Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Behavior Rating Scales As Screeners For Autism? A Closer Look At The Cab-P And Cbcl/1.5-5, Brandy Mickele Mcreynolds

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

In recent years, autism diagnoses have steadily increased, putting a substantial emphasis on early identification as a crucial component for intervention. Autism diagnoses, however, often require a thorough and comprehensive assessment from a highly trained practitioner. Although ideal, such assessments are often time consuming and expensive, creating a need for a quicker, more simplistic method of screening for autism. Clinicians customarily used behavior rating scales to identify a number of various problem behaviors and/or disorders. The purpose of the present study is to examine the utility of two common behavior rating scales in accurately discriminating between a group of preschoolers …

The Impact Of Westernization On Tongan Cultural Values Related To Business, Lucas Nelson Ross

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This study examined the impact of Westernization on Tongan cultural values (Collectivism I, Collectivism II, Power Distance, Future Orientation, and Uncertainty Avoidance) related to business. A Tongan version of the Project GLOBE Beta Questionnaire measuring cultural dimensions at the societal level was completed by 222 Tongans from the island groups of Vava’u, Ha’apai, and Niuatoputapu. One-way ANOVA and planned comparison results indicated significant differences for Collectivism II and Uncertainty Avoidance. Scores from Vava’u showed significantly less Collectivism II than Ha’apai, but not Niuatoputapu. Furthermore, scores from Vava’u showed significantly less Uncertainty Avoidance than Ha’apai and Niuatoputapu. No significant differences were …

The Heat Is On: Variations Among Male And Female Chefs, Brandi Wyatt-Hughes

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The primary purpose of this research was to examine a group of fourteen chefs, half male and half female, to determine the differences in the way male and female chefs do their job. To get an understanding of the perceptions of the chefs I conducted in-depth interviews with seven male chefs and seven female chefs. Definite differences were found in the way the chefs perceived their roles in the kitchen as well as how they managed their kitchens as a whole. Female chefs tended to manage their kitchens more collaboratively, thus creating and fostering a less emotional environment. Lack of …

Finances, Social Capital, And College Organizational Membership, Jalandra Michelle Penick

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

There were three focal objectives of this research. The research aimed to determine whether an association exists between perception of financial strain and involvement in campus clubs and organizations, actual finances, and involvement in clubs and organizations, and the levels of social capital generated by involvement in campus clubs and organizations. Results indicate that the perception of financial strain has no significant effect on involvement in campus clubs and activities. The analysis also reveals that actual finances have an insignificant relationship with involvement in campus clubs and organizations. There were significant relationships revealed when social capital was measured. The research …

Fan Perception Of Justice In Team Disciplinary Decisions, Lauren Cathryn Gruchala

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The present study examined procedural and distributive justice outcomes of discipline in an athletic team setting. A 2 (Consistency of Punishment: consistent vs. conditional) x 2 (Violation Severity: moderate vs. severe) x 2 (Punishment Severity: moderate vs. severe) x 2 (Decision Maker: head coach vs. team captains) factorial design was used. Participants responded to four of the 16 hypothetical scenarios resulting from the design. Participants included 354 fans in attendance at a several university athletic events and students in psychology courses. The results indicated that consistent punishment was perceived as more fair to the punished athlete, teammates, and fans than …

Advocate, May 2009, Vol. [20], No. [7], Gc Advocate

The Advocate

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

From the Editor’s Desk: Writer’s Block (p. 2)

Adjuncting: Stifling the Economy of Ideas. Renée McGarry (p. 4)

Political Analysis: Letter from Dakar. Michael Busch (p. 7)

Foul Play at Bard? Controversy Ensues After College Terminates Kovel. John Boy (p. 8)

Midlife Crisis for a Movement Icon: At 95, the “Peace Pentagon” Building is Hardly in its Dotage; Is it Nonetheless Nearing the End of Its Days? John Otrompke (p. 10)

Masthead (p. 2)

CUNY News in Brief (p. 3)

Student Enrollment to Hit All-Time High

Even on the Cheap, Education Costs are Difficult to Bear

While …

The Role Of Gender Identity On The Effects Of Stereotype Threat: An Examination Of Girls’ Math Performance In A Single-Sex Classroom, Erin E. Twamley

Psychology Honors Projects

Despite all of the advancements women have made in the field of mathematics, the negative stereotype regarding women’s mathematical competence persists. Stereotype threat research demonstrates that the negative stereotype contributes to significant gender differences in attitudes, academic achievement, and educational and career attainment in math. The current longitudinal study focused on stereotype threat as an explanation for how a negative gender stereotype influences the mathematical performance of middle school girls in math in a single-sex setting. In particular, the study examines how the girls’ gender identification moderates the effects of stereotype threat. The results of the study indicate that stereotype …

Growing Change: Local Foods Movements And The Emergence Of Global Social Change, Annie S. Virnig

Political Science Honors Projects

Local foods movements increasingly emerge as social movements with the power to challenge global norms. This paper develops around the question: can local foods movements create holistic sustainability at the global level? I begin by analyzing impetuses behind contemporary local foods movements. I then evaluate sustainability in three case studies – Auroville, India; the Twin Cities, United States; and Southern Africa. I ultimately argue that local foods movements can create sustainable change if they: (1) develop organically within their locale, (2) account for ecological, social, and economic implications of their actions, and (3) build translocal connections across multiple geographic scales.

Animal Pleasure And Its Moral Significance, Jonathan Balcombe

Sentience Collection

This paper presents arguments for, and evidence in support of, the important role of pleasure in animals’ lives, and outlines its considerable significance to humankind’s relationship to other animals. In the realms of animal sentience, almost all scholarly discussion revolves around its negative aspects: pain, stress, distress, and suffering. By contrast, the positive aspects of sentience – rewards and pleasures – have been rarely broached by scientists. Yet, evolutionary principles predict that animals, like humans, are motivated to seek rewards, and not merely to avoid pain and suffering. Natural selection favours behaviours that enhance survival and procreation. In the conscious, …

Interests And Harms In Primate Research, Nathan Nobis

Experimentation Collection

The article discusses the moral issues on primate research in reference to the moral defenses by Sughrue and colleagues. It states that Sughrue and colleagues have claimed to provide equal examination of the primate stroke research's ethics. It mentions that the promise to straighten out a number of ethical arguments in favor and against primate research was not fulfilled. Several moral arguments are presented in response to Sughrue and colleagues' moral defense for animal experimentation.

Animal Behaviour, Animal Welfare And The Scientific Study Of Affect, David Fraser

Emotion Collection

Many questions about animal welfare involve the affective states of animals (pain, fear, distress) and people look to science to clarify these issues as a basis for practices, policies and standards. However, the science of the mid twentieth century tended to be silent on matters of animal affect for both philosophical and methodological reasons. Philosophically, under the influence of Positivism many scientists considered that the affective states of animals fall outside the scope of science. Certain methodological features of the research also favoured explanations that did not involve affect. The features included the tendency to rely on abstract, quantitative measures …

Snapshot: The Impact Of Giving Together, Angela M. Eikenberry, Jessica Bearman, Hao Han, Melissa Brown, Courtney Jensen

Public Administration Faculty Publications

Donors in giving circles give more, give more strategically, and are more engaged in their communities, according to a new study by Dr. Angela Eikenberry and Jessica Bearman with research assistance from Melissa Brown, Hao Han, and Courtney Jensen. ever since giving circles—groups of individual donors who pool their money and other resources and decide together where these should be distributed—emerged as a philanthropic trend, we have speculated about their impact. Do donors give more or give differently because they are involved in a giving circle? Do they become more engaged and active in their communities? Are they more politically …

Editors’ Note: Media And Information Literacy In Theory And Practice, Jeremy Harris Lipschultz, Michael L. Hilt

Communication Faculty Publications

Studies in Media & Information Literacy Education (SIMILE) has published a wide-range of international articles from across the disciplines. As a collection, they represent the growing influence and importance of media and information literacy.

Signs Of Our Times, May 2009

Signs of Our Times

A newsletter published for Deaf Catholics in Providence, RI

Signs of our Times Finding Aid

Drawing Conclusions From Non-Random Samples: A Comment On “Race And Art: Prices For African American Painters, Melissa Boyle, Victor Matheson

Economics Department Working Papers

In a recent paper in the Journal of Black Studies, “Race and Art: Prices for African American Painters and Their Contemporaries,” economist Richard Agnello examines price differentials between paintings sold at auction from 1972 to 2004 for a set of 16 African American artists, and a group of white artists identified as similar contemporaries. In this short paper we examine Agnello’s control group of white artists and confirm that this is a non-randomly selected sample of artists that are, on average, quantifiably more famous than the black artists in Agnello’s treatment group. In light of this selection bias, we discuss …

A Study Of Three Program Types' Effectiveness In The Prevention And Awareness Of Hiv/Aids In Sub-Saharan Africa, Kathryn Wood

Social Work Theses

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to over 60% of the world’s AIDS cases; thus, HIV prevention and treatment is a pressing global issue that needs to be addressed with governmental assistance, medication, education, and overall community support. This research paper examines and compares the success of HIV/AIDS treatment, education, and prevention programs in sub-Saharan Africa in order to determine which type of program is the most effective. The three program types that are examined are large-scale governmental policies and organizations, local community run grassroots organizations, and programs that combine grassroots initiatives with umbrella organization assistance. The general consensus of the reviewed …

Creative Therapy And Adolescents: Emotion Regulation And Recognition In A Psycho-Educational Group For 9th Grade Students, Stacey Smith-Israel

Social Work Theses

Adolescence is a great opportunity for researchers to examine emotion regulation because of the physical, psychological, and social transformations that occur during this developmental stage. Adolescents that lack emotion regulation capabilities are more prone to expressions of anger, which commonly yield further symptoms of aggression, depression, and drug use. Factors contributing to low levels of emotion regulation during adolescence include stress, influence of childhood, parental influence, and maltreatment. A pre and post test were used to examine the effects of anger in a seven week creative therapy group for ten 9th grade students in a small, public high school in …

Ua35/11 Arête May 2009, Honors College

Arête: Honors College at WKU Newsletter

No abstract provided.

Information Literacy And Blind And Visually Impaired Students, Rebecca Adler Schiff

Urban Library Journal

In the summer of 2007, as part of the City University of New York PeopleTech Summer Institute held at Baruch College, the author taught a class in information literacy to a group of blind and visually impaired students, using assistive technology to access the resources of the college library. Despite considerable preparation and experience, teaching the class presented unexpected difficulties, detailed in this paper. Rapid advances in information literacy technology present unusual challenges for the average student—challenges that are magnified when the intermediate assistive technology is itself not easy to master. The author explores the pertinent literature.

Signs Of Faith, May 2009

Signs of Faith

A newsletter published for Deaf Catholics in Paterson, NJ

Signs of Faith Finding Aid

The Faculty Notebook, May 2009, Provost's Office

Faculty Notebook

The Faculty Notebook is published periodically by the Office of the Provost at Gettysburg College to bring to the attention of the campus community accomplishments and activities of academic interest. Faculty are encouraged to submit materials for consideration for publication to the Associate Provost for Faculty Development. Copies of this publication are available at the Office of the Provost.

The Power Of The Beat Impacting Human Emotion, Kelsey Anderson, Mandy Dion

Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal

The main objective of this study was to examine the effects that music would have on emotions when a song has lyrics and when it does not. It was hypothesized that if a song is played without lyrics then it will invoke a different emotion than if the exact same song with lyrics were played. There were a total of 70 participants who were recruited from the Human Subject Pool. After retrieving the data and observing the results, there was a correlation between emotions and songs played with lyrics and there was a different correlation of emotions with the songs …

Gender Differences In Exclusive Romantic Relationships, Maria Diaz, Sarah Ward

Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal

There is previous research indicating that men and women worry while involved in an exclusive relationship. In the study conducted, we were interested in finding whether there are differences in the issues men and women worry about while involved in an exclusive romantic relationship. We recruited 60 participants, or 30 heterosexual couples. Participants were asked to complete a short survey rating 15 issues on a 5-point Likert scale focusing on how much they worry about different issues. Our findings indicate that there are no significant differences in what issues men and women worry about. However, there was a significant difference …

How Do You Compare? The Correlations Of Social Desirability And Self-Esteem As Well As Social Desirability And Self-Consciousness, Kristy Johnson, Kristy Myers

Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal

In the present study, 81 participants were asked to self-report their levels of self-esteem and self-consciousness using Rosenberg’s Self-Esteem Scale and Fenigstein’s Self-Consciousness Scale, respectively, as well as report their current semester GPA in order to study the correlations between these variables and the variable of GPA inflation. There was no significance found for the correlations between the level of GPA inflation and experimental condition, between GPA inflation and self-esteem, or between GPA inflation and self-consciousness for the 35 participants with obtainable GPA’s. However, the present researchers did find significance in the correlation between inflated GPA and self-consciousness for the …

Time: Friend Or Foe?, Greg Townsend

Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal

The present research was conducted in order to determine whether timing a test (such as on the ACT) causes a decrease in accuracy compared to the same test given without any time limit. Participants were given two equivalent tests (Test A & Test B), one timed and the other not timed, in the four ways: 1) test A first with test B timed, 2) test A first with test A timed, 3) test B first with test A timed, and 4) test B first with test B timed. The time allowed for the timed test was eight minutes and fifteen …

Mental Imagery And Basketball: A Comparison Of Cognitive-Specific And Flow Imagery, Evan Welo

Psychology Honors Projects

Flow is a psychological state that is associated with optimal performance. Sports such as basketball are conducive to an individual experiencing flow because they have rules that structure and focus attention. Past research indicates that sports related mental imagery practice improves athletic performance; however few studies to date have systematically included the characteristics of flow in their sports mental imagery interventions. The present study compared the efficacy of a ―flow‖ and a standard basketball mental imagery intervention at improving performance on a basketball-shooting task. No significant differences were found between groups, but both reported increases in flow experiences.

Effects Of Social Support On The Social Self-Concepts Of Gifted Adolescents, Caroline S. Cochran

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The current study investigates the relationship between social support and the social self-concepts of gifted adolescents. Participants include 245 gifted students who had completed the fifth through the tenth grade during the previous academic year. Social self-concept was measured using the Self-Description Questionnaire II (Marsh, 1990). Social support was measured using the Child and Adolescent Social Support Scale (Malecki & Demaray, 2002). Results indicate multiple relationships between perceived social support and social self-concept, as well as a significant gender difference for the frequency of close friend social support. No gender differences were found for the parent, teacher, classmate, or school …

Intercollegiate Athlete Perceptions Of Justice In Team Disciplinary Decisions, Brandon Richard Severs

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Perceptions of justice involving disciplinary decisions for a star player in an intercollegiate team sport setting were investigated. Male and female intercollegiate athletes (N = 142) at a midsized southeastern university responded to one of sixteen scenarios and reported perceptions of fairness for the punished athlete and teammates, perceptions of procedural fairness for the punished athlete and teammates, and whether the punishment was likely to deter future misconduct by the punished athlete and teammates. The results indicated that athletes perceived consistently applied punishment as more fair to all team members than they did conditional punishment; consistently applied punishment was perceived …

The Influence Of Inequality And Noneconomic Institutions On Cross-National Terrorist Incidents, Magan Savana Newton

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

To expand the research base concerning terrorism this study connects terrorist incidents on a global scale with economic and noneconomic institutional factors. Whereas most terrorism studies use social disorganization theory or anomie theory as their theoretical bases, this study uses institutional anomie theory (IAT) to examine the influence of economic and noneconomic institutions on terrorist-incident counts in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. The research employs the following five sources that are linked together: The Global Terrorism Database (GTD), World Bank Database, data from the University of Texas Inequality Project (UTIP), the United Nations (UN), and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). …

Peer Perceptions Of Self-Injurious Behavior, Fantom Shakeria Smith

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Students of a south central university provide data for this study investigating knowledge of self-injury (SI), experiences with those who self-injure, and perceptions of SI. This study proposes that college peers of those who self-injure have higher levels of SI knowledge than professionals who work with individuals who self-injure. In addition, the study proposes that individuals who have experience with others who self-injure have higher levels of SI knowledge than individuals who do not have experience with others who self-injure. An additional purpose of this study is to explore information regarding experiences people have with others who self-injure and their …