Digital Commons Network^™

New Approaches And Challenges Regarding Trade, Climate Action, And The Wto, Sunayana Sasmal

Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment

This report considers how the WTO, as an institution and its rules, can and should be a game-changer in undertaking climate action and the green energy transition globally. By leveraging its toolkit, the WTO has the potential to drive climate action, from regulating border carbon adjustments to promoting trade in green products, green electricity, and dissemination of climate technologies. However, unlocking this potential requires legal reforms, a proactive institutional role, and strong political will from WTO members.

Effects Of Parent Involvement In Academic Achievement Of Upper Elementary School Student, Joseph Guzman

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

This senior capstone research project focuses on how parental involvement can affect academic achievement in upper elementary school students. Understanding the various factors of parental involvement is crucial to gaining insight into its impact on students, parents, teachers, and principals. Through the use of literature review, interviews with four teachers, one principal, and anonymous surveys of one classroom of 26 fourth-grade students, the result findings indicated that parental involvement is a vital component of students' academics and is essential for their positive progress. Effective communication among teachers, principals, and parents regarding class and schoolwork significantly impacts students' academic achievement. In …

Enhancing Memory Through Literary Features, Sarah Naylor

Psychological Science Undergraduate Honors Theses

Literary devices used by a writer can influence and impact the manner in which readers respond and interact with a text. Both the perspectives readers are expected to take while reading and the amount of foregrounding in a text cognitively and affectively influence a reader’s experience. However, little research has explored what effects these factors have on verbatim memory. For this research, participants were instructed to read a short literary story either by identifying with the protagonist or as a spectator. After reading and completing a range of other tasks, participants were asked to select sentences they saw in the …

Enhancing Password Security And Memorability Using Machine Learning And Linguistic Patterns, Jared Wise

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

In the digital age, text-based passwords remain a primary method for securing online accounts. Yet, users frequently face a dilemma between creating passwords that are easy to remember and sufficiently secure against cyberattacks. This research introduces an approach to password generation that bridges this gap by utilizing linguistic patterns, particularly song lyrics, to develop highly secure and naturally memorable passwords. Using large lyric datasets gained from web scrapes from popular song lyric websites (AZ Lyrics, Genius), features are extracted from a corpus of over 5 million lyrics using sentence structure and natural language processing in a novel way. In using …

Mission Possible: Motivating Students Toward High School Completion, Terri Howard

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Celebrated each spring, high school graduation yields many positive, long-term impacts on an individual’s life. These include better overall health, lower reliance on government resources, higher lifetime earnings, and eligibility for post-secondary educational opportunities (Levin et al., 2007; Rowley et al., 2011; McFarland et al., 2019; Uretsky, 2019). While the benefits of high school completion are clear, each year hundreds of students fail to meet diploma requirements. Autonomous motivation, both intrinsic motivation and integrated regulation, drives engagement in activities perceived as relevant to desired outcomes and is closely associated with positive academic performance, school persistence (Deci et al., 1991; Vallerand …

The Elusive Nature Of Martian Liquid Brines, Vincent F. Chevrier, Rachel A. Slank

Space and Planetary Science Faculty Publications and Presentations

The possible presence of brines on Mars adds an intriguing dimension to the exploration of Martian environments. Their potential involvement in the formation of recurring slope lineae has sparked debates on the existence of liquid water versus alternative dry processes. In situ instrumentation on rovers and landers has been instrumental in providing valuable data for comprehending the dynamics of brines. Laboratory experiments and thermodynamic simulations conducted under Martian conditions offer insights into the formation and persistence of brines, shedding light on the planet’s current hydrological processes. Despite these findings, the prevailing surface conditions on Mars, characterized by a combination of …

Verification Of Past Beliefs Influences Current Beliefs, Michael Wolfe, Todd Williams, Alexander J. Denison, Liam W. Hart

Open Access Publishing Support Funded Articles

Background: It is important to understand the factors that influence belief formation and belief change.

Objective: We test the hypothesis that following belief change about contentious topics, verifying a past belief will influence current beliefs.

Methods: In Experiment 1, participants reported initial beliefs about television violence in a prescreening, then read a belief-inconsistent text in the experiment. Participants either verified or did not verify their initial beliefs before reporting current beliefs. In Experiment 2, participants were randomly assigned to verify their initial belief (about gun control effectiveness), a false belief that was the opposite of their initial belief or did …

Primary Industries Education Foundation Australia (Piefa) Storm And Flood Industry Recovery Program: Evaluation Report, Tamara Van Der Zant, Katherine Dix

Program monitoring and evaluation

Despite the growing diversity of careers in Primary Industries, young peoples’ pursuit of agricultural careers is often hampered by outdated perceptions of the sector and its opportunities. As Primary Industries adapt to the threat of natural disasters by turning to scientific and technological solutions, a diverse, highly skilled workforce will be required. In the wake of the devastating impacts of storm and floods in early 2021 across New South Wales, the Storm and Flood Industry Recovery Program (SFIRP): Creating resilience through empowering school curriculums about primary industries careers project was developed. To aid the long-term recovery and resilience of the …

Use Of Hatchery-Raised Fish In Validation Of Daily Age Estimates For Juvenile Common Snook, Philip W. Stevens, Kyle L. Williams, Meredith B. Pfennig, Ryan W. Schloesser, Alexis A. Trotter, Derek P. Crane

Biology

Objective: We investigated the validity of daily age estimates for juvenile Common Snook Centropomus undecimalis by using sectioned and sanded sagittal otoliths. Methods: Common Snook have a protracted spawning season, which is problematic for validation of daily ages because a hatch date—needed to calculate age—cannot be reasonably assigned like it can for species with a short spawning period (<30 days). To help overcome this, two readers independently counted presumed daily increments in otoliths collected from hatchery-reared Common Snook of known age (100–240 days; n = 91). Result: Differences between known ages and those estimated from otoliths were small (mean absolute difference = 3.4 days) for individuals aged 100 days, but these differences increased after 100 days, mainly due to the crowding of increments along the otolith margin. Underestimation of ages was 8% at 120 days, 29% at 180 days, and 36% at 240 days. Conclusion: Ideally, analyses based on counts of daily increments in Common Snook otoliths should be limited to fish with an age of 100 days or younger.

Marine Clay Maturation Induces Systematic Silicon Isotope Decrease In Authigenic Clays And Pore Fluids, Sonja Geilert, Daniel A. Frick, April N. Abbott, Stefan C. Löhr

Marine Science

Marine silicate alteration exerts a major influence on marine carbon and cation cycles, but has proven difficult to quantify. In this context, silicon isotopes of marine pore fluids became an important tracer. However, poorly constrained silicon isotope signatures of precipitates produced during silicate alteration (i.e. authigenic clays) remain a major source of uncertainty. Here we present in situ silicon isotope analyses of marine authigenic clays (intergrown iron-smectites and iron-glauconites) occurring within recent sediments from the Oregon margin, eastern North Pacific. We identify a trend to lower silicon isotopes (from −2.24‰ to −3.17‰), accompanied by decreasing aluminum/silicon ratios and increasing potassium …

“Breaking Barriers: Empowering African Youth Through Implementation Of A Therapeutic Patient Education Program For Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis”, Wafa Hamdi, Angela Migowa, Hanene Lassoued Ferjani, Alia Fazaa, Saoussen Miladi, Kaouther Maatallah, Kawther Ben Abdelghani, Ayodele Faleye

Paediatrics and Child Health, East Africa

Introduction: Patient education is crucial in managing chronic diseases like Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA). Traditional methods such as videos and brochures often fail to maintain long-term knowledge retention. Therapeutic Patient Education (TPE) offers a more effective, patient-centered approach.

Objective: PAFLAR aimed to implement a TPE program with a “train the trainers” masterclass to ensure effective delivery and improve outcomes for children with JIA.

Methods: PAFLAR’s TPE program was designed through a focus group, involving a literature review and strategic planning for the implementation step. The program includes specialized training for healthcare professionals enhancing their abilities to deliver …

Recreational Fishing For Western Rock Lobster: Estimates Of Participation, Effort And Catch In 2023/24, Claire B. Smallwood, Karina L. Ryan, Alissa C. Tate

Fisheries Research Reports

The Western Rock Lobster (WRL) (Panulirus cygnus) is the most commonly caught Rock Lobster (RL) species in Western Australia. Catches from the commercial and recreational sectors are required to determine and monitor Total Allowable Commercial Catch (TACC), Total Allowable Recreational Catch (TARC) and the proportion of Allowable Harvest Level (AHL) achieved. The TARC is set at 5% of the AHL and evaluated in the harvest strategy based on a 5-year average.

Data for the recreational sector are obtained using phone-recall surveys to provide annual estimates of participation, fishing effort and retained catch (by numbers) from recreational fishers who hold a …

Volumetric Breast Density Estimation From Three-Dimensional Reconstructed Digital Breast Tomosynthesis Images Using Deep Learning, Vinayak S Ahluwalia, Nehal Doiphode, Walter C Mankowski, Eric A Cohen, Sarthak Pati, Lauren Pantalone, Spyridon Bakas, Ari Brooks, Celine M Vachon, Emily F Conant, Aimilia Gastounioti, Despina Kontos

2020-Current year OA Pubs

PURPOSE: Breast density is a widely established independent breast cancer risk factor. With the increasing utilization of digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) in breast cancer screening, there is an opportunity to estimate volumetric breast density (VBD) routinely. However, current available methods extrapolate VBD from two-dimensional (2D) images acquired using DBT and/or depend on the existence of raw DBT data, which is rarely archived by clinical centers because of storage constraints.

METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed 1,080 nonactionable three-dimensional (3D) reconstructed DBT screening examinations acquired between 2011 and 2016. Reference tissue segmentations were generated using previously validated software that uses 3D reconstructed slices …

Correlating Clinical Course With Baseline Subcortical Shape In Provisional Tic Disorder, Tiffanie Che, Soyoung Kim, Deanna J Greene, Ashley Heywood, Jimin Ding, Tamara Hershey, Bradley L Schlaggar, Kevin J Black, Lei Wang

2020-Current year OA Pubs

OBJECTIVE: This study examined children at the onset of tic disorder (tics for less than 9 months: NT group), a population on which little research exists. Here, we investigate relationships between the baseline shape and volume of subcortical nuclei, diagnosis, and tic symptom outcomes.

METHODS: 187 children were assessed at baseline and a 12-month follow-up: 88 with NT, 60 tic-free healthy controls (HC), and 39 with chronic tic disorder/Tourette syndrome (TS), using T1-weighted MRI and total tic scores (TTS) from the Yale Global Tic Severity Scale to evaluate symptom change. Subcortical surface maps were generated using FreeSurfer-initialized large deformation diffeomorphic …

Optimizing Topical Drop Efficacy With Proper Eyelid Positioning, Yu Xia, Nathaniel A Blecher, Philip L Custer, Erin G Sieck

2020-Current year OA Pubs

PURPOSE: To report the observation that the efficacy of topical glaucoma treatment improved after surgical correction of ectropion in a 71-year-old male with a known history of glaucoma.

OBSERVATIONS: The patient initially presented for tearing and lid malposition and was found to have bilateral elevated intraocular pressures (IOP) in addition to bilateral lower eyelid ectropion. IOP control was initially prioritized over ectropion repair, with IOP remaining elevated despite topical glaucoma treatment and selective laser trabeculoplasty. Sequential unilateral ectropion repair was then carried out, with topical glaucoma treatment resumed after the first repair. It was observed that the IOP improved with …

Emergent Microenvironments Of Nucleoli, Matthew R King, Kiersten M Ruff, Rohit V Pappu

2020-Current year OA Pubs

In higher eukaryotes, the nucleolus harbors at least three sub-phases that facilitate multiple functionalities including ribosome biogenesis. The three prominent coexisting sub-phases are the fibrillar center (FC), the dense fibrillar component (DFC), and the granular component (GC). Here, we review recent efforts in profiling sub-phase compositions that shed light on the types of physicochemical properties that emerge from compositional biases and territorial organization of specific types of macromolecules. We highlight roles played by molecular grammars which refers to protein sequence features including the substrate binding domains, the sequence features of intrinsically disordered regions, and the multivalence of these distinct types …

Three Proposals For Fixing The Tcja, Reuven S. Avi-Yonah

Articles

The year 2025 promises to be important in U.S. tax history for three reasons. First, the expiration of the individual provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act means that Congress is very likely to enact important tax legislation to prevent tax increases for millions of individual taxpayers. Second, a new administration frequently means tax legislation, typically through budget reconciliation if the same party controls Congress (1981, 1993, 2001, 2017, 2022). Third, the trifecta of Supreme Court decisions in 2024 (Moore, Corner Post, and Loper Bright) suggests that there may be a spike in litigation challenging various tax provisions as …

Next Steps In Online Courts: Accelerating Access To Justice Through Court Technology, J.J. Prescott

Articles

For more than a decade, state courts have been expanding access to justice by adopting online dispute resolution (ODR) platforms and other outward-facing communication technologies. At a deep level, these reforms aim at improving society by bolstering the rule of law. At a surface level, these innovations recognize that the justice system works better when courts and law are easier and less costly to understand and use. In important respects, these efforts have been a success. The accessibility of many state courts is considerably more robust today than it was ten years ago, at least for small-stakes cases, like traffic …

Psychology Graduate Student Experiences, Social Support, And Mental Health, Kathryn Lang

Theses and Dissertations

Graduate school is a highly stressful experience for many psychology students. Accordingly, graduate psychology programs need to identify and minimize unnecessary sources of stress on their students. Despite the importance of this topic, there is little research on factors that increase psychology graduate students’ stress. The present study determined how a student’s financial difficulties, quality of their social support, quality of their faculty support, number of adverse experiences they had in their program, the impact of a student’s negative experience in their program; and the population size of the location of their program affect a student’s mental health, perceived progress …

Personality Across Realities: Correlations Between Personality Profiles And Preferences Within Roleplaying Games, Brittany Lee Mancha

Theses and Dissertations

Clinically maladaptive behaviors and personality types have been studied within gamers, both those who play video games and those who roleplay in tabletop games. However, the connection between personality types and the preferences of the players themselves in what and how they roleplay is just barely being studied. Personality traits, such as extraversion/introversion and motivation by pain or pleasure, may be both influencing the gameplay decisions and preferences of players, and vice versa. A total of 500 respondents completed the Millon Index of Personality Styles, Revised (MIPS-R), followed by a demographics survey and finally a survey assessing Dungeons and Dragons', …

Developing Inclusive Practices Through Peer Coaching In College Science Teaching, Briana Miller

Theses and Dissertations

Historically underrepresented students pursuing STEM majors encounter systemic barriers. Students are more likely to experience success when faculty implement inclusive practices. Faculty often lack the pedagogical training necessary to adopt inclusive practices, further perpetuating inequities. To eliminate barriers and offer equitable opportunities for success in STEM majors, this case study explores the implementation of peer coaching and Culturally Relevant Science Teaching (CRST) in college level science teaching, focusing on the experiences of three participating faculty. Through a year-long professional development (PD) cycle, three science faculty members from a small liberal arts college engaged in reflective practices aimed at improving their …

Experimental Investigation Of Freezing Microdroplets For Understanding Chain Crystal Aggregates Observed In Atmospheric Clouds, Imteaz Osmani

Theses and Dissertations

Ice crystal aggregates are observed in upper stratospheric clouds. The crystal aggregates can form in different orientations, geometry, and shapes which are not well studied. These crystal aggregations are found in the clouds as crystal chains of various lengths and cause damage to hypersonic vehicles which include missiles, re-entry vehicles, and jet aircraft. The reasons behind such damage by atmospheric crystal chains to hypersonic bodies are unknown. That is why studying these ice crystals and their behavior in the hypersonic environment is necessary. Ice crystals form in the atmosphere in two different ways which are homogenous and heterogenous. Heterogenous freezing …

Behavioral Health Workforce Modeling To Assist In Prioritizing Educational Pathways Programs In North Dakota, Mandi-Leigh Peterson

Theses and Dissertations

Background. The need for behavioral health services in North Dakota has grown in recent years. As part of the response to the need for services, a state definition of behavioral health workforce was enacted in state statute to assist in addressing this need. Thus far, no empirical evaluations of the status of that workforce have been conducted.Purpose. The primary purpose of this work was to quantify the supply and demand for the behavioral health workforce in North Dakota to assist in identifying and prioritizing those educational pathways that can assist in growing the identified needed workforce. Sample. This study examined …

Using Problematic Sexual Behaviors And The Developmental Life Course Model To Predict Criminal Justice Involvement And Psychopathology By Early Adulthood, Amanda Schwartz

Theses and Dissertations

The developmental life course (DLC) model explains risk factors and developmental patterns among juveniles who have committed more than one sexual offense by considering the impact of major life events, experiences, and risk and protective factors throughout various developmental stages. Using an archival longitudinal dataset, the Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN), this study applied the DLC model to explore the relationship between gender and onset and persistence of problematic sexual behaviors (PSBs) in childhood and adolescence with criminal justice involvement and psychopathology by early adulthood (N = 330, 46% male, M = 18.26 years) after controlling for …

The Fcc 5-Year Deorbit Rule’S Impact On The Space Industry Including Non-Traditional Scientific And Environmental Stakeholders, Kristin Shahady

Theses and Dissertations

In pursuit of a safer and more sustainable space environment, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) introduced the 5-year deorbit rule, a regulatory mandate aimed at mitigating space debris by requiring satellite operators to remove their spacecraft from LEO within 5 years after their mission is complete. While the intent behind this rule is admirable in the desire to remediate and limit the generation of orbital debris, it raises questions whether it was crafted with consideration of all stakeholders, whether it will truly mitigate the creation of orbital debris, and whether it exhibits characteristics of arbitrariness and capriciousness. Agencies’ actions be …

Handheld Multimodal Point Spectroscopy, Rgb Imaging, And Fusion Artificial Intelligence To Determine The Species And Freshness Of Fish Fillets, Mitchell Sueker

Theses and Dissertations

When fish species are mislabeled and the fish’s freshness is inaccurately represented, health, environmental, and economic problems can arise for both consumers and the fish industry. Fish are some of the easier foods to mislabel, as the processing of whole fish to fillets makes the visual identification of the species and freshness assessment more challenging. Due to the shortcomings of the current industry standards, confirmed by our interviews with over 20 professionals in all fish supply chain nodes, developing a system that can provide accurate and rapid on-site fraud detection is of necessity. In an attempt to meet these needs, …

Investigating The Impact Of Urban Areas On Quasi-Linear Convective Systems, Claiborne Wooton

Theses and Dissertations

Urban areas absorb and radiate energy at a higher rate compared to surrounding rural areas due to several factors, including an urban area’s tendency to have sparse vegetation and tree canopies along with high incidences of pavement. Urban areas have been shown to impact both the environment in which thunderstorms form (by altering thermodynamic, microphysical, and wind flow patterns) and the thunderstorms themselves; however, most of this previous work focused on isolated thunderstorms amid weak environmental vertical wind shear. This thesis analyzes how the structure of observed quasi-linear convective systems (QLCSs)—i.e., lines of thunderstorms—are altered as they pass over urban …

Frequency Distribution Of Graphemic-Phonemic Correspondences Of Vowels In English Children's Literature, Steven Michael Paquin

Graduate Masters Theses

Phonics instruction is widely regarded as the most efficacious method for teaching children to read English. In order to acquire reading, young-learners must connect orthography to phonology. An obstacle to English reading acquisition is the language’s opaque orthography. Its grapheme to phoneme correspondence is not 1:1. Instead, a range of multi-letter strings, or graphotactics, correspond to various phonemic sequences. This network of graphophonemic correspondences renders English reading acquisition an arduous undertaking for young-learners. Phonics curricula like Letters and Sounds (Department for Education and Skills, 2007) in the U.K. and UFLI Foundations (Lane et. al., 2022) in the U.S. aid young-learners …

The Impact Of Restorative Practice Implementation On Culturally Responsive Teaching And Student Behavior, Patrice Mccoy

Dissertations

American public schools uphold the policies, standards, and disciplinary practices that guide the belief systems of how students view fairness and deal with conflict. As teachers invest in student knowledge and seek to guide students in the right direction, the challenge is learning the appropriate methods of dealing with student behavior. Behavior management practices have evolved just as many student challenges and needs have changed. With these changes evolves the need to better understand students and families. Teachers gaining cultural responsiveness to student behavior challenges is a relatively new ideology to ensure students feel understood and more engaged in the …

The Effectiveness Of Mbsr On The Occupational Stress Of Correctional Officers, Nikolas Kerr

Dissertations

This dissertation looks at the negative effects of the work environment and other factors related to correctional officers lived experience. The intervention concentrates on the effect of mindfulness-based stress reduction on the occupational stress of correctional officers. Correctional officers have always dealt with difficult work conditions, but over the last 30 years the increase in the number of incarcerated people, the lack of retention among correctional officers, and the proliferation of inmates with complex mental health issues and gang affiliations have all created a much more complex and dangerous work environment. Combine this with the new understanding of the effects …