Digital Commons Network^™

Domain Specific Identity Commitment And Alcohol Use And Problems, Alison Glanville

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Identity formation is an important developmental task of the college years. Previous research has demonstrated that identity commitment, as defined by James Marcia, is related to decreased substance use and problems. That is, individuals who are identity achieved or foreclosed use substances less frequently and experience fewer substance-related problems than do individuals who are classified in the statuses of identity diffused or moratorium. However, Marcia discussed identity as developing in two domains, the occupational and the ideological (religious beliefs and political ideology). To date, no studies have examined in which domain commitment is associated with a decrease in substance use …

The Effects Of Study Abroad Experience On Student Cognitive And Affective Outcomes Of College, Jennifer L. Graban

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Most educators agree that the global challenges of the 21 st century require that college students obtain anEducation with broad economic, cultural, and technological knowledge about the world and its people. Additionally, contemporary college students will require wide-ranging skills in critical thinking, analysis, problem solving, and communication for a successful future. One way that colleges and universities are meeting the challenge of educating global citizens is through study abroad programs. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of a study abroad experience on student cognitive and affective learning. Using a mixed method design, this study investigated quantitatively …

The Learning Impact Of Computer Mediated Communication On Computer-Based Training, Mark A. Revels

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Trainee performance using computer-based training (CBT) may be related to the degree of interaction that occurs between trainees and the instructor, or between trainees and each other. This is significant in that the individualized nature of CBT (and perhaps Web-based training) is contrary to the social interaction needs of trainees. Using relevant pedagogical and social communication theories as a basis, this study employed empirical research methods on undergraduate participants to achieve the following objectives: to explore the use of computer mediated communication (CMC) as a surrogate for face-to-face interaction with CBT trainees, and to provide research-based recommendations for human resource …

Coordinated Machine Learning And Decision Support For Situation Awareness, Timothy Draelos, Pengchu Zhang, Donald C. Wunsch, John E. Seiffertt Iv, Gregory Conrad, Nathan Brannon

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

For applications such as force protection, an effective decision maker needs to maintain an unambiguous grasp of the environment. Opportunities exist to leverage computational mechanisms for the adaptive fusion of diverse information sources. The current research employs neural networks and Markov chains to process information from sources including sensors, weather data, and law enforcement. Furthermore, the system operator's input is used as a point of reference for the machine learning algorithms. More detailed features of the approach are provided, along with an example force protection scenario.

Foster Parent Pre-Service Training Programs: A Content Analysis Of Four Common Curricula, Jason B. Whiting Phd, Paul Huber, Alice Koech

Faculty Publications

This study compares four curricula commonly used in the pre-service training of US foster parents. Stufflebeam's (1983) CIPP model for program evaluation was used to guide a content analysis of each curriculum, with specific attention to the content and training methodology used. The content was examined to determine if it covered topics identified as germane to the task of fostering children. The instructional methodology of each program was compared with established andragogical adult education techniques. Results indicated that each curriculum varied in content and method of instruction, although there were many areas of overlap. Suggestions for curriculum selection criteria are …

Health Monitoring Of A Truss Bridge Using Adaptive Identification, James W. Fonda, Steve Eugene Watkins

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Integration of structural analysis, system identification, and sensor networks provide health monitoring capabilities that benefit many aspects of infrastructure management. This work presents an adaptive identification method based on Lyapunov methods for a truss structure. Lyapunov methods in the identification provide guaranteed convergence for the parameter estimation. Identification is carried out on a simulation model based on FEA methods. The FEA model offers realistic results from a truss structure and allows verification of the identification method for a rolling load case. A rolling load scenario provides use of realistic loading of a structure so that identification methods may be extended …

Acute Stretch Perception Alteration Contributes To The Success Of The Pnf "Contract-Relax" Stretch, J. Brent Feland, Sterling C. Hilton, J. Ty Hopkins, Iain Hunter, Ulrike H. Mitchell, J. William Myrer

Faculty Publications

Context: Some researchers have suggested that an alteration of stretch perception could be responsible for the success of the contract-relax (CR) stretch, a stretch technique derived from proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation (PNF). Objective: This study was conducted to determine if the alteration of the stretch perception is a possible explanation for the range of motion (ROM) gains of the CR stretch. Participants: Eighteen subjects performed two stretches in randomized order: the slow stretch and the CR stretch. Main Outcome Measure: The stretch intensity was controlled. The stretch force was measured and compared between the slow stretch and CR stretch. Results: There …

Contextual Empowerment: The Impact Of Health Brigade Involvement On The Women Of Miraflor, Nicaragua, Gayla Jewell

Peer Reviewed Articles

This qualitative, descriptive study investigated how working with Health Brigades influenced a sense of empowerment and a resultant shifting of gender-power relationships for women in a rural Nicaraguan community. A convenience sample of 10 women aged 18 to 65 years who had worked with the Brigades were interviewed. Open and axial coding were used to determine core categories and theoretical concepts. From this emerged a grounded theory of contextual empowerment. Key findings included that within this collectivist culture, the concept of contextual empowerment includes psychosocial and structural dimensions. Implications for nursing practice include the impact of unintentional role modeling.

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder And Post-Traumatic Stress Symptoms Following Critical Illness In Medical Intensive Care Unit Patients: Assessing The Magnitude Of The Problem, James C. Jackson, Robert P. Hart, Sharon N. Gordon, Ramona O. Hopkins, Timothy D. Girard, E. Wesly Ely

Faculty Publications

Introduction Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a potentially serious psychiatric disorder that has traditionally been associated with traumatic stressors such as participation in combat, violent assault, and survival of natural disasters. Recently, investigators have reported that the experience of critical illness can also lead to PTSD, although details of the association between critical illness and PTSD remain unclear.

Methods We conducted keyword searches of MEDLINE and Psych Info and investigations of secondary references for all articles pertaining to PTSD in medical intensive care unit (ICU) survivors. Results From 78 screened papers, 16 studies (representing 15 cohorts) and approximately 920 medical …

Gendered Risks Of Retirement: The Legal Governance Of Defined Contribution Pensions In Canada, Mary G. Condon

Articles & Book Chapters

This paper examines how the governance of new employer-sponsored pension arrangements in Canada mediates the relationship between gender and discourses of economic risk. It considers the role played by these pension regimes in maintaining gendered forms of financial self-governance and economic insecurity. It asks whether evolving precepts of pension regulation assist or hinder women who wish to resist the disciplinary reach of policy restructurings in the employer-based pension sector.

Fundamental Enterprise Income Tax Reform In China: Motivations And Major Changes, Jinyan Li

Articles & Book Chapters

In March 2007, the National People's Congress of China promulgated a new Enterprise Income Tax Law (EIT Law), which takes effect on 1 January 2008 and is the first law in Chinese history that imposes an income tax on all forms of enterprise. It replaces the current FIE Income Tax Law applicable to enterprises with foreign direct investment and the Interim Enterprise Income Tax Regulations applicable to Chinese-owned enterprises. Most notably, the EIT Law abolishes the tax incentives available only to foreign-investment enterprises and introduces a general tax rate that is internationally competitive. The promulgation of the EIT Law symbolizes …

Depression Vulnerability Within Smoking Research: How Accurate Are One-Item Screening Items?, Dennis E. Mcchargue, Jessica Werth Cook

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Epidemiological and large scale treatment studies within smoking research have utilized many one-item screening items to examine the influence of current depressive symptoms on smoking behavior and quitting. Little is known about that concurrent validity of screening items that may reflect depression vulnerability independent of current symptoms. The present paper evaluated the concurrent validity of two one-item screening items that were essential for diagnosing past episodes of major depression. Screening questions were administered to seventy seven nicotine dependent participants via a telephone screening interview. Smokers then returned to the laboratory for a comprehensive structured assessment of depressive vulnerability. Vulnerability measures …

Effect Of Impulsivity On Cardiovascular And Subjective Reactivity To Smoking Cues, Neal Doran, Dennis E. Mcchargue, Bonnie Spring

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Individuals with high levels of impulsivity are more likely to smoke and may have greater difficulty quitting than other smokers. Although the specific mechanisms mediating this relationship are not explicitly known, one candidate is disproportionate cigarette craving in response to environmental smoking cues. We assessed the effect of impulsivity on three measures of cue reactivity. Regular smokers (n=75) were exposed to a smoking cue and a neutral cue in 2 counterbalanced experimental sessions. Cigarette craving, heart rate (HR), and mean arterial pressure (MAP) were used to index cue reactivity. More impulsive smokers exhibited a disproportionate response to the …

Personal Values As A Mediator Between Parent And Peer Expectations And Adolescent Behaviors, Laura M. Padilla-Walker, Gustavo Carlo

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

The current study examined the mediating role of adolescents’ personal values on the relation between maternal and peer expectations for prosocial behaviors and adolescents’ self-reported prosocial and antisocial behaviors. One hundred thirty-four adolescents (mean age = 16.22 years, 54% girls) completed measures of their own values and behaviors, as well as their perceptions of the positive expectations that their mother and their best friend(s) had for their (the adolescents’) prosocial behaviors. Stepwise regression analyses suggested that adolescents’ personal prosocial values mediated the relation between adolescents’ perceptions of both maternal and peer expectations and adolescents’ prosocial behaviors. In addition, for boys, …

Acculturative Stress, Social Support, And Coping: Relations To Psychological Adjustment Among Mexican American College Students, Lisa J. Crockett, Maria I. Iturbide, Rosalie A. Torres Stone, Meredith Mcginley, Marcela Raffaelli, Gustavo Carlo

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

This study examined the relations between acculturative stress and psychological functioning, as well as the protective role of social support and coping style, in a sample of 148 Mexican American college students (67% female, 33% male; mean age = 23.05 years, SD = 3.33). In bivariate analyses, acculturative stress was associated with higher levels of anxiety and depressive symptoms. Moreover, active coping was associated with better adjustment (lower depression), whereas avoidant coping predicted poorer adjustment (higher levels of depression and anxiety). Tests of interaction effects indicated that parental support and active coping buffered the effects of high acculturative stress on …

How Do I Feel About The Behavior? The Interplay Of Affective Associations With Behaviors And Cognitive Beliefs As Influences On Physical Activity Behavior, Marc T. Kiviniemi, Amy M. Voss-Humke, April L. Seifert

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Individuals have affective associations with health behaviors. In other domains such associations have been shown to influence behavior, but affective associations with health behaviors are not included in current health decision-making models. The authors examined whether affective associations with exercise predicted individuals’ activity behavior and, if so, how they interfaced with other decision-making constructs to influence behavior. Adult participants (N = 433) reported their current physical activity behavior and affective associations with physical activity. Health belief model and theory of planned behavior constructs were also assessed. More positive affective associations with activity significantly predicted greater activity behavior. Moreover, the …

“Introduction” To Modeling Complex Systems: Volume 52 Of The Nebraska Symposium On Motivation, Bill Shuart, William D. Spaulding, Jeffrey Poland

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Capturing the complexity of human behavior has been a recurring theme in the Nebraska Symposium on Motivation:
We expect behavior to be patterned or integrated, and to make biological sense; and so patterning and biological utility are what we see. And of course what we see is actually there-behavior in general is not chaotic; it is organized. (Nissen, 1954, p. 314)
When fundamental psychologists do make excursions into the human motivational world ... it is rare that they survey the requirements for theory or pre-theory by intensive descriptive analysis of behavior related to such motives as produced by concrete human …

Multilevel Models For Examining Individual Differences In Within-Person Variation And Covariation Over Time, Lesa Hoffman

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Heterogeneity of variance may be more than a statistical nuisance—it may be of direct interest as a result of individual differences. In studies of short-term fluctuation, individual differences may relate to the magnitude of within-person variation as well as to level of an outcome or its covariation with other processes. Although models for heterogeneous variances have been utilized in group contexts (i.e., dispersion models), they are not usually applied in examinations of intraindividual variation. This work illustrates how an extension of the multilevel model for heterogeneous variances can be used to examine individual differences in level, between- and within-person covariation, …

On The Use Of Multilevel Modeling As An Alternative To Items Analysis In Psycholinguistic Research, Lawrence Locker Jr., Lesa Hoffman, James A. Bovaird

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

The use of multilevel modeling is presented as an alternative to separate item and subject ANOVAs (F₁ x F₂) in psycholinguistic research. Multilevel modeling is commonly utilized to model variability arising from the nesting of lower level observations within higher level units (e.g., students within schools, repeated measures within individuals). However, multilevel models can also be used when two random factors are crossed at the same level, rather than nested. The current work illustrates the use of the multilevel model for crossed random effects within the context of a psycholinguistic experimental study, in which both subjects …

Civil Liability Relief For Brownfields Redevelopers, Stepan Wood

Articles & Book Chapters

The paper examines the extent to which state and federal governments in the United States seek to stimulate brownfields redevelopment by legislating immunity against third-party civil (common law) liability for "innocent" owners or operators who purchase contaminated land. Surveying developments in Alabama, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey and Virginia, it shows that such liability relief is uncommon, narrow, and largely unknown to brownfields lawyers. It concludes by identifying implications for Canadian lawmakers grappling with similar issues.

High-Pressure Turbine Deposition In Land-Based Gas Turbines From Various Synfuels, Thomas H. Fletcher

Faculty Publications

Ash deposits from four candidate power turbine synfuels were studied in an accelerated deposition test facility. The facility matches the gas temperature and velocity of modern first-stage high-pressure turbine vanes. A natural gas combustor was seeded with finely ground fuel ash particulate from four different fuels: straw, sawdust, coal, and petroleum coke. The entrained ash particles were accelerated to a combustor exit flow Mach number of 0.31 before impinging on a thermal barrier coating (TBC) target coupon at 1150°C. Postexposure analyses included surface topography, scanning electron microscopy, and x-ray spectroscopy. Due to significant differences in the chemical composition of the …

Ecological Momentary Assessment Of Older Women's Health, Janice Penrod, Jeremy B. Yorgason, Susan J. Loeb, Chin-Fang Liu, Lesa Hoffman, Sarah H. Gueldner, Leonard W. Poon

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Living with chronic co-morbidities implies long-lasting, always present conditions associated with highly variable health trajectories. In this study, ecological momentary assessment was used to explore nine older women's experiences of living with co-morbidities. Each participant completed a daily diary, which focused on 10 variables related to energy, pain, effort expended, and an overall health rating, for 21 days. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to explore intra-individual variation in daily health experiences and health-related burden, and determine the extent to which health-related burden was related to daily health experiences. Each of the daily health experience variables sipiificantly predicted health-related burden. Over …

Child Sexual Abuse, David J. Hansen, Kathryn R. Wilson

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Although definitions can vary across legal, clinical, and research contexts, sexual abuse is commonly defined as sexual acts between a youth and an older person (e.g., by 5 years or more) in which the dominance of the older person is used to exploit or coerce the youth. Behaviors may include noncontact (e.g., exposure) and contact (e.g., intercourse) offenses.

A Statistical Taxonomy And Another “Chance” For Natural Frequencies, Adrien Barton, Shabnam Mousavi, Jeffrey R. Stevens

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Commentary on Barbey & Sloman: "Base-rate respect"

The conclusions of Barbey & Sloman (B&S) crucially depend on evidence for different representations of statistical information. Unfortunately, a muddled distinction made among these representations calls into question the authors’ conclusions. We clarify some notions of statistical representations which are often confused in the literature. These clarifications, combined with new empirical evidence, do not support a dual-process model of judgment.

When Quantity Trumps Number: Discrimination Experiments In Cotton-Top Tamarins (Saguinus Oedipus) And Common Marmosets (Callithrix Jacchus), Jeffrey R. Stevens, Justin N. Wood, Marc D. Hauser

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

The capacity for non-linguistic, numerical discrimination has been well characterized in non-human animals, with recent studies providing careful controls for nonnumerical confounds such as continuous extent, density, and quantity. More poorly understood are the conditions under which animals use numerical versus nonnumerical quantification, and the nature of the relation between these two systems. Here we test whether cotton- top tamarins and common marmosets can discriminate between two quantities on the basis of the amount of food rather than on number. In three experiments, we show that when choosing between arrays containing different numbers and sizes of food objects, both species …

Will They Tell? Weapons Reporting By Middle-School Youth, Eve M. Brank, Jennifer L. Woolard, Veda E. Brown, Mark Fondacaro, Jennifer L. Luescher, Ramona G. Chinn, Scott A. Miller

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Adding to the body of research that describes students who will bring weapons to school, the current research examined middle-school students’ willingness to report when they know someone has a weapon at school. The sample included 1,957 sixth, seventh, and eighth graders from 27 schools in five states. Overall, a majority of students indicated that they would be willing to report; however, there were significant effects for the conditions of reporting (such as anonymity) and effects for some demographic characteristics. Furthermore, students who perceived adult or parental involvement in their lives were more willing to report. In contrast, students with …

Childhood Psychological Maltreatment And Quality Of Marriage: The Mediating Role Of Psychological Distress, Andrea R. Perry, David K. Dilillo, James Peugh

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

This study examined the role of adult psychological distress in mediating associations between childhood psychological maltreatment and marital satisfaction in a sample of 65 newlywed couples. Results indicated that a significant linkage between psychological maltreatment (including emotional abuse and emotional neglect) and marital satisfaction was eliminated when accounting for global psychological distress, hostility, and depression in the overall sample. These findings were moderated by gender, such that for men, the long-term cOl'relates of emotional abuse were mediated by broad psychological distress and paranoia. Conversely, for women, relations between emotional abuse and emotional neglect and later marital satisfaction were mediated by …

Towards An Understanding Of The Process And Mechanisms Of Change In Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: Linking Innovative Methodology With Fundamental Questions [Editorial], Adele Hayes, Debra A. Hope, Sarah Hayes

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

There is now consistent evidence to support the efficacy of cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) to reduce clinical symptoms and improve quality of life across a variety of clinical problems (Butler, Chapman, Formen, & Beck, 2006). This outcome research typically relies on a pretreatment-posttreatment design and follow-up assessments at fixed intervals beyond post-test. These outcome studies have been important in answering questions about if a treatment works and, to some extent, for whom it works. However, these designs provide much less information about the mechanisms of treatment—why or how an intervention works. There has been a resurgence of interest in studying …

John Rawls’S Proffer To Believers: A Bargain Called, ‘The Idea Of Public Reason’, William J. Wagner

Scholarly Articles

No abstract provided.

Interviewing Suspected Victims Of Child Maltreatment, Bette L. Bottoms, A R. Perona, E Sorenson, Cynthia J. Najdowski

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.