Digital Commons Network^™

Do Age And Media Type Influence The Effects Of Pretrial Publicity On Verdicts?, Akera Williams

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Concerns about Pretrial Publicity (PTP) have grown with the rise of the internet and social media, leading to a near impossibility of selecting a jury that can ignore PTP and focus only on facts presented at trial. Previous research has shown participants exposed to negative PTP were more likely to find the defendant guilty, and tended to misattribute PTP as having been evidence presented during the trial. This study compared jury verdicts among older and younger jurors when PTP was presented in different media formats (text vs video). Results suggest both older and younger jurors tend to misattribute PTP information …

Mindfulness Meditation Training And Naturalistic Prospective Memory Performance, Chris Nuño

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Although mindfulness research has become a trending topic in cognitive science, there is a gap in the literature that fails to explore the relationship between mindfulness and prospective memory (i.e., the ability to remember to execute a future intention). To explore this relationship, students in either a mindfulness condition or vocabulary control condition were asked to complete 10 self-concordant academic tasks (both time-based and nontime-based) over the course of five days. The percentage of academic tasks completed was calculated to measure prospective memory completion. Prospective memory performance was compared between groups and between task type. Trait mindfulness was also measured …

Does Cognitive Control Affect Successful "Sandbagging" Of Concussion Symptoms?, Melissa Materia

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The value of concussion baseline assessments is dependent upon athletes giving their best effort. If an athlete fakes poor performance or “sandbags”, a future injury may go undetected. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine if the SportGait concussion baseline assessment detects differences between participants instructed to sandbag and those who are not. Furthermore, I examined whether participants’ cognitive control is related to their ability to fake poor performance on SportGait. Forty-four participants completed two cognitive control tasks, were randomly assigned to “sandbag” or do their best and completed the SportGait baseline concussion assessment. Results revealed that “sandbagging” …

Experiences Of Employees With Chronic Health Conditions During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Stephanie Penpek

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Although workers with chronic health conditions have received little attention in past Industrial-Organizational Psychology research, the COVID-19 pandemic has brought new concerns for the workplace safety of these employees. I applied the JD-R model to a sample of 143 workers with chronic conditions, looking at how prevalent demands and resources impacted levels of burnout and emotional well-being. Quantitative analyses supported that job demands (i.e., devaluation and job insecurity) were generally related to negative health outcomes, while job resources (i.e., support and flexibility) were related to better health outcomes. Results also indicated that the impact of demands and resources on health …

Adverse Childhood Experiences (Aces) And Co-Occurring Disorders (Cods): Is There A Relationship Between Aces, Substance Use, And Mental Health Among Inmates?, Skylar Crick

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Previous literature has shown that adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are a factor in future criminal behavior, victimization, and overall health (DeLisi et al., 2017; Mersky et al., 2013; U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020). Research has also found that co-occurring disorders (CODs) are prevalent among inmates with approximately half of inmates meeting the criteria of mental health and substance use disorders in previous studies (Butler et al., 2011; James & Glaze, 2006). The current study explores the relationship between ACEs and CODs, specifically in the areas of substance use and mental health. This study utilizes a secondary data …

Total Rewards Or Totally Not What The People Want? Examining The Preferred Total Rewards Of Those At Home Vs. In The Workplace, Luke Ronchetti

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

With the rapid change to remote work, the present study explored whether differing life circumstances (e.g., an at-home parent vs. an older male) changed reward preferences. The present study adds to the scarce total reward preference research by examining the moderating effect age, gender, and parental status have on the relationship between physical work location and total reward preference. Results indicated age to be a moderator of the relationship between work location and reward preference (benefits, work-life effectiveness, performance management, talent development), but gender and parental status were not significant moderators. Exploratory analyses were performed and found correlations between work …

Machine Learning-Enabled Classification Of Climbers Using Small Data, Nicholas Milburn

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Athlete performance scoring within climbing presents interesting challenges as the sport does not have an objective way to assign skill. Assessing skill level is valuable as it can be used to mark training progress and help an athlete choose appropriate climbs to attempt. Machine learning-based methods are popular for complex problems like this. The dataset available was composed of dynamic force data recorded during climbing; however, this dataset came with challenges such as data scarcity, imbalance, and it was temporally heterogeneous. Investigated solutions to these challenges include data augmentation, temporal normalization, conversion of time series to the spectral domain, and …

Situational And Individual Factors Of Reactive Cognitive Control: Examining Feedback And Motivation, Robert Robbins

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

This study examined the influences of individuals’ cognitive intrinsic motivation and the presence or absence of feedback on a cognitive task that encouraged reactive cognitive control. I hypothesized that the presence of feedback would facilitate faster responses. I also hypothesized that cognitive intrinsic motivation, one’s disposition towards exerting cognitive effort, would be related to reactive cognitive control in reward situations. Sixty-six individuals completed the Need for Cognition questionnaire (Cacioppo & Petty, 1984) to measure cognitive intrinsic motivation and were randomly assigned to either a rewarded feedback or informative feedback Stroop task. My findings support my first hypothesis indicating a role …

Topological Analysis Of Microtubules During Cell Division, Hemanth Kumar Mandya Nagaiah

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Cells are complex biological systems, composed by many biopolymers, which undergo morphological changes during cell division. Microtubules are biopolymers essential for functions in the cell. Understanding the role of microtubules in cell division requires characterizing their conformations during this process. In this thesis, we model the microtubules by mathematical curves in space and use methods from Knot Theory to characterize the single and multi-chain topological complexity of such systems. We create computational methods for analyzing the topology of microtubules obtained through large electron tomography data. Our results show that the geometry/topology and entanglement of microtubules changes throughout cell division and …

Computational Studies On Polyunsaturated Fatty Acid Uptake And Its Effects On Antimicrobial Resistance, Andrew Turgeson

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The topic of this research was initiated by the discovery, in part by Dr. David Giles, that Vibrio cholerae, the enteric bacteria responsible for the disease cholera, has the ability to uptake and utilize long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids up to 22 carbon atoms long. Before this discovery was made, conventional belief was that fatty acids of greater than 18 carbons long were toxic to bacteria. Further investigations have revealed that this uptake is not unique to Vibrio cholerae, and a range of bacteria such as Klebsiella pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Acinetobacter baumannii, and even Escherichia coli have been found to …

Stabilization Agent Selection Guide And Comparative Study For Full Depth Reclaimed Pavement Stabilization Media Case Study: Portland Cement And Emulsified Asphalt., Dumbiri Odia

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

One of the most important decisions made in using full depth reclamation (FDR) as a rehabilitation technique is the choice of stabilization agents. Amongst the numerous ways of improving the properties of rehabilitating deteriorated pavements is FDR stabilized with media like Portland cement, emulsified asphalt, foamed asphalt, lime, fly ash. However, the subject of choosing the right stabilizing medium for FDR rehabilitation remains one governed by empirical understanding of the rehabilitation process. This paper research FDR practices and aims to develop a suitable guide for selecting appropriate FDR stabilizing agents, based on the structural properties, material properties, environmental properties and …

When The Goal Is To Be Less Stressed: A Naturalistic Investigation Of Academic And Self-Care Goal Completion, Stephanie Wells

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

The demands of college are synonymous with stress for many students, with stress generally being related to academic success and posing a challenge for academic goals and self-care behaviors. Individual difference factors such as resilience and need for cognition may impact this stress experience as well as academic and self-care behaviors. Prior to the current study, self-care had yet to be studied in the same context as academic goal completion. The results of the present research revealed that students were significantly better at completing academic goals versus self-care goals and that self-care goal completion predicted completion of academic goals. Further, …

The Social Network Of Early American Architecture: A Network Analysis Of Early Architectural Training In And Out Of The Lowcountry, James Mcenerney

All Theses

The contents of this thesis contain research conducted over a 9-month span surrounding the nature of architectural education in the late American Colonial Period, progressing into the Early Republic. Themes such as early European influences, 17^th and 18^th century art and architecture schools of Dublin, Ireland and Paris, France, and early American drafting schools/apprenticeship societies are analyzed. This paper, first, seeks to document the scholarly dialogue surrounding the ways in which early American architectural practitioners were educated, and in what ways this training was manifest in their physical designs. With a timeframe of approximately 1770 to 1830, 23 …

The Screen And Development: Creative Writing And Liminality In Children’S Literature, Rebecca E. Glenn

All Theses

This creative thesis strives to research and implement the overlap of liminality found within Children’s Literature, especially those works that exist through the screen. The critical component of this thesis explores the ways in which childhood development and maturity, a theme commonly found within Children’s Literature, embodies its own “right of passage” associated with the liminal. The journey of the Children’s Literature protagonist is often wrought with this movement from familiar boundaries to a sense of new development. The critical analysis emphasizes the methods Children’s Literature genre uses emotion, familial connections, symbology, space, and even elements of the monstrous to …

China Maritime Report No. 21: Civilian Shipping And Maritime Militia: The Logistics Backbone Of A Taiwan Invasion, Lonnie D. Henley

CMSI China Maritime Reports

Most analysts looking at the Chinese military threat to Taiwan conclude that the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is incapable of invading the island because it lacks the landing ships to transport adequate quantities of troops and equipment across the Taiwan Strait. This report challenges that conventional wisdom, arguing that the PLA intends to meet these requirements by requisitioning civilian vessels operated by members of China’s maritime militia (海上民兵). Since the early 2000s, the Chinese government and military have taken steps to strengthen the national defense mobilization system to ensure the military has ample quantities of trained militia forces to support …

“Boom‐And‐Busted‐Dynamics” Of Phytoplankton‐Virus Interactions Explain The Paradox Of The Plankton, Kevin J. Flynn, Aditee Mitra, William H. Wilson, Susan A. Kimmance, Darren R. Clark, Angela Pelusi, Luca Polimene

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

SummaryRapid virus proliferation can exert a powerful control on phytoplankton host populations, playing a significant role in marine biogeochemistry and ecology. We explore how marine lytic viruses impact phytoplankton succession, affecting host and nonhost populations.Using an in silico food web we conducted simulation experiments under a range of different abiotic and biotic conditions, exploring virus–host–grazer interactions and manipulating competition, allometry, motility and cyst cycles.Virus-host and predator–prey interactions, and interactions with competitors, generate bloom dynamics with a pronounced ‘boom-and-busted’ dynamic (BBeD) which leads to the suppression of otherwise potentially successful phytoplankton species. The BBeD is less pronounced at low nutrient loading …

Results Of The Compare Trial Of Constraint-Induced Or Multimodality Aphasia Therapy Compared With Usual Care In Chronic Post-Stroke Aphasia, Miranda L. Rose, Lyndsey Nickels, David Copland, Leanne Togher, Erin Godecke, Marcus Meinzer, Tapan Rai, Dominique A. Cadilhac, Joosup Kim, Melanie Hurley, Abby Foster, Marcella Carragher, Cassie Wilcox, John E. Pierce, Gillian Steel

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Background:

While meta-analyses confirm treatment for chronic post-stroke aphasia is effective, a lack of comparative evidence for different interventions limits prescription accuracy. We investigated whether Constraint-Induced Aphasia Therapy Plus (CIAT-plus) and/or Multimodality Aphasia Therapy (M-MAT) provided greater therapeutic benefit compared with usual community care and were differentially effective according to baseline aphasia severity.

Methods:

We conducted a three-arm, multicentre, parallel group, open-label, blinded endpoint, phase III, randomised-controlled trial. We stratified eligible participants by baseline aphasia on the Western Aphasia Battery-Revised Aphasia Quotient (WAB-R-AQ). Groups of three participants were randomly assigned (1:1:1) to 30 hours of CIAT-Plus or M-MAT or to …

Impact Of Recent Acute Kidney Injury On Creatinine Clearance Estimation In Critically Ill Patients Undergoing Cardiac Surgery, Amaris Fuentes, Jagadeswara R Earla, Tomona Iso, Joshua T Swan

The Texas Heart Institute Journal

Acute kidney injury (AKI), often present in critically ill patients and patients with cardiac dysfunction, may alter estimates of renal function. The impact of recent AKI on the accuracy of the Cockcroft-Gault creatinine clearance equation (CG-CrCl) before cardiac surgery is unknown. This single-center, retrospective study included patients who underwent cardiac surgery from 1 January 2006 through 30 June 2012 and whose 24-hour urine creatinine clearance (24hr-CrCl) was measured in the intensive care unit before surgery. We evaluated CG-CrCl accuracy by calculating absolute differences between 24hr-CrCl and CG-CrCl estimates. Clinical impact was signified by discrepancies in United States Food and Drug …

Supracardiac Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Return Repair In A 7-Month-Old Infant, Mislav Planinc, Ivan Malcic, Darko Anic

The Texas Heart Institute Journal

Total anomalous pulmonary venous return is a congenital heart malformation characterized by anomalous pulmonary venous inflow to the right atrium. Surgical repair typically occurs during the first month of life, and survival beyond that age in untreated patients is unlikely. We report an extreme case of supracardiac total anomalous pulmonary venous return in an infant who survived 7 months despite atypical anomalous inflow without atrial-level communication and with right-to-left shunting only through a patent ductus arteriosus. We stabilized the patient's left-sided heart function before surgically repairing the anomalous venous return 2 months later. Three years postoperatively, the patient was well.

Recurrent Parotid Adenocarcinoma Presenting As Diffuse Myocardial Metastatic Disease, Edward A El-Am, Upasana Jarori, Sara J Grethlein, Ronald Mastouri, Abhishek Khemka

The Texas Heart Institute Journal

A 64-year-old man who had undergone treatment for left parotid adenocarcinoma presented with progressive exertional shortness of breath. Evaluation revealed metastatic invasion of the myocardium as a rare presentation of recurrent parotid adenocarcinoma. This case highlights the importance of using multimodal imaging methods in diagnostic evaluation and a collaborative multidisciplinary approach in managing patient care.

Gender, Terrorism, And Nation-Building: A Comparative Study Of Chechnya's Black Widows And The Female Liberation Tigers Of Tamil Eelam, Rachel Kadar

International Studies (MA) Theses

This research examines the historical context of female terrorists in Chechnya (referred to as Black Widows) as well as the female participants of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The author explores women’s motivations for joining each of the conflicts, as well as the shifting role of women within terrorist organizations. Outcomes for women in civil society in both Chechnya and Sri Lanka after they leave the patriarchal structure of the military are also examined.

Inflation Expectations Of Households And The Upgrading Channel, Sumit Agarwal, Yeow Hwee Chua, Changcheng Song

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Motivated by the evidence that households purchased better quality goods across time in Singapore, we use a survey experiment to study the relationship between consumption upgrading and households’ beliefs about inflation. We find that providing price information on better-quality products will lead to higher inflation expectations. The effects on inflation expectations are smaller when price information on both higher- and lower-quality products is made available, suggesting that product replacement increases inflation expectations. Additional tests show that our results are not driven by mixing price with quality or numeracy. Our findings highlight the relationship between product replacement, product variety, and inflation …

Tocilizumab In Patients Hospitalised With Covid-19 Pneumonia: Efficacy, Safety, Viral Clearance, And Antibody Response From A Randomised Controlled Trial (Covacta), Ivan O Rosas, Norbert Bräu, Michael Waters, Ronaldo C Go, Atul Malhotra, Bradley D Hunter, Sanjay Bhagani, Daniel Skiest, Sinisa Savic, Ivor S Douglas, Julia Garcia-Diaz, Mariam S Aziz, Nichola Cooper, Taryn Youngstein, Lorenzo Del Sorbo, David J De La Zerda, Andrew Ustianowski, Antonio Cubillo Gracian, Kevin G Blyth, Jordi Carratalà, Bruno François, Thomas Benfield, Derrick Haslem, Paolo Bonfanti, Cor H Van Der Leest, Nidhi Rohatgi, Lothar Wiese, Charles Edouard Luyt, Rebecca N Bauer, Fang Cai, Ivan T Lee, Balpreet Matharu, Louis Metcalf, Steffen Wildum, Emily Graham, Larry Tsai, Min Bao

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

BACKGROUND: In COVACTA, a randomised, placebo-controlled trial in patients hospitalised with coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19), tocilizumab did not improve 28-day mortality, but shortened hospital and intensive care unit stay. Longer-term effects of tocilizumab in patients with COVID-19 are unknown. Therefore, the efficacy and safety of tocilizumab in COVID-19 beyond day 28 and its impact on Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) clearance and antibody response in COVACTA were investigated.

METHODS: Adults in Europe and North America hospitalised with COVID-19 (

FINDINGS: By day 60, 24·5% (72/294) of patients in the tocilizumab arm and 25·0% (36/144) in the placebo arm died (weighted …

Internal Medicine Residents' Perceptions Of Virtual Morning Report: A Multicenter Survey, Tyler J Albert, Joel Bradley, Helene Starks, Jeff Redinger, Cherinne Arundel, Albertine Beard, Laura Caputo, Jonathan Chun, Craig G Gunderson, Dan Heppe, Anand Jagannath, Kyle Kent, Michael Krug, James Laudate, Vignesh Palaniappan, Amanda Pensiero, Zaven Sargsyan, Emily Sladek, Matthew Tuck, Paul B Cornia

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

IMPORTANCE: The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted graduate medical education, compelling training programs to abruptly transition to virtual educational formats despite minimal experience or proficiency. We surveyed residents from a national sample of internal medicine (IM) residency programs to describe their experiences with the transition to virtual morning report (MR), a highly valued core educational conference.

OBJECTIVE: Assess resident views about virtual MR content and teaching strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic.

DESIGN: Anonymous, web-based survey.

PARTICIPANTS: Residents from 14 academically affiliated IM residency programs.

MAIN MEASURES: The 25-item survey on virtual MR included questions on demographics; frequency and reason for attending; opinions …

Curated Variation Benchmarks For Challenging Medically Relevant Autosomal Genes, Justin Wagner, Nathan D Olson, Lindsay Harris, Jennifer Mcdaniel, Haoyu Cheng, Arkarachai Fungtammasan, Yih-Chii Hwang, Richa Gupta, Aaron M Wenger, William J Rowell, Ziad M Khan, Jesse Farek, Yiming Zhu, Aishwarya Pisupati, Medhat Mahmoud, Chunlin Xiao, Byunggil Yoo, Sayed Mohammad Ebrahim Sahraeian, Danny E Miller, David Jáspez, José M Lorenzo-Salazar, Adrián Muñoz-Barrera, Luis A Rubio-Rodríguez, Carlos Flores, Giuseppe Narzisi, Uday Shanker Evani, Wayne E Clarke, Joyce Lee, Christopher E Mason, Stephen E Lincoln, Karen H Miga, Mark T W Ebbert, Alaina Shumate, Heng Li, Chen-Shan Chin, Justin M Zook, Fritz J Sedlazeck

Faculty, Staff and Students Publications

The repetitive nature and complexity of some medically relevant genes poses a challenge for their accurate analysis in a clinical setting. The Genome in a Bottle Consortium has provided variant benchmark sets, but these exclude nearly 400 medically relevant genes due to their repetitiveness or polymorphic complexity. Here, we characterize 273 of these 395 challenging autosomal genes using a haplotype-resolved whole-genome assembly. This curated benchmark reports over 17,000 single-nucleotide variations, 3,600 insertions and deletions and 200 structural variations each for human genome reference GRCh37 and GRCh38 across HG002. We show that false duplications in either GRCh37 or GRCh38 result in …

Residual Strength Estimation Of Degraded Bonded Joints Based On Non-Destructive Evaluations, Guilherme Garcia Momm

Theses and Dissertations

Pioneer designers acknowledged structural bonding advantages over other joining methods, sparking many aerospace applications. Nonetheless, durability issues, weak bonds, and the inability to non-destructively interrogate bond quality after-the-fact hindered widespread bonding use. These challenges also contributed to several aircraft accidents, fostering extensive related research. Firstly, we examined the bonding operational history in aviation. The challenge to simulate or experimentally reproduce bonded joints’ long-term behavior under real-life conditions magnifies the value of in-service data. Since 1944 the International Civil Aviation Organization has recommended investigating aircraft incidents/accidents. Among numerous investigation reports publicly available, we identified 73 bond-related occurrences involving type-certified aircraft registered …

Dataset Evaluation For Data Trading Using Expected Loss And Homomorphic Encryption, Minsung Joo

Senior Honors Papers / Undergraduate Theses

Supervised machine learning suffers from the ``garbage-in garbage-out" phenomenon where the performance of a model is limited by the quality of the data. While a myriad of data is collected every second, there is no general rigorous method of evaluating the quality of a given dataset. This hinders fair pricing of data in scenarios where a buyer may look to buy data for use with machine learning. In this work, I propose using the expected loss corresponding to a dataset as a measure of its quality, relying on Bayesian methods for uncertainty quantification. Furthermore, I present a secure multi-party computation …

Design Of Wideband Decoupling Networks For Mimo Antennas Based On An N-Ary Optimization Algorithm, Min Li, Kwan Lawrence Yeung, Lijun Jiang, Ross Murch

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Techniques for reducing the coupling between antenna elements in multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems are important for achieving the full potential of MIMO. In this article, a general and systematic method is developed to design a wideband decoupling and matching network (DMN) for MIMO antenna arrays. The DMN is formed by grid-like transmission lines interconnected by lumped components, whose reactance can be obtained from an N-ary optimization algorithm. Four design benchmarks are performed for validating decoupling methodology, elaborating on design/implementation procedure, and demonstrating superiority of the proposed method. Results show that the DMN achieves broad isolation bandwidth while occupying a small …

Writing Dystopia: Zamyatin’S Writing Philosophy, Genre, And The Protagonist Of We, Kelly A. Gallagher

College Honors Program

This thesis examines how Russian author Yevgeny Zamyatin (1884-1937) came to write one of the first literary dystopias. I argue that he designed dystopia in his novel We as a place that threatens the creation of what he considered “true literature,” in order to show why his conception of true literature is essential to the survival of the human spirit. The first chapter synthesizes Zamyatin’s critical essays and biographical details to reveal his writing philosophy, which I characterize as his belief that “creative revolution” sustains literature’s movement forward into the future. The second chapter explores why Zamyatin’s philosophy may have …

Woven Words In The Iliad: Gender, Narrative, And Textile Production In The Scholia Of The Venetus A Manuscript, Anne-Catherine Schaaf

College Honors Program

The work of previous scholars has established powerful connections between the process of creating textiles and process of epic oral composition. I build on disparte sources from the fields of archaeology and philology and analyze how the scholia in one epic manuscript of the Iliad, the Venetus A, treat this issue and with a focus on how it interplays with gender, specifically the female characters in the Iliad who produce textiles. I focus on a few major sections of scholia and important scenes of weaving in the Iliad. The key female characters in the novel, both divine and human nearly …