Digital Commons Network^™

Effectiveness Of Counseling For Anxiety And Depression In Mothers Of Children Ages 0-30 Months By Community Workers In Karachi, Pakistan: A Quasi Experimental Study, Niloufer Sultan Ali, Badar S. Ali, Iqbal Azam Syed, Ali Khan Khuwaja

Department of Family Medicine

Background: The prevalence of anxiety/depression is quite high during the perinatal period but unfortunately its detection and treatment have been less than satisfactory. Moreover, many women are reluctant to take pharmacotherapy for fear of excretion of drugs into their breast milk. This study assesses the effectiveness of counseling from minimally trained community health workers in reducing anxiety/depression, the rate of recurrence and the interval preceding recurrence in women during first two and a half years after childbirth.
Methods: In a quasi-experimental study, community women from two under-privileged communities were trained in data gathering, teaching healthy child-rearing practices, basic counseling skills, …

Designing Thematic Instruction With Authentic Resources: Science And Technology, Brian G. Kennelly

World Languages and Cultures

No abstract provided.

Pitfalls Of Legal Regulation To Improve End-Of-Life Care. The Example Of Artificial Nutrition And Hydration, Jos V.M. Welie Ma, Mmeds, Jd, Ph.D.

Journal of Health Ethics

Biomedical advances nowadays enable physicians to keep patients hovering at the brink of death for many years. These new technologies have evoked challenging ethical dilemmas that test society’s moral resources. But some have been unwilling to patiently search for new moral wisdom, believing a bold stance is required and they are using legal means to achieve their goal. Attempts to legalize physician assisted suicide and euthanasia are one example, and the literature is replete with analyses of these practices. Far less attention has been paid to opposite attempts at legally enforcing life-sustaining medical interventions. In the mid 1990s, a group …

Intelligent Computational Argumentation For Evaluating Performance Scores In Multi-Criteria Decision Making, Xiaoqing Frank Liu, Rubal Wanchoo, Ravi Santosh Arvapally

Computer Science Faculty Research & Creative Works

Multi-Criteria decision making (MCDM), is a discipline aimed at assisting multiple stakeholders in contemplating a decision paradigm in an uncertain environment. the decision analysis to be performed involves numerous alternative positions assessed under varied criterion. a performance score is assigned for each alternative in terms of every criterion, and it represents satisfaction of the criteria by that alternative. in real applications, performance scores are sometimes hard to determine, and they are often subjective. We have developed an intelligent computational argumentation approach for dealing with the problem of uncertainty in resolving the subjective scores. in this approach, an argumentation tree is …

24 Hour Portraits, Lee R. Cowan

Theses and Dissertations

I believe an individual can be profiled by their color preferences, but not indefinitely, for a shorter period of time, a 24-hour period of time. A person's state of mind will change continually based on their experiences. These experiences will affect their perception and preference of color. I developed a model that will map an individual's profile, a portrait, through color. Participants are given a worksheet and a list of terms describing personality traits and states of mind. The worksheet is categorized by event, time of day, duration, impact, and summed term. From midnight to midnight, a 24-hour period, the …

Examining Rater Bias In Elicited Imitation Scoring: Influence Of Rater's L1 And L2 Background To The Ratings, Min Hye Son

Theses and Dissertations

Elicited Imitation (EI), which is a way of assessing language learners' speaking, has been used for years. Furthermore, there have been many studies done showing rater bias (variance in test ratings associated with a specific rater and attributable to the attributes of a test taker) in language assessment. In this project, I evaluated possible rater bias, focusing mostly on bias attributable to raters' and test takers' language backgrounds, as seen in EI ratings. I reviewed literature on test rater bias, participated in a study of language background and rater bias, and produced recommendations for reducing bias in EI administration. Also, …

Redefining Success: Whose Reality Counts?, Asa Massleberg

The Journal of Conventional Weapons Destruction

This article redefines how the mine-action community should measure accountability and effectiveness, suggesting that more thoughtful effort should be taken to measure success. It discusses recent developments in evaluating mine-action activities, examines the increased role of local communities as stakeholders and details the use of Mines Advisory Group’s impact-assessment tool in Sudan.

Ap® French Language, Brian G. Kennelly

World Languages and Cultures

No abstract provided.

Intelligent Time-Aware Query Translation For Text Sources, Amal Kaluarachchi, Aparna S. Varde, Jing Peng, Anna Feldman

Department of Computer Science Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Time-stamped documents such as newswire articles, blog posts and other web-pages are often archived online. Since these archives cover long spans of time, the terminology in them could undergo significant evolution. In answering user queries over such text, it is desirable that the system be intelligent enough to incorporate historical information. For example, a query on Sri Lanka should automatically retrieve documents with its former name Ceylon. Hence, temporal terminology evolution needs to be taken into account to translate these queries. This has become vital today because users expect that computer systems have the intelligence to find all related information …

An Introduction To Major University English Tests And English Language Teaching In China, Caiping Sun

Theses and Dissertations

The purposes of this project were to introduce (1) the four main college level English tests used in the People's Republic of China to expatriate English language educators, researchers, curriculum developers, and program designers; and (2) the college English language teaching situation in China to expatriates and give them information on where and how to apply for teaching positions there. The project produced two products to fulfill these goals. First, a paper titled an introduction to major university English tests in China: Their nature, development and importance is now ready to submit for publication. It is a paper that introduces …

Physicians, Society, And The Science Fiction Genre In The Film Versions Of Invasion Of The Body Snatchers: Or Doctors With A Serious Pod Complex, Brett S. Stifflemire

Theses and Dissertations

Close textual analysis of the four extant film versions of Invasion of the Body Snatchers reveals that each film modifies the original story such that it reflects changing societal attitudes toward physicians and the medical profession, as well as depictions of military and government in the science fiction genre. The changing depictions of characters and events in these films respond to changes in medical history, social history, and the science fiction genre across five decades. Each film reflects the contemporary anxieties of its time and the perceived ability of physicians to relieve those anxieties. Doctors are important semantic elements of …

Dacum And Head Start: Working To Success, Jason Curry

Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development

This article presents the Working to Success (WTS) model as a structured format to help parents and Head Start personnel not only meet the performance indicators of the Head Start Regulations, but also look to other disciplines for creative ideas. The model is based on basic DACUM principles and asserts that these principles can potentially be incorporated into Head Start curricula via the WTS model and could potentially promote family and educational development. Literacy, following directions, organization, teamwork, symbolic thinking, and cognitive, social, and linguistic development are just a few of the potential, not yet proven, benefits for Head Start-aged …

Levinas, Meaning, And Philosophy Of Social Science: From Ethical Metaphysics To Ontology And Epistemology, Samuel David Downs

Theses and Dissertations

The current approach to science for mainstream psychology relies on the philosophical foundation of positivism that cannot account for meaning as humans experience it. Phenomenology provides an alternative scientific approach in which meaning is constituted by acting toward objects in the world that is more consistent with how humans experience meaning. Immanuel Levinas argues that the phenomenological approach, while more consistent with human experience, does not provide a grounding for meaning. Rather, Levinas argues that meaning is grounded in the ethical encounter with the Other, or other person, such that meaning is given by the Other in rupture. For Levinas, …

The Prevalence Of Postpartum Depression In Hispanic Immigrant Women, Nissa Breann Lucero

Theses and Dissertations

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of postpartum depression among Hispanic immigrant women seeking healthcare services at a community health clinic.

Data Sources: Hispanic immigrant women were recruited. Out of 116 study participants, 96 women were in the final sample. Using the Beck PDSS-Spanish version, women were screened for symptoms of postpartum depression.

Conclusions: The prevalence rate of significant symptoms of PPD was 54.2% for the entire sample of 96 women. Nearly 66% of women who screened positive for symptoms of PPD scored above the listed cutoff score for suicidal thoughts. Women were divided into …

Developing Cued Pronunciation Readings For Latter-Day Saint Missionaries Learning English, Holly A. Mueller

Theses and Dissertations

The focus of this project was to develop self-directed pronunciation materials for a specialized group of English as a second language (ESL) learners—missionaries at the Provo Missionary Training Center (MTC) of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A set of six Cued Pronunciation Readings (CPRs) were developed. CPRs are computer-based, self-directed pronunciation materials designed to help students perceive pausing, word stress, and sentence-final intonation in spoken English and practice these features through a sequence of oral reading tasks. The CPRs developed in this project were based on essential missionary communicative tasks and utilized high-frequency gospel vocabulary. These tasks …

The Victory Of Confession: Ashamnu, The Shirah, And Musical Symbolism In Jewish Worship, Jonathan L. Friedmann

Intermountain West Journal of Religious Studies

No abstract provided.

Mythcon 41 - War In Heaven, The Mythopoeic Society

Mythcon Programs

Conference theme - War in Heaven

From the great epic poems of ancient Greece and ancient India to the Book of Revelation and the Poetic Edda; from John Milton and William Blake to J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and Charles Williams; from Philip Pullman to Neil Gaiman and beyond, theomachy (conflict amongst and against the gods) has been a perennial theme in mythology and mythopoeic literature. Moreover, the conference year of 2010 marks our theme with special significance as the 80th anniversary of the publication of Charles Williams's novel War in Heaven. We hope to encourage new conversation on Williams, too …

Locomotor Adaptation Versus Perceptual Adaptation When Stepping Over An Obstacle With A Height Illusion., Christopher K. Rhea, Shirley Rietdyk, Jeffrey M. Haddad

Department of Health and Kinesiology Faculty Publications

Background

During locomotion, vision is used to perceive environmental obstacles that could potentially threaten stability; locomotor action is then modified to avoid these obstacles. Various factors such as lighting and texture can make these environmental obstacles appear larger or smaller than their actual size. It is unclear if gait is adapted based on the actual or perceived height of these environmental obstacles. The purposes of this study were to determine if visually guided action is scaled to visual perception, and to determine if task experience influenced how action is scaled to perception.

Methodology/Principal Findings

Participants judged the height of two …

Empirical Study Of Information Design: Four Experiments, Noel Teresa Alton

Theses and Dissertations

Current design theory sets out many rules and guidelines for designers, but good design is still difficult to replicate. Often the design principles found in the manuals are misapplied, resulting in designs that (1) do not fulfill their purpose and (2) disrupt the clarity of information. This thesis will review and provide experimental data supporting a model of visual form/visual purpose connections based on the semiotic of C.S. Peirce. This model was first used by Amare and Manning (2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009) to evaluate and explain both effective and ineffective visual information design. This thesis will extend their approach, …

An Acoustic And Perceptual Investigation Of Contrastive Stress In Children, Anita Susan Dromey

Theses and Dissertations

Key aspects of prosody have been studied in adults for a number of years; however, less attention has been paid to the acoustic patterns of prosody in children. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to evaluate how a group of 20 pre-adolescent children use prosody to mark contrastive stress compared to a control group of adult speakers. It was of interest to investigate whether the children's use of prosody differed between boys and girls or the part of speech being emphasized. The prosodic patterns of contrastive stress were evaluated in terms of duration, fundamental frequency, and intensity change …

N400 Activations In Adults Who Stutter In A Picture-Word Priming Task Requiring Attention To Probe Word Phonology, Angela A. Pizon-Moore

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Objective: A neuroscientific picture-word task was used to investigate semantic and phonological activation spreading in adults who stutter (AWS).

Method: Fourteen AWS and 14 adults who do not stutter (AWNS) participated. On each trial, a picture was named at a delay. Sometimes, an attended probe word was heard before naming. Some probes were Semantically-Related to the labels. Those same probes also appeared following pictures with Unrelated labels. N400 ERPs recorded to these two probe types were compared (Semantically-Related versus Unrelated). Other probes were Phonologically-Related to the labels. Those same probes also appeared following pictures with unrelated labels (P-Unrelated). N400 ERPs …

Literacy And Behavior In Early Childhood: Exploring The Factors That Impact Achievement, Melissa Farino Todd

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Academic achievement has been the focal point in education for decades. In 2001, an Act of Congress was proposed to improve individual outcomes in education through evidenced based research using measurable goals, higher standards, and accountability. This federal legislation, known as the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, mandates that all teachers be highly qualified by 2006 and that all students become proficient by the 2013/14 school year, specifically in the area of literacy. Consequently, kindergarten readiness has become an area of concern, thus placing preschool teachers under pressure to prepare children for school. The purpose of this study …

Characterization: A Content Analysis Of Pulitzer-Awarded And Traditional Features, Linda Janet Tobler

Theses and Dissertations

Characterization in Pulitzer-awarded features and traditional features was measured using a characterization typology developed by the author. Although some of the results were statistically constrained by a small n, those results which were statistically significant reflect that what separates Pulitzer-winning features from regular features are those elements of characterization particular to scene: a character's distinctive physical characteristics, clothing and possessions; the setting and environment as it defines a character; a physical description of character that is not lineament nor habitual posture or expression but bodily appearance in the immediate moment; a character's movements and actions, facial expressions, words, and …

The Effects Of Client Therapist Racial And Ethnic Matching: A Meta Analytic Review Of Empirical Research, Raquel Cabral Bowman

Theses and Dissertations

In a widely cited 2003 report, the U.S. Surgeon General criticized mental health and social services within the United States for failing to adequately serve the needs of clients of color. The report highlighted the fact that therapists often do not adequately account for cultural variables in their evaluations or interventions. Clients of color are rarely seen by therapists who adequately understand their cultural values and backgrounds. To address this discrepancy, researchers have explored a variety of therapy process and outcome variables across clients seen by therapists of their same race vs. another race (often called "ethnic matching"). Over 200 …

A Curriculum For General Academic Preparation, Teresa Ann Martin

Theses and Dissertations

The curriculum at the English Language Center (ELC) at Brigham Young University (BYU) currently has two programs: Foundations and Academic. In order for students to progress from Foundations to the Academic Program, they must pass their Level Achievement Tests (LATs), which are administered as final exams. Each semester there are students who do not pass their LATs. The question then is what should happen to these students? Should they be asked to leave the ELC, should they have to repeat the same level until they pass, or should they be promoted without passing their LATs? This project presents an alternative …

Evaluating The Usefulness Of An Aural Gapped Listening Summary As A Measure Of Academic Listening Proficiency, Sarah Elizabeth Mottaghinejad

Theses and Dissertations

For this project I sought to find a more effective means of evaluating academic listening comprehension. This involved doing an in-depth investigation of academic listening, the constructs involved in listening comprehension, and of methods of assessing listening comprehension. It also included a study of the concept of test usefulness (Bachman and Palmer, 1996), which consists of reliability, construct validity, authenticity, interactiveness, impact, and practicality, and is used to help select the most effective methods of assessing language abilities. Based on my review of listening comprehension testing methods, I created a method of assessing academic listening comprehension, Aural Gapped Listening Summaries …

An Evaluation Of The Learning Outcomes And The Curricular Organization Of The Brigham Young University Undergraduate Tesol Internship Course, Marisa Irene Ontiveros

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents two research problems regarding the evaluation of the learning outcomes and the curricular organization of the TESOL minor internship course at Brigham Young University. First, the course learning outcomes have not been revisited after their initial design which demands the need for assessment. Additionally, the current curricular organization of the course does not allow for all learning outcomes to apply to students enrolled in the course, as some of the students do their internships internationally which prevents them from participating in the sessions held locally during their internship. In an effort to find solutions to these two …

Utilizing Human-Computer Interactions To Improve Text Annotation, Marc A. Carmen

Theses and Dissertations

The need for annotated corpora in a variety of different types of research grows constantly. Unfortunately creating annotated corpora is frequently cost-prohibitive due the number of person-hours required to create the corpus. This project investigates one solution that helps to reduce the cost of creating annotated corpora through the use of a new user interface which includes a specially built framework and component for annotating part-of-speech information and the implementation of a dictionary. This project reports on a user study performed to determine the effect of dictionaries with different levels of coverage on a part-of-speech annotation task. Based on a …

Whole Set Of Volume 1 No 2 (2010) Of Comparative Philosophy, Comparative Philosophy

Comparative Philosophy

No abstract provided.

A Probabilistic Morphological Analyzer For Syriac, Peter J. Mcclanahan

Theses and Dissertations

We show that a carefully crafted probabilistic morphological analyzer significantly outperforms a reasonable, naive baseline for Syriac. Syriac is an under-resourced Semitic language for which there are no available language tools such as morphological analyzers. Such tools are widely used to contribute to the process of annotating morphologically complex languages. We introduce and connect novel data-driven models for segmentation, dictionary linkage, and morphological tagging in a joint pipeline to create a probabilistic morphological analyzer requiring only labeled data. We explore the performance of this model with varying amounts of training data and find that with about 34,500 tokens, it can …