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2019

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Attention, Context And The Inverse Base Rate Effect, Angus B Inkster Jan 2019

Attention, Context And The Inverse Base Rate Effect, Angus B Inkster

Other Faculty of Health Theses

The Inverse Base Rate Effect (IBRE; Medin & Edelson, 1988) is a non-rational behavioural phenomenon reported within the learning literature. A considerable amount of research has investigated the effect, as well as other effects that occur in onjunction with it. The EXIT model (Kruschke, 2001a) is widely considered to be the best formal explanation of the IBRE and is based on an error-driven attentional account. This thesis aims to further existing research, investigating unexplored avenues and providing new datasets with which to test the capabilities of the EXIT model. Chapter 1 provides a review of the research surrounding the IBRE …


The Influence Of Online Reviews On Saudi Consumers’ Tourism Destination Choices, Arej Alhemimah Jan 2019

The Influence Of Online Reviews On Saudi Consumers’ Tourism Destination Choices, Arej Alhemimah

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Online consumer reviews (OCRs) can be key aspects of how tourists choose a travel destination. OCRs are particularly important for experiential purchases such as tourism destinations, because consumers have difficulty assessing the quality of intangible products prior to consumption. OCRs can thus shape preconceptions or expectations about a destination for potential tourists, subsequently influencing visit intention. Social influence impacts adoption intention, but this relationship in the context of tourism OCRs and destination choice has largely been ignored, despite the fact that tourism often involves travel across different cultures. The aim of this research is to investigate the influence of OCRs …


Molecular Control Of Tooth Mesenchymal Stem Cell Activation, Jemma Victoria Walker Jan 2019

Molecular Control Of Tooth Mesenchymal Stem Cell Activation, Jemma Victoria Walker

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Background The continuously growing mouse incisor provides a robust model for studying molecular mechanisms of stem cell (SC) fate determination. While the epithelial SCs are well studied within this model, the identification and characterisation of a mesenchymal SC (MSC) population has yet to be defined. Aims This study aims to identify the molecular signatures of a novel MSC pool within the lower murine incisor. This work aims to investigate the molecular mechanisms governing the maintenance and transition of MSC cells and their progeny, particularly the role of Notch signalling in this process. Methods Isolation of proposed putative MSC containing and …


Action Intentions And The Puzzle Of Non-Willed Behaviour, James Colton Jan 2019

Action Intentions And The Puzzle Of Non-Willed Behaviour, James Colton

Other Faculty of Health Theses

It feels intuitive that our actions are intentional, but there is considerable debate about whether (and how) humans control their behaviour. Ideomotor models of action argue that action intentions have a fundamentally perceptual format. In these views, actions are not only controlled by anticipating – imagining – their intended perceptual consequences but are also initiated when this “action effect” activation is sufficiently strong. Yet, this latter initiating function of action effect activation has not yet been tested directly. In Experiments 1-4, participants mentally rehearsed a movement sequence and were unexpectedly presented with salient visual cues that were either compatible or …


Impact Of Time Pressure, As A Stressor, On Dentist’S Diagnostic Decision Making., Anastasios Plessas Jan 2019

Impact Of Time Pressure, As A Stressor, On Dentist’S Diagnostic Decision Making., Anastasios Plessas

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Background: Growing evidence from the wider healthcare and psychology literature support the notion that stress may affect an individual’s decision making, technical and non-technical skills. Stress amongst dentists is prevalent and different stressors have been described in the dental literature. In dentistry, although extensive research has been conducted on dentists’ well-being and mental health, little is known about how different stressors may affect dentists’ performance. Aim: The current work aimed to examine the effect of stress, if any, on dentists’ decision making and performance. Methods: This ResM project was divided into three parts: a systematic review examining the impact of …


Shaping The Perceptual Representation Of Observed Human Action Through Prediction., Katrina Louise Mcdonough Jan 2019

Shaping The Perceptual Representation Of Observed Human Action Through Prediction., Katrina Louise Mcdonough

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Understanding the actions of others is crucial for all social interactions. Despite a dynamic and complicated social world, humans can derive the goals, attitudes and beliefs that drive others’ actions, imbuing them with meaning and understanding. While such abilities were traditionally accounted for by a direct matching of observed actions to actions within the observer’s motor system, contemporary theories of social perception explain them within a predictive processing framework. They argue that perception of others’ actions is shaped by prior assumptions about their goals and intentions and the behaviours that these mental states predict. This thesis aimed to resolve whether …


Understanding Student Charters Through Psychological Contracts In Higher Education: A Grounded Theory Approach, Julie Ann Osborn Jan 2019

Understanding Student Charters Through Psychological Contracts In Higher Education: A Grounded Theory Approach, Julie Ann Osborn

Other Faculty of Health Theses

The introduction of higher fees and globalisation have created a competitive environment in which UK universities operate. Higher fees and globalisation have placed emphasis on higher education institutions operating as a profit driven sector with feedback sought from consumers in the form of large scale surveys e.g. National Student Survey (NSS). Our understanding of the student experience has been framed within a broadly positivist framework, which arguably limits our understanding. The purpose of this study was to trial a new way of exploring the student experience. This novel approach used the psychological contract as a sensitising concept. It has been …


Effect Of Phytoestrogens On Breast And Prostate Cancer Cell Lines – Potential Implications For Bone Metastasis, Safaa Salman Mezban Al-Thamiree Jan 2019

Effect Of Phytoestrogens On Breast And Prostate Cancer Cell Lines – Potential Implications For Bone Metastasis, Safaa Salman Mezban Al-Thamiree

Other Faculty of Health Theses

The effect of phytoestrogens on breast and prostate cancer cell lines – potential implications for bone preferential metastasis to bone Safaa Salman Mezban AL-Thamiree Abstract Many epidemiological studies indicate that diets rich in phytoestrogens (PE), especially soy and grain products, may be associated with a lower risk of some steroid hormone-dependent cancers such as breast and prostate. In particular PE have been shown to reduce the incidence of skeletal metastasis which have a high degree of morbidity and mortality. However, the most effective combinations of PEs and the mechanism through which they may reduce bone metastasis remain unclear. Therefore, this …


Exploring The Sensitivity Of Mantle Cell Lymphoma To Inhibitors Of Bruton’S Tyrosine Kinase, Hannah Patricia Thompson Jan 2019

Exploring The Sensitivity Of Mantle Cell Lymphoma To Inhibitors Of Bruton’S Tyrosine Kinase, Hannah Patricia Thompson

Other Faculty of Health Theses

EXPLORING THE SENSITIVITY OF MANTLE CELL LYMPHOMA TO INHIBITORS OF BRUTON’S TYROSINE KINASE Mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) is an incurable B-cell lymphoma which responds poorly to conventional chemotherapy. Inhibitors of Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTKi) have shown a significant clinical effect; despite this success however, approximately one third of MCL patients have primary resistance to the drug, and patients who initially respond to treatment frequently acquire secondary resistance with aggressive relapse of the disease. The purpose of this study was to understand how BTKi-resistance or sensitivity is mediated, aiming to identify new targets for therapy or predictive biomarkers of response. Combining …


Testing The Gliocentric Hypothesis Of Brain Pathology, Sarah Hannah Ellwood Jan 2019

Testing The Gliocentric Hypothesis Of Brain Pathology, Sarah Hannah Ellwood

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Ischaemic stroke is a leading cause of death and disability worldwide, causing cell death and tissue damage. All cell types are affected by ischaemia, however until recently, the impact of acute ischaemia has been studied from a neuronal point of view. Currently, there is a greater interest in glial cells such as astrocytes and oligodendrocytes as they are essential for the correct working of the central nervous system (CNS). This thesis aimed to investigate the regional sensitivity of the glial cells and the mechanisms behind any regional differences. Three mechanistic areas were chosen to be examined; the role of glycogen …


Evaluating Digital Health Technologies To Advance Parkinson's Disease Care, Thea Dominey Jan 2019

Evaluating Digital Health Technologies To Advance Parkinson's Disease Care, Thea Dominey

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a common progressive neurological disorder characterised by a complex range of motor and non-motor symptoms (NMS). Current PD service provision does not meet the needs of patients, and puts pressure on services with limited capacity. Digital Health Technologies (DHTs), including body-worn sensors and portable devices, may provide advantages, by enabling continual and objective monitoring of symptoms, and facilitating patient self-management. I carried out a series of studies and evaluations of DHTs for use in PD, to evaluate their ability to identify and monitor symptoms in both a clinical and research context. These included: 1. The evaluation …


Role Of Cd47 In Red Cell Apoptosis (Eryptosis), Ibrahim Faisal Halawani Jan 2019

Role Of Cd47 In Red Cell Apoptosis (Eryptosis), Ibrahim Faisal Halawani

Other Faculty of Health Theses

CD47 is a 47-52 kDa membrane spanning glycoprotein, which has 5 known isoforms and is a member of the immunoglobulin superfamily (IgSF). It possesses a large extracellular N-terminal IgV like domain. CD47 acts as a ‘do not eat me’ signal and consequently as a marker of self. Moreover, CD47 is reported to be upregulated in cancer cells allowing them to escape immune surveillance by binding to SIRP alpha on macrophages. The aims of this thesis were to evaluate and to confirm the presence of CD47 isoforms in erythroid and erythroleukemic cells, identify new CD47 binding proteins that may mediate the …


The Effect Of Visual Distraction On Memory For Words, Pictures And Complex Events, Pamela Rae Jan 2019

The Effect Of Visual Distraction On Memory For Words, Pictures And Complex Events, Pamela Rae

Other Faculty of Health Theses

This thesis aims to provide further understanding of how visual distraction disrupts retrieval from long-term memory. Eyewitness testimony research shows a fairly consistent picture: visual distraction (or its removal though eye-closure) decreases retrieval-accuracy of details embedded in an event. However, research on verbal memory suggest that distraction effects may be selective: Glenberg, Schroeder and Robertson’s (1998) widely cited study found distraction to impair recall of mid-list words from multiple word-lists but Rae’s (2011) single word-list studies found no such effect. The investigation thus began with a part-replication of Glenberg et al. with tighter control of materials including using Dynamic Visual …


Unbiased Global Proteomic Profiling Of Patient-Derived Meningiomas Of All Grades To Identify Molecular Signatures Of Differentially Expressed Proteins And Phosphoproteins., Jemma Suzanne Dunn Jan 2019

Unbiased Global Proteomic Profiling Of Patient-Derived Meningiomas Of All Grades To Identify Molecular Signatures Of Differentially Expressed Proteins And Phosphoproteins., Jemma Suzanne Dunn

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Meningioma is the most frequent primary intracranial tumour. Surgical resection remains the main therapeutic option as pharmacological intervention is still hampered by the poor knowledge of the molecular signature of these tumours. In order to elucidate the proteomic profiling of meningiomas and identify proteins involved in their pathogenesis, we completed a comparative mass spectrometry analysis of meningioma tissue of all WHO grades, analysing global proteins, phosphoproteins and phosphopeptides. We performed differential expression analyses and functional annotation studies to identify commonly upregulated proteins and phosphoproteins in all grades of meningioma compared to meningeal tissue as well as grade-specific candidates relevant for …


Neuronal Network Oscillations In The Control Of Human Movement, Edward Rhodes Jan 2019

Neuronal Network Oscillations In The Control Of Human Movement, Edward Rhodes

Other Faculty of Health Theses

The overarching aim of this thesis was to use neuroimaging and neuromodulation techniques to further understand the relationship between cortical oscillatory activity and the control of human movement. Modulations in motor cortical beta and alpha activity have been consistently implicated in the preparation, execution, and termination of movement. Here, I describe the outcome of four studies designed to further elucidate these motor-related changes in oscillatory activity. In Chapter 3, I report the findings of a study that used an established behavioural paradigm to vary the degree of uncertainty during the preparation of movement. I demonstrate that preparatory alpha and beta …


The Perceived Effectiveness Of Brief Psychological Techniques For Acute Postoperative Pain, Alsanaani Tahani Jan 2019

The Perceived Effectiveness Of Brief Psychological Techniques For Acute Postoperative Pain, Alsanaani Tahani

Other Faculty of Health Theses

Postoperative pain is still a challenge and patients are still suffering from postoperative pain, despite the administration of multiple analgesic methods for treating pain. In a systematic review and meta-analysis I found that brief psychological interventions such as relaxation techniques including simple breathing exercises or guided imagery, and simple distraction techniques such as listening to music, or practicing a script of self-hypnosis may help those patients to cope better with their pain. Although quality of these studies was not always of the highest level, the findings synthesized from 30 randomised controlled trials indicated that brief psychological interventions did reduce postoperative …


The Role Of Slit/Robo Signalling In Peripheral Nerve Regeneration, Lauren Singer Jan 2019

The Role Of Slit/Robo Signalling In Peripheral Nerve Regeneration, Lauren Singer

Other Faculty of Health Theses

The role of Slit/Robo signalling in peripheral nerve regeneration. Slit/Robo chemorepulsive signalling has been shown to play a role in axon pathfinding during the development of the central nervous system. There is evidence that Slit/Robo are expressed in the adult intact and injured peripheral nervous system. Owing to their role in axon pathfinding during development it is plausible that Slit/Robo signalling could also play a role in axon pathfinding following peripheral nerve transection injury where axons must find their way across the newly-formed nerve bridge. This project aimed to study the expression pattern of Slit and Robo family members in …


Meeting The Archive Through An Interdisciplinary Artistic Practice, Steven Mark Paige Jan 2019

Meeting The Archive Through An Interdisciplinary Artistic Practice, Steven Mark Paige

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

This practice research thesis investigates creative approaches to ‘the archive’, through the making and analysis of contemporary art works that are located across and between screen-based, live, and installation art forms. The methodology focuses on encountering and responding to moving image collections, in particular films where the body is instructive, active and moving. Artistic strategies include the creative re-appropriation and enactment of archival material that interrogates the relationships between artefact, body and digital space through the use of archival scenarios. This aligns with Uriel Orlow’s concept of the ‘archive thinker’, where artists test the nature of archives beyond a singular …


Investigation Into Stand-Alone Brain-Computer Interfaces For Musical Applications, Satvik Venkatesh Jan 2019

Investigation Into Stand-Alone Brain-Computer Interfaces For Musical Applications, Satvik Venkatesh

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) aim to establish a communication medium that is independent of muscle control. This project investigates how BCIs can be harnessed for musical applications. The impact of such systems is twofold — (i) it offers a novel mechanism of control for musicians during performance and (ii) it is beneficial for patients who are suffering from motor disabilities. Several challenges are encountered when attempting to move these technologies from laboratories to real-world scenarios. Additionally, BCIs are significantly different from conventional computer interfaces and realise low communication rates. This project considers these challenges and uses a dry and wireless electroencephalogram …


Birds With Wolf Hearts, A Collection Of Poetry, With An Analysis Of Contemporary Nepalese Women’S Poetry, Eleanor Walsh Jan 2019

Birds With Wolf Hearts, A Collection Of Poetry, With An Analysis Of Contemporary Nepalese Women’S Poetry, Eleanor Walsh

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

This thesis is comprised of a collation of women’s poetry from Nepal and its contextualising material, and a creative element which is poetry of my own responding to that work. The critical introduction argues that contemporary women’s poetry expresses female experiences and exposes a movement in women’s rights in Nepal that has previously gone unrecognised. The analysis demonstrates how women’s poetry has been used to form new communities, both literary and political, and is a summons to social action, as it recognises the marginalisation of women in literature that has historically been overwhelmingly ignored. In a country where female characters …


Can Regionalism Provide Stabilization To Central Asia And Thus Afghanistan?, Richard Good Jan 2019

Can Regionalism Provide Stabilization To Central Asia And Thus Afghanistan?, Richard Good

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

This research was undertaken as there is a gap in the current academic realm, in which Central Asia and Afghanistan were heavily referenced, but none which went a step further and critically analyzed a new regionalism which would tie Afghanistan and Central Asia together bilaterally and multilaterally, whilst also deciphering through analysis, theory, and practice, the most suitable type of regionalism to be employed to achieve stability in Central Asia and thus Afghanistan. There is much discussion on regionalism as a standalone product and theory, and little on the formulation of a new regional body, one which can provide the …


The Development Of Nuclear Propulsion In The Royal Navy, 1946-1975, Gareth Michael Jones Jan 2019

The Development Of Nuclear Propulsion In The Royal Navy, 1946-1975, Gareth Michael Jones

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

This thesis covers the development of nuclear propulsion in the Royal Navy from the first proposal in 1946 to the start-up of the last core improvement for the first submarine reactor power plant PWR 1 in December 1974. There are three topics: Political, what problems were encountered in transferring nuclear knowledge from the US in the post-war period and what support was there for the development of nuclear propulsion? Militarily, what was the requirement to develop nuclear propulsion and why submarines in particular? Technical, were the problems associated with nuclear energy fully appreciated, did the UK have the technical and …


‘Lady Mary Wortley Montagu’S The Turkish Embassy Letters (1763): Agency, Authority And The “Female Spirit Of Contradiction”’‘Lady Mary Wortley Montagu’S The Turkish Embassy Letters (1763): Agency, Authority And The “Female Spirit Of Contradiction”’, Michelle Marie Lester Jan 2019

‘Lady Mary Wortley Montagu’S The Turkish Embassy Letters (1763): Agency, Authority And The “Female Spirit Of Contradiction”’‘Lady Mary Wortley Montagu’S The Turkish Embassy Letters (1763): Agency, Authority And The “Female Spirit Of Contradiction”’, Michelle Marie Lester

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

The Turkish Embassy Letters is considered both inaugural and atypical of women’s travel writing, and scholarship is largely orientated around Montagu’s focus on women and their lives in the different countries she travelled to and stayed in between 1716 – 18. While this dissertation maintains a primary engagement with gender, it evaluates the text’s participation in myriad discourses and genres of the Restoration and early Augustan period. The cultural conditions that saw a significant growth in female participation in the world of print and, thereby, in intellectual exchange with men - often in writings loosely operating within a ‘Republic of …


Sonic Analysis For Machine Learning: Multi-Layer Perceptron Training Using Spectrograms, Samuel Pearce-Davies Jan 2019

Sonic Analysis For Machine Learning: Multi-Layer Perceptron Training Using Spectrograms, Samuel Pearce-Davies

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

This thesis presents efforts to lay the foundations for an Artificial-Intelligence musical compositional system conceived on similar principles to DeepDream, a revolutionary computer vision process. This theoretical system would be designed to engage in stylistic feature transfer between existing musical pieces, and eventually to compose original music either autonomously or in collaboration with human musicians and composers. In this thesis, construction of the analysis and feature recognition systems necessary for this long-term goal is achieved through the use of neural networks. Originally, DeepDream came about as a way of visualising the weights inside neural network layers – matrices of variables …


Europeanization Of Foreign Aid: Managing Post-9/11 Fragile, Conflict-Affected States, James Frank Flint Jan 2019

Europeanization Of Foreign Aid: Managing Post-9/11 Fragile, Conflict-Affected States, James Frank Flint

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

Since the turn of the millennium fragile, conflict-affected states (FCAS) have grown to constitute a significant issue within European discourse. The spill-over of their ‘complex political emergencies’ is destabilising, as epitomised by the 9/11 attacks. Bush’s ‘war on terrorism’ speech-act during 9/11’s aftermath signified a juncture, and new historical epoch within International Relations. Within this epoch the EU was confronted by violent extremism/terrorism and irregular-migration flows. Nonetheless, fragile states risked being ‘aid orphans’. They can be unattractive to aid-donors due to the foreign aid dilemma whereby those states and peoples exhibiting the direst need of assistance are frequently the hardest …


Dervish Sound Dress; An Investigation Of Wearable Technology Using Computer Music And Haptic Mechanisms For Live Performance, Hedy Hurban Jan 2019

Dervish Sound Dress; An Investigation Of Wearable Technology Using Computer Music And Haptic Mechanisms For Live Performance, Hedy Hurban

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

The realm of this thesis combines the areas of computer music, fashion design, digital art, smart clothing, biometrics, cultural traditions and performance. Dervish Sound Dress is a wearable piece of technology; a garment that is inspired by the sacred ‘turning’ experience of the Whirling Dervishes or the Mevlevi Sufi order in Turkey known as the sema. It utilizes the fundamental aspects of the sema such as music, performance and body movement through spiritual elation by creating a unique and interactive experience. Wearable technology is a burgeoning field of research. Fashion designers who are using smart textiles or integrating fashion and …


Towards The Development Of Music As An Intervention For Insomnia Treatment: A Research Synthesis, Miriam Richter Jan 2019

Towards The Development Of Music As An Intervention For Insomnia Treatment: A Research Synthesis, Miriam Richter

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

Though research has been conducted with regards to music and sleep over the last two decades, there is still a significant uncertainty to its effectiveness due to the lack of scientific validation through objective testing and data analysis (Jespersen et al 2015). It has been proven that music can help in the management of physical pain and psychological conditions such as depression and anxiety, hence, music is already being implemented in medical treatments in the form of music therapy (Jespersen et al 2015). The literature review commences with a brief consideration of conventional treatment methods including pharmaceutical and talking therapy-based …


Comparative Assessment Of Measures To Tackle The Illegal Trade In Endangered Species, Melanie Berry Jan 2019

Comparative Assessment Of Measures To Tackle The Illegal Trade In Endangered Species, Melanie Berry

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

This thesis is an assessment of measures to tackle the illegal trade in endangered species in Australia, South Africa and the UK. Utilising responses from Freedom of Information Act requests, it is shown that organisations have varying reactions when implementing domestic legislation relating to the illegal wildlife trade. Analysis extends to the offences contained within the domestic legislation; the requirements laid down in the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, along with other legislation aids the combating of the illegal wildlife trade. It highlights both global and national issues and the importance of tackling the illegal wildlife trade. This …


From The Harmony Of The Spheres To Spherical Harmonics : The Potential Of Wave-Based Morphogenetic Processes For Musical And Architectural Composition, Nicolas Reeves Jan 2019

From The Harmony Of The Spheres To Spherical Harmonics : The Potential Of Wave-Based Morphogenetic Processes For Musical And Architectural Composition, Nicolas Reeves

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

Architecture is to space what music is to time: this brief sentence summarizes the deep, intriguing and intimate relationship that architecture and music have maintained all along history, especially in the Western world. It also reflects the cosmological roots of this connection, which translates through a number of analogies in several fields (mythology, poetry, science, philosophy...), and which at times explicitly considered music and architecture as terrestrial echoes of the cosmos. The development of science from XVIIth century on has put a definitive end to the claim of this relationship at revealing anything sensible about the physical world. However, its …


An Exploration Of Issues Relating To The Implementation Of Active Learning In Saudi Arabian Universities, Fatmah Alotaibi Jan 2019

An Exploration Of Issues Relating To The Implementation Of Active Learning In Saudi Arabian Universities, Fatmah Alotaibi

Other Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Theses

Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 is ambitious in its proposals for educational reform which includes the preparation of a modern curriculum focused on rigorous standards which will be aligned with a range of education outcomes Therefore, Saudi Higher Education laid the groundwork to develop and improve the educational aspects towards students and lecturers, as well as to adopt all new approaches in education. Accordingly, this study aimed to explore the perceptions of Saudi lecturers and undergraduate students towards learning approaches especially Active Learning (AL) when participating in active courses. The advantage of AL is that it may provide the Colleges and …