Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Variability, Stability, And Flexibility In The Speech Kinematics And Acoustics Of Adults Who Do And Do Not Stutter, Eric S. Jackson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

It is well known that people who do and do not stutter produce speech differently, at least some of the time, even when perceived as fluent. One way that investigators have assessed these differences is by measuring variability, or the inconsistency of repeated speech movements. Variability in speech has typically been quantified using linear analysis techniques (e.g., measures of central tendency), and results have indicated that people who stutter produce speech that is (sometimes) characterized by increased variability. However, variability is a complex phenomenon, one that cannot be assessed by linear methods alone. This dissertation employs linear and nonlinear analysis …

Sex-Dependent Role Of Interleukin-1 Signaling In Emotional And Cognitive Behaviors In Mice: Phenotyping Male And Female Il1-R1 Null Mutant Mice, Jennifer Anne Johnson

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

IL1-R1 null mutant mice (IL1-R1 KO) have reduced signaling in the interleukin-1 (IL-1) pathway, making them a convenient model for testing the importance of IL-1 in either the development or maintenance of mouse behaviors. Prior research has revealed impaired cognitive and emotional processes in adult male IL1-R1 KO mice, including impaired spatial learning and memory and decreased anxiety with associated impairments in hippocampal cell proliferation and signal transmission. The current studies explored the neuroanatomy and behavioral phenotype of both male and female IL1-R1 KO mice. An array of behavioral tests was administered, including retesting at an older age for cognitive …

The Influence Of A Child's Learning Disability On A Parent's Psychological Experience: A Comparison Of Parents With And Without Learning Disabilities, Alice Varley Mangan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examined the psychological experience of parents whose children have been diagnosed with moderate to severe learning disabilities (LD) and compared the impact of a child's learning disability across two groups of parents: one with LD and one without LD. In-depth semi-structured interviews were administered to eleven parents of children with LD, four of whom had LD themselves, and seven of whom did not have LD. Three levels of qualitative data analysis were employed to code the interviews resulting in four theoretical constructs: (1) Diagnosis as a Threat to Parental Narcissism; (2) Parents Engage Containing and Stabilizing Strategies; (3) …

Civil Unrest In The Untied State Of America: Facing The Threat, Menemsha P.S. Milnor

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This essay explores the purpose and function of the police in a modern state. It draws mainly from the ideas put forth by Walter Benjamin in his 1921 essay, Critique of Violence, and focuses exclusively on the events surrounding the Black Lives Matter movement. By applying political theory to concrete events, it attempts to expose the mechanics of capitalist state repression as presented in its current form. Central themes are police violence, state repression, popular sovereignty and political resistance. It is the intention of this piece of writing that it be used for practical purposes, to serve as a foundation …

Roles Of Shifting Attention, Alternating Attention And Inhibition On Temporary Syntactic Ambiguity Resolution And Use Of Context In Younger And Older Adults, Youngmi Park

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Twenty-four younger adults (20-35 years, mean: 25.88) and thirty-four older adults (65-79 years, mean: 71.82) read sentences via a word-by-word self-paced reading paradigm. Study 1 examined how older and young adults resolve sentences containing Noun Phrase (NP) and Verb Phrase (VP)-attached Prepositional Phrases (PPs) yielding temporary syntactic ambiguity, and which cognitive factors (working memory capacity, inhibition, shifting attention, alternating attention, and cognitive processing speed) contribute to temporary syntactic ambiguity resolution.

Study 2 was designed to investigate how both age groups utilize contextual information while resolving PP-attachment, and which cognitive functions play a role in the use of referential context during …

Surviving The Gauntlet: Adult Undergraduates In American Higher Education, David Bernard Monaghan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In modern American higher education, people ages twenty-five and older account for nearly forty percent of all undergraduates. Though neglected by scholars, these students and their experiences are both important in their own right and can help shed light on the broader world of non-elite postsecondary education. In this dissertation, I combine qualitative and quantitative methods to address central questions relating to college-going among adults. I draw on data from a nationally-representative longitudinal study (the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979 cohort) and from in-depth interviews with thirty-six adult undergraduates in order to explore factors that lead students to drop …

The 'In-Group Advantage' For Perceiving Emotion Across Demographic Groups And Communication Channels, Thomas Myers

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The ability to perceive emotions in others is critical to successful social interaction. While much research has been conducted on some of the factors affecting emotion perception, other areas have received relatively little attention and, thus, are not well understood. There is growing evidence to suggest that various demographic factors, as well as their interactions, impact the accuracy of emotion perception. The impact of these factors seems to vary as a function of the particular channel (e.g., facial, prosodic, and lexical) through which emotions are perceived and may even be influenced by the presence of an 'in-group advantage' (IGA; Elfenbein …

Singing Motherhood: First Time Mothers' Experiences Singing To Their Infants, Margaret Mia Pixley

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Mothers have sung to their children for centuries. Because singing provides an opportunity for self-expression and connection with others, understanding how first time mothers experience this age old practice might help us understand how singing facilitates a woman's developing relationship with herself as a mother and with her new infant. To date, little research exists on this particular function and experience of first time maternal singing. In this qualitative phenomenological study, 16 first time mothers with infants one year and under were interviewed about their experiences singing to their babies and were also asked to write a one-time diary entry …

Essays On The Economic Analysis Of Transportation Systems, Hyoungsuk Shim

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation consists of four essays on the economic analysis of transportation systems. In the first chapter, the conventional disaggregate travel demand model, a probability model for the modeling of multiple modes, generally called random utility maximization (RUM), is expanded to a model of count of mode choice. The extended travel demand model is derived from general economic theory -- maximizing instantaneous utility on the time horizon, subject to a budget constraint -- and can capture the dynamic behavior of countable travel demand. Because the model is for countable dependent variables, it has a more realistic set of assumptions to …

A Critique Of Western Liberalism, Siddhant Issar

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this thesis I draw attention to the connections between Western liberalism, particularly exemplified by the idea of liberal freedom, and (in)visible modalities of oppression. In chapter 1, I examine how the philosophical basis of liberalism allows it to serve as a mediator of oppression. In chapter 2, through a genealogical analysis, I trace out the link between liberalism and political economy. Here I focus on the imbrication between (neo-)liberalism, capitalism, and the production of subjectivity. My analysis aims at revealing the specific form of subjectivity engendered under the sign of liberal freedom. In chapter 3, I take up post …

Whistles Of Sympatric Species Of Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops Truncatus) And Spotted Dolphins (Stenella Frontalis) In The Bahamas: Acoustic Characteristics And Contextual Use, Jennifer Daisy Kaplan

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Bottlenose and spotted dolphins in the Bahamas frequently interact in social, socio-sexual, and aggressive encounters, and whistles are thought to play a key role in their communication. Concurrent vocal and behavioral recordings of wild sympatric species of Atlantic spotted dolphins (Stenella frontalis) and Atlantic bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) were collected from three Bahamas populations, and the acoustic parameters, structure, and contextual use of their whistles were analyzed. The mean acoustic parameters of spotted dolphins in the Bimini and White Sand Ridge Bahamas populations were higher in frequency than those of bottlenose dolphins, but bottlenose dolphins produced whistles that had higher …

Pragmatics And Semantics In Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Karece Lopez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study examined scalar implicature to investigate semantic bases of pragmatic language impairment in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Scalar implicatures are inferences made by listeners, whereby they strengthen the weaker meaning of a term that can be represented on a scale (Grice, 1975; Horn, 1992). Scalar terms include: some/all; or/and; numerals. These inferences depend on understanding a speaker's intent and having the cognitive skills necessary to process such information in real time. Informativeness is the value a listener places on having to derive an implicature and assumes that the listener perceives the speakers intentions. Cognitive effort includes the …

Essays On Exchange Rate Pass-Through, Michael Malenbaum

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation examines the degree to which the prices of imports to the United States respond to changes in bilateral exchange rates. The first chapter provides a review of the literature on exchange rate pass-through and outlines how research on the topic has changed over the past forty years. The next two chapters focus individually on specific questions that are important to the pass-through literature. These topics include the impact of imperfect competition and varying market shares on pass-through rates, as well as the decline in pass-through to import prices and the possible effects of China's increased role in trade …

The Role Of The Vta Nmda Receptors, Vta Da Cells And Vta Terminal Regions In Reward-Related Learning, Karen Kest

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Reward-related learning occurs when an initially neutral stimulus acquires the capacity to elicit responses similar to an unconditioned stimulus (US) with which it is associated, in which case the stimulus now functions as a conditioned stimulus (CS). The mechanisms whereby stimuli come to function as CSs are not fully understood and comprise the theme of this dissertation. We have previously proposed that coincident signals from an unconditioned and the eventual conditioned stimulus (US and CS) signals on dopamine (DA) cells of the ventral tegmental area (VTA) leads to strengthening of CS synapses, allowing the CS to acquire the ability to …

Investigating The Effects Of Intervention Intensity On Skill Acquisition And Task Persistence In Children With Down Syndrome, Nicole Marie Neil

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Maximizing outcomes for learners with Down syndrome requires an approach which is both effective and efficient. Modifying the intensity of intervention has the potential to affect the rate of skill acquisition as well as other learner behavior, such as task persistence, which alters the efficiency of intervention. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of varying intensity levels of a behavior-analytic on acquisition and task persistence for young children with Down syndrome. Three children with Down syndrome were taught expressive language targets using three manipulations of intervention intensity (dose): the number of opportunities, the spacing of opportunities, …

'Hope For Every Addicted American' An Opioid Epidemic In The Age Of Ethopolitics: Implications For U.S. Drug Policy And Governing Problematic Subjects, Elizabeth Newcomer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The United States is in the midst of an unprecedented drug epidemic instigated by overprescribed pain relievers and cheap, accessible heroin. Beyond its immense scope, what makes this opioid epidemic distinctive is a widespread awareness of its effects among privileged populations and a political consensus that it cannot be effectively addressed with existing, punitive drug policies. Building upon analyses of the drug addict identity and policy change as well as critical addiction studies, I critically examine the discourses of the opioid epidemic, considering their impact on U.S. drug policy since 2000 and analyzing the implications of these changes for governing …

Is Cue-Based Memory Retrieval 'Good-Enough'?: Agreement, Comprehension, And Implicit Prosody In Native And Bilingual Speakers Of English, Elizabeth Pratt

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation focuses on structural and prosodic effects during reading, examining their influence on agreement processing and comprehension in native English (L1) and Spanish-English bilingual (L2) speakers. I consolidate research from three distinct areas of inquiry'cognitive processing models, development of reading fluency, and L1/L2 processing strategies'and outline a cohesive and comprehensive processing model that can be applied to speakers regardless of language profile. This model is characterized by three critical components: a cognitive model of memory retrieval, a processing paradigm that outlines how resources may be deployed online, and the role of factors such as prosody in parsing decisions.

The …

Carl Schmitt And Political Catholicism: Friend Or Foe?, Brian J. Fox

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The scholarship on controversial German constitutional lawyer and political theorist Carl Schmitt (1888-1985) has long accepted what can be called a "standard narrative" as regards his intellectual development. This narrative treats Schmitt as, on the whole, a "Catholic" intellectual and "political theologian" until the mid-1920s when he turns decidedly towards a secular decisionism. Commentators frequently point to Schmitt's non-canonical second marriage in 1926 as the biographically salient factor in dating a turn from an early association with political Catholicism to his later nationalist authoritarianism. This later approach to politics led Schmitt to promote plebiscitary dictatorship in the last years of …

The Relationship Between Maternal Depression And Negative Outcomes In Children: Parenting Deficits' Impact On Children's Emotional Regulation And Behavioral Expression, Gabrielle Francesca Cione

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The present study examined the relationships between maternal depression, parenting practices and children's emotional and behavioral expressions. The study was a secondary analysis of a previous cross-sectional and cross-generational study (Maternal aggression, self-regulation and adverse child outcomes, DA 08963) funded by the National Institute for Drug Abuse (NIDA) that examined the pathways between maternal impairments (crack/cocaine use disorder, general psychopathology, and self-regulation deficits), child-rearing deficits (parenting deficits, child neglect, child physical/ sexual abuse), and adverse child outcomes (substance abuse, aggressive/ delinquent behaviors, and child self-regulation deficits).

The population for the current study was chosen because children of depressed mothers in …

Sexual Victimization, Disclosure, And Accountability: Organizational Responses Of The Boy Scouts Of America To Child Sexual Abuse, Michelle Anne Cubellis

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Child sexual abuse has always been a highly publicized and controversial topic due to the vulnerability of children. However, there have been several recent child sexual abuse (CSA) scandals garnering even more attention and concern. With the exposure of the Catholic Church abuse scandal in 2002, public attention became focused on the Archdiocese's poor and prolonged response. However, this crisis was not the sole case of widespread sexual violence and institutional failure. In October of 2012, Boy Scouts of America files from 1959 to 1991 containing reports of child sexual abuse were released. These reports feature detailed information about the …

Wh-Question Processing In Children With Cochlear Implants, Zarabeth Waldman Deluca

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Children with cochlear implants (CIs) have exhibited difficulty accurately answering and producing wh-questions. The syntactic construction of wh-questions include syntactic movement, whereby the wh-question phrase that replaces the subject or object noun is fronted to the beginning of the sentence. This leaves a syntactic gap at the subject or object's original location, to be filled by the listener during immediate language processing. One view is that this syntactic gap is resolved by retaining that filler concept in working memory (WM), until it can be reintegrated into the wh-question. However, the CI population is also notable for WM deficits, which may …

View From The Front Gate: A Comparative Study Of Nyc Schools From A College Admissions Perspective, Sharon Hardy

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This study evaluated patterns of college applications from NYC Schools to CUNY. Specifically, a cohort of former large high schools that were reorganized into small schools of choice (SSCs) under the City's Children First education plan were studied. Coupled with the assessments of college admissions directors, the study concluded that despite an increase in applications, the outcomes of student academic quality and college preparation from a college admissions perspective were mixed.

/N/:/R/ Correspondences In Albanian Dialects: Understanding The N>R Sound Change, Katie Albany

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Albanian language is an Indo-European language that constitutes a separate branch in the Indo-European language family. There are two major dialects, Geg and Tosk, spoken in present day Albania that are mutually intelligible. There are morpho-syntactic differences between the two dialects and shared words provide evidence for a number of sound changes applying in certain contexts in Tosk. The focus of this paper is n > r sound change in Tosk applying to the nasal /n/ in an intervocalic position followed by an unstressed vowel. The lenition rule has been prolific diachronically, but stopped applying some time between the 13 …

Social-Ecological Resilience In The Viking-Age To Early-Medieval Faroe Islands, Seth Brewington

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation aims to evaluate the development and maintenance of social-ecological resilience during the settlement-period (ca. 9th through 11th centuries CE) in the Faroe Islands. In particular, the core objectives include the identification of the key social and natural variables involved, the examination of how these variables contributed to overall resilience, and the investigation of the initiation of the Faroese domestic economy.

This research focuses primarily on an analysis of the 9th through 13th century archaeofaunal assemblage from the site of Undir Junkarinsfløtti, located on the island of Sandoy. This analysis represents the first detailed study of the Faroese settlement-period …

Interleukin-1 (Il-1) As A Potential Contributor To The Pathophysiology Of Alzheimer's Disease, Sara Nicole Resch

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Elevations of the pro-inflammatory cytokine interleukin-1 (IL-1) have been reported as part of the inflammatory response to injury and neurodegenerative disorders. The observation of increased IL-1 levels in the brains of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) triggered over two decades of research implicating IL-1 in the disease pathogenesis. IL-1 has been suggested to modulate a variety of actions related to AD pathology, including the processing of the Aβ precursor protein and deposition of amyloid plaques. IL-1 also activates glial cells and induces recruitment of leukocytes and peripheral macrophages to the CNS across the blood-brain barrier (BBB). When exposed to IL-1, …

Self-Esteem As A Predictor Of Posttraumatic Growth And Adaptation Among Maltreated Early Adolescents, Hadar Schwartz

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Child maltreatment, including neglect and physical, sexual, and emotional abuse, affects 12% of American children each year (Wildeman, Emanal, Leventhal, Putnam-Hornstein, Waldfogel, & Lee, 2014). Maltreatment can be devastating to an individual's development and is associated with considerable negative psychological sequelae, including high rates of depression and problem behaviors, impaired peer relationships, and low self-esteem (e.g., Bolger, Patterson, & Kupersmidt, 1998; Cicchetti & Carlson, 1989; Kim & Cicchetti, 2006; Swanston, Tebbutt, O'Toole, & Oates, 1997; Toth, Manly, & Cicchetti, 1992). However, despite a historic emphasis on the negative effects of trauma, not all children experience traumatic reactions (Cicchetti & Rogosch, …

Arab-American Lives In New York City: The Value Of Creative Non-Fiction Journalism To The Social Sciences, Sofie F. Tholl

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Through three journalistic portraits of Arab Americans living in New York City today, this thesis adds to the academic work of documenting the post-9/11 Arab-American experience via creative non-fiction storytelling. The three portraits of different generation Arab Americans each touch upon major themes covered in the post-9/11 social science research on this population, themes that are discussed in the literature review of this thesis. Furthermore, the thesis argues that the choice of creative non-fiction storytelling contributes to the already existing research in the area by making otherwise specialized material readable and accessible for a non-academic audience. Additionally, this thesis addresses …

Learning Functional Prepositions, John Stewart

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In first language acquisition, what does it mean for a grammatical category to have been acquired, and what are the mechanisms by which children learn functional categories in general? In the context of prepositions (Ps), if the lexical/functional divide cuts through the P category, as has been suggested in the theoretical literature, then constructivist accounts of language acquisition would predict that children develop adult-like competence with the more abstract units, functional Ps, at a slower rate compared to their acquisition of lexical Ps. Nativists instead assume that the features of functional P are made available by Universal Grammar (UG), and …

The Fengsu-Driven Practice Of Sending Infants To China: The Experiences Of Chinese Immigrant Mothers In New York, Kitching Rhoda Wong

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This dissertation explores Fujianese women's transnational parenting experiences. Although transnational mothering is ubiquitous in an era of globalization, this study surfaces the unique aspects of this phenomenon among Chinese female migrants to New York City. These women send months-old infants to China for care expecting their return at school age. The 'satellite-baby' phenomenon (Bohr, 2009) appears unique to Chinese immigrant mothers, particularly those from the Fujian-Fuzhou region. Conducted in the phenomenological tradition of qualitative research, I sought to uncover the complex, contextual experiences mothers experienced in their migration to the US. This included their experiences as immigrants, their decisions to …

Turning To Culture In Times Of Crisis: Global Toolkits And Urban Reinvestment In Buenos Aires, Jacob H. Lederman

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

As cities transition from industrial to post-industrial forms of development, new activities based on leisure and entertainment have come to comprise a greater share of urban economic growth. Drawing upon 10 months of qualitative fieldwork, this research examines the emergence of new urban policies, increasingly reliant on cultural and touristic production, which gained importance in Buenos Aires after Argentina's devastating 2001-2002 economic crisis. Through interviews and fieldwork with policymakers, everyday cultural producers, and the urban poor situated at the margins of these changes, the dissertation seeks to illuminate how local officials reconceived of culture as a form of economic development …