Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Motherhood And Childbirth Experiences Among Newcomer Women In Canada: A Critical Ethnographic Study, Fatmeh Ahmad Alzoubi

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Statement of the Problem: Motherhood and childbirth are very sensitive experiences and have a strong impact on family functioning, social identity, and cohesiveness. Although motherhood and childbirth have been discussed extensively in the scholarly and popular literature, much of this work has been conducted from a North American perspective, with little attention to how motherhood and childbirth are experienced by newcomer women from diverse racial and cultural backgrounds.

Methodology and Theoretical Orientation: A critical ethnographic study using in-depth interviews with 16 newcomer women was utilized to explore newcomer women’s experiences and understandings of motherhood and childbirth in the aftermath of …

"Aren't They Keen?" Early Children's Food Advertising And The Emergence Of The Brand-Loyal Child Consumer, Kyle R. Asquith

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation examines how American food advertisers approached children in the early twentieth century and how this conceptualization changed during a critical juncture that lasted from approximately 1928 until 1945. Prior to the late 1920s, national advertisers acknowledged children as “consumers” (that is to say, eaters) of food and celebrated their idyllic innocence; however, advertisers rarely addressed children as active participants in the consumer marketplace. This perspective changed due to new commercial media platforms, such as radio and comic strips, as well as changing attitudes within the business community. By the 1930s, food advertisers began to communicate with children as …

A Collection Of Portfolio Management Issues, Mike Mccausland

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis consists of three chapters of interest to a portfolio manager. The first paper examines how the profitability of trading rules depends on volatility. In particular, a question of interest is whether one rule dominates all others regardless of the level of volatility, or whether it is more profitable to vary the choice of trading rule corresponding to volatility. Certain rules, such as the KST indicator using overbought/oversold levels, appear to excel under highly volatile conditions, while exponential moving average rules perform better with low volatility. In the second paper, a Value-at-Risk (VaR) model capable of producing accurate and …

Shifting Notions Of Citizenship In The Netherlands: Exploring Cultural Citizenship And The Politics Of Belonging Through Neighbourhood Spaces In Rotterdam, Jennifer Long

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Notions of citizenship in the Netherlands are increasingly shifting away from liberal models of civic citizenship that, in theory, promote diversity, pluralism and, multicultural understandings of citizenship and are moving, instead, towards a mono-cultural and assimilationist understanding of national identity and belonging. This trend, known in the literature as the ‘culturalization of citizenship’ constitutes the primary topic of this project.

In this dissertation, I argue that official and populist discourses concerning non-western Muslim immigrants in Dutch society today work to inscribe difference onto “foreign” (“allochthonous”) residents of the Netherlands while upholding an idealized notion of “Dutch identity”. My research revealed …

A Self-Regulation Model Of Depression: Content Of Cognitive Representations And Prediction Of Treatment Seeking, Catherine Leite

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Leventhal's self-regulation model (SRM) was applied as a conceptual framework from which to examine individuals' cognitive representations of depressive symptoms. This thesis explored the nature of these representations, as well as factors that may impact on these representations and, in turn, influence coping strategies and professional help seeking. In particular, Study 1 examined the effect of symptom severity and the label used to identify the symptoms on the cognitive representations of depressive symptoms and coping, whereas Study 2 examined the effect of symptom duration in this regard. This thesis also considered the extent to which the various SRM domains are …

Flexibility In Parent-Child Interactions: The Application Of Dynamic Systems Methodology To Dyadic Processes In Children With Behaviour Problems, Vivien Lee

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Dynamic systems theory (DST) can provide a comprehensive account for how parent-child interactions evolve over time to produce stable patterns of interacting and can result in seemingly divergent trajectories. Recent methodological advances using state space grids (SSGs) have provided a graphical means to examine real-time dyadic processes, as well as measures of dyadic flexibility, or the ability to adapt emotional and behavioural responding in response to contextual demands. Higher levels of dyadic flexibility have been associated with improvements in child behaviour problems after treatment (Granic et al., 2007), while its converse, rigidity, has been associated with increases in behaviour …

The Expression Of Religious Bias In The Evaluation Of Foreign-Trained Job Applicants, Caroline Bennett-Abuayyash

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation compromises 2 experiments that investigated religious discrimination as it particularly affects foreign-trained job applicants. Study 1 consisted of a 3 (Applicant’s religion: Christian, Muslim, or No Affiliation) X 2 (Applicant’s location of training: Canada or Cyprus) between-subjects design. After viewing an advertisement for a health-care position, Canadian participants reviewed a male applicant’s CV and watched his taped interview, in which a briefly visible pendant indicated his religious affiliation. The job applicant was then evaluated on two sets of skills: hard (technical) skills and soft (non-technical) skills. As predicted based on the justification suppression model of prejudice (Crandall & …

Rethinking Justice In Transitional Justice: An Examination Of The Mãori Conception And Customary Mechanism Of Justice, Stephanie Vieille

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

As a relatively young field of academic inquiry, the transitional justice scholarship presents some important difficulties, not least of which is its lack of critical evaluation of the approaches to justice it adopts and promotes. This research argues that the framework used in the transitional justice scholarship is ill-suited to account for, and to think about, the philosophy of justice embodied in customary mechanisms of justice. It explains that the type of “justice” embodied in customary mechanisms of justice is difficult to appreciate by using the retributive, reparative, and the restorative approaches. These Western, individualistic and legally based approaches are …

A Rawlsian Idea Of Deliberative Democracy, Angela D. White

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In my thesis, I develop a framework based on John Rawls's Political Liberalism that addresses the question: how is it possible for democratic institutions and their decisions to be legitimate, given that (i) they are supposed to be governed by the "will of the people", but (ii) the people will disagree with each other about what political institutions ought to do about any given issue? Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson advance a deliberative democratic response to this question, which has served as the basis of governments' attempts to "strengthen democracy". They argue that political decisions are justified insofar as they …

Development Of A Cohesion Inventory For Children's Sport Teams, Luc J. Martin

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The general purpose of this dissertation was to develop an inventory designed to measure cohesion in children’s (ages 9-12) sport teams. To this end, three studies were conducted. In Study 1, children became active agents in the process of test construction. More specifically, children (N = 167) participated in focus groups and completed open-ended questionnaires in order to provide information on their perceptions of cohesion as well as motives for participating, continuing, and ceasing involvement on sport teams. Study 2 involved the use of the information obtained from Study 1 to develop potential items for the questionnaire. In addition, the …

Vulnerability Of Adolescents To Hiv/Aids In Malawi, Paul Mkandawire

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis aims at examining vulnerability to HIV/AIDS among adolescents in Malawi. The study uses mixed methods that combine quantitative and qualitative techniques in order to better understand whether there are significant variations in the pattern of sexual behaviour between adolescent orphans and non-orphans. Results of a quantitative analysis (n=1214) revealed that orphans are less likely to undertake voluntary counseling and testing (VCT) for HIV/AIDS, that they tend to experience their first sexual intercourse earlier in life, and that they are generally more likely to engage in high risk sexual behavior than non-orphans. In addition, female orphans in particularly are …

Brassinosteroid-Mediated Stress Tolerance In Arabidopsis Thaliana, Tawhidur Rahman

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Brassinosteroids (BRs) are a group of steroidal plant hormones that are essential for proper plant development and also promote stress tolerance. Without BRs, plants are dwarfs and infertile. To understand the molecular mechanisms underlying BR-mediated stress tolerance, global gene expression analysis of untreated and 24-epibrassinolide (EBR)-treated Arabidopsis thaliana seedlings under non-stress and heat stress (HS) conditions was carried out. Microarray data analysis indicated that stress-related genes were predominant within the EBR up-regulated gene data set. Furthermore, several of these genes were abscisic acid (ABA) and jasmonic acid (JA) related. Measurements of endogenous hormones showed significant increases in the levels ABA …

The Moderating Effect Of Reciprocity Beliefs On Work Outcomes, Stephanie Hastings

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Researchers have long assumed that employees’ reactions to treatment by their organization are guided by reciprocity norms. Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison, and Sowa (1986) developed a measure to assess how sensitive employees were to reciprocity obligations, focusing in particular on their beliefs that work effort should depend on treatment by the organization. Since then, research has found that this Exchange Ideology (EI) predicts variables such as organizational citizenship but cannot predict negative outcomes such as workplace deviance. Insight into why this is the case can be found by examining the related construct of reciprocity orientation. Positive (PRO) and Negative Reciprocity Orientation …

Essays On International Trade, Kai Xu

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis consists of three essays on the economic effects of agricultural and non-agricultural trade. The first essay asks whether the observed low trade intensity of agricultural goods is caused by high trade costs or small gains from agricultural trade. By empirically estimating structural equations from a trade model, I find that it is largely due to high trade costs. I also find large variation in relative efficiency of producing agricultural goods, which suggests that lower agricultural trade costs could lead to large gains from trade. The second essay asks how large are the gains from lower trade costs in …

Workplace Commitment And Employee Well-Being: A Meta-Analysis And Study Of Commitment Profiles, Elyse R. Maltin

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Employee commitments have been connected to a multitude of organizationally- relevant variables, including turnover, absenteeism, job performance, and organizational citizenship behaviours (e.g., Meyer, Stanley, Herscovtich, & Topolnytsky, 2002). Research has repeatedly demonstrated that the form these commitments take matters; that is, research has shown that commitment based on a mindset of affective attachment has the strongest positive relations with desired outcomes, while commitment based on mindsets of social or economic costs has much weaker and sometimes even negative relations with these same outcomes.

Far less research exists on the connection between workplace commitments and their implications for employees themselves, although …

Seasonal Subsistence In Late Woodland Southwestern Ontario: An Examination Of The Relationships Between Resource Availability, Maize Agriculture, And Faunal Procurement And Processing Strategies, Lindsay J. Foreman

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This study uses the zooarchaeological record to examine the seasonal mobility and scheduling of faunal procurement and processing activities by southwestern Ontario’s two Late Woodland (ca. A.D. 800-1600) communities, Western Basin and Iroquoian. Faunal datasets helped to reconstruct the timing and location of Western Basin annual hunting and fishing pursuits and identified a greater degree of flexibility in the organization of these activities than previously recognized, as well as in comparison to contemporaneous Iroquoian communities who also occupied this region.

Western Basin groups oriented themselves near lakes and rivers year-round where they exploited locally abundant fish, mammals, birds, and other …

Austerity In America, Stephen R. Gray Jibb

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The main focus of Austerity in America concerns how the country's geographical belts contribute to the culture of austerity in US capitalism in the time since Reaganism. In this dissertation I examine the Corn Belt, the Rust Belt, the Bible Belt, the Sun Belt and the Marijuana Belt as stages in the development of America’s culture of austerity. Since the early 1980s America’s culture of austerity has protected the wealthy elite from the working classes, who have been punished by the offshoring of US manufacturing jobs in post-Fordist corporate restructuring. The overall goal of this research is to address how …

Model Socialist Town, Two Decades Later: Contesting The Past In Nowa Huta, Poland, Kinga Pozniak

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This work examines people’s experiences of the postsocialist transformation in Poland through the lens of memory. Since socialism’s collapse over two decades ago, Poland has undergone dramatic political, economic and social changes. However, the past continues to enter into current politics, economic debates and social issues. This work examines the changes that have taken place by looking at how socialism is remembered two decades after its collapse in the Polish former “model socialist town” of Nowa Huta. It explores how ideas about the past are produced, reproduced and contested in different contexts: in Nowa Huta’s cityscape, in museums, commemorations, and …

The Power Of Dialogue: Understanding Developmental Origins And Processes Underlying Mother-Child Conversations About Past Emotional Events, Celia Hsiao

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Mother-child emotion dialogues represent an integral medium through which children’s autobiography develops. This study sought to understand the developmental origins and processes underlying this co-construction process by examining the inter-relations between: mother-infant attachment relationships, maternal attachment representations, maternal sensitivity during interactions in infancy, maternal affective mindset during toddlerhood, and mother-child emotion dialogues.

Our findings are consistent with past research on the links between the three organized categories of mother-infant attachment relationships and later mother-child emotion dialogues. Children in disorganized attachment relationships displayed a lack of consistent and coherent strategy during emotion communication. Our results emphasize the important role of maternal …

From Marriage Revolution To Revolutionary Marriage: Marriage Practice Of The Chinese Communist Party In Modern Era, 1910s-1950s, Wei Xu

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation focuses on exploring the myth of ―revolutionary marriage‖, a popular and lasting marriage tradition of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
The concept of ―revolutionary marriage‖ came out of a marriage revolution initiated by the May Fourth radicals in order to challenge the traditional marriage system. This term was then borrowed by the early Chinese Communists who used it to describe their socialist marriage ideal. However, regarding the CCP‘s marriage policy, there was always a gap between the progressive ideals and the conservative realities. In every piece of propaganda the CCP swore to completely overthrow the feudal arranged marriage …

"Ça Devient Une Question D’Être Maîtres Chez Nous”: The Canadiens, Nordiques, And The Politics Of Québécois Nationalism, 1979-1984, Terry Gitersos

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This dissertation analyzes the discourses produced by the selected newspaper coverage of the Montréal Canadiens and Québec Nordiques, two professional hockey clubs based in the province of Québec, from 1979 to 1984. Sport has long provided a medium for national identification, and constitutes one the most effective institutions through which the nation is imagined. This is especially true of Canada, where ice hockey has been celebrated as the country’s national game and a window into the Canadian soul. However, sport is a malleable institution; in Québec, hockey has long served as a symbol, speaking to French Canadian national identity, imbued …

Do I Feel Dissonance Over You? Sex Differences In The Experience Of Dissonance For Romantic Partners, Sandra D. Lackenbauer

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The present research investigated sex differences in the experience of cognitive dissonance after decisions made for oneself or for one’s romantic partner. Guided by theory and research suggesting that women and men possess divergent self-construals, I predicted that women would experience more dissonance when making a difficult decision for their partner relative to men. Both men and women were predicted to experience dissonance after decisions made for themselves, although possibly to a lesser degree for women. In two studies, a modified free-choice dissonance paradigm was utilized to test sex differences in the experience of cognitive dissonance, as determined by the …

The Use Of Capacity As An Indicator Of Automatic Processing: Is Smoking Automatic?, Agnes A. Massak

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

It has been suggested that substance use transitions from a controlled to an automatic process (Tiffany, 1990). In particular, smoking has been found to appear automatic (Baxter & Hinson, 2001). Experienced smokers were able to attend to a reaction time task with minimal interference while smoking. Novice smokers’ performances were impaired when smoking. These results were based on differences in mean reaction times using analysis of variance. Another analytic approach to test the hypothesis that smoking is an automatic process is through the use of capacity coefficients and ratios. These mathematical tools allow for the direct testing of mental processing. …

Contributions Of Signal-Detection Mechanisms And Semantic Memory Representations To Famous Name Recognition, Ben P. Bowles

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In past research, investigators have often used the recognition memory paradigm to study the cognitive and neural processes that permit the ability to accurately assess whether or not stimuli are familiar. This paradigm involves presenting stimuli to participants in a study phase, and examining their later recognition of them when these stimuli are subsequently presented again in a later test phase. It is not well understood, however, whether the same mechanisms that support familiarity assessment in recognition memory also support familiarity based on general life experience (e.g., recognizing a famous celebrity in daily life). To address this, I implemented modified …

A Model, Leah K. Hamilton

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

to be released at conclusion of embargo.

An Investigation Of Masked Priming Mechanisms In Binary Classification Tasks, Jason Perry

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The goal of the present research was to examine the nature of masked priming with an emphasis on the influence of stimulus-response (S-R) associations. In Chapter 2, both the magnitude of the category congruence (priming) effect and the nature of the priming distance effect were assessed in two number classification tasks. Participants made either magnitude (i.e., is the target larger or smaller than ‘5’?) or identification judgments (i.e., press one button if the target is a ‘1’, ‘2’, ‘3’ or ‘4’ or the other button if the target is a ‘6’, ‘7’, ‘8’ or ‘9’). Priming distance effects in …

The Prejudice Paradox (Or Discrimination Is Not Dead): Systematic Discrimination In Forced Choice Employment Decisions, Paula M. Brochu

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This research examined discriminatory responding in a forced choice employment decision paradigm, using a justification-suppression perspective to interpret the findings. In this paradigm, participants play the role of employers and make employment choices between two excellent and similarly qualified individuals that differ only on one dimension. In the first three studies, participants chose between two individuals who were described as differing only in ethnicity (European vs. Middle Eastern), gender (Male vs. Female), religion (Christian vs. Muslim), age (Young vs. Old), height (Tall vs. Short), weight (Average Weight vs. Overweight), nationality (Canadian vs. Immigrant), or sexual orientation (Heterosexual vs. Homosexual). Patterns …

Judging Covers By Their Books: Malleable Attractiveness Appraisals In Response To Belongingness Feedback, Christopher J. Wilbur

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The present research examined biases in appraisals of target attractiveness in response to belongingness feedback. Specifically, I hypothesized that individuals would provide favorable attractiveness appraisals of targets who accept them, and would provide unfavorable attractiveness appraisals of targets who reject them. I hypothesized further that biased appraisals would be most pronounced when people received feedback from opposite-sex targets. Two literatures guided the development of the present research. The first literature underscores the power of reciprocal liking – people like those who like them. In mirror fashion, people are highly critical of targets who deny opportunities for social affiliation. The second …

Organizational Behavioural Obstructions Between Planners And Implementing The Development Permit System, Joseph Nethery

MPA Major Research Papers

This study examines why few municipalities in Ontario have adopted the Development Permit System (DPS). In attempting to identify what relationships exist between organizational behaviours and the consideration of DPS, a survey pre-test and a full survey were administered to various municipalities in Ontario, in addition to a case study of DPS in Carleton Place. The findings reveal that larger municipalities and municipalities with a higher number of Registered Professional Planners tend to consider DPS more often, with statistically significant relationships found between the consideration of DPS and the individual interest of planners, challenging development projects, and male planners.

Corruption Prevention In Ontario Municipalities, Jacqueline Palmer

MPA Major Research Papers

This paper examines whether provincial and municipal government actions are sufficient to reduce and eventually eliminate corruption in order to preserve integrity within Ontario municipalities. A case study analysis of the incidents and allegations of corruption highlighted in the City of Toronto’s Bellamy Inquiry Report was conducted. The findings reveal that the preventative measures currently in place to guide the municipal decision making process are insufficient to prevent corruption and municipal staff, the general public, police, and the private sector can help maintain integrity within municipalities.