Digital Commons Network^™

Work Motivation In Wealth Management: The Role Of Self Determination Theory, Mark J. Mattia

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this paper, we use Self Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000A, Deci & Ryan, 2008) as the underlying theory to help determine the factors that may influence wealth advisors to consider leaving (or being committed) to their positions. Baard et al. (2004) established that Self-determination theory was relevant to motivation in the workplace. This quantitative study utilizes a survey instrument that incorporates many already proven reliable and valid items from Self-determination Theory to better understand the wealth advisor work motivation framework. This topic is important within financial services since positive work motivation has been tied to positive work outcomes …

Students' Perceptions Of Career And Academic Advising In College Learning Communities, Kelly M. Hallas

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine if community college students in differing learning communities had different perceptions of their career and academic needs and whether students in different learning communities perceived their career and academic advisor as meeting these needs (i.e. are they satisfied with their advising). In addition, this study examined the variables of gender, ethnicity, and enrollment status and their relation to students’ needs and satisfaction across learning communities.

The Community College that provides the backdrop for the inquiry has recently transitioned to Academic and Career Learning Communities. This institution defines its communities as similar majors …

Covalent Organic Frameworks As An Organic Scaffold For Heterogeneous Catalysis Including C-H Activation, Harsh Vardhan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Linking small organic molecules into an extended solid usually afford disordered amorphous polymers. The instigation of order into such a material is of profound interest to induce inherent fine control of the overall structure. Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) are new class of porous crystalline material prepared by connecting organic building blocks via strong covalent bonds. The judicious choice of organic monomers can give rise to highly ordered and predictable frameworks with high crystallinity, surface area, and thermal/chemical stability. The role of connecting linkages such as B─O, C─C, C─N extends the principle of fundamental molecular covalent chemistry to the formation of …

Detecting Symptoms Of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease And Congestive Heart Failure Via Cough And Wheezing Sounds Using Smart-Phones And Machine Learning, Anthony Windmon

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) and Congestive Heart Failure (CHF) are progressive disorders, and major health concerns among today’s aging population. COPD causes a large mucus buildup in the lungs, leading to chronic cough and difficulty to breathe. CHF causes fluid buildup in the lower lungs due to the failing heart, causing cough and difficulty to breath. People who are clinically diagnosed with COPD or CHF are expected to regularly monitor their symptoms and follow complex medical recommendations in an effort to prevent exacerbation. In this dissertation, we elaborate upon three different machine learning based techniques that we developed for …

Feature Selection Via Random Subsets Of Uncorrelated Features, Long Kim Dang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The role of feature selection is crucial in many applications. A few of these include computational biology, image classification and risk management. In biology, gene expression micro array data sets have been used extensively in many areas of research. These data sets typically suffer from an important problem: the ratio between the number of features over the number of examples is very high. This problem mainly affects prediction accuracy because it is best to collect more labeled examples than features. A correlation based random subspace ensemble feature selector (CCC_RSM) was proposed to handle this problem [5]. In this approach, first …

Establishing Topological Data Analysis: A Comparison Of Visualization Techniques, Tanmay J. Kotha

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

When visualizing data, we would like to convey both the data and the uncertainty associated with it. There are many incentives to do this, ranging from hurricane path projection to geographical surveys. Important decision making tasks rely upon humans perceiving a clear picture of the data and having confidence in their decisions. Topological Data Analysis has the potential to visualize the data as features or hierarchies in ways that are familiar to human intuition, and thus could help us convey the variation associated with uncertainty.

In this thesis, we evaluate four visualization techniques: color maps, isocontours, Reeb graphs, and persistence …

Development Of Ultrasonic-Based Ambient Desorption Ionization Mass Spectrometry, Linxia Song

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Ambient desorption/ionization techniques (ADI) have drawn significant attention in mass spectrometric instrumentation development. The analyte classes that are successfully studied by any ADI mass spectrometry (MS) method strongly depends on how gas-phase ions are generated. Spray-based techniques may ionize molecules across a wide range of mass-to-charge ratios, but are commonly used for polar analyte, however, suffers from severe matrix effect. Contrastingly, methods employing electric (or laser) plasmas are capable of ionization of polar and nonpolar analytes suffering from less matrix effect, but primarily targeting those with low molecular masses. Thus far, developments of universal ionization methods, which do not depend …

The Warren Buffett Project: A Qualitative Study On Warren Buffett, Christian G. Koch

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Engaged scholarship focuses on real-world problems. The purpose of my research is to understand why Warren Buffett and his investment principles are not taught systematically in institutions where people are being prepared as investment and finance professionals. The rationale for the study was to answer the research question: What major themes can be extracted from the Warren Buffett Archive?

I used a qualitative research analytic method called thematic analysis used by Braun and Clarke (2006). The research includes 11 years of coded transcripts from Buffett speaking at his annual shareholders meetings. An interval of every two years was selected, which …

Understanding The Complex Ethical Landscape Of Artificial Intelligence Adoptions, Chrissann R. Ruehle

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although Artificial Intelligence (AI) has existed since the 1950’s, it has experienced a series of expansions and declines over the years. Currently, AI is on an upward trajectory and has prompted the fourth industrial revolution as many scientists have noted. Some firms have rapidly embraced this technology and experienced growth while others have been slow to adopt. Naturally, this expansion often has societal impacts. The aim of this study is to explore ethical considerations that arise during the adoption of this technology. This research addressed three questions: 1. How do market and regulatory forces reportedly shape Artificial Intelligence adoptions? 2. …

Soil Characteristics Associated With Horse Cases Of Eastern Equine Encephalitis Virus In Florida, Fulya Guzelkucuk

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Eastern Equine Encephalitis virus (EEEV) is a mosquito-borne virus found in Florida that affects humans and horses. Also, EEEV is an agricultural land management issue in Florida, as it causes mortality in large numbers of horses each year and sometimes humans. This study investigates the characteristics of soils associated with horse cases of EEEV in the State of Florida, focusing on differences in soil characteristics between summer and winter cases. This study analyzed a total of 676 EEEV cases during 2005-2018, including 611 summer cases and 65 winter cases. Soil characteristics that were examined include: soil texture, drainage class, hydrology …

Black Lives Matter In Engineering, Too! An Environmental Justice Approach Towards Equitable Decision-Making For Stormwater Management In African American Communities, Maya Elizabeth Carrasquillo

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The United States and the world have recently been challenged with the disparate effects of COVID-19 and the continual killings of unarmed Black men and women across the nation. A history of anti-black racism has led to systemic structures of inequity that thread throughout institutions and communities across the nation. This environmental engineering research comes at a time when understanding how to effectively engage in, and with Black communities is at the forefront of discourse in academia, utilities and private sector.

In 2018 the Brookings Institute published a report on workforce in the water sector demonstrating the lack of diversity …

Roots Of Coded Metaphor In John Dee's Monas Hieroglyphica, Joshua Michael Zintel

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

An enormous amount of research on John Dee has materialized within the last forty years. Contrary to research published earlier in the twentieth century, such relatively recent studies have considered Dee’s idiosyncratic plurality of parallel traditions instead of trying to pigeonhole his activities into one of several discrete camps. That research (much of which is listed in the Bibliography) has been helpful hypothesizing what his Monas Hieroglyphica (1564) may mean for several fields of study in an interstitial capacity. Students of Early Modern mathematics, neoplatonism, and the histories of alchemy, chemistry, Christian kabbalah, and astronomy are among the many diverse …

Chemical Investigation Of Floridian Mangrove Endophytes And Antarctic Marine Organisms, Bingjie Yang

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Nature creates diseases and illnesses for mankind, however, nature also provides therapeutics by making biological systems produce secondary metabolites. Although the secondary metabolites originally play roles in chemical defense or evolution, researchers have been working on them for drug discovery. Plants, fungi and marine organisms have been mostly explored by natural products chemists over the century and contributed most drugs to the market. With the increasing need of new drugs resulting from drug resistance and pathogen evolution, the natural products area has been focused on developing innovative methodologies to achieve higher efficiency of isolating new bioactive compounds.

This dissertation herein …

A Chemical Investigation Of Three Antarctic Tunicates Of The Genus Synoicum, Sofia Kokkaliari

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Marine invertebrates, mainly sponges, tunicates and corals, have in the past few decades attracted the interest of the scientific community in regard to their secondary metabolites and their potential as leads in drug discovery. The genus Synoicum is comprised of multiple organisms found in both deep and shallow waters, tropical and cold environments around the world. The majority of the members of this genus that have been investigated can be found in shallow tropical waters due to the ease of accessing and collecting them. Of the cold environments, Antarctica is a representative of the environments where members of the Synoicum …

The Participation Of Children With Multiple Disabilities In The Florida State Alternate Assessment: Parent Perspectives, Lora Reese

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The perspectives of parents of children with multiple disabilities regarding their understanding and involvement in their child’s participation in the Florida State Alternate Assessment (FSAA) Performance Task and Datafolio are explored in this study. In the United States, federal policies require all students to participate in state-wide formal assessments, including students with multiple disabilities. Current research literature examines the perspectives of teachers and other education professionals regarding the many facets of formalized assessment. However, the perspective of parents of children with multiple disabilities and their child’s participation in formal alternate assessment is scant. Throughout this study, the reflections of six …

Deep Learning Predictive Modeling With Data Challenges (Small, Big, Or Imbalanced), Renhao Liu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the real world, data used to build machine learning models always has different sizes and characteristics. These size and characteristic features, including small datasets, big datasets, imbalanced datasets, often lead to different challenges when training machine learning models. Models trained on a small number of observations tend to overfit the training data and produce inaccurate results. When it comes to big data, efficiently learning from "huge" size data in a short time becomes important. With an imbalanced dataset, learning is usually biased towards the majority class in the data and appropriate measurements are needed to check model performance.

As …

An Ethnography Of Wash Infrastructures And Governance In Sulphur Springs, Florida, Mathews Jackon Wakhungu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation describes the forces that shape the perceptions and practices in Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WaSH) services in the community of Sulphur Springs, Tampa, Florida. It also explores how these forces, perceptions, and practices produce adverse experiences and inequalities in water, sewer, drainage, and laundry services. This ethnographic study combines participant observation, ethnographic interviewing, freelisting, oral history, and GIS to uncover the context, experiences, and perceptions about WaSH in Sulphur Springs. The study finds that the present conditions and perceptions about WaSH are embedded into the historical contexts—especially racial segregation, the construction of the interstate, and multiple economic downturns …

Facilitators And Barriers To Treatment Engagement In A Behavioral Parent Training Program, Holland Hayford

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This quantitative study sought to analyze caregivers’ perspectives regarding facilitators of, and barriers to, attending the behavioral parent training programs (BPTs) known as Helping Our Toddlers, Developing Our Children’s Skills (HOT DOCS) and Developing Our Children’s Skills K-5 (DOCS K-5). Participants included 43 caregivers who successfully completed their respective DOCS program. These caregivers answered two questionnaires which contained items addressing demographic variables (i.e., gender, race, ethnicity, household income, level of education, number of children, and program attendance) and logistic factors of the DOCS programs (i.e., course location, class length, time of day, course duration, availability of transportation, availability of childcare). …

Beyond The Hype: Challenges Of Neural Networks As Applied To Social Networks, Anthony Hernandez

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Recent advances in neural network-based machine learning algorithms promise a rev-olution in prediction tasks across a variety of domains. Of these, forecasting user activity insocial media is particularly relevant for problems such as modeling and predicting informa-tion diffusion and designing intervention techniques to mitigate disinformation campaigns.Another potential task is anonymizing social network datasets to facilitate their distributionand promote research. Given the success of deep generative models, it may be possible touse them for anonymization. Social media seems an ideal context for applying neural net-work techniques, as they provide large data sets and challenging prediction objectives. Yet,our experiments find a number …

Using Optimization Methods For Solving Problems In Sustainable Urban Mobility And Conservation Planning, Zulqarnain Haider

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation considers three separate optimization problems related to sustainable urban and environmental systems. The first problem relates to the nightly relocation and recharging operations for Free-floating electric vehicle sharing (FFEVS) systems. Such operations involve a crew of drivers to move the shared electric vehicles (EVs), and a fleet of shuttles to transport those drivers. Mixed integer programs are used to model the relocation and recharging operations. Two approaches are devised: sequential and synchronized approaches. In the sequential approach, the movement of EVs is first decided, then the routing of shuttles and drivers is determined. In the synchronized approach, all …

Temporal Discounting And The Assessment And Treatment Of Academic Procrastination, Anthony Concepcion

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Many individuals engage in procrastination at some point in their lifetime. Although procrastination is usually not detrimental, for college students, academic procrastination is correlated with adverse health effects (e.g., anxiety, depression, sleep hygiene) and poor academic performance (Akinsola, et al., 2007; Ferrari, et al., 1995). Furthermore, the prevalence of academic procrastination is high with reports of up to 95% of college students engaging in detrimental amounts of procrastination (Hussain & Sultan, 2010). Notably, students enrolled in online courses are likely to be at greater risk to experience adverse consequences associated with procrastination (Elvers, et al, 2003). Previous studies have focused …

Early Adolescents' Basic Psychological Need Satisfaction And Frustration, Motivation, And Verbal Divergent Thinking Within An Out-Of-School Context, Megan Louise Atha

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Early adolescence is a vital time for the development of creative thinking and behaviors (Barbot et al., 2016) as well as for examining factors that influence the motivation of youth to engage and persist in creative processes and to develop creative abilities (Beghetto & Dilley, 2016). In order to support the motivation towards creative pursuits that may be unique to early adolescent youth, the satisfaction of basic psychological needs for competence, autonomy, and relatedness may be important. Since out-of-school contexts are an increasingly important element of adolescents’ day-to-day experiences, research that investigates how contextual factors contribute to the development of …

Distributed Control Of Multiagent Systems Under Heterogeneity, Selahattin Burak Sarsilmaz

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The overarching objective of this work is to propose solutions to quite a few distributed control problems arising from networks of heterogeneous agents or the heterogeneous nature of multiagent systems. Each problem with its solutions is concisely summarized below.

We consider the cooperative output regulation problem of heterogeneous linear multiagent systems over fixed directed communication graphs. The purpose of this problem is to design a distributed control law such that the overall closed-loop stability is ensured and the tracking error of each agent converges to zero asymptotically for a class of reference inputs and disturbances generated by a so-called exosystem. …

Exploring Refugee Students’ Second Language (L2) Motivational Selves Through Digital Visual Representations, Nhu Le

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

While the ‘travel ban’ immigration executive order, ‘build a wall’ proposal, and ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) raids under the Trump administration are still hot-button issues, the United States (US) is urged to maintain its leadership in addressing a rising global refugee crisis with over 65 million (70.8 million updated from United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR)’s website, https://www.unhcr.org/en-us/figures-at-a-glance.html, as of April 2020) individuals displaced all over the world (Khurma, 2017). Millions of refugee families have fled from life-threatening conditions in their homelands, making perilous journeys to reach host countries in search of a better life. While settling into …

The Perceived Usefulness Of A Weather Radar Display By Tampa Bay Residents, Michelle E. Saunders

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A weather radar display is a tool that provides spatially oriented, timely information about an impending weather event. While radar is frequently used by meteorologists, emergency managers, and pilots, this tool is now readily available for individuals to use on a variety of platforms including television, computer/laptop, smartphones and tablets. Most importantly, there are hundreds of mobile weather applications available as well as online sources that provide a weather radar display. However, little is known about how individuals use a weather radar display. Therefore, the purpose of this dissertation is to understand why radar is sought out as a tool …

A Process-Based Approach To Evaluating The Role Of Organic Ligands In Trace Metal Cycling In The Marine Environment, Travis Mellett

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In addition to control by major nutrient elements (nitrogen, phosphorous, and silicon) growth and community composition of marine phytoplankton is also regulated by trace element nutrients (iron, copper, manganese, zinc, cobalt, nickel, and cadmium). Of these, iron is the most influential in the modern ocean, regulating phytoplankton growth and carbon export in high-nutrient low-chlorophyll regimes and exerting an important control on the marine nitrogen cycle through its role in di-nitrogen fixation. The distributions of these metals has the capacity to control primary production and phytoplankton community composition through differences in cellular quotas or metal sensitivities amongst species. The relationship between …

Machine Learning For The Internet Of Things: Applications, Implementation, And Security, Vishalini Laguduva Ramnath

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Artificial intelligence and ubiquitous sensor systems have seen tremendous advances in recent times, resulting in groundbreaking impact across domains such as healthcare, entertainment, and transportation through a collective ecosystem called the Internet of Things. The advent of 5G and improved wireless networks will further accelerate the research and development of tools in deep learning, sensor systems, and computing platforms by providing improved network latency and bandwidth. While tremendous progress has been made in the Internet of Things, current work has largely focused on building robust applications that leverage the data collected through ubiquitous sensor nodes to provide actionable rules and …

Efficient Viewshed Computation Algorithms On Gpus And Cpus, Faisal F. Qarah

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Nowadays with the advance in managing and collecting large data, GIS is one of the applications that suffer from lack of efficient data management methods. GIS data often come in form of maps with different types of data such as temperature, topology, and population.

This dissertation focuses on exact-viewsheds computation for large terrains, and due to the poor performance of current exact-viewshed algorithms that may need several hours to process a midsize map, we found the need for new algorithms that are capable of efficiently computing viewshed for large size maps. This work presents a highly-efficient exact-viewshed computation algorithm based …

Textbooks As A Tool For Planning And Facilitating Mathematical Discourse, Denise L. Polojac-Chenoweth

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Across the nation, mathematics teachers are struggling to help their students meet the demands of high stakes testing while adhering to state standards for content and teaching and dealing with the time constraints imposed by school activities, paperwork, and testing schedules. Classroom mathematical discourse is touted as a central element of a quality mathematics learning environment. Nevertheless, many teachers struggle to implement mathematical discourse effectively. This dissertation aims to explore the use of textbooks as tools to support teachers in the planning and facilitation of mathematical classroom discourse.

In this study, I employed a mixed-methods design to investigate (1) how …

Opportunities Provided In Mathematics Methods Textbooks For Pre-Service Teachers To Develop Mathematical Knowledge For Teaching Fractions, Irem Ercan

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

I explored using qualitative content analysis what type of opportunities in mathematics methods textbooks are provided for pre-service elementary teachers to develop Mathematical Knowledge for Teaching Fractions (MKTF). Specifically, I examined all fractions tasks that are located in fraction chapters of mathematics methods textbooks in order to explore the ways they support pre-service teachers’ Subject Matter Knowledge and Pedagogical Content Knowledge of fractions.

I used qualitative content analysis of three mathematics methods textbooks to analyze how MKTF is offered for pre-service elementary teachers. In particular, I investigated the chapters that are designated to fraction concepts using both deductive and inductive …