Digital Commons Network^™

The Psychosocial Effects Of Compensated Turnout On Dancers: A Critical Look At The Leading Cause Of Non-Traumatic Dance Injuries, Rachel Smith

Honors Theses

Dancers suffer from extremely high injury rates compared to the general population (Noh, Morris, & Anderson, 2003). Most of the injuries are overuse injuries (60-75%), as opposed to traumatic injuries (Thomas & Tarr, 2009). One of the most common overuse injuries is compensated, or forced, turnout (Negus, Hopper, & Briffa, 2005). Continual misplacement of turnout wears and tears on the body, leading to pain and injury. However, dancers feel the risk is worth it to stay relevant in a physically demanding career that has little-to-no off-season to heal (McEwen & Young, 2011). Dance companies typically have the mindset of pushing …

Community Strain And Familial Dysfunction: The Influence Of County Characteristics On Child Maltreatment, Katherine Mobley

Honors Theses

Child maltreatment does not happen equally across communities. Instead, in some places it is nearly non-existent (less than 1 out of every 11000 children) while in others it is experienced by nearly 10% of the population. This research examined how demographic factors relate to the rate of child abuse and neglect at the county level and found that a decline in economic stability, lack of post-secondary education, an inability to reach financial stability, and the rate of drug usage in a county significantly contributed to the child maltreatment rate. Durkheim’s Theory of Anomie and Merton and Agnew’s Strain Theories were …

Representations Of Mainstream And Marginalized Subjects In The Work Of Diane Arbus, Grace Short

School of Art, Art History, and Design: Theses and Student Creative Work

This thesis considers the photographs of the twentieth-century photographer, Diane Arbus. In America during the 1950s and 60s, Arbus photographed both marginalized and mainstream subjects including dwarfs, giants, transvestites, nudists, debutants, socialites, and celebrities. At one point in her career, she expressed an interest in family portraiture and, indeed, a number of her images depict families.

Scholars who have written about Arbus, such as Susan Sontag, Carol Armstrong, Anthony W. Lee, and John Pultz, have formulated theories about Arbus’s motivations, although their findings focus on individual features of her work. Sontag argued that Arbus exploited her unorthodox sitters whereas Armstrong …

A Phenomenological Exploration Of Secondary Teachers' Perceptions Of The Flipped Classroom Model, Jami Weidmann

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this qualitative transcendental phenomenological study was to describe secondary teachers’ experiences implementing a secondary flipped classroom model (FCM) in the United States. A FCM is a framework wherein students work at their own pace and use in-class time for active learning activities. The following questions were researched: (a) How do secondary FCM teachers describe their lived experiences from implementing the FCM? (b) What benefits, if any, do secondary teachers describe from implementing the FCM? (c) What challenges, if any, do secondary teachers describe from implementing the FCM? (d) What necessary resources do teachers perceive important for successful …

Student Transition Into Kindergarten: A Case Study Of The Reggio Emilia Approach, Joan Stephens

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this intrinsic case study was to arrive at a better understanding of what teachers contribute to the unique issues of student transition from a Reggio Emilia approach preschool into kindergarten. Transition was defined as “. . . reciprocal organization activities and cooperation (vertical connection), one of the aims of which was to connect with families (horizontal connection)” (Ahtola et al., 2016, p. 169). The central question of the research is; what do Reggio Emilia approach schoolteachers contribute to transition? Vygotsky’s (1978) social constructivist theory involved the “actual relations between individuals” (p. 57), and social constructivist theory, along …

Child Labor : An Adaptive Strategy Among Syrian Refugees., Tasneem Karim

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses

This thesis investigates child labor as an adaptive strategy among Syrian refugees living in urban host communities in the Middle East. While research has shown an increasing prevalence of child labor in these communities, an anthropological investigation into how it manifests and why it persists is valuable in elucidating the implications of systemic barriers to socioeconomic success and the dissonances in discourse regarding child labor between families and aid workers. Accordingly, this research is based on transnational, multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork conducted in an urban host community in Irbid, Jordan, humanitarian/government offices in Irbid and Amman, Jordan, and the resettled Syrian …

"To Prevent Pernicious Political Activities" : The 1938 Kentucky Democratic Primary And The Hatch Act Of 1939., Raymond Michael Myers Iv

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses

By 1938, popularity for President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal had declined. The 1938 Kentucky Democratic primary, pitting Senate Majority Leader Alben Barkley against Governor A.B. “Happy” Chandler, became a referendum on the administration. During the campaign, each candidate accused their opponent of employing government resources to buy votes. This national scandal prompted Congress to enact the Hatch Act of 1939. Still in effect, this law restricted how federal employees interacted with political campaigns. This paper contends that the 1939 Hatch Act served as a constitutional backlash against the New Deal’s federal expansion and the rise of the administrative state. …

Choose Your Own Adventure: An Analysis Of Gender Inequality In Higher Education, Topaz Szewczok, Bethany Parslow

Senior Honors Projects

This project explores how gender inequality in contemporary society impacts the individual’s experiences in their career path, especially in regards to higher education. We document experiences that gender minorities have in their academic disciplines and gain insight on how individuals overcome or do not overcome being the gender minority. Our data come from in-depth interviews with college professors and survey responses from college students in gender segregated fields such as nursing, STEM, early education, and family studies. For this study, according to information gathered and published by the university, a “gendered field” at URI is determined by two thirds or …

Examining The Potential Of The “Csi Effect” To Create False Expectations In Jurors In Regard To Expert Testimony, Sarah Stewart

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

The “CSI Effect” has been generally defined as the effect that watching forensic shows, such as the wildly popular, 15-season long television show CSI, has on the general public’s perception of forensic evidence presented at criminal trials. A major concern expert witnesses have is that the existence of the “CSI Effect” can affect the outcomes of the trials, over the strength of the case itself. Whether or not the defendant is guilty should not rest on how well the forensic evidence presented lived up to the jury’s expectations, and as such, the potential existence of this effect has been a …

In What Areas And With What Successes The Participation In International Trade Agreements Affect Socio-Economic And Political Development In Brazil?, Alisa Sokolova

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

This paper examines the effects of international trade agreements on Brazil’s socio-economic and political development. It specifically analyzes multilateral trade agreements such as Southern Common Market (MERCOSUR), the World Trade Organization (WTO), bilateral agreement with the European Union and multilateral agreement with China, Russia, India and South-Africa (BRICS). This research uses Brazil as a case study because of its rapid growth, young democracy and important economic role it plays in the region and the world. The relatively recent date of Brazil’s trade liberalization, the 1991, allows comparing data on Brazil before and after it. The purpose of the research is …

“When Are We Going Home?”: Home Attachment In The Bosnian Community Of Central New York, Amela Hrustic

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

Following the Bosnian War, over 100,000 Bosnians were resettled in the United States and over 6,000 of these refugees were resettled in the Central New York cities of Syracuse and Utica. Since their resettlement, these Bosnians have managed to transform the cities into places they can now call “home”. This was partly done through the phenomenon of place attachment which is the affective link that individuals establish with places. Literature from the fields of anthropology, environmental psychology, and refugee studies was reviewed in order to build the background of this study and an ethnographic study was conducted from Fall 2017 …

Down-Under Dispatches: A Travel And Culture Website About Australia And New Zealand, Erica Petz

Renée Crown University Honors Thesis Projects - All

No abstract provided.

These Relationships Save Lives:The Association Between The Nature Of Relationships And Experience Of Support In The Workplace For The Amber Alert Training And Technical Assistance Program, Kimberly Rutigliano

Education Policy and Leadership Theses and Dissertations

My research looks at organizational behavior as a resource to beleveraged for human learning. Two theoretical constructs guided this research, Team Member Exchange theory (TMX) and Social Network Analysis theory (SNA). The data for this research were derived from a case study of a subpopulation of the AMBER Alert organizationin Mexico.While no results were statistically significant, there was a weak association between the perceived support on the team (TMX) and the perceived strength of dyadic relationships (SNA) based on measures of outbound degree centrality (r>0.3). Graphical SNA analysis provided a more useful observation for a small group (N=14) than …

Differential Enforcement Of Title Vii Of The Civil Rights Act Of 1964 With Respect To Sex Discrimination, Tracy Leigh Garnar

All Theses

This study uses sociological frameworks to examine the effects that judges’ personal characteristics, such as race, sex, political affiliation, and political ideology, as well as personal characteristics of the plaintiff, such as race and sex, have on cases filed in federal appellate courts dealing with sex discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Previous research examining these factors have produced conflicting results. This study, using data extracted from Title VII cases dealing with sex from federal appellate courts from 1995 to 2002, attempts to tease out these different effects. Results indicate that the political ideology of …

Understanding Urban Renewal From A Different Perspective, Makonen A. Campbell

All Theses

In 1958, the Charlotte City Council voted to demolish the community of Brooklyn for the purpose of creating a better environment for its residents and attracting business opportunities to the city. Over a ten-year period, over 9,000 residents would be forced to move to the outskirts of the city as the history of Brooklyn was erased. The history of urban renewal in Charlotte has been reported from the perspective of politicians, city planners, and businessmen who have touted the benefit of the city’s efforts. The historical literature has neglected to tell the story of those who were directly affected by …

Taking The Plunge: Enhancing The Visitor Experience In Waterfall-Based State Parks, Margaret M. Citarella

All Theses

Waterfalls have long been popular tourist attractions due to their soundscape, beauty, natural pool, and recreational opportunities. With technological advances and abundant tourism information, more visitors are being drawn to waterfalls. Such high visitation and use amplifies the risk of degrading pristine waterfall sites and their resources. Not only are waterfalls experiencing high demand, but state parks are also seeing large increases in visitation. State parks are typically located closer to population centers and complement the more well-known and iconic national parks by providing recreational opportunities to more, diverse visitors. The present study aims to provide a basis for understanding …

The Relationship Between Mentally Unhealthy Days And Access To Healthcare And Healthcare Services Utilization Among The Long-Term Uninsured In South Carolina, Tamara Semaj Dobson-Brown

All Theses

Background: The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) made a tremendous impact on the nation’s nonelderly (ages 18-64) uninsured population. Despite the ACA provisions, they fell short of universal health insurance coverage; especially in states that chose not to expand Medicaid, like South Carolina. Those left uninsured are likely to experience great difficulty with the health care delivery system, especially in areas that have a high concentration of uninsured residents. Purpose: To assess the effect of psychological vulnerability, as measured by mentally unhealthy days, on access to healthcare and healthcare utilization among the long term uninsured in South Carolina. …

Endowed With Manly Courage: Medieval Perceptions Of Women In Combat, Katherine Rose Hager

All Theses

In the Middle Ages, a certain subset of women occupied a liminal space between the masculine and feminine spheres. These were the women who participated in armed combat and who were the enactors of aggression as opposed to the passive recipients of violence. There is debate today regarding whether medieval women lacked the capability, means, and training to engage in bellicose endeavors. Meanwhile, other scholars see in the male-voiced records of fighting women disdain for the female warriors. This study argues, first, that women did have the capacity in the Middle Ages to engage in combat and, second, that the …

The Work Of Water In Edwidge Danticat's Environmental Imagination, Gabrielle Nugent

All Theses

This paper argues that focusing on seascapes in Danticat’s fiction unsettles former land-sea relations and, in turn, generates fluid conceptual alternatives to rigid colonial histories, hierarchies, and temporal scales. Investigating how the water in Danticat’s fiction upends cultural narratives of colonial progress and modernization’s processes also yields considerations of how Danticat’s novels entail a widening of the customary aperture of ecocritcism. Thinking about Danticat’s fiction environmentally raises the stakes for how we may think about the links between “the local” and contexts of planetary reach on an “ecoglobal” scale. Foregrounding these concerns when reading Danticat’s work bears directly on contemporary …

Man And Technology: The Glitch In Nature's System, Carey W. Morton

All Theses

This work acknowledges the tangible and intangible attributes found in the complex relationship between man and nature. The human capability of manipulating the environment continues to grow at an exponential rate. The technology by which this is achieved has progressed to unprecedented heights. While this evolution has made leaps and bounds in the continuous struggle to achieve mastery over the natural world, advancements in technology challenge the very foundations of human experience. Processing this phenomenon through my own background in the rural American South, there is a nostalgic and anthropologic component to the display and content of the installations as …

Transgressive Theatricalities: Questioning The Existence Of A Sincere Self In Sensation Fiction, Carley Amanda Robertson

All Theses

This paper seeks to explore connections between the sensation fiction genre of the 1860s and theatricality. The theatricality present in sensation fiction plays on the fears of acting and insincerity that Nina Auerbach outlines in her book Private Theatricals: The Lives of the Victorians. Theatricality differs from performance or performativity, areas abundant with scholarship, in that it describes a person’s ability to perform, not elements of an individual performance. In this thesis, I analyze characters within sensation fiction who utilize their theatricality in order to mask their sincere identities or interior self, or portions of their identities in some cases. …

Culturally Relevant Pedagogy: Teacher Experiences And Impact On Student Learning, Jessica Denton

Dissertations

Growing public concern about the educational experiences of English language learners (ELL) has placed pressure on teachers and schools to provide equitable learning opportunities for this group of students. Currently, federal and state mandates promise to hold all students to the same high expectations, but ELLs consistently underperform academically. Such research suggests that culturally relevant pedagogy (CRP), specifically the inclusion of culture in the classroom, as well as the integration of students’ lived experiences can influence students’ learning opportunities.

This study was guided by existing theories of culturally relevant pedagogy, “funds of knowledge,” social maturity and cognitive development theories as …

Assessment Of Cultural Competency Of The Lgbt Community In The Nursing Workforce, Joshua A. Abel, Anne Saleem, Sarah Turner, Jessica Zumwalde

Anna Vaughn School of Nursing Undergraduate Work

The lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community comprises a significant, growing patient population in the United States and faces a unique set of healthcare challenges which must be addressed by the healthcare system and those employed by it. The LGBT community, having experienced historic oppression and discrimination, has reflexively withdrawn from healthcare workers, refrained from disclosing its LGBT identity and become reluctant to seek healthcare, resulting in delayed treatments and poor patient outcomes. While recent years have brought improved provisions, social acknowledgment, and public acceptance to the LGBT population, health risks still prevail due to patients concealing their LGBT …

A Forensic Investigation Into The Possible Origins Of Three Human Skeletons, Jefferson P. Sinnott

Forensic Science Theses

The Anthropology Department at Buffalo State has three human skeletons that have been part of the department’s collection for several years. The origin of the skeletons is currently unknown. Modern DNA techniques coupled with forensic anthropological techniques may now allow us to determine with some certainty the geographic origin of the skeletons. Ancestry, sex, age, and stature were assessed using current anthropological techniques. Afterwards, one tooth from each of the three skeletons was extracted, pulverized and DNA was isolated. Y-STR fragment size analysis of the DNA samples can provide information about the patrilineage of male individuals. Mitochondrial DNA sequencing analysis …

Group Characteristics Influence Distribution Patterns Of Off-Road Vehicle Recreation Within A Complex Trail System In Southwest Idaho, Eric Frey, Kathryn Demps, Ben Pauli, Julie A. Heath

Biology Faculty Publications and Presentations

Recreation on public lands is growing and is increasingly recognized as an ecosystem service providing improved health, connection to nature, and social time while also disturbing and degrading ecosystems. Human impacts must be managed, but often managers have little information about the factors that affect recreation patterns. We combined data from global positioning system receivers to record off-road vehicle (ORV) travel with a pretrip survey to determine how group characteristics, site experience, site knowledge, and motivation are associated with ORV trip patterns on public lands in southwest Idaho. Spatial and temporal extent and distribution could summarize most variation in ORV …

Picturing Buffalo: The Howard D. Beach Photography Studio Collection, A Master’S Project To Prepare And Exhibit Images And Artifacts From The Howard D. Beach Photography Studio Collection, Kimberly A. Bruckman

Museum Studies Projects

The purpose of this Master’s Thesis Project is to implement essential practices in the museum profession in relation to the stabilization, digitization, and exhibition of the Howard D. Beach Photography Studio Collection. Through skills learned in the Museum Studies MA program, negatives from the Beach Collection were systematically chosen, digitized, and researched. This process resulted in an exhibition titled Picturing Buffalo: The Howard D. Beach Photography Studio Collection, which was on display from February 4-27, 2018 at the Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum, in Buffalo, New York.

Body-And-Soul: Embodied Participation Of The Laity In The Divine Service, Aaron Roggow

Master of Sacred Theology Thesis

Roggow, Aaron, W. “BODY-AND-SOUL: EMBODIED PARTICIPATION OF THE LAITY IN THE DIVINE SERVICE.” Master’s thesis, Concordia Seminary, 2018. 96 pp.

Since God has created us as body-and-soul creatures, it follows that worship of Him is not only spiritual but also physical in essence and in practice. The resurrection of Jesus Christ in the flesh points to the holistic nature of our faith; as such, the physicality of our worship is a fruit of this faith in an incarnate Lord. The benefits of bodily movement and gesture associated with the Word in Christian worship are a vitally important part of worship …

Digital Palace Of Nestor: Assessing Mycenaean Palatial Complex Construction Of Socio-Political Status And Navigation Through Architecture, Caleb Ward

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Because architecture necessitates the conscious planning of space, its consequences for navigation and socio-political status are equally deliberate and have indirect effects. This research combines experiential and spatial syntax techniques to gain a deeper understanding of how Mycenaeans shaped space to construct status and navigation in the Palace of Nestor at Pylos. Using a digital reconstruction of the palace ensured the most accurate experiential data by utilizing a whole, albeit virtual, version of the site. Without employing a digital reconstruction, the only experiences with the site would occur in the ruinous, actual site preventing complete experiences with how the site’s …

Palestinian Labor In West Bank Settlements, Ethan Morton-Jerome

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Since the late 1970s, Palestinians have worked in West Bank settlements, with approximately 30,000 to 40,000 Palestinians currently employed in construction, factories in industrial zones, and plantations. My analysis of Palestinian labor on the settlements begins with the historical, political, legal, and economic context of Palestinian labor in three jurisdictions: in Israel, on the settlements in the West Bank, and in PA-controlled Area A. Fundamental to the analysis is to go beyond the restrictions of nationalist discourse to recognize both intranational tensions and that labor exploitation occurs in all jurisdictions. My fieldwork and analysis were conducted over three years (2013-2016) …

A Flourynge Aege: Tracing The Sacred And Secular In The Book Of St. Albans, Allison Treese

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

With the introduction of the printing press to England around the mid-fifteenth century, English authors were not only writing under the lingering influence of Chaucer and the conventions of established medieval genres, but now had to confront the implications for reading and readership that printing brought with it along with the already turbulent political climate of the fifteenth century. Though this cultural shift was arguably a gradual one, with the earliest printers taking special care to remain faithful to the manuscripts they were copying, and conventional scribes likewise being commissioned to make copies of printed works, there were nevertheless radical …