Digital Commons Network^™

Pain Management For Post-Treatment Survivors Of Complex Cancers: A Qualitative Study Of Opioids And Cannabis, Beatriz Currier

All Publications

Aim: We aimed to understand experiences with opioids and cannabis for post-treatment cancer survivors. Patients & methods: We conducted seven focus groups among head and neck and lung cancer survivors, using standard qualitative methodology to explore themes around 1) post-treatment pain and 2) utilization, perceived benefits and perceived harms of cannabis and opioids. Results & conclusion: Survivors (N = 25) experienced addiction fears, stigma and access challenges for both products. Opioids were often perceived as critical for severe pain. Cannabis reduced pain and anxiety for many survivors, suggesting that anxiety screening, as recommended in guidelines, would improve traditional pain assessment. …

School Copaganda In The Us South: Tinsel, Twinkle, And Police-Youth Programming, Hannah Carson Baggett, Kaitlyn Selman

Faculty Publications - Criminal Justice Sciences

Told in schools across the US for decades, Officer Friendly is a story about policing. Through the literal reading of books like Miss Frances’ 1953 Your Friend the Policeman, visits from McGruff the Crime Dog, and even the ever-expanding TikTok world of dancing SROs, the story remains the same: police keep us safe from the bad guys. In this paper, we draw on data from school and police social media accounts in a community in Alabama to expose the bad faith underpinnings of this story, and how it functions through ‘friendly’ police-youth programming in schools. This story relies on at …

'We' Instead Of 'Me': How Buen Vivir Indigenous Cosmopraxes Allow Us To Conceive Security Differently And Face Insecurities Together, Juliano Cortinhas, Yara Martinelli, Ricardo Barbosa

Student Publications [Scholarly]

Although Critical Security Studies (CSS) has done much to advance security debates, some shortcomings remain. Its excessive focus on the individual - which we term 'me' - reduces CSS' capacity to propose solutions to current global security problems such as pandemics and climate change. This paper contributes to the emerging scholarship on the potential of relational ontologies in Security Studies by introducing Buen Vivir Indigenous cosmopraxes into the debate. Indigenous cosmopraxes such as Sumak Kawsay, Suma Qamaña, and Teko Kavi, we argue, can inform CSS by providing alternative considerations to the pluriverse of ideas that address security crises. These cosmopraxes, …

Growing Up Sustainable? Politics Of Race And Youth In Urbanplan, Copenhagen, Max Ritts, Rebecca Rutt

Geography

This paper considers how racialized youth in Denmark negotiate sustainability amid contexts marked by intersecting forms of economic restructuring, progressive neoliberalism, white ethno-nationalism, and green urban planning. Urbanplan is a low-income, notoriously “troubled” Copenhagen neighborhood where we conducted fieldwork for 7 months (2019-2020) with fifteen male youth, aged 17-21. Using ethnography, policy reviews, and interviews with city social workers, we explore how intimate experiences of nature, group-identity, and place attachment here relate to and depart from the structural forces actively reshaping the neighborhood. Our analysis combines Cindi Katz's intersectional political economy approach with recent work on green gentrification, Critical Utopian …

Methods To Compare Sites Concerning A Category’S Change During Various Time Intervals, Thomas Mumuni Bilintoh, Robert Gilmore Pontius, Aiyin Zhang

Geography

This paper presents new methods to analyze a category’s change through a time series of maps, even when the time intervals have inconsistent durations. The methods include an option to facilitate comparison among sites by expressing results as an annual percentage of each site’s unified size. A site’s unified size is the union of where the category exists at any of the site’s time points. The methods also specify gross losses, gross gains, eight trajectories, and three components: Quantity, Exchange, and Alternation. The illustrative application compares maps of the marsh category for three Long-Term Ecological Research sites: Plum Island Ecosystems …

Amazonia In Motion: Changing Politics, Development Strategies, Peoples, Landscapes And Livelihoods, Susanna Hecht, Marianne Schmink, Rebecca Neaera Abers, Eduardo Assad, Denise Bebbington, Eduardo Brodizio, Francisco De Assis Costa, Ana María Calisto Durán, Philip Fearnside, Rachael Garrett, Sebastian Heilpern, David Mcgrath, Gustavo Oliveira, Henrique Pereira, Miguel Pinedo-Vazquez

Geography

We review the often-invisible powerful processes that drive social and ecological change in Amazonia, and the diverse peoples who inhabit its landscapes. It explores large-scale development ideologies of modernization, and the policy tools that were deployed to carry them out. Outlining general periods of macro policy shifts, we show the evolution of the framework for today’s complex interactions between large-scale agroindustry, mining, and hydrocarbons, and diverse small-scale livelihoods, as well as the clandestine and illicit economies of land grabbing, gold, coca and timber, and their operation in globalized and regional economies. While Pan-Amazonian governments have oscillated between authoritarian and democratic …

A Novel System To Culture Human Intestinal Organoids Under Physiological Oxygen Content To Study Microbial-Host Interaction, Tatiana Y Fofanova, Umesh C Karandikar, Jennifer M Auchtung, Reid L Wilson, Antonio J Valentin, Robert A Britton, K Jane Grande-Allen, Mary K Estes, Kristi Hoffman, Sashirekha Ramani, Christopher J Stewart, Joseph F Petrosino

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Mechanistic investigation of host-microbe interactions in the human gut are hindered by difficulty of co-culturing microbes with intestinal epithelial cells. On one hand the gut bacteria are a mix of facultative, aerotolerant or obligate anaerobes, while the intestinal epithelium requires oxygen for growth and function. Thus, a coculture system that can recreate these contrasting oxygen requirements is critical step towards our understanding microbial-host interactions in the human gut. Here, we demonstrate Intestinal Organoid Physoxic Coculture (IOPC) system, a simple and cost-effective method for coculturing anaerobic intestinal bacteria with human intestinal organoids (HIOs). Using commensal anaerobes with varying degrees of oxygen …

Leadership And Environmental Sustainability: An Integrative Conceptual Model Of Multilevel Antecedents And Consequences Of Leader Green Behavior, Hannes Zacher, Clara Kühner, Ian M. Katz, Cort W. Rudolph

Psychology Faculty Publications

Environmental sustainability is a strategic and ethical imperative for organizations, and numerous studies have investigated associations between leadership and employee pro-environmental or “green” behavior. However, these studies have typically focused on leadership styles that conflate leader behavior with its assumed antecedents or consequences. Moreover, the literature on relations between leadership and environmental sustainability constructs is fragmented and in need of systematic integration to effectively guide future research and practice. Accordingly, we pursue three goals in this conceptual paper. First, after a brief review of key insights from extant theoretical and empirical research, we define leadership in the context of environmental …

Assessment Of Simultaneous Alcohol And Cannabis Use And Its Related Consequences And Cognitions In College Students: A Narrative Review, Jennifer L. Shipley, Abby L. Braitman

Psychology Faculty Publications

As rates of students using cannabis continue to rise, simultaneous use of alcohol and cannabis (such that their effects overlap; commonly referred to as simultaneous alcohol and marijuana [SAM] use) is prevalent among college students who use both substances. Although research focusing on SAM use and related cognitions and consequences continues to grow, there are no common established measures, as approaches vary across studies. This narrative review identifies current methods for assessing SAM use and measures of SAM-related consequences and cognitions (motives and expectancies) among college students, evaluates how they were developed, identifies gaps in the literature, and provides recommendations …

Developing A Pathway To Clinical Trials For Cacna1a-Related Epilepsies: A Patient Organization Perspective, Pangkong M Fox, Sunitha Malepati, Lisa Manaster, Elsa Rossignol, Jeffrey L Noebels

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

CACNA1A-related disorders are rare neurodevelopmental disorders linked to variants in the CACNA1A gene. This gene encodes the α1 subunit of the P/Q-type calcium channel Cav2.1, which is globally expressed in the brain and crucial for fast synaptic neurotransmission. The broad spectrum of CACNA1A-related neurological disorders includes developmental and epileptic encephalopathies, familial hemiplegic migraine type 1, episodic ataxia type 2, spinocerebellar ataxia type 6, together with unclassified presentations with developmental delay, ataxia, intellectual disability, autism spectrum disorder, and language impairment. The severity of each disorder is also highly variable. The spectrum of CACNA1A-related seizures is broad across both loss-of-function and gain-of-function …

Mental Workload Modulates The Effects Of Baroreceptor Afferents On Sensorimotor Processing, Xiao Yang, Katie Herberlein, Anthony Reid, Dongfang Jiao, Fang Fang

Psychology Faculty Publications

The heart–brain interaction is the main mechanism for maintaining normative physiological processes, and its dysregulation underlies the somatic symptoms of various mental disorders. Cortical inhibition, triggered by afferent signals from baroreceptor activation, induces systematic variations in sensorimotor responses within a cardiac cycle, with reaction times (RTs) slower at cardiac systole compared to diastole (known as cardiac cycle time effects). However, recent data suggest that baroreceptor afferents not only inhibit simple responses but also facilitate complex sensorimotor responses during cardiac systole. The mental workload that is implicated in complex responses may modulate the cardiac cycle time effects. The current study aimed …

Ethical Decision-Making In Older Drivers During Critical Driving Situations: An Online Experiment, Amandeep Singh, Sarah Yahoodik, Yovela Murzello, Samuel Petkac, Yusuke Yamani, Siby Samuel

Psychology Faculty Publications

The present study examined the impact of aging on ethical decision-making in simulated critical driving scenarios. 204 participants from North America, grouped into two age groups (18–30 years and 65 years and above), were asked to decide whether their simulated automated vehicle should stay in or change from the current lane in scenarios mimicking the Trolley Problem. Each participant viewed a video clip rendered by the driving simulator at Old Dominion University and pressed the space-bar if they decided to intervene in the control of the simulated automated vehicle in an online experiment. Bayesian hierarchical models were used to analyze …

Sleep Disturbances And Psychological Well-Being Among Military Medical Doctors Of The Swiss Armed Forces: Study Protocol, Rationale And Development Of A Cross-Sectional And Longitudinal Interventional Study, Dena Sadeghi-Bahmani, Viola Rigotti, Zeno Stanga, Undine E. Lang, Rebecca K. Blais, Michelle L. Kelley, Serge Brand

Psychology Faculty Publications

Background: Compared to civilians and non-medical personnel, military medical doctors are at increased risk for sleep disturbances and impaired psychological well-being. Despite their responsibility and workload, no research has examined sleep disturbances and psychological well-being among the medical doctors (MDs) of the Swiss Armed Forces (SAF). Thus, the aims of the proposed study are (1) to conduct a cross-sectional study (labeled ‘Survey-Study 1’) of sleep disturbances and psychological well-being among MDs of the SAF; (2) to identify MDs who report sleep disturbances (insomnia severity index >8), along with low psychological well-being such as symptoms of depression, anxiety and stress, but …

All The Better To Hear You With: Using Social Media For Employee Listening, C. S. Ju, E. A. Liguori, N. M. Savage

Psychology Faculty Publications

The article explores the use of social media for employee listening in organizations, highlighting the importance of employee voice and its positive impact on the workplace. It suggests that social media platforms can provide a space for employees to express themselves, share ideas, and connect with others. However, caution is advised when integrating social media into formal workplace decisions and the hiring process due to concerns about fairness, privacy, and discrimination. The article also addresses the challenges faced by minority employees in voicing dissent and the potential for social media to amplify their voices. It recommends consulting the book "Social …

Expanding A Behavioral View On Digital Health Access: Drivers And Strategies To Promote Equity, Maura M. Kepper, Lauren A. Fowler, Isabelle S. Kusters, Jean W. Davis, Manal Baqer, Sarah Sagui-Henson, Yunyu Xiao, Adati Tarfa, Jean C. Yi, Bryan Gibson, Kristin E. Heron, Nicole M. Alberts, Marissa Burgermaster, Veronica Njie-Carr, Lisa M. Klesges

Psychology Faculty Publications

The potential and threat of digital tools to achieve health equity has been highlighted for over a decade, but the success of achieving equitable access to health technologies remains challenging. Our paper addresses renewed concerns regarding equity in digital health access that were deepened during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our viewpoint is that (1) digital health tools have the potential to improve health equity if equitable access is achieved, and (2) improving access and equity in digital health can be strengthened by considering behavioral science-based strategies embedded in all phases of tool development. Using behavioral, equity, and access frameworks allowed for …

Gaze Transition Entropy As A Measure Of Attention Allocation In A Dynamic Workspace Involving Automation, Zixin Cui, Tetsuya Sato, Austin Jackson, Sampath Jayarathna, Makoto Itoh, Yusuke Yamani

Psychology Faculty Publications

Real-world work environments require operators to perform multiple tasks with continual support from an automated system. Eye movement is often used as a surrogate measure of operator attention, yet conventional summary measures such as percent dwell time do not capture dynamic transitions of attention in complex visual workspace. This study analyzed eye movement data collected in a controlled a MATB-II task environment using gaze transition entropy analysis. In the study, human subjects performed a compensatory tracking task, a system monitoring task, and a communication task concurrently. The results indicate that both gaze transition entropy and stationary gaze entropy, measures of …

Neuroticism Mediates The Association Between Autistic Traits And Choice Reaction Time Among Young Adults, Kassandra De Jesus Cintron, Xiao Yang

Psychology Faculty Publications

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that influences an individual’s cognitive functions and social interaction. While most studies have focused on children and adolescents diagnosed with ASD, elevated levels of autistic traits in subclinical populations may also influence individuals’ daily functioning. Autistic traits are also linked to the Big Five personality. In particular, neuroticism (emotion instability) has been shown to be positively associated with autistic traits, which may contribute to behavioral symptoms of autistic traits. The present study aimed to investigate the association between autistic symptoms and sensorimotor processing among a subclinical population. One hundred young adults (M …

Facilitating Thought Progression To Reduce Depressive Symptoms: Randomized Controlled Trial, Shai-Lee Yatziv, Paola Pedrelli, Shira Baror, Sydney Ann Decaro, Noam Shachar, Bar Sofer, Sunday Hull, Joshua Curtiss, Moshe Bar

Psychology Faculty Publications

Background:

The constant rise in the prevalence of major depressive disorder calls for new, effective, and accessible interventions that can rapidly and effectively reach a wide range of audiences. Recent developments in the digital health domain suggest that dedicated online platforms may potentially address this gap. Focusing on targeting ruminative thought, a major symptomatic hallmark of depression, in this study we hypothesized that delivering a digital health-based intervention designed to systematically facilitate thought progression would substantially alleviate depression.

Objective:

The study aims to investigate the efficacy of a novel digital intervention on the reduction of depressive symptoms. This intervention was …

Sex Differences In The Association Between Cardiac Vagal Control And The Effects Of Baroreflex Afferents On Behavior, Xiao Yang, Jacob Chaney, Aaron S. David, Fang Fang

Psychology Faculty Publications

Background: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of mortality and disability worldwide. While sex differences in CVD have been well documented, the physiological mechanisms of those sex differences remain unclear. As important components of the cardiovascular system, cardiac vagal control and baroreflex serve as mechanisms of sex differences in CVD and are modifiable factors for gender-specific CVD preventions. Methods: Ninety-four healthy adults (18–44 years of age; M_age = 21.09 years; 46 female) were recruited to complete the assessments of heart rate variability (HRV) at a resting baseline and the cardiac timing effect on an R-wave-locked reaction time (RT) …

Ultradian Rhythms In Accelerometric And Autonomic Data Vary Based On Seizure Occurrence In Paediatric Epilepsy Patients, Solveig Vieluf, Sarah Cantley, Vaishnav Krishnan, Tobias Loddenkemper

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Ultradian rhythms are physiological oscillations that resonate with period lengths shorter than 24 hours. This study examined the expression of ultradian rhythms in patients with epilepsy, a disease defined by an enduring seizure risk that may vary cyclically. Using a wearable device, we recorded heart rate, body temperature, electrodermal activity and limb accelerometry in patients admitted to the paediatric epilepsy monitoring unit. In our case–control design, we included recordings from 29 patients with tonic–clonic seizures and 29 non-seizing controls. We spectrally decomposed each signal to identify cycle lengths of interest and compared average spectral power- and period-related markers between groups. …

The Impact Of Direct Inoculation Of Ascites Into Blood Culture Bottles On Ascites Culture Positivity, Tyler Brehm, Todd Lasco, Mayar Al Mohajer

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

OBJECTIVE: Assess whether direct inoculation of ascites into blood culture bottles would improve ascites culture yield.

DESIGN: Pre-post-study.

SETTING: The study was performed at a quaternary academic medical center in Houston, Texas, including all inpatient and emergency department encounters.

PATIENTS: Ascites cultures collected from November 2020 to December 2022 were reviewed and screened for spontaneous bacterial peritonitis. Patients were excluded if a prior ascites culture from the same patient was already included in the study or if there was evidence of secondary bacterial peritonitis.

INTERVENTION: In the pre-intervention period, ascites cultures were collected into a sterile container and inoculated onto/into …

Extra-Legal Uses Of Tm, Clark Asay, Lareina Hingson, Stephanie Plamondon

Faculty Scholarship

Theoretical accounts of trademark law suggest that trademarks serve multiple marketplace functions, including protecting consumers and producers from unfair dealing, reducing consumer search costs, and incentivizing higher quality goods and services. Producers of goods and services often use the ‘TM’ symbol to signal their assertion of legal rights in a mark, arguably helping advance these goals. But recently, an interesting phenomenon has arisen in which individuals not engaged in typical commercial activities have been using the TM signifier in ways that don’t necessarily correspond to the symbol’s legal function. These so-called “extra-legal” uses of the TM symbol can offer insights …

Stop, Collaborate, And List ‘Em: Creating Local Metadata To Promote User Discovery Of Minoritized Identities In A Stem Collection, Paige Dhyne, Alyssa Nance

Libraries Publications

Historical and modern scientific thought is dominated by the English language, colonized science, patriarchal norms, and Westernized “ways of knowing.” By making materials that lie outside that narrative discoverable (e.g., non-Western science, Indigenous/Aboriginal knowledge, women in science, etc.) we can assert that science is a global endeavor by representing diverse scientists on physical library shelves or ebook “shelves.” The Cataloging and Metadata Librarian and Science and Outreach Librarian at Furman University, a small liberal arts college, collaborated on a project to address discriminatory practices in the catalog records of a subset of the libraries’ STEM collection. Spurred by another project …

Civic And Community Engagement Among Poor Rural Women In Bihar: A Pilot Study, Kirk Leach, Mirivel Julien, Tusty Ten Bensel, Avinash Thombre

School of Public Service Faculty Publications

Civic and community engagement is often crucial for the successful development of rural areas and a catalyst of personal transformation. This article examines changes in civic and community engagement among women in rural Bihar, India. Using an exploratory factor analysis of survey data from n = 815 respondents who participated in Heifer’s Values-Based Holistic Community Development [VBHCD] training, the study identifies three factors that constitute civic and community engagement. Next, the study assesses the efficacy of VBHCD’s impact on participants’ civic and community engagement relative to participants’ duration in the program and type of self-help group. The results indicate that …

The Domain-Specific Neural Basis Of Auditory Statistical Learning In 5-7-Year-Old Children., Tengwen Fan, Will Decker, Julie Schneider

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

Statistical learning (SL) is the ability to rapidly track statistical regularities and learn patterns in the environment. Recent studies show that SL is constrained by domain-specific features, rather than being a uniform learning mechanism across domains and modalities. This domain-specificity has been reflected at the neural level, as SL occurs in regions primarily involved in processing of specific modalities or domains of input. However, our understanding of how SL is constrained by domain-specific features in the developing brain is severely lacking. The present study aims to identify the functional neural profiles of auditory SL of linguistic and nonlinguistic regularities among …

Calendar Reforms In Ukrainian Orthodoxy, Nataliia Ishchuk

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The study provides a brief retrospective and the current state of the calendar issue in Ukrainian Orthodoxy. To achieve this, the attitude towards the calendar issue of those Orthodox Ukrainians who, in certain historical periods, lived in Ukrainian territories as part of European states and the Russian Empire, is examined. The ideological discourse of the calendar reform during the existence of the Soviet Union is outlined. Special attention is given to the calendar issue in Independent Ukraine. The reasons, main stages, features, and difficulties of the current transition of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church to the new Julian calendar are systematized. …

The Essence Of The Image Of The Fool In The Context Of The Orthodox Teachings In Eastern Europe, Olga Polumysna, Valeriy Bulatov

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article explores aspects of the image of the holy fool in the context of Orthodox teaching in Eastern Europe. The phenomenon of people who are called holy fools in the thinking and teaching of the Orthodox religious tradition is a controversial issue and still causes conflicting opinions, because the actions of people called holy fools are difficult to understand both for simple observers and for Orthodox researchers. The contrast of opinions in the formation of the holy fool's gestalt is of particular interest to this study. Is the life of holy fools directly connected with sacred life and Orthodox …

Religious Symbolism In Rhetoric Of Right Populist Parties, Serhii Kostiuchkov, Dmytro Garaschuk, Viacheslav Serhieiev, Kateryna Volkova

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

This article explores the use of religious symbolism in the populist rhetoric of Poland's Law and Justice (PiS) party and Hungary's Fidesz party. Both parties leverage historical and cultural narratives emphasizing Christianity's role in their national identities to legitimize their political agendas and mobilize support. The study examines how these populist leaders incorporate religious imagery and language to create a moral dichotomy between the “righteous people” and the “corrupt elite,” thereby deepening societal divisions and undermining democratic governance. In Poland, the PiS party's close alignment with the Catholic Church reinforces its nationalist and anti-EU stance, while in Hungary, Fidesz employs …

"God Has Given Women All Kinds Of Opportunities To Serve": How Media Discourse On The Ordination Of Women Constructs Understanding Of The Role Of Women In Church And Society, Ilva Skulte, Kristīne Briede

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The representation of a particular topic in the mass media not only forms the understanding of this topic at a particular moment of time, but also contributes to the cultivation of values and norms in a particular culture that go far beyond this topic. The discourse in media establishes relations of power between particular social groups and (re)structures the way people see the roles of those groups. This is why discussion of a particular case of denying ordination to women in the Latvian Evangelical Lutheran Church (ELCL), the biggest church in Latvia, is determined by and has an impact on …

Looking For Love On A Chilly Night: The Colorado Brown Tarantula Mating Season, Dallas Haselhuhn

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Aphonopelma hentzi is the most widespread and abundant tarantula species in the United States. While a distinct mating season is observed, it has not been well studied and the environmental drivers for the mating season are unknown. By conducting daily surveys on a peripheral population within Southeast Colorado, between August and November 2022, I found that after the first significant temperature drop, the number of mate-seeking males was significantly higher than prior to this temperature event. Mate-seeking males were significantly correlated with a drop in the water vapor pressure gradient, a rarely used biological metric for assessing potential water loss …