Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Emotional Closeness Within Romantic Relationships: Is There Transmission Between Generations?, Mckenna Diane Fey

Theses and Dissertations--Family Sciences

This study tested the existence of intergenerational transmission of romantic emotional closeness using Galovan and Schramm’s (2018) model of relationship flourishing as a theoretical backbone. Romantic emotional closeness in the present study included intimacy (i.e., self-disclosure), admiration (i.e., appreciation expression), and dyadic coping. Couples among three generations from the Panel of Analysis of Intimate Relationships and Family Dynamics (Brüderl et al., 2013) were examined to test whether romantic emotional closeness in the first generation predicted romantic emotional closeness in the second generation, and whether that of the second generation predicted that of the third. Regressions within a partial latent model …

Parenting From Prison: Perceptions Of Incarcerated Parents' Ability And Influence, Gabrielle Hadorn

Theses and Dissertations--Family Sciences

Incarcerated parents are at a substantially higher risk for losing their legal right to parent than the general public. This study assessed implicit perceptions and biases that may play a role in these legal decisions, specifically the perceptions of incarcerated parents’ ability to parent and influence their children’s lives. Court appointed special advocate (CASA) volunteers’ (N = 242) perceptions of incarcerated parents based on the parents’ personal characteristics, characteristics of their children, and characteristics of their criminal activity were assessed through a true-experiment design. Ordinal regression analyses revealed that age of child, level of violence in the crime committed, and …

Examining The Effects Of Public Policies And Addiction On Purchase Of Tobacco Products With Causal Inference And Machine Learning Methods, Xueting Deng

Theses and Dissertations--Agricultural Economics

My three essays explore the effects of tobacco policies and addiction on the consumption of e-cigarettes and other tobacco products. Recently, jurisdictions imposed taxes and other regulations on e-cigarettes, with the hope to raise tax revenues and address health concerns regarding e-cigarette use, especially youth addiction. My first essay in Chapter 1 focuses on the effects of e-cigarette taxes on sales of e-cigarettes. It compares the two types of tax policies on sales of e-cigarettes, cigarettes, and smoking-cessation products. This comparison provides information for lawmakers on decisions of taxes regarding the perspectives of revenue generation and tobacco control. Second, after …

Fix Society, Please: Three Papers On The Mental Health Treatment, Social Support Resources, And Suicidology Of Transgender And Gender Diverse Adults, Annie Snow

Theses and Dissertations--Social Work

Despite their frequent utilization of mental health resources, transgender and gender diverse (TGD) adults are more likely than their cisgender counterparts to attempt suicide. While this phenomenon may inspire a myriad of explanations, the present dissertation is interested in two exploratory ideas: namely, that 1) mental health professionals may be failing their TGD clients, and 2) traditional mental health paradigms may be myopically inadequate. Paper 1 addresses the first issue by considering TGD experiences of active discrimination by mental health professionals. In addition to investigating the prevalence of abuse, this paper analyzes how intersectionality of oppression plays a role in …

We Died And Were Reborn: An Anthropological Study Of Health-Seeking Strategies For Mental And Emotional Distress In Post-War Eastern Sri Lanka, Daniel Ball

Theses and Dissertations--Anthropology

Since the early 2000s, Sri Lanka has made major gains in decentralizing and expanding state-based mental healthcare access and services outside of Colombo. However, little evidence exists related to on-the-ground experiences of Sri Lankans who access these services, the quality and sustainability of services, and the effects services have on individual therapy management of mental and emotional distress. In addition to an extensive historical review of mental health service provision, this dissertation explores strategic health-seeking practices among Tamil-speaking communities in eastern Sri Lanka—an area ravaged by high rates of poverty, 26 years of civil war, and the 2004 tsunami catastrophe. …

Carceral Extractivism, Livelihood Strategies, And “Acting Right” In The U.S. South, Edward L. Bullock

Theses and Dissertations--Anthropology

Mass incarceration and its effects are well documented and carceral privatization is hotly contested on moral and economic grounds. This dissertation examines the local effects of carceral privatization in the U.S. south in historical context. Tallulah is a small, rural predominately African American town in northeastern Louisiana that endures high rates of poverty, unemployment, and low educational attainment. It also hosts four private prisons operated by LaSalle Corrections, LLC. Two primary and overlapping questions guide the research. 1) How has an history of carceral entrepreneurship and mass incarceration impacted the way persons and communities create livelihoods and imagine futures, and …

Restructuring Work “The Chattanooga Way”: Urban Revitalization, Contingent Labor, And Trying To Get By In Tennessee, Mauri Systo

Theses and Dissertations--Anthropology

In Chattanooga, TN, the construction of a fiber optic telecommunications network has led to a tech-based revitalization strategy, and the promotion of entrepreneurial and technical positions within the Downtown. This dissertation questions what revitalization, the “Chattanooga Way,” means to differently situated residents of Chattanooga, TN, and how those differences in interpretation are related to lived experiences of economic inequality. Powerful local discourses, like the Chattanooga Way policy model and its accompanying “origin myth” of Chattanooga’s development often conceal disparities between grass-roots, public, and private sector notions of economic revitalization. Through the projection of a tech-based economic future, Chattanooga has created …

Village-Temple Consciousness In Two Jaffna Tamil Villages In Post-War Sri Lanka, Pathmanesan Sanmugeswaran

Theses and Dissertations--Anthropology

This dissertation investigates how community rebuilding is occurring in a gravely damaged, post-conflict society. Specifically, it looks at how people in two villages in Tamil, Hindu, Jaffna, Sri Lanka, are using their ‘sense of place’ and ‘place-making practices’ or what I call here their ‘village-temple consciousness’ or village consciousness, to maintain and rebuild their communities after war to make them, once again, places in which they feel a comfortable sense of belonging. This is a comparative study because Inuvil and Naguleswaram were affected differently by the Sri Lankan civil war. That is, while Inuvil, was physically damaged and socially disrupted …

Communication Technology Intention To Use And Use By Cognitively Intact Long-Term Nursing Home Residents, Amy M. Schuster

Theses and Dissertations--Gerontology

The goal of this dissertation was to gain an in depth understanding of intention to use and use of communication technology (CT) by long-term cognitively intact nursing home residents. This study also explored the value of the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) as a framework for investigating the CT use of long-term cognitively intact nursing home residents. A convergent mixed methods design was used to gather data through semi-structured interviews, a nursing home resident communication technology checklist, a modified UTAUT questionnaire, the UCLA loneliness scale 10 item version, and the self-rated health scale. Participants (n …

The Construction Of The American Catholic Church: Gender, Sexuality, And Patriotism In U.S. Catholic Media, 1917–1970, William Korinko

Theses and Dissertations--Gender and Women's Studies

This project explores the complex relationship between religion, culture, and politics in the United States during the twentieth century by examining a largely unexplored pocket of Roman Catholic pamphlet literature, as well as other forms of Catholic media, including newspapers, magazines, radio programs, and television shows. During the twentieth century Catholic media makers spent a considerable amount of energy speaking and writing about issues related to gender and sexuality, and they often did so in racially coded terms. In addition to making prescriptions of what was appropriate and moral sexual and gendered behavior, these media makers repeatedly made the case …

Judicial Elections, Public Opinion, And Their Impact On State Criminal Justice Policy, Travis N. Taylor

Theses and Dissertations--Political Science

This dissertation explores whether and how the re-election prospects faced by trial court judges in many American states influence criminal justice policy, specifically, state levels of incarceration, as well as the disparity in rates of incarceration for Whites and Blacks. Do states where trial court judges must worry about facing reelection tend to encourage judicial behavior that results in higher incarceration rates? And are levels of incarceration and racial disparities in the states influenced by the proportion of the state publics who want more punitive policies? These are clearly important questions because they speak directly to several normative and empirical …

From Hobbes To Habermas: The Anti-Cultural Turn In Western Political Thought, Ralph Gert Schoellhammer

Theses and Dissertations--Political Science

The theme of this dissertation is the anti-cultural turn of Western Political Thought that has emerged out of Enlightenment thinking and was first turned into a comprehensive political idea by Thomas Hobbes.

Beginning with an overview of psychological research into the phenomenon of culture I put forward the argument that human beings are by nature social and individualistic, but that they oscillate between their ability to put group-interests before individual interests and vice versa. Culture is the main mechanism that influences which interest we give priority. This mechanism work through emotional attachments that create intuitions about what is morally right …

Piecing Together Coalition War: Threat, Politics, And Coalition Structure, Stephen Joiner

Theses and Dissertations--Political Science

Military coalitions are both a common feature of interstate warfare and an example of the highest level of cooperation between states. Despite their tremendous importance in international relations, military coalitions remain poorly understood. This project investigates critical questions related to coalition structures, and uses quantitative and qualitative methods to show that both the threat and political opportunity facing coalitions helps to determine the shape of their structures. This project utilizes a dataset of all coalition wars since 1816, as well as case studies of six coalitions to investigate these relationships. Key contributions include novel theoretical arguments and the findings that …

Effective Elective? Elective Courses’ Impact On Student Performance During Associated Advanced Pharmacy Practice Experiences, Shelby Spencer Tungate

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Experiential education programs at colleges of pharmacy are guided by standards set forth by the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE.) Exactly how these standards are met, however, is often determined by the individual college of pharmacy. This includes deciding how students are selected and placed on their fourth-year rotations, referred to as Advanced Pharmacy Practices Experiences, or “APPEs.” While it may seem that students who have taken elective courses focused on specialized topics, such as pediatrics or geriatrics, will perform better on related APPEs, this thought remains largely unfounded. Using four years of student data at the University of …

The Effect Of The Earned Income Tax Credit (Eitc) On Savings: Do Low-Income Households With Multiple Children Save More Eitc Money?, Vinh Dao

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

EITC provides monetary assistance to lower-income families with children, and it has expanded to become the largest cash-transfer program in the United States. Understanding how EITC affects savings is crucial, since they are closely linked to financial stability of millions of American families. Do these families put the tax credit in their savings accounts, or do they just spend it? To tackle this question, this paper examines the effects of an increase in EITC’s generosity in 2009 on investment income of eligible households with 3 children. I perform a difference-in-differences using 2005-2014 CPS data and find no statistical evidence of …

Cost-Benefit Analysis Of Composting At The University Of Kentucky, Jennifer Sutton

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

This study is a cost-benefit analysis (CBA) of the University of Kentucky’s composting program. Food waste is collected from two major dining facilities on campus and composted at the university’s C. Oran Little Research Center in Woodford County. This CBA only considers the direct accounting costs of the program. Three models were developed and analyzed. Ultimately, all three models resulted in a deficit over the life of the project. However, it is important to note that benefits were likely understated because this CBA did not take into consideration the environmental or social benefits that exist from a composting program at …

Defying The Odds: Exploring The Ways First-Generation College Students Enact Resilience, Paris Lauren Nelson

Theses and Dissertations--Communication

This thesis examined the experiences of first-generation college students in the context of higher education. This thesis was framed by the communication theory of resilience to discover how first-generation college students enact five processes of resilience: crafting normalcy, affirming identity anchors, maintaining and using communication networks, employing alternate logics, and foregrounding productive action. First-generation college students face academic preparation, financial, social capital, personal, and college completion adversities that may necessitate engagement in resilience processes. Participants (N = 8) participated in focus groups and interviews where they discussed messages from family, peers, and university faculty and staff involving reactive and proactive …

Raising Intercultural Competence Of American Students: A Pilot Study, Sheyla Finkelshteyn

Theses and Dissertations--Communication

International students and study abroad programs are major components of internationalization efforts for institutions (Beelen & Jones, 2015). Domestic students however do not have any established practice of intercultural training or orientation, even though most universities in America accept international students and promote internationalization which is the increase of intergroup contact as part of globalization (Sakurauchi, 2014). It is crucial to raise the intercultural communication competence (ICC) of American students so they can benefit from the internationalization efforts of universities (Sakurauchi, 2014). This study attempted see if the ICC can be raised by implementing an IPM training in a treatment …

Inclusive Recreation In Kentucky State Parks: A Survey Of Ada Compliance And Transcendent Programing, Jason Thomas

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, disabled, or differently abled, members of American communities are entitled to receive identical, or equivalent, treatment and admission to public services, without discrimination based solely on their disability. Therefore, it is in violation of this act to not accommodate public spaces and facilities for these individuals, with the exception of cases where doing so to an existing facility would demonstrably, and with burden of proof on the agency, “result in a fundamental alteration in the nature of a program or activity or in undue financial and administrative burdens” (28 CFR § 39.150). …

Organic Farming And Incidence Rates Of Select Health Outcomes: An Evaluation Of The Usda Certified Organic Program, Aja Croteau

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Medical studies over the past few decades have shown increasing evidence that exposure to pesticides is associated with numerous health conditions, specifically Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma, leukemia, asthma, and depression. Pesticides are widely used across the United States to ensure an affordable and bountiful food supply, but many of the chemicals used pose notable health risks. Numerous programs exist to measure and monitor pesticide exposure from agriculture, but researchers and public health experts remain uncertain of the efficacy of regulatory programs on reducing the amount of pesticide used and on protecting citizens from exposure. Organic agriculture, which uses significantly fewer pesticides than …

Performance Evaluation And Community Needs Of Spay Our Strays Organization, Elizabeth Adams

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

Free-roaming cat populations have been linked to public health concerns and negative impacts on animal shelter resources. Trap-neuter-return has gained popularity in the last few decades as a humane and effective approach to decrease the population of community cats and address these concerns. Spay Our Strays advocates for trap-neuter-return practices in Lexington, Kentucky, by providing services to the local community and surrounding counties. Strategic planning techniques and comparative analysis are used to develop recommended strategic actions the organization can use to improve their impact. Findings showed a need to invest in board development, diversify funding sources, focus on community-level targeting, …

Evaluating The Labor Supply And Migration Effects Of The Interstate Medical Licensure Compact, William Clay Fannin

MPA/MPP/MPFM Capstone Projects

A growing body of literature suggests that occupational licensing distorts economic behavior through various mechanisms, such as inflating prices and inhibiting interstate mobility. To combat some of these ill-effects, policymakers have turned to interstate compacts as a way to promote uniformity in licensing requirements across states and facilitate license portability. Despite the development of interstate compacts for numerous licensed occupations and professions, evidence of their efficacy in the literature is thin. Based on data from over 70,000 physicians from 2012 to 2018, I construct a difference-in-differences model to estimate the effects of the adoption of the Interstate Medical Licensure Compact …

Risky Business: Visualizing And Historicizing The Role Of Geographic Representation And Thinking In American Business, John Swab

Theses and Dissertations--Geography

Geographic representation and thinking has a long history in the American business world. This thesis examines the role of geographic representation and thinking in the fire insurance industry in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries through the Sanborn Map Company and in the development of site selection as a concept in the mid-twentieth century through the biography of William Applebaum. Through these case studies, I explore the relevance applied cartographic representations to the business world and the opportunities it presents towards advancing geography as a discipline.

It’S Not Just Sunday School: Young Children, Race/Ethnicity, And Gender In Three Homogeneous Protestant Sunday Schools, Henry James Zonio

Theses and Dissertations--Sociology

Current sociological approaches to examining the lives of children approach children as active agents and participants in their socialization. Further, children are considered experts witnesses and interpreters of their own experiences. In the cases of race and gender socialization, interpretive reproduction has been used as a framework to examine how children construct and act on meanings of race and gender. While these interpretive studies illuminate how children interpret and reproduce meanings of race and gender, they do not explicate how children appropriate meanings from their cultural milieu. Consequently, these studies do not consider ways the larger culture enables and constrains …

Ethanol Sustains Phosphorylated Tau Protein Immunofluorescence In The Cultured Neonatal Rat Hippocampus: Implications For Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders, Caleb Seth Bailey

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASDs) are comprised of developmental, behavioral, and cognitive abnormalities caused by prenatal alcohol exposure, affecting an estimated 2%-5% of childrenand costing up to $4 billion annually in the United States alone. Although some behavioral therapies can help, the biochemical mechanisms that underpin FASDs need further elucidation for development of more efficacious therapeutics. The tau protein modulates cytoskeletal structure in neurons, and thereby plays an integral role in proper development and function of the central nervous system, but its function is altered by its phosphorylation state, such that increased phosphorylation reduces tau protein function. The tau protein …

Is Athlete Activism A Predictor Of Resilience?, Travis Robert Scheadler

Theses and Dissertations--Kinesiology and Health Promotion

Several athletes have taken personal responsibility to engage in activism, often with hopes of bringing social and political change. While scholars have identified several barriers preventing athletes from engaging in activism (e.g., public criticism, status and job loss, withdrawal of funding, anticipated distress; Cunningham & Regan, 2012), other scholars have identified personal benefits from engaging in activism (e.g., improved confidence, self-concept, belief in change, agency, life meaning; Klar & Kasser, 2009; Rabkin et al., 2019). Distress from the barriers, however, may be prerequisites to enhancing resilience, a theoretical construct that may help explain the benefits of activism. Thus, by applying …

Move Or Improve? Place, Policy, And Educator Labor Markets, Cory Curl

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

What is the role of place and policy in shaping educator labor markets during the decade following the Great Recession of 2008? This research leverages data on Kentucky students, educators, schools, and school districts from 2009 to 2018, with a focus on the rural, isolated Appalachian region. Many counties in the region have long struggled with poverty, low rates of labor force participation, lower educational attainment, and dependence on public transfers (Ziliak, 2019). Despite these challenges, the people of Appalachia demonstrate a strong attachment to the region. With this research, I enhance understanding of contexts and conditions, such as unique …

Home Rule, Local Autonomy, And Municipal Government Behavior, Xin Chen

Theses and Dissertations--Public Policy and Administration

This dissertation focuses on relationships between state and local governments. Of particular interest in this project is how the shift of power from the state to local governments changes local governments’ performance. This dissertation is comprised of four chapters. The first chapter briefly introduces the motivation and organization of the dissertation. The second chapter reviews the three state-imposed fiscal institutions—home rule, debt limitations, and tax and expenditure limitations, across states. While previous studies have looked at specific institutions, few studies have comprehensively reviewed the status of those institutions across states. This chapter attempts to fill this gap by comprehensively scrutinizing …

The Mothman And Other Strange Tales: Shaping Queer Appalachia Through Folkloric Discourse In Online Social Media Communities, Brenton Watts

Theses and Dissertations--Linguistics

Little work has been conducted on the intersections of queer and Appalachian identities, in part because these two identities are viewed as incompatible (Mann 2016). This study uses a multimodal critical discourse analytic approach to examine the Instagram posts of the Queer Appalachia Project, which represent a substantial body of discourse created by and for queer Appalachians. Of specific interest to this analysis are those posts which employ folkloric figures, such as West Virginia’s Mothman, to do identity work that is queer, Appalachian, and queer-Appalachian. Often, this act is accomplished through juxtaposition with Appalachian imagery and the reclamation of homophobic …

The Role Of Attachment And Cognitive Pre-Sleep Arousal On Associations Between Sleep Concordance And Sleep Quality, Taylor L. Elsey

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

The amount of time someone spends co-sleeping with their partner, known as sleep concordance, has implications for sleep quality in couples. Attachment security has emerged as an important moderator of the association between sleep concordance and subjective sleep quality (Elsey et al., 2019). The current study tested whether cognitive pre-sleep arousal explains this pattern of moderation. Prior research suggests that these associations between sleep concordance, attachment security, and subjective sleep quality may be stronger for women than men, therefore gender differences in associations were also examined. Participants were 204 (68% female) individuals in an exclusive relationship lasting at least 3 …