Digital Commons Network^™

Re-Evaluating California’S Greenhouse Gas Emission Law: Is It Rational Under The Current Economic Situation?, Hassan Algadi

Theses

This research evaluates the impact of the economic recession on the California Air Resource Board (CARB) strategy for reducing current greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from motor vehicles. The principle potential contribution of this work is that it evaluated whether the rationale behind the CARB strategy is or is not valid under the current, unanticipated economic recession.

Regulating Collaborative Law Ucla: The Uniform Collaborative Law Act Takes Shape, Andrew Schepard, David A. Hoffman

Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Book Review: What's Left? A Review Of International Law On The Left: Re-Examining Marxist Legacies By Susan Marks, Barbara Stark

Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship

In response to the American invasion of Iraq, a group of prominent European legal scholars convened a symposium to explore the causes of the “material economic woes of international society.” A revised and expanded version of that Symposium, including five new essays, was published by Cambridge, International Law on the Left: Re-examining the Marxist Legacies (Susan Marks, ed. 2008).

In What’s Left? I review the provocative, scholarly, and occasionally electrifying essays in this volume in two parts, each addressing a version of the question, “What’s Left?” Part I asks, “What‘s ‘Left?” That is, is there a coherent Left in international …

Circuit Breakers And The Mission Of Stock Market Stability, J. Scott Colesanti

Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship

Between the morning of October 19, 1987 and the closing bell of October 20, 1987, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 25%. Shunning the drastic remedy of closing the markets (akin to FDR’s “bank holiday” of March 1933), the regulatory response ultimately took the form of ‘circuit breakers,’ crudely fashioned, limited trading halts that some critics described as “throwing sand in the gears.”

The calibration of the decline prompting a trading halt remained constant from the time of the implementation of the circuit breaker in April 1989 until April 1998. At that time, the trigger point was changed from an …

The Parthenon, "U And Mu" Edition, 2010, Marshall University

The Parthenon

No abstract provided.

Investigation And Modeling Of Viscoelastic Moduli For Multilayered Polymeric Systems Using High Frequency Ultrasonic Waves, Todd Mathew Fernandez

Theses

Mechanical characterization of both the bulk and individual layer properties of layered polymer stacks provides important information for their use in novel applications. A single technique to measure both the bulk and layer properties is atempted. Ultrasonic testing provides an opportunity to determine the mechanical characteristics for layered samples in the form of the complex mechanical moduli. These moduli express the viscoelastic properties of the materials. Using ultrasound, this can be done for the bulk and the layers in a single test. With ultrasound, the ability to determine the complex moduli in single layers has been demonstrated. The moduli were …

Evolutionary Spectral Co-Clustering, Nathan S. Green

Theses

The field of mining evolving data is relatively new and evolutionary clustering is among the latest in this trend. Presently, there are algorithms for evolutionary k-means, agglomerative hierarchical, and spectral clustering. These have been excellent in showing the advantages of using evolving data snapshots for better clustering results. From these algorithms the key portion of the conversion from static data handling to evolving data handling has been the addition of the historical cost function. The cost function is what determines whether or not instances should be moved from one cluster to the next between time-steps based on the historical cuts …

Developing A Taxonomy For Office Email: A Case Study, Larry Conrow

Theses

Email is the most successful computer application invented yet. As email communication continues to thrive professionals are running into similar problems time and time again. Email overload has been estimated to be costing a loss of productivity in the U.S. of millions or even billions of dollars due to time spent reading, organizing and saving emails. As stated in New York Times in 2007 by Steve Lohr, "$650 billion figure is an estimate of the cost of unnecessary interruptions in terms of lost productivity and innovation". These interruptions which add to the information overload problems is a total of several …

The Relationships Between Obesity, Obstructive Sleep Apnea And Commercial Motor Vehicle Operator Performance, Jennifer Ann O'Neil

Theses

Obesity and Obstructive Sleep Apnea will impair Commercial Motor Vehicle operator performance. Obesity will increase the risk of developing serious medical conditions that may cause harm to human health and wellbeing. One condition that can be associated with obesity is known as Obstructive Sleep Apnea. Various symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea will impair a commercial motor vehicle operator's ability to safely maneuver a vehicle. Many commercial motor vehicle collisions have been caused by operator fatigue and have resulted in serious injury and death. Due to unhealthy lifestyles, commercial motor vehicle operators are at a high risk of being obese. Obesity …

The Development Of A Model Program For The Effective Management Of Biomedical Waste In The Caribbean. A Review Of Barriers Within Public Hospitals In The Caribbean., Andrea Spence

Theses

When biomedical waste is improperly managed it poses a health hazard and risk to healthcare workers, sanitation workers and the general public in contracting infectious/dangerous diseases. Biomedical waste is also generated from individuals in their homes from the use of syringes or diagnostic lancets that are not properly managed. Biomedical waste is considered special waste and has a health and environmental hazard that can result in infections and diseases such as HIV/AIDs. Discarded sharps pose a health risk to the public particularly solid waste workers who may suffer a needle stick injury if they are not properly packaged for disposal. …

From Medical Images To Individualized Cardiac Mechanics: A Physiome Approach, Chun Wong

Theses

Cardiac mechanics is a branch of science that deals with forces, kinematics, and material properties of the heart, which is valuable for clinical applications and physiological studies. Although anatomical and biomechanical experiments are necessary to provide the fundamental knowledge of cardiac mechanics, the invasive nature of the procedures limits their further applicability. In consequence, noninvasive alternatives are required, and cardiac images provide an excellent source of subject-specific and in vivo information. Noninvasive and individualized cardiac mechanical studies can be achieved through coupling general physiological models derived from invasive experiments with subject-specific information extracted from medical images. Nevertheless, as data extracted …

Evaluation Of Rumble Stripes, Kenneth R. Agent

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

Lane departure has been shown to be a major cause of serious traffic crashes. Installing a rumble strip on the shoulders of two lane roads provide drivers with an audible warning that they are leaving their lane of travel. Painting the edge line on the rumble strip has the possible benefit of providing more wet, nighttime delineation through the portion of the edge line painted on the sloped portion of the groove. The objectives of this study were to: a) monitor the initial installations of rumble stripes and b) evaluate the results of rumble stripe installations.

Ten rural, two-lane road …

Sources Of Entrepreneurial Discretion In Kinship Systems, Alex Stewart

Management Faculty Research and Publications

Entrepreneurs may wish to be selective about which relatives to include or exclude in their businesses. For example, their child might be inept but their niece might be outstanding. What aspects of kinship systems affect their ability to make these sorts of choices? What enables them to bend their ties of kinship and marriage to the interests of their business? Most broadly, what dimensions of kinship lend themselves to tactical or instrumental actions? This question is sweeping just as my meaning of “entrepreneurs” is very broad: those who take actions with the goal of growing their capital (Stewart, 1991). This …

Skeptical About Family Business: Advancing The Field Of Family Business In Its Scholarship, Relevance, And Academic Role, Alex Stewart

Management Faculty Research and Publications

Less polemical authors have published useful overviews of scholarship and institutional development in family business (Chrisman, Kellermanns, Chan, & Liano, 2010; Heck, Hoy, Poutziouris, & Steier, 2008; Schulze & Gedajlovic, 2010; Sharma, 2004). I take this as license for hyperbole. In such a vein, I am skeptical eight times over: that the field can be objective, that it can be defined, that “family business” is the right label, that it will find useful theories, that kinship exists, that if it does exist (all right, I do believe it does) we really observe it in action, that the field can progress …

The Relationship Between The Wechsler Intelligence Scale For Children-Fourth Edition And The Woodcock-Johnson Iii Tests Of Cognitive Abilities In A Clinically Referred Pediatric Population, Lindsay Anne Shaw

Theses and Dissertations

This research involves an investigation of the construct validity of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-; Fourth Edition (WISC-IV) when compared to the Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Cognitive Abilities (WJ III COG) to provide evidence for the utility of using the WISC-IV in assessing cognitive abilities according to the Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) theory. The study was conducted using archival data consisting of 92 children and adolescents between the ages of 6 years and 16 years, 11 months referred for a comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation at a university-affiliated assessment center. Data for all participants were collected following administration of a battery of measures …

An Experimental Study Of Executive Decision-Making With Implications For Decision Support, Terence T. Ow, James G. Morris

Management Faculty Research and Publications

Past research in the field of information systems has explored factors and conditions that are relevant to decision-making in many contexts. However, very little is known about how executives consider, weigh, and integrate these factors. One current school of thought holds that intuition and instincts can play a significant role and that when decision-makers use their instincts, they rely on only a relatively small subset of the cues available to them. This has implications for designing and improving decision support systems, which form a major and widespread element of modern organizational computing. We examine the decision-making policies of professional decision-makers. …

Attributional Style, Presenting Symptoms, And Readiness To Change In Female Childhood Sexual Abuse Survivors, Eric Ford Kebker

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of the effect that attribution style and presenting symptoms has on the self-reported readiness to change of female survivors of childhood sexual abuse. The aim was to demonstrate that the stages of change are a useful concept in understanding how to approach treatment with female child sexual abuse survivors seeking psychotherapy.

One factor that influences the effectiveness of psychotherapy is a client's degree of motivation. The concept of "stage of change" has been used as a measure of client motivation. Stage of change consists of four basic stages; precontemplative, …

An Investigation Of Factors That Affect Hipaa Security Compliance In Academic Medical Centers, James William Brady

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

HIPAA security compliance in academic medical centers is a central concern of researchers, academicians, and practitioners. Increased numbers of data security breaches and information technology implementations have caused concern over the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of electronic personal health information. The federal government has implemented stringent HIPAA security compliance reviews and significantly extended the scope and enforcement of the HIPAA Security Rule. However, academic medical centers have shown limited compliance with the HIPAA Security Rule. Therefore, the goal of this study was to investigate the factors that may affect HIPAA security compliance in academic medical centers. Based on a review …

An Investigation Of Multiple Integration Techniques For Information Systems: A Model For Integrating Data Warehousing, Erp, And Soa In Practice, Jessie Burns

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

This study addressed issues associated with implementing multiple data integrators. The process included implementing the same data integrator multiple times or implementing multiple different data integrators. It was shown that single data integrators implementations were failing at high rates. Environments were complicated because there were more acquisitions and mergers now than in the past, companies were required to be competitive while implementations were taking place, and possibly had short implementation time frames.

The main goal of this study was to develop an agile, sturdy, and rigorous model that addressed the needs of companies that found themselves in situations where they …

Ascertaining The Relationship Between Security Awareness And The Security Behavior Of Individuals, Gordon J. Grant

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

Security threats caused by the inappropriate actions of the user continue to be a significant security problem within any organization. The purpose of this study was to continue the efforts of Katz by assessing the security behavior and practices of working professionals. Katz conducted a study that assessed whether the faculty and staff at Armstrong Atlantic State University had been performing the simple everyday practices and behavior necessary to avert insider threats to information security. Critical in understanding human behavior is in knowing how behavior varies across different groups or demographics. Because a user's behavior can be influenced by demographic …

Judges' Awareness, Understanding, And Application Of Digital Evidence, Gary Craig Kessler

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

As digital evidence grows in both volume and importance in criminal and civil courts, judges need to fairly and justly evaluate the merits of the offered evidence. To do so, judges need a general understanding of the underlying technologies and applications from which digital evidence is derived. Due to the relative newness of the computer forensics field, there have been few studies on the use of digital forensic evidence and none about judges' relationship with digital evidence.

This study addressed judges' awareness, knowledge, and perceptions of digital evidence, using grounded theory methods. The interaction of judges with digital evidence has …

Early Detection Of Online Auction Opportunistic Sellers Through The Use Of Negative-Positive Feedback, Gregory J. Reinert

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

Apparently fraud is a growth industry. The monetary losses from Internet fraud have increased every year since first officially reported by the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) in 2000. Prior research studies and third-party reports of fraud show rates substantially higher than eBay’s reported negative feedback rate of less than 1%. The conclusion is most buyers are withholding reports of negative feedback.

Researchers Nikitov and Stone in a forensic case study of a single opportunistic eBay seller found buyers sometimes embedded negative comments in positive feedback as a means of avoiding retaliation from sellers and damage to their reputation. This …

Assistive Technology Attrition: Identifying Why Teachers Abandon Assistive Technologies, Michael Edward Sharpe

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

The study surveyed a sample of K-12 teachers who had used assistive technology (AT) in the classroom to determine answers to five research questions. These were, (1) why the teachers adopted AT, (2) their attitudes and perceptions about its value, (3) challenges they have experienced in adopting AT, (4) whether they have discontinued or decreased use of AT, and, if so, (5) the factors that led to this result.

The study used both quantitative and qualitative methods. For the quantitative aspect, an online survey instrument was developed to answer five research questions. Participants were teachers who had used AT in …

Trust And Trustworthiness: A Framework For Successful Design Of Telemedicine, James Robert Templeton

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

Trust and its antecedents have been demonstrated as a barrier to the successful adoption of numerous fields of technology, most notably e-commerce, and may be a key factor in the lack of adoption or adaptation in the field of telemedicine. In the medical arena, trust is often formed through the relationships cultivated over time via clinician and patient. Trust and interpersonal relationships may also play a significant role in the adoption of telemedicine. The idea of telemedicine has been explored for nearly 30 years in one form or another. Yet, despite grandiose promises of how it will someday significantly improve …

An Analysis Of The Radio Frequency Identification (Rfid) Technology Implementation Within An Independent Public Library System: A Case Study Of The North Canton, Ohio Public Library, Keith P. Lyons

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

An Analysis of the Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) Technology Implementation within an Independent Public Library System:

A Case Study of the North Canton, Ohio Public Library

by

Keith P. Lyons

June 2010

Public libraries require efficient control systems to maintain accurate inventories, statistics, and records of patron borrowing. Generally, public libraries use barcode technology to accomplish these tasks. Radio frequency identification (RFID) has gained the attention of public library personnel in recent years as a replacement for barcodes. RFID implementation contributes to improved staff productivity, increased operational efficiency, and improved item security as well. While potential benefits are significant, issues …

Developing A Framework For Evaluation Of Corporate Non-Transactional Business-To-Consumer Web Sites: A Descriptive Study, Karen Denise Pate

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

During the soaring information economy of the last decade, organizations spent large sums of money on the development of Web sites without much knowledge of their performance value. In time, organizations realized that measuring Web site performance to determine value was fundamental. For transactional, e-commerce Business-to-Consumer (B2C) Web sites, this effort is straightforward because value is attached to sales. Measuring performance to determine the value of non-transactional B2C Web sites (i.e., sites that provide information, not sales) is more complex.

This study examined the underexplored subject of evaluating non-transactional Web sites. Performance was defined as outcomes ranging from site visitor …

Physician Information Seeking Behaviors: Are Physicians Successful Searchers?, Janice Swiatek-Kelley

CCAC Theses and Dissertations

In the recent past, physicians found answers to questions by consulting colleagues, textbooks, and professional journals. Now, the availability of medical information through electronic resources has changed physician information-seeking behaviors. Evidence-based medicine is now the accepted decision-making paradigm, and a physician's ability to locate best practice guidelines through electronic information resources has become an essential skill. As physicians struggle to stay current in the wake of an ever-growing volume of medical information, several electronic resources claim to provide one-stop access to the most current information with correct and complete answers to problems encountered in the practice of health care. The …

Information Theoretic Approach For Assessing Image Fidelity In Photon-Counting Arrays, Srikanth R. Narravula, Majeed M. Hayat, Bahram Javidi

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

The method of photon-counting integral imaging has been introduced recently for three-dimensional object sensing, visualization, recognition and classification of scenes under photon-starved conditions. This paper presents an information-theoretic model for the photon-counting imaging (PCI) method, thereby providing a rigorous foundation for the merits of PCI in terms of image fidelity. This, in turn, can facilitate our understanding of the demonstrated success of photon-counting integral imaging in compressive imaging and classification. The mutual information between the source and photon-counted images is derived in a Markov random field setting and normalized by the source-image’s entropy, yielding a fidelity metric that is between …