Digital Commons Network^™

Identifying The Risk Factors To Postpartum Depression, Jannica Bondoc Santos

Senior Theses

A woman’s life instantly changes after the birth of their child. Furthermore, culture influences the stigma that a mother is the primary caregiver of their children and are accountable for the health and upbringing of the child. Giving birth to a baby and taking up the responsibility of another human life is a great impact in a female’s existence. In addition to the new tasks that come with motherhood, women are also challenged to cope with their emotional and mental state after giving birth. The most chronic mental illness that can develop after labor is postpartum depression (PPD). Women who …

Flowers Or Flora?: Understanding The Effects Of Probiotics On Depression, Nicole Collopy

Senior Theses

The human gut is populated with hundreds of types of bacteria and fungi. In North America, both intestinal and mood disorders are prevalent, presenting health problems that challenge health care professionals and patients alike. A scholarly literature review was conducted to explore this important relationship.

The investigation of the literature revealed that there is an association between gut health disorders and mood disorders, mainly anxiety and depression. This is due to bi-directionality between the brain-gut pathways, meaning that gastrointestinal health may have an effect on mental health and vice versa.

This connection between gut and mood can have substantial implications …

Crime And Greenspace: Extending The Analysis Across Cities, Samuel Scott Ogletree

All Dissertations

The role of greenspace in urban areas has become a focus of research as municipalities seek to increase the quality of life in cities. Multiple benefits are found to be associated with greenspace, but disservices such as crime are often overlooked. Studies investigating the link between crime and greenspace have revealed mixed results and been limited in geographic scope. This dissertation sought to examine the crime and greenspace relationship, extending the analysis to multiple cities in order to describe how the relationship may vary in different contexts. Additionally, one possible cause of crime, increased temperatures, was investigated to determine how …

Improving Healthcare Readiness To Respond To Human Trafficking: A Case Study, Traci A. Hefner

All Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to assess the readiness of a Department of Emergency Medicine (ED) to respond to human trafficking (HT), using an adapted Transtheoretical Model’s Stage of Change Model as a guide. Content analysis allowed for an assessment of 13 system-wide policies and procedures and 25 hours of on-site observations of patient data collection processes and clinical practices during intake, triage, and the medical screening evaluation at three ED sites. Thematic analysis identified five readiness themes based on semi-structured interviews with 22 healthcare personnel from four ED sties. Results indicated that system-wide policies and procedures …

Educating For Civic-Mindedness: Examining Student Impacts Of Academic Programs Of Community And Civic Engagement In Higher Education, Laura L. Minor

All Dissertations

Within the last decade, colleges and universities in the United States have embraced the “community engagement” model to fulfill their public missions and prepare their students for work within increasingly complex and diverse communities. The number of academic majors and minors in community engagement-related fields has multiplied across the country, yet there is little literature that examines their impact on students, and whether or not they are producing uniquely engaged citizens upon graduation. This quasi-experimental, quantitative study explores the effects of one such program on students at Central Connecticut State University. Graduates who have completed a minor in Community and …

Probabilistic Framework For Behavior Characterization Of Traffic Participants Enabling Long Term Prediction, Jasprit Singh Gill

All Dissertations

This research aims at developing new methods that predict the behaviors of the human driven traffic participants to enable safe operation of autonomous vehicles in complex traffic environments. Autonomous vehicles are expected to operate amongst human driven conventional vehicles in the traffic at least for the next few decades. For safe navigation they will need to infer the intents as well as the behaviors of the human traffic participants using extrinsically observable information, so that their trajectories can be predicted for a time horizon long enough to do a predictive risk analysis and gracefully avert any risky situation. This research …

Hybridly Integrated Diode Lasers For Emerging Applications: Design, Fabrication, And Characterization, Yeyu Zhu

All Dissertations

The emerging applications of LiDAR, microresonator based frequency comb, and photon pair generation in photonic integrated circuits (PICs) have attracted lots of research interests recently. The single frequency, high power, narrow-linewidth, tunable semiconductor lasers are highly desired for the implementation of these emerging applications in future PICs. In this dissertation, we use the hybrid integration via edge coupling to obtain the integrated diode lasers for future PICs, since the active chip and the passive chip can be fabricated and optimized independently.

We demonstrate hybridly integrated narrow-linewidth, tunable diode lasers in the Indium Phosphide/Gallium Arsenide-silicon nitride (InP/GaAs-Si3N4) platform. Silicon nitride photonic …

Systems Engineering Approaches To Minimize The Viral Spread Of Social Media Challenges, Amro Khasawneh

All Dissertations

Recently, adolescents’ and young adults’ use of social media has significantly increased. While this new landscape of cyberspace offers young internet users many benefits, it also exposes them to numerous risks. One such phenomenon receiving limited research attention is the advent and propagation of viral social media challenges. Several of these challenges entail self-harming behavior, which combined with their viral nature, poses physical and psychological risks for the participants and the viewers. One example of these viral social media challenges that could potentially be propagated through social media is the Blue Whale Challenge (BWC). In the initial study we investigate …

Conservation, Conflict, And Community Context: Insights From Indian Tiger Reserves, Devyani Singh

All Dissertations

Protected areas across the world have been established to preserve landscapes and conserve biodiversity. However, they also are crucial resources for nearby human populations who depend on them for subsistence and to fulfill social, economic, religious, and cultural needs. The contrasting ideologies of park use and conservation among diverse stakeholders (e.g. managers and local communities) make protected areas spaces of conflict. This mixed methods study aimed to gain a deeper, more comprehensive understanding of these complex conflicts and potential solutions by focusing on the social and ecological landscapes surrounding two Indian protected areas: Dudhwa National Park (DNP in Uttar Pradesh) …

Multi-Scale Assessment Of Binding Geometries And Energetics Of Aqueous Phase Reforming Of Glycerol And Methanol: Towards Realistic, Accurate, And Computationally Tractable Strategies, Tianjun Xie

All Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Concept Of The Hologenome, An Epigenetic Phenomenon, Challenges Aspects Of The Modern Evolutionary Synthesis, Adena Collens, Emma Kelley, Laura A. Katz

Biological Sciences: Faculty Publications

John Tyler Bonner's call to re-evaluate evolutionary theory in light of major transitions in life on Earth (e.g., from the first origins of microbial life to the evolution of sex, and the origins of multicellularity) resonate with recent discoveries on epigenetics and the concept of the hologenome. Current studies of genome evolution often mistakenly focus only on the inheritance of DNA between parent and offspring. These are in line with the widely accepted Neo-Darwinian framework that pairs Mendelian genetics with an emphasis on natural selection as explanations for the evolution of biodiversity on Earth. Increasing evidence for widespread symbioses complicates …

Supporting Confidence And Participation For People With Aphasia Through Student Interaction: A Descriptive Study On The Effects Of An Interdisciplinary Campus Program, Tyson G. Harmon, Mei-Ling Lin, Gabrille Scronce, Adam Jacks

Faculty Publications

PURPOSE: Decreased social participation is one consequence of aphasia that can lead to poor psychological health and reduced quality of life. Involving people with aphasia in advocacy efforts may be one solution for increasing their social participation. The present study investigated the benefits of a campus program for three people with mild aphasia who were involved in educating allied health students about aphasia and training them to communicate with those who have aphasia. METHODS: Three participants with aphasia shared their stories and interacted with interdisciplinary students in two seminar sessions aimed at educating students about aphasia and helping them learn …

A Transformative Concept: From Data Being Passive Objects To Data Being Active Subjects, Hans-Peter Plag, Shelley-Ann Jules-Plag

OES Faculty Publications

The exploitation of potential societal benefits of Earth observations is hampered by users having to engage in often tedious processes to discover data and extract information and knowledge. A concept is introduced for a transition from the current perception of data as passive objects (DPO) to a new perception of data as active subjects (DAS). This transition would greatly increase data usage and exploitation, and support the extraction of knowledge from data products. Enabling the data subjects to actively reach out to potential users would revolutionize data dissemination and sharing and facilitate collaboration in user communities. The three core elements …

Phonology And Morphology Of Bolgo, Katie Ann Tikka

Theses and Dissertations

Bolgo [bvo] is a language spoken in central Chad. It is a Bua language within the Adamawa branch of the Niger-Congo language family. This thesis provides an overview of the phonology and morphology of Bolgo, focusing on the underdocumented Bolgo Dugag dialect. The data on which the thesis is based consist of original research; approximately 600 nouns, 350 verbs, and 50 adjectives were elicited, as well as a number of phrases and sentences.

A significant aspect of Bolgo phonology is its ATR harmony system, which contains nine phonemic vowels. In this harmony system, words contain either the +ATR vowels /i/, …

Hierarchical Filter And Refinement System Over Large Polygonal Datasets On Cpu-Gpu, Yiming Liu, Jie Yang, Satish Puri

Computer Science Faculty Research and Publications

In this paper, we introduce our hierarchical filter and refinement technique that we have developed for parallel geometric intersection operations involving large polygons and polylines. The inputs are two layers of large polygonal datasets and the computations are spatial intersection on a pair of cross-layer polygons. These intersections are the compute-intensive spatial data analytic kernels in spatial join and map overlay computations. We have extended the classical filter and refine algorithms using PolySketch Filter to improve the performance of geospatial computations. In addition to filtering polygons by their Minimum Bounding Rectangle (MBR), our hierarchical approach explores further filtering using tiles …

Evaluative Discourse As Community Identity Among Expatriates In Shenzhen, China, Karyn Harding

Theses and Dissertations

Expatriates are a modern-day community built by a rapid advance towards globalization. Expatriates are now likely to be self-initiated; that is, they chose to live in a foreign country rather than having been sent there by an employer, and they are changing the face of the global job market. However, their social interactions have not been the subject of much previous study. This paper delves into the ways that expatriates build and maintain their communities. In this case, participant observation and discourse analysis are used to study an expat community living in Shenzhen, China. As a group not defined by …

Valley Youth House: A Partnership With The Lehigh Valley Health Network Campus Of University Of South Florida Morsani College Of Medicine, Taylor Jarvill, Jeffrey Downen, Brittney Gaudet, Nina Liu, Amy B. Smith Phd, Marna R. Greenberg Do, Mph, Facep

Department of Emergency Medicine

No abstract provided.

Counseling Students’ Attitudes Toward Complementary And Alternative Medicine Integration In Counseling Practice, Lee Za Ong, Carrie L. King, Hope A. Jackson

College of Education Faculty Research and Publications

This study explored counseling students’ attitudes toward beliefs and personal experience with complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) integration in counseling practices. A total of 113 clinical mental health counseling students completed a demographic questionnaire, the CAM use, and the Complementary and Alternative Medicine Beliefs Inventory. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, nonparametric Chi-Square testing, Mann–Whitney U test, and logistic regression analysis to determine the prevalence of CAM use, CAM beliefs, and predictive factors of CAM integration. The results indicated differences in ethnicity, gender, and age for CAM use, CAM beliefs, and predictors of attitudes toward CAM integration. Recommendations for counseling …

Transmission-Scale Battery Energy Storage Systems: A Systematic Literature Review, Kevin Marnell, Manasseh Obi, Robert B. Bass

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

When the transmission capacity of an electrical system is insufficient to adequately serve customer demand, the transmission system is said to be experiencing congestion. More transmission lines can be built to increase capacity. However, transmission congestion typically only occurs during periods of peak demand, which occur just a few times per year; capitol-intensive investments in new transmission capacity address problems that occur infrequently. Alternative solutions to alleviated transmission congestion have been devised, including generation curtailment, demand response programs, and various remedial action schema. Though not currently a common solution, battery energy storage systems can also provide transmission congestion relief. Technological …

The Era Of Trump: How Jamaican Daca Recipients Are Coping With The 2017 Daca Policy Change, Rachele M. Hall

Education Doctoral

The topic of undocumented immigrants living in the United States stimulates consistent national and local debate. In 2012 President Barack Obama signed an executive order creating the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy which provided undocumented immigrants work authorization and reprieve from deportation. In 2017, newly elected President Donald J. Trump announced the removal of the DACA policy. Researchers have focused on the impact of the removal of the DACA policy on undocumented Latino/a immigrants, but limited to no research has focused on the impact for Black immigrants, specifically those identifying as Jamaican. The purpose of this study was …

Examining The Perceptions Of School Teams Participating In Professional Development On Restorative Practice, Clinton A. Bell

Education Doctoral

In recent years, restorative justice (RJ) has been used by the criminal justice system to provide an alternative to punishment and retribution in response to crime. Restorative justice’s response to crime requires all parties affected or involved in the crime to come together to repair the harm done to the victim. The parties involved or affected include victim, offender, family, and community. Many schools have considered restorative justice as alternative to suspension and a way to build school community. The purpose of this study was to explore the perceptions of school faculty participating in professional development on restorative practices (RP). …

A Governance Perspective For System-Of-Systems, Polinpapilinho F. Katina, Charles B. Keating, James A. Bobo, Tyrone S. Toland

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

The operating landscape of 21st century systems is characteristically ambiguous, emergent, and uncertain. These characteristics affect the capacity and performance of engineered systems/enterprises. In response, there are increasing calls for multidisciplinary approaches capable of confronting increasingly ambiguous, emergent, and uncertain systems. System of Systems Engineering (SoSE) is an example of such an approach. A key aspect of SoSE is the coordination and the integration of systems to enable ‘system-of-systems’ capabilities greater than the sum of the capabilities of the constituent systems. However, there is a lack of qualitative studies exploring how coordination and integration are achieved. The objective of this …

Supporting Parents In Title I Schools: A Qualitative Study Of Parent Engagement, Vanessa Sanchez

Master's Theses

This qualitative study focuses on how to improve parent engagement in Title I schools from parents’ point of view. The purpose of this project is to understand parent involvement in a Northern California school and how to improve it. This paper offers insights from parents’ perspectives how parents view the education process. The focus is on their experiences and how to support all parents. The lenses of the study is viewed through a critical pedagogy and social cognitive theory. All five of the parents being interviewed had suggestions on how to improve parent engagement in Title I Schools. The three …

2019 December, Morehead State University. Office Of Communications And Marketing.

Morehead State Press Release Archive, 1961 to the Present

Press releases for December of 2019.

American And Iraqi Prose Fiction Of The Iraq War: Traumas Of The Self, Traumas Of The Nation, Ghyath Manhel Alkinani

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

War is so omnipresent in our contemporary world that the story of war is too important to be left to fiction writers to frame and give meaning for. This dissertation provides an analysis of two dominant patterns in contemporary Iraqi and American prose fictional representations of the Iraq War: the individualistic trauma hero narrative and the nationalistic, collective narrative. I argue that the trauma hero myth that dominates American representations of the Iraq War psychologizes and de-politicizes war experience alienating the victim of trauma by decontextualizing their experience and negating the Other. On the other hand, the sweeping nationalistic narrative …

The Extent Of The Contribution Of The Determinants Of Organizational Support In The Enhancement Of The Mental Status Of Banking Services - A Study Of The Views Of A Sample Of Employees In A Number Of Banks In The City Of Dohuk, Shaima M. Saleh, Maha Mostifa Jankeer

Journal of Economics and Administrative Sciences

The objective of this study is to determine the extent to which the determinants of organizational support contributed to enhancing the mental status of banking services in a number of banks in Dohuk governorate in order to diagnose the correlation between the perceived organizational support and the mental status of services. Availability in the environment of banks and to enhance the mental position from the point of view of customers as the main hypotheses focused on the nature of the relationship between the dimensions of research among them has been tested these hypotheses using statistical and descriptive methods have been …

What’S Love Got To Do With It?: Passion And Inequality At Work, Aliya Hamid Rao, Megan Tobias Neely

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Emotion has become an increasingly important aspect of work in the 21st century. In this article, we take stock of the extant literature delineating the role of emotions, especially passion as a cultural schema, in white‐collar workplaces. Scholars have covered extensive ground on emotions at work, but the role of passion remains an underexplored yet significant area. Drawing from recent developments in research on white‐collar work, we argue that the passion schema has become a critical marker in the labor market for sorting individuals into occupations, hiring and promotion within organizations, and assigning value to people's labor. Emergent research suggests …

Riding The Blockchain Mania: Public Firms’ Speculative 8-K Disclosures, Pengkai Lin

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

This paper provides evidence on public firms' initial 8-K disclosures that mention Blockchain and investors' response to these disclosures. We categorize the description of Blockchain activities in firms' 8-Ks as Speculative (e.g., a vague future plan that involves Blockchain) or Existing (e.g., a description of Blockchain product). We document a sharp increase in the number of initial 8-K disclosures of Blockchain, particularly by Speculative firms, coinciding with the rise of Bitcoin prices and excitement in Blockchain technology in the last quarter of 2017. Investors react positively to the Blockchain 8-Ks issued by Speculative firms in the initial seven-day event window …

The Sound Of Adventure: Two Original Compositions That Combine Music, Sound Design, And Post-Production, Inspired By Outdoor Experiences, Jason K. Gibson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Composers have been inspired by nature for centuries, but writing music about nature is becoming more popular in our day. Now, under titles like “Landscape Music” and “Environmental Music,” many composers seek to embody the feeling of nature in music. What has yet to be fully developed is how electronic music and landscape music can overlap in the chamber music world. This project culminates in two original compositions, Natural Opposition (ca. six min), and Giants at Night (ca. 15 min), that seek to satisfy the requirements of both realms by combining naturally inspired music with electronic influences. The compositions themselves …

Engineering Education Through Problem Based Learning: A Case Study Of Teaching Mechanical Engineering Design In Tu Dublin, Kevin Delaney, Ger Nagle

Articles

Undergraduate students, having learnt to quantify the performance of specific elements of engineering objects, often find it difficult to integrate these elements into quite basic design concepts. Employers expect these engineering graduates to be able to do a great deal more than solve the technical problems taught in engineering school once they enter the workforce. To help students meet this expectation by developing real-world engineering skills as part of their engineering education, the Mechanical Engineering Discipline in Technological University Dublin (TU Dublin) introduced Problem Based Learning (PBL) module for Third Year Mechanical Engineering students in 2005. This module was well …