Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Role Of International River Basin Organizations In Facilitating Science Use In Policy, Kelsey Wentling

Masters Theses

Transboundary watershed management seeks to reconcile the dichotomy between political lines and the resources that flow freely over such borders. Transboundary waters cover half of the earth’s surface and define the natural communities of over 40% of the global population. Because water plays an integral role in every culture and society, international entities seek to identify the principles and methods that minimize conflict and maximize harmonious water resource management across borders. Successful management practices to date have aimed to incorporate relevant scientific literature throughout the basin using alternate governance structures. International River Basin Organizations (IRBOs), independent governing structures, provide one …

The Philosophical Underpinnings And Negative Consequences Of The Indian Child Welfare Act, Elizabeth Sharon Morris

Masters Theses

This paper will examine the philosophical underpinnings of current federal Indian policy and its physical, emotional, and economic consequences on individuals and communities. The U.S. Civil Rights Commission found in 1990 that “[T]he Government of the United States has failed to provide civil rights protection for Native Americans living on reservations” (W. B. Allen 1990, 2). As Regan (2014) observes, individuals have been denied full title to their property – and thus use of the property as leverage to improve their economic condition (Regan 2014). Tribal executive and judicial branches have been accused of illegal search and seizures, denial of …

Planning For Industrial Land And Industrial Jobs: An Evaluation Of New York City's Industrial Business Zone Program, Jennifer Davis

Masters Theses

In recent years, industrial preservation policies, which aim to preserve urban industrial activity and industrial employment often through the preservation of industrial land, have emerged as a flashpoint in cities across the country that have implemented these policies. While critics contend that industrial preservation policies amount to smokestack chasing in “post-industrial” cities like New York City, industrial preservationists argue that such policies help to preserve well-paying, middle-class jobs and thus represent a tool to mitigate rising income inequalities in cities. Despite considerable attention to these policies, minimal research has evaluated the effectiveness of industrial preservation policies as land use and …

Crusaders, Sellswords, And Separatists: The Russian State’S Use Of Paramilitaries, Separatists, And Irregular Armies, Bruce Schlesman

Masters Theses

Russia currently supports various paramilitaries around the world whether in the guise of separatists, mercenaries, or irregular armies. Using their own military and intelligence operatives and different tactical and religious-ideological means of asserting control over these paramilitaries and the territories they inhabit, Russia seeks to expand the scope of its global dominance and regional influence. Consistent with its long-term goal of weakening NATO and the EU, Russian strategy under Putin has sought to exploit Russian Orthodoxy and the Russian culture as instruments of solidarity binding many of these paramilitaries to Russia in a kind of pan-Slavic religious-nationalist mission. No passive …

Authoritarianism Both In Venezuela And Turkey, Furkan Burcu Yildiz

Masters Theses

In this paper, I undertake a comparative analysis of the authoritarian process in Venezuela and Turkey. In both countries, there are signs of political and economic instabilities. Therefore, I examine Turkey's and Venezuela's politics and economy to understand the reasons for authoritarian regimes. The comparison reveals that both countries are en route of authoritarianism; however, the motives are different. As for Venezuela. comparison grounds the argument that their authoritativeness relies on economic instability. On the contrary, Turkey has a stable economy while it has been struggling with political upheavals.

The result of this study pinpoints different ways for authoritarian regimes. …

Searching For The Fulcrum: Can Accountable Care Organizations Lower Spending By Balancing Specialists-To-Primary Care Providers?, Vishal Shetty

Masters Theses

Background:

While value-based payment models emphasizing care coordination have been widely implemented to improve quality and lower expenditures, supporting empirical evidence is sparse. Our objective was to quantify the impact of specialist-to-primary care physician involvement within accountable care organization (ACO) and its association with lower spending.

Methods:

We conducted a retrospective cohort study of Medicare Shared Savings Program ACOs from 2012-2016 using publicly available data provided by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services at the ACO level. We examined the association between the proportion of primary care services delivered by specialists versus other types of care providers and ACO …

The Effects Of Gateway Width On Driver Yielding To Pedestrians: A Systematic And Parametric Analysis, Jonathan M. Hochmuth

Masters Theses

The gateway in-street sign treatment has been demonstrated to be a cost-effective method for increasing driver yielding behavior at crosswalks. In the present study, wide and narrow gateway widths were compared at two sites to determine if there was a differential effect on driver yielding behavior. Then, the relationship between width and yielding was refined with a parametric analysis at one of these sites. Gateway width was varied in two-foot intervals from 12ft to 18ft. The results indicated an inverse relationship between gateway width and driver yielding behavior. There are likely two variables related to this effect. First, because drivers …

A Study On Modelling Spatial-Temporal Human Mobility Patterns For Improving Personalized Weather Warning, Yue Xu

Masters Theses

Understanding human mobility patterns is important for severe weather warning since these patterns can help identify where people are in time and in space when flash floods, tornados, high winds and hurricanes are occurring or are predicted to occur. A GIS (Geographic Information Science) data model was proposed to describe the spatial-temporal human activity. Based on this model, a metric was designed to represent the spatial-temporal activity intensity of human mobility, and an index was generated to quantitatively describe the change in human activities. By analyzing high-resolution human mobility data, the paper verified that human daily mobility patterns could be …

Is Religion An Effective Rehabilitation Method? Comparing The Results, Ashley Kittrell

Masters Theses

Faith-based rehabilitation programs receive both praise and criticism from the criminal justice academic community. Critics argue they risk violating inmates’ constitutional rights by forcing them to participate and adhere to religious principles and activities. Supporters of faith-based programs claim that they reduce both recidivism rates and high incarceration costs. Current studies evaluating the effectiveness of faith-based programs have struggled to accurately define and measure either variable. This study compares two popular faith-based programs to a similar secular program to determine if there is a significant difference in recidivism rates using an independent t-test.

Social Security Act Of 1935 To Tanf: A Comprehensive Look At The History And Current State Of Welfare In America, Parker Gilkesson

Masters Theses

This study seeks to explore the welfare system within the United States. The study spans from the Great Depression to the current state of TANF, post-welfare reform, to better understand the current state of welfare within the United States in order to analyze the need for further welfare reform. The initial disparities in the system, from the very beginning, are worth analyzing because it provides a framework to understand how disparities could possibly exist in the program today. Social Policy Programs are systems that have been built from multiple policies and components over time. Faulty, systematic issues, must be evaluated …

A Comparison Of Alternative Route Alignments For The North Country Trail Through Calhoun County, Mi, Whitney K. Lambert

Masters Theses

Recreational hiking trails are a popular destination for local residents and tourists, offering health, educational, and social benefits. The North Country Trail (NCT) provides a unique hiking experience because of the many landscapes through which it travels. Because it spans across seven states in the Midwest, a hiker can travel through the mountains of New York, the hardwood forests of upper Michigan, and the plains of South Dakota along one route. When completed, the NCT will be about 4,600 miles; however, there are currently 1,900 miles of undeveloped connector routes during which the route is often located along the road. …

Physician Shortage Or Allocation Problem? A Comprehensive Analysis Of The Primary Care Physician Shortage Rurally In The United States, Mazin E. Khalil

Masters Theses

This paper seeks to address the meaning of supply and demand as it relates to physician shortages, the claim that there is an actual shortage problem and the theory that the issue is not one of a shortage but simply a misallocation of physicians, and explores some potential solutions to the issue with case studies highlighting China, and Australia, which have faced similar issues and have utilized innovative approaches to dealing with their problems.

The Impact Of Fiscal Policy On Economic Growth: Empirical Evidence From Four South Asian Countries, Tasnia Symoom

Masters Theses

There is a constant debate about the effectiveness of fiscal policy on economic growth of developing countries. Policy makers in developing countries generally attempt to address socioeconomic issues such as poverty, unemployment, hunger, poor investment, and illiteracy while adjusting the levels of public spending and determining tax rates. This thesis examines the impact of fiscal policy on economic growth in four countries of South Asia. For reasons of data availability I choose four of these countries – Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka – for the period 1980 to 2016. I use the Error Correction Model (ECM) and Autoregressive Distributed …

War Spin: How U.S. Politicians, The President And The Media Frame Foreign Intervention, Samantha White

Masters Theses

In this research, I seek to explain how three different foreign policy actors, the President, key Senators, and the media frame intervention policy when determining if intervention is used for human rights versus U.S. interests. I will be looking at four different areas of turmoil (Bosnia (1992-1995), Rwanda (1994), Syria (2011-present) and Iraq (2003-2011)) to see if the Presidents, Senators, and the media framed their intervention around human rights atrocities being committed, or if they framed it around a national security dilemma.

Rigs Of Refuge: Spatial Agency And Its Role In Conflict, Brittany Lauren Mcgraw

Masters Theses

Architecture is an inherently political endeavor. As such, designers should carefully consider the spatial dialogue that the built environment creates between those who control spaces and those who use them. In times of crisis, this dialogue often ceases to be an equal exchange, pushing users’ needs aside and exerting authority in the most expedient way possible.

This thesis proposes that amidst settings of conflict, hyper-responsive architectural systems can counteract landscapes of authority by returning spatial agency to users. As the means of providing such a system, oil rigs should be repurposed as a network of deployable crisis response hubs.

An Incremental Intervention In Jakarta: An Empowering Infrastructural Approach For Upgrading Informal Settlements, Christopher H. Counihan

Masters Theses

Incrementalism is a growing movement within multiple design disciplines that approaches design with sustainable, social, and resilient aims structured around participatory, infrastructural, and phased approaches to design. Carefully considered structural and independent infrastructural frameworks allow infill and accretion according to the demands and needs of individuals and communities. This paper outlines the theories, case studies, and conditions driving incrementalism. My research has informed my project proposal for an incremental upgrade of a slum located in Jakarta using a phased, soft infrastructural, resident facilitated upgrade and development strategy creating new housing units, productive landscapes, and urban form. Incremental development will foster …

Evaluation Of New England Bridges For Bat Roosting Including Methodology And Case Studies, Angela Berthaume

Masters Theses

Bats are known and documented to use bridge structures as roosts in various locations throughout the United States and abroad, but there is limited knowledge of how bats use bridges in New England. Significant population declines due to White-Nose Syndrome have resulted in several bat species being listed as state or federally threatened or endangered. If bats are using bridges as roosts, significant effort is required to ensure they are not disturbed or harmed during construction or maintenance work, requiring knowledge of assessment methods to identify likely roost locations in bridges. This thesis describes a two summer study evaluating the …

Development Of Nuclear Underground Engineered Test Surrogates For Technical Nuclear Forensics Exploitation, Robert Boone Gilbreath

Masters Theses

A method for formulation and production of Nuclear UnderGround Engineered Test Surrogates (NUGETS) based on notional improvised nuclear device (IND) detonations in an underground environment analogous to the Nevada National Security Site (NNSS) is presented. Extensive statistical analyses of precursory geochemical and geophysical characteristics are combined with an augmented surrogate debris cooling technique and predictive IND contributions from the ORIGEN Fallout Analysis Tool. Precursory and resultant elemental compositions, cooling curve calculations, and visual comparison of NUGETS to genuine underground debris are reported. Application of NUGETS methodology to future studies in urban, underground post-detonation technical nuclear forensic (TNF) analysis is suggested.

Motivation And Support For Regulatory Changes: A Typology Of Tennessee Wild Turkey Hunters, Cristina Elisa Maldonado

Masters Theses

Hunters form a diverse group with multiple motivations for seeking outdoor recreation experiences. A deeper understanding of hunters’ motivations may benefit wildlife managers in state agencies to cater services and regulations to meet the needs of this diverse group. To determine the motivations of wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) hunters in Tennessee, and their attitudes and preferences concerning turkey hunting and management, a self-administered questionnaire was developed and mailed to a sample of licensed Turkey hunters in Tennessee. A multivariate K-means cluster analysis was then applied to identify hunter typologies based on several motivation factors that were derived from …

Veterans’ Satisfaction With Veterans’ Administration Healthcare Systems, Dale Arnold

Masters Theses

There are currently over 600,000 veterans in the State of Michigan served by only five Veterans’ Administration Medical Centers. These medical centers are not evenly distributed throughout the state with the majority located in the southernmost portion of the state. There necessarily will be a number of veterans for which it is unreasonable to travel to these medical centers to receive care to which they are entitled. This research will investigate the number of veterans that are currently required to drive excessive distances to receive adequate care under the present system, and to possibly suggest solutions to the current situation.

Student Veterans And Their Transition To Becoming A College Student, Paul R. Higgerson

Masters Theses

This study sought to understand how student veterans view their transition to becoming a college student. A small, but increasing, amount of studies have been conducted on this topic. A qualitative approach, specifically a narrative method, was utilized to better understand how student veterans made meaning of the life events they experienced during their transition. Six student veterans in at least their second semester at their current institution were interviewed one-on-one, and their narratives are included here. This study revealed that student veterans and adult learners share many characteristics and that by viewing the student veteran as a student in …

The Power Of The Periphery: Aid, Mutuality And Cold War U.S-Ghana Relations, 1957-1966, Moses Allor Awinsong

Masters Theses

This project interrogates how economic self interest motivated periphery states such as Ghana to use foreign policy as a vehicle to attract improved development assistance from superpowers, in this case the United States. While the United States viewed its aid program in Ghana in stringently Cold War terms, Kwame Nkrumah and his advisors were less inclined to get deeply concerned about Cold War ideology. This project shows that Ghanaian agency was manifested in the Cold War through the new state's construction of a foreign policy image that made it a prominent African voice globally. It then examines how that image …

Planning [And] The Sanitary City: Understanding Implications Of Community-Based Ecological Sanitation Reforms In The U.S., Catherine K. Bryars

Masters Theses

Though most commonly regarded as a revolutionary public health invention, the introduction of conventional wastewater sanitation systems has a mixed legacy in the U.S. A growing body of research links sewage-based sanitation systems with nationwide ecosystem degradation and an unsustainable dependence on vast inputs of materials and resources. In addition to contributing to chronic problems across the country, today these wastewater infrastructures are in various states of disrepair. The EPA estimates that at least $270 billion must be invested in coming years to prevent massive sanitary failures, but municipalities are increasingly unable to fund these expensive (re)investments in buried water-carriage …

Transit-Oriented Development And Weak Real-Estate Markets, Jonathan Cabral

Masters Theses

Mass public transportation has quickly become one of the hot topic issues throughout the country. Connecticut in particular has made significant investments in public transit and hopes to create a modern public transit system over the next two decades.

As part of the investment in public transit, there has also been significant investment in development planning around these newly created transit hubs. The development of the land around these hubs is oftentimes referred to as transit-oriented development (TOD). Rooted in TOD are principles of "new urbanism," an attempt to make places safer, walkable, and esthetically pleasing. In addition, TOD has …

Accelerating Expertise To Facilitate Decision Making In High-Risk Professions Using The Dacum System, Ralph Kuchenbrod

Masters Theses

The purpose of this research was to determine whether the process of achieving occupational expertise could be accelerated enabling operators in high risk vocations to make effective decisions earlier in their careers. Scholars have hypothesized good decision making skills are largely a result of relevant experience within the specific domain. The rationale being that the greater the experience an individual has the more likely the operator has experienced similar situations and can apply solutions that have been successful in the past. Two distinct methods of decision making have been identified: traditional decision making and naturalistic decision making (NDM).

The ability …

Dairy, Democracy, & Pr: A Political Economic Analysis Of Associated Milk Producers, Inc. 1988-1989, Anna L. Percival

Masters Theses

This paper, using a political economic approach, explores the communication techniques used during a second-wave of consolidation in the dairy industry in the 1980s. After providing a historical context of the dairy industry and its connections with federal policy, this paper follows the story of a large dairy cooperative: Association Milk Producers, Inc. (AMPI) and how it influenced public policy and consumption through interconnected dairy organizations like the National Milk Producers Federation and by using a political action committee. This paper provides an example of Carey's (1997) treetops propaganda by way of the powerful political action committee C-TAPE and the …

Modeling The "Gravity" Of Foreign Aid: A Dyadic Panel Analysis On The Impact Of Bilateral Aid Commitments On Bilateral Immigration From 1994 To 2011, Miles D. Williams

Masters Theses

While research shows policymakers increase bilateral foreign aid commitments in response to an increase in bilateral immigration, supposedly as a means for reducing the demand for immigration, the effectiveness of this strategy is given only passing consideration in the literature. Many doubt this approach's success, but little effort has been made to empirically justify this doubt. This paper attempts to fill this gap in the literature and proposes a novel hypothesis. It is argued here that aid, more than simply failing to promote development quickly enough to reduce the demand for immigration, functions as a signal of donor wealth. When …

The Economic Implications Of Evolving Aviation Funding Policy In Tennessee, Hunter Pressley Mccracken

Masters Theses

The majority of state funding for capital improvements at Tennessee’s general aviation and commercial airports comes through grants awarded from the Tennessee Transportation Equity Trust Fund (TETF). Through a 4.5 percent sales and use tax on the consumption of aviation fuel, users help to fund the continued improvement and maintenance of aviation facilities around the state. Aircraft refueling operations associated with the FedEx “SuperHub” in Memphis were responsible for two-thirds of the TETF’s revenue for Fiscal Year 2014. In response to speculation that FedEx would relocate its refueling operations to reduce its fuel tax liability, the Tennessee General Assembly passed …

Language Policy In Turkey And Its Effect On The Kurdish Language, Sevda Arslan

Masters Theses

For many decades the Kurdish language was ignored and banned from public use and Turkish became the lingua franca for all citizens to speak. This way, the Turkish state sought to create a nation-state based on one language and attempted to eliminate the use of other languages, particularly Kurdish, through severe regulations and prohibitions.

Firstly, this thesis traces the language planning policies in the 20th century which resulted in the invisibilization and denial of Kurdish through an attempted linguicide. Through decade long oppressions which resulted in mass killings, arrests, re-location of Kurds, monopolization of education in Turkish and eventually the …

Examining Implementation Of The Massachusetts Act Relative To Safety Regulations For School Athletic Programs (Sessions Laws: Chapter 166 Of The Acts Of 2010): A Multiple-Case Study, Mitchell L. Doucette

Masters Theses

Background/Purpose: Reducing the incidence and negative consequences of concussion among youth athletes is a public health priority. Fifty states have adopted legislation addressing the problem of sports-related concussions among youth-athletes. In 2010, Massachusetts adopted legislation based on Washington State’s Lystedt Law, enacting state-wide requirements for high school athletic programs. This study explored how the legislation has been implemented within Massachusetts schools and school-districts and identified factors influential to local implementation.

Methods: A qualitative multiple-case study approach was utilized. US Census data concerning the household median income and population size of the school-district’s representative town(s) were used to purposively recruit cases. …