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Voluntary Versus Involuntary Runaway Youth: Basic Demographics, Characteristics And Family Relations, Darcia A. Colburn '99

Honors Projects

There is an increased concern that youths are leaving home earlier than ever. According to the National Network for Youth, 38% of runaways are under the age of 14. Clinicians, as well as researchers, who have worked with the population of runaway youth recognize that there are two distinct groups (i.e., voluntary and involuntary). Previous research has largely neglected the difference between those youths who have left home on their own initiative (voluntary) and those youths who were forced to leave their home (involuntary.) I hypothesized that involuntary youth will predominantly male and older in age. I examined a number …

Themes And Issues In The Experience Of Child Survivor Friends, Katherine Jane Adolphus

School of Psychology Theses

This study was interested in the experience of adults who had been bereaved of close friends during childhood (aged 5-12 years). This was identified as an area that was both underresearched and of potential importance to mental health professionals. Six participants were recruited through newspaper articles and requests placed in G.P. surgeries. All of the participants met with the researcher for an open-ended, unstructured interview lasting between 1 and 11/2 hours. The interviews were explored using the qualitative approach of 'Interpretative Phenomenologjcal Analysis'. Several themes and issues emerged as important in the experience of child survivor friends. These themes were …

Structuring Time And Task In Electronic Brainstorming, Alan R. Dennis, Jay E. Aronson, William G. Heninger, Edward D. Walker Ii

Faculty Publications

There are many ways in which a GSS can beused to support group brainstorming. This paper reports the results of an experiment that manipulated task structure and time structure. Groups electronically brainstormed on intact tasks(where all parts of the task were presented simultaneously) or on partitioned tasks (where three subcategories of the task were presented to thegroups). The time periods in which groups worked were either one 30-minute time period or three 10-minute periods separated by two-minute breaks. Groups in the partitioned task treatment generated 40% more ideas, but there were no time effects. These differences are attributed to the …

Annual Report 1 September 1998 - 31 August, 1999, Dublin Institute Of Technology

DIT Annual Reports

No abstract provided.

Identities And Racial Attitudes Of South African And American Adolescents: A Cross-Cultural Examination, Timothy B. Smith, Christopher R. Stones

Faculty Publications

Issues of group identity and prejudice have played a large role in the history of South Africa. This study examined differences among Xhosa-speaking Black, so-called Coloured, English-speaking White, and Afrikaans-speaking White adolescents within a context of social change. Data was collected from 818 high school students using a questionnaire that assessed aspects of these groups' perceptions of themselves (their identities), attitudes toward other racial groups (their prejudices), and beliefs about changes in the socio-political environment. Several statistically significant differences between the groups were found. Comparative analyses on identity and attitude variables performed with 263 White American adolescents were also statistically …

Slaves To Fashion: A Thirteenth Amendment Litigation Strategy To Abolish Sweatshops In The Garment Industry, Samantha C. Halem

San Diego Law Review

Viewed as a relic of a bygone era, modem legal teaching largely ignores the Thirteenth Amendment. Few constitutional law textbooks give it any more than a passing glance.' After all, slavery was abolished in the United States in 1863. While it is true that some scholars have suggested new applications for the Civil War Amendment legal practitioners have found few practical applications. This Article proposes a real world application of the Thirteenth Amendment to a current real world problem. Legal practitioners have under-utilized the Thirteenth Amendment. They should employ the Thirteenth Amendment as a valuable tool for fighting slavery and …

Legal Rules And Social Reform, Emily Sherwin

San Diego Law Review

Rules are designed to reduce error by prescribing actions that, in the run of cases, will produce better results than the subjects of rules would obtain if they judged for themselves what to do. At the same time, rules sometimes produce errors when applied to particular cases. If the sum of error under rules is less than the sum of error rules prevent, then the rule-making authority has reason to issue "serious" rules-rules to be followed in every case. Because rules are imperfect, however, the subjects of rules do not always have good reason to follow them. This means that …

The Devil Made Me Do It: Replacing Corporate Directors' Veil Of Secrecy With The Mantle Of Stewardship, Constance E. Bagley, Karen L. Page

San Diego Law Review

This Article argues that the nature of the corporate form coupled with an exclusive focus on shareholder value leads to economically and socially inefficient results. The "profit maximization" view of directors' duties ignores the historical reasons why corporations were given special privileges, such as limited liability, by the state. This narrow view should be replaced with a doctrine of stewardship that imposes a more comprehensive view of the corporation's and directors' responsibility to manage the vast resources held in corporate form. This broader view is consistent not only with the values of a free market economy, but also with modem …

Human Control Of Robotic Mechanisms: Modelling And Assessment Of Assistive Devices, Cathy-Ann Leonie Radix

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics Theses

The prescription and use of Assistive Technology, particularly teleprostheses, may be enhanced by the use of standard assessment techniques. For input devices, in particular, existing assessment studies, most of which are based on Fitts' Law, have produced contradictory results. This thesis has made contributions to these and related fields, particularly in the following four areas. Fitts' Law (and background information theory) is examined. The inability of this paradigm to match experimental results is noted and explained. Following a review of the contributing fields, a new method of assessing input devices is proposed, based on Fitts' Law, classical control and the …

Management Of Change In The Irish Construction Industry, Louis Gunnigan

Masters

Ireland is changing and this change is nowhere more apparent than in the rapidly growing construction industry. The industry is being forced to change at an unprecedented pace. This thesis sets out to develop a framework on which construction organisations can approach and manage change.

It examines the issues that will cause change, reviews the available literature to find how change can be managed and controlled, and develops a model for guiding change programmes in the construction industry. The model is tested against three case studies, the first two of which are concerned with finding increases in efficiency and demonstrating …

Trauma Stress Severity And Road Traffic Accidents: A Prospective Pilot Study Into 11 Causal Factors, Louise Horner-Baggs

School of Psychology Theses

Factors associated with the development of post traumatic stress symptomatology have frequently been reported in the literature over the last decade. However, of the empirical studies examining these factors, few have used appropriate methodological designs and most have examined one factor in isolation. This pilot study used a cross-lagged panel analysis design to investigate 11 factors previously identified in the literature as being causally related to the development of post traumatic stress symptomatology. The 11 factors investigated were: perceived controllability, perceived predictability, perceived threat, shattering and confirmation of core assumptions, causal attributions, supportive and unsupportive behaviour, peritraumatic dissociation and the …

"Little Teachers," Big Students: Graduate Students As Tutors And The Future Of Writing Center Theory, Connie Snyder Mick

The Writing Center Journal

No abstract provided.

Review: Approaches To Teaching Non-Native English Speakers Across The Curriculum, Carol Severino

The Writing Center Journal

No abstract provided.

A Divided Attention Task To Measure Functional Auditory Comprehension Deficits In Aphasia, Bruce Dewayne Bane

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This experiment assessed auditory comprehension in the presence of a divided attention task. Words and nonwords were embedded within the commands of the first subtest of the Revised Token Test (RTT) to comprise the divided attention RTT (dRTT). A statistically significant poor performance was found on the dRTT compared to the RTT. Further, the subjects' performance was found not to change from the beginning to the end of the dRTT suggesting that learning and fatigue were not meaningful variables in their performance. The position of the distractor (e.g., opposite the verb, color adjective, noun, or randomly placed) had mixed affect …

Making Sense Of The At-Risk Phenomenon, Karri Elizabeth Beath

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this qualitative study is to help in making sense of the at-risk phenomenon. The implications throughout this study are based on the constructivist paradigm in that we create things such as at-risk and not discover them, therefore, allowing us to change the way things are. The data collected throughout this study developed into four main contradictions. The first contradiction, We Can't Define At-Risk, but Treat It Like a Thing, presents a variety of definitions of at-risk which represent the inability to define such an ambiguous term. The second contradiction, Moving Towards Inclusion During the Creation of Another …

The Relationship Between Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder And Aggression In Children: A Cross-Sectional Study, Eric Wayne Boelter

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This study examined the correlation between aggression and ADHD symptoms across several age groups in children. Participants were elementary and secondary students recruited from grades 1st through 12th in a suburban, university-affiliated laboratory school (N = 426). The students' teachers also participated in the study. The study consisted of administering questionnaires to students and teachers. These included: (a) The Self-Report Inventory, (b) The Peer Nomination Inventory, and (c) The Teacher Report Inventory. All of these measures were designed for this study. One way analysis of variance for gender showed that males were more aggressive and had more ADHD symptoms than …

Sex, Violence, And Hand Puppets: History And Structure Of Punch And Judy Performance Tradition, James Robert Davis

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Punch and Judy are characters who exist only within the boundaries of the puppet theatre, in performances where characters are portrayed by inanimate figures. Nonetheless, the history of the puppet theatre, and particularly that of Punch and Judy, is closely related to the history of more widely accepted, actor-based theatre, where characters are portrayed by human beings. While the two traditions-share many common elements--such as the importance of characterization, direction, and design--the essential difference between actor-theatre and puppetry is the manner in which the performance is presented. The approach of this study is threefold: first, a linear history of the …

Forgiveness Education As A Factor In Adolescent Adjustment To Parental Divorce, Amy L. Knupp

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

An educational intervention with forgiveness as the goal, was implemented with five adolescents who had experienced a parental divorce. The adolescents were all from a Midwestern city, ages 12-14, and Caucasian. The goal of the intervention was for the experimental participants to forgive their parents for a hurt associated with a parental divorce. An exploratory design with a static control group was used. Five subjects volunteered for the forgiveness education intervention, comprising the experimental group, and five subjects agreed to fill out pre- and post-test measures, for monetary reimbursement, composing the control group. The educational intervention lasted 10 weeks, and …

Personality Characteristics Associated With People Who Frequently Experience Flow, Mark A. Ackerman

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Flow is a state of mind that has been found to occur when people become immersed in a challenging activity that matches or slightly exceeds their skill level. It has been suggested that some people may be more likely to enter this state of mind than others. The purpose of this study was to attempt to identify personality traits common to people who frequently experience flow.

Amount of flow generally experienced in 115 college undergraduates was measured with two modified flow measures, the modified Flow State Scale (FSS) and the modified Flow Descriptions Questionnaire (FDQ). Eight personality characteristics were hypothesized …

School Vision, Teacher Autonomy, School Climate, And Student Achievement In Elementary Schools, Connie J. Erpelding

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this study was to determine within an elementary school context (a) the relationship among teachers' perceptions of their principal's school's vision, of their sense of autonomy, and of the school climate; and (b) how these core variables were associated with student achievement and student socioeconomic status. Leadership and effective schools literature link the visionary principal with a variety of school-related variables including those in this study.

Data were collected using three survey instruments and a questionnaire administered to fourth grade general education teachers in the sample. The principals of the schools included in this study were also …

Physical Activity Patterns Among Physical Education Major Students In Selected Institutions Of China And The United States, Wei Bian

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The benefits associated with regular physical activity have been well documented in recent years. Numerous studies have investigated physical activity patterns among children, adolescents, and adults, yet little work to date has examined the patterns of habitual physical activity participation among pre-service physical education (PE) majors. Furthermore, inasmuch as physical activity affords health benefits irrespective of one's nationality or culture, comparisons among the peoples of nations around the world becomes of greater interest.

This study was designed to examine the leisure-time physical activity patterns of physical education major students in selected institutions from the People's Republic of China (PRC) and …

Pre-Performance Routines And Rhythm: A Comparative Study, Blake Wade Miller

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The present study was designed to investigate the effects of pre-performance routine rhythm on novel motor task success. At the center of the study was the comparison of differing characteristics of two theories of motor control: the dynamical systems theory and the schema theory. It was hypothesized that an even pre-performance routine rhythm would be more advantageous to task success than an uneven preperformance routine rhythm, regardless of the rhythmic characteristic of the task. The results concluded the contrary to be more accurate, and indicated that task success was more likely to occur when the pre-performance routine rhythm was congruent …

A Study Of Service Programs At Selected Midwest Universities, Tammy Lee

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

When students enter a four-year college or university, they begin the journey of higher education. Through direct and indirect means of structured course work, involvement in campus organizations, and other activities, students gain the knowledge and skills crucial to obtaining a career in their chosen field. Although a college or university has primary responsibilities for the education of students, it also has a social obligation to the community in which it is located. One mechanism that has been devised to mutually benefit the students' need to develop as responsible citizens and the communities' need for college or university expertise is …

Bully/Victim Problems In A Japanese Junior High School, Yukari Kajishima

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this study was to examine affective factors of bullying behavior among Japanese junior high school students, with specific emphasis on anger, envy, revenge, and self-esteem.

Data were collected by using five instruments: STAXI, Olweus's bully/victim questionnaire, revenge scale, dispositional envy measure, and the Coopersmith Inventory. The participants in this study were 107 seventh and eighth graders; 58 males and 49 females. They were classified as bullies, victims, bully/victims, or neither bullies nor victims.

Analysis of the data included an examination of correlations between bullying and emotion ,and an investigation of differences in emotions, among bullies, victims, bully/victims, …

Exploration Of Namibian Adolescents’ Sexual Knowledge, Attitudes And Behavior, Shamani-Jeffrey Shikwambi

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between sexual knowledge, sexual attitude, and sexual behavior among Namibian adolescents.

Data were collected by using a ~edified version of the Prevention Minimum Evaluation Data Set (PMEDS) instrument. The participants were 45 twelfth graders, of which 23 were females and 22 males.

Analysis of the data included an examination of intercorrelation between sexual knowledge, sexual attitude, and sexual behavior, and an investigation of gender differences among these three variables. Pearson correlations were calculated for each variable and t-tests were run to look for the gender difference. Multiple regression was also …

“I Only Want To Be”: Black Women Experiences As Depicted In Nikki Giovanni’S Poetry, Lawanda Brown

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Traditional sociology is negligent in the case of recognizing Black women as carriers and standards of knowledge. Sociology is dominated by egotistic white male theories of individuals and groups that exclude and invalidate the existence of Blacks in the United States, especially Black women. Furthermore, no matter how hard we try to free our work and our selves from these Eurocentric Theories, even Black women sociologists such as myself are bound by them. In spite of the limitations imposed by Eurocentric Theories, I show that Black women are carriers of knowledge by presenting an understanding of their lives during a …

Juvenile Justice Professionals And The Goal Of Rehabilitation, Heather Bruch

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Numerous studies conducted over the past 20 years have suggested that support for rehabilitation in the criminal justice system has decreased. As a result of these findings, an increase in the examination of support for rehabilitation has occurred. According to much of the research on this issue, an important factor in the support of rehabilitation is the attitudes of criminal justice workers. The increasing prison populations are partially responsible for the heightened interest in this issue. It is believed by many that the attitudes of the workers in the criminal justice system have an effect on the success of the …

Leadership In Student Organizations: Do Women And Men Lead Stereotypically?, Jennifer Cullen Danielson

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Men and women are believed to vary along stereotypical male and female leadership behaviors (Cann & Siegfried, 1990; Eagly & Johnson, 1990). Stereotypic leadership behaviors for men are defined as task and goal oriented behavior, whereas for women, it is interpersonal or social behavior. The present study explored the leadership behavior of male and female students in student organizations at a mid-western state university. The Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI; Posner & Kouzes, 1988) was used to assess leadership behavior in the student organizations. The leaders of 100 student organizations, 50 males and 50 females, were contacted and asked to fill …

The Reasons For Living Inventory For Adolescents (Rfl-A) : Validation In Three Adolescent Populations, Joe S. Rich

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This study is intended to examine further psychometric characteristics of the Reasons for Living Inventory for Adolescents (RFL-A), a self-report measure developed specifically for use with adolescents. Three separate groups were utilized in this study: a psychiatric suicidal group, a psychiatric inpatient non-suicidal group, and a non-clinical control group from a local laboratory school. Specifically, the factor structure, discriminant validity, internal consistency reliability, and convergent validity of the RFLA total and subscales were examined. Overall, results indicated that the five-factor structure that was identified by Osman et al. (1998) was replicated. Further, results showed that the measure demonstrated adequate internal …

Adolescent Depression : Further Examination Of Gender Differences, Elizabeth Marie O'Neill

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This study was designed to examine pertinent research questions that remain unanswered by past investigations of adolescent depression. Specifically this study investigated potential differences between high and low scoring depressed adolescents, and whether gender is an influential variable for consideration. Subjects were 175 adolescent boys and girls from a laboratory school in Midwestern Iowa. Subjects were divided into four groups based on gender and responses two questions on the BDI-A. Specifically, the four groups were: boys who scored at or above IO on the BDI-A (sub-clinical group--boys), boys who scored below 10 on the BDI-A (control group--boys), girls who scored …