Digital Commons Network^™

Seeing Is Believing: Identifying The “Ideal Manifestation Of Hidden Disability” In Ontario’S And Quebec’S Social Benefits Tribunals, Pascale Malenfant

Dalhousie Law Journal

The phenomenon of disability skepticism, especially in relation to “hidden” disabilities like chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), has fostered a culture of doubt among medical, legal, and public entities. This paper explores the intersection of such skepticism with the social benefits adjudication processes in Ontario and Quebec. In drawing parallels to feminist critiques of the “ideal victim” in sexual assault cases, it argues that the tribunals’ biased framework for believability is based on a claimant’s conformity to stereotypical expectations of what an “ideal” claimant with a hidden disability looks like. By comparatively examining 10 years worth of Ontario and Quebec tribunal …

Curricular Choices: Misconceptions Regarding Law School Courses, Constance Backhouse, Holland Stille, Avery Esford

Dalhousie Law Journal

Canadian law schools offer their upper-year students a wealth of optional curricular choices. Yet many students choose narrowly and poorly. This article addresses the misconceptions that many hold as they select their second- and third-year courses. Often students believe they need certain courses to get a job, to prepare for articling, to pass the bar exams, or to prepare for future legal careers. In most cases, these concerns are erroneous. This article urges students to choose based on factual evidence rather than imagined anxieties and on personal interest rather than the “group think” rigidity that infects much of the curricular …

What Can Trends In Emergency Department Visits Tell Us About Child Mental Health?, Han Choi, Adriana Corredor-Waldron, Janet Currie, Chris Felton

Cowles Foundation Discussion Papers

Increases in mental health diagnoses and suicidal behaviors in Emergency Departments are often cited as evidence of an accelerating child mental health crisis. We ask whether trends in ED visits provide an accurate picture of changes in U.S. child mental health. These measures have been profoundly affected by changing conventions about screening, defining, and coding of mental illness. We conclude that child mental health has been deteriorating, but not by the startling magnitudes suggested by jumps and trends in some measures such as suicidal ideation. Although reported suicidal behaviors rose 228% from 2006–2021, the true rise in mental health disorders …

Diabetes-Related Foot Complications And Socioeconomic Influences Among Hispanic Males In South Texas: A Scoping Review, Mariana J. Rodriguez, Demian Rodriguez, Amanda L. Killeen

School of Podiatric Medicine - Student Research

Introduction: Diabetes mellitus is the 7^th leading cause of death in the United States and is 6^th in the state of Texas. Counties from South Texas are primarily affected with higher rates of diabetes than both the state and national average. Diabetes mellitus is a complex and progressive disease which can affect multiple systems of the body, leading to serious complications if untreated, especially in the lower extremities. Uncontrolled diabetes is often associated with diabetic foot ulcers (DFU), foot infections, and lower extremity amputations (LEA). South Texas is a region predominantly populated by Hispanic Americans who are disproportionally …

Dignity And Deepfakes, Michael Goodyear

Articles & Chapters

Today, we face a dangerous technosocial combination: AI-generated deepfakes and the Internet. Believable and accessible, these deepfakes have already spread sex, lies, and false advertisements across the Internet and targeted everyone from Taylor Swift to middle school students. Dissemination of deepfakes inflicts multifarious dignitary harms against their victims—especially women and LGBTQ+ persons—stripping them of control over their own identities, harming their reputations, and ostracizing them from society through shame.

Yet this is not the first time a new technology for capturing one’s likeness and a method for disseminating images threatened individuals’ dignity. In the late nineteenth century, the right of …

Closing The Graduation Gap: Factors That Impact The Graduation And Enrollment Rates Of First Generation African American Male Students At Predominantly White Christian Universities, Byron C. Johnson Jr

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

First-generation African American male students encounter unique challenges on their journey through higher education. These challenges include inadequate academic preparation, limited family support, financial hardships, and difficulties in finding a sense of belonging. Additionally, factors such as race and religion present significant barriers that hinder their ability to persist in and graduate from colleges and universities without institutional support. Strategic initiatives, programs, and services that address the specific needs of these students are crucial for promoting their academic and social integration, ultimately influencing their success in higher education. This study focused on the experiences of successful first-generation African American students …

The Power A Generation Holds: A Study On Students Generating Change In American Social Movements, Caroline E. Koziol

Dartmouth College Master’s Theses

Social activism ebbs and flows throughout American history. In the contemporary period, high visual coverage of activism has contributed to frustrations over the apparent decrease in change despite perceptions of increased participation. Young activists in the classroom ask questions to learn from their predecessors. This paper focuses on answering, “How can students create sustained change through social activism?” The present work recenters activism in the role of students and higher education institutions, noting their potential for creating change through a formula for future activists to engage with. The proposed formula targets methods and theories to bolster success towards the cause …

The Sports Parent's Predicament, Katharine B. Silbaugh

Faculty Scholarship

Youth sport enjoys a favored status in American culture, encouraged by policymakers and local communities, pursued by parents, and remembered through rose-colored lenses by adults. Most lawyers are familiar with Justice Harry Blackmun’s ode to the magical qualities of baseball in Flood v. Kuhn, in which he took the liberty of running through his own memories of scores of baseball legends.¹ Congress and presidents want children to continue in sport.² Many in the health field argue that sport is important because exercise is important, and sport is treated as the natural manifestation of exercise.³ An enormous number—perhaps …

Towards A Unified Framework For Knowledge Tracing With Graph Convolutional And Neural Architectures, Yaxi Su, Mohamad Yusof Darus, Norizan Mat Diah, Jinpeng Huang, Azlin Ramli

Malaysian Journal of Computing (MJoC)

This paper sets out to propose a unified theoretical framework for knowledge tracing (KT) that combines graph convolutional networks (GCNs) with neural sequence architectures in intelligent tutoring systems. While existing methods have achieved some success, they face limitations in modelling relational dependencies among concepts and the temporal progression of learner behaviour. Building on socio-constructivist views of knowledge as a network of relations and connectionist accounts of learning as adaptation over time, the framework integrates graph-based relational reasoning with sequence-based temporal modelling. The argument advanced here is that the integration offers interpretable representations of knowledge states while preserving predictive performance. The …

Experiments In Church-Based Research, David R. Dunaetz

Great Commission Research Journal

Experiments, with their ability to establish causal relationships (unlike correlational studies), are an under-utilized research tool in church-based research. This article examines experimental designs, including pre-experiments, true experiments, and quasi-experiments, and their relevance to church contexts. The challenges of random assignment, ethical considerations, and threats to validity, such as history, maturation, and selection effects, are real, but not insurmountable. There are practical limitations to experiments in church settings, but previously conducted experiments focusing on Bible reading, church attendance, and leadership development initiatives demonstrate their feasibility. The value of experimental methodologies for understanding church-related phenomena, improving ministry effectiveness, fostering spiritual growth, …

Diabetes-Related Foot Complications And Socioeconomic Influences Among Hispanic Males In South Texas: A Scoping Review, Mariana J. Rodriguez, Demian Rodriguez, Amanda Killeen

School of Podiatric Medicine Publications

Introduction: Diabetes mellitus is the 7th leading cause of death in the U.S. and 6th in Texas. South Texas counties have higher diabetes rates than state and national averages. This complex, progressive disease affects multiple body systems and can lead to serious complications, especially in the lower extremities. Uncontrolled diabetes is often associated with diabetic foot ulcers (DFU), foot infections, and lower extremity amputations (LEA). South Texas, predominantly Hispanic American, is disproportionately affected. This demographic faces clinical barriers due to a lack of cultural understanding, highlighting the need for culturally sensitive healthcare workers such as promotoras. This study aimed to …

Front Matter, Michigan Law Review

Michigan Law Review

Front Matter for Volume 124, Issue 1 of Michigan Law Review

Citizen Shareholders: The State As A Fiduciary In International Investment Law, Eleanor L. Thompson

Michigan Law Review

International investment law provides stability for investors, helps capital flow across the globe, and can be a critical tool for sustainable development. This regime, however, has become increasingly controversial, in part due to its inability to reconcile investor obligations with competing human rights obligations. International investment treaties provide substantive guarantees to investors, including submission to binding arbitration in the event of breach. When found in breach of one of these guarantees, international investment arbitral tribunal awards are often in the hundreds of millions of dollars, potentially creating “regulatory chill” for states that may otherwise take affirmative action to protect human …

Finding Aid For University Of Mississippi Small Manuscripts(Mum01771)

Archives & Special Collections: Finding Aids (alphabetical)

The collection contains items related to the University of Mississippi. The collection is arranged by subject.

Antitransgender Legislation And Needs Of Transgender Floridians, 2018–2024, Callan Hummel, Kim-Phuong Truong-Vu, Kathryn Nowotny, Ashley Mayfaire, Beaux Ramos, Jasmine Mckenzie, Charlton C. Copeland, Tiffany R. Glynn

Articles

Objectives. To document transgender Floridians’ service needs before and after antitransgender state legislation.

Methods. We conducted descriptive and change point analyses of intake survey data collected by a transgender-led community-based organization in Florida from 701 clients who requested services between 2018 and 2024.

Results. Findings show enrollment for services increased during the rise in antitransgender legislation, with pressing needs for legal and financial support for name changes and gender-affirming health care. The percentage of clients requesting sexual health resources increased, especially among Black clients.

Conclusions. Findings underscore the urgency of (1) understanding the impact of antitransgender legislation on service needs, …

The Excellent Legal Scholar, Seow Hon Tan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Excellent Legal Scholar: This article considers how virtues pan out in the life of the legal scholar, bearing in mind the purpose of legal scholarship and the identity of the legal scholar, who plays multifarious roles in today's research landscape. I consider how vision is important for the excellent legal scholar, bearing in mind that an aretaic account should be attentive to eudaimonia. I conclude with soul-searching questions for the legal scholar who endeavours to live an examined life that stands up to aretaic appraisal.

Studying Topic Evolution Based On Bertopic Model And Semantic Function, Jiabin Qu, Mengyang Wang

Journal of Scientific Information Research

[Purpose/significance] Topic evolution analysis can help researchers quickly grasp the research hotspots and development trends of a discipline. However, existing topic models often overlook the semantic functions and structures of texts during topic extraction, making it difficult to reveal the deeper patterns of disciplinary development. This paper proposes an integrated framework for topic evolution analysis that combines the BERTopic model with semantic functions, aiming to enrich and improve the methodological system of topic evolution research.

[Method/process] Firstly, the BERTopic model is used to extract topics, obtaining the“Topic-Word”distribution. Next, a discourse parsing tool analyzes abstracts into five semantic function segments, resulting …

Identifying Key Influencing Factors Of Elderly Health Information Search Based On Meta-Ethnography, Zhumei Sun, Zhibing Wang

Journal of Scientific Information Research

[Purpose/significance] Health information search is an important way for elderly people to actively cope with aging. Identifying the key factors affecting of their health information searching and exploring the correlation among these factors are of positive significance for promoting the elderly proactive health ability.

[Method/process] This paper firstly integrated the original research through a meta-ethnographic approach to form a set of factors influencing the elderly health information search. The DEMATEL method was then used to analyze the interrelationships among the influencing factors and identify the key influencing factors.

[Result/conclusion] The study finds that, the influencing factors of elderly health information …

A Qualitative Exploration Of Parents' Experiences Of Homeschooling In The United Arab Emirates: Motivations And Challenges, Reem Thani Aldhaheri

All Works

Homeschooling in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is an understudied phenomenon despite the growing numbers of homeschoolers. Controversies about homeschooling and its impact on children’s well-being create a social stigma around families that choose to homeschool their children for various reasons. This study explored the experiences of homeschoolers in the UAE, specifically, the motivations for homeschooling and the challenges homeschooling families face during the experience. The study followed a qualitative exploratory approach using a semi-structured interview. The sample consisted of 16 parents of different nationalities living in the UAE. Data were analyzed using a thematic approach to gain an in-depth …

Rethinking Behavior - Fall 2025, Midwest Symposium For Leadership In Behavior Disorders

ReThinking Behavior Magazine

A magazine for professionals serving children and youth with behavioral needs.

Fall 2025, Volume 9, Issue 1

Introduction To Joint Issue, Thomas Seckler

Great Commission Research Journal

No abstract provided.

Life In The Kingdom: Reimagining Theological Education For A Post-Secular Global Age, Jose Philip

Great Commission Research Journal

Theological education faces a profound crisis, shaped by globalization, secularization, and an epistemological fracture that prioritizes intellectual mastery over spiritual formation. Many seminaries fail to cultivate graduates who are spiritually grounded and missionally engaged due to models rooted in Enlightenment rationalism and managerial pragmatism. This paper advocates for reimagining theological education as a Kingdom-centered vocation, emphasizing transformative participation in the life of God. The paper calls for a shift from content delivery to character formation, centering theological education on faithful, embodied witness to God's mission in a complex world.

Misuse Of Financial Services For The Sexual Exploitation Of Children: A Socio-Legal Study In Indonesia, Ahmad Sofian

The Indonesian Journal of Socio-Legal Studies

This paper discusses children in the online space who are entrapped in interactions across various social media applications and digital platforms and became victims of sexual exploitation practices and how this sexual exploitation is facilitated by the availability of diverse financial service providers that allow for transactions between perpetrators and victims as well as distributors and producers. In view of ongoing efforts by the Indonesian government to formulate more relevant and effective regulations for child protection, this study is crucial for our understanding of the realities of sexual exploitation in the context of children’s use of social media and may …

Legal Protections For Gig Workers: A Comparative Socio-Legal Study Of Indonesia And India, Vidisha Shekhawat, Pranjal Khare

The Indonesian Journal of Socio-Legal Studies

The platform economy has transformed the lines of labour in the last few years across both developed and developing countries. In the case of other countries, such as Indonesia and India, where informal employment has been a long-standing characteristic of the labour force, the rise of digital platforms, including Gojek, Grab, Swiggy, and Zomato, has added another layer of complexity to already existing labour issues. These services provide flexibility and earning potential, albeit in exchange for social safety nets and work rights. This paper undertakes a doctrinal and comparative socio-legal study to observe the way the legal jurisdictions of Indonesia …

Tassel Turning Versus Tossing In The Towel: An Analysis Of Undergraduate Student Persistence And Challenges, Josie Ambur

Journal of the Symposium of University Research and Creative Expression

Project Mentor(s): Pamela McMullin-Messier, Bernadette Jungblut

Completing college is no easy feat. All higher education has barriers and obstacles students must face and overcome. Observations have been used to gather various student perspectives that have been compiled alongside research in the field to create a picture of what student barriers look like at Central Washington University specifically. Some of these barriers include navigating academic requirements, challenges with academic advisors, unique challenges first-generation students face, and financial challenges including balancing employment and academics. Within the personal lives of students, there are several internal factors that impact their success such as their …

Appropriate Blackness: Feminism, C.R.T, Marxism & Boxing, Olene Togiailua

Journal of the Symposium of University Research and Creative Expression

Project Mentor(s): Cynthia Pengilly, PhD

Black people of the Progressive era were concerned with how to regulate their behavior to better their position in society. This research will examine the synthesis of gender performativity, critical race theory, Marxism, and psychoanalysis to create an assimilation identity strategy called “Appropriate Blackness” and how it is demonstrated through the sport of Boxing. The case study subject of all these different frameworks is the first Black Heavyweight champion of the world, Jack Johnson, who was the premier Black celebrity during the Progressive Era and thus an example for a specific gender strategy many working-class …

Examine Supreme Court Decisions That Have Influenced The Gender Salary Gap, Shinhae Hwang

Journal of the Symposium of University Research and Creative Expression

Project Mentor(s): Rodrigo Murataya, PhD

Despite significant advancements in gender equality policies and legal frameworks, women consistently earn less than men across various industries and job positions (Blau & Khan, 2017). As of 2023, median weekly wages of full-time women are 83.6 percent of the median weekly wages of men, an increase of just three percentage points since 2004 (BLS 2024). This stalled convergence in the gender gap in wages has led to a large and vibrant research literature that seeks to understand why change has been so slow (England 2010). This paper explores the impact of legislative acts such …

Into The Canebrakes: Arkansas And Naacp's Campaign For A Federal Anti-Lynching Law, Marie Claire Durr

The Ozark Historical Review

Race relations worsened and violence driven by racism increased following World War I. As a result, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or the NAACP, began to scout out cases they could employ in the fight to enshrine federal protections against racial terrorism that were exemplified in Arkansas' 1919 Elaine Massacre and the 1921 lynching of Henry Lowery.

“If I Ruled The World”: Deploying Spatial Imaginaries For Examining Anti-Blackness And Space In Precollege Engineering Education, Christopher Wright, Monet V. F. Harbison

Journal of Pre-College Engineering Education Research (J-PEER)

Engineering’s systemic exclusion of Black people has been a decades-long inquiry. While critical race theory and community cultural wealth have been utilized to examine anti-Blackness in precollege engineering education, critical geographies have been underutilized. This essay contends that the deployment of a spatial imaginaries lens could be used to expand understandings of the spatial imaginary of anti-Blackness in the discipline. Using historical and contemporary data from an engineering high school as well as nonpositivist ways of knowing, the essay contends that examining spatial realities and underpinnings are opportune provocations for redefining purposes, assumptions, and values in precollege engineering education.

Realidades De Las Organizaciones De La Sociedad Civil En México: Índice De Fomento A Las Actividades De Las Osc, Pablo Armando González Ulloa Aguirre

Journal of Nonprofit Innovation

Este artículo presenta los hallazgos derivados de la construcción de un Índice que evalúa el estado del fomento de las Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil (OSC) en las 32 entidades federativas de México durante el año 2021. También describe los criterios considerados en la construcción del Índice y los resultados obtenidos en cada una de sus dimensiones. El Índice proporciona una perspectiva integral y multidimensional sobre el estudio del fomento a las OSC, analizando las dimensiones legal, institucional y programática con el objetivo de comparar los avances y los retrocesos en este ámbito. Al hacerlo, ofrece una oportunidad para mejorar …