Digital Commons Network^™

Herding In Artificial Intelligence, John Cotter

Honors Scholar Theses

This paper examines whether increased attention to artificial intelligence (AI) influences herding behavior in financial markets. As AI has become a dominant theme in both financial markets and public discourse, understanding how investor attention affects behavior has become increasingly important. Herding behavior is measured using the Cross-Sectional Absolute Deviation (CSAD) methodology developed by Chang, Cheng, and Khorana (2000). The analysis uses daily data from December 2019 through November 2025 and focuses on the Global X Artificial Intelligence & Technology ETF (AIQ) as a proxy for the AI sector. Investor attention is measured using a composite Google Search Volume Index (SVI) …

Negative Core Beliefs And Cognitive Fusion As Predictors Of Depressive Symptom Severity And Course, Caila Flaemig

Honors Scholar Theses

Major depressive disorder (MDD) is one of the most prevalent mental health disorders among young adults, and its prevalence has continued to increase in recent years. Cognitive vulnerabilities are believed to play a significant role in the onset and maintenance of depressive symptoms. Thus, the present study examined the relationship between negative automatic thoughts and cognitive fusion as predictors of depressive symptom severity and course among psychologically vulnerable young adults. The study also explored how these constructs relate to the expression of negative core beliefs in participants’ open-ended written responses and whether these relationships differed by gender. Participants included 320 …

American Coverage Of The Killing Of Awdah Hathaleen: A Case Study, Charlie F. Nichols

Journalism

This project analyzes coverage from major American news outlets regarding the killing of Awdah Hathaleen by Yinnon Levi, using firsthand accounts of the event as a point of reference. These accounts are organized into a timeline of the event that coverage is compared with. The propaganda model outlined in Manufacturing Consent by Herman & Chomsky (1988) is used as a theoretical framework, namely the concept of unworthy victims. This framework posits that victims of violence perpetrated by American client states are framed as deserving of said violence. This addresses a gap in the literature of comparing coverage with a verifiable …

Strategic Marketing Plan For An Ai-Powered Personalized Wellness Platform, David D. Dilts

Senior Honors Theses

Demand for personalized nutrition guidance is analyzed within the context of the expanding digital health and fitness sector. A review of current literature highlights major trends shaping the industry, including AI‑powered coaching, wearable integration, precision nutrition, and sustainability‑focused consumer behavior, as well as legal and ethical compliance. These insights inform the development of a strategic marketing plan for an AI‑powered wellness platform that unifies fitness, nutrition, genomics, and environmental impact scoring. The plan outlines target markets, competitive positioning, and product differentiation through adaptive personalization and ethical data practices. Findings suggest that combining AI, biometric data, and sustainable design can enhance …

Know Thy Enemy: Building A Command-And-Control Solution For Adversarial Emulation, Caleb J. Chen

Senior Honors Theses

Command and Control (C2) is a critical part of any cyberattack. It serves many purposes, including Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, data exfiltration, and malware deployment. Consequently, C2 frameworks play an important part in red team engagements and adversary emulation. However, many adversary emulation solutions focus on comprehensive testing through sequential technique execution instead of realistic chained and automated attacks. The proposed solution is Centurion, an open-source C2 framework that integrates MITRE's ATT&CK framework and several cybersecurity tools into modular playbooks for effective threat emulation. This paper provides background by defining key terms and concepts before delving into a …

You Can’T Spell Audit Without Ai: The Current Uses Of Artificial Intelligence In Audit, Jena Perkins

Senior Honors Theses

The accounting profession continuously adapts to the innovations provided by the broader context in which it exists. Artificial intelligence (AI) is a forerunner among tools used to enhance and optimize auditing services within the accounting profession. The realm of AI offers advancements to procedures used within an audit to detect misstatements. Based on the proprietary platforms developed by Big 4 accounting firms, AI is a key component in maintaining an advanced approach towards auditing.

Swimming Sucks, A Retrospect On Hard Work And Dedication, Braydon Ohrtman

Celebrating Scholarship and Creativity Day (2018-)

This is my take on the popular This I Believe media project that originated in the 1950's. They're around 500 words, and are supposed to explain a core belief of someone through a story of someone's life. My essay is about my experience swimming and how it gave me the ability to persevere, and how I applied my perseverance to my academic life.

Brick-By-Brick: Incorporating Lego Bricks To Increase Engagement In Managerial Accounting, Bonnie R. Albritton, Jennifer Bannister, Amy Foshee Holmes

School of Business Faculty Research

In this case study, students apply managerial accounting concepts through a business simulation as two friends use a LEGO competition to jumpstart their business. The real-world setting and kinesthetic learning increase engagement in managerial accounting as students create a unique LEGO product, estimate revenue and costs, conduct financial analyses, and prepare a presentation to pitch their business to potential investors. Implementing this project as a holistic overview to connect managerial concepts reinforces understanding and knowledge retention. Following the case study, students reported a perceived increase in engagement in the course and the ability to understand and think critically about the …

Spectacle And Survival: Tourism, Colonialism, And Indigenous Agency In Taiwan, A Case Study Of Alishan And The Tsou Indigenous Group, Ganga Corsaro

Standard Theses

This thesis examines tourism in Taiwan as a contemporary continuation of colonial processes through a case study of the Tsou people and the Alishan region. It traces how Tsou ancestral land was transformed into a national tourist landscape and analyzes how state tourism narratives frame Indigenous land and culture while obscuring histories of dispossession and political exclusion. At the same time, the thesis considers Indigenous tourism as a potential space for cultural continuity and self-representation when shaped by Indigenous authority and community priorities. By bringing together historical context, analysis of tourism materials, and scholarship on Indigenous tourism, this project argues …

Computational Fluid Dynamics Modeling Of Counter-Current Flow In Channels Separated By A Membrane, Akram Mashhour Riziq Abdullah

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Counter current flow in channels separated by membrane were studied in several published studies. The present study aims to numerically and analytically simulate and physically describe the distribution of pressure, volume flow rate and velocity in counter current flow module. Numerical simulation Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) was performed by solving Navier-Stokes (N–S) equations in the channels and membrane pores (vertical channels) to determine pressure and velocity fields. An analytical solution one-dimensional (1-D) model was developed to simulate the flow in the channels and membrane pores by solving the continuity and Darcy’s Law to obtain pressure and volume flow rate. Accordingly, …

Piloting A Pediatric Screener For Assessing Emergent Literacy With Preschool Children, Nafia Sarhadi

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Shopper Marketing Thesis For Upkept, Chesney Cox

Marketing Undergraduate Honors Theses

This shopper marketing brand thesis focuses on Upkept, an online tailoring and alterations company based in Rogers, Arkansas. Using research gathered through in-depth interviews, empathy maps and user personas are created to better understand customer motivations, behaviors, and perceptions surrounding clothing repair. Based on these insights, three strategic deliverables, partnerships, in-person touchpoints, and expanded services, are designed to increase brand awareness and encourage a shift in target market attitudes toward clothing repair as a valuable, accessible, and sustainable solution.

New Clubs: Taking Roots, Diorama, 1981

Documents

Article with photographs describing the 1981 introduction of four new campus organizations: Delta Sigma Theta, Ascending Voices, Fashion Forum, and the University of North Alabama Film Society. The article is derived from the Diorama, the student yearbook.

The Las Cruces International Mariachi Conference: Breaking Down Constructed Borderlands, Melissa Rios

Music ETDs

Despite its significant contribution to the educational mariachi movement in the United States, the history of the Las Cruces International Mariachi Conference (LCIMC), established in 1994, remains largely absent from existing scholarship. This study offers a historical account of mariachi music in Las Cruces and the development of the LCIMC, establishing a foundation for future research on mariachi music in the Mesilla Valley. Distinct from other mariachi conferences that emerged at the turn of the 21st century, the LCIMC was shaped by its location in a border city in New Mexico. Conceptualizing both physical borders and metaphorical border spaces as …

Transforming Theory Into Action: Feminist Frameworks In Reproductive Justice Organizing, Ella R. Mitchell

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

This honors thesis examines how feminist theoretical frameworks can be translated into practical strategies for reproductive justice organizing. Grounded in a reproductive justice framework and drawing on three key feminist frameworks, intersectional feminism, queer feminist theory, and feminist ethics of care, this paper explores how each provides critical tools for understanding and responding to reproductive oppression. Intersectional feminism illuminates how overlapping systems of inequality structure reproductive experiences and political marginalization. Queer feminist theory challenges heteronormative assumptions about family, gender, and reproduction, expanding reproductive justice discourse to include LGBTQ+ communities and diverse forms of kinship. Feminist ethics of care emphasizes relational …

Lewis Carroll’S Curious Creatures: Examining Carroll’S Use Of Animal Characters Within The Context Of His Life And Victorian Era England, Nima M. Faunce

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) has maintained a wide readership since its publication, but many aspects of Carroll’s original intentions and inspirations are lost on modern readers. By examining his animal characters through the lens of his personal life and Victorian England, a deeper understanding of his novel is uncovered. Some of his characters directly reflect individuals from his real life, such as the Liddell family, while other characters provide a window into Victorian beliefs and practices. This paper investigates each of Carroll’s animal characters in order of appearance and determines possible points of inspiration from his personal …

The Consumptive Female Ideal: The Case Study Of “Snow White”, Nayla G. Torres Ruiz

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Tuberculosis (TB), also known as “consumption” or “phthisis,” was one of the most pervasive and culturally significant diseases of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Despite its high mortality rate—claiming more lives than cholera and smallpox combined—TB was widely romanticized in art, literature, and popular culture, particularly as a feminine disease associated with beauty, purity, fragility, and moral virtue. The physical traits of consumption—pale skin, rosy cheeks, red lips, glassy eyes, and a slender, delicate frame—became an ideal of female beauty, one that many women sought to emulate through restrictive diets, toxic cosmetics, and evolving fashion trends, such as increasingly tight …

Redefining The Mother Wound: Marianism, The Church, And Communal Mothering In Las Madres: Latinas In The Heartland Who Led Their Family To Success, Maria R. Loya-Pérez

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis reconsiders the restrictive role assigned to Mexican mothers that is perpetuated by the Church and Marianism, and how those restrictions are liberated by communal mothering. In examining how a Mexican mother is expected to act based on cultural expectations, I analyze the stories of three real mothers from the familial autobiography Las Madres: Latinas in the Heartland Who Led Their Family to Success. I analyze three mothers, the matriarch Candelaria, her daughter Rafaela, and her daughter Irene to better understand how the Church and Marianism has restricted them based on the experiences of Candelaria. These restrictions when placed …

Note From The Chief Articles & Symposium Editor, Simyllina S. Chen

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

Immigrants And The Battle For Our Nation In The Courts, Raquel E. Aldana

University of the Pacific Law Review

No abstract provided.

Artificial Intelligence In Video Production, Jonathan Ringor

Theses

This project examines the role of artificial intelligence in video advertisement production and explores whether AI can help bridge the gap between everyday users and professional advertising. The project combined both creative production and audience research. To do this, three original AI-generated advertisements were created in distinct commercial formats: a pharmaceutical advertisement, a petcentered narrative commercial, and a lifestyle montage advertisement. After the advertisements were completed, audience response was measured through a survey of U.S.-based participants. Participants evaluated each advertisement on realism, emotional engagement, trustworthiness, polish, and authenticity. The results showed that the advertisements were not perceived equally. The pet …

The Dynamics Of Trust: Exploring The Unique Antecedents Of Firm Versus Executive Level Trust, Hameeda Sharifi

Executive DBA Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Brightly Slacked Tight, It Sways, Molly Brooke Martin

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Brightly Slacked Tight, It Sways is a body of work that investigates unpredictability and process-based making through collage and materially hybrid forms that combine natural and synthetic elements, operating between drawing, painting, and sculpture. Using familiar, readily available materials gathered from the studio, hardware store, and my surrounding environment, the work embraces improvisation as a generative force. Unpredictability keeps me in relation to the work, interrupting certainty, requiring responsiveness, and mirroring the shifting conditions of the natural world. I break, cut, and recombine sticks gathered from my yard and athletic tape from gymnastics, along with scrap drawings and paintings. Shaped …

The Noise Of Time...., Shannon P. Smith

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

"the noise of time…" is a meditation on home, memory, and the fluidity of time, told through image and sculpture (materiality). Rooted in the complexity of Black identity and ignited by the passing of my father, this work began as a challenge: to create something interior and vulnerable, specific to my experience yet open enough for others to hold. Influenced by Gaston Bachelard’s "The Poetics of Space," I consider home—our personal intimate space—not only as a container for objects, but as a sanctuary for dreams, remembrance, and complicated emotions. I observe the home as a structure that holds what cannot …

Engineering Silicone Magnetic Fluids For Localized Radiation Attenuation During Ocular Melanoma Brachytherapy, Zachary L. Caprow

All Dissertations

Ocular melanoma is commonly treated using plaque brachytherapy; however, radiation-induced damage to healthy ocular tissues frequently results in partial or complete vision loss. This work investigates the development of an injectable, magnetically responsive silicone magnetic fluid designed to localize adjacent to the tumor and attenuate low-energy gamma radiation during treatment.

The material system consists of iron oxide nanoparticles surface-functionalized with a siloxane polymer, in which the nanoparticles provide magnetic responsiveness and radiation attenuation, while the polymer coating ensures colloidal stability, injectability, and biocompatibility. A one-pot synthetic approach was developed wherein a functionalized siloxane polymer containing iron-affinitive groups was reacted with …

An Exploratory Study On Perceptions Of Climate Change And Mental Health Among Alaskans, Emily Miranda Cohen

Theses and Dissertations

Climate change is a pressing global issue with diverse mental health impacts. However, the relationship between climate change perceptions and mental health remains poorly explored. Rapid climate change in Alaska makes it an ideal setting to explore these relationships. Thus, 204 Alaskan adults were surveyed to assess their perceptions of climate change and explore the relationships between climate change perceptions, exposure to adverse climate impacts, and psychological distress (i.e., symptoms of depression, anxiety, and climate-related post-traumatic stress). Results suggest that participants agree that climate change is real, human-caused, negative, and impacts areas both close to and far from where they …

Social Reading And #Booktok: Exploring Emotion, Community, And Book Promotion On Tiktok, Courtney B. Thompson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines how BookTok, a subcommunity centered on reading, functions as a social and emotional domain that shapes contemporary reading culture. Discourse analysis of the most popular videos within the BookTok subspace revealed commonalities in how creators expressed their emotions through text, language, and audio. Patterns of emotional devastation were also present in the discourse, pointing to affective-discursive practices circulating the community. Moreover, a content analysis of the books being promoted across highly engaged BookTok videos uncovered significant themes of romance and an appreciation for modern fiction novels.

Findings suggest that reading functions as a social experience that is …

S100a4-Lineage Cells Contribute Modestly To Angiotensin Ii-Mediated Thoracic Aortic Aneurysms Through Angiotensin Ii Type 1a Receptor In Mice, Sohei Ito, Jeff Z. Chen, Deborah A. Howatt, Jessica J. Moorleghen, Hong S. Lu, Alan Daugherty, Hisashi Sawada

Physiology Faculty Publications

Angiotensin II (AngII) exerts a critical role in thoracic aortic aneurysm (TAA) formation via AngII type 1a receptor (AT1aR). However, the principal cell type mediating this process remains unclear. Our previous study demonstrated that S100A4-lineage cells are present in the aortic wall and involved in AngII-induced vascular remodeling. In the present study, we investigated whether S100A4-lineage cells contribute to AngII-mediated TAA formation through AT1aR. Proteomic, bulk RNA sequencing, and single-cell RNA sequencing data were analyzed to assess changes in S100A4 abundance in response to AngII infusion. Lineage tracing was performed to track S100A4-lineage cells during AngII-mediated TAA formation. Either saline …

Another Inconsistency: A Collection, Christy Luong

Student Theses

A collection of stories.

Fascism Usa: Class And Identity Politics In The Age Of Trump, Marc Edelman

Publications and Research

This essay argues that Trump’s triumph in the 2024 presidential contest represents the consolidation of an oligarchical authoritarian project, backed by a multi-class and (surprisingly, for some) multi-racial electorate. It brought intensified state and freelance attacks on immigrants, labor unions, women, LGBTQ+ people, journalists, civil servants, assorted “political enemies,” and other groups that the MAGA movement targets. It is institutionalizing authoritarian governance structures in ways that will be exceedingly difficult to undo. The paper first addresses the experience of growing up in the shadow of fascism. It analyzes various sectors that supported Trump and the impacts of inflation, incumbency, economic …