Digital Commons Network^™

The Occurrence Of Maltreatment And Depression Among Adjudicated Adolescent Sexual Offenders With High Functioning Autism Or Asperger's Disorder, Jessica Bleil Walters

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The following study examined the presence and severity of abuse and/or neglect and the occurrence of depressive symptomatology among adolescents with High Functioning Autism (HFA) or Asperger's Disorder (AD) compared to adolescents without HFA/AD who are adjudicated delinquent due to sexual offense and attend a State Residential Sexual Offender Program. The scores of 23 adolescent sexual offenders diagnosed with either HFA or AD were compared to 15 non-HFA/AD adolescent sexual offenders on the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) as well as the Beck Depression Inventory - Second Edition (BDI-II). An investigation of whether there is a relationship between the severity of …

Imag(In)Ing Neuro-Psychology: A Multi-Perspectival, Critical, Autoethnographic Study, Kristen Hennessy

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Neuropsychology in the United States initially strove to diagnose brain damage. Recently, this diagnostic task has been largely usurped by the emergence of neuroimaging. Despite the encroachment upon the traditional territory of neuropsychology, neuropsychology has continued relatively unchanged. Personally encountering neuropsychology from the multiple positions of patient, family member, and training professional, I wondered about the forces operating that prevented neuropsychology from evolving. I speculated that unseen forces operated to keep neuropsychology stagnant and that the neuropsychologist's function was largely unarticulated. I further speculated that the hidden functions involved very particular (problematic) relationships. This dissertation aims to begin to highlight …

The Effects Of Being Placed In Special Education Classes Versus General Education Classes And Teacher Certification On Students' High-Stakes Testing Scores, Bethany Ann Porter

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

The introduction of new laws such as the amendments to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, 1997) and the No Child Left Behind Act have changed education for special education students in the United States. Students with disabilities are now more frequently being held to the same standards as those students without disabilities. These federal laws are designed to help close the achievement gap among all students regardless of race, gender, poverty, or disability status. Special education students are now required to participate in statewide high-stakes testing programs alongside their nondisabled peers. Another movement involves including students with disabilities …

A Unity Of Contraries: Dorothy Day And The 'No-Alibi' Rhetoric Of Defiance And Devotion, Catherine Carr Fitzwilliams

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This offering considers what I term the embedded narrative of Dorothy Day (1897-1980) as a Rhetoric of Defiance and Devotion and it is illustrated by selected metaphors associated with Martin Buber and M. M. Bakhtin. Concepts of conscience, community and the complexities associated with being authentically human are engaged within an interpretive journey of a life lived in response to the flashpoints of the last century.

Enlisting hermeneutics as a guide, Day's petite narrative is situated against a broader narrative of eight decades of economic, social, political, cultural and (for her) philosophical and spiritual changes. Her various and varying labels …

Foster Mothers' Experience Of Parenting A Foster Child With Attachment Problems: An Empirical Phenomenological Investigation, Cynthia Byers

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explored foster mothers' experiences of parenting a foster child who displayed problematic attachment. This topic is important because research suggests foster children presenting with attachment problems often experience disrupted foster placements, which are known to be detrimental to their continued development.

An introductory letter seeking foster mothers with difficult to care for foster children between the ages of 2 and younger than 6 years was sent by seven foster care agencies in Allegheny County to all of those agencies' foster mothers. Foster mothers were not told in advance that the study involved attachment-disordered foster children. Six foster mothers …

Factors That Influence College Students Who Choose Engineering As Their Major To Presist In That Major To Their Fifth Semester, Kelli Elaine Wildman

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Individuals, institutions, and society are affected by whether or not students persist in college; therefore, persistence and retention on college campuses is an important topic for higher education systems. However, little research has been done on program retention. Since engineering as a profession is expected to increase, it is imperative to have students persist in the major. The primary purpose of this study is to determine the influence of selected demographic and academic characteristics in the decision of first time in college (FTIC) traditional-age undergraduates who declare engineering as their major at admission to persist in the curriculum from second …

Third-Party Imagined Interactions: Expanding Imagined Interactions As False Memories In Understanding Interactions, Marcus Allen Porter

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Previous studies have found imagined interactions (IIs) help individuals recall past interactions and plan for future interactions. Those studies have not investigated what occurs when individuals imagine the interactions of others (third-party imagined interactions hereafter TPIIs), how the II varies with the party imagined or what happens when those imagined interactions create false views of what happened. To fill this research gap, this study proposed one research question and nine hypotheses investigating TPIIs, how they vary with the individual in the TPII, if they contribute to false memories and how they affect communication plans. A survey was conducted to gain …

The Role Of Hurricane Exposure And Life Disruption As Predictors Of Child Post-Traumatic Stress Symptomatology Following Hurricane Katrina, Angie Lynn Pellegrin

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

While many children emotionally recover following a disaster (Salzer & Bickman, 1999), possibly one-third of children will experience significant psychological distress or post-traumatic stress symptoms which cause interference with their daily school and home functioning (Vernberg, La Greca, Silverman, & Prinstein, 1996). Research supports the role that exposure, loss, and disruption play in increasing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) severity in children following disasters (La Greca, Silverman, Vernberg, Prinstein, 1996; Verberg et al., 1996). However, there are no assessments or questionnaires that have investigated what type of events during and following a hurricane are most predictive of post-traumatic stress reactions. Using …

(Im)Possible Encounters, Possible (Mis)Understandings Between The West And Its Other: The Case Of The Maghreb, Tanja Stampfl

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

My work deals with what I call (im)possible encounters, possible (mis)understandings between the West and the Rim of the World (in my case The Maghreb). I focus on writers (such as Paul Bowles, Patricia Highsmith, Edith Wharton, Tayeb Salih, Ahlam Mosteghanemi, Ahdaf Soueif) who stepped across the cultural dividing line to claim a voice of their own; a voice that enabled them to represent and at times misrepresent the host culture they chose to live in, and which acts as a “lieu” and at times “milieu de mémoire.” It is what the late Edward Said aptly called “intertwined histories, overlapping …

Achievement Of Boys And Girls In Single-Gender Kindergarten Classrooms At One Elementary School In Western Michigan, Celeste L. Diehm

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The impact of single gender classrooms on kindergarten students’ acquisition of literacy skills was investigated in this research project. A sample of 144 kindergarten students in one public school district in western Michigan participated in this quasi-experimental, quantitative study during the 2008-09 school year.

The development of reading skills is important for a child’s success throughout his or her educational career and is influenced by many factors. This study explored the impact of the variables of age, developmental readiness, socioeconomic status, family structure, and teacher experience on the acquisition of literacy skills among children in different classroom compositions including all-girls, …

The Evolution Of Eastern Michigan University: The Politics Of Change And Persistence, Dawn Malone Gaymer

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Background: Eastern Michigan University (EMU) is a regional comprehensive university established as a teacher training school in 1849. This case study analyzed the politics of change and persistence as the organization evolved from a normal schools that trained teachers to a regional comprehensive university.

Purpose: This study was pursued to inform higher education leadership; satisfy the personal interests of the researcher and to contribute knowledge to comprehensive university organizational studies.

Research Design: An interpretive longitudal historical case study design was pursed for this research. This case study reviewed the political cultural environment that occurred prior to the organization’s formation and …

Ninth-Grade Interventions And The Impact On High School Graduation Rates, Shannon Mcbrady

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

There is a need to become economically sensible when deciding on new school initiatives and reforms. This is partly due to increasing accountability and tightening school budgets. Hertzog & Morgan (1999) found the freshman year sets the tone for a student‟s entire high school career. Yet, frequently, ninth-graders struggle to feel connected to school and therefore experience failure. Often times this period of failure is related to the developmental process the ninth-grader experiences. Many ninth-graders struggle in various areas including behavioral growth, social pressures, and adjusting to the rigidity of high school (Mizelle & Irvin, 2000). Researchers have found that …

Language, Emotion, And Imagination: Constructing Human Identity Through Hemingway's Work, Gorka Diaz

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This thesis examines how Hemingway’s use of language evokes emotions in his stories and how his particular way of evoking emotions affects readers. Hemingway’s style of providing vivid experiences for readers centers on the image as the dimension where emotions are offered, but also the dimension where the writer’s work converges with the reader’s reception of it. The reader reconstructs the text through the act of signifying emotions. This process of signification is made possible only through the use of the reader’s imagination. The study of the relation between emotion and imagination emphasizes that readers decode fiction as they decode …

The Effect Of Stigma On The Daily Occupations Of Adults With Mental Illness, Kelley Lee

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Influence Of Adult Attachment Styles On Coping With Bereavement, Sarah Wice

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This study explored the associations between adult attachment style, coping style, religious beliefs, and experiences with grief. Participants from local bereavement and religious groups completed questionnaires about these constructs.

Hyp. 1-2 predicted that greater endorsement of Secure and Dismissingly Avoidant attachment styles would be associated with less Subjective Distress. Results partially supported these hypotheses. Hyp. 3-6 predicted that the relationship between a Substitute Attachment Figure and adult attachment style would be associated with religious beliefs. Results did not support these hypotheses. Hyp. 7-9 predicted that greater endorsement of Secure and Dismissingly Avoidant attachment styles would be associated with more problem …

Predicting Child Abuse Potential During Pregnancy, Kylene Krause

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This study examined how mothers' perceptions of their childhood relationships with their mothers, expectations about being a mother, demographic characteristics, and perceptions of social support are related to a woman's child abuse potential during pregnancy. Data were collected during an initial interview with women during their third trimester of pregnancy as part of a larger longitudinal study. One hundred twenty high-risk women between the ages of 18 and 42 were recruited through fliers from public locations and pregnancy-related programs in southeastern Michigan to participate in this study. Results showed that perceptions of a higher quality childhood relationship with one's mother, …

Development And Initial Validation Of The Family Eating And Activity Questionnnaire, Jennette Lea Palcic

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Pediatric overweight is a growing public health concern in the United States. According to the CDC approximately 17% of children are currently obese (Body Mass Index (BMI) ¡Ý 95th percentile) and the percentage of obese children has tripled since the 1970¡¯s. Both eating and physical activity behaviors have been shown to be related to increased rates of obesity; however, there is a lack of assessment tools to measure these behaviors. The purpose of the current study was to develop a psychometrically sound, parent-report measure of family and child behaviors related to obesity in children between 5- and 12- years-old. Item …

Faculty Should Consider Peer Review As A Means Of Improving Students' Scientific Reasoning Skills, Briana Timmerman, Denise Strickland

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

No abstract provided.

The Integrated Biomedical Science Graduate Program At The University Of South Carolina, Richard Hunt

Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science

No abstract provided.

Parents Involved In Community Schools V.Seattle School District No. 1: A Return To A Separate And Unequal Society, Kimberly J. Freedman

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Spirit Of Brown In Parents Involved And Beyond, Shron L. Browne, Elizabeth A. Yi

University of Miami Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Application Of Social Marketing In Reducing Binge Drinking Among Female College Students: An Investigation Of A Third Level College In Cork, Fergus Murphy

Theses

Ireland has one of the highest levels of alcohol consumption in the EU, consuming 10.6 litres of pure alcohol per person in 2003, increasing to 13.4 litres in 2006. This rise in consumption has led to increases in alcohol-related harm and disease, and has resulted in more than 1,775 deaths according to the Health Research Board (Mongan et al., 2007). In general, increases in overall consumption are accompanied by a greater incidence of health and social problems. In addition to the high volume of alcohol consumed by people in Ireland, drinking occasions appear to be strongly related to heavy episodic …

Customer Satisfaction : The Case Study Of A Service Company, Emre Ilkme

Theses

This research was undertaken in Derichebourg Multi services to gain an understanding of customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction and improving the customer service are important as this serves to create loyal customers in the business, since market competition has increased. If a company fails to respond to the customer needs and expectations, the satisfaction will not be provided and so customers will lose loyalty to the company and may eventually change the companies altogether. Thus, the importance of customer satisfaction and related subjects has been highlighted in this research. Satisfaction causes have been identified and the recommendations made to increase the …

The Surplus Woman: Unmarried Women In Imperial Germany, Catherine L. Dollard

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Catalog Denison University 2009-2010

Denison University Catalogs

Denison University Course Catalog 2009-2010

Facial Skin Motion Properties From Video: Modeling And Applications, Vasant Manohar

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Deformable modeling of facial soft tissues have found use in application domains such as human-machine interaction for facial expression recognition. More recently, such modeling techniques have been used for tasks like age estimation and person identification. This dissertation is focused on development of novel image analysis algorithms to follow facial strain patterns observed through video recording of faces in expressions. Specifically, we use the strain pattern extracted from non-rigid facial motion as a simplified and adequate way to characterize the underlying material properties of facial soft tissues. Such an approach has several unique features. Strain pattern instead of the image …

Annotated Legal Bibliography On Gender

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Henkle V. Gregory: A Landmark Struggle Against Student Gay Bashing, Armen H. Merjian

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

No abstract provided.

A Safe Haven For Nixzmary Brown, Chantal L. Hamlin

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

No abstract provided.

Annotated Legal Bibliography On Gender

Cardozo Journal of Equal Rights & Social Justice

No abstract provided.