Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

A Pelican's Journey To Flight: A Louisiana National Guardsman, The Development Of The United States Army Air Service, And The Human Cost Of Military Innovation, James H. Smith

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

George E. Dicks deployed to the Mexican Punitive Expedition and World War I with the Louisiana National Guard. He recorded his experience in writing and photography, which reside in the Jackson Barracks Military Museum in Chalmette, Louisiana. His memorabilia reflect an officer’s perspective on early military aviation and parallel to the United States military’s experimentation with aviation. Through experimentation, Dicks became an aerial observer in World War I.

This thesis explores George E. Dicks’ memorabilia and how it both represents the development of the American Air Service and the human cost of military aviation with photographic evidence. By representing aviation’s …

The Transaction Costs Of Federal Environmental Policy Changes: The Effects Of The Temporary Covid-19 Cwa Rollback On Local Water Systems, Jesse Lee Barnes

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

An institutional dilemma exists between the Clean Water Act (CWA) and the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). US surface waters are protected from point-source pollution by the CWA. Community Water Systems (CWSs) that draw from these surface waters for potable purposes are required to treat that water to a level that meets SDWA health standards. Therefore, decreases in CWA regulations could lead to surface water quality declines and, thus, higher SDWA compliance costs for CWSs. This area of inquiry has become increasingly relevant due to Trump-era executive actions to try to decrease the federal government's role in multiple environmental policies, …

Where Will I Sleep Tonight? A Qualitative Case Study Of Homeless And Displaced College Students, Andria Lynn Coleman

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this study is to identify the needs of undergraduate students who are homeless or displaced, as well as examine the policies, procedures, and systems of Mountain University, a public four-year university, that may support or hinder students’ retention and progression. This study will be driven by the following research question: How do students who are homeless or displaced, but earned a scholarship, grant, or both navigate the policies, procedures, and systems of Mountain University during their first two years? Using Resiliency Theory and Hope Theory as the theoretical frameworks, this qualitative multiple case study seeks to identify …

Mena Terrorism And The West: Explaining Why Terrorist Groups From The Middle East And North Africa Target Western Democracies, Michael A. Defeo

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Terrorist groups from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region remain one of the most formidable threats to international security. While their organization and motives have been significantly different over time, a commonality is that they tend to disproportionately target Western democracies. This dissertation argues that this trend is mainly a consequence of the foreign policies that these states pursue in the region. These policies, in terms of support for Israel and interventionism, are theorized as being the precipitous causes of MENA terrorism. Likewise, it is argued that the democratic institutions and extents of globalization in these states are …

The Impact Of Childhood Experiences On Involvement And Confidence In Social Institutions, Jordan Sydney Donohue

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Childhood is made up of a wide array of both negative and positive experiences. One potential negative childhood experience may be understood as childhood maltreatment. Childhood maltreatment consists of physical abuse, sexual abuse, emotional abuse, or neglect prior to age 18 (World Health Organization, 2020). Neighborhood, family, and school dynamics are other areas in a child’s life that may create difficulties and challenges. Prior research has concluded that negative outcomes are associated with poor school, community, and family dynamics (Coulton, 2007; Lansford, 2009; Split et al., 2012). Previous research has also examined the impact of childhood maltreatment on different domains …

The Impact Of Attachment And Optimism On Delinquency, Kaylee Dawn Faria

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this study is to assess if justice-involved juveniles’ optimism toward future prospects mediates the relationship between parental and peer attachment and the likelihood of future delinquency. Theory and prior research support the argument that there is a negative relationship between parental and peer attachment and delinquency, and a negative relationship between optimism and delinquency. This study attempts to expand on this research by exploring whether parental and peer attachments influence delinquency through their influence on optimism for future prospects. This study utilizes data from the Pathways to Desistance Study, a panel study of seriously justice-involved youth, to …

Digitods, Statistical Machine Learning Algorithms, And Internet Cognition: Sociocultural Learning Through Familial Modeling And Mediated Exchanges, Sina Foley

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

With ever-advancing technology and the ubiquity of smart devices, younger generations of children are growing up with access to smart mobile technology from birth. These digitally acculturated children ages 0-5, or digitods, are learning to make sense of the world in large part through sociocultural exchanges in the home. As these digital natives are habituated to mobile media, prevalent and accessible, they are also opened to data-mining and target-marketing as their online engagement signals algorithmic function. This study adds to our understanding of how digitods may be susceptible to algorithmic culture and strategic digital marketing, as familial modeling and mediated …

Maternal Health In The Context Of Social, Political, And Economic Change Among Hadzabe Foragers Of Tanzania, Kristen Herlosky

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Many low and middle-income countries have implemented new national policy measures aimed at reducing maternal morbidity and mortality due to globalized efforts to improve women’s maternal health. One of the main goals is to move childbirth into hospital facilities and improve health access and education outreach. For Indigenous communities around the world, these measures have fallen short of their goals. Indigenous women suffer from greater social, political, and economic disparities and inequalities, have poorer health indicators overall, and worse maternal health outcomes compared to their non-Indigenous counterparts. For small-scale communities, we have limited data on reproductive health among women, specifically …

Increasing Foster Parent Awareness Of An Occupation-Based Approach To Child Well-Being, Taylar Hirte

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Foster parents are an integral part of the child welfare system. They provide temporary care to children who otherwise cannot stay in their homes. They are required to be state or county licensed and each licensing agency has their own requirements including varying hours of training. The literature indicates foster parents do not receive enough training to feel prepared and confident to care for children with increased mental health, behavioral, school-related, cognitive, and peer relationship challenges that foster children often experience (AOTA, 2017; Lotty et al., 2020; Paul-Ward et al., 2014; Smith, 2022).The purpose of the present capstone project was …

Flying The Unfriendly Skies: How Flight Crew Members Perceived And Communicatively Constructed The Emotional Labor Of Their Positions Throughout The Covid-19 Pandemic, William B.L. Ingelson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The COVID-19 pandemic brought about unprecedented levels of volatility to all hospitality industries, including aviation. Such levels of volatility have highlighted a need to understand the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on flight crew communication. This study explores the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on intra-flight crew communication and the emotional labor flight crew members experienced. Utilizing the theoretical frameworks of facework, politeness theory, emotional labor, and emotional management, this study examined how participants communicated through the tumult of this time period. This study discovered heavy usage of surface acting and increased levels of emotional labor through 28 qualitative interviews …

Individual Differences In Police Officers’ Decision Styles In Order Maintenance Policing, Damarrah Elisheba Jameson

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Day-to-day police work tends to be in order maintenance policing. These encounters necessitate officer discretion in decision responses to manage them. These decision responses reflect an officer’s decision style which precedes the encounter and drives subsequent decision making to manage them. However, little is known about officer-level decision style. For example, whether an officer has a rational, intuitive, dependent, avoidant, or spontaneous decision style (Scott& Bruce, 1995). Police training in any format often lacks attention to decision styles. As such, an officer’s decision style is most likely associated with demographics (e.g., age, gender) and occupational self-efficacy – a reflection of …

Examining Reflexive Communication Following A Break In Alcohol Abstinence, Lynda Kay Maxfield

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Over 107 million individuals are thought to have alcohol use disorder (AUD) (Ritchie & Roser, 2018). Discontinuing drinking can be difficult, but social support is thought to promote sobriety efforts. The r/stopdrinking online public community supports such efforts. This study has two broad aims: (1) explore how resilience building might occur on r/stopdrinking among initial users disclosing an abstinence disruption and responses from other users; and, (2) explore possible relationships, within initial posts, between resilience and three other phenomena (i.e., trauma, stated views of Alcoholics Anonymous, statements reflecting the transtheoretical model’s ten processes of change; Prochaska & Prochaska, 2021). To …

The Influence Of Prediction Error Strength On Reconsolidation, Kevin D. Mohawk

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

It has been well established that consolidated memories can be reactivated and enter a labile state where they are once again vulnerable to modification. Reactivated memories, therefore, need to be restabilized or reconsolidated. Prediction error (PE) is one of the most common ways of reactivating consolidated memories, yet no studies have examined how varying the strength of PE influences reconsolidation. The present study aimed to determine if the strength of PE is an important factor for triggering reconsolidation and if so, how PE strength influences the reconsolidation process, whether through strengthening or weakening the memory. To vary PE strength, participants …

Gender Differences In Internalizing Problems And Everyday Behaviors Associated With Executive Function In Children And Adolescents With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Hiroko Mullner

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Background: Many children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) experience internalizing problems, and there was evidence suggesting that poor executive function (EF) predicted their internalizing problems. However, this association was primarily found in studies with male children with ASD. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate gender differences in internalizing problems and everyday EF in ASD children (age 5-15) and examined the associations between internalizing problems and everyday EF.Method: This study examined neuropsychological assessment data of ASD children without intellectual disability. The study consisted of two groups: 1. ASD boys (n = 44), 2. ASD girls (n = 15). The study …

“But What About Me?”: How Memorable Messages Received During Catholic Sex Education Contribute To The Development Of Identity Gaps, Hannah Novak

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Sex education in the United States is a widely debated issue. Christians have supported abstinence-based education in the United States for decades (Dent & Maloney, 2017). There are numerous studies that have examined how abstinence sex education is faulty, specifically religious sex education (Judge, 2020; Levand & Ross, 2021; Rasmussen, 2010; Reuther, 2008). Studies found that religious sex education led to mental, physical, and emotional health disparities in the United States (Baker et al., 2015; Nelson et al., 2017). This study explored how memorable messages received in Catholic sex education led to the formation of identity gaps in participants' lives. …

The Effect Of Sleep And Emotion On Pattern Separation, Alanna N. Osmanski

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Prior work on the relationship between sleep and memory suggests that the sleep state is an optimal time for memory consolidation to occur. During slow wave sleep, newly encoded information in the hippocampus is repeatedly activated, driven by slow oscillations that originate in the neocortex. This process that occurs during slow wave sleep facilitates the long-term storage of memories. A widely accepted view of emotion and sleep is that emotional memories are preferentially consolidated during sleep so that they are easily accessible for retrieval, whereas neutral memories tend to be less accessible. However, recent meta-analyses of sleep, emotion, and memory …

Systemic Theoretical Instruction: Tense And Aspect In Italian A Sociocultural Study Of American Learners Of Italian, Charles Joseph Panarella, Jr.

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

University-level language and second-language classrooms typically use general rules of thumb to teach grammar without considering its conceptual aspects and cultural origins. These general rules of thumb are normally taught using a communicative approach to language teaching which typically places little emphasis on immediate corrective feedback and learner development. Most assessments are static in nature and focus on right and wrong answers rather than their origins (i.e., learner development and microgenesis). The lack of corrective feedback and lack of considering affective factors have the potential to negatively influence language acquisition in terms of motivation and self-efficacy. In addition, foreign language …

Comparing Comics And Illustrated Texts In Multimedia Learning, Jackson S. Pelzner

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this research was to examine how different forms of media, in particular science comics and illustrated texts, contribute to different patterns of learning. While the standard illustrated text seen in a textbook has been a useful tool for instruction, science comics appear to be an alternative that could be used in lieu of media that use the traditional illustrated text format. The comic format, known more for its visual appeal to readers, is consistent with the principles of the Cognitive Theory of Multimedia Learning (Mayer, 2009), though comprehension may require different mechanisms (Cohn, 2013a). It was hypothesized …

Rock Or Relic? Lithic Technology And Social Life In The Mimbres Mogollon Region Of Southwestern New Mexico, Jeffrey Dylan Clark Person

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This research project investigates stone tool technology at pithouse and pueblo sites in the Mimbres Mogollon region of southwestern New Mexico. Starting around AD 550, people in this area were shifting from mobile foragers who moved in seasonal rounds to sedentary village farmers. This process of subsistence change sparked further changes in material culture and social organization across the Mimbres region. The dissertation focuses on lithic debitage, the stone flakes and rock shatter that resulted from reducing stone cores into usable cutting and scraping tools. Debitage from three Mimbres sites, the Harris site, La Gila Encantada, and Elk Ridge were …

Gendered Bodies, Engendered Lives: Bioarchaeological Exploration Of The Intersectionality Of Gender, Health, And Trauma At Turkey Creek Pueblo, Arizona (Ad 1225-1286), Claira Elizabeth Ralston

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This dissertation examines the relationships between sex, gender, and health at Turkey Creek Pueblo (AD 1225-1286), the earliest aggregated Pueblo community in the Point of Pines region of east central Arizona, to better understand their roles in producing differential health outcomes. To gain a view of these interactions, I use osteological, mortuary, and ethnohistoric data to explore how gender, as a social institution, informed divisions of labor and experiences with traumatic injury at Turkey Creek Pueblo, because this site was occupied during a socially dynamic and important period in the pre-contact American Southwest. Using these data, I explore how sex, …

Multiple Approaches To Examining Gender Norms In Romantic Relationships, Carrie Underwood

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Romantic relationships are essential to the human experience, and gender stereotypes are so ingrained they can be automatic. In this dissertation, I address three empirical questions through both quantitative and qualitative research methods, all of which contribute to the growing body of literature on gender norms and romantic relationships. In Chapter 2, I present a mixed-methods study that examines how heterosexual men reason about benevolent sexism. Results revealed themes of equality in the workplace and men’s roles as providers. In Chapter 4 I implemented a two-study research design to understand how heterosexual women and men reason about troubled romantic relationships. …

Examining The Effects Of Perspective-Taking And Empathetic Concern On Attractiveness Biases In Millennial And Generation X Adults, Stephanie Verba-Quinones

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The current study examined the effects of perspective-taking and empathetic concern on attractiveness biases and stereotypes in Generation X and Millennial adults. Such biases and stereotypes are pervasive and can lead to preferential treatment and differential outcomes for individuals of varying attractiveness levels (see Langlois et al., 2000 for review). Previous research suggests that social media may amplify the importance placed on attractiveness, particularly for women (Fardouly et al., 2015; Perloff, 2014; Tiggemann et al., 2014; Toma & Hancock, 2018). Given the negative impacts of biases and stereotypes, this study sought to investigate pathways to reduce attractiveness biases and stereotypes …

Development And Initial Validation Of The Mindful Self-Regulated Learning Scale (M-Srls), Sarah Wolff

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Modern mindfulness is a catch-all term. Just exactly what it looks like within the context of education and how it is taught vastly varies. As such, program fidelity and integrity is questioned. Here a definition of mindful self-regulated learning is proposed and the Mindful Self-Regulated Learning Scale (m-SRLS) is developed. This includes item generation and development, systematic testing of item performance, scale dimensionality, convergent and divergent validity, measurement invariance across groups and subgroups, and scale reliability over a series of five pilot studies and five primary studies using independent samples. The resulting m-SRLS is a context specific measurement tool that …

Musculoskeletal Injury Concealment In The Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, Joshua D. Wooldridge

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

INTRODUCTION: Among service members, musculoskeletal injuries threaten military readiness and place a substantial burden on medical and financial resources. While musculoskeletal injuries (MSKIs) are a leading threat to military readiness, service members’ unwillingness to seek care constrains current prevention and surveillance efforts. A growing body of evidence shows US service members conceal a large proportion of injuries, especially in training environments. The Reserve Officers’ Training Corps is a critical training environment for future US military commissioned officers. Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC) is the largest commissioning source of new officers for the US military. ROTC cadets are college students concurrently …

Fear Of Recurrence As A Mediator Of Illness Perception And Perceived Stress In Acute Myocardial Infarction Survivors, Sarah E. Zvonar

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Purpose: The primary objective of this study is to evaluate fear of recurrence as a mediator of illness perception and perceived stress. This research will determine how illness perceptions and fear of recurrence affect perceived stress in the acute myocardial infarction (AMI) population. Other aims will observe how demographics predict patients who may experience increased fear of recurrence and stress in the AMI population, how the variables of fear of recurrence change over time, and if fear of recurrence is still a significant mediator after controlling for depression and anxiety.Rational/ Conceptual Basis/ Background: Acute myocardial infarctions (AMIs) are often accompanied …

The Insurer Of Last Resort: Investigating A Federal Insurance Backstop For Catastrophic Cyber Incidents, Brianna Bace

Political Science

The demand for cyber insurance has accelerated in recent years due to the increased frequency and severity of cyber-attacks. The NotPeyta cyberattack, which spread to countries and systems across the globe and is estimated to have caused over $10 billion in damages, is one example. These kinds of catastrophic cyber incidents are causing insurers to raise premiums and tighten their policies, creating a significant gap in protection in the market. In response to this problem, the United States Treasury Department issued a Request for Comment regarding the potential for a federal insurance response to catastrophic cyber incidents. The aim of …

Are Right-Wing Populists And Right-Wing Populist Parties In America Buoyed By Mass Self-Deception?, Owen Herbert

Political Science

The recent rise of right-wing populist candidates and parties in America and around the globe has (unsurprisingly) been associated with a concomitant growth in scholarship on the causes of individuals voting for right-wing populist candidates and joining the movements with which those candidates associate. Much of the scholarship in this area appeals to economics or culture as reasons why individuals side with right-wing populists or right-wing populist parties and movements. This thesis will begin by examining the significant literature in those two areas. Then, I will raise two questions that the literature has scarcely addressed: (1) What is the psychological …

U.S.-Russia Relationships: How Superpower Relations Affect Conflict Resolution, Julian Terris

Political Science

Russia and the United States struggle for power throughout the 20^th and 21^st century has imprinted itself on many current conflicts. While the post-war international order has focused on avoiding violent conflict, the inability of Russia and U.S. to cooperate has hindered the ability to create peace throughout these zones of conflict. This paper seeks to demonstrate how U.S. and Russian relations have influenced current conflicts as well as which policies they should adopt in order to help resolve conflicts in the future. It specifically analyses ideological, military and economic actions taken by both nations throughout the Ukrainian, …

The Scaling Method: Body Mass Reconstruction Of East African Hominins, Julianna Rose

Anthropology Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis details a series of novel methods developed to estimate body masses of hominin fossils using 3-D point cloud registration software. All analyses were conducted through 3-D modeling software that supported the remote study of five fossil femora from East Africa. The fossil computer models were repeatedly aligned with anatomically modern human femora to determine their scaling relationship with the objective of using the scaling factor of the human references to estimate the body mass of the fossils, on the basis of the femoral head breadth. Body mass estimates obtained through this technique were compared to estimates using more …

“Man, I Will Miss This Place”: An Ethnographic Account Of Place-Making On Dickson Street Through Men’S Bathroom Graffiti, Ethan S. Brown

Anthropology Undergraduate Honors Theses

Walking into a public bathroom, often we are faced with interesting, unique, and easily ignorable cases of residual humanity: bathroom graffiti. These writings, academically known as latrinalia, offer scholars a unique portrait of the people who form an immediate culture and community. By providing opportunities to produce individual and collective identities, local folklore, and contesting narratives of space, latrinalia allows authors to carve out personal or cultural place out of the impersonal materiality of space. Utilizing traditional methods of ethnographic fieldwork, latrinalia in the men’s bathrooms of three bars along the famed Dickson Street in Fayetteville, Arkansas is approached …