Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Did School Accountability Improve School Performance In Mid-Size Louisiana School Districts?, Mahalie Lefranc

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Unintended Consequences For Tanf: An Incubator For Domestic Violence?, Eileen Deleo

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Crisis Communication, Socio-Economic Inequalities, And Governmental Risk Management: Analysis Of The 2016 Baton Rouge Floods, Joan Crockett Lyons

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

An Investigation Of Treatment Acceptability, Self-Efficacy, And Feasibility Of Interventions Delivered Through Different Modes Of Communication, Ashley Phillips

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Self Management: Overcoming Barriers To Success, Jazmyn Souryamat

Honors Theses

Individuals with an autism spectrum diagnosis often have a social-skills deficit that may include the tendency to avoid eye contact. In addition, they may have sensory issues and become easily overwhelmed by excessive sensory stimuli. Self-management is a treatment that has been found to enhance the quality of life for individuals with or without an autism spectrum diagnosis. It has been helpful in treating procrastination, used to increase physical activity, lower caloric intake, and increase independence. In this study, self-management treatments were used to increase instances of appropriate social responding and to decrease behaviors that posed a barrier to personal, …

Sentiment Analysis Of Tweets Including Emoji Data, Travis Lecompte

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

A Microgenetic Study Of Postpartum Depression And Infant Development, Anna S. Docurral

Honors Theses

Approximately 15% of mothers and 3-5% of fathers experience postpartum depression (DelRosario, 2013). Current literature suggests a negative association between maternal depression and infant development, but little is known about paternal contributions. Field (2010) found that mothers with depressive symptoms at 4 and 8 weeks postpartum reported frequent infant nighttime awakenings and less sleep during the night. Depressed mothers also reported more eating difficulties and lower infant weight gain than nondepressed mothers did (Gress-Smith, 2012). Moreover, infants of depressed mothers expected maternal unavailability and made less effort to engage the mother during the still face experiment (Field, 2002). In this …

Us Net Foreign Direct Investment: Determinants And Implications, Ryan Gomez

Honors Theses

Political campaigns always churn the political spectrum on the issue of outsourcing and international trade with the 2017 presidential primary being no exception. Are politicians, like Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump, correct when preaching the economic negatives associated with outsourcing? Are they considering the right factors? Could it be that a strictly negative outlook on outsourcing is economically inappropriate in determining future policy? In an attempt to answer these questions, this paper will critically analyze the impact of incoming and outgoing Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the USA. Specifically, this study will use determinants of Net FDI (NFDI), where NFDI …

A Return To The Authentic: The Changing Book Industry & Millennial Detachment, Kathryn Bauer

Honors Theses

Similar to many other industries in the twenty-first century, the book industry is beginning to turn in the technological direction. The emergence of eBooks, among other factors, has started to change the face of the industry as we know it. However, these changes may be a result of something bigger: the lifestyle choices of the trailblazing millennial generation. Millennial lifestyles differ significantly from those of past generations, especially in terms of social and emotional detachment. How do these seemingly different, yet defining, aspects of today’s world relate? And is it possible to use ideas from thinkers of the past such …

A Child's World: How Electronics Influence Children's Language, Physical, And Social-Emotional Development, Santina Marinelli

Honors Theses

The present study examines how parents view the role that electronics play in their children’s language, physical, and social-emotional development. Children are growing up in a world where technology is incorporated into many aspects of daily life. It has become an element in how children are parented/raised and it is believed to have an impact on children's development. An instrument was developed to survey parents about their perceptions of the role of technology in their children’s lives. The survey was distributed to 120 participants. The participants comprised a convenience sample of parents from a New England childcare center with children …

Does Mindful Meditation Enhance Eyewitness Memory And Prevent The Misinformation Effect?, Lauren Price

Honors Theses

Engaging in a brief mindful meditation task prior to witnessing an event may enhance event encoding and reduce susceptibility to post-event misinformation. Participants in this study completed either a 3-minute mindful meditation exercise or an unrelated filler task (Sudoku). Half of the participants in each group were first told their task was beneficial to memory, while the other half were told nothing. After completing the task, all participants viewed a video of a fictitious crime. After viewing the video, they listened to a narrative that introduced misleading information about the video. Finally, they took a memory test on the video. …

The Role Of Couples' Birth Experiences In Coparenting Dynamics During The Transition To Parenthood, Deanna Marie Cecilia Tortora

Honors Theses

Past research uncovered different antecedents, which influence the coparenting relationship including environmental supports and stressors, individual parent and child characteristics, and the couple relationship, though no prior study to date has investigated the impact of birth narratives on coparenting. The main purpose in the present study was to explore links between partners’ conjointly constructed birth narratives and coparenting dynamics preceding and following the birth of couples’ first child. Fifty-five couples’ coparenting interactions were observed during their last trimester of pregnancy (Prenatal Lausanne Trilogue Play) and at 3- (Postnatal Lausanne Trilogue play) and 12- months postpartum (Triadic play and mealtime interactions). …

Finding Christ In Cinema: Examining Secular Film Theologically, Evan Wheatley

Honors Theses

For me as a teenager, secular films were merely a form of entertainment. A trip to the movies meant the chance to escape to a “galaxy far, far away,” to stand alongside Harry Potter in his latest confrontation with Lord Voldemort. I did not realize at the time the parallels between the Force in Star Wars, and the Christian God, or how Harry and Voldemort’s cinematic struggle can be seen as an allegory for the fight between good and evil.

At the 2016 Sundance Film Festival, I was introduced to how God can use secular film to challenge our …

Hyperconnectivity, Transhumanism, And Chesterton’S “Want Of Wonder”, Joanna Horton

Honors Theses

Connecting a general want of wonder with the reality that there is neither the time nor the need to wonder about anything, when the answer to any query is constantly in our back pocket, waiting to be looked up on our smart phones. There is no space between the initial itch of a question and the satisfaction of learning its answer--that space between question and answer being a crucial element in wondering. Since the tools we use do shape us, it is important that we notice how we are being shaped.

Here’s what I think is at stake—in having such …

Averting A New Nuclear Arms Race, Michael Anthony Calhoun

Honors Theses

The first goal of this thesis is to defend the claim that working towards nuclear disarmament is a rational, ethically pressing, and urgent goal. I will parse, condense, and array the arguments of statesmen, military leaders, philosophers, peace advocates, scientists, and religious leaders against the continued production, modernization, and maintaining of nuclear arsenals. After this, I will examine the current challenges to nuclear disarmament and promising and pragmatic options on the way to a world without nuclear weapons, with a focus on United States’ policy.

Sustaining O-Gah-Pah: An Analysis Of Quapaw Language Loss And Preservation, Robert Desoto

Honors Theses

The story of the Quapaw, or Downstream People, and their language is an integral part of both the American Indian experience and the larger, universal tapestry of multilingualism. Despite historical setbacks and contemporary challenges, preserving the virtually extinct Quapaw language adds to the diverse cultural narrative of the Americas and shares a nation’s unique story with the rest of humanity. Consulting linguists, historical records, tribal members, and experts on indigenous studies, this project aims to answer questions concerning the state of the Quapaw tongue: how it arrived at virtual extinction, what is being done to preserve it, and the challenges …

Failure Or Adjustment?: An Analysis Of The Slowing Growth Of The Chinese Economy, Kay G. Degraw

Honors Theses

With GDP growth for the 2016 fiscal year reported at 6.7%, it appears that the Chinese economy has departed from the three-decade period in which GDP growth averaged plus-10%. While both academic journals and media outlets have accredited this slowdown to a variety of factors, existing research has failed to conflate the economic and political factors into a comprehensive explanation. Consequently, this thesis examines the causative factors behind the slowing of the Chinese economy though the analysis of three contesting plausibility probes centered on the impact of corruption, statism, and structural economic change. The results of the plausibility probes indicates …

Trump, Twitter And The Death Of The American Political Party: A Discussion Of The Fate Of The American Party System Before, During, And After The Presidential Election Of 2016, Madeleine Neider

Honors Theses

Abstract: This paper seeks to address the essential question: what happened during the presidential election of 2016 and what does this mean for the American party system? Using qualitative and quantitative analysis, this research suggests that the 2016 election is evidence that domineering policy demanders, such as the Tea Party Movement and Occupy Wall Street, and domineering politicians, such as Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, used the democratized media to force a top-down realignment of the American party system. A top-down realignment is characterized by the demise of the prominent American political party­– an institution fundamental to our political process. …

Visions For Waterville's Future: Perceptions Of Its Residents, Alex Wolansky

Honors Theses

Mills and factories in the United States have steadily been closing down as industry is outsourced in the globalized economy. Cities that were once prosperous face decay and often have no hopeful future outlook. Post-industrial towns face major unemployment and poverty and are not typically places for re-investment. But Rust Belt cities like Baltimore, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Detroit, Milwaukee and St. Louis are not the only post- industrial hubs that are struggling. Many small towns in rural areas once thrived from manufacturing and are becoming forgotten. Local governments, policy makers, urban planners, developers and scholars are working to figure …

Constructing (Hu)Man Nature: A Feminist Critique Of Western Ir Theory, Liberal Economics And U.S. Foreign Policy, Nadia Stovicek

Honors Theses

Feminism in general exposes the fundamental folly of Western political theorists’ view of human nature, which is based on Western, decently well-off, white men’s experiences and privilege. This view of human nature, which is not human nature at all, but rather a socially constructed definition of what men’s human nature is, is replicated in neoclassical economics and perpetuated in mainstream Western International Relations theory. Understanding the social construction of norms exposes how what is conceived in conventional theory as human nature and state behavior is unnecessarily limiting. The U.S. is the greatest benefactor from the worldview of Western political theorists, …

Cicig In Guatemala: The Institutionalization Of An Anti-Corruption Body, Greg M. Morano

Honors Theses

When is the institutionalization of anti-corruption bodies possible in Latin America? Central America’s Cold War era internal conflicts destabilized the Northern Triangle’s governments and greatly weakened judicial institutions. The legacy of these conflicts led to the creation of parallel corrupt networks that infiltrated state institutions and perpetuated impunity and violence. However, in Guatemala, the institutionalization of the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (Comisión Internacional Contra la Impunidad en Guatemala, CICIG) has improved the country’s ability to prosecute high-level corruption against the threat of powerful and corrupt state actors. A comparative analysis of the tenures of CICIG’s three commissioners reveals …

The Anonymous Truth: Honesty And Hostility In Public And Private Online Settings, Grace S. Carroll

Honors Theses

Three studies were conducted to understand the relationship between honesty and hostility in public and private online settings. Study one analyzed a college’s public and private online forums and examined post frequency. Related to study one, study two examined the usage of these forums, and current and past social and political issues. Study one found the public forum comprised of general announcements, while the private forum hosted random jokes/statements, negative posts targeting specific people, and personal reflections. Study two’s results indicated the private forum was used more often than the public forum and race was the prevailing social and political …

Crops And Controversy: Industry’S Role In The Gmo Debate, Carina Wallack

Honors Theses

The use of genetically modified crops (also called GM crops, genetically modified organisms, or GMOs for short) has become a highly contested issue. New genetic modification technologies offer a variety of advantages for improving agricultural efficiency. However, some scientists argue that the safety testing conducted thus far does not provide enough information and worry about possible health and ecological risks. Private industry sponsors a great deal of research on genetically modified crops. As the international controversy regarding the use of GMOs has unfolded, the very companies responsible for commercializing genetically modified crops have gained substantial influence in the resulting scientific …

It’S Not You, It’S— Hookup Culture And Sexual Subjectivity, Anne Vetter

Honors Theses

A semi-fictionalized ethnography that interrogates how students at Colby College use hookup culture as a way to make sense of themselves and others. This thesis is about systems, about social power and norms, and the very real ways that they are experienced in and enacted by the bodies of individual students. In other words, this thesis is a naming of what many students on this campus already know without words, a linking of story to story to story, a marking of patterns that underlie the forms of sexual subjectivity driving participation in hookup culture. Ultimately, by making visible the systems …

America's National Parks And The Anthropocene: Addressing The Present To Accommodate The Future In Acadia National Park, Sophie A. Swetz

Honors Theses

In 2000, atmospheric chemist, Paul J. Crutzen, and limnologist, Eugene Stoermer, formally proposed the idea of “the Anthropocene,” a new geologic epoch in which humans are the dominant force shaping the Earth. To claim the Anthropocene's existence is to declare that human actions have altered the Earth in such a way that geologic indicators render it a distinct epoch in the stratification of geologic time. This new epoch emerges as a consequence of increased technological development employed to accommodate an anthropocentric human existence. That is, rapid advancements in technology have driven the transformation from a primarily naturally controlled planet to …

Women, War, And Social Memory In Peru: The Posthumous Careers Of Edith Lagos And María Elena Moyano, Meghan Kelly

Honors Theses

During the internal armed conflict between the Shining Path and the Peruvian state, women participated in important ways that are under-recognized in the scholarly literature. In this thesis, I examine the lives, deaths, and hero cults surrounding Edith Lagos and María Elena Moyano, two of the best-known women from this period. Edith Lagos, a young, white militant recruited by Sendero, was killed by the Peruvian police in 1982, while Moyano, an Afro-Peruvian activist from a low-income district of Lima, was assassinated by the Shining Path in 1992. I argue that the shifting narratives surrounding Lagos’s and Moyano’s lives and deaths …

Shifts In Thermal Habitats In The Gulf Of Maine Under Climate Change: A Case Study On American Lobster, Xinyi Zheng

Honors Theses

The rapid ocean warming observed in and predicted for the Gulf of Maine (GoM) raises uncertainties in the future distribution of American lobster (Homarus americanus). The location of lobsters is crucial to the long-term sustainability as well as management of Maine lobster fishery. This study provides a literature review of lobsters’ thermal preferences in the summer lobstering season and analyzes high-resolution sea surface temperature data in Geographic Information System in order to predict the changes in thermal habitats in the GoM under different climate change scenarios. The results show a projected decrease in cooler thermal habitats (11-15 °C) …

Dear Reader, How Do We Go On? Letters Of Reflection On Community Care In Climate Activism In Maine, Ester Topolarova

Honors Theses

Climate activist groups in Maine often see their members become too tired to continue organizing. Thus, I decided to explore how these activists enact community care. I conducted my fieldwork with 350 Maine and its local nodes. I explore community care as a practice and as an aspiration. Community care is practiced through the acts of people taking care of each other. Aspiration, therefore, is a way of living and seeing the self as striving to replicate the world activists are fighting for. I conceptualize care as racialized, gendered, classed, and embedded in neoliberal capitalism. In activist meetings, care is …

The Influence Of Social Context On Communication And Restricted And Repetitive Behaviors In Autism, Shannon Campbell

Honors Theses

Two of the most salient features of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are impairments in communication and engagement in restricted and repetitive behaviors (RRBs). The goal of this study was to identify the effects of social context on both the occurrence of RRBs and social language performance in children with ASD. In this study, we defined the social context of a situation based on the primary focus (object or conversation) and the initiator of the interaction (child or experimenter). We performed a frequency count of RRBs as well as a mean length of utterance (MLU) analysis for play tasks with variations …

Health Care Delivery For The U.S. Hispanic Minority Can Be Improved, Samantha Pascoe

Honors Theses

America was born as a melting pot of peoples. From the very beginning this culture has been mixed with others. Diversity is a huge part of the American experience, and over the past 30 years, the Hispanic and Latino population has been increasing. With this population increase, the experience in the medical field that latino and Hispanic patients receive needs to be improved due to the cultural differences concerning individualism, values, and medical care: especially when concerning Latino patients. As a whole, the Hispanic community in the United States have a lower mortality rate then that of non-Hispanics living in …