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Kindergarten Story Retell: Considering The Influence Of Vocabulary On Quality Of Production, Sarah Hardy

Open Access Dissertations

The purpose of the present study was to examine kindergarten student performance on a story retell task across at-risk and typically achieving groups (Intervention, Control, Reference) and language status (English-only, English-language learners). Additionally, the current study examined the relationship between vocabulary knowledge and the quality of production on a Story Retell task. Kindergarten students (n = 540) from twenty-two schools across Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Oregon completed a vocabulary program approximately 20 weeks in duration, including an additional vocabulary intervention for students in the Intervention group. Each student was assessed on vocabulary knowledge measures before and after completion of the …

Framework For The Automated Disassembly Of Electronic Waste Using The Soar Cognitive Architecture, Nicholas M. Difilippo

Open Access Dissertations

An experimental study was conducted to investigate the feasibility of integrating the cognitive architecture Soar with a robotic system to aid in the disassembly of electronic waste (e-waste). This study was broken up into different parts, first, to examine how well the different sensors and tools that composed the system worked before finally integrating the cognitive architecture Soar to assess how it improved the systems performance. Due to the increasing amounts of e-waste and the adverse effects it has on human health, a robotic system that can aid in the disassembly of e-waste is essential.

The first part in this …

A Pragma-Dialectical Approach To Argumentative Discourse, Touria Drid

Khazar Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

Theoretical and procedural diverseness is a feature characterising the study of argumen- tation. The common core in all perspectives is to examine a type of discourse that attempts to convince another party of the acceptability of one’s view(s) through a set of arguments, but what differs, to a larger or lesser extent, is the theoretical apparatus through which discourse is scrutinised. The present paper offers a general account of the pragma-dialec- tical approach to argumentation. Expatiating on the principal theoretical and methodolo- gical lines on which the theory proceeds, the paper aims at delineating the analytical tools provided in this …

Literature And Psychology In The Context Of The Interaction Of Social Sciences, Badegül Can Emir

Khazar Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

There is a two-way relationship between literature and psychology coming together on the same intersection at the point of essential people and human behavior. As it is possible to approach literature and to evaluate literary works with the resources of psychology, and of literary sciences, so it is also possible to consider literary works based on psychology and to discover psychological facts in literature. Thus, both psychologists and writers have taken into consideration the relationship between literature and psychology. Studies of the science of psychology directed to literature, literary works and writers that was introduced by Freud continued with other …

The Economic Life Of The Aetas Of Northern Philippines, Darin Jan Tindowen

Khazar Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences

In today’s world, one of the bases of economic development is the presence of technology. However, not all communities and groups can have an access to the different technologies created by man. And one of these groups is the Aetas of Northern Philippines. This study was conducted to determine the different economic activities, and seasonal activities for survival of the Aetas. The participants of the study were the 25 Aeta families of a rural community in Northern Philippines. In-depth interview, observation, and community immersion were the instruments used by the researcher. Moreover, key informants and the elders were identified to …

One Of Us, Farrah T. Al Sulaiman

Theses and Dissertations

With this thesis, I reflect on my identity as a Saudi American. I look at how nonverbal communication through gesture and artifact presents the potential for both communication breakdowns, as well as shared understanding. From the lens of Saudi culture, I consider how gender relations and intra-national tribal factions play a role in the division of society, which my work seeks to overcome, at both the national and global levels. My exhibit, One of Us, interrogates one of the most controversial gestures in contemporary society: veiling. As I discuss the notion of camouflage, I review the types of veils available …

The “Phantom Growth” Of Sol Nazerman: Suppression In The Pawnbroker, Abigail Baltuskonis

The Expositor: A Journal of Undergraduate Research in the Humanities

No abstract provided.

“The Knots Within”: Translations, Tapestries, And The Art Of Reading Backwards, Kathryn Vomero Santos

English Faculty Research

This article presents a new approach to reading the famous tapestry metaphor that has circulated in discourses on translation for centuries. Popularized by Miguel de Cervantes in the second part of Don Quixote (1615), the image of the tapestry’s two sides—the smooth front side and the messy reverse side—has long been assumed to illustrate the uneven relationship between an original and its translation. Following the lead of seventeenth-century English translator Leonard Digges, who urges readers to remember “the knots within” that make the tapestry possible, the article advocates for a method of reading backwards toward a history of translation …

Peer Review: Navigating Uncertainty In The United States Jury System, Anna Offit

Faculty Publications

This Article examines American prosecutors' approaches to uncertainty during voir dire. At different points during trial preparation and during jury selection itself-- lawyers draw on multiple interpretive systems to make sense of ordinary citizens. Taking Assistant United States Attorneys in a federal jurisdiction in the Northeast United States as a case study, and drawing on ethnographic research, I focus on three systems prosecutors alternately (and sometimes simultaneously) use to evaluate jurors: (1) probabilistic and evaluative analogies, (2) juror-types generated from the details of criminal cases, and (3) local knowledge stemming from prosecutors' relationships and experiences outside of the courtroom. I …

Exploring Feature Sets For Turkish Word Sense Disambiguation, Bahar İlgen, Eşref Adali, Ahmet Cüneyd Tantuğ

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

This paper presents an exploration and evaluation of a diverse set of features that influence word-sense disambiguation (WSD) performance. WSD has the potential to improve many natural language processing (NLP) tasks as being one of the most crucial steps in the area. It is known that exploiting effective features and removing redundant ones help improving the results. There are two groups of feature sets to disambiguate senses and select the most appropriate ones among a set of candidates: collocational and bag-of-words (BoW) features. We introduce the effects of using these two feature sets on the Turkish Lexical Sample Dataset (TLSD), …

A Comprehensive Control Strategy Of Railway Power Quality Compensator For Ac Traction Power Supply Systems, Hamed Jafari Kaleybar, Siamak Farshad

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

The development of electrical railway systems leads to critical power quality problems in the power grid. This paper discusses a kind of half-bridge-based railway power quality compensator system (HBRPQC) that can compensate negative sequence currents, harmonics, and reactive power simultaneously. In order to keep the HBRPQC performance efficient for the different kinds of transformers used in traction power supply substations, a new multifunctional control strategy that performs better than previous methods is proposed. Due to the fast dynamicity of traction loads, a recessive self-tuning PI controller based on fuzzy logic is adopted in the current control system. The output control …

Publish Or Perish : Linguistic Policies And The Picard Language Of France, Marcy Taylor Kersch

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The rise of the French language from dialect to standard has shared the same trajectory as the French nation. But to postulate "une nation, une langue" is to discount the survival of the various regional languages that exist within metropolitan France. Regional languages, in spite of claims otherwise, are alive, albeit not always well. This thesis will focus specifically on the Picard language spoken in northern France and southern Belgium. Picard and French can be described as collateral languages, sharing a common origin but developing differently into two distinct languages, each with its own unique morphological, syntactical, and lexical characteristics. …

Demographic Characteristics As Predictors For Early Program Success, On-Time Completion, And Nclex-Rn Success In A Bachelor Of Science In Nursing Program, Nancy Petges

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This study examines the extent to which selected demographic characteristics (nontraditional student, English as a second language [ESL], male student, and first generation student) predict early-program success, successful on-time completion, and NCLEX-RN success in baccalaureate nursing education for a sample of students at a Midwestern university. To determine the relationships among study variables, correlational analysis was used. Logistic regression was utilized to examine the relationship of the predictive variables (nontraditional student, ESL student, male student, and first-generation student) to the outcome variables (early-program success, successful on-time completion, and NCLEX-RN success). In addition, descriptive statistics, including measures of central tendency (mean, …

Resistant Acts : Challenges Of Older And Chronically Ill Mexican Women Living In 21st-Century United States, Lucy Sosa

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Older and chronically ill Mexican women living in a 21st century working class neighborhood confront many challenges. The challenge of being older and chronically ill are exacerbated by the multiple socially constructed identities of difference they embody, such as, race, gender, class, linguistic competence, immigration and educational status. In their search for health and wellbeing, these embodied differences constructed for the women a number of care-searching, care-receiving and health outcome experiences that reveal the effect these differences can have in the lives of members of a vulnerable population. The women's experiences also reveal their determination to gain access to affordable, …

Seekers, Dwellers, And The Plural Contingencies Of Grace: Hospitality, Otherness And The Enactment Of Human Wholeness, Philip J. Rossi

Theology Faculty Research and Publications

No abstract provided.

Invisible Missions: The Grace That Heals Disjunctions, Robert Doran

Theology Faculty Research and Publications

No abstract provided.

A Study Of Boundary Spanning : Pastors' Perceptions Of Their Role As Boundary Spanners In The Elca, Rachel Carrie Berry

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This project examined pastors' roles as boundary spanners regarding information received from the synodical expression in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). Twenty-six pastors from the Northern Illinois Synod of the ELCA were interviewed and transcriptions were analyzed using the constant comparative method of inductive analysis. Two research questions were posed to explore boundary spanning from a pastor's perspective. The results echoed the literature on boundary spanning responsibilities and challenges, expanding the boundary spanning research field into the realm of religious organizations and leadership. Implications of this research and further areas of study are provided.

Beyond Adat : Transwomen Boldly And Innovatively Navigating Their Communities In Central Java, Indonesia, Laurence Anthonie Tumpag

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of the following thesis was to investigate how transwomen (otherwise known locally as waria) of Indonesia, navigate their gender identities within their specific locales in central Java. Particularly, I focus how my respondents do this within Yogyakarta, which I define as a cultural hub where local custom and law known as adat predominates and two other field sites located in the periphery of Yogyakarta. Due to the importance of local culture in the general central Javanese region, I hypothesized adat serves to help create space and belonging for my transwomen respondents within each locale. While previous research has …

A Bird For The Ages : National Concupiscence In The Work Of John Milton, Doug Depalma

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This thesis examines the religious concept of concupiscence in the work of John Milton from Comus to Samson Agonistes with a special focus on Milton's political tracts and histories. I suggest in readings of Comus, Eikonoklastes, and The Ready and Easy Way that we find Milton interacting with concupiscence in a different way as his experiences in the British Commonwealth advanced. In the Comus we find Milton willing to forgive the concupiscent Lady, yet in Eikonoklastes and The Ready and Easy Way, Milton describes the "thralls" that dominate his later prose work in a keenly concupiscent manner such that the …

A Case Study Examining Perceptions Of Female Saudi University Students Regarding The Use Of Asynchronous Online Discussion Boards, Hanadi M. Bokhari

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This phenomenological case study explored undergraduate Saudi female students' perceptions of using asynchronous online discussion boards (AODB) as a learning tool. In addition, the current study explored factors that helped students learn skills, specifically their language learning. The current study sought to add to knowledge about how asynchronous online discussion forums can benefit undergraduate Saudi female students' development of learning. Data were collected during the Spring 2016 semester through focus group and individual interviews with ten undergraduate students in an online course as well as their narrative reflections and the researcher reflections and notes. Participants were undergraduate Saudi female students …

A Covert War At Sea : Piracy And Political Economy In Malaya, 1824-1874, Scott C. Abel

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Piracy around the Malay Peninsula during the 19th century was extraordinarily prevalent and resulted in the death and loss of liberty for an untold number of people. This essay examines the connections between the piracy of this era and the political economies of the Straits Settlements and the Malay states in the region. Malays pirates often had the support of local rulers who required the goods and slaves brought back by pirates to reinforce their own political and socio-economic positions. The piratical system supported by the rulers was a component of the overall Malay economic system known as kerajaan economics, …

Altering State Intolerance Of Uncertainty And Its Influence On Checking Behavior, Hannah Faleer

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a heterogeneous mental disorder characterized by the presence of obsessions and compulsions that can have debilitating effects on the lives of individuals affected by it. Whereas obsessions and compulsions can fixate on nearly any subject, they tend to cluster around certain themes (e.g., cleaning, checking, symmetry). From a cognitive-behavioral perspective, certain dysfunctional beliefs or attitudes are believed to contribute to the etiology and maintenance of OCD. One of these beliefs is intolerance of uncertainty (IU), the tendency for an individual to avoid ambiguous situations and view him or herself as unable to cope in the face …

Differences Among Subgroups In Concurrent And Predictive Validity Of Timed Oral Reading Fluency Measures And Informal Reading Inventories On Performance On Computer Adaptive Assessments Of Reading, Paul J. Perry

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Recent legislation such as No Child Left Behind and the Performance Evaluation Reform Act (PERA) increasingly pressure teachers and schools to be accountable for instructional time in the form of improved test scores. As a result, students are given an increasing variety of assessments in a given school year in an attempt to measure academic growth over time. These assessments frequently occur in the form of curriculum-based measures (CBM) of oral reading fluency, informal reading inventories (IRIs), computer adaptive tests (CATs) of reading, and annual high stakes assessments of reading ability. While a review of the literature reveals a well-established …

Does Inflated Responsibility Moderate The Relationship Between Thought-Action Fusion Beliefs And Neutralizing Behaviors?, Brenda Ellen Bailey

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This study sought to empirically assess the theoretically suggested relationship---according to the cognitive-behavioral model---among cognitive beliefs in producing obsessive-compulsive behaviors. Two beliefs were identified: the belief that one is responsible for negative effects of thoughts and behaviors by either failing to prevent or acting to cause harm (inflated responsibility) and the belief that thoughts about negative events happening to others can increase their likelihood of occurring (thought-action fusion likelihood-others [TAF-LO]). A sample of N = 102 students participated in a manipulation of inflated responsibility by completing a linguistically altered measure of responsibility that either encouraged (high responsibility [HR]) or discouraged …

Dreamkeepers At The Gate : Culturally Relevant And Responsive Pedagogy In The Community College Classroom, Stephanie A. Whalen

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This study was inspired by Gloria Ladson-Billings's work on culturally relevant pedagogy, which examined the common conceptions and shared aims of "Dreamkeepers" who were identified as particularly effective instructors of African American students. In addition to exploring the dispositions of Dreamkeeper faculty at the community college, the instructional practices of these faculty members were analyzed using the descriptive characteristics of culturally responsive pedagogy according to Geneva Gay. The implications of the study include deeper understanding of a culturally relevant pedagogy and cultural integrity as foundations for cultural responsiveness in the community college classroom. These concepts are clarified through qualitative analyses …

Clerics In Arms : Militant Catholicism And Religious Violence In France, 1584-1598, Gregory D. Bereiter

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation examines the participation of Catholic clergy in religious violence and sectarian conflict at the height of the French Wars of Religion, a series of protracted armed conflicts that ravaged the kingdom of France between 1562 and 1629. It aims to produce a cultural history of clerical militancy at the height of these disastrous wars, when a "Holy League" of extremist Catholics formed across France with the twin goals of eradicating French Protestantism and preventing the crown from passing to a Protestant "heretic," Henri de Navarre. The dissertation investigates the violent practices of militant Catholic clergy in the 1580s …

An Examination Of The Athletic Identity, Identity Foreclosure, And Career Maturity Of Division I Collegiate Student-Athletes In Nonrevenue-Producing Sports, Stacia A. Klasen

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

Very few student-athletes will go on to become a professional in their sport; therefore, the vast majority will need to pursue a non-sport career once their collegiate athletic eligibility has ended. Research indicates that a strong athletic identity and identity foreclosure coincide with lower levels of career maturity, which contributes to the struggle that student-athletes often face with their post-sport transition. The majority of student-athletes compete in nonrevenue-producing collegiate sports (e.g., cross country and soccer), but this subgroup has not been adequately examined. This is problematic because research suggests that lower career maturity levels exist among student-athletes in both revenue- …

The Gendered Superhero : An Examination Of Masculinities And Femininities In Modern Age Dc And Marvel Comic Books, Jennifer Volintine

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This thesis examines American gender concepts of masculinity and femininity depicted in six Modern Age superhero comic books. Specifically, it examines how the American gender concepts of hegemonic masculinity, hypersexualized masculinity, emphasized femininity, and hypersexualized femininity are depicted in three Marvel and three DC comic books. This examination found that despite gender differences defined by biological essentialism that legitimates gender inequality, female and male superheroes are much more alike than different through what I term "visionary gender". Also, it examines indicators of gender not previously examined in American superhero comic books. In particular, it examines the text of superhero comic …

Jumping In The Snow : An Exploration Of Early Childhood Educator Career Commitment, Tara Mathien

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This study examined the experiences of early childhood educators that had chosen to make teaching a career. Little research exists that examines resiliency and persistence factors in association with career commitment ideals of early childhood educators. Work experiences in early childhood programs have been researched extensively yet without the focus on those that have stayed in the field for at least five years or more. Questions addressed by this study involve how educators describe and perceive their role and overall careers. Additionally, background experiences, life experiences, personality factors, and resiliency were deeply explored. The study involved a three-part interview series …

Teacher Perceptions Of Performance Evaluation And Teacher Self Efficacy In Illinois Public Elementary And Middle Schools, Amy Marks

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

This quantitative dissertation explored the association between teacher self-efficacy and teacher perceptions of the Illinois teacher performance evaluation process. It also examined how the teacher evaluation system's procedures, the evaluative feedback received by the teacher, and the context of the evaluation process related to teacher self-efficacy in the areas of student engagement, instructional strategies, and classroom management. Teachers from two different Illinois suburban public elementary school districts were surveyed. One school district employed the Charlotte Danielson Model and the other a more traditional evaluation model. The study results showed teachers who reported using a high quality teacher evaluation process also …