Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Navigating The Institutional Review Board For Librarianship Research, Carolyn Schubert

Libraries

Librarians are encountering more opportunities to conduct original research and contribute to evidence based practices, but only 26% believe they have the educational training to conduct these tasks (Kennedy & Brancolini, 2012). One key step in this process is navigating an Institutional Review Board (IRB) to assure participants are treated in an ethical manner. What does it mean to protect research participants today? What does an IRB look for? What tips, tricks, and best practices can save you time with this process? Discussion of these questions and more are the focus of this webinar.

Taking The First Step To Develop Scalable, Asynchronous Library Instruction, Liz Thompson, Bethany Mickel, Howard Carrier

Libraries

Scalable equals asynchronous. And asynchronous equals boring. Or does it? The First Year Writing program at JMU offers more than 60 sections of the foundational first‐year writing course each semester to more than one thousand students and is supported by one librarian. In an effort to reach more than the usual 20 one‐shot sessions each semester, a small team from the library planned and built an asynchronous, modular tutorial series. Now, information literacy instruction is provided using a tool called Guide on the Side (GotS) and uses short scenario videos and additional content followed by activities and assessment to improve …

A Guide To Survey And Clearance Of Underwater Explosive Ordnance, Gichd

Global CWD Repository

This guide focuses on providing a collection of current policy and best practices used in survey and clearance of underwater explosive ordnance. Specific cases are used; they provide examples and analysis. It is not intended to be a comprehensive database of policies and practices; it provides national authorities and mine action organisations with guidance to better understand the issues and complexities of underwater EO survey and clearance operations.

Mine Detection Rats | Apopo: Efficiency And Effectiveness Study Using Mdr Capability, Gichd, Anti-Persoonsmijnen Ontmijnende Product Ontwikkeling

Global CWD Repository

As the laboratory rat is one of the most widely studied animals, the abundance of available research material on its olfactory capabilities is not surprising. However, very little information can be found on their mine/ERW detection abilities. Consequently, in late 2015, GICHD conducted a study of APOPO’s Mine Detection Rat (MDR) programs in Angola, Mozambique and Cambodia. The aim of the study was to focus on the operational efficiency and effectiveness of the MDR, as well as to determine compliance with the International Mine Action Standards (IMAS). Within the sector, MDR suffer from a negative perception of scent detection as …

Ddasaccident812, Hd-Aid

Global CWD Repository

On 17/05/2016 the operation manager of [Demining organization involved] has contacted us by telephone to inform about explosion of an IED in their worksite or the risk (Hazard) area 012 in the village of Tal Al-Rabiea /Daquq /Kirkuk and after the call, the in-charge person of Quality Assurance: [Name removed] and his assistant: [Name removed] we have moved toward the location in order to collect necessary information and taking the photos of the place of the incident. According to the information gained by the board it was found that the affected person: [the Victim] has intended to render some IEDs …

Strategies For Improving The Prevention Of Intimate Partner Violence Against Women In Burma, Rebecca L. Murray

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This research combines an understanding of gender in Burmese society with contemporary techniques for preventing intimate partner violence (IPV). It is designed to provide individuals and groups with a comprehensive understanding of intimate partner violence in Burma as well as strategies to best improve programs dealing with this form of violence. To understand the current state of gender relations in Burma, interviews were conducted with 24 college students in Yangon, Burma. These interviews were used as a context for creating strategies which would best aid interested organizations in preventing intimate partner violence. These strategies include program development, legislation, social gender …

Preliminary Insights Into Prehistoric Toolstone Preference Of Two Igneous Materials In The Tanana River Drainage, Interior Alaska, Brooks A. Lawler

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This project examines prehistoric human mobility and raw material preference for tool manufacture in a 45,918 square mile portion of Interior Alaska, the Tanana River Drainage. A geographic approach is used to investigate the distribution of prehistoric obsidian and rhyolitic artifacts in relation to the sources of these materials. The objective of the investigation is to reveal spatial patterning in the distributions of artifacts made of these two materials, relative to each other and relative to the cost of obtaining these raw materials from their sources on the landscape. I examine a hypothesis based in human behavioral ecology and optimal …

U.S. Policy And Civil Liberties In Cuba: A Qualitative Analysis, Jason E. Mann

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

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Seeing The Forests For The Trees: A Comparative Study Of The Green Belt And Chipko Movements, Claire E. Elverum

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The Green Belt Movement (GBM) in Kenya and the Chipko movement in India are two examples of social movements that support the ecofeminist ideology. Both of these environmental movements began under similar circumstances at around the same time, but they are now very different. While the GBM broadened its focus beyond planting trees and gained widespread international attention, the Chipko movement maintained its central focus on protecting trees and remained relatively decentralized and informal. This paper uses these two social movements to explore which factors most influence social movement success and international reach.

Beyond Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Learned Information In Forodhani Park, Jaimie Lynn Mulligan

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

This ethnographic study examines Traditional Ecological Knowledge in Mji Mkongwe (Stone Town), Zanzibar, and how ecological knowledge shared by locals on the island is formed and is shared among locals in a park setting. Using a framework of political ecology, this study specifically highlights ecological pressures of local population growth, global climate change on a local scale, and local economic changes as the key drivers for the creation and cultural importance of Traditional Ecological Knowledge. To discover both the ecological pressures and the examples of Traditional Ecological Knowledge, I conducted semi-structured, open-ended interviews in Forodhani Park, a public park on …

Predicting Student Involvement In Campus Recreation Programs, Nicole Grabowski

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Purpose: To identify factors that predict the frequency of campus recreation (CR) use at a 4-year, public university in the mid-Atlantic region.

Methods: Students were given an online survey to collect a variety of student lifestyle and health information, including campus residency status, gender, year, height, weight, academic discipline, semester credit hour enrollment, and job hours per week during the semester. Analysis participants (n = 1561) were divided into two subsets, one with 90% of the subjects, and one with 10% of the subjects. A stepwise multiple regression analysis was performed on the 90% subset with the predictor variables. Two …

Examination Of Cue-Induced Nicotine Withdrawal Among Humans, Kathleen R. Owens

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

There is copious research investigating the effect of environmental cues on the maintenance of drug behavior in animals, but sparse data exist with regard to humans. In our study, we examined 6 dependent cigarette smokers from James Madison University. We paid participants to use novel lighters that served as audible/tactile cues. After 2 weeks, participants returned to the lab satiated with nicotine for their testing session in which they were presented with the same cue and immediately completed a multiple-choice procedure (MCP) that measured their preferences by offering choices regarding money or the ability to take a cigarette break. Results …

The Relationship Between Mortality Salience And The Two Subtypes Of Narcissism, Rianna H. Yung

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Terror management theory (TMT) posits that a psychological conflict (“terror”) is created when human beings are reminded of their own mortality (Solomon, Greenberg, & Pyszczynski, 1991). This experimental study examines whether the impact of mortality salience on self-esteem is moderated by individual differences in narcissism. There are two subtypes of narcissism, namely grandiose narcissism and vulnerable narcissism. Grandiose narcissism is associated with higher self-esteem, whereas vulnerable narcissism is associated with lower self-esteem. Participants (N = 437) completed an online survey that consisted of the Rosenberg Self-esteem Inventory, the Pathological Narcissism Inventory, a mortality salience manipulation or the control task, …

The Expansion Of The Training Of The Hospital Emergency Response Team At Sentara Rockingham Memorial With The Harrisonburg Rescue Squad, Allison E. Mayzel

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Major emergency incidents occur without any notice and can cause extreme disorder and confusion. The hospital in Harrisonburg, Virginia, Sentara Rockingham Memorial, has created a Hospital Emergency Response Team (HERT) that will be prepared to respond to major incidents in order to create an Emergency Treatment Area that will triage, decontaminate, and transport patients. An agency that operates closely with the HERT is Harrisonburg Rescue Squad. The Rescue Squad is the first response to the scene of disasters, therefore it is important for them to be prepared for any emergency situation. In order to create uniformity between the Rescue Squad …

Understanding Identity And Personality Authenticity Of Engineering Students, Kylie D. Stoup

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Women are underrepresented in engineering, with 18-20% of engineering students being women¹. We, therefore, used the framework of identity theory and self-concept differentiation to better understand female and male engineering student retention. An exploratory approach is used to measure freshman and senior engineering students’ personality and authenticity of personality across engineering and non-engineering contexts. First, we found personality profiles among engineering freshmen and seniors in engineering settings, and then compared them to their personality in nonacademic settings for authenticity purposes. Big 5 Personality and Authenticity scale were methods used through a survey to determine personality and authenticity in …

Too Much Television?: Does Watching Political Ads Influence If And How People Vote?, Andrew Haveles

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The goal of this study was to examine the impact of negative political advertising on a young voters’ emotions and his/her decision to vote in the next election. This was done through the lens of the theory of cultivation analysis. The theory stated that the more television a person watches, the more likely he/she is to believe what he/she sees is reality. Using a cross-sectional survey, 324 participants viewed one of four political ads or a control group ad. Although no significant evidence found that negative political ads would stop people from voting, some significant evidence suggested that negative ads …

No Soy De Aquí, Ni Soy De Allá: How Stateless Individuals In The Dominican Republic Construct National Identity, Lindsay Wright

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Resolution 12, a piece of national legislation in the Dominican Republic, retroactively revokes citizenship from individuals whose ancestors came to the country illegally. The resolution was proposed in 2007, signed into law in 2008, and ratified in 2013, rendering a large number of Dominican-born individuals stateless. Using the framework of Communication Theory of Identity (CTI), the researcher analyzed the communication processes and cultural elements stateless individuals utilize to form their national identity. The researcher used a qualitative approach to gather data, which were analyzed using the constant comparative method. Responses from the participants, provided through in-depth individual interviews, indicate that …

The Relationship Between Conflict Resolution Styles In Cross-Gender Sibling Relationships And Romantic Relationships, Kristen M. Friel

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Previous research demonstrates that there are several similarities between sibling relationships and romantic relationships and the former may even impact the latter. Further, research has shown that sibling relationships of mixed-gender dyads more significantly impact later romantic relationships. As conflict is a normative and frequent aspect of both relationships, the purpose of this study was to determine if there is a relationship between a female’s conflict resolution style with her male sibling and her conflict resolution style with her romantic partner, if relational closeness and distance in years between her and her male sibling are moderating factors of her conflict …

Student Awareness Of The Daily News-Record, Molly Margaret Jacob

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The Daily News-Record is a local daily newspaper located in Harrisonburg, Virginia, a city with a population of about 52,000. The Daily News-Record's print circulation is 26,000, while its digital circulation is 800. The paper also houses other local publications, such as the Rocktown Weekly, a free weekly publication that covers local news and the local music scene. James Madison University is a mid-sized public university also located in Harrisonburg, Virginia. The researcher wanted to understand JMU student awareness of local news sources, student consumption of news sources, student intention to read the local paper and whether there was a …

Exploring The Associations Among College Students Self-Reported Resilience, Coping Behavior, Goal Orientation And Passion For Academics, Sara C. Mcmillan

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The current study expanded research on resilience by examining associations between resilience, coping behaviors, goal orientation and passion for academics of college students. Participants were 252 undergraduate students (147 female, 105 male) with an average age of 19. Three resilience scales assessed in this study, Resilience Scale for Adults, Brief Resilience Scale and the Academic Resilience Scale, were positively correlated with each other. Resilience was positively correlated with adaptive coping, learning goals and harmonious passion. Resilience and maladaptive coping were negatively correlated. This study connected variables not previously examined in a college student population. Limitations and implications of the findings …

A Comparison Of Combined Versus Individual Cognitive Coping Strategies For Managing Pain, Grant Pointon

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Several cognitive coping strategies for reducing pain sensation have been identified, but their effects have traditionally only been examined in isolation. The current investigation instead compared the effectiveness of traditional cognitive coping strategies based upon imagery and pain acknowledgement/attention against an “integrated” strategy (that required both strategies to be used in combination) within a cold pressor test (CPT). Participants (N = 24, M_age= 19.46, SD = 1.47) underwent a baseline condition followed by counterbalanced strategy trials: imagery, attention, & integrated condition. Tolerance times, pain ratings, and perceived control ratings were recorded. The imagery condition had lower pain …

Does Passion Predict Enjoyment And Performance In An Interteaching-Based Course?, Allison T. Piotrowski

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The present study sought to examine whether passion for academic activities predicted students’ enjoyment of and performance in an interteaching-based course. Although previous studies have shown interteaching to produce better student-learning outcomes than lecture, few studies have examined factors that predict how students respond to interteaching. Because people who have higher levels of harmonious passion tend to approach activities in an open and flexible manner, we predicted that harmonious passion for academic activities would predict increased enjoyment of and performance in an interteaching-based course. In contrast, because people with higher levels of obsessive passion approach activities in a rigid and …

A Novel Use Of The Deese-Roediger-Mcdermott Paradigm: Distinguishing Between Differential Memory Mechanisms In Emotional Literature, Alan John Yablonski Jr.

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

To current knowledge, the emotional literature has not included the proposal to conceptualize experimental designs in terms of item vs. hippocampal-dependent relational memory representations. Through utilizing the Deese-Roediger-McDermott (DRM) paradigm the current study targets two memory mechanisms: item-specific memory (i.e., font color) and relational memory. In addition, relational-binding memory was also assessed. The current study consists of three hypotheses: (a) negatively-valenced critical lures will be correctly recalled by participants more than neutrally-valenced critical lures (increased relational memory for negatively-valenced words), (b) participants will more accurately recall studied negatively-valenced words with the correct color compared to neutrally-valenced studied words (increased item-specific …

Selected Health Behaviors Among Undergraduate College Students In Different Academic Disciplines, Patrick C. Gathman

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Physical activity, campus recreation (CR) use, body mass index (BMI), and varied health indices were compared between academic discipline (AD) groups and sex. Participants (n = 219) were classified as AD I (kinesiology and physical education majors), AD II (health science majors and nursing majors), and AD III (representative sample of other non-health-related majors) in order to make between group comparisons based on the amount of emphasis placed on physical activity and health-related content within different disciplines. Significant differences (p < 0.05) were found between the academic discipline groups for International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ) scores, CR minutes, CR days, CR time per day, vigorous physical activity (VPA), and perceived-health score; and between sex for BMI, VPA, sitting (SIT), fiber intake, and fruit and vegetable intake. When measuring CR use in total minutes per semester, days per semester, and minutes per day AD I was higher than AD II by 100%, 66%, and 21%, respectively; and AD I was higher than AD III by 247%, 160%, and 27%, respectively. The results indicate a positive relationship between the emphasis placed physical activity and health within an academic discipline and the degree to which students participate in physical activity, positive health behaviors and perceived health.

Military Connections, Shannon M. Malloy

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

There is a long tradition of research on children from military families, which has focused on observations that these children often exhibit both internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors. One of the emphases over that last several decades as the military moves to an all-volunteer force, is a recognition that the military is no longer largely staffed by single males. An emphasis on military families has been exhibited at many different levels. This research compared university students with and without a parental history of military service on extroversion, self-esteem, and attachment style. The hypothesis regarding higher rates of extroversion among children …

Interteaching And Mindset, Caroline D. Hall

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The researcher investigated the relationships between growth mindset and performance and statistics self-efficacy and performance in interteaching courses. The study included college students enrolled in one section of a Psychological Statistics and Measurements class. Participants completed a mindset survey indicating their level of growth mindset. Participants then completed a Statistics Self-Efficacy Survey. Finally, participants completed a demographics survey. Participants completed the mindset survey again in the middle of the semester as well as at the end of the semester. The researchers also collected behavioral data including the number of emails participants sent throughout the course and the number of preparation …

Changing Peer’S Attitudes Towards Accommodations For Disabled Students, Dylan G. Kitley

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Previous research on attitudes towards accommodations given to university students with disabilities has examined three groups: Faculty, disabled students, and their non-disabled peers. In general, faculty members have positive attitudes about implementing accommodations as long as they do not drastically change the curriculum. Both disabled and non-disabled students had similar positive attitudes for external disabilities such as visual impairment, cerebral palsy, and brain injury but less positive attitudes towards non-physical disabilities like depression. The purpose of this study was to see if an online educational intervention could change attitudes towards accommodations of disabilities. Participants (N = 122) were divided …

Initiating Conversation By A Kindergarten-Aged Child With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Eliana A. Segal

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) have social skill deficits that are often manifested in a failure to achieve normal back-and-forth conversation. They rarely initiate social interactions and often show little responsiveness to others. This can extinguish the social initiations of their peers, leading to great difficulty making friends. The purpose of the present study was to teach a child with ASD at an inter-professional autism clinic how to initiate and reciprocate a social conversation. A prompt fading procedure was implemented during training sessions to build a set of social skills into the child’s repertoire. The intervention provided social attention …

The Impact Of Market Perception On Sovereign Default Risk In The European Union, Keith Pendergrast

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

The recent debt crisis in the European Union has resulted in the differential treatment of Greece’s debt due in large part to market perception. This is evident in the large differences in credit default swap spreads between Greece and other periphery countries in Europe. The goal of this thesis is to explore the differential treatment, and determine the magnitude of this difference. In order to do this, a fixed effect regression is implemented to first determine that a difference exists. Then, a perception index is created in order to determine the magnitude of the market perception. Using these methods we …

American Sign Language As A Foreign Language Equivalent At James Madison University, Abigail E. Compton

Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019

ASL is increasingly gaining acknowledgment as a foreign language in the university setting. At James Madison University, sign language classes have traditionally been housed within the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. This research makes a case for considering ASL as an equivalent to courses in the Department of Foreign Languages, Literatures, and Cultures and argues that ASL meets the university standards for the study of a foreign language with regard to fulfilling Bachelor of Arts requirements.

Considering the linguistic history of ASL and the language’s accompanying culture, we will demonstrate the standards for teaching ASL are identical to the …