Digital Commons Network^™

Vietnamese Women's Critical Reflections On Their Adaptation To Living In The United Sates, Mai Le Ho Del Buono

Doctoral Dissertations

unavailable

Ladies Who Launch Organization : A Case Study Of Women Entrepreneurs, Dorothy Raab

Doctoral Dissertations

unavailable

Imagining Just Discourse In Policy-Making : Transnational Space, Identity, And The Other, Annette Marie Caneda

Doctoral Dissertations

unavailable

The Relationship Between Executive Coaching And Organizational Performance Of Female Executives As A Predictor For Organizational Success, Lily Benavides

Doctoral Dissertations

unavailable

An Analysis Of The Efficacy Of Extinction As An Intervention In The Modification Of Switching In Patients With Dissociation Identity Diorder, June Canaris

Doctoral Dissertations

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Humanitarian Assistance And The Private Security Debate: An International Humanitarian Law Perspective, Benjamin Perrin

All Faculty Publications

The changing nature of armed conflict has had a dramatic impact on the security risks facing humanitarian personnel. Historically, the safety of humanitarian aid delivery was secured through the consent of the relevant Parties to the conflict. However, non-international ethnically-motivated armed conflicts, failed and failing states, and insurgency-based warfare have fundamentally challenged the viability of this traditional security paradigm. In confronting today's complex security climate, humanitarian organizations are faced with a diverse menu of alternatives to enhance their security. The debate over armed protection that has sharply divided the humanitarian community is explored in this paper, including a critique of …

The Effect Of Simulated Clinical Experience On Knowledge, Near Transfer, And Far Transfer In Nursing Education, Shana Ruggenberg

Doctoral Dissertations

unavailable

Democratic Failure: Tracking The Ebb Of Democracy's Flow, 1800–2006, Sanja E. Sray

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Scant attention has focused on the systematic study of democratic failure. This dissertation partially corrects this oversight. Tracing the roots of antidemocratic sentiment across the centuries, it first argues that the advance of institutions, fueled by underlying shifts in values and innovation in political philosophy, was key to freeing democracy from its bondage as a most disparaged form of governance. Focusing on the measurable aspects of these institutions, the study focuses on describing patterns of behavior when democracies fail. First, it shows that there have been clusters of democratic failure. These clusters, or counterwaves, find their roots in ancient antidemocratic …

Japanese Students' Autonomy In Learning English As A Foreign Language In Out-Of-School Settings, Kimiyoshi Inomata

Doctoral Dissertations

unavailable

Religion And Initiation Into Marijuana Use: The Deterring Role Of Religious Friends, Amy Adamczyk, Ian Palmer

Publications and Research

Over the last two decades researchers have begun to look at how personal religious beliefs and behaviors influence substance use, finding that more religious teens are less likely to drink, smoke, and use illegal drugs. This study builds on this previous research, combining it with work on religious contextual effects to develop a theoretical model that explains why friends’ religion would influence teens’ marijuana use, even if teens are not personally religious. Using two waves of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, this study examines whether individual and friends’ religiosity (e.g., religious participation and importance) or born-again …

A Truism With Attitude: The Tenth Amendment In Constitutional Context, Gary S. Lawson

Faculty Scholarship

The Tenth Amendment is caught in a crossfire hurricane. From one direction, it is dismissed as "but a truism"' with no significant constitutional function. From another direction, its unassuming language- "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people" 2-has inspired Byzantine doctrines concerning such matters as federal commandeering of state institutions,3 conditions on federal spending programs implemented by states,4 and federal regulation of state governmental institutions. 5 The Tenth Amendment thus appears to be either the constitutional equivalent of a …

Dirty Dancing: The Fda Stumbles On The Chevron Two-Step, Gary S. Lawson

Faculty Scholarship

Professor Lars Noah deserves much credit for exposing some of the myriad ways in which the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has consistently sought to expand its authority through questionable, and perhaps in some cases abusive, legal practices.' As Professor Noah observes, there are signs that the federal courts' century-long honeymoon with the FDA may be ending 2 -and perhaps the FDA never deserved the solicitude that it has traditionally received from both the judiciary and Congress. 3 If Professor Noah can hasten the onset of a more realistic legal and public attitude toward the FDA, he will have performed …

Corporate Boards Of Directors: Advisors Or Supervisors, Tamar Frankel

Faculty Scholarship

What makes for a well-functioning corporate board? In this Article I argue that one important condition is that board members must understand and agree upon the group's objectives and its roles. If a corporate board of directors (Board) does not agree on what it is supposed to do; or, worse still, if Board members disagree about the Board's mission and its implementation, then the Board is likely to become dysfunctional-inefficient and ineffective. The Board's missions, however, may be mixed and their forms of implementation may conflict. In this case, the balance between the two missions must be established, and it …

Covert Encryption And Document Authentication Using Texture Coding, Jonathan Blackledge, Mary Hallot

Articles

With the improvements in the quality of Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) printing and scanning devices, the ability to counterfeit documents has become a widespread problem. Consequently, there has been an increasing demand to develop digital watermarking techniques which can be applied to both electronic and printed images (and documents) that can be authenticated, prevent unauthorized copying and withstand abuse and degradation. In this paper , a new approach to digital watermarking is presented and a range of possible applications are considered. The process is defined by using concepts and techniques borrowed from Cryptography. It is based on computing a 'scramble image' by …

Multi-Algorithmic Cryptography Using Deterministic Chaos With Applications To Mobile Communications, Jonathan Blackledge

Articles

In this extended paper, we present an overview of the principal issues associated with cryptography, providing historically significant examples for illustrative purposes as part of a short tutorial for readers that are not familiar with the subject matter. This is used to introduce the role that nonlinear dynamics and chaos play in the design of encryption engines which utilize different types of Iteration Function Systems (IFS). The design of such encryption engines requires that they conform to the principles associated with diffusion and confusion for generating ciphers that are of a maximum entropy type. For this reason, the role of …

Audio Data Verification And Authentication Using Frequency Modulation Based Watermarking, Jonathan Blackledge, Omar Farooq

Articles

An approach to watermarking digital signals using frequency modulation - ‘Chirp Coding’ - is considered. The principles underlying this approach are based on the use of a matched filter to reconstruct a ‘chirp stream’ code that is uniquely robust. The method is generic in the sense that it can, in principle, be used for a variety of different signal (the authentication of speech and biomedical signals, for example). Further, by generating a bit stream that is signal dependent, chirp coding provides a method of self-authentication, which has a wide range of applications including copyright protection and digital rights management. However, …

Proposal For Using A Studio Format To Enhance Institutional Advancement, Shannon Chance

Articles

Universities today need to become quicker on their toes. They must continually scan the environment and seize emerging opportunities – and institutional advancement must lead this effort. An unfortunate number of institutional advancement operations are ill equipped for the task at hand. Many suffer from high staff turnover and overly hierarchical systems that refl ect excessive fragmentation and compartmentalization. They inadvertently perpetuate stifl ing and unnecessary bureaucracy. Organizing advancement efforts around the metaphor of the design studio or creative workshop promises to (a) pool talent, (b) cultivate collaboration, and (c) align diverse but related interests in order to promote fruitful …

Experimental Study Of High-Temperature Smectic-C*F12 Phase In Chiral Smectic Liquid Crystals That Exhibit Phase-Sequence Reversal, K. L. Sandhya, J. K. Song, Yuri Panarin, J. K. Vij, S. Kumar

Articles

We report the results of an experimental study of a recently observed phase sequence reversal of smectic-C*FI2 [SmC*(qT=1/2); a four layer antiferroelectric] phase appearing in the temperature range above the smectic-C* (SmC*) phase from the results of optical birefringence, spontaneous polarization, selective reflection, conoscopy, and dielectric spectroscopy. The SmC*FI2 phase is observed in an antiferroelectric liquid crystalline compound, 10OHF, in a temperature range above that of SmC*A phase and is found to be thermodynamically monotropic, i.e., it appears only upon cooling from SmC*A phase. This is also unstable as if it is once transformed to SmC* by the application of …

Electro-Optic And Dielectric Study Of The De Vries-Type Smectic A* Phase Exhibiting Transitions To Smectic-C*A And Smectic-C* Phases, U. Manna, Jang-Kun Song, Yuri Panarin, Atsuo Fukuda, J. K. Vij

Articles

Mixtures of different compositions of an antiferroelectric liquid crystal compound that exhibits direct smectic-A*(Sm-A*)-smectic-C*A(Sm-C*A) transition with a ferroelectric liquid crystal compound that exhibits Sm-A*-smectic-C*(Sm-C*) transition are studied using electro-optics and dielectric spectroscopy. The results of optical texture, birefringence, and the tilt angle suggest that a part of the Sm-A* phase is of de Vries type, since an increase in the tilt angle with decreasing temperature results in a reduction in the value of the birefringence in the Sm-A* phase, whereas the birefringence at Sm-A* to Sm-C* transition goes up by 12.7%. The soft mode relaxation strength, the Landau coefficient of …

V-Shaped Electro-Optic Response Observed In A Chiral Ferroelectric Smectic Liquid Crystal, V. Manjuladevi, Yuri Panarin, Jang-Kun Song, B. K. Sadashiva

Articles

We report on the observation of V-shaped switching in a ferroelectric liquid crystal cell over a wide range of temperatures. Results of the optical transmittance in the visible region give us the helical pitch for various temperatures of the ferroelectric liquid crystalline compound used. We show that the helical pitch, in addition to the spontaneous polarization (PS) and thickness of the alignment layer of the cell, is an important factor in giving V-shaped switching. A longer or helical compensated mixture gives a better V-shaped switching. © 2008 American Institute of Physics.

Women Of The Sisters' Hall: Religion And The Making Of Women's Alternative Space In Taiwan's Economic Restructuring, Anru Lee

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Ecosystem Properties Of Urban Land Covers At The Aboveground-Belowground Interface, Loren B. Byrne, Mary Ann Bruns, Ke Chung Kim

Arts & Sciences Faculty Publications

Understanding of ecological differences among urban land covers can guide the sustainable management of urbanized landscapes for conservation of ecosystem services. The objective of our study was to compare ecosystem properties at the aboveground–belowground interface of three land cover types commonly found in residential landscapes: lawns, bark mulch, and gravel mulch. Using unmowed vegetation as a reference land cover, we measured surface soil variables (to 5 cm depth), CO2 fluxes, and ground temperatures in experimental field plots within 3 years after their creation. Each land cover had a distinctive set of ecosystem properties. Mulched plots had significantly warmer soil and …

Introduction To Ecological Landscaping: A Holistic Description And Framework To Guide The Study And Management Of Urban Landscape Parcels, Loren B. Byrne, Parwinder Grewal

Arts & Sciences Faculty Publications

Urbanized ecosystems and urban human populations are expanding around the world causing many negative environmental effects. A challenge for achieving sustainable urban social ecological systems is understanding how urbanized landscapes can be designed and managed to minimize negative outcomes. To this end, an interdisciplinary Ecological Landscaping conference was organized to examine the interacting sociocultural and ecological causes and consequences of landscaping practices and products. This special issue of Cities and the Environment contains a diverse set of articles arising from that conference. In this introductory paper, we describe the meaning of ecological landscaping and a new conceptual framework that helps …

Jamaican Dons, Italian Godfathers And The Chances Of A ‘Reversible Destiny’, Hume N. Johnson, Joseph L. Soeters

Arts & Sciences Faculty Publications

For close to 50 years, so-called ‘dons’ have positioned themselves as civic leaders in Jamaica, gaining acceptance among poor urban communities and (tacit) political recognition in the wider society. The dons' systematic, coercive organization of the ghetto community and the counter-hegemonic, executive-style bureaucracy and culture entrenched here resembles the ‘godfather’-led criminal culture and power of the (Italian) Mafia. However, over the last ten years the Mafia has faced a considerable decline in its omnipotence, due to increased state intervention and resistance within civil society, particularly by women in the local Italian communities. This article attempts to ascertain if such a …

From Obsession To Confession: A False Confession Paradigm In The Murder Of Jon Benet Ramsey, Morgan Moffa, Judith Platania

Arts & Sciences Faculty Publications

In this study, we used a fact pattern similar to the John Mark Karr scenario to examine perceptions of DNA and confession evidence. Specifically, we hypothesized that DNA evidence, confessor level of psychopathology, and presence or absence of Miranda protections would affect participants’ perceptions of guilt and attitudes towards the interrogation process. One hundred nine undergraduates read a two-page summary based on John Mark Karr’s confession. Summaries varied based on psychopathology of confessor, the presence or absence of DNA evidence, and the provision of Miranda warnings prior to confession. The DNA manipulation explained participants’ attitudes towards specific aspects of the …

Effective Teaching & Teaching Evaluation Practices: Canadian University Geography Departments, Susan Vajoczki

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In this thesis teaching evaluation practices in Canadian university geography departments are examined. The objective of this research is to identify good practices for teaching evaluation that can be applied within geography departments at Canadian universities and may be applicable to other departments and within other countries. In order to meet this goal a number of research questions were identified. These include:

1. What is effective teaching in higher education?;
2. What is effective teaching within the discipline of geography in higher education?;
3. How and why is teaching evaluated in higher education?;
4. What is the breadth of teaching evaluation practices currently used …

The Impact Of The Blackberry On Couple Relationships, Jurgen Dieter Czechowsky

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This research focused on the BlackBerry developed by Research In Motion and its impact on couple relationships. The areas examined were couple communication, time spent together, and martial satisfaction using grounded theory, a demographic survey, the ENRICH Marital Satisfaction Scale and interviews. Ten couples participated and reported that the BlackBerry offered many practical applications for their relationship. The research showed that communication via the BlackBerry resulted in fewer face-to-face interactions. There was no increase in time together and for some time decreased. Martial satisfaction had increased for two couples, decreased for two couples with no influence for the rest of …

Trips Down Memory Lane: Recall Direction Affects The Subjective Distance Of Past Events, Kent C.H. Lam

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The subjective temporal distance of a past event—how close or far away it feels—is influenced by numerous factors apart from actual time. The present studies extend research on subjective distance by exploring the experience of remembering autobiographical events as part of a stream of related events. It is proposed that a key determinant of subjective distance is the temporal direction in which events are recalled. Five experiments supported the hypothesis that people feel closer to a target event when they recall a stream of related events in a backward direction (i.e., a reverse-chronological order ending with the target event) rather …

Intra-Urban Analysis Of Commercial Locations: A Gis-Based Approach, Christopher D. Storie

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The urban landscape is an interspersed mixing of residences, shops, theaters, parks, natural areas, and a multitude of other uses. From the early days of the central markets, to the planned downtown, to the heavily planned super-regional shopping complexes, commercial landscapes evolve. There has been considerable research conducted on analyzing the commercial structure of urban environments in an attempt to better understanding the nature of retailing and its resultant impacts on the geography of the city.

This research has three broad goals: a) to develop a technique that makes operational, in a systematized and objective manner, an approach to analyzing …

The Story Of South African Child Welfare: A History Of The Present, Jeanette Elizabeth Schmid

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Though significant transformation has occurred in post-apartheid South Africa, extensive poverty, AIDS and violence present major challenges. The capacity of families and local networks, undermined by apartheid policies, continue to be depleted, leaving children vulnerable. During the apartheid era, the child welfare sector, despite its intention of supporting children and families, utilized interventions that failed to address the needs of the majority and weakened family life. Post-apartheid, government has presented Developmental Social Welfare—with its family-centered, rights-oriented, community-based, participatory, generalist and intersectoral approach—as an indigenous correction to the previous expert-driven, pathologizing, individualistic, discriminatory and costly approaches.

Employing a Foucauldian genealogy or …