Digital Commons Network^™

Developing Popular Music Programs In Higher Education: Exploring Possibilities, Kat Reinhert

Open Access Dissertations

Popular music programs continue to expand into higher education in the United States. By examining the who, what, when, where, how, and why of existing higher education popular music programs, information for future development and assessment can be provided. This qualitative multiple case study explored the creation, implementation and operation of two popular music performance programs in higher education in the United States: The Musicianship, Artistry Development and Entrepreneurship (MADE) Music Program at The University of Miami, Frost School of Music, and the Bachelor of Popular Music Program at The University of Southern California, Thornton School of Music. This study …

A Population-Based Assessment Of Suicide Risk, Summer D. Debastiani

Open Access Dissertations

Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the U.S., and suicide rates in Monroe County, Florida are among some of the highest in the state. The purpose of this dissertation was threefold: (1) analyze the concept of suicide lethality to clarify the concept through the identification of antecedents, attributes and consequences; (2) identify suicide risk factors to target for prevention in Monroe County, Florida; and (3) identify the sociodemographic characteristics associated with selective nonresponse to suicide risk questions. The two methods used in this dissertation were six stages of the Walker and Avant concept analysis method to literature …

The Underrepresentation Of Women Studying Engineering: A Grounded Theory Case Study, Sandra Gross

Open Access Dissertations

The purpose of this case study is to explore the lived experiences of women engineering students. Social cognitive and social cognitive career theories served as the theoretical foundation of this study. In this study, a sample of seven engineering students from a small private university in Ecuador were interviewed using a semi-structured format to explore their perceptions of factors that help and hinder them in pursuing a degree and career in engineering. Using a grounded theory methodology, this study proposed a mid-level theory of the factors and processes that support and challenge them as engineering students at this institution. Themes …

Defying The Statistics: Latinx Students' Journeys From Esl To The Honors College At The Community College, Juan Carlos Morales

Open Access Dissertations

This qualitative study explored the factors that contributed to community colleges students’ successful completion of the English for Academic Purposes (EAP) program for English Language Learners (ELLs) and entrance into the Honors College at Miami Dade College. The purpose of this study was to develop a mid-level theory about the factors and processes that facilitate this success for these students. A phenomenological and grounded theory approach and analysis was used to discover the lived experiences of these students and to construct a mid-level theory that helps capture their experiences. The study was conducted at a mid-size campus of a large, …

Black, Female, First-Generation College Students: Perceptions Of Academic Persistence, Renée Dickens Callan

Open Access Dissertations

Higher education continues to grapple with addressing the successful retention and degree attainment of first-generation students. Further, there is limited research that explores implications of first-generation status by racial or ethnic group. Black women who are first-generation are members of at least two groups that have been historically marginalized in education. Although the percentage of Black women participating in higher education has increased, graduation rates for this demographic remains disproportionate. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore factors that contribute to college persistence of Black, female, first-generation college students. Research questions that were explored include: (1) how do …

Are Apologies Less Effective For Transgressors Who Seem Unlikely To Exploit Their Victims Again In The Future? An Experimental Evaluation Of A Mediational Hypothesis, Daniel E. Forster

Open Access Dissertations

Why do people continue to interact with others who have harmed them in the past? A plausible explanation is that people possess cognitive mechanisms that enable them to evaluate whether past transgressions would be indicative of future transgressions (i.e., risk of future exploitation) and whether the costs of the transgression negate the value of the relationship (i.e., future relationship value). Psychologists have put forth theory and empirical evidence to suggest that when transgressors apologize, it causes victims to perceive the transgressor as less exploitative and of higher relationship value, and that these intermediate psychological changes ultimately cause forgiveness. Recently, scholars …

Bright Bass Timbres In The "Dark Age" Of Jazz: Eddie Gomez, Three Quartets, Transgression, And Transcendence, Tianyuan (Ken) Ge

Open Access Dissertations

This paper offers a case study of the iconic jazz bassist Eddie Gomez. By locating his negotiations of timbre within historical and social contexts, and examining how others have interpreted his sound, I show that jazz bass timbre can communicate meanings and facilitate discourses of identity, authenticity, gender, and race. Specifically, I rely on a close hearing of Gomez’s tone on the 1981 recording Three Quartets, framing my analysis in research from the fields of historical musicology, ethnomusicology, African American studies, gender studies, timbral and sound studies, and music phenomenology. In doing so, I portray timbre as a common thread …

Applying An Effective Practice Framework To Create A Lesson Syllabus For Undergraduate Jazz Trombone Students, William Wulfeck

Open Access Dissertations

This essay provides a review of concepts and findings from recent research in the psychology of expertise that are relevant to the unique difficulties of jazz trombone practice. An adapted framework is developed based on deliberate practice and motivation psychology concepts to help jazz trombonists and teachers design an effective, organized, and personalized system for skill development. This framework is applied in the creation of a syllabus for an undergraduate jazz trombone studio.

Family Impact On Substance Use And Sexual Risk Behavior In Sexual Minority Hispanic Adolescents, Manuel A. Ocasio

Open Access Dissertations

Sexual minorities represent a diverse group and are characterized by having a sexual identity, attraction or behavior that differs from the majority (i.e., exclusively heterosexual). HIV risk behaviors, in particular substance use, among Hispanic youth and sexual minorities have been well documented, yet little is known about these behaviors in sexual minority Hispanic adolescents (SMHA) specifically. Limited understanding of the mechanisms driving these risk behaviors during adolescence has resulted in a lack of evidence-based interventions targeting these risk behaviors in SMHA. Family relationships have consistently shown to significantly impact these behaviors in both sexual minorities and Hispanic adolescents alike. For …

Collective Time- Exploring Interaction In Music That Swings, Nicholas Anthony Petumenos

Open Access Dissertations

A study was conducted on how musicians react to deviations from an isochronous pulse for the purpose of applying emerging understandings of the perception of time to the endeavor of cultivating musical timing in the context of jazz ensemble playing. Anecdotal wisdom was gathered through interviews with reputed sources. Classic jazz recordings were examined as part of the inquiry into how to best improve the interactive aspect of one’s musical timing. Strengths and deficiencies of existing paradigms of practicing and teaching were evaluated with consideration to leading-edge insight into temporal cognition. It was concluded that there exists a need for …

Illustrated Libros For Niños: The Interplay Of Translanguaging And Multimodality In Polycultural Picturebooks, Carolina Rossato De Almeida

Open Access Dissertations

The interplay of translanguaging and multimodality was analyzed across 15 English-based polycultural picturebooks with Spanish insertions. The way in which translanguaging is used across the verbal features of these texts and how it is intrinsically related to multimodal elements was critically analyzed. An eclectic coding method (Saldaña, 2016) was employed in order to uncover the nature of these picturebooks while answering the research questions. Five main categories emerged from the analysis, namely: (1) picturebooks provide context clues to understand translanguaging; (2) translanguaging demonstrates the grammar of an additional language; (3) translanguaging is used to represent specific semantic fields; (4) translanguaging …

Insecurity And The Rise Of Nationalism: The Case Of Putin's Russia - Keeper Of Traditional Values, Suzanne Loftus

Open Access Dissertations

An analysis of leadership approval ratings in Russia after the fall of the USSR until the present day was conducted through a review of secondary literature, a demonstration of statistics, process-tracing and discourse analysis to answer the following research question: What explains President Vladimir Putin’s sustainably high approval ratings today despite economic downturn? Indicators including economic performance, political and civil liberties, centralization of power, foreign policy actions, and security levels were examined in their relation to presidential approval ratings during former Russian President Boris Yeltsin’s and current President Vladimir Putin’s time in office respectively. The former was used to provide …

Perceptions Of Cheating At A Small, Private Ecuadorian Institution, L. Enrique Ponce

Open Access Dissertations

The topic of cheating at higher education institutions has been studied empirically for more than 80 years in the U.S. and has become a subject of concern in the rest of the world, where academic research has spread to other continents. However, institutional research has just begun in South American countries, where studies and surveys conducted in higher education institutions may not exceed twenty studies. In Ecuador, the studies on this topic are almost non-existent. This study aimed to encourage further research on this area with a hope to set the parameter that can make future studies in Ecuador comparable …

Alignment And Nonsurgical Pain Relief Methods For Musicians: A Trumpet Player's Perspective, Jack Wengrosky, Jr.

Open Access Dissertations

Three out of four musicians may experience musculoskeletal pain that interferes with their ability to perform optimally. Within that group, the modern trumpet player must uniquely contend with high compressive forces on the muscles of the torso, which temporarily raise ocular and blood pressures. Also, the compressive forces temporarily affect heart function, and require the trumpet player to counteract negative external forces on the head and neck where the trumpet connects with the embouchure. When the rigors of performing music are combined with poor technique, poor posture, and general misuse of body mechanics, the chronic pain and injury to the …

Benefits Associated With Science, Technology, Engineering, And Mathematics Learning, Ryan Edward Holt

Open Access Dissertations

Innovation and discovery are important for driving the advancement of human society. As a result, there has been a large growth in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) employment opportunities. Science and technology have become a strong prerequisite for successful integration into higher academics and the labor force of the United States. The increase in demand for STEM positions necessitates motivating future workers from schools in kindergarten through 12th grade. A metaphor of a pipeline has been used to describe the retention of students through the completion of an academic program in STEM fields. Several science organizations have created the …

Neonatal Readmission In Term Infants: Maternal, Infant, Provider And Institutional Factors, Angelita M. Hensman

Open Access Dissertations

Hospital readmissions are a patient safety and quality concern. Readmission rates in term-born infants in the past decade have been < 1.3% in the United States and < 8% globally. Most readmissions have been for jaundice/hyperbilirubinemia. Changes in exclusive breastfeeding rates, healthcare/institutional policies and demographics may have influenced the rate of neonatal readmission. Most literature on term-born neonatal readmission (within 28 days of birth) is conflicting and outdated. This study aimed to quantify the risk of maternal, infant, provider and institutional factors associated with neonatal readmission to the birth hospital in healthy term infants. Secondary aims estimated the incidence of neonatal readmission and characterized birth length of stay (in hours), readmission diagnosis, birth weight loss > 7% and breastfeeding quality ([LATCH score] ≤ 6). A nested case-control study (N=390) was conducted at a Level III hospital in the Northeastern United States. There were 11, 958 infants delivered between January 1, 2016 through May 8, 2017. A cohort of in-state domicile, healthy term (370/7 - 416/7 weeks gestation) infants (n = 5,940) admitted directly to the well-baby nursery were identified. Cases (n =130) were infants from the cohort readmitted within 28 days of …

Transtheoretical Model Development For Retail Health Clinic Utilization, Stephen V. Matsko

Open Access Dissertations

Primary Care is considered to be in a crisis in the U.S. related to increasing rates of chronic disease, increasing numbers of patients, less physicians, and less money. This dilemma has led to the rise of what could be a disruptive innovation in the form of retail health clinics, health clinics located within retail settings like pharmacies and large retail stores. The core aim of this study was to use a sequential approach to measurement development to develop TTM measures for the Stage of Change, Decisional Balance, and Self-Efficacy for patients’ readiness to utilize retail health clinics using split half …

Compassion: Can Service Learning Make A Difference, And If So, How?, Edward Goldberg

Open Access Dissertations

The future of education is often framed in terms of bringing education into the second half of the 21^st century. Technology and along with it, faster and better ways to bring content to our students are important topics for discussion; but how our students treat each other and other members of their community is equally, if not more, important.

This study takes a look at how we may be able to encourage and foster compassion among our students. I wanted to know how compassionate thoughts and feelings develop following a service-learning experience focused on compassionate behavior. In this qualitative …

Refining The Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Screening: Is There A Distinct Role For Anxiety?, Meada R. Daly-Cano

Open Access Dissertations

Anxiety and depressive symptoms were investigated using the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale (EPDS) in a convenience sample of 371 mothers who were referred to a maternal mentoring program for mothers with, or at risk for, postpartum depression. Social support is considered a protective factor for postpartum mothers at risk for depression but there is less research about the connection between postpartum anxiety and social support.

A factor analysis of the EPDS provided evidence of a two-factor correlated model with a three-item anxiety subscale and six-item depression subscale. Comparisons, using chi-square tests, were done of risk factors, associated with postpartum depression …

Discrete Classification Problems In Agricultural And Behavioral Economics, Clayton P. Michaud

Open Access Dissertations

The focus of this dissertation is on discrete classification problems in agricultural and behavioral economics. In my first two manuscripts, I take up the issue of producer misperceptions of yield risk relative to their objective, a well-established phenomenon in which farmers tend to be overly optimistic in their perceptions of yield risk, forecasting yields with higher mean and lower variance than historical outcomes would suggest. Manuscript 1 focuses on estimating both how such misperceptions are distributed across individual forecasts, as well as how such misperceptions might arise. Manuscript 2 goes on to look at how these misperceptions of yield risk …

Collective Synchrony In Team Sports, Daniel Martin Smith

Open Access Dissertations

Collective synchrony is the simultaneous occurrence of behavior, cognition, emotion, and/or physiology within a group of three or more people. In this dissertation, I draw from various literatures to inform exploratory empirical and methodological investigation of collective synchrony in team sports. These include physiological synchrony, which has been examined primarily in dyads, and collective behavior in sports teams.

In Manuscript 1, I present a conceptual framework of collective synchrony in team sports. I argue that three possible antecedents (copresence, shared task, and coordination) underlie the interindividual matching of emotion, behavior, and cognition. This matching contributes to collective behavioral synchrony and/or …

Virtual Environments For The Induction Of Action, Brian Adrian Flowers

Open Access Dissertations

This dissertation is a study on the ways in which Virtual Reality can actively and reactively affect human physiology. The first manuscript describes the design of a highly generalized Virtual Reality biofeedback system. This system was developed such that, given proper design, it would be able to provide users with a highly responsive Virtual Environment to meet the criteria of embodiment, which will increase the user's responsiveness to stimuli. The system also functions as a biofeedback system that can be used for biomechanical as well as physiological feedback by using a generalized design paradigm.

The second manuscript describes a biofeedback …

Exploring The Treatment Experiences Of African American Substance Using Women And Perceptions Of Culturally Competent Care, Janan Patrice Wyatt

Open Access Dissertations

Research continues to suggest that substance use treatment retention and completion presents an ongoing problem, especially among marginalized groups. In particular, African American women have the lowest rates of treatment retention and completion across all substance using groups. While gender and ethnoracial identities continue to be examined in their relation to substance use treatment, these identities are often studied in isolation offering limited information about how intersecting identities impact substance use treatment for African American women. Researchers have commented on the immediate need for research aimed at describing, understanding, and improving treatment for this population. Research using the voices of …

After “Being Thrown In The Classroom”: The Development Of Pedagogical Skills In Veteran Adjunct Faculty Teaching In The Natural Sciences, Heather Shannon Miceli

Open Access Dissertations

The postsecondary landscape has changed drastically in the past 40 years, with one of the most obvious changes being the increased reliance on adjunct or part-time faculty. Approximately 50% of the current faculty employed by postsecondary institutions are categorized as part-time faculty, up from approximately 25% in 1975 (American Association of University Professors, 2017; Snyder, de Bray, & Dillow, 2016). While there is literature surrounding the impacts of this phenomenon, the majority of studies are entrenched in a positivist framework, utilize quantitative methods, and many use large datasets to distill down whether students are more or less successful when taught …

Essays On Participatory Pricing, Branding, And Consumer Behavior, James Blair

Open Access Dissertations

Participatory pricing consists of unique pricing mechanisms which can provide firms an opportunity to differentiate themselves by allowing consumers to have some influence in setting the price in transactions. Many firms attempting to utilize participatory pricing mechanisms have struggled or even failed in their attempts. Understanding the role of branding with participatory pricing and how it is associated with consumer perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors would be beneficial as more firms attempt to utilize this pricing mechanism. Additionally, examining how giving consumers autonomy in part of the pricing mechanism could provide marketing managers insights into their purchasing preferences and behaviors.

Two …

Development And Validation Of The Arabic Versions Of The Transtheoretical Model Scales For Exercise, Iman Aly Almohammadi

Open Access Dissertations

High prevalence of physical inactivity in Saudi Arabia is a major public health problem that contributed to the increasing lifestyle-related diseases. Thus, interventions to promote and increase exercise are necessary. The Transtheoretical model demonstrated significant impacts in this area, however, effective interventions require psychometrically sound measures. The goal of this study is to develop, assess the psychometric properties, and confirming the factorial invariance of the Arabic versions of the Decisional Balance and Self Efficacy measures for exercise, as well as test their predicted theoretical relationships with Stages of Change with a population-based sample of Saudi adults (N=685). Three …

Sin Papeles Y Licencia: Access To Drivers’ Licenses And Participation In Early Care And Education, Jacquelyn Heyward Fede

Open Access Dissertations

Attending high-quality early education or care (ECE) is positively associated with short-term academic outcomes for children (Yoshikawa et al., 2013) as well as longer-term social and behavioral (Heckman, Moon, Pinto, Savelyev & Yavitz, 2010). Despite the demonstrated benefits of early care and education (ECE) for children with immigrant parents (Puma et al., 2010), participation rates are lower among children of immigrants than children with native-born or citizen parents among three- to five-year-olds (Hernandez, Denton, & McCartney, 2007). There are many barriers to accessing ECE programs for immigrants, which may be exacerbated for undocumented immigrants. Specific immigration policies may either restrict …

Widening The Sphere: Mid-To-Late Victorian Popular Fiction, Gender Representation, And Canonicity, Anna J. Brecke

Open Access Dissertations

When Victorian fiction entered academic study in the mid-twentieth century, the texts that were considered essential had been influenced by a small group of scholars primarily concerned with studying the novel form across periods rather than studying literature of the Victorian Era. The collection of authors that became "the" Victorian canon included Dickens, Thackeray, Hardy, the Brontës, Trollope, Henry James and George Eliot, limiting the Victorian novel to realist fiction. The choices of these critics did not accurately represent the diverse range of authors and genres in fiction published during the period. Particularly absent from this canon are the popular …

Varying Social Media And Involvement To Determine Recruitment Effectiveness In Adolescent Populations, Lucy Ling Gu

Open Access Dissertations

This study examined how adjusting the degree of school involvement and types of recruitment channel relate to research recruitment effectiveness in both rural and urban high-school populations. Presently, there is a lack of consensus in the literature on the most useful media based channel or cost-effective strategy for sampling adolescents in school-based research. This study represents the second of a two-phased exploratory trial to determine effectiveness and cost-efficiency of examined methods to recruit adolescents to participate in online research. Varying combinations of social media channels (QR codes, Facebook ads) and degrees of school involvement (none, passive, active) were implemented at …

The School Connections Survey And Middle School Students: Concurrent Validity With The Strengths And Difficulties Questionnaire, Brandis Ruise

Open Access Dissertations

School connectedness has emerged as an important construct for the study of promoting resilience in youth in school settings. Potentially, the ability to identify youth before the onset of a disorder can be very beneficial, but there is much to consider in terms of the technical adequacy of a connections screening. A major concern pertains to whether such a screening can reliably and accurately identify students as at risk of academic failure or social and emotional difficulties. Findings suggest that self-reported peer connections on the School Connections Survey are significantly correlated with the Peer Relationship Problems subscale on the Strengths …