Digital Commons Network^™

Examination Of The Role Of Dehumanization As A Potential Mechanism Underlying The Racial Disparities In School Disciplinary Measures., Ebony A. Lambert

Theses and Dissertations

Schools should be safe and supportive spaces for all students, yet Black students tend to face biased treatment in the education system, which often results in harsh disciplinary measures. This research examined the role of animalistic dehumanization (i.e., perceiving others as animal-like and uncultured and denying uniquely human characteristics), in predicting choice of harsher disciplinary measures for Black students as opposed to White students. It was hypothesized that individuals who dehumanize Black students to a greater degree would be more likely to believe that Black students need to be disciplined through harsher measures. Additionally, it was hypothesized that the link …

Organizational Assessment Of Diversity And Inclusion, Linsday Flaming Yeats

Theses and Dissertations

This study outlines the research methods and findings of an assessment performed to evaluate an organization's diversity and inclusion climate. A survey was conducted with 67 of 81 of the organization's employees, followed by 15 interviews, and six focus groups. The study found this organization to be very diverse and to place a high value on the importance of Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) to its performance. However, there are limited form D&I structures currently in place. A comprehensive D&I management strategy integrated with the organization's business strategy will be critical to supporting achievement of its mission. This organization plays a …

Coping And Physical Well-Being Among First, 1.5, And Second-Generation Immigrants From Of Non-European Descent, Jacob R. Stein

Theses and Dissertations

This study brings attention to the growing body of literature examining the role of culture and context in the study of generation-status differences in cross-cultural coping and physical well-being among immigrants to the United States. Prior literature on the unique challenges, stressors, coping strategies, and health outcomes for immigrants provides a basis for hypothesized generation status differences on cross-cultural coping (collectivistic, avoidance, and engagement) and physical well-being (health, safety, and environmental). A sample of 118 male and female first, 1.5, and second-generation immigrants of non-European backgrounds, between the ages of 18 and 35, were recruited from the local community to …

Voices From The Middle: Examining The Lived Schooling Experiences Of Black Males In A Predominantly White Middle School, Donham Douglas Kauffman, Jr.

Theses and Dissertations

Being labelled as qualifying for special assistance simply by being a Black male is common, as with five Black males at my professional educational institution. This study elicits the voices of these Black males in such areas as their personal perception of academic achievement, school improvement needs, and staff misunderstandings of Black males. Because this research elicits voices of Black males missing from the current research literature (Howard, 2014), the participant researcher decided to use these ethnographic accounts to glimpse into the minds and schooling experiences of these students. This study should advance the research literature on Black male students …

Common Strategies And Practices Among Facilitators Of Innovative Thinking In Organizations, Matthew D. M. Watson

Theses and Dissertations

Innovation is researched significantly throughout academic literature, ranging from leadership to organizational culture, with the aim of understanding how to enable greater creativity. This study attempted to address the knowledge gap on the common strategies of facilitating innovation in a group setting by evaluating this condition through four specific areas: environment, process, team dynamics, and facilitator behavior. This study built upon those four areas aiming to understand the process a facilitator puts a group of individuals through to stimulate innovation. Applying a qualitative phenomenological study, the researcher interviewed 15 facilitators of innovative thinking to understand the common strategies applied by …

Adolescent Perceptions Of Addiction: A Mixed-Methods Exploration Of Instagram Hashtags And Adolescent Interviews, Colleen Marie Brazill-Murray

Theses and Dissertations

Addictive disorders are a public health crisis that affects our society by draining our workforce, health care, judicial, education, and law enforcement, resources. Adolescents are particularly susceptible to social influence - for better and for worse - and addiction. Through social media, today’s youth experience a whole new way of communicating. Not enough is known about adolescent perceptions of addiction, and messages of addiction they are exposed to on social media. Social Learning Theory and the Learning Theory of Addiction provided the framework for understanding how adolescents are at risk for developing unhealthy practices that create numerous psychological, social and …

Studying The Phenomenon Of Expressive Arts With Male Survivors Of Childhood Sexual Abuse, Megan Hogg

Theses and Dissertations

Male childhood sexual abuse (CSA) is a traumatic experience that is prevalent, under-reported, and under-treated. CSA leaves males with feelings of shame, low self-esteem, and interpersonal problems, which put them at risk of developing mental health disorders that persist into adulthood. Although expressive arts therapy has been used as a treatment for trauma in children and adolescents, existing literature on the use of expressive arts with adult CSA survivors is limited to female survivors. The current study aims to explore the experiences of male CSA survivors who have participated in expressive arts therapy, including the effects that expressive arts has …

The Theory, Process, And Outcomes Of Culturally Adapted Psychotherapy And Psychosocial Interventions, Caitlin Sorenson

Theses and Dissertations

Massive demographic changes have coincided with rise of the importance of evidence-based treatment among the health sciences and widespread awareness of the failure of psychology to address and serve the mental health needs of historically underrepresented groups. Researchers, theorists, and clinicians demand that empirically supported treatments be adapted to better address and better "fit" clinical needs. Based on existing approaches in the literature, this dissertation presents a four-part model of cultural adaptation of psychological interventions and reviews 101 current culturally adapted empirically supported treatments through the lens of this model. The dissertation project comprehensively describes the current state of the …

Reclaiming Empowerment, Agency, And Collective Healing (R.E.A.C.H.) For Youth: An Adaptation Of Emotional Emancipation Circles For Adolescent Males Of African Ancestry, Marlene Angela Garza

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation identifies the relevant literature and methods that were used to develop a facilitator's handbook for a culturally-specific intervention for adolescent males of African ancestry. The handbook, 'Reclaiming Empowerment, Agency, and Collective Healing for Youth' (R.E.A.C.H.-Youth) provides curriculum for a culturally-centered and social justice-oriented group intervention for adolescent males of African ancestry. The resource developed will serve to provide empowerment for healing for young adolescents who have experienced historical discrimination and the negative effects of racism and discrimination in the United States. Adolescent young men of African ancestry are one of the many groups within the US that have …

Gender Beyond Binary, Sidra Zubairi

Theses and Dissertations

Transgender individuals challenge the binary definition of gender accepted in Pakistani society and as a result, Pakistan’s transgender community is highly marginalized. Pakistani society regards transgender individuals as “abnormal,” because their physical appearance and behavior fail to conform with conventional expectations. Based on contextual research and interviews conducted with transgender individuals in Pakistan, my thesis explores the obstacles transgender individuals face in the course of everyday survival. My research responds to the physical realities of being transgender in Pakistani society and analyzes cultural norms associated with gender, which trigger harassment. By designing transformable apparel for these individuals, informed by primary …

Unpacking Students’ Writer Identity In The Transition From High School To College: A Mixed Methods Study, Marcie J. Walsh

Theses and Dissertations

Since the 1975 publication of Newsweek’s article asserting that “Johnny” can’t write, many have continued to support the claim that students graduating from American high schools and universities can’t write. This criticism has led many students to believe the problem lies exclusively with them. Efforts to improve students’ writing have had little effect, as reflected in continually concerning scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Recently, researchers have begun to suggest that the problem should be addressed by working to change students’ identification as a bad writer. Two constructs have emerged from these efforts: writer and authorial identity. Research …

Ground Truthing: The Politics And Culture Of Soil And Water Conservation In Iowa Agriculture, Brianna Farber

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores the complex relationships between people, technologies, and ecologies involved in natural resource conservation and industrial agriculture in Iowa. Specifically I focus on the various efforts to address water pollution affected primarily by agriculture in the state. Using a theoretical framework informed by political ecology, Science and Technology Studies (STS), and posthumanist theory, I draw on thirteen months of ethnographic fieldwork to discuss what makes conservation culturally salient and practically difficult to achieve. This difficulty around conservation arises in part from the tensions between what I describe as the corn assemblage and the prairie assemblage. I identify these …

On Nature's Prototypes: Character Design And Worldbuilding, Taylor J. Bardon

Theses and Dissertations

Nature’s Prototypes is an ongoing narrative series that blends realism and fiction to create both dialectic plot structures and image sets. For substance, the series utilizes biological inquiries into fields, like ecology, pathology, and bioengineering, to imagine action-centric vignettes, where animalistic to monstrous characters become the predominant actors in a post-dystopian worldscape. Throughout these vignettes, these characters are subjected to the trials and tribulations of the catalysts and flux that are imposed upon them. In the series’ larger scope, these vignettes are sequential events within a larger timeline and an original mythos that delve into the implications and the intrigue …

The Impact Of A Manualized Parent Psychoeducational Program And Parents' Knowledge Of Internalizing Behaviors In Youth: A Pilot Study, Emily Morse

Theses and Dissertations

Over 50% of mental disorders have an onset in childhood, and mental health issues during adolescence impact adult psychological, social, and occupational functioning. Parents serve as the primary gatekeepers to child mental health resources, and this research discussed factors that influence parental help seeking, and developed a manualized psychoeducational program for parents was with the aim of addressing barriers. The program was developed based on the need for evidence-supported school-based programs that target parental knowledge, competence, and access to community resources while simultaneously decreasing stigma toward children with mental health difficulties. A quantitative pilot study was conducted as a means …

East Branch Of The Cooper River, 1780-1820: Panopticism And Mobility, Lisa Briggitte Randle

Theses and Dissertations

In recent years historical archaeologists have employed the panoptic plantation approach to examine issues of surveillance and control at plantations. Despite new scholarship in the area of the panoptic plantation, few studies place the enslaved laborer at the center and the planter-elite on the periphery. Failure to broaden the scope of studies that focus on enslaved laborers minimizes the importance of the differences in perception, cognition, and landscape between the planter-elite and the enslaved laborers. The aim of this study is to determine potential enslaved laborer mobility and how cognitive predictive models can aid in identifying potential locations for archaeological …

From Rhetoric To Response: Climate Change, Conflict, And Development In Karamoja, Uganda, Daniel Abrahams

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation addresses the broad question: How do the discourses of climate change and conflict travel across time and space to become policy, programming, and ultimately a development initiative that exist on the ground? To answer this question, I broke the research into three separate papers. The first examines how the US policy community approaches, understands and seeks to address the discourses of climatesecurity. The second examines the ways in which climate change affects conflict outcomes in Karamoja, Uganda. And the third, using the efforts of Mercy Corps in Karamoja as a case study, examines the realities and opportunities in …

Translating Slavery As Told To My Daughter, Victoria L.A. Carvelli

Theses and Dissertations

I am translating an excerpt of the work L’esclavage raconté à ma fille, by the French Guianese politician Christiane Taubira. A former Minister of Justice of France, Taubira is famous for her legislative work in recognizing slavery as a crime against humanity and instituting national educational efforts on the subject. The book is an exposition of the history of slavery, set in a storytelling, question-and-answer style, which has the merit of bringing a conversational and accessible aspect to a difficult topic.

I chose this work at the recommendation of one of my professors, and when I was unable to find …

That Diabolical Traffic: Archaeological Explorations Of The Nineteenth Century Slave Trade In Coastal Guinea, Katherine Goldberg

Theses and Dissertations

The nineteenth century transatlantic slave trade had significant social, political, and economic ramifications for the coastal West African environments. As Britain pressured European and American imperial powers to join in anti-slave trading endeavors in the early portion of the nineteenth century, the slave trade was directed to areas such as the Rio Pongo in coastal Guinea, where imperial and national powers were scarce, and both legal and contraband trade could continue to succeed. In these situations, foreign traders were able to integrate themselves into local networks, gaining access to social and material capital, and creating a new class of transnational …

Constructing Scientific Knowledge: The Understanding Of The Slow Virus, 1898-1976, Burke Hood Dial

Theses and Dissertations

Scrapie is the ovine form of the transmissible spongiform encephalopathies. The understanding of scrapie as a slow viral disease was developed through an international scientific dialogue during the first half of the twentieth century. British investigators used epidemiological and experimental observations to define its very long incubation period before the appearance of symptoms. This enabled French researchers to prove scrapie could be transmitted from sick to healthy animals and allowed them to define the etiological agent as an ultramicroscopic, filterable virus. Following this, an Icelandic scientist, Björn Sigurdsson, investigated two other ovine diseases characterized by unusually long periods between contracting …

An Exploration Of Identity Negotiation In Adult English Learners’ Communities Of Practice, Kathleen D. Rolander

Theses and Dissertations

This study utilizes Lave and Wenger’s (1991) communities of practice (COP) model to explore how ELLs navigate their positions within and between their many language learning communities. Drawing on Norton’s (1995, 2013) work on ELLs’ identity negotiation and Wenger’s 1998 work on the reinforcing impacts of identities between multiple COPs, this study explores what adults consider to be their COPs, how they perceive themselves within and between them, and how past, current, and imagined or possible COPs impact each other.

A constructivist, multiple case study design was used to focus on participants’ perceptions of their identity negotiation processes through their …

Police Officer Perceptions Of Organizational Justice And Body-Worn Cameras: A Civilizing Effect?, Carolyn Naoroz Ph.D.

Theses and Dissertations

This research sought to understand the potential association between officer perceptions of organizational justiceand officer perceptions of body-worn cameras (BWCs). A questionnaire was administered to a convenience sample of 362 officersfrom the 750 sworn personnel from the Richmond Police Department in Richmond, VA, yielding a response rate of 91% and representing 44% of the Richmond Police Department’s sworn employees. This study extends prior work by partially replicating a previous BWC survey conducted by leading body-worn camera scholars, utilizing a large sample from an urban mid-Atlantic police department. This study also extends prior work on officer perceptions of organizational justice …

On Being A Good Neighbor, Kathren M. Cutshall

Theses and Dissertations

This research supports the design of a museum dedicated to reconciliation on the issue of human slavery. Throughout the museum guests will be ushered through contemplation to prepare for the context of the museum, gallery exhibitions chronicling the slavery and corporate apologia. The aim of the museum is to aid guests toward taking ownership of the history of slavery while simultaneously offering up forgiveness for it. Platforms for spoken word art, lecture halls and spaces dedicated to dialogue will be included. The chronological progression through the museum will move guests from introspection to education, personal acceptance to forgiveness. Guests will …

The Mall: A World-Building Speculation On The Future Of Privacy, Hazem Asif

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a science fiction exploration of a future dystopian world where privacy becomes a dominant currency that is distributed according to social class and ranking mechanisms. It utilizes speculative world-building to study the unanticipated implications of technology on personal privacy, surveillance and social inequality on future societies. The project introduces The Mall, as a highly efficient and hyper-connected world, but also exposes its downfall as a society with heightened cultural and socio-political disparities. Inspired by past civilizations, the development of the modern nation-state as well as contemporary society, the design adapts, appropriates and reformulates existing cultures into new …

"Let The Castillo Be His Monument!": Imperialism, Nationalism, And Indian Commemoration At The Castillo De San Marcos National Monument In St. Augustine, Florida, Claire M. Barnewolt

Theses and Dissertations

The Castillo de San Marcos is the oldest stone fortification on the North American mainland, a unique site that integrates Florida’s Spanish colonial past with American Indian narratives. A complete history of this fortification from its origins to its management under the National Park Service has not yet been written. During the Spanish colonial era, the Indian mission system complemented the defensive work of the fort until imperial skirmishes led to the demise of the Florida Indian. During the nineteenth century, Indian prisoners put a new American Empire on display while the fort transformed into a tourist destination. The Castillo …

Consuming Digital Debris In The Plasticene, Stephen R. Parks

Theses and Dissertations

Claims of customization and control by socio-technical industries are altering the role of consumer and producer. These narratives are often misleading attempts to engage consumers with new forms of technology. By addressing capitalist intent, material, and the reproduction limits of 3-D printed objects’, I observe the aspirational promise of becoming a producer of my own belongings through new networks of production. I am interested in gaining a better understanding of the data consumed that perpetuates hyper-consumptive tendencies for new technological apparatuses. My role as a designer focuses on the resolution of not only the surface of the object through 3-D …

Work/Death, Of Each In Their Own, Micah H. Weber

Theses and Dissertations

Writings in support of my visual thesis, including some background, and bibliographic information: Oregon/Death/Animation/Vocation and the artist as an agent of potential.

A Longitudinal Analysis Of Shiftwork And Self-Reported Depression In A Police Cohort, Meghan Holst

Theses and Dissertations

Background: Shiftwork is associated with many chronic diseases stemming from the disruption of circadian rhythms. Police officers have a high risk for many adverse conditions including depression. Abnormal bodily functions, such as increased stress and disturbed sleeping patterns, may play an important role in the development and severity of depression. This study was designed to assess the association between depressive symptoms and shiftwork in a police cohort from Buffalo, NY

Methods: This longitudinal analysis consists of 470 police officers from the Buffalo Cardio-Metabolic Occupational Police Stress (BCOPS) study. Data were collected during visit 3 between 2004-2005 and visit …

Counseling Program Intervention For Improving African American Students’ Science, Technology, Engineering, And Mathematics Dual Enrollment Participation, Sonja L. Taylor

Theses and Dissertations

African Americans are underrepresented at all points in the STEM pipeline from K-12 coursework into professional careers. The reasons for this underrepresentation are varied and reflect a myriad of contributing factors based on early academic experiences, sociocultural influences, and the effects of standardized testing. The three-fold purpose of this study was to implement a counseling program to inform nine African American study participants about the dual enrollment opportunity at their high school, to gain perspective about the factors which shaped their STEM disposition, and to determine the effect of the program on their attitudes about dual enrollment participation. The study …

Print On Demand: Stereotyping And Electrotyping In The United States Printing Trades And Publishing Industry, 1812-1860, Jeffrey Michael Makala

Theses and Dissertations

Print on Demand explores the role and significance of stereotyping and electrotyping in the United States printing trades and publishing industry during the early nineteenth century. Stereotyping—the creation of solid printing plates cast from moveable type—fundamentally changed the ways in which books (and later, periodicals) were printed. The commissioning of plates altered shop practices, distribution methods, and the author/publisher relationship. Because of this new embodiment of capital and texts in the form of printing plates, a secondhand market for stereotyped works prolonged and complicated the production and distribution of material texts. The primary focus of this study is the ways …

Garagecraft: Tinkering In The American Garage, Katherine Erica Mcfadden

Theses and Dissertations

The American garage, whether in the home or larger, communal ventures, has been a site of technological crafting for a variety of people across the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The garage has been a space in which to both reaffirm the status quo of masculinity, and to discover feminist modes of self sufficiency. It has provided a place to play, experiment, commercialize technology, while also providing a space to create new identities and communal standards. What we make and how we make it is, in the end, more about crafting ourselves than crafting objects.