Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

African Seminole Settlement Ecologies Of Early Nineteenth Century Florida, Jordan E. Davis

Theses and Dissertations

For over three centuries prior to the outbreak of the Second Seminole War [1835-1842], peoples of African and Native American descent independently and collectively formed multiple communities throughout what is now Florida. During the early 1990s, several ancestral African Seminole (otherwise known as “Black Seminole”) settlements were identified across Central Peninsular Florida, many of which were founded by self-emancipated Africans commonly referred to as maroons. Previous archaeological research at the African Seminole settlement of Pilaklikaha, or Abraham’s Old Town, has greatly stimulated both scholarly and public interest in tracing the historical trajectories of individual African-Native American communities while remaining attentive …

Racism-Related State Policies And The Psychological And Physiological Wellbeing Of Black And White Adults, Calley Elizabeth Fisk

Theses and Dissertations

Recent research on how state-policy affects population health outcomes suggests that state contexts are important sites for producing health disparities. In the United States different domains of state policy are historically linked to the livelihood of Black Americans and enacted within a racist system designed to maintain white supremacy. Despite this history and evidence of racial inequities in health outcomes linked to institutional discrimination for Black and white adults, scholars have yet to examine whether racism-related state policies affect the wellbeing of Black and white Americans. Combining a dataset of racism-related state policies with a nationally representative data of older …

Juveniles, Transferred Juveniles, And The Impact Of A Criminal Record On Employment Prospects In Adulthood: An Experimental Study, Joanna Daou

Theses and Dissertations

Previous research shows that a criminal record reduces an individual’s employability. The impact of a juvenile record on employability as a young adult, however, has rarely been examined, and no previous studies have estimated the effect of a criminal record when a juvenile was waived to the adult court. The current study seeks to fill these gaps in the literature using an experimental correspondence approach. The results of this research indicate that the effects of a delinquency record on employability for juveniles and young adults are comparable to the effects of a criminal record for adults.

Facilitating Role Understanding And Collaboration Between Aspiring School Counselors And Principals: A Pilot Convergent Mixed Methods Design, Shelby Kaitlin Gonzales

Theses and Dissertations

Using a piloted convergent mixed-methods design, I investigated role understanding and collaboration between school counselors and principals. Specifically, this intervention situated aspiring school counselors and principals in a curriculum implementation on the role of their counterpart and then brought the two professions together in a collaborative powerful learning experience (PLE). Neither the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Education Programs (CACREP), American School Counseling Association (ASCA) or National Policy Board for Education Administration (NPBEA) currently require graduate students to learn about the role of their opposite counterpart or collaboration between the two professions before they graduate from their respective …

“Power, Poison, Pain & Joy”: Applying A Critical Race Conceptual Model Of Implicit Racial Bias To Narratives Framing Blackness In Black Sports Columns, Black Music, And Black Journalism, Christina Lauren Myers

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation presents a Critical Race Conceptual Model of Implicit Racial Bias to representations of African Americans in mass media to illustrate how stereotypical depictions and racist ideologies arise in media content, including by Black content creators. By bridging the concepts of implicit bias, framing theory and concepts from critical race theory through the conceptual model, I contend that content creators implicitly share racially biased beliefs. Moreover, Black content creators in expressing the authentic experiences of the Black community also do the same. Thus, Black content creators further stereotypes, majoritarian narratives as well as deficit perspectives about the Black community …

S-Equol: A Novel Therapeutic For Hiv-1 Induced Gut Dysbiosis, Mason T. Rodriguez

Theses and Dissertations

HIV-1 infection affects approximately 38 million people around the world. The advent of cART has greatly improved the quality of life of infected individuals; however, roughly 50% of these individuals will still experience HIV-1 associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND). Additionally, the gut microbiome has been reported to be dysbiotic in HIV-1 infected individuals, regardless of adherence to cART. Current research has pointed to the gut-brain-microbiota axis as a potential target to treat both cognitive deficits and microbial changes. The present study investigated S-equol (SE) as a potential therapeutic for HAND by modulating the gut microbiome. The study included 21 HIV-1 Tg …

“That Was Denied Thee On Earth”: An Intersectional Bioarchaeology Of Institutionalized Euro-American Women Throughout 19Th And 20Th-Century America, Madeline Maria Atwell

Theses and Dissertations

In the mid 19th-century, American state-supported insane asylums, later renamed state mental hospitals in the 20th-century, were constructed to house and humanely treat individuals perceived to be socially deviant or mentally and physically ill. Women were particularly vulnerable to undue institutionalization because of the prevailing patriarchal gender ideology within medical and colloquial spheres that contributed to the perception that they were biologically pathological. This dissertation interprets the findings of combined archival, historical, and osteological analysis from two U.S. skeletal collections: The Colorado State Insane Asylum (CSIA) Collection and the Hamann-Todd Human Osteological Collection (HT), to examine the embodied, physiological impact …

Specific Learning Disability: Rates Across A Southeastern State, Joseph T. Ferraracci

Theses and Dissertations

Reading, writing, and mathematics are crucial academic and life skills. Specific Learning Disability (SLD) in these areas is the most common disability in children and account for almost 40% of all students in special education. Special education law permits for the identification of these students in multiple ways; IQ/Achievement Discrepancy, Response to Intervention, or the use of other, alternative research-based procedures (e.g. Pattern of Strengths and Weaknesses Model. There is variability within and across these methods, causing incongruity and inconsistency in rates. Other variables associated with SLD such as socioeconomic status, age, sex, and race also play important roles when …

Trajectories And Psychiatric Consequences Of Inhibitory Control In Young Males With Fragile X Syndrome, Erin Hunt

Theses and Dissertations

Inhibitory control (IC), the ability to suppress inappropriate responses, emerges late in the first year of life and improves across typical development, concurrent with brain maturation. The development of IC is critical to various social-emotional and behavioral functions, with IC deficits being linked to numerous psychiatric conditions, including attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is a single-gene disorder characterized by IC deficits, and elevated rates of ADHD and ASD, making it a useful model for understanding the early development and consequences of IC. In this longitudinal study, we characterized IC trajectories across multiple time …

An Analysis Of Wet Bulb Globe Temperature Estimation Methods And Microclimate Heat Variability In Columbia, South Carolina, Stafford Mullin

Theses and Dissertations

Extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States and poses major health risks in the wake of rising global average temperatures. Wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT) is a holistic measure of human heat stress, but is not feasible to implement in most settings because the equipment is expensive and troublesome to operate. This research evaluates the performance of WBGT estimation methods using more standard meteorological variables, measured in-situ and a local National Weather Service Automated Surface Observing Station, and examines how WBGT and its components vary across two distinct microclimates in Columbia, SC. Results indicate …

“Whoz Ya People?”: Defining Lumbee Citizenship And Belonging In The 21St Century, Timothy Blake Hite

Theses and Dissertations

The Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina is a state-recognized tribe with an estimated 60,000 citizens. From 2018-2020, the tribe closed their enrollment office so that the tribe could reexamine enrollment policies, particularly the criterion for appropriate contact with the tribal homeland. During this closure, the tribe was continuing its long journey for federal recognition, with a bill passing the U.S. House of Representatives and receiving support from then President Donald Trump and current President Joseph Biden. During the summer of 2021, I conducted ethnographic fieldwork with the tribe’s enrollment department, located in Pembroke, NC, to answer the question of how …

Using Item-Response Analysis To Evaluate The Task-Demands Of A Pictural-Response Based Test Of Word Reading, Michael Eason

Theses and Dissertations

While some children’s reading difficulties are a consequence of socio-economic factors and inadequate instruction, other children have extreme difficulties learning to read despite having adequate educational opportunity and adequate levels of intelligence. These children are classified under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) as having a learning disability specific to reading (SLD-R). The identification of children with SLD-R is costly on time, personnel, and other school resources, and due to an insufficient number of resources generally available to schools, the methods implemented for identifying children are alarmingly inconsistent. The aim of the current study is to investigate the task …

Life In The Time Of Covid-19: The Everyday Impacts Of The Pandemic In Amman, Jordan, Patrick Mckenzie

Theses and Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic and the responses taken to combat it caused enormous changes to the everyday lives of people around the world. Jordan, in its early success against the virus and with its large refugee population, represents a unique country in which to study these everyday impacts. From May to August of 2021, I conducted ethnographic fieldwork in the Jordanian capital city of Amman while working with the refugee nongovernmental organization the Collateral Repair Project. In this thesis, I explore the COVID-19 Spectacle, examining the ways in which policies and discourses at the national and international scales bled into the …

Testing Models Of Context-Dependent Outcome Encoding In Reinforcement Learning, William M. Hayes Iv

Theses and Dissertations

Previous studies of reinforcement learning (RL) have established that choice outcomes are encoded in a context-dependent fashion. Several computational models have been proposed to explain context-dependent encoding, including reference point centering and range adaptation models. The former assumes that outcomes are centered around a running estimate of the average reward in each choice context, while the latter assumes that outcomes are compared to the minimum reward and then scaled by an estimate of the range of outcomes in each choice context. However, there are other computational mechanisms that can explain context dependence in RL. In the present study, a frequency …

Three Essays In Behavioral Economics, Foteini Tzachrista

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation includes three essays on behavioral economics with applications in health, strategic thinking, and labor.In the first essay titled ``The Effect of Nudging on the Utilization of Counseling Services and the Implications on College Student Involvement'', I examine the effect of nudging on the utilization of mental health services and the impact on college student involvement. To improve the utilization of mental health services for college students I designed and implemented an intervention promoting a pro-counseling social norm on campus. More specifically I sent campus-wide emails to inform students of the mental health services offered on campus. Randomly selected …

Suas And Deep Learning For High-Resolution Monitoring Of Tidal Marshes In Coastal South Carolina, Grayson R. Morgan

Theses and Dissertations

Tidal marshes are dynamic environments, now more than ever threatened by both natural and anthropogenic forces. Best practices for monitoring tidal marshes, as well as the environmental factors that affect them, have been studied for more than 40 years. With recent technological advances in remote sensing, new capabilities for monitoring tidal marshes have emerged. One of these new opportunities and challenges is hyper-spatial resolution imagery (<10 >cm) that can be captured by small unmanned aerial systems (sUAS). Aside from enhanced visualization, structure-from-motion (SfM) technology can derive dense point clouds from overlapped sUAS images for high resolution digital elevation models (DEMs). …

The Role Of Force Dynamic Schemas In The Comprehension Of Causal Language, Dawson Petersen

Theses and Dissertations

The current study is an attempt to empirically test the predictions of Talmy’s (1988) force dynamics. Specifically, Talmy argues that causal sentences are understood by reference to basic image schemas, such as Starting and Stopping. While many of the predictions of other cognitive linguistic models, such as Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) conceptual metaphor theory, have been tested empirically by psycholinguists (Fischer & Zwaan, 2008; Gibbs, 2006; Boroditsky & Ramscar, 2002), force dynamics has received very little empirical attention (I am only aware of Wolff & Song, 2003), in spite of its productivity in formal linguistics.

The current study aims to …

Impact Of Number Of Alternatives And Spatial Arrangement On Decoy Effects, Jacob M. Stanley

Theses and Dissertations

The way in which people make decisions is largely guided by the context of the choice set. Choice sets that contain decoy alternatives can result in context effects that violate rational principles of decision making. Most studies on contextual choice manipulate preference among two alternatives in the context of a decoy using three option choice sets. However, many real-world decisions are made among choice sets with many more than three alternatives, such as in online shopping. We tested for attraction and compromise decoy effects in choice sets with varying numbers of alternatives by using a within-subjects preferential grocery shopping task. …

The Variation Of Metaphor Processing Strategies And The Effects On Reading Skills In L2 English Learners, Shana Scucchi

Theses and Dissertations

Metaphor use and meaning is deeply tied to the culturally-determined conventional use of language. To date, most research regarding metaphor comprehension exists within the realm of first language (L1) acquisition, with little research that examines how learners interpret metaphor in their second language (L2). Thus, little is known about how learners process metaphor constructions in their L2, or how these processing strategies may affect other L2 skills, such as reading abilities.

Gentner (1988) investigated how metaphors are comprehended at various ages using the nominal metaphor X is Y, where Y is the base of the metaphor and X is the …

Gatekeeping Blackness: Roles, Relationships, And Pressures Of Black Television Journalists At A Time Of Racial Reckoning, Denetra Walker

Theses and Dissertations

Building on Du Bois’ (1903) concept of double-consciousness, Critical Race Theory, and communications theories including Gatekeeping, this dissertation aims to provide understanding of the experiences of Black broadcast journalists at a racially contentious time in American history. In 2020-2021, following the deaths of Black Americans at the hands of police and subsequent Black Lives Matter protests, and during a global pandemic, a “racial reckoning” ensued throughout the nation. The reckoning, which continued through the writing of this dissertation, was a salient issue for news media. Through my positionality as a Black female forever journalist, I interviewed 29 Black journalists who …

Lexical And Syntactic Priming In Dialogue, Sarah Campbell Wilson

Theses and Dissertations

Speakers engaged in dialogue align with one another across multiple linguistic levels to ensure effective communication. The Interactive Alignment Model (Pickering & Garrod, 2004) suggests speakers align due to automatic priming mechanisms at individual linguistic levels. Syntactic priming is the tendency to repeat a syntactic structure that has been recently comprehended or produced. Although syntactic priming is regarded as an automatic, abstract structural phenomenon, other linguistic factors can influence a syntactic structure’s priming strength. Lexical repetition between structures has been shown to enhance syntactic priming, an effect termed “lexical boost” (Branigan et al., 2000; Healey, Purvery, & Howes., 2014). Another …

“Describing Without Identifying”: The Phenomenological Role Of Gender In Cataloging Practices, Travis L. Wagner

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores gendering practices of visual information catalogers. The work aims to understand how catalogers perceive gender when describing persons within visual information. The qualitative study deployed queer interpretative phenomenological analysis to understand how catalogers think broadly about describing identity. The infused queer theoretical tenets helped to understand that while participants may not directly name gender as challenging, the conflation of gender into cisnormative monoliths (assuming every person's gender matches their sex-assigned-at birth) or silence around gender produce telling opinions concerning nonbinary gender. The research also utilized a Think Aloud exercise wherein participants undertook in-the-moment cataloging three moving images. …

Associations Between Child Characteristics And Maternal Mental Health In Families Of Children With Autism, Fragile X Syndrome, And Autism Associated With Fragile X Syndrome, Tiffany Nicole Worley

Theses and Dissertations

The present study examined the association between various child characteristics and maternal mental health concerns in three high-risk groups of mothers ± those of children with non-syndromic autism spectrum disorder (NSASD), mothers of children with fragile X syndrome (FXS), and mothers of children with fragile X syndrome and autism (FXS+ASD). Research has shown that mothers of children with NSASD and FXS are thought to share a degree of genetic vulnerability to mental health concerns it is key to examine the various other factors that may contribute to difficulties within the family system and maternal stress, depression, and anxiety.

Participants for …

International Financial Assistance And Inequality In Emerging Markets: Colombia, Egypt And Turkey, Sara Farag

Theses and Dissertations

This research study investigates the effects of the three main pillars of structural adjustment policies imbedded in IFI funding facilities on income inequality in three specific cases; Colombia, Egypt and Turkey to uncover if income inequality present in those emerging markets is attributed to; the policy reforms conditionality or to pre-existent country features. The three main pillars of policy conditions discussed in this thesis are 1. Government Expenditure Reforms, 2. External Sector Reforms, and 3. Financial Sector Reforms. My hypothesis is that, although pre-existent country features may have had an impact on the levels of inequality a populace faces, the …

Nutritional Messaging: To Eat Or Not To Eat?, Christina Triptow

Theses and Dissertations

There is a great deal of diet-specific processed foods on the market today. With so many options it can become difficult for consumers to decide what products to purchase. This situation is further intensified by the plethora of contradictory messages found in food advertising, especially in weight loss and dieting food advertising, but also seen in government nutrition campaigns and all over the internet on platforms like social media, blogs, and so forth. These messages can be confusing and frustrating for consumers as they try to decipher which foods they should eat to reach their health or weight loss goals. …

Virtual Advertising In The Nba: How Arousal Level And Visual Attention Alter Brand Recall And Recognition, Caleb H. Porter

Theses and Dissertations

During the 2020 season, the NBA implemented, for the first time, the use of virtual advertisements. Virtual advertisements are digitally superimposed ads directly on the court that are visible to anyone viewing the broadcasted version of a game. This study used eye-tracking and galvanic skin response (GSR) in conjunction with the limited capacity model of motivated mediated message processing (LC4MP; Lang, 2006a) to a) determine virtual advertising's effectiveness compared to traditional in-stadium advertising and to b) monitor the effect emotional arousal has on advertising recall and recognition. A sample of 176 fans of the Utah Jazz viewed one of four …

Be With Me: Well-Being And Singling Contact; The Moderating Role Of Autistic Traits, Michelle Lupien Lieber

Theses and Dissertations

Sibling contact (synchronous or asynchronous) in young adulthood may have implications for individual well-being (health, life satisfaction & depressive symptoms). This link may be moderated by each individuals' traits, specifically autistic characteristics. Current literature has examined sibling contact, mediums of contact, autism relationships, but has yet to consider sibling contact moderated by autistic traits. This study analyzed data from 390 young adults 61% female, mean age = 25.65) who gave self-reports over two collection waves. Structural Equation Models found that regardless of autistic traits, synchronous contact was linked with increased life satisfaction as well as lower depressive symptoms, and asynchronous …

Behavioral And Physiological Effects Of Heavy Metals On Fish: A Review And Preliminary Results, Diana V. Morales

Theses and Dissertations

Pollution, specifically heavy metal pollution, in various bodies of water has been a significant issue for decades. Research has been conducted on heavy metals and their effects on the environment, larger fish species, and humans since the 1970s (Skidmore, 1964; Adeniyi et al., 2007; Adeosun et al., 2015; Bawuro et al., 2018). It is known that zinc is a neurotoxin in some species and causes harm to the environment. It is also known that it causes harm to people if it is ingested or if they are exposed to it for long periods of time (Mahurpawar, 2015; Mizuno and Kawahara, …

The Shirt Of Nessus: International Debt As A Tool Of Hegemonic Control, Omar Hamed Ghannam

Theses and Dissertations

International debt has been a fixture of the global economy and state financing for centuries. The economic logic of accruing international debt and its management is rarely questioned in the literature, even as sovereign debt crises abound. These crises offer a point of examination, re-assessment, and negotiations concerning allocating the burdens. This paper aims to study these debt crises to interrogate the issue of international debt, the depoliticized economic mantras that govern it, their validity, sincerity, and the political and social implications on the indebted polity. This is done by looking at the origins of debt crises, and examining how …

Analysis Of The Perspective On Syrian Refugees By Neighboring Countries, Norma Ghanem

Theses and Dissertations

Mass migration destabilizes neighboring states, opening the way for fragile state exploitation by enemies, including those that could undermine U.S. national interests. This study investigates an area of the Levant region, specifically countries neighboring Syria, and analyzes their perspective on Syrian refugees for the time frame of 1 June 2019 - 30 June 2020. This analysis may assist in forming policy and creating strategies to address refugee related issues, both domestic and international. There are three main questions addressed. The first inspects dominant refugee framing, the second explores sentiment (dis)similarity within each country and across countries, and the third investigates …