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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Science Occupational Images And Aspirations Of African American/ Black Elementary Students, Saron Lamothe Jan 2019

Science Occupational Images And Aspirations Of African American/ Black Elementary Students, Saron Lamothe

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Within the United States, more than a million jobs in science and engineering (S&E) are projected over the next few years; yet, the Nation lacks the workforce to meet these demands. Despite the need for a more diverse, qualified workforce, African Americans/Blacks remain disproportionately underrepresented in science occupations, science degree attainment, and in science postsecondary majors. The lack of science participation is reflective of how minority secondary students view science and science occupations as many consider the pursuit of a science career as unfavorable. Moreover, minority secondary students, who do choose to pursue science occupations, seem to possess inaccurate (or …


The Impact Of Alcohol Consumption On Academic Success And Athletic Identity In Collegiate Student-Athletes, Zoe E. Arnold Jan 2019

The Impact Of Alcohol Consumption On Academic Success And Athletic Identity In Collegiate Student-Athletes, Zoe E. Arnold

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Upon entering college in the United States, students are exposed to alcohol and, relatedly, the potentially dangerous experiences and effects that come with consuming alcohol. This is especially true for collegiate student-athletes, who have been found to have the highest consumption rate among student groups on campus. The purpose of the study was to understand the relationship between how student-athletes at a focus university, a Division I member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, experience alcohol consumption, how their consumption affects their academic grade point average (GPA), and how athletic identity plays a role in their experiences. While the research …


An Exploration Of The Relationship Between Work Climate, The Utilization Of Support Resources, And Compassion Fatigue Level In Child Protective Investigators, Shannon Holliker Jan 2019

An Exploration Of The Relationship Between Work Climate, The Utilization Of Support Resources, And Compassion Fatigue Level In Child Protective Investigators, Shannon Holliker

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The impact of child maltreatment is far reaching, affecting the abused child, the family system, and the professionals tasked with providing support during the moments of crisis. As child protective investigators (CPIs) provide care and support to others, they are at high risk of experiencing secondary traumatic stress and/or burnout, both aspects of compassion fatigue. Researchers suggest that work climate, utilization of resources, and worker characteristics can impact CPI compassion-fatigue level. Drawing on extant literature, this study examined three research questions and seven hypotheses aiming to explore the relationship between work climate, resource utilization, CPI characteristics, and CPI compassion-fatigue level. …


I Decide When You Die: A Mixed-Methods Analysis Of Prior Reporting Of Physical Violence For Intimate Partner Homicides By Heterosexual Spouses In Florida, Donna King Jan 2019

I Decide When You Die: A Mixed-Methods Analysis Of Prior Reporting Of Physical Violence For Intimate Partner Homicides By Heterosexual Spouses In Florida, Donna King

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

It is generally believed that a victim of an intimate partner homicide, who faced ongoing physical violence prior to the killing, would have contacted authorities for assistance or protection some time prior to their death. However, the results of this study show that this notion that a victim of ongoing abuse will, more than likely, request help is a misconception. Through qualitative and quantitative methods analysis, this study reveals the dearth of prior reporting of physical violence to law enforcement or the court when an intimate partner homicide takes place between heterosexual spouses in Florida between 2006 and 2016. Additionally, …


Habituation Trajectory During Exposure Therapy: Comparing Trauma Frequency And Trauma Type, Madeline Marks Jan 2019

Habituation Trajectory During Exposure Therapy: Comparing Trauma Frequency And Trauma Type, Madeline Marks

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The current DSM-5 criteria for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) affords heterogeneous symptom presentations; however, current treatment fails to consider differences in trauma frequency and trauma type. These different symptom profiles that exist within the PTSD framework lead to questions about the generalizability of treatment outcomes from one group to another group. One group of interest is those that experience multiple traumatic events and report multiple index traumas (trauma frequency). The second group of interest is those with a PTSD diagnosis from occupational exposure to traumatic events (trauma type). Appreciation of the reinforcement schedule may be particularly crucial for understanding treatment …


Victimization And Health Experiences For Tgnc Individuals In Women's Prisons, Kristina Davis Jan 2019

Victimization And Health Experiences For Tgnc Individuals In Women's Prisons, Kristina Davis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This text examines the health-related experiences of transgender and gender nonconforming persons assigned female at birth within the criminal justice system. It moves through a transgender-centric approach to explore the ways gender nonconformity relates to experiences of violence and healthcare disparities for those interacting with law enforcement and incarcerated in women's prisons. The study utilized statistical analyses of nationally representative data in the 2015 U.S. Transgender Survey carried out by the National Center for Transgender Equality. Multivariate analyses suggested significant connections between race and education and experiences of harassment and assault within the criminal justice context. There were largely mixed …


Designing Calorie Counter Smartphone Applications For Effective Weight Loss, Sharlin Milliard Jan 2019

Designing Calorie Counter Smartphone Applications For Effective Weight Loss, Sharlin Milliard

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Poor dietary choices and lack of physical activity are two main contributing factors for the increasing prevalence of overweight and obesity in the United States. Overweight and obese individuals are at risk for developing major life-threatening diseases. Weight loss is an effective means for reversing these adverse health effects, and smartphone applications (apps) may be an effective means for supporting weight loss outside of formal clinical settings. This study involved identifying factors that contribute to effective weight loss to compare with functionality commonly found in a sample of calorie counter apps. A content analysis was performed using a design framework …


Commitment And Credibility In Fdi, Kathleen Sullivan Jan 2019

Commitment And Credibility In Fdi, Kathleen Sullivan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

How can firms in foreign direct investment (FDI) best protect their assets from host government contract beach? FDI is the largest and most stable form of external financing to less developed countries (LDCs). It increases job growth, technological development, and efficiency in the host country, subsequently increasing economic development. Companies prefer to invest in countries that are less prone to contract breach. I propose that credibility of commitments can help explain variation in contract breach. I propose that firms are most likely to avoid contract breach when they are involved in supply chains and when the host country has a …


Trouble In Paradise: Impacts Of Theme Park Tourism On The Mental Health Of Employees In Orlando, Florida, Lea Harvey Jan 2019

Trouble In Paradise: Impacts Of Theme Park Tourism On The Mental Health Of Employees In Orlando, Florida, Lea Harvey

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Tourism is a topic that has gained much attention within the realm of anthropology over the past few decades. Anthropological research of the tourism industry has been largely devoted to the study of the tourist gaze and its subsequent sociocultural impacts as well as the benefits that travelers reap from their colonialist excursions. However, the voices of those who form the foundation of this industry, the laborers, remain almost entirely absent from said discourse. Furthermore, there is a lack of anthropological consideration for the relationship between tourism and mental health experiences of employees within the tourism industry. One specific region …


Telephone-Delivered Cognitive Behavioral Therapy For Insomnia In Patients With Cancer: A Randomized Controlled Trial, Andel Nicasio Jan 2019

Telephone-Delivered Cognitive Behavioral Therapy For Insomnia In Patients With Cancer: A Randomized Controlled Trial, Andel Nicasio

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examined the efficacy and feasibility of a brief telephone-delivered CBT-I (TeleCBT-I) intervention in cancer patients compared to a control group. The study used a randomized controlled trial design. The TeleCBT-I program consisted of a brief four-week CBT-I program adapted for cancer patients. Patients completed assessment measures at pre-treatment, post-treatment and one-month follow-up. Out of 184 patients screened, 39 were randomly assigned, and 35 (TeleCBT-I, n = 19; Control, n = 16) completed pre- and post-treatment measures and were included in the analyses. Compared to control group, the TeleCBT-I group reported decreased insomnia severity symptoms (p < .014), improved sleep quality (p < .023), and reduced dysfunctional beliefs about sleep (p = .039) at post-treatment with sustained treatment effects at one-month follow-up. Sleep measures yielded large effect sizes (Hedges' g, 0.84-2.7). Although the TeleCBT-I group indicated improvements in fatigue, general functioning, physical well-being, functional well-being, and physical quality of life, effects at follow-up were observed only for fatigue, functional well-being and physical quality of life. No effects were found on depression at any of the time points. In terms of feasibility, TeleCBT-I demonstrated high adherence, high homework completion and high overall satisfaction. These results advance the empirical evidence of CBT-I in cancer patients and support the use of telephone-delivered CBT-I to widely disseminate and implement among patients with cancer.


Nike's Corporate Social Advocacy (Csa) Practices As Related To Strategic Issues Management (Sim) And Threats To Organizational Legitimacy, Eve Heffron Jan 2019

Nike's Corporate Social Advocacy (Csa) Practices As Related To Strategic Issues Management (Sim) And Threats To Organizational Legitimacy, Eve Heffron

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research examined how corporate social advocacy (CSA) and corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts impacted perceptions of authenticity. Using an experimental survey, participants were randomly exposed to Nike's actions related to the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement via mock-online news articles. Participants completed a survey that contained Likert-type scale items regarding attitudes (perceived corporate intent, perceived authenticity, brand trust, and brand credibility) and behavioral intentions (word of mouth intentions (WOM), and purchase intention (PI)). Results indicated that positive attitudes significantly increased when Nike implemented an action step after taking a public stance on a controversial social-political issue. Further, results revealed …


Teachers' Perceptions Of Safety Regarding School Shootings, Megan Olive Jan 2019

Teachers' Perceptions Of Safety Regarding School Shootings, Megan Olive

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As a result of high media attention surrounding school shootings in recent years, it may appear that American public schools are becoming dangerous places (Schildkraut & Elsass, 2016; Elsass, Schildkraut, & Stafford, 2016; Toppo, 2013). Though schools remain to be one of the safest locations for children, various safety measures are discussed and implemented in schools to combat this perceived problem and ensure the safety of school campuses. Discussions of best safety practices spikes directly following a school shooting event from relevant parties, such as school administration, law enforcement agencies, parents, and students, (Crawford & Burns, 2015; Chrusciel, Wolfe, Hansen, …


Hurricane Maria: A Qualitative Study Of Recently Displaced Students To The State Of Florida, Esmeralda Cabrera Jan 2019

Hurricane Maria: A Qualitative Study Of Recently Displaced Students To The State Of Florida, Esmeralda Cabrera

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Over the past ten years Puerto Rico has been experiencing a severe economic crisis that was worsened when Hurricane Maria made landfall on September 20, 2017. Maria hit Puerto Rico as a category 4 storm, devastating the whole island and its 3.4 million residents. Many students were left with minimal educational choices after Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico. Research on Latino/a students shows that they are met with unique experiences and challenges as they pursue higher education. The current study uses qualitative data to investigate what are the unique challenges and needs of displaced students from Puerto Rico? and what …


The Wonder Women: Understanding Feminism In Cosplay Performance, Amber Grissom Jan 2019

The Wonder Women: Understanding Feminism In Cosplay Performance, Amber Grissom

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Feminism conjures divisive and at times conflicting thoughts and feelings in the current political climate in the United States. For some, Wonder Woman is a feminist icon, for her devotion to truth, justice, and equality. In recent years, Wonder Woman has become successful in the film industry, and this is reflected by the growing community of cosplayers at comic book conventions. In this study, I examine gender performativity, gender identity, and feminism from the perspective of cosplayers of Wonder Woman. I collected ethnographic data using participant observation and semi-structured interviews with cosplayers at comic book conventions in Florida, Georgia, and …


The Causes, Dynamics, And Implications Of Child Soldiering, Christopher Faulkner Jan 2019

The Causes, Dynamics, And Implications Of Child Soldiering, Christopher Faulkner

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Child soldiers continue to be regular participants in modern conflicts in many different parts of the world. This dissertation addresses several interrelated questions about child soldiering employing large-N statistical analyses, process-tracing, and in-depth interviews. First, it asks how foreign state support and the characteristics of these donors influence rebels' recruitment of child soldiers. An important finding is that rebels supported by democratic states are less likely to employ child soldiers. It then investigates the factors and conditions that lead some groups to diversify their demographics in the types of recruits and others to not. Specifically, it considers why a rebel …


The Invisible Men: Analyzing The Virtual Subculture Of England's Punters, Ashley Christensen Jan 2019

The Invisible Men: Analyzing The Virtual Subculture Of England's Punters, Ashley Christensen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Research on prostitution has flourished over the last few decades with a new emphasis on the online sex market. To study the online market, researchers have utilized qualitative methods to investigate escort review websites. Coding for violent rhetoric and perceived intimacy are two conventional techniques that have been utilized using qualitative methods. Other areas investigated include the overall characteristics of sex buyers, price variation, and socialization of buyers. What has lacked in current literature has been the use of quantitative methods to study what factors influence the presence of positive reviews. To expand on limited existing literature utilizing quantitative methods, …


Government Respect For Human Rights And Their Relation To Shadow Economic Activity, Christopher Gahagan Jan 2019

Government Respect For Human Rights And Their Relation To Shadow Economic Activity, Christopher Gahagan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Shadow economic activity can have detrimental effects on many aspects of a society including trust in government policies, quality of public institutions, government revenues, and economic growth. Empirical studies have generally employed a rational actor approach and focused on economic factors. Most studies in this literature claim that when individuals do not receive the right economic stimuli from the government, it damages the relationship between individuals and the state and citizens opt to move into the shadow economy. A small but growing body of research, however, suggests that certain political factors can also lead to shadow economic activity because of …


How Political Violence Helps Explain Organized Crime: A Case Study Of Mexico's "War On Drugs", Alanna Fulk Jan 2019

How Political Violence Helps Explain Organized Crime: A Case Study Of Mexico's "War On Drugs", Alanna Fulk

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines research from the disciplines of political science and criminal justice to develop a theory that explains geographic variation in violence related to organized crime. Large-scale organized crime violence exhibits characteristics of both ordinary crime violence and political violence, but these subjects are generally analyzed separately. However, as large-scale organized crime has become more prevalent and violent in recent years, most notably in Latin America, studies, including this one, have attempted to cross disciplinary boundaries in order to better explain trends in organized crime onset, termination and violence. This thesis argues that although the overall goal of organized …


Appropriate Adjective: Executive Authority And The Classification Of Enemy Combatants, Taraleigh Davis Jan 2019

Appropriate Adjective: Executive Authority And The Classification Of Enemy Combatants, Taraleigh Davis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Is the term enemy combatant an established legal category of persons under international law? Has the President exceeded his constitutional authority in classifying United States citizens who are suspected terrorists as enemy combatants? In 2018 a U.S. citizen was released after being held for 13 months as an enemy combatant. He was detained without being charged with a crime and without the ability to challenge the legality of his detention. This thesis serves two purposes. First, it will seek to trace the history of the term enemy combatant and highlight the evolution of its use by the executive branch. This …


The Unacceptable Rise: An Investigation Of School Shootings In The United States, Tracy Gulliford Jan 2019

The Unacceptable Rise: An Investigation Of School Shootings In The United States, Tracy Gulliford

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This research study examined teachers' understanding of risk factors and characteristics of potential perpetrators of school shootings, as well as the steps to take when they are identified in students. Participants completed a survey that contained Likert-type scale items regarding self efficacy and open-ended questions regarding school violence experiences. A mixed methods analysis revealed three primary conclusions. First, teachers have high levels of self-efficacy regarding the importance of and ability to deal effectively with troubled students. This conclusion suggests that teachers do internalize the relevance of this issue to them. Second, this study revealed a gap in terms of the …


Overkill: A First Run Definition, Traccy Martins Jan 2019

Overkill: A First Run Definition, Traccy Martins

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Homicide is a major social issue that has been studied by many researchers worldwide. The vast literature available, however, has avoided distinguishing homicide characterized by excessive wounds as a particular category or type of murder. This is what is often referred to as overkill. It has been observed in a variety of incidents, but it has not been systematically defined or examined in the literature in regard to why it occurs. This study aims to define "overkill" based on the number and extent of injuries for LGBT homicides between the years 1969 to 2018 (provided by Dallas Drake, co-founder of …


Subjective Measures Of Implicit Categorization Learning, Audrey Zlatkin Jan 2019

Subjective Measures Of Implicit Categorization Learning, Audrey Zlatkin

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The neuropsychological theory known as COVIS (COmpetition between Verbal and Implicit Systems) postulates that distinct brain systems compete during category learning. The explicit system involves conscious hypothesis testing about verbalizable rules, while the implicit system relies on procedural learning of rules that are difficult to verbalize. Specifically from a behavioral approach, COVIS has been supported through demonstrating empirical dissociations between explicit and implicit learning tasks. The current studies were designed to gain deeper understanding of implicit category learning through the implementation of a subjective measure of awareness, Meta d', which until now has not been validated within a COVIS framework. …


Augmenting Land Cover/Land Use Classification By Incorporating Information From Land Surface Phenology: An Application To Quantify Recent Cropland Expansion In South Dakota, Lan Hoang Nguyen Jan 2019

Augmenting Land Cover/Land Use Classification By Incorporating Information From Land Surface Phenology: An Application To Quantify Recent Cropland Expansion In South Dakota, Lan Hoang Nguyen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Understanding rapid land change in the U.S. NGP region is not only critical for management and conservation of prairie habitats and ecosystem services, but also for projecting production of crops and biofuels and the impacts of land conversion on water quality and rural transportation infrastructure. Hence, it raises the need for an LCLU dataset with good spatiotemporal coverage as well as consistent accuracy through time to enable change analysis. This dissertation aims (1) to develop a novel classification method, which utilizes time series images from comparable sensors, from the perspective of land surface phenology, and (2) to apply the land …


"Femme Fatales Of Faith": Queer And "Deviant" Performances Of Femme Within Western Protestant Culture, Kelsey Waninger Minnick Jan 2019

"Femme Fatales Of Faith": Queer And "Deviant" Performances Of Femme Within Western Protestant Culture, Kelsey Waninger Minnick

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Women and queer folk are changing the religious landscape of Christianity in America, and the scope of visibility for these figures and their apostolic endeavors is widening as more and more Christians are seeking out communities rooted in doctrines of love and connection rather than exclusion and hegemonic piety. Thinking on this phenomenon, this dissertation focuses on the intersectional dilemmas of faith practice and rhetorical discourse with Western Christianity, particularly as it revolves around those female pastors and clergy - considered "dangerous" by many within the church - who are advocating for a more inclusionary church space. By conducting a …


The Impacts Of Land Use And Land Cover Change On Water Quality In The Big Sioux River: 2007-2016, Dinesh Shrestha Jan 2019

The Impacts Of Land Use And Land Cover Change On Water Quality In The Big Sioux River: 2007-2016, Dinesh Shrestha

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Between 2006 and 2012, conversion of 485,000 acres of grassland to cropland in eastern South Dakota was reported. In 2012, the Big Sioux River (BSR) running through most of eastern South Dakota was listed among the dirtiest rivers in the nation. This rating convinced state authorities to study trends of land cover changes in the BSR watershed and its association with BSR water quality with respect to increases in nitrate levels. This research i) quantifies spatial and temporal changes in the land cover types within the BSR watershed, and ii) identifies any correlation between these changes and changes in BSR …


The Impact Of Location Characteristics On Population Distribution In The United States, Shuruq Alsharif Jan 2019

The Impact Of Location Characteristics On Population Distribution In The United States, Shuruq Alsharif

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The United States is one of the most mobile countries in the world. This paper examined a couple of questions not previously addressed in the literature, namely the research questions of how the distributional patterns and associated factors, especially locational characteristics could be different between two types of internal migrants: native-born and foreign-born. The central hypothesis that guided the analysis was that income is often the primary push factor and key contributor to population growth in a county for both types of internal migrants, as they would be more likely to live in a county with a good economic conditions …


An Initial Exploration Of The 2005 Iowa Rural Interstate Speed Limit Increase Using Linear Regression, Thomas Ryan Cook Jan 2019

An Initial Exploration Of The 2005 Iowa Rural Interstate Speed Limit Increase Using Linear Regression, Thomas Ryan Cook

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Speed limit increases, particularly on interstates have been studied and researched many times over the course of the last 50 years in the United States. These research efforts began after the implementation of the National Maximum Speed Law (NMSL), which reduced all speed limits to a maximum of 55-mph. In the years that followed, this restriction was relaxed to 65-mph with the Surface Transportation and Uniform Relocation Assistance Act (STURAA) and ultimately repealed later by the National Highway System Designation Act (NHSDA). Since the repeal, states reacted in myriad of ways and many studies documented the changes of those reactions. …


Methods For Earth-Observing Satellite Surface Reflectance Validation, Moe Talal Badawi Jan 2019

Methods For Earth-Observing Satellite Surface Reflectance Validation, Moe Talal Badawi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In this study an initial validation of the Landsat 8 (L8) Operational Land Imager (OLI) Surface Reflectance (SR) product was performed. The OLI SR product is derived from the L8 Top-of-Atmosphere product via the Landsat Surface Reflectance Code (LaSRC) software and generated by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center. The goal of this study is to develop and evaluate proper validation methodology for the OLI L2 SR product. Validation was performed using near-simultaneous ground truth SR measurements during Landsat 8 overpasses at 13 sites located in the U.S., Brazil, Chile and France. The ground …


Consumer Perceptions And Demand For Locally-Grown Vegetables In South Dakota, Richard Mulder Jan 2019

Consumer Perceptions And Demand For Locally-Grown Vegetables In South Dakota, Richard Mulder

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

An increasingly popular topic in the food labeling field over the last 15 years has been the increasing body of research for food that is locally produced. Consumers’ definition of, attitudes toward, and willingness-to-pay (WTP) for local food have been areas of interest for researchers. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that contributes to the current body of local foods’ research for vegetables by providing information on these areas of interest for the state of South Dakota. This study acquires data through a consumer-intercept survey conducted in grocery stores throughout South Dakota with a sample …


Food Assistance Programs In The Us And Their Impact On Childhood Obesity, Jannatul Kawsar Jan 2019

Food Assistance Programs In The Us And Their Impact On Childhood Obesity, Jannatul Kawsar

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Numerous food assistance programs (FAP) aim to ensure food security among low income American households. However, the literature suggests that participation in food assistance programs may be associated with the US childhood obesity epidemic. The goal of this study is to analyze the association between the number of major food assistance programs children participate in and childhood obesity. The major food assistance programs considered are the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), the National School Lunch Program (NSLP), and the School Breakfast Programs (SBP). This is the first study to …