Digital Commons Network^™

Neurosteriod Enhancement Of Glutamatergic Transmission Via Transient Receptor Potential Melastatin 3 Chanels In The Developing Cerebellum, Paula Andrea Zamudio-Bulcock

Biomedical Sciences ETDs

Neurosteroids are compounds synthesized de novo within the central nervous system and affect brain function via genomic and non-genomic mechanisms. Sulfated neurosteroids modulate synaptic neurotransmission via interactions with various membrane receptors located at pre- and/ or postsynaptic sites, including metabotropic and ionotropic neurotransmitter receptors and ion permeable channels. The interactions of sulfated neurosteroids with these types of targets can induce rapid changes in neurotransmitter release and/or in postsynaptic responses. Since the 1940's, pregnenolone sulfate (PregS), the sulfated version of the steroid precursor, pregnenolone, has been suggested to have anti-stress, anti-aging, antidepressive, neuroprotective and memory enhancing effects in the mature brain. …

Theoretical And Empirical Guidance For A Chunk Valuation Mechanism In Act-R, Ion Juvina, Alessandro Oltamari, Christian Lebiere

Psychology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

La Construcción Social Del Español En La Diglosia Educativa De California, Nicole Siminski

World Languages and Cultures

This project attempts to deconstruct the position of the Spanish language in society while observing its effects on Spanish speaking students in the education system. An extensive look at the history of bilingual education in California reveals its portrayal in society as well as how it is implemented in the school systems. I will study the reaction of both native English speaking children and native Spanish speaking children to learning a second language in a dual immersion setting. Dual Immersion programs are popular for English speaking families but Spanish speaking families are often hesitant to participate. Due to social class …

Wisconsin's Antitrust Law: Outsourcing The Legal Standard, Michael P. Waxman

Marquette Law Review

Since its first commentary about the Wisconsin Antitrust Act (Pulp Wood Co. v. Green Bay Paper & Fiber Co., 157 Wis. 604, 147 N.W. 1058 ((1914)) the Supreme Court of Wisconsin has regularly reiterated its policy that interpretations of the Act must follow absolutely “federal [antitrust] decisions.” This policy is driven neither by federal preemption nor by state legislative enactment or pronouncement. The Supreme Court of Wisconsin’s commentaries on this policy for almost a century since the Pulp Wood decision have provided very little counsel to state courts much less businesspersons and their legal advisors. Indeed, one may still reasonably …

Mcquade Messenger- Summer 2011, Merrimack College

McQuade Messenger

Triannual newsletter outlining the activities, events, hours, features, and resources available at McQuade Library. Summer 2011, 4 pages.

Ceramic Resource Selection And Social Violence In The Gallina Area Of The American Southwest, Connie Irene Constan

Anthropology ETDs

This dissertation examines the relationship between social violence and ceramic resource procurement. Do people in middle-range societies alter resource use in response to conflict? Specifically, does social strife influence the distance to which potters in middle-range societies will travel to collect ceramic resources? Distance and quality are primary elements in clay selection. Clay is heavy, so for many potters distance is the determining factor in clay selection (Arnold 1985, 2000). Arnold (1985, 2000) estimated procurement thresholds using worldwide ethnographic data from 111 traditional societies. He found that for both clays and tempers, people prefer to travel only one kilometer, but …

The Evolutionary Ecology Of Human Infancy, Amanda Veile

Anthropology ETDs

Infancy is a time of profound energetic trade-offs, and in many South American native groups, infant growth is stunted and mortality by infectious disease is high. The goal of this dissertation was to explore the nature of human infancy from a life history theoretical perspective. Specifically, I investigated infant growth, feeding patterns, and thymic development in two South American native populations, the Tsimane of Bolivia and the Pumé of Venezuela. This broad goal is addressed through four specific goals: 1) to model the weaning transition using behavioral data collected in Tsimane communities where infants experience varying mortality rates, 2) to …

Undocumented, Unapologetic, And Unafraid: Discursive Strategies Of The Immigrant Youth Dream Social Movement, Claudia Alejandra Anguiano

Communication ETDs

This project centers on the advocacy of undocumented immigrant youth to realize the passage of the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, a narrowly tailored bipartisan legislation that would provide qualifying undocumented youth a pathway to citizenship. Using a Latino/a Critical Race framework to address socio-political discourses surrounding the immigration debate, my analysis presents the ways undocumented youth communicated about their identity and agency and the ways they constructed their demands publicly in seeking passage of the DREAM Act during the years 2001 to 2010. This research purposefully departs from the traditional modality of research and conceptualizes …

Constructing The "At-Risk" Student In Education: A Sociopolitical Analysis From 1960-2009, Rebecca Beals

Sociology ETDs

In this thesis, I examine the changing conceptualization of what is called the at-risk' or disadvantaged student from 1960-2009. Using components of theory on education as an institution, the construction of knowledge, and racial formation theory, I specifically argue that research reviews and federal policy serve as sites where these core concepts in educational discourse and policy continually go through a process of rearticulation and legitimation. I use one journal, the Review of Educational Research, to examine this relationship over 50 years, from 1960-2009. I use a quantitative content analysis of research abstracts to explore 1.) how the concept of …

Ibn Arabshah: The Unacknowledged Debt Of Christopher Marlowe’S Tamburlaine, Ahlam M. Alruwaili

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis suggests strong relations between Marlowe’s Tamburlaine I & II and Ibn Arabshah’s 1436 account of Tamerlane’s Life (‘Ajaib al-maqdur fi nawa’ib Timur: The Wonders of Destiny Concerning the Calamities Wrought by Tamerlane), clarifies controversial issues, and explains previously baffling allusions editors have pondered long. In general, the thesis enriches our understanding of Marlowe's wide ranging sources, im­plies a critique of western-biased source scholarship, and opens possibilities to re-evaluate eastern contributions to the Renaissance in general. The first chapter high­lights some well-recognized events in the play and in historical sources (the caging of Bayazid and ill-treatment of his …

The Effect Of Improvisations And Observations On Standardized Patient Encounters, Subjective Workload And Stress, Elizabeth T. Newlin-Canzone

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Standardized patients (SPs) are people trained to present a medical case for teaching and assessing medical students and they simultaneously perform several demanding tasks including portraying the patient, assessing the learner, and providing feedback. This study investigated the effect of improvisations and multiple task performance on the ability to observe another's nonverbal (NV) behaviors and rate their communication skills. Subjective reports of mental workload and stress were also obtained. The first study involved undergraduates interviewing for a job. Type of interview (rote and improvisational) and type of observation (passive and active) were manipulated within groups. Based on theories of attention …

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender And Questioning Students: A Qualitative Study Of The Perceived Effects Of Bullying In Schools, Brandy Kelly Richeson

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

Bullying research frequently focuses on incidence and prevalence of bullying in schools, often failing to provide detailed accounts of the experiences and perceived impact of harassment and abuse (Poteat et al., 2009) on victimized lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ) students. Further, these studies tend to have small samples of racial and ethnic participants and they fail to address victimization in individuals with multiple oppressed identities (D'Augelli et al., 2002; Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network [GLSEN], 2009). Utilizing a consensual qualitative research (CQR) design, the purpose of this study was to examine the victimization experiences and coping mechanisms utilized …

Social Networks, Language Acquisition, And Time On Task While Studying Abroad, Rebecca Ann Hillstrom

Theses and Dissertations

This study was designed to collect and evaluate the social networks of 32 study abroad students participating in the 2009 BYU study abroad program in Amman, Jordan. Survey data, language journals, and test scores were analyzed to determine how they successfully built social networks with native speakers, the relationship between students' social networks and time spent using Arabic outside of class, and the relationship between students' social networks and their acquisition of Arabic. The experiment provided a number of insights into how study abroad students meet potential conversation partners, select which relationships to pursue, and develop relationships in order to …

Speaking Rate Effects On Normal Aspects Of Articulation: Outcomes And Issues, Jeffrey J. Berry

Speech Pathology and Audiology Faculty Research and Publications

The articulatory effects of speaking rate have been a point of focus for a substantial literature in speech science. The normal aspects of speaking rate variation have influenced theories and models of speech production and perception in the literature pertaining to both normal and disordered speech. While the body of literature pertaining to the articulatory effects of speaking rate change is reasonably large, few speaker-general outcomes have emerged. The purpose of this paper is to review outcomes of the existing literature and address problems related to the study of speaking rate that may be germane to the recurring theme that …

Learning Author’S Writing Pattern System By Automata, Qun Yu

Master's Projects

The purpose of the report is to document our project’s theory, implementation and test results. The project works on an automata-based learning system which models authors’ writing characters with automatons. Since there were pervious works done by Dr. T.Y. Lin and Ms. S.X. Zhang, we continue on ALERGIA algorithm analysis and initial common pattern study in this project. Although every author has his/her own writing style, such as sentence length and word frequency etc, there are always some similarities in writing style. We hypothesize that common strings fogged the expected test result, just like the noise in radio wave. This …

The New Chicana Heroine: Representations Of Anzaldua's Mestiza Consciousness In Chicana Feminist Cultural Productions, Monica E. Montelongo

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

This thesis analyzes Gloria Anzaldúa‟s mestiza consciousness as a representation seen thematically in Chicana feminist cultural productions. Mestiza consciousness, defined in Anzaldúa‟s Borderlands/La Frontera, is a non-binary feminist ideology, which proposes a third space in female identity, explored in terms of gender, class, race, and sexuality identification. The representation of mestiza consciousness in Chicana feminist cultural productions is proposed as a new trope in Chicana\o cultural studies, which I term the “New Chicana Heroine.” The New Chicana Heroine is both a proposal and representation of a third space in female identity. An examination of several authors, artists, and filmmakers, spanning …

Immigration Discourses In The U.S. And In Japan, Chie Torigoe

Communication ETDs

The primary purpose of this study was to investigate how systems of racial inequality and dominance produced at macro-institutional level discourses are reproduced and/or challenged in micro-interpersonal everyday discourses regarding immigration/foreign workers in the U.S. and in Japan. To establish a link between the discourses at these two levels, I employed a combination of critical and interpretive theoretical perspectives, and analyzed how racial ideologies were reproduced and/or challenged through participants' use of various interpretative repertoires (i.e., discursive themes and specific rhetorical moves therein) and positioning of self and Others. Interpretative repertoires and discursive positioning of self and Others are major …

The Elusive End Of The Rainbow: A (Queer) Rhetorical Analysis Of Rainbow Sash Rhetoric, Kenneth Lythgoe

Communication ETDs

Rainbow Sash Catholicism refers to several LGBT Catholic groups practice of wearing rainbow sashes to Pentecost Mass to denote their opposition to the Roman Catholic Church's stance on non-normative gender and sexuality. Utilizing ideological rhetorical criticism, this study analyzed the act of sash wearing itself along with multiple publicly-available articles, letters, and other rhetorical artifacts generated about sash wearing. The rhetorical artifacts examined were generated by multiple parties to sash wearing: (1) sash wearers themselves, (2) members of the Catholic clergy, and (3) lay Catholics who do not wear the rainbow sash. The principal purpose of this study was to …

Revisting William Tyndale, Father Of The English Bible, Ray L. Huntington, Jeffrey Marsh

Religious Educator: Perspectives on the Restored Gospel

No abstract provided.

The King James Bible In America: Pilgrim, Prophet, President, Preacher, John S. Tanner

BYU Studies

John S. Tanner, BYU academic vice president (2004-2011), says the influence the King James Bible on American culture and history is like the air we breathe. This paper, given in 2011 at Oxford University, illustrates this influence by examining the central role the King James Bible played in the lives of a Pilgrim, John Winthrop; a prophet, Joseph Smith; a president, Abraham Lincoln; and a preacher, Martin Luther King Jr. Puritan leader John Winthrop's famous 1630 speech compared the Pilgrims bound for the Massachusetts Bay Colony to ancient Israel, as both sought a covenant with God in a promised land. …

Breaking The Criminogenic Code: A Frame Analysis Of Neo-Nazi And Violent Jihadi Propaganda, William Travis Morris

Student Work

This dissertation focuses on neo-Nazi and violent jihadi propaganda and its role in defining social boundaries. Frame analysis was used to gain a deeper understanding of how neo-Nazis and violent jihadis construct propaganda to neutralize objections and promote drift. Specifically, diagnostic and prognostic frames were analyzed for 10 "effective" propagandists and two "ineffective" propagandists in a comparative framework. This research uses a social psychological perspective, paying particular attention to the emotion of shame and advances the "violence as communication" model into "terrorism as criminogenic propaganda." Qualitative and quantitative methods were used to analyze how neo-Nazi and violent jihadi propagandists incorporate …

Then, Now, And Al, Nicholas Wolterstorff

Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers

No abstract provided.

A Herzbergian Look At Academic Librarians And Job Satisfaction, Alan Bernstein

Georgia Library Quarterly

Job satisfaction plays a vitally important role in any employee’s success in a profession. This paper presents results and analysis of a study involving job satisfaction among University System of Georgia academic librarians relative to organizational classification status. One interesting conclusion induced from the research was confirmation of Frederick Herzberg’s motivation-hygiene theory.

Oral History And “Girls’ Voices”: The Young Women’S Studies Club As A Site Of Empowerment, Susan Cayleff, Melissann Herron, Chelsea Cormier, Sarah Wheeler, Alicia Chávez-Arteaga, Jessica Spain, Cristina Dominguez

Journal of International Women's Studies

Girls’ Voices is a collaborative research project involving multi-tiered community-and university-based mentorship and a Young Women’s Studies Club (YWSC) at Hoover High School in San Diego, California. Since its inception 15 years ago, the Club meets weekly and engages in activities that address the life circumstances and coming-of-age issues faced by its membership. Thirty-five to 45 students (95% female) attend weekly. They are a widely diverse population: new immigrants from various parts of the globe, and mostly lower-socioeconomic status Southern Californians of color (Mexican, Asian, and African-American). English is not the first language for several of the members.

Girls’ Voices …

Vocabulary Acquisition In Bilingual Children: Are They More Delayed In English Than Their Monolingual Peers? Does This Depend On Input Of Language?, Naomi Kilgore

The Plymouth Student Scientist

The current study investigated the effect of exposure to English on bilingual language acquisition. 18 monolingual and 6 bilingual children, aged between 29 -32 months, took part in standardised language tests measuring productive and comprehensive vocabulary. Although previous research has investigated this, not all variables known to affect vocabulary development have been controlled for. This study controlled for socio-economic status, birth order and different levels of exposure to English and compared these to test scores. Results suggest exposure is a significant predictor of productive (p = .01) and comprehensive (p < .01) language development. A greater difference was found between groups for production (p < .01) supporting previous research suggesting production may be more problematic than comprehension for bilingual children.

Unsupervised Information Extraction With Distributional Prior Knowledge, Cane Wing-Ki Leung, Jing Jiang, Kian Ming A. Chai, Hai Leong Chieu, Loo-Nin Teow

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We address the task of automatic discovery of information extraction template from a given text collection. Our approach clusters candidate slot fillers to identify meaningful template slots. We propose a generative model that incorporates distributional prior knowledge to help distribute candidates in a document into appropriate slots. Empirical results suggest that the proposed prior can bring substantial improvements to our task as compared to a K-means baseline and a Gaussian mixture model baseline. Specifically, the proposed prior has shown to be effective when coupled with discriminative features of the candidates.

Early Childhood Bilingualism Leads To Advances In Executive Attention: Dissociating Culture And Language, Sujin Yang, Hwajin Yang, Barbara Lust

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This study investigated whether early especially efficient utilization of executive functioning in young bilinguals would transcend potential cultural benefits. To dissociate potential cultural effects from bilingualism, four-year-old U.S. Korean-English bilingual children were compared to three monolingual groups – English and Korean monolinguals in the U.S.A. and another Korean monolingual group, in Korea. Overall, bilinguals were most accurate and fastest among all groups. The bilingual advantage was stronger than that of culture in the speed of attention processing, inverse processing efficiency independent of possible speed-accuracy trade-offs, and the network of executive control for conflict resolution. A culture advantage favoring Korean monolinguals …

The Absent Empire: The United States And The South American Regional Subsystem, Carlos Gustavo Poggio Teixerira

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

The United States often acted in Latin America as an empire. Nevertheless, there has been an obvious dissimilarity between US actions in South America and US actions in the rest of Latin America, which is illustrated by the fact that the United States never sent troops to invade a South American country. While geographic distance and strategic considerations may have played a role, they provide at best incomplete explanations for US relative absence south of Panama. The fact that the United States has had a distinct pattern of interactions with South America is thus not captured by the typical concept …

The Exclusion Of Non-English-Speaking Jurors: Remedying A Century Of Denial Of The Sixth Amendment In The Federal Courts Of Puerto Rico, Jasmine Gonzales Rose

Faculty Scholarship

This Article explores the constitutional implications of the Jury Selection and Service Act’s English language juror prerequisite, as applied in the federal courts in Puerto Rico. The language requirement results in the exclusion of approximately 90% of the age-eligible population of Puerto Rico from federal jury service and disproportionately excludes Puerto Ricans of color and the poor. The Article argues that application of the language requirement in Puerto Rico violates monolingual Spanish speakers’ fundamental Sixth Amendment right to a jury selected from a fair cross section of the community in federal criminal proceedings. It also examines the English language juror …

"Mentor Me To Mister" A Case Study Of Mentoring Through The Kappa Leadership And Developmental League, Christopher Eugene Johnson

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to explore the non-academic strategies the Kappa Leadership and Developmental League uses to mentor African American males and the impact it has on their academic and social achievement. The researcher used a collective case study design to identify the best practices of the Kappa League. Purposeful sampling was used to identify and invite Kappa League mentees, parents, advisors/mentors and school administrators as participants in the investigation. Kappa League members, their mentors, school administrators, and parents alike perceived the Kappa Leadership and Development League as highly effective in providing both direction and support for African …