Digital Commons Network^™

Mitochondrial Dna Diversity In West Mexico, Emma Zoiss

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

The long-standing movement of people, exchange of goods, and transmission of cultural traits are imprinted not only in the archaeological record but also within the genomes of individuals, making ancient DNA a powerful tool for uncovering past interactions and population dynamics. Despite attempts at systematic research, we are still missing critical information about pre-Columbian Mesoamerican populations in the Aztatlán region. This research will focus on those individuals recovered from archaeological sites located both in the highlands of the Lake Chapala Basin, as well as the coast of the Aztatlán core region. The integration of genetics into our understanding of the …

Pathways And Places: Mobility And Lithic Use At 48ye238 In The Late Archaic And Late Prehistoric Yellowstone, Jacob Q. Wilmoth

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

Through the lens of Central Place Foraging Theory, an analysis of lithic remains from 48YE238, a medium to high-density archaeological site in the Hayden Valley of Yellowstone National Park, has provided insight into both material value and decision-making among Late Archaic and Late Prehistoric hunter-gatherers of the Hayden Valley. First, an examination of lithic materials and the stages of bifacial reduction, in relation to sourced lithic materials, offers insight into changing ideas of material value between these two periods. This is especially evident when considering the cultural and societal changes that influenced regional residence during the Late Prehistoric period, compared …

Visual Semiotics In Parks: Assessing Pictorial Symbol Effectiveness In Outdoor Recreation Settings, Miranda Jane Foster

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

As interest in outdoor recreation grows, so does the need for effective communication in parks and protected areas. With a larger, more diverse visiting population, managers face new challenges, including intensified recreational use, staffing demands, and barriers to communication presented by cultural and linguistic diversity (Manning et al., 2017; Perry et al., 2021). Effective, indirect communication tools, such as pictorial symbol signage, are essential for addressing these challenges. Pictorial symbol signs are widely used in recreational signage and serve as vital indirect management strategies for communicating to diverse visitors as a universal visual language (Davies et al., 1998). However, research …

A Pilot Training Program For The Cultural Formulation Interview In School-Based Assessment, Jaida A. Lilly

Graduate Student Theses, Dissertations, & Professional Papers

School psychologists are responsible for promoting and maintaining an equitable, inclusive environment for all students to learn. For those who work in school settings, assessment of a student’s academic, mental health, and behavioral difficulties are often a significant component of school psychological practices. However, for various reasons, the assessment process can be flawed, and can unintentionally perpetuate systems of oppression in school-settings; this is especially true when working with children from culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) backgrounds. Within culturally responsive assessment, conducting interviews is necessary for connecting with and effectively supporting the student and family. The Cultural Formulation Interview (CFI) …

Challenges And Opportunities Of Universal Health Coverage In Africa: A Scoping Review, Evaline Chepchirchir Langat, Paul Ward, Hailay Gesesew, Lillian Mwanri

Centre of Excellence in Women and Child Health

Background: Universal health coverage (UHC) is a global priority, with the goal of ensuring that everyone has access to high-quality healthcare without suffering financial hardship. In Africa, most governments have prioritized UHC over the last two decades. Despite this, the transition to UHC in Africa is seen to be sluggish, with certain countries facing inertia. This study sought to examine the progress of UHC-focused health reform implementation in Africa, investigating the approaches utilized, the challenges faced, and potential solutions.

Method: Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews guidelines, we scoped the literature …

Exploring The Educational Gap Of Virginia English Language Learners: Challenges And Opportunities For Academic Success, Amanda Purcell, Sochitl Rodriguez Kauffman

UROP Posters

English Language Learners (ELLs) in the state of Virginia have significantly lower scores in the Standards of Learning (SOL) assessment exam than those of their English-speaking peers. The SOL measures students’ mastery of knowledge and skills taught in the classroom, and over the last decade, passing rates of the assessment’s core subjects amongst ELLs have continued to decrease and remain relatively low. In the 2023-2024 academic year, the average passing rate for ELLs who took the Writing SOL was only 26%, with Science being not much higher at 29%, and Reading at 33%. For the non-ELL student body, average rates …

Spanking And Children's Approaches To Learning: Estimates From A Longitudinal Matched-Sample Design, Jeehye Kang, Christina M. Rodriguez

Sociology & Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

One form of corporal punishment commonly used in the United States is spanking. Spanking is a well-known risk factor for adverse child development, although its influence on children's approaches to learning (ATL) has been largely overlooked. Existing research is particularly limited in inadequately considering multiple confounds and selection biases in children's exposure to spanking. This study examined the links between spanking and children's ATL, using a matched-group design to strengthen causal estimates among children aged 5 to 7.5 (N = similar to 12,800) from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2010-2011. Entropy-balanced matching mitigated selection and confounding biases, …

Living In The Hyphen: Creating Puentes Through Encuentros And Pláticas With Latinx Cross-Cultural Kids, Jennifer Jane Daby

Dissertations

Latinx cross-cultural kids, or children of immigrants, are often faced with a feeling of not belonging to mainstream American culture nor their parents’ home culture(s) of origin. As such, they are viewed through a deficit lens and forced to negotiate their sense of identity and belonging through language and culture to fit in. By embracing the concept of educación, using culturally responsive methods of encuentros and pláticas with cross-cultural kids and their families, this study intends to find ways to foster a sense of belonging for this population in schools through participants’ testimonies. It aims to find ways to bridge …

Fine-Tuned Large Language Models (Llms): Improved Prompt Injection Attacks Detection, Md Abdur Rahman, Hossain Shahriar, Guillermo Francia, Fan Wu, Alfredo Cuzzocrea, Sheikh Iqbal Ahamed

Computer Science Faculty Research and Publications

Large language models (LLMs) are becoming a popular tool as they have significantly advanced in their capability to tackle a wide range of language-based tasks. However, LLMs applications are highly vulnerable to prompt injection attacks, which poses a critical problem. These attacks target LLMs applications through using carefully designed input prompts to divert the model from adhering to original instruction, thereby it could execute unintended actions. These manipulations pose serious security threats which potentially results in data leaks, biased outputs, or harmful responses. This project explores the security vulnerabilities in relation to prompt injection attacks. To detect whether a prompt …

Contextual Embedding-Based Clustering To Identify Topics For Healthcare Service Improvement, K M Sajjadul Islam, Ravi Teja Karri, Srujan Vegesna, Jiawei Wu, Praveen Madiraju

Computer Science Faculty Research and Publications

Understanding patient feedback is crucial for improving healthcare services, yet analyzing unlabeled short-text feedback presents challenges due to limited data and domainspecific nuances. Traditional supervised approaches require extensive labeled datasets, making unsupervised methods more practical for extracting insights. This study applies unsupervised techniques to analyze 439 survey responses from a healthcare system in Wisconsin, USA. A keyword-based filter was used to isolate complaint-related feedback using a domain-specific lexicon. To identify dominant themes, we evaluated traditional topic models such as Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) and Gibbs Sampling Dirichlet Multinomial Mixture (GSDMM) - alongside BERTopic, a neural embedding-based clustering method. To improve …

Leveraging Artificial Intelligent For Optimized Crop Production: An Ann-Based Approach, Yahya Layth Khaleel, Fadya A. Habeeb, Mustafa Abdulfattah Habeeb, Fatimah N. Ameen

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

To incite modern day crop production and ensure sustainability, exact crop recommendations are key to the process. This study pays significant attention to the need for the use of big data tools in studies involving comprehensive data sets that contain information on soil and other environmental characteristics. The set of data used in this research includes Nitrogen, Phosphorus, and Potassium content coordinated with Temperature, Humidity, pH Value, and Rainfall. Knowing these factors is to make a favorable decision about improving agricultural products yield, availability and management of the resources, as well as general well-being of the crops. Specialized advisory on …

Self-Attention Enhanced Dual Bigru For Arabic Fake News Detection, Baqer M. Merzah, Jafar Razmara, Jaber Karimpour

Mesopotamian Journal of Computer Science

The rapid proliferation of social media platforms has greatly amplified the dissemination of fake news, representing significant obstacles to public trust and evidence-based decision-making, particularly for the Arabic-speaking population. Meeting the challenge of Arabic fake news detection is a problem compounded by the complex morphological nature of the language, as well as limited resources. This study presents a hybrid deep learning framework that integrates two Bidirectional Gated Recurrent Units (BiGRUs) along with an attention mechanism for efficiently detecting misinformation in Arabic news. The method leverages FastText word embeddings for disambiguating the intricate semantics of the Arabic language. The model is …

Effects Of Selected Language-Related Factors On Reading Performance And Growth In Grades 4-5: An Hypothesis-Generating, Growth Mixture Modeling Study, Robyn Mennella

Selected Full Text Dissertations, 2011-

As U.S. society becomes increasingly culturally and linguistically diverse, public schools face challenges in developing more effective approaches to reading instruction, especially for students who are learning English as a new language. This dissertation investigated the impact of selected language-related factors on the reading performance and growth trajectories of 370 students in Grades 4 and 5, obtained through six nationally-normed i-Ready reading assessments in a suburban New York State public school district. Controlling for gender, socioeconomic status, and having an individualized education program, this study examined three key factors: English language proficiency, participation in two-way dual language instruction, and primary …

Child Protection And Disability: An Anti-Oppressive Reading, Susan Flynn Dr

Irish Journal of Applied Social Studies

Existing research alludes to complex inequalities within child protection systems for disabled children and disabled parents. An established risk of maltreatment that is higher for disabled children than for majority population peers converges with intersecting inequalities in the child protection arena. These include discrepancies around professional responses and service outcomes. Practice shortcomings, under-resourcing, practical impasses and knowledge deficits are also an enduring concern. Further, inequalities in child protection service outcomes and involvement for intellectually disabled parents are well documented. Thus, child protection and welfare casework with disabled children and disabled parents is fraught with complexities. This is due to the …

The Internist's Post V.1 N.11, The University Of Texas Rio Grande Valley. School Of Medicine, Eunbee Cho, Osiris Fernandez, Hector D. Preciado, Sobia Memon, Diana Acosta Pozo, Corey Haines, Roque Mifuji Lira, Martha Solis, Cesar Gutierrez

School of Medicine Publications

No abstract provided.

Is Originalism Bullshit?, Michael L. Smith

Faculty Articles

It’s finally time to answer the big question. This Article draws on the surprisingly robust literature examining the definition, essence, and significance of bullshit and evaluates whether originalist constitutional interpretation fits the bill. I begin with Harry Frankfurt’s definition of bullshit as utterances made in pursuit of the speaker’s goals without regard for their truth value. I also rely on alternate formulations, including bullshit as unclarifiable nonsense as well as contextual and audience-centric variations of bullshit.

While not all instances of originalism are bullshit, I identify those instances which are, and go on to demonstrate that originalism is uniquely prone …

Unveiling The Other: Feminine And Colonial Subjugation In Mary Elizabeth Braddon's England, Kaylie Rastegar

All ETDs from UAB

Just a few years after England experienced major societal shifts, both domestically in the passage of revolutionary women’s rights legislation and internationally in the Indian Mutiny, Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret (1862) offered Victorian readers a way to confront their anxieties and uncertainties about the nation’s future. The traditional power structures of British imperialism and patriarchy faced growing resistance as Indian rebels and women’s rights reformers challenged their assumed natural authority. Past scholarship contextualizes the novel within these major historical events, viewing them in relation to each other in which the struggles of Indian colonial subjects equate to those …

Precision Imaging For Head And Neck Tumors, Logan Daniel Stone

All ETDs from UAB

Antibody-based imaging modalities have become more common in the field of imaging oncology as more biomarkers are identified for certain cancers. Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) is overexpressed in several cancer types including head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) and ameloblastoma (AB). The over- expression in these cancers has been targeted with antibodies such as Panitumumab and Cetuximab for imaging modalities. These antibodies can be conjugated with IRDye800 molecules for intraoperative fluorescence imaging or radiolabel for pre-operative positron emission tomography/ computed tomography (PET/CT) imaging. These agents could provide surgeons with additional exams to identify carcinoma in scenarios where only …

"It Says Mommy’S Coffee!": Environmental Print As A Tool To Support Young Children’S Emergent Literacy And Family Engagement In Early Care And Education, Melissa Dawn Sudduth

All ETDs from UAB

This study addressed topics related to family engagement in early childhood education, emergent literacy skills, and the use of environmental print (EP) to support young children’s emergent literacy. The children of interest in this study were young children between the ages of birth and 5-years enrolled in licensed, private early care and education (ECE) centers in Alabama. The researcher employed an explanatory sequential mixed methods design using a quantitative survey and qualitative interviews to address the following mixed methods questions: How do families of young children perceive family engagement?, Which emergent literacy skills do families of young children value and …

Creation And Use Of Sbs’S The Boat; Principles For The Co-Creation Of Online Interactive Learning Environments For Innovative Digital Pedagogy, Prue Miles, Kylie Boltin

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Teachers and students rely more on online-learning environments than ever before, including open, trusted and high-quality online learning resources produced by public broadcasters. For educators, this represents both an inspiration and challenge in the wake of new techologies and online learning environments. This article is a case study of one such online learning environment created by Australia’s multicultural broadcaster, the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS), an adaptation of Nam Le’s award-winning short story, “The Boat” (2008). SBS’s The Boat (2015) is an immersive online experience that explores a refugee perspective and is accompanied by SBSLearn online learning materials. The Boat (2015) …

Serial Killers And The Production Of The Uncanny In Digital Participatory Culture, Laura Glitsos, Mark Deuze

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Many theorists have expounded on what serial killing says about the social in any given context and the ways in which serial killing and media are entangled, in particular, Mark Seltzer, Jon Stratton and Elliot Leyton. However, in this article, we ask, how is serial killer mythology developing in relation to participatory culture typical of our current digital environment? In scaffolding discourse analysis with theories from various literature, such as Judith Fathalla and Mark Deuze, what we find is that people’s lives as lived in media open up radically new spaces through which media publics consume, cultivate and perform knowledge …

Analysis Of Safety Investment : Economic Benefit In Arctic Shipping To Shipping Companies And The Arctic Coastal States, Junjie Wan

World Maritime University Ph.D. Dissertations

Global warming severely affects the Arctic region, including ice coverage and thickness. In contrast, it allows unprecedented navigation opportunities for more extended periods each year, attracting maritime stakeholders because of the potential distance reduction compared to shipping corridor routes. However, mitigating Arctic navigation hazards requires safety investments, especially from shipowners and Arctic coastal states. When allocating limited resources to safety, decision-makers should efficiently prioritize their investments. This research aims to determine how to optimize shipping companies and Arctic coastal states’ safety investments. It begins with a comprehensive analysis of safety investments and safety economic benefits in Arctic shipping. Then, an …

The Absence Of Disability Representation: A Critical Gap In Children's Picture Books, Helen Adam, Sally Murphy, Yvonne Urquhart, Katira Ahmed

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

In a recent study, we examined the diversity of main characters and family structures in 90 award listed Australian children's picture books from 2019 and 2020. We found some progress compared to past research (Adam and Barratt-Pugh, 2020; Adam et al., 2021) in terms of culturally diverse representation, though still with predominantly white main protagonists (Adam and Urquhart, 2023). Similarly, we found some increased representation of diverse family structures, albeit with notable absences of LGBTQIA+, step, foster and blended families (Adam et al., 2024). However, a glaring omission caught our attention - the almost complete absence of disability representation among …

Assessment Of Multilingual Children By Western Australian Speech-Language Pathologists: A Survey Of Practices, Barriers And Facilitators, Emily Frances Hunt, Charn Nang, Suzanne Jacqueline Meldrum, Elizabeth Armstrong

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Purpose: In the past decade, diagnostic criteria for developmental language disorder, guidelines for assessment of multilingual children, and reviews of the diagnostic utility of dynamic assessment have been published. It is unknown how Australian speech-language pathologists currently assess multilingual children or how local factors influence assessment. Method: A mixed-method anonymous online survey of Western Australian speech-language pathologists explored the frequency and perceived usefulness of assessment practices recommended for multilingual children, elements of dynamic assessment used, and the utility of specific client factors for diagnosis. Confidence ratings and descriptions of barriers and facilitators that affect assessment of multilingual children were also …

Elizabeth Usher Memorial Lecture 2024: Speech-Language Pathology Practice In Aboriginal Spaces: A Journey Of Learning And Unlearning, Elizabeth Armstrong

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

In this paper I describe learnings gained from 15 years collaboration with Aboriginal colleagues in Australia, in endeavours to improve rehabilitation services for Aboriginal people with brain injury and their families. Colleagues include Aboriginal researchers, clinicians, and people with communication and other disorders associated with brain injury and their families. My research journey in this field has been made possible through the work, mentoring, and support of these colleagues who introduced me to Aboriginal ways of knowing, being, and doing. My journey has involved challenging and un-learning some widely accepted Western tenets of speech-language pathology practice in order to explore …

Mental Health Support Workers Perspectives On Barriers To And Facilitators Of The Effective Delivery Of Their Roles: A Systematic Review And Meta-Aggregation, Martha Njuguna, Irene Ngune, Yvonne Middlewick

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Mental health support workers (MHSWs) are an important workforce within the mental health care system. Research shows that support services delivered by MHSWs are effective at improving the outcomes of individuals with mental illness. However, there is also literature suggesting that this group of workers are facing many challenges in their roles. This qualitative systematic review sought to explore, analyze and synthesize available primary research literature on the experiences of MHSWs with the aim of identifying the barriers to and facilitators of effective delivery of their roles. An electronic search of Medline, CINAHL, PsycINFO, and Web of Science was conducted …

Enhancing Phygital Customer Experience Through Generative Ai: A Social Listening Method For Strategic Retail Decision-Making, Zahra Dahish, Shah J. Miah, Ameet Pandit, Sanjit K. Roy

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

The use of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) to transform vast amounts of textual content for strategic insights have been a rapidly growing trend for business researchers. Although various studies have identified applications of GAI in business operations, aspects related to strategic support are yet to be fully developed in the relevant literature. This paper introduces a new GAI-enabled social listening solution that integrates advanced text analytics techniques: (a) Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM)–a specialized form of Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) adept at capturing long-term dependencies through its memory function over time, and (b) Google BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers). Our …

The Missing Link In Urban Tourism: Connecting Leisure, Accessibility And Resident Participation For Enhanced Value, Juliana Juliana, Amelda Pramezwary, Arifin Djakasaputra, Moh Muhlis Anwar, Ferry Jie

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

This study aims to explore the interrelationships between urban leisure opportunities, accessibility of cultural resources, residents’ active engagement in urban tourism and their perceptions of tourism value. By examining these dynamics, the study seeks to provide insights into fostering sustainable urban tourism that benefits both residents and visitors. A quantitative research design was employed, utilizing a structured survey distributed to urban residents. Partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to analyze the relationships among variables, supported by reliability and validity tests. Bootstrapping techniques further assessed the robustness of the hypotheses. The results indicate significant positive relationships among the studied …

Barriers To Family And Domestic Violence Support For Culturally And Linguistically Diverse Women In Australia: A Systematic Review, Annastasya J. Watts, Suzanne Rock, Natalie Gately, Antionette L. Smith

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Purpose: This systematic review investigated barriers culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) Australian women encountered when seeking support for family and domestic violence (FDV). Despite CALD women’s heightened vulnerability to FDV due to factors like immigration status, language barriers, and limited social networks, research suggests persistent, multifaceted obstacles to help-seeking. Methods: A systematic review of both qualitative and quantitative studies was conducted for articles published in peer-reviewed literature and grey literature. Databases searched included MEDLINE, PsycINFO, EMBASE, ProQuest, Cochrane, Scopus, and Web of Science, applying inclusion criteria centered on Australia, FDV, CALD women, and access to support services for studies in …

Exploring The Sociocultural Significance Of Funerals In Zongo Communities In Less-Developed Countries: A Case Of Effiakuma Zongo In The Western Region Of Ghana, Fusheini Halawayhi, Victor Fannam Nunfam

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Social and cultural capital have been recognized as critical assets for improving nations under the Sustainable Development Goals. The sociocultural significance of funerals in Zongo communities in Ghana, however, has not received much research attention. The Kastenbaum’s concept of funerals and Szmigin and Louise’s relational framework on funeral experiences were used to explore the social-cultural significance of funeral in the Effiakuma Zongo community as is the case in Ghana. Based on interpretive phenomenology and descriptive case study, we purposively sampled and conducted focus group interviews with 15 participants including bereaved family members, gravediggers and Imams. Data was processed and analyzed …