Digital Commons Network^™

Humans And Nonhumans Becoming Political: Memphis Women's March Assemblages, Margaret Ann King

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

In this post-qualitative feminist study, object-interviews with women who participated in the Memphis Womens March (MWM) and nonhuman objects were used to explore the interconnections of the MWM and the women and the nonhuman objects, and the relational knowledge generated by the interconnections between humans (e.g., the women who marched, other marchers) and nonhumans (e.g., posters, banners, t-shirts, pink pussyhats, and/or photographs). This study is significant in two ways. First, this post-qualitative feminist study attends to the interconnections of the MWM and the women and the signs. Second, this study will contribute to current post-qualitative work by utilizing object-interviews to …

Examining Beliefs About The Use Of Culturally Responsive Teaching Practices When Planning Literacy Instruction, Latwayla L. Knowlton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the relationships between beliefs about the use of culturally responsive teaching practices when planning literacy instruction, reading course enrollment, and demographic factors among undergraduate K-6 elementary teacher candidates. Specifically, the study participants are K-6 elementary undergraduate teacher candidates attending a small, rural university within the Mid-south. The researcher sought to understand factors that may affect teacher candidates beliefs about the use of culturally responsive teaching practices as they begin making specific pedagogical adjustments to the classroom when planning literacy instruction. Data for this study was collected using a structured survey in …

First Destination Survey 2020: For Degrees Awarded December 2019-August 2020, Hart Career Center, Illinois Wesleyan University

First Destination Survey

No abstract provided.

Reducing Hazardous Drinking Among Veterans With Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Using A Brief Alcohol Intervention And Avoidance-Focused Feedback, Matthew Thomas Luciano

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

This study supplements a one-session personalized drinking feedback intervention with a one-session activity feedback intervention for veterans with symptoms of PTSD and hazardous drinking. Veterans were screened (N=129) and enrolled (N=15) in an open trial to test feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary efficacy. Veterans completed assessments at baseline and post-intervention (1-month and 3-months). Participants (13.3% women; 40% African American) were recruited through a community in the mid-South. Thirteen participants (86.6%) were retained between the baseline assessment and second intervention session. Descriptive findings from a self-report acceptability questionnaire indicate that elements of this intervention were viewed favorably by a majority of participants. …

Media And Music: A Qualitative Content Analysis Of The African American Educational Experience As Portrayed In Black-Produced Films, Songs And Print Publications, Christopher Jamel Major

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

African Americans have been treated unequally and unfairly by the media. This issue deserves national attention while stressing the need for more positive messages of African Americans. The intent of this study was to examine how Black produced films, Hip-Hop songs and magazines portray the African American high school educational experience. The theory that guides this paper is critical media literacy. Critical media literacy provides an opportunity to evaluate, understand and critically analyze all forms of media. A qualitative content analysis was used to determine how African Americans are depicted by Black producers, directors and writers. Central questions worth exploring …

How Preschool Teachers Use Book Sharing Strategies To Build Academic Language Skills, Lorraine Ann Meiners-Lovel

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

AbstractMeiners-Lovel, Lorraine A. PhD. The University of Memphis. Preschool Teachers Use of Book Sharing Strategies to Build Academic Language Skills. May, 2020. Emily Thrush, PhD. ArrayIt is essential to understand the role of preschool teachers in the linguistic preparation of young children for kindergarten and elementary school. This understanding becomes even more important as more American preschoolers attend group care and public universal pre-kindergarten becomes more common. Children must master the variety of language known as the academic register, academic language, or school language in order to be academically successful. Preschool teachers need to understand the features of academic language …

Transgender Health Care: Symptom Disclosure, Gender Minority Stress, And Health Status, Christina New

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Gender-Affirming Hormone Therapy (GAHT) is one of the most commonly sought transition-related medical care services accessed by transgender individuals. Considering this, the experiences of transgender individuals engaged in GAHT is a relevant area of research among medical and mental health communities. Among 385 individuals currently engaged in GAHT, this study assessed the prevalence of symptom disclosure to medical providers related to GAHT, as well as explored the relationships between GAHT symptom disclosure to medical providers, distal and proximal gender minority stress, physical and mental health, and gender minority resiliency. The results of this study supported that transgender individuals engaged in …

Transactional Distance In Middle And High School Online Learning Environments: An Empirical Study, Silas Njoroge

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Understanding the communication gap due to the separation of teachers-students and students-students in online learning environments can have a profound impact on improving online learning. Moores Transactional Distance Theory (TDT) is an important pedagogical theory in distance learning that can be used to gain a better understanding of K-12 distance education practices. This study sought to empirically verify the theory by investigating the relationship of dialogue, structure, learner autonomy, and transactional distance (TD) perceived by students in K-12 Online Learning Environments (OLE). The study also investigated the effect of environmental and demographic factors on TD. Participants were selected from online …

Printed Spiral Coil Design, Implementation, And Optimization For 13.56 Mhz Near-Field Wireless Resistive Analog Passive (Wrap) Sensors, Babak Noroozi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Noroozi, Babak. Ph.D. The University of Memphis. June 2020. Printed Spiral Coil Design, Implementation, and Optimization for 13.56 MHz Near-Field Wireless Resistive Analog Passive (WRAP) Sensors. Major Professor: Dr. Bashir I. Morshed.Monitoring the bio-signals in the regular daily activities for a long time can embrace many benefits for the patients, caregivers, and healthcare system. Early diagnosis of diseases prior to the onset of serious symptoms gives more time to take some preventive action and to begin effective treatment with lower cost. These health and economy benefits are achievable with a user-friendly, low-cost, and unobtrusive wearable sensor that can easily be …

Yoknapatawpha Railroad: Trains And Mobility In The Novels Of William Faulkner, James Christopher O'Brien

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Though considered one of the foremost of 20th-Century American modernists, many critics accuse William Faulkner of being obsessed with some idyllic southern past. In contrast, my study, utilizing the burgeoning field of mobility studies, focuses on the trains featured within his novels to counter this accusation. As I discuss, Faulkner does indeed question notions of modern progress wrought from industrialization as well as technological advancements, though he never offers blanket condemnations of them. In contrast, his depictions of railroad mobility reveal an attitude of active participation in modernity rather than cantankerous retreat. In my opening chapter, I begin by explaining …

Ecolinguistically Informed Critical Discourse Analysis Of Political Speech On Climate Change Policies In The United States Of America, Othman Khalid Al Shboul

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

This study uses a mixed-methods approach to explore how climate change is conceptualized in the politics of the United States from the perspective of Ecolinguistics and Critical Discourse Analysis. I analyzed all the statements and letters issued by the governors and mayors who opposed the American president, Donald Trump, when he announced that he would withdraw the U.S. from the Paris climate agreement that 195 countries around the world signed. The qualitative analysis employs Critical Metaphor Analysis to investigate politicians metaphorical choices made to influence public opinion and influence policies about climate change in the U.S. These types of metaphors …

A Further Validation Of The Mindful Self-Care Scale In Emerging Adults, Cache Archer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

With a growing interest in understanding ways to increase optimal functioning in humans, a relatively novel concept mindful self-care gained research attention in the past few years. Mindful self-care is a combination of the active evaluation of internal needs and external demands and intentional engagement in self-care practices. Although initial evidence was reported in the development and validation study of the Mindful Self-Care Scale (MSCS, Cook-Cottone & Guyker, 2018), there were some notable limitations, including the wide age range of the sample (i.e., ages 18-71 years) and a lack of evidence to confirm criterion validity and invariance across men and …

Administrators' Benevolent And Corrective Humor And Suspensions Of African American School Age Females, Roslyn E. Bacon

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

African American female students suspension rates are rising and outpacing those of all categories of students, including African American males. This is due, in part, to an administrators over-reliance on zero-tolerance disciplinary policies, as well as a teachers negative perception of African American female students. Soaring rates of suspension contribute to school disengagement, high dropout rates, and a formidable risk of involvement in the school to prison pipeline. In addition to the toll these risks take on human lives, society loses the benefit of human productivity, taxable wages, and stable, thriving communities. As attention to the rising rate of suspension …

Computational Investigation Of Plasmonic Properties Of Metal Nanoparticle Assemblies, James Wade Barr

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Nobel metal nanoparticles (NPs) exhibit an optical-plasmonic response when perturbed by incident radiation. Gold (Au) is particularly useful as it has a strong surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) response and is chemically stable and suitable for biological applications. Often, magnetic properties are also desired, and iron-oxide NPs are utilized for the sake of magnetic separation or delivery and these types of materials are often used with inert plasmonic shells to obtain the desired optical and magnetic features. This provides much more flexibility when designing a detection scheme. Functionalizing these NPs with Raman reporter molecules allows for use in imaging and …

Identifying A Customer Centered Approach For Urban Planning: Defining A Framework And Evaluating Potential In A Livability Context, Golnaz Sarram

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

In transportation planning, public engagement is an essential requirement forinformed decision-making. This is especially true for assessing abstract concepts such aslivability, where it is challenging to define objective measures and to obtain input that canbe used to gauge performance of communities. This dissertation focuses on advancing adata-driven decision-making approach for the transportation planning domain in thecontext of livability. First, a conceptual model for a customer-centric framework fortransportation planning is designed integrating insight from multiple disciplines (chapter1), then a data-mining approach to extracting features important for defining customersatisfaction in a livability context is described (chapter 2), and finally an appraisal of …

Writing Instruction For Students With Learning Disabilities: Examining Teacher Practice, Preparedness, And Self-Efficacy, Alycia M. Taylor

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

ABSTRACT Writing is critical for high school students academic, social, and professional success. However, developing writing skills is a challenging process, particularly for students with learning disabilities (LDs). To produce high quality writing, substantial support from teachers is needed. Yet, many teachers are uninformed of how to assist students with LDs. Grounded in social cognitive and socio-cultural theories, the aim of this quantitative study was to expand the fields of writing instruction and LDs by comparing data from general and special education teachers. This study was designed to survey this population about their writing instruction, including the use of evidence-based …

Electro- And Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production By Molecular Cobalt Complexes With Pentadentate Ligands In Aqueous Solutions, Ping Wang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Solar hydrogen production via artificial photosynthesis has the potential to provide clean and renewable fuel for the worlds increasing energy demands. The availability of efficient, robust, and low-cost catalysts capable of splitting water into oxygen and hydrogen is critical for future applications. There has been significant progress in designing molecular catalysts for hydrogen production based on earth-abundant metals such as Ni, Co, and Fe. Hydrogen production based on metalorganic-framework (MOF) templates has also received great interest over the past few years. Among the reported catalysts for H2 production, cobalt complexes with polypyridyl groups have gained much attention because of their …

The Built Environment: An Autoethnography Of Black Masculinity And Physical Space Through The Use Of Poetic And Photographic Inquiry, Derwin Sisnett

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

In this critical race theory (CRT) autoethnographic arts-based study, I used autoethnographic arts-based methods (i.e. poetry and photography) to examine my experiences growing up as a Black male in an urban city in the Northeast in order to examine how I navigated between the physical spaces of school and neighborhood and how that shaped my understanding of Black masculinity, including the dominant narratives of underachievement, tough neighborhoods, and the proclivity to violence associated with it. I aimed to answer the following research questions: 1) How did the physical spaces of school and neighborhood contribute to my systemic oppression and my …

Daring To Be Herself: Womanist Rhetorical Theory And Black Womens Presidential Campaign Announcement Speeches, Dianna N. Watkins

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

ABSTRACT Watkins, Dianna N. The University of Memphis. May, 2020. Daring to be Herself: Womanist Rhetorical Theory and Black Womens Presidential Campaign Announcement SpeechesMajor Professor: Andre E. Johnson, Ph.D.Black womens theoretical production has neither been consistently celebrated nor canonized within the academy; therefore, the primary focus of this dissertation is to establish a definition for womanist rhetorical theory in order to acknowledge Black womens voice as carrier of theory and persuasive prowess (Collins, 1998). Theorizing through rhetorician Kimberly Johnsons (2015) womanist rhetorical criticism, I build from Alice Walkers (1983) definition of womanism and ethicist Stacey Floyd-Thomas womanist tenets. These tenets …

Never Silence My Sexy: A Narrative Inquiry Study With Young Black Women Who Have Engaged In Sexy Selfies, Crystal Lashell White

Electronic Theses and Dissertations Archive

Hip Hop feminist research seeks to combat oppressive experiences of Black women by encouraging them to share their stories through its main tenets: fuck with the grays (Morgan, 2017), bring wreck (Pough, 2015), and pleasure politics (Morgan, 2015). Previous research on sexy selfies has mainly investigated the trends, motivations, and dangers of these practices, but only a few include the lived experiences and voices of Black women. Building on research surrounding identity and sexy selfie engagement within 21st century Hip Hop (HH) and social media cultures, this HH feminist narrative inquiry study investigated the following research questions: (1) How is …

From The Eider River To The Great Plains: The Danish American Community And The 1920 Slesvig Plebiscites, Ryan J. Gesme

The Bridge

On April 6, 1917, the United States declared war on the German Empire, officially entering the three-year-long conflict now known as the First World War. At the time the US entered the conflict many American-born citizens felt uneasy about the recent immigration of thousands of Europeans and the possibility of those new residents having divided loyalties between their homelands and adopted country. These fears proved to be largely unfounded, as millions of naturalized Americans took up the call to arms issued by the United States, even in the face of increasingly xenophobic laws and policies. This included the Danish American …

My Life As A Danish American Archive And Library (Daal) Intern, Chantal Powell

The Bridge

Scouring through archives provides a person with a glimpse into the details of the past not provided by just reading a history book. Homemade Christmas cards and PanAm airplane tickets, award ribbons and family pictures, newspaper clippings and handwritten letters are just a few of the details of people’s lives I got to go through and experience for myself at the Danish American Archive and Library (DAAL) in Blair, Nebraska.

Bulletin Of Yale University School Of Nursing 2020-2021, Yale School Of Nursing

Yale School of Nursing Bulletins and Catalogues

Series 116, Number 15

September 5, 2020

Law Students And Cell Phone Use: Results Of A Six-School Survey, Linda Galler, Robert M. Jarvis, Cindy I.T. Archer, Hugh D. Spitzer, Jodi Wilson, Mark E. Wojcik

Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship

The sight of a law student using his or her cell phone now is so common that law professors do not give it a second though. But what, exactly, is the student doing? Texting with friends? Shopping? Watching a movie? To try to find out, during the Fall 2019 semester we asked our six diverse law schools to take an online survey consisting of eighteen questions. To our knowledge, this is the first phone survey of law students.

This paper presents the results of the survey, exploring applications used (text, social media, email, etc.) and differences by audience (e.g., whether …

@Karlnarcs: A Comedic Critique On The Digital Age, Evelyn Davis

Scripps Senior Theses

An outline of the pre-production, production, and post-production of a five-minute comedic short on the digital age and its influence on Generation Z using Marxist theory.

Traumatized Characters In Traumatized Environments: A Look At Repression And Horror, Rebecca L. Goldman

Scripps Senior Theses

Using Sigmund Freud’s theory of ‘return of the repressed’ as a theoretical basis, this paper takes a case study approach using three critically acclaimed horror films. These films include Nicholas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now (1974), Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980), and Ari Aster’s Midsommar (2019). With use of each film, the interaction between the repressed trauma of the protagonists’ and the film environment is explored, utilizing the notion that repressed trauma will always manifest itself as a symptom of the unconscious mind. Supporting theories include Slavoj Zizek’s notion that dreams must be read in terms of their form, stemming from …

Impact Of Family Separation And Length Of Time Spent In A Detention Center On Latino Immigrants' Trauma, Myranda Alonso

Scripps Senior Theses

With the Trump administration separating families at the border, there are many questions surrounding its impact on Latinos and what effects come from being detained. This study focuses on the impact of length of time spent in a detention center and family separation at the border on Latino immigrants’ trauma. This study looks at 788 Latino adults who were recruited from local nonprofits in major cities like Los Angeles, Houston, and Phoenix and had them answer questions regarding length of time in a detention center, trauma, distress, and hopelessness. The expected results are that immigrants who were separated from their …

Equity, Education, And Emergency: Examining Social Resilience Building Pilot Programs, Methods, And Successes In Massachusetts Communities, Mia Kania

Scripps Senior Theses

The concept of resilience and the methods and process of building it are as-of-yet undefined, set, or universally agreed upon. However, as the need to build resilience’s essential components, i.e. “the capacity of social, economic, and environmental systems to cope with a hazardous event or trend or disturbance,” increases, the urgency to understand the driving factors behind the concept and develop effective methods to foster these capacities grows as well. To gain insight into how climate change preparations can best facilitate resilience in their target communities, therefore, this thesis explores the concept of resilience as it is built, practiced, and …

Career Funneling, Perceptions Of Success, And Their Impact On College Students At Scripps, Pitzer, And Claremont Mckenna Colleges, Carina A. Schick

Scripps Senior Theses

The U.S. News top college ranking lists have created a narrowing definition of collegiate and career success. Students are told an elite education is the ticket to a successful life, one filled with a high achieving career, meaning, and happiness. Through peer, familial, and media interfaces students are inundated with societal definitions of success such as fame, wealth, and status. Socialization primes adolescents to work towards these goals. This idealized type of success is only accessible to a select few, leading to dissatisfaction and creating pressures on students to work towards their college admission at early ages. This thesis examines …

Neuroscience Of Stress & Addiction: A Digitally Animated Video On How These Brain Systems Interact And Influence Each Other From Early Life Stress To Withdrawal, Claire Bacon-Brenes

Scripps Senior Theses

Alcohol addiction and stress are both highly prevalent health conditions impacting our society. With stress on the rise in college students and alcohol addiction impacting 19.7 million Americans as of 2017, communication around the science of these issues is ever important because of stigma around them. This digitally animated video effectively explains alcohol addiction and stress on a neurobiological level with college science students as the audience, including two important examples of how stress and alcohol addiction interact. Stress experienced early in life is a known risk factor in developing addiction due to dysregulation of the reward pathway and altered …