentorship type …

Effectiveness Of Peer Mentoring In First-Year Program Classrooms, Katherine Casey

Master's Theses

First-year programs (FYPs) for college students offer extended orientation to campus resources and provide first-time freshmen with essential skills for academic success, and many believe that the effectiveness of FYPs increases with the presence of peer mentors. The present study measured the added effectiveness of peer mentoring in FYP classrooms with knowledge of campus resources as a dependent measure. Ninety one first-year students in nine sections of FYP classes participated in this quasi-experimental study. Seven of the classes had peer mentors (n = 70), and the two control classes (n = 21) did not have peer mentors in the classroom. …

Accent-Based Implicit Prejudice: A Novel Application Of The Implicit Association Test, Carolyn Chu

Master's Theses

In the present study, implicit attitudes toward accents were examined. The most common method used to study accent-based perceptions is by self-report questionnaires, which measure explicit attitudes. To my knowledge, no previous study has examined implicit accent-based attitudes. In the present investigation, auditory stimuli were used in a novel application of the Implicit Association Test (IAT) to measure implicit accent attitudes. Participants were randomly assigned to listen to a passage read in one of three foreign accents (Mexican, Chinese, or British) and the same passage in a Standard American accent. Participants also completed the Speech Dialect Attitudinal Scale, which measured …

This Could Be A Game!": Defining Gamification For The Classroom, Darcy Elaine Osheim

Master's Theses

Instructors find a gap between what they experienced in school in the mid-to-late 20th century and the experiences of students entering college in 2012/13. In the United States, the influx of almost universal access to technology has marked this generation in a way the previous generations must work to understand, and gamification is a strategy used in areas like marketing to gain participation from this age group. Gamification is a strategy that employs game mechanics, techniques, and theory in areas that traditionally are not set up to function like a game. The purpose of this study was to define gamification …

Experiences Of Coping With Injury In Division I Athletes From Low-To-Middle Socioeconomic Status Backgrounds, Matthew Philip Bejar

Master's Theses

Injuries inevitably occur in any sport at any level. The integrated sport injury model is one of the most extensive frameworks to address the psychological responses to athletic injury. While this model posits that socioeconomic status (SES) influences how an athlete cognitively, emotionally, and behaviorally responds to an injury, no research has substantiated this claim. Low SES individuals experience an exceptional amount of stress, which may complicate how they cope with a negative event. The coping strategies employed by an athlete can have major implications on rehabilitation adherence, recovery time, and psychosocial well-being. The purpose of this study was to …

Women In Science, Technology, Engineering, And Mathematics (Stem) Fields: The Importance Of The Need To Belong And Self-Esteem On The Intention To Leave A Job, Jung Eun Lee

Master's Theses

The purpose of the study was to predict individual intentions to leave science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) field jobs. Psychological predictors were gender, the need to belong, self-esteem, perceived personal discrimination, and perceived group discrimination. We used the Amazon Mechanical Turk to recruit participants and Survey Monkey to conduct an online survey. Participants were 174 men and women who worked or studied in STEM fields. Two-step hierarchical linear regression analyses were performed to analyze the data. As a result, we found that all predictors mentioned above accounted for the variance in the intention to leave a job. Self-esteem and …

The Effects Of Indoor Climbing Route Rating Manipulation On Participant Climbing Self-Efficacy, Phillip James Sandlin

Master's Theses

This quantitative study utilized a classical experiment design to explore the

effects of manipulation of indoor climbing route ratings on the climbing self-efficacy of 90 indoor rock climbers. Controversy surrounding the accuracy of the assigned ratings of indoor climbing routes is commonplace at indoor climbing facilities. For indoor rock climbers to accurately assess their abilities, set appropriate goals, and monitor their progress, they must be able to choose climbs that accurately represent their desired level of challenge. Statistical analysis of the data did not support a relationship between manipulation of climbing route ratings and any changes in participant climbing self-efficacy. …

Funding Sources Of Impactful And Transformative Research, Barrett Anderson

Master's Theses

Understanding how the most important scientific articles have been funded can help inform and improve future funding decisions. Importance is here defined as science that, in the metaphor of the tree of knowledge, plays a structurally significant role (e.g., creates new branches of knowledge or transforms existing ones). The structural significance of articles is broken down into two submeasures: citation count and "generativity" (a novel measure defined as being highly cited and also leading to a comparatively large number of other highly cited articles). Generativity is an attempt to provide a quantitative operationalization that should correlate with transformativeness, a concept …

Future Work Selves And Work-Related Outcomes: The Role Of Perceived Supervisor Support, Shama Arakeri

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between future work selves and work-related outcomes such as proactive career behaviors, self-development organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs), and work engagement. Future work self salience was used to capture employee work selves that could be easily and clearly recalled into memory. An additional purpose of the current study was to examine whether perceived supervisor support would moderate each of the three relationships. A total of 123 employees participated. Future work self salience was positively related to proactive career behaviors, self-development OCBs, and work engagement. Furthermore, perceived supervisor support was found to …

Developing A Library Of Display Effects On Pilot Performance: Methods, Meta-Analyses, And Performance Estimates, Ellen Salud

Master's Theses

The design of NextGen and current-day cockpit displays are critical for efficient pilot performance and situation awareness on the flight deck. Before deployment of a design into the cockpit the costs and benefits that a display design imposes on performance and situation awareness should be considered. In this thesis, a design tool was developed to support the design of NextGen displays for situation awareness and performance. This design tool is a library of pilot performance estimates. Through literature reviews and meta-analyses of empirical data, the library was developed to provide display designers 1) qualitative distinctions of display properties that either …

Making The Right Impression: An Exploratory Study Of Job Applicants' Social Networking Sites, Ka Weng Sitou

Master's Theses

The purpose of the study was to investigate whether job applicants manipulated their Facebook pages for employment purposes and the specific characteristics on their pages that were purposely altered to attract potential employers. A total of 50 interviewees participated in the study. Results indicated that job applicants did manipulate their Facebook pages for employment purposes for various reasons with the most common reason being to avoid misperceptions by potential employers. Another goal of this study was to examine job applicant beliefs on employer and job applicant use of Facebook for employment purposes. The study results indicated that job applicants supported …

The Effect Of Bmi On The Age Of Menarche In Adolescent Girls, Samara R. Sterling

Master's Theses

Problem. Over the past century, the age of menarche has consistently declined in the United States and globally. Obesity has also increased by 82% globally over the past 20 years. Obesity, as measured by BMI percentiles in children, may contribute to the declining age of menarche. -- Method. Adolescent girls ages 12-19 were examined in California and Michigan. Physical development and the age of menarche were assessed through an online questionnaire. Height and weight measurements were taken at a clinic and converted to BMI percentile values. -- Results. A negative correlation was observed between BMI percentile values and the age …

Toward A Biblical View Of Collective Responsibility For The Seventh-Day Adventist Church In The Twenty-First Century, Miroslav Danihel

Master's Theses

The notion of collective responsibility is an issue that is not very popular in the postmodern society. However, the idea of collective responsibility can be found in the Bible. This thesis examines philosophical, ethical, and biblical sources on the subject. The biblical evidence focuses on examining Josh 7 and Ezek 18, as well as some of the New Testament contributions to the topic. The relationship between collective responsibility, collective personality, and collective punishment is discussed. The thesis acknowledges collective responsibility as a valid biblical doctrine and proposes its application for church members, leaders, and the decision-making process in the Seventh-day …

Literary And Visual Representations Of Traumatic Memory Of The Pinochet Dictatorship In Chile, Alison Tange

Master's Theses

This thesis presents an analysis of six narratives that contribute to the collective memory of the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile. In this study, I attempt to pinpoint the commonalities, motivations, and differences in three literary texts - Un día de octubre en Santiago (Carmen Castillo, 1982), Mi verdad (Marcia Alejandra Merino, 1992), La vida doble (Arturo Fontaine, 2010), and three documentary films - La Flaca Alejandra (Carmen Castillo, 1993), Chile, la memoria obstinada (Patricio Guzmán, 1997), and Mi vida con Carlos (Germán Berger, 2008). These literary and visual narratives are deliberate efforts to shape the memories of the dictatorial past …

Seeking Modernity, Brain Gain, And Brain Drain: The Historical Evolution Of Chinese Students' Overseas Education In The United States Since Modern China, Di Luo

Master's Theses

This thesis is an historical research project that examines major waves of Chinese students studying in the United States since the mid-nineteenth century, as well as the impact of returned, American-educated Chinese students to the modernization of Chinese society. It also discusses the trend and pattern of the current wave after 1978 and compare it with previous waves. The analysis and examination of this thesis is based on a wide variety of written documents in both Chinese and English, including historical literatures, academic articles, dissertations, surveys, government publications, statistical data from both primary and secondary sources, as well as educational …