Digital Commons Network^™

Post-Katrina New Orleans: The Challenges, Milestones And Progress Of Small Business Owners And Entrepreneurs, Iona Lee

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The US Small Business Association reports that 99.9% of all US business can be classified as small. Having less than 500 employees small businesses provide work for just over half of all US private sector workers (2009). Additionally, less than 2% of those businesses have between 100-499 employees (Headd & Kirchhoff, 2009), leaving approximately 97% of all US businesses employing 99 or fewer employees. Given this statistic, it would stand to reason that small businesses have a higher success rate than large ones; however, developing and opening a small business does not occur without risk. The SBA reports that only …

Loyalty To Relationships: Examination Of Affluent Casino Guest Retention In Las Vegas, Adrian Y. Low

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This paper analyzes the challenges faced by Las Vegas, Nevada casinos when catering to their affluent guests. As part of the literature review, the paper will examine the various retention efforts taken by luxury products and service providers, along with luxury hotels and hotel casinos in Las Vegas. Personal communications with casino hotel executives provides a real-world comparison of the effectiveness and limitations of various techniques discussed in the literature review.

A Parallel Computing Test Bed For Performing An Unsupervised Fluoroscopic Analysis Of Knee Joint Kinematics, Renu Ramanatha

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Fluoroscopic analysis of knee joint kinematics involves accurately determining the position and orientation of bones in the knee joint. This data can be derived using the static 3-D CT scan images and 2-D video fluoroscopy images together. This involves generating hypothetical digitally reconstructed radiographs (DRR) from the CT scan image with known position and orientation and comparing them to the original fluoroscopic frame. This represents a search problem in which, among all the DRRs possible from a CT image, the image that most closely matches the target fluoroscopy frame of the knee joint has to be found.

Each image in …

Constructing Marriage: A Thematic Analysis Of Self-Help Books On Marriage, Stephanie Mae Jones

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Questions about what makes a marriage work are treated widely in the popular press. This study seeks to discover how we learn about marriage through self-help books. According to Cameron (2007), these texts can become a part of our construction of everyday life. Therefore this study focuses on how marital self-help books frame the institution, and whether relational dialectics were present in each book. Two books— Laura Schlessinger’s The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage and John Gottman’s Seven Principles of Making Marriage Work—were selected through an exhaustive process. A thematic analysis was conducted on each text, and topics …

Mental Health Provision To Hispanics In Idaho: Findings From A Provider Survey, Nicole Stickney

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Currently, Idaho’s mental health resources for Hispanics are not designed to meet their mental health needs. According to Jose Valle, the Chief of Children’s Mental Health at the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare Region III, there are no available data regarding prevalence rates for mental disorders among Hispanics in Idaho (personal communication, September 18, 2007), and little is known about what interventions work best among Hispanics (Gonzalez, 2006). As a first step in addressing the mental health needs of Hispanics in Idaho, information on the capacity of local providers to deliver culturally appropriate care is needed. The Idaho Partnership …

The Root Causes Of Errant Ordered Radiology Exams, Benjamin Duman

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research was to determine why there was a high number of errant radiology orders from requesting physicians at ATA Hospital. As the researcher, I wanted to clearly define errant orders, determine the root causes of errant orders, and further, make recommendations that would help diminish current as well as future order errors. This study answers three research questions: RQ1. Exactly what are the performance problems associated with errant orders within ATA Hospital’s radiology department that warrant further research? RQ2. What causes the increase in errant radiological orders at ATA Hospital? And, RQ3. What types of performance …

Understanding How Evaluators Deal With Multiple Stakeholders, Michelle Elyce Baron

Theses and Dissertations

Although many leaders in evaluation advise evaluators to balance the needs of the client and other stakeholders, very little is known about how or if practicing evaluators address this injunction. Understanding how practicing evaluators address the needs of multiple stakeholders could inform evaluator training. The purpose of this qualitative study was to describe what practicing evaluators do when faced with conflicting stakeholder values. This study invited five evaluators to share their experiences working with multiple stakeholders while reflecting on how they deal with multiple and often conflicting values as they seek to serve the stakeholders. One implication from this study …

Compact Size Design With Low Side Lobes Of Fractal Linear Array Antenna, Refa'at Talib, Fawwaz Jinan Jibrael

Iraqi Journal of Computers, Communications, Control and Systems Engineering

In this paper, the fractal concept is used in the linear array antenna design to obtain multiband operation and reduced size. MATLAB programming language version 7.2 (R2006a) is used to simulate the fractal linear array antenna and their radiation pattern. Fractal Cantor linear array antenna of array pattern of 101 has been designed at a frequency of 2700 MHz with uniform and non uniform amplitude distribution. The performance of this array has been simulated. It is found that it operates at frequencies 2700 MHz, 900 MHz, 300 MHz, and 100 MHz. Two proposed models of Cantor linear array antenna having …

Preparing Medical Students To Counsel For Smoking Cessation, Aubree M. Guiffre

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Smoking is a national epidemic. Medical providers are the first line of defense to help patients reduce or stop smoking. However, smoking cessation counseling does not occur consistently or regularly. Medical providers must be trained to counsel for smoking cessation, with certain areas requiring attention in order for the training to be successful. There is a relationship between medical students who have high rates of self-efficacy related to smoking cessation counseling and high rates of actual counseling. Understanding the relationships between knowledge, skills, attitudes, and the medical school year in training on self-efficacy is important to better prepare medical students …

Is Parenting Style Related To Overweight In Mexican Or Mexican-American Preschoolers?, Darlene Mcpherson-Ventura Phd

Dissertations

The prevalence of childhood overweight (OW) continues to rise and children from low-income, Mexican or Mexican-American families are disproportionately affected. The preschool years have been identified as a critical period for excessive weight gain and during this time children respond to parental cues as they form their early eating habits. Certain parenting styles have been associated with improved health outcomes in children. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship of parenting styles and feeding practices to the Mexican or Mexican-American preschool child's risk of overweight. Interdependence Theory was used to inform this study to understand the interaction …

Cybersieves, Derek E. Bambauer

Duke Law Journal

This Article offers a process-based method to assess Internet censorship that is compatible with different value sets about what content should be blocked. Whereas China's Internet censorship receives considerable attention, censorship in the United States and other democratic countries is largely ignored. The Internet is increasingly fragmented by nations' different value judgments about what content is unacceptable. Countries differ not in their intent to censor material-from political dissent in Iran to copyrighted songs in America-but in the content they target, how precisely they block it, and how involved their citizens are in these choices. Previous scholars have analyzed Internet censorship …

Compact Trench-Based Silicon-On-Insulator Rib Waveguide Ring Resonator With Large Free Spectral Range, Seunghyun Kim, Gregory P. Nordin, Weisheng Hu, Yusheng Qian, Jiguo Song, Gregory L. Wojcik

Faculty Publications

We demonstrate a compact trench-based silicon-on-insulator (SOI) rib waveguide ring resonator comprised of trench-based bends and splitters. It has a perimeter of 50 μm and occupies an area of only 25×25 μm. The measured free spectral range (FSR) is 13.2 nm, which the largest reported for an SOI rib waveguide ring resonator. The measured FSR, full width at half maximum, and quality factor match reasonably well with analytical calculations. Further calculation shows that a FSR of 50.8 nm is achievable for an SOI rib waveguide ring resonator with a perimeter of 15 μm.

Density: An Additive Process, Oscar Sam Boyko

Architecture Theses and Projects

This project is about embracing the global transition from primarily rural life to primarily urban life. The project is looking for a way to organize the inevitable vertical growth that will need to occur in major cities such as New York.

Living In The Spectrum: Autistic Children Center, Jennifer Villegas

Architecture Theses and Projects

Throughout this project, I became aware of how the life of an autistic child differs from others. They view the world around them as something new and exciting. The goal was to create an environment to help children with autism and make them comfortable within their daily lifestyle. I used architecture to construct a realm in which these students could explore an environment which benefited their development.

What's Wrong With The Commissioner? Some Lessons From Downunder, Ian Dobinson, David Thorpe

Seton Hall Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law

No abstract provided.

Buccaneers And Bucks From The Internet: Pirate Bay And The Entertainment Industry, Tara Touloumis

Seton Hall Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law

No abstract provided.

Modern Difficulties In Resolving Old Problems: Does The Actual Malice Standard Apply To Celebrity Gossip Blogs?, Victoria Cioppettini

Seton Hall Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law

No abstract provided.

Could The New Women's Professional Soccer League Survive In America? How Adopting A Traditional Legal Structure May Save More Than Just A Game, Marc Edelman, Elizabeth Masterson

Seton Hall Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law

No abstract provided.

"To Catch A Predator" Gets Caught: Are Nbc's Television Journalists Sacrificing Media Ethics And Legal Procedures For A Chance In The Spotlight?, Amy Rokuson

Seton Hall Journal of Sports and Entertainment Law

No abstract provided.

Direct And Indirect Effects Of Injunctive Norms On Marijuana Use: The Role Of Reference Groups, Joseph W. Labrie, Justin F. Hummer, Andrew Lac, Christine M. Lee

Psychological Science Faculty Works

Objective: Little work has evaluated the relationship between injunctive norms and marijuana use. This study sought to establish whether misperceptions exist between perceived injunctive norms of typical college students and the actual approval level of the students. We also examined respondents’ perceptions of which groups (typical student, close friends, and parents) were the most and least approving of marijuana. These variables were then applied to an explanatory model to assess their relationships with marijuana use.

Method: Participants were 3,753 students (61% female) randomly recruited from two West Coast campuses. Participants were asked about their own marijuana use and their own …

How Effectively Do People Learn From A Variety Of Different Opinions?, Andrew Healy

Economics Faculty Works

This paper presents experimental evidence about how effectively individuals learn from information coming from heterogeneous sources. In the experiment, Thai subjects observed information that came from Americans and from other Thais that they could use to help them answer a series of questions. Despite listening too little to either group, subjects demonstrated a significant amount of statistical sophistication in how they weighed observed American information relative to observed Thai information. The data indicate that subjects understood that outside information has extra value because people from the same group tend to make the same kinds of mistakes. The results illustrate the …

A Spoofing Attack Against An Epc Class One Rfid System, Christopher Bolan

Australian Information Security Management Conference

In computing the term spoofing historically referred to the creation of TCP/IP packets using another device’s valid IP address to gain an advantage. The Electronic Product Code (EPC) RFID system was investigated to test the efficacy of spoofing a valid tag response to basic requests. A radio frequency transmission device was constructed to determine whether a valid reader could distinguish between the response of an actual tag and a spoofed response. The results show that the device was able to successfully deceive the EPC reader and further, to replace actual tag responses with a spoofed response. The potential for such …

A New Look At The Original Meaning Of The Diversity Clause, Mark Moller

William & Mary Law Review

Must a federal court have obtained the power to bind a party before her citizenship becomes relevant to diversity jurisdiction? For a long time conventional wisdom has assumed the answer is “no”: Congress can authorize diversity jurisdiction based on the citizenship of persons who, although currently beyond the court’s power to bind, might later join the suit. Congress, in turn, has acted on this assumption. Key provisions of the most ambitious, and controversial, expansion of diversity jurisdiction in the last decade, the 2005 Class Action Fairness Act (CAFA), hinge diversity jurisdiction on the citizenship of persons conventionally believed beyond a …

The Effect Of A State Department Of Education Mentoring Program For Teachers On Science Student Achievement, Gilda Darlene Lyon

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to assess the effect of the Georgia Department of Education Science Specialist teacher-mentoring program on student achievement on science standardized tests. This study analyzed the impact this program has had on student achievement in participating high schools when compared with high schools across the state where the program had not intervened. The Georgia High School Graduation Test, physical science end-of-course, and biology end-of-course test data, from a three year period, we re collected from the Georgia Department of Education website and analyzed using an independent-t test and the Mann-Whitney test. While test score improvements …

Impact Of Increased Technology Use In The Free-Time Choices Of Fifth And Seventh Grade Students In A Southern School District, Cynthia Susan Miller

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The study sought to determine if increased technology use affects the free-time choices of students. While technology options have grown exponentially, time remains a fixed commodity. Therefore, it is suggested that students who increasingly use technology must draw time from more traditional childhood activities. Students' free-time activities were examined to document discernable patterns among the activities valued by students who use technology extensively and the activities valued by students who use technology less frequently. Study participants were fifth and seventh grade students in a semi-rural suburban county in the southeastern United States. The data collection instrument was a self-reporting survey …

Thai Buddhism And Women With A Christian Response, Alice K. Terrell

Masters Theses

Thai Buddhism is a subset of Theravada Buddhism. Theravada Buddhism is one of two main branches of Buddhism which was founded by Siddartha Gautama around 560 B.C. Theravada is the strictest branch of the two. Thai Buddhism is a mixture of Theravada, local folklore and superstitions. Thai Buddhism is practiced by ninety-five percent of the population of Thailand. Within Thai Buddhism, men and women participate in the religion differently. Men are given the opportunity to be ordained into the sangha and serve as a monk. Through this path, men are able to achieve nirvana. Women are not given the same …

The Impact Of Captivity On The Behaviour Of Mute Swans (Cygnus Olor), Jessica Guyon

The Plymouth Student Scientist

The mute swan (Cygnus olor) is a large water fowl species widely distributed in Great Britain. They are residential and territorial so often there is no interchange between groups. Swans face many injuries in the wild so are brought into wild life centres for treatment and rehabilitation. The aim of this study was to see if their captive behaviour differed from the behaviour of wild conspecifics. This was achieved by performing observations of captive and wild mute swans. From this it was found that several behaviours were more common in captivity these were standing, standing whilst preening or feeding, lying, …

The Effect Of Imipramine Hcl On Haemolysis Of Horse Erythrocytes, Tamara Esther Farrant

The Plymouth Student Scientist

The mechanism of action of tricyclic antidepressant (TCAs) is not fully understood. The effect of the TCA imipramine on the haemolysis of erythrocytes was investigated, focussing on dosage and incubation time. The method used a drug free red blood cell (RBC) haemolysis assay (Watts & Handy, 2007) comparing experimental drug concentrations ranging from 0.0904 mg/ml – 90.4 mg/ml. Incubation time effects were also investigated, and haemolysis increased with decreasing osmolarity. Compared with the control the percentage haemolysis increased significantly with higher concentrations of imipramine, but was reduced by 0.0904 mg/ml imipramine. Haemolysis also increased with longer incubation time in both …

Recent Advances In Marine Microbiology - A Selection Of Critical Evaluations Of Research Papers, Colin Munn, Heather Guy, Grace Phillips, Elizabeth Robertson

The Plymouth Student Scientist

This collection of articles features examples of coursework submitted by three students taking the module BIOL3309 „Marine Microbiology – Ecology & Applications‟ as part of the BSc Hons Marine Biology degree at Plymouth. In this module, students discuss recent research papers in regular seminars, and keep a portfolio of critical evaluations of papers that they have studied. This subject is arguably one of the fastest moving fields in marine science and recent discoveries, made possible by the application of new techniques (especially metagenomics and rapid DNA sequencing) have revolutionized our understanding of ocean processes and the interactions of microbes with …

Labrador Sea Water Formation In The Irminger Basin And Its Dependence On The North Atlantic Oscillation, Philip Garner

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Historical temperature and salinity data from the Irminger basin were analysed to determine if Labrador Sea Water forms in the Irminger Basin and if deep convection in the region is dependent on the North Atlantic Oscillation. This was undertaken by analysing the Surface Mixed Layer depth during the Boreal winter (December-March) and comparing it to the North Atlantic Oscillation Index. We find there is evidence of LSW formation in the region and there is a weak to moderate correlation with the North Atlantic Oscillation Index.