Digital Commons Network^™

Platform Of Growth: An Analysis Of Earnings And Social Media Engagement Among Esports Athletes, Colleen Marie Dibble

Theses and Dissertations

Esports consists of online gaming, cyber sport, and virtual sport in a highly competitive environment. The industry has grown tremendously over the last 30 years (Leroux-Parra, 2020). Professional esports competitions are often now contested with a large scale, global audience, and millions of dollars potentially at stake in some competitions. Hundreds of esports athletes earn a living from the multi-billion-dollar esports industry. In addition to players earning salaries and prize pool money in a professional setting, many colleges have offered scholarships to enrolled students and have begun to offer esports-related curriculums (Dominguez, 2022). Networks such as ABC, ESPN, and TBS …

A Bayesian Spatial Scan Statistic For Normal Data, Laasya Velamakanni

Theses and Dissertations

Scan statistics are useful methods for detecting spatial clustering. While they were initially developed to detect regions with an excess of binomial or Poisson events, spatial scan statistics have been extended to detect hotspots in other types of data including continuous data. They have many applications in different fields such as epidemiology (e.g. detecting disease outbreaks), sociology (e.g. detecting crime hotspots), and environmental health (e.g. detecting high-pollution areas). Spatial scan statistics identify a ‘most likely cluster’ and then use a likelihood ratio test to determine if this cluster is statistically significant. Spatial scan statistics have been extended to the Bayesian …

An Examination Of Semester-Long Review Of Behavior Referral Data At A High School In A Southeastern State, Shalanda L. Shuler

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine semester-long referral data from a ninth-grade cohort in a public school in a southeastern state. The research question for this study was the following: What will the examination of semester-long referral data from the entire ninth-grade cohort of a public school in a southeastern state reveal? The problem that prompted this study centered around the ninth grade having the highest number of office disciplinary referrals (ODRs) in the Henderson County school district (pseudonym). Students who routinely receive ODRs run the danger of failing their classes and are more likely to have been …

Returning Home: The Thesis Of A Master, Yang Thai Vang

Theses and Dissertations

Over centuries, Hmong people have moved from mountain to mountain, home to home, country to country, crossing rivers and valleys in search of an escape from oppression. The Txiv Xaiv (Plig) ritual and chant has survived serial exodus and diaspora that Hmong people have experienced. This ritual encodes Hmong historical and cosmological understandings as an oral text, passed down from master to student, and performed at funerals to apply that understanding in the management of souls--ultimately to send them home. The Txiv Xaiv (Plig) serves as a glue, connecting the past generations to the generation of today and the generations …

Meaning Making And Athletic Gender Discrimination: Associations Between Sports Participation And Gender Discrimination Among Adolescent Females, Chenae Christensen Duerden

Theses and Dissertations

Research suggests that participation in athletics provides adolescent females with a variety of positive mental and physical benefits. While Title IX paved the way for increased female participation in organized sports, female athletes, including adolescents, continue to face various forms of gender discrimination. Research also suggests that females with a strong feminist identity are more likely to identify and speak out against gender discrimination. Accordingly, this study seeks to examine the association between gender discrimination and sports participation and the potential moderating role of feminist identity and cognitive appraisals of discrimination on this relationship. Participants were 580 adolescent females (age …

Non-Zero Sum Sport: Pickleball And The Theory Of Coopetition, Max Arthur Manthou

Theses and Dissertations

An ethnography of the sport of pickleball was conducted over a span of 7 months in the United States. Findings are partly the result of the author’s journey from playing in the park to playing in the Pros—presented in autoethnographic terms—and partly the result of 11 semi-structured interviews with 13 avid pickleball players. The main contention of this study is that sport is non-zero sum, despite a tendency for sport to be considered in zero sum terms. The non-zero sum aspect of sport is argued to be the result of two main causes: one, sport is coopetive, in that it …

High-Risk Fertility Behaviors: Impact On Child And Risks Of Maternal Mortality In Kenya, Mercy Chepkosgei Kiprop

Theses and Dissertations

Rapid population increase in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) over the last several decades and limited healthcare interventions have exacerbated child and maternal mortality. The maternal mortality ratio (deaths per 100,000 live births) in Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for at least 50 percent of maternal deaths globally. In 2020 alone, 5 million children under 5 years died in Kenya. Research also points out that, tragically, many of the mothers and children died of preventable or treatable conditions. Previous research has focused on biological or socioeconomic determinants of child mortality rather than their joint influences. In this study, we investigate the premise that all …

Remembering And Forgetting: The Commemoration Of The First World War And The Spanish Influenza Pandemic In Salt Lake City, Utah, Bethany Kathleen Gustafson

Theses and Dissertations

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, American culture has experienced a renewed interest in pandemic events, including the Spanish Influenza pandemic of 1918-1919. Based on research carried out in cemeteries and monuments in Salt Lake City, Utah, this paper compares commemoration practices relating to the Spanish Influenza pandemic and the simultaneous events of First World War within the city. Such research provides evidence that warfare enjoys a greater presence in places of social memory than does disease, suggesting an inequality in the cultural value placed on different causes of death. This outcome is the result of numerous factors and …

Seashells Lost In The Desert: The Syrians Exodus Through Sudan To Egypt, Waseem Khattab Shahla

Theses and Dissertations

The Syrian conflict of 2011 resulted in a significant number of Syrians fleeing their homes in search of safety and stability. After the Syrian conflict in 2011, Syrians were allowed access to many countries, including Egypt. However, after the prolonged conflict, access to numerous nations was severely restricted. This thesis examines the challenges faced by Syrian refugees in their journey through Sudan to Egypt, where they hoped to find a better life. The study specifically focuses on the irregular migration route taken by Syrians through Sudan and Egypt, with a focus on the period of 2016 to 2021. This period …

Identifying Handsaws From Cut Marks On Bone: A Microscopic Trait Analysis, Sarah Elizabeth Patterson

Theses and Dissertations

A naturalistic approach in applied forensic research is paramount to reliable expert testimony. Less controlled, or natural, methods in forensic toolmark research are meant to mimic the conditions under which criminal dismemberment would occur; ensuring that the outcomes of such research are applicable in criminal cases. In a monumental study, Steve Symes (1992, Morphology of Saw Marks in Human Bone: Identification of Class Characteristics, University of Tennessee) made experimental cuts into defleshed, degreased human bone with serrated blades and found that blade set width was indicative of kerf width, although kerf width alone could not indicate blade or set type. …

Ecology And Retribution: Blake, Tokarczuk, And Animal Rights, Kristina Isaak Powell

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores how Nobel laureate Olga Tokarczuk's 2008 novel, Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, engages with William Blake's life and his writings on animal welfare and speaks to current conversations about multispecies justice in the environmental humanities. It argues, first, that in recognizing how this novel's protagonist, Janina, selectively reads Blake to rationalize retributive justice, readers should resist a tendency to mistake this character for Tokarczuk's ideal advocate for environmental ethics. Secondly, it asserts that legal scholars' division between retributive and restorative justice offers valuable framework for approaching both this novel and ongoing debates about …

Meet Them Where They Scroll: A Meta-Analytic Review Of Teen And Young Adult Dating Violence Prevention Programs, Aeriel Grace Halstead

Theses and Dissertations

The public is often surprised by the high prevalence of relationship violence. With more than 50% of adults experiencing some form of physical or psychological violence in their intimate relationships during their lifetime, IPV is a public health crisis that particularly affects marginalized communities (Breiding et al., 2015; Johns et al., 2019, 2020; Stockman et al., 2015). The variable results of perpetrator and victim treatments make prevention particularly important if it is effective (Anderson & Van Ee, 2018; Babcock et al., 2004; Cheng et al., 2021; Karakurt et al., 2019; Maguire, 2018; Stith, Rosen, et al., 2004; Stover et al., …

Marital Stability In Newlywed Remarried Couple Relationships: Positive Communication And Marital Interactions In Shared Moments Or Activities, Colette Hickman-Evans

Theses and Dissertations

Remarriages are more structurally diverse, last less time, are more vulnerable, and at greater risk for divorce than first marriages. The newlywed stage of marriage is a critical time when relationship patterns are established or reinforced that can impact a relationship for years to come, yet very few studies have examined remarried relationships in the newlywed stage. This study examined the association between marital interaction, positive communication, and marital instability in 348 newlywed remarried couple participants from a nationally representative sample. Using structural equation modeling (SEM) and actor-partner interdependence model with mediation (APIMeM), the findings indicated that positive communication was …

Group Therapy For Externalizing Behavior Problems In Youth: A Meta-Analysis, Rachel Anne Arnold

Theses and Dissertations

Externalizing behavior problems are a common concern among youth and can be associated with significant problems. As such, the need for effective treatment is evident. While research on psychosocial interventions has been promising, the specific efficacy of youth group therapy has not been assessed in a meta-analysis. Objectives: to assess group therapy's efficacy for youth with behavioral issues and whether treatment effects are moderated by study, patient, leader, or group characteristics. Method: major databases were used to identify and screen potential articles based on inclusion criteria. Included studied were analyzed in a random effects meta-analysis, and potential moderators were assessed. …

Gratitude Training For Promoting Subjective Well-Being: A Randomized Controlled Trial Comparing Journaling To A Personalized Menu Approach, Conner Lee Deichman

Theses and Dissertations

Research suggests a link between gratitude and subjective well-being exists. Research on gratitude practices have shown to increase gratitude, subjective well-being, and other related outcomes. However, the efficacy of gratitude practices may be limited by the rote application of the gold standard gratitude practice--the gratitude journal. Such findings suggest that a more comprehensive, adaptable, and flexible gratitude practice may be needed. This study examined the efficacy of the My Best Self 101 (MBS101) gratitude module: an online gratitude resource that provides psychoeducation about gratitude along with a menu of empirically based gratitude practices. Using a randomized controlled design method, this …

Family Of Origin Stress, Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms, And Resource Loss For Couples During Covid-19: A Longitudinal Analysis, Betsy Hughes Barrow

Theses and Dissertations

The pandemic affected daily life on an unprecedented global scale resulting in the need for adaptation and flexibility to cope with ongoing stress, uncertainty, and loss that may affect couple relationships. Understanding resource loss in the context of mass stress events is critical because resource loss has been defined as the primary agent of stress (Hobfoll, 1989). As such, it is important to understand what factors may have shaped the degree of resource loss incurred during the pandemic. Extant research implies that considering early life adversity may be useful to explore as it may be a form of resource loss …

Exploration Of The Impact Of Gender-Affirming Care And Social Support On Executive Functioning And Mental Health In Gender-Diverse Autistic And Non-Autistic Adults, Karys Michaela Normansell-Mossa

Theses and Dissertations

Between 4.8% and 26% of adults presenting to gender dysphoria clinics have an autism diagnosis. Both autistic people and gender-diverse people have higher rates of mental health conditions including anxiety and depression and more difficulties with executive functioning, all of which impact quality of life. Some work suggests that gender affirmation leads to better mental health outcomes, including better executive functioning, but this has not been studied directly in autistic adults who identify as gender-diverse or transgender. As such, we elected to explore the relationships among these variables at this intersection of gender diversity and autism. In a sample of …

Narrating & Living With Loss: Towards An Ethnography Of Grief, Fayrouz Ibrahim

Theses and Dissertations

Through this paper, I seek to approach grief through how it is lived, the nexus between loss, and the sought-for physical abstractions through memory, objects, and materials to live with/despite such a loss. This paper is a phenomenological and ethnographic research project on the curatory rituals and practices that individuals employ in keeping lost loved ones alive in their everyday. I explore grief through a multidisciplinary and multimodal conceptualization rather than simply through cultural and social practices such as burial and mortuary rituals. The research follows the grief narratives of different individuals in Egypt in inquiring about the objects, memories, …

Visions Of Mary: Patria As The New Mestiza Madonna In Alvarez's In The Time Of The Butterflies, Mila Argueta

Theses and Dissertations

Alvarez’s In the Time of the Butterflies is a fictional depiction of three sisters who are lauded for their role in ending the supremacist, womanizing, and terror-inspiring reign of Trujillo. While, one character, Patria, seems to represent the traditional, and at times cloistered, life of a Dominican wife and mother (reflecting the Malinche and sufrida archetypes), the text also shows her transformation into one of the most vital figureheads of the revolution. I find that when she joins the revolution, she comes as a transformed Marian-figure. Unlike Ibez Gomez Vega and other feminist scholars who have categorized Patria as one …

The Role Of Online Discursive Action In Subjects' Emancipatory Repositioning In Egypt: Assault Police Case Study, Christine Saad Guirguis Ma

Theses and Dissertations

The current study's central question is how social change is discursively constructed. I studied an online feminist social movement that sparked in Egypt on Instagram in July 2020 and labeled "Assault Police." Within the critical social theory and feminism framework, I reviewed the literature on (critical) discourse, social change, and social movements. I tried to unravel the complexity around emancipation as a vital concept in the current study. I located and discussed areas of tension and identified a conceptualization that loosens the theoretical entanglement around it. The research problem sought to specify how the online discursive action facilitated desired …

The Fall And Rise Of Bengali Muslim Conciousness: Conceptualising The Identity Of The Bangla Universal, Habib Khan

Theses and Dissertations

The emergence of modern-nation states saw the end of the empirical era of exploitation and exercise of inherent racist tendencies towards the 'other'. However, the effect of that colonial system is still ever-present in the creation and governance of these newly independent states. While every new state aims to be 'modern', they adopt the international legal framework of the West as their own - a system they had initially wanted to escape. The concept of Muslim universality in the form of the ummah should have freed Pakistan from the shackles of its former colonial masters. Instead, this phenomenon was replaced …

Daughterly Narratives In Search Of Voice: Fadwa Tuqan, Latifa Al-Zayyat, And Samar Attar, Rania Bedeir

Theses and Dissertations

A myriad of pressures and struggles affect Arab women as they are coming of age due to the familial and societal constructs they face. As daughters, they yearn for a voice amidst a plethora of generational boundaries, transmissions, and ideals. The intricacy of the psychological and interconnected structural factors is augmented by their gender in societies that are motivated, and often governed by, the implications of gender roles. While multiple layers of influence such as familial and sociocultural institutions affect how consciousness is formed, generational transmission, through the maternal figure, is paramount. Daughters, therefore, cannot narrate their personal stories without …

Privacy Perceptions Transformation In Cairo’S Home Designs - A Case Study: Gated Communities, Yasmine Esmat

Theses and Dissertations

The infrastructure of gated communities in Egypt’s New Cairo and 6th of October cities have become the new normal. The streets bordered by fences, walls, and the occasional gate, formed when two or more gated communities face each other, dominate the urban landscape today (Kostenwein, 2021). Nowadays, it is highly common to see billboards advertising new gated communities everywhere on the roads and bridges. Gated communities offer various privileges, and one of them is privacy. Taking Cairo city with its several gated communities as a case study, the research focuses on the transformation of privacy perception for Cairo’s home designs …

Fragments Of A Writer’S Mind: Virginia Woolf In Her Own Words, Baheya Zeitoun

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides a thematic reading of select autobiographical and theoretical works by Virginia Woolf. It utilizes Deleuze and Guattari’s philosophy of the rhizome as a methodological framework. The rhizome does not have a hierarchal structure but is rather interconnected. In the same way, the chapters interweave the multi-disciplinary theoretical approaches to connect the disparate factions of the modernist writer’s mind and life.

The early twentieth century saw the rise of post-suffrage writers with narratives that diverged from male-centric values. Woolf is one of the writers who makes a clear distinction between male and female values by championing women’s experiences …

Architectural And Heritage Experience Through Playful Learning (An Interdisciplinary And Exploratory Action Research Focused On The Egyptian Context), Atheer Ahmed Salama

Theses and Dissertations

“The lack of awareness of the value of heritage and the lack of opportunities to engage in preserving and safeguarding heritage in the public sphere not only puts the heritage in risk of being irremediably lost. It also impoverishes the younger generation’s sense of identity and belonging within its respective socio-cultural continuum, and thus limits its ability to engage and contribute meaningfully to society at large” (UNESCO, 2021). With conducting this research, the researcher believes that heritage-themed analog games may carve the younger generation’s memory of heritage, allowing them to boost their sense of identity and belonging; thus, widening their …

Global Health Governance And Its Role In Health Equity: The Case Of Covid-19, Wafa Abu El Kheir-Mataria

Theses and Dissertations

In the globalized world, we are living in, health became the joint responsibility of individuals, their governments, and the global health governance system. Moreover, based on the right to health, health equity is increasingly in demand, and adopting it to a global level has become an even more complex task to realize. This thesis is focuses on health equity at a global level. The main research questions addressed are: Is health equity present at an intercountry /global level? how is it related to Global Health Governance (GHG)? Is GHG performing well in achieving health equity? what are the reasons behind …

Historical Trauma: Literary And Testimonial Responses To Hiroshima, Mariam Ghonim

Theses and Dissertations

The concept of trauma is controversial in literature. While one may be able to come up with ways to describe trauma in fiction, representing historical trauma is a hard task for writers. Some argue that trauma can not be described through those who did not experience it, while others claim that, provided some elements are added, one can represent trauma to the reader. This thesis focuses on twentieth-century historical traumas related to a nuclear catastrophe and explores the different literary and testimonial responses to the catastrophic man-made event of Hiroshima (1945). In this thesis, Kathleen Burkinshaw’s historical fiction The Last …

The Wallet Of Digital Citizens: Online Payment Adoption In The Developing Countries’ Public Administration – Case Of Egypt, Ahmed El Masry

Theses and Dissertations

Online payment methods play a crucial role in helping digital citizens interact and receive e-government services. Citizens’ tendency to accept online payments in the public sector is a vital factor in implementing successful e-government services. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the behavioral, institutional, and social aspects that influence citizens’ tendency to accept the usage of digital payments in the Egyptian public sector. To achieve this objective, the study relies on conducting in-depth interviews with citizens who belong to different age, and social and educational backgrounds, in addition to policy experts and public employees. Meanwhile, the study adopts the lens …

Reparation For The Irreparable: Is Punishing International Crimes A Universalist Hoax?, Kholoud Hafez Hassan

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis challenges the conventional discourse on international punishment that emphasizes the development of a single, unified system of international criminal justice. Instead, it advocates for a pluralistic approach that recognizes the fragmented nature of international punishment, which involves various actors, including permanent courts, special tribunals, internationalized tribunals, and domestic courts exercising universal jurisdiction. The sui generis nature of international crimes demands a comprehensive approach to punishment that considers multiple perspectives and norms of diverse actors involved. Rejecting the notion of universalism in determining punishment rationales and promoting accounts of sentencing consistency, the author asserts that a global framework can …

The Sidelined Front-Liners: Eritrean Cbos In Greater Cairo, Nada Hegazy

Theses and Dissertations

Despite the recognition of the important role that community-based organizations play, among international actors concerned with refugee issues, as well as UNHCR’s adoption of a community-based approach to protection; community-based organizations continue to be sidelined by these actors. This thesis explores the role that Eritrean CBOs play in improving the lives of Eritrean refugees and asylum-seekers living in Greater Cairo. It also investigates the challenges that they face while trying to operate in Egypt. Using a multi-scalar lens, the research examines the relationships between Eritrean CBOs and Eritrean refugees and asylum-seekers, the State, UNHCR and its partner organizations, in addition …