Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Human Error In Commercial Fishing Vessel Accidents: An Investigation Using The Human Factors Analysis And Classification System, Peter J. Zohorsky

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Theses & Dissertations

The commercial fishing industry is frequently described as one of the most hazardous occupations in the United States. The objective, to maximize the catch, is routinely challenged by a variety of elements due to the environment, the vessel, the crew, and several external considerations and how they interact with each other. The analysis of fishing vessel accidents can be complicated due to the diverse nature of the industry, including the species caught, the type and size of boat that is employed, how far travelled from their homeport, and the adequacy of the support organizations ensuring safe and uninterrupted operations. This …

Student Success Coaching In Virginia Community Colleges, Angela Lawhorne

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

Community college students face many barriers when they start college, especially if they are from first-generation families, are low-income, or identify as a minority. Retention and completion for these at-risk students are relatively low compared to those with higher socioeconomic backgrounds (Bettinger & Baker, 2014). To improve these statistics and promote academic persistence, some Virginia Community College System (VCCS) colleges have implemented student success coaching under the Chancellor’s College Success Coach Initiative (VCCS, 2011). This entails not only assisting students with academic coaching, but also with career, financial, and personal matters that may affect their academic success. The researcher sought …

International Student Recruitment, Retention, And Transfer Efforts At Top Community Colleges Hosting International Students In The United States, Alejandra Diaz-Rangel

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

The number of international students enrolled at community colleges across the U.S. has significantly shifted in recent years. As a result, higher education institutions across the country have developed and integrated rationales for attracting and retaining international students to their campuses. The purpose of this research study was to examine international student recruitment, retention, and transfer efforts taking place at community colleges in the U.S. The data that influence the international student recruitment, retention, and transfer plans set forth by community colleges in the U.S. was collected from decision makers at 15 U.S. higher education institutions through the means of …

Investigating A Multimodal Approach To Clinical Diagnosis Of Mild Cognitive Impairment And Alzheimer’S Disease, Sean M. Flannery

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

An estimated 5.8 million Americans suffer from dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease (AD), with that number projected to grow to 13.8 million by mid-century (Alzheimer’s Association, 2019). Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) describes the stage between normal cognitive decline that comes with aging and a dementia diagnosis (Peterson, 1999). Due to a lack of a cure or particularly effective treatment, a major goal of treatment is to focus on improving quality of life (Budson & Solomon, 2016). An early and accurate diagnosis can address this goal in a variety of ways. Despite the high prevalence and immense amount of research in …

Alcohol Use And Drinking-Related Eating Restriction Behaviors Among College Students, Peter Preonas

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The combination of eating restrictions and alcohol use is a prevalent problem on college campuses. Some students engage in eating restrictions prior to drinking to limit their overall caloric intake or to enhance intoxication effects. To date, limited research suggests that drinking-related eating restriction behaviors are associated with additional and unique health risks relative to high-risk drinking or eating restrictions alone. As such, additional research examining this unique, risky set of behaviors is warranted. Consequently, the present study aimed to address gaps in the literature by further examining the risks associated with drinking-related eating restrictions and testing trait factors related …

The Study Of Motivation For Defection Within The Intelligence Community: Hindering The Government's Ability To Prevent And Detect Defection, William Virgili

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

Since its inception, the global community has been marred by insecurities about the intentions of other states, which led to states creating intelligence agencies to engage in human intelligence operations. In defense against foreign intelligence services, the U.S. has implemented policies and procedures, informed by defection research, to prevent and detect defection. However, this leads to the question does current research on motivation for defection adequately inform government policies and procedures to prevent and detect defection within the intelligence community? To interrogate this question, I present an in-depth analysis of motivation; the ways in which these conclusions have or have …

Critical Language Awareness Pedagogy In First-Year Composition: A Design-Based Research Study, Megan Michelle Weaver

English Theses & Dissertations

In this design-based research (DBR) study, I collaborated with two first-year composition (FYC) instructors in designing and implementing Critical Language Awareness (CLA) pedagogy to promote students’ linguistic consciousness while strengthening and enhancing their postsecondary writing skills. I designed and implemented this study by drawing on a critical theory of language, informed by literature on language ideologies (Silverstein, 1979; Irvine & Gal, 2000; Kroskrity, 2010) and raciolinguistics (Flores & Rosa, 2015; Alim, 2016), and a critical theory of pedagogy, informed by literature on critical pedagogy (Freire, 1970, 1973; Giroux, 2011) and critical race pedagogy (Ladson-Billings & Tate, 1995; Lynn, 1999). After …

Faits Accomplis In The Shadow Of Shifting Power, Joshua Adam Hastey

Graduate Program in International Studies Theses & Dissertations

The military fait accompli is so understudied a phenomenon in the international relations literature that even its definition is not widely known. A fait accompli is a unilateral revision to the status quo in an ongoing dispute over some distribution of benefits. Though recent work has demonstrated that faits accomplis are relatively common events in international history and current international relations, the subject remains undertheorized and empirically underexplored. This dissertation seeks to open up the conversation about faits accomplis in two complementary ways. First, it advances an original formal model of faits accomplis in the shadow of power shifts, …

Quasi-School Leaders: The Lived Experiences Of High School Counseling Directors And Their Role In Schools, Andrea Cherice Simon

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

The aim of this study is to explore the lived experiences of high school counseling director’s and how their principal and district school counseling supervisor shape their experiences as leaders. The role of high school counseling director’s is increasingly complex, unique, and oftentimes misunderstood. They are often viewed as leaders and change agents in student’s overall success due to their unique skill levels in advocacy and collaboration (Kaffenberger, Murphy, & Bemak, 2006; McMahon, Mason, Daluga-Guenther, & Ruiz, 2014; Young, Millard, & Kneale, 2013). However, principal’s and district school counseling supervisors are key players in defining the role and responsibilities of …

Why Do Nonprofits Fail? A Quantitative Study Of Form 990 Information In The Years Preceding Closure, Mackenzie Arbogust

School of Public Service Theses & Dissertations

Nonprofit organizations are an important piece of the community and economy in the United States. Each year, nonprofit organizations close their doors and stop providing services to the community. While there are large amounts of literature around financial health and vulnerability and governance best practices of nonprofit organizations, few of the studies have ever looked specifically at failed organizations. In general, the end stages of the life cycle of nonprofit organizations have not been well studied and are not well understood. This study draws on resource dependency theory and institutional theory to identify financial and governance factors that may serve …

Towards Dynamic Vehicular Clouds, Aida Ghazizadeh

Computer Science Theses & Dissertations

Motivated by the success of the conventional cloud computing, Vehicular Clouds were introduced as a group of vehicles whose corporate computing, sensing, communication, and physical resources can be coordinated and dynamically allocated to authorized users. One of the attributes that set Vehicular Clouds apart from conventional clouds is resource volatility. As vehicles enter and leave the cloud, new computing resources become available while others depart, creating a volatile environment where the task of reasoning about fundamental performance metrics becomes very challenging. The goal of this thesis is to design an architecture and model for a dynamic Vehicular Cloud built on …

Coping Self-Efficacy As A Potential Moderator Of The Relationship Between Sexual Orientation And Negative Mental Health Outcomes, James M. Macchia

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Sexual minority individuals (i.e., those who identify as a sexual orientation other than heterosexual) have consistently been linked to an increased risk of negative mental health outcomes. The process of coping can impact the content and severity of said outcomes, and one’s ability to cope is often predicted by the concept known as coping self-efficacy (i.e., one’s belief in his or her ability to cope). This study aimed to assess the effects of sexual orientation, coping self-efficacy, and their interactions on mental health by looking at different aspects of coping self-efficacy as potential moderating variables. Self-perceptions of coping skills were …

Investigating The Impact Of The Fava Well-Being Protocol On Perceived Stress And Psychological Well-Being With At-Promise High School Students, Renee L. Fensom

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

An elevation in stress levels can be caused by many contributing factors, which can ultimately interfere with the learning of young people. Fortunately, an increase in well being can help promote resilience, creating a buffer to stress. Therefore, the current study investigated the influence of a positive psychology intervention aimed at lowering perceived stress and increasing well-being among at-promise students. The theoretical framework for this study was based on Ryff’s Model of Psychological Well-Being (PWB). The specific intervention used was the Well-being Therapy School Protocol developed by Fava and associates, based off of Carol Ryff’s Model of PWB (Fava, 2016). …

Testing A Model Of Sexual Minority Orientation In Individuals With And Without The Broad Autism Phenotype, Lydia Ruth Qualls

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and the Broad Autism Phenotype (BAP) are more likely than individuals with typical development (TD) to report a sexual minority orientation (e.g., Bejerot & Eriksson, 2014; DeWinter et al., 2017; Qualls, Hartmann, & Paulson, 2018). There has been no research on how existing theories of sexual orientation might explain the development or increased likelihood of sexual minority orientation in these individuals. The aim of this study was to operationalize and test the fit of an existing model of sexual orientation (Worthington, Savoy, Dillon, & Vernaglia, 2002) in individuals with TD, BAP, and ASD.

Participants …

A Daily Diary Examination Of Microaggressions And Alcohol Use Among Emerging Adult Bisexual Women: The Role Of Alcohol Demand, Sarah J. Ehlke

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Bisexual women are at far greater risk for alcohol use, alcohol-related negative consequences, and alcohol use disorder than heterosexual or lesbian women. However, research on sexual minority women often combines lesbian and bisexual women into a single group. One possible explanation for the increased alcohol use and associated consequences among bisexual women relates to their experiences of discrimination or microaggressions that are daily insults and comments, intentional or unintentional, about their sexuality from both the heterosexual and sexual minority communities. Thus, it is possible that bisexual women drink to cope with microaggressions. Specifically, bisexual women may drink more and have …

Mindfulness And Its Impact On Adaptive Coping And Psychological Well-Being: An Intervention For Undergraduate Students, Charles Bradley Freligh

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The concept of mindfulness has been shown to positively impact psychological well-being, and one application of mindfulness-based interventions has been the development and implementation of courses specifically for college students, a population that has been shown to be particularly vulnerable to the negative impacts of stress. While these interventions have displayed beneficial outcomes, the mechanisms of how mindfulness exerts its impact remain unclear. One potential mechanism of mindfulness’ enhancement of well-being may be through its cultivation of an adaptive coping style in which an individual becomes more likely to approach and investigate stressors rather than avoid them. In this study, …

Property, Wealth, Race, And Power: An Introduction To Critical Resource Theory, Andrew Whitfield

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

School funding inequality is an issue that has plagued America and the Commonwealth of Virginia for years (Owings & Kaplan, 2020). Understanding the role that funding plays in education is one that is of extreme importance today This study explored the relationship between income inequality and how education is funded. This study follows a quantitative study approach using correlational methods. This study takes multiple facets from Critcal Theory, Critical Race Theory, and Resource Dependency Theory to introduce a new theory, Critical Resource Theory The results indicated there is a practically significant relationship between income inequality and education funding. These findings …

Counselor Education Doctoral Students’ Research Self-Efficacy: A Concept Mapping Approach, Zahide Sunal

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

Research self-efficacy (RSE) is a key concept not only for counselor educators as successful researchers but also for the advancement of counselor education field. In the literature, researchers have studied multiple factors (e.g., research interest, productivity) to understand the complex nature of RSE phenomenon. Despite being informative, these studies only focused on partial aspects of the multilayered RSE, showing methodological and conceptual limitations. Particularly, we do not have a holistic understanding of RSE and the interrelated relationship among the factors informing RSE. In the current study, the researcher used a mixedmethods design, Concept Mapping (Kane & Trochim, 2007) to explore …

Playing On The Threshold: Topological Chronotopes And Video Games, Michael Joseph Piero

English Theses & Dissertations

This study argues that the chronotope—literally “timespace”—is a useful, flexible heuristic for understanding how video game timespace is ideology, often encoding hegemonic norms of heteronormativity, misogyny, sovereign power’s control of bare life, and dualistic thinking. Adapting and reforging Mikhail Bakhtin’s “chronotope of the threshold,” I track the topological movements of threshold chronotopes across a series of games and game genres that reveal threshold experiences of play, ontology, and justice. This work of theory takes into account video game mechanics, interfaces, narratives, iconography, and materiality within the context of a player’s experience as a player-reader given to a bodily-rooted play with …

Bootstrapping Web Archive Collections From Micro-Collections In Social Media, Alexander C. Nwala

Computer Science Theses & Dissertations

In a Web plagued by disappearing resources, Web archive collections provide a valuable means of preserving Web resources important to the study of past events. These archived collections start with seed URIs (Uniform Resource Identifiers) hand-selected by curators. Curators produce high quality seeds by removing non-relevant URIs and adding URIs from credible and authoritative sources, but this ability comes at a cost: it is time consuming to collect these seeds. The result of this is a shortage of curators, a lack of Web archive collections for various important news events, and a need for an automatic system for generating seeds. …

The Effects Of Ceo Dismissal Risk And Skills On Risky Corporate Decisions And Ceo Compensation, Son T. Dang

Theses and Dissertations in Business Administration

This dissertation consists of three distinct essays on the effects of CEO dismissal risk on M&A megadeal decisions, the association between CEO compensation and generalist managerial ability in the presence of CEO dismissal risk, and the alignment of the initial compensation of new CEOs following CEO dismissals with their managerial ability.

In Essay 1, I study the link between CEO dismissal risk and risky M&A decisions and find that higher-dismissal-risk CEOs engage in more M&A megadeals than their counterparts. Such megadeal transactions lead to lower acquirer post-M&A abnormal returns, suggesting that risky investment decisions are driven by CEOs’ career concerns. …

Exploring The Effects Of Task Priority On Attention Allocation And Trust Towards Imperfect Automation: A Flight Simulator Study, Tetsuya Sato

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

The present study examined the effect of task priority and task load on attention allocation and automation trust in a multitasking flight simulator platform. Previous research demonstrated that, participants made less fixations and reported lower levels of trust towards the automation in the secondary monitoring under higher load on the primary tracking task (e.g., Karpinsky et al., 2018). The results suggested that participants perceived behaviors of the automated system less accurately due to less attention allocated to monitoring of the system, leading to decreased trust towards it. One potential explanation of the effect is that participants might have prioritized the …

Assessment Of Coordination And Proprioception In Youth With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Taylor Kristina Jones

Human Movement Studies & Special Education Theses & Dissertations

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by social and communicative delays. It is known that those with ASD exhibit lower activity levels and decreased proprioception to some extent. The biomechanics of movement in ASD has not been assessed thoroughly enough to provide information on ASD specific movement patterns, and no studies have been performed examining work and recovery. The purpose of this study is to examine whether 1) inter-limb and intra-limb coordination patterns during walking and running differ between youth with ASD and neurotypical sex, age, and BMI-matched controls. Youth with ASD (N=8) and their BMI, age, and sex matched …

Trust Issues: A Case Study Of The Relationship Between Trust And Reform Implementation, Courtney R. Wilson

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Theses & Dissertations

Reform creation and implementation tends to focus on the mechanics needed to ensure intended outcomes are achieved. School relationships are affected by the tension caused by reform implementation. Research suggests trust among teachers and between teachers and their administrator affects the way teachers make sense of, implement, and use new reform efforts. Given the demands reforms place on schools, trust has the potential to impact and encourage the implementation of reform and the maintenance of relationships. A qualitative case study method was used to decipher the impact trust plays in the implementation of reform. The concept of trust is used …

Governance Impact On Public-Private Partnerships For Member Countries Of The World Bank Group, Kouliga Koala

School of Public Service Theses & Dissertations

Member countries of the World Bank Group (WBG) increasingly turn to public-private partnerships (PPPs) to finance their transportation infrastructure projects due to the financial burden of undertaking big projects on their own. The World Bank coordinates the PPPs between investors and recipient countries. PPPs are expected to produce positive outcomes that respond to policy objectives. However, the outcomes and benefits of PPPs not only depend on several factors, but more importantly on how those factors interact with one another to yield the expected outcomes. This dissertation has identified good governance, PPP governance, and PPP outcome as the key concepts in …

A Multi-Dimensional Model Of Sexual Stigma And Relationship Satisfaction Among Female Same-Sex Couples: The Self-Fulfilling Prophecy Of Rejection Sensitivity, Alexander Thomas Shappie

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Sexual stigma is associated with impaired relationship functioning among sexual minority couples and is associated with a variety of negative outcomes that result in an inequitable burden for members of this population. While there is considerable evidence that sexual stigma and minority stress are related to individual health outcomes, less research has examined relationship health. The present study provides an important contribution to the literature because it was the first to offer a dyadic model that tested the relatedness between all three individual-level manifestations of sexual stigma (i.e., enacted, internalized, and perceived sexual stigma) and relationship satisfaction among same-sex couples. …

A Quest To Identify The Emerging Leadership Skills In Vuca World And Investigation Of Their Applications In Various Organizational Levels And Security Environments, Ali Can Kucukozyigit

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Theses & Dissertations

The theoretical framework of this research is based on “skills approach” that emphasizes the leader’s capabilities (skills, knowledge, and capabilities) that can be learned, taught, and fostered. VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous) environment is chosen as the focal point of this research as the leadership skills are extracted from studies referring to such environment. Although the acronym is dominantly used in management and business domains, the military also uses it to describe the complex operational environments like in Iraq and Afghanistan. The identification of individual leadership skills and delivering the right skill, at the right time, to the right …

Group Treatment Effectiveness For Substance Use Disorders: Abstinence Vs. Harm Reduction, Jill D. Parramore

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

The purpose of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to compare group treatment effectiveness for substance use disorders within the U.S. across treatment philosophies as it relates to the primary research question, Is there a significant difference of group treatment effectiveness between Abstinence and Harm Reduction treatment philosophies? It was hypothesized that group treatment will remain an effective intervention to treat substance use disorders between treatment philosophies and that no significant differences exist between-group comparisons. The aim of this study is to provide evidence of treatment effectiveness that will ultimately improve treatment outcomes for substance use disorders, provide guidance for …

Minority Counselor Multicultural Competence In The Current Sociopolitical Climate, Kathleen Brown

Counseling & Human Services Theses & Dissertations

A key component of professional orientation in the field of mental health is the ability to provide counseling that is culturally competent. Counselor preparatory education, ethical codes, professional organizations and regulating bodies recognize cultural competence as a cornerstone of clinical practice. It is especially important during a time in which cultural and racial minorities combat a tumultuous sociopolitical climate. American society has seen an exponential rise in anxiety, depression, and helplessness secondary to the 2016 Presidential Election. For minority counselors, providing multiculturally competent counseling in the face of extreme oppression, and during a period of apparent resurgence in overt systemic …

A Framework For Verifying The Fixity Of Archived Web Resources, Mohamed Aturban

Computer Science Theses & Dissertations

The number of public and private web archives has increased, and we implicitly trust content delivered by these archives. Fixity is checked to ensure that an archived resource has remained unaltered (i.e., fixed) since the time it was captured. Currently, end users do not have the ability to easily verify the fixity of content preserved in web archives. For instance, if a web page is archived in 1999 and replayed in 2019, how do we know that it has not been tampered with during those 20 years? In order for the users of web archives to verify that archived web …