Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Understanding Associations Between Social Vulnerability And Impacts Of Declared Disasters In U.S. Coastal Counties, Magaly Ramirez

Theses and Dissertations

United States coastal counties are geographically exposed to coastal hazards and their associated risks which are amplified by social vulnerability. This study examined associations between social vulnerability factors and impacts of disasters decorated with the presidential disaster declaration. Study area includes 306 US coastal shoreline counties. Data were obtained from the 2017 American Community Survey and Spatial Hazard Events and Losses Database. Multi-regression method was implemented. Disaster impact was measured by property damages, crop damages and number of disasters declared during 2008–2017. Findings indicated that females, civilians with a disability, mobile homes, and single parent households show statistically significant positive …

Do Individuals Have Stressful Experience Of A Future Possible Disaster In The Rio Grande Valley?, Nancy Carlson

Theses and Dissertations

The risk of exposure to natural and man-made disasters in the United States has been an increasing concern among key stakeholders. During a disaster event, individuals living in the impacted area experience destruction through personal experience. Whereas, individuals living in other parts of the country experience the disaster second-hand through media outlets such as print, news broadcast, social media, and the Internet.

This study focuses on individuals living in the Rio Grande Valley, a location that is geographically vulnerable to natural disasters including hurricanes, flooding, flash flooding, and storm surge. The study investigates whether individuals indirectly experience stress of two …

Climate Resiliency: Application Of Gis Methods To Assess Flood Risk, Vulnerability, Potential Impacts, And Resiliency In Hidalgo County, Texas, Joe F. Chavez

Theses and Dissertations

A contemporary concern towards the increased force of storms and massive rainfall occurrences caused by climate change are issues that can cause socio-economic disturbances, destruction of property, and loss of life. The implementation of techniques towards enhancing preparedness, planning, and mitigation, such as assessing risk and vulnerabilities through a Geographic Information System (GIS), can promote climate resiliency. This study measures the risk and vulnerabilities of assets within Hidalgo County through GIS spatial analysis. STATA and GIS results were used to summarize the number of vulnerable assets and assets at risk as well as assets exposed to flooding at the County …

Gender Dynamics In Charreria Mexicana, Karen Melissa Flores Tavizon

Theses and Dissertations

This research and analysis about the experiences of women in charrería show the pervasive negotiation of needs that they engage as practicing in an Escaramuza Charra. Inside this study, it is introduced the term Sisterhood Paradox, used to describe the struggle that represents the Escaramuza’s constant collective performance, in comparison to charros, but that paradoxically serves a tool of resistance of charra women inside this patriarchal institution. In this piece of work, it is also argued that women in charrería, in many cases, are not aware of the subordinate position they occupy and in an unconscious way function as agents …

A Systematic Review Of Mood Disorders And The Working Alliance In Latino Populations, Ricardo Contreras

Theses and Dissertations

The working alliance and mood disorders in Latin populations has received scant attention. To remedy this deficit, this analysis completed a systematic review of this subject. This initial systematic review may aid to acquire a greater understanding of general and specific factors impacting this population. The Mixed Methods Appraisal Tool (MMAT), Version 2018 will be utilized in study appraisal, as will PRISMA guidelines. Study inclusion consists of studies involving adult Latino subjects with working alliance results as related to symptomology or discussion of working alliance effects on the population. A total of 12 studies met criteria; limitations consisted of the …

Media Impact On Public Opinion: Lgbtq Issues, Gabriel M. Galvan

Theses and Dissertations

This study’s research question asks what impact “new media” has on public opinion regarding LGBTQ issues. This study uses a survey conducted at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley on the student body on campus. Using an ordered logistic regression analysis to test for a variety of independent variables, this paper finds that the type of media has a minor impact in public opinion on LGBTQ issues. Other control variables include religiosity, race and ethnicity, perceived economic class, and political ideology. This research is grounded on the theory that media can have an impact on the political positions of …

Introducing A Silverback To An Established Group Of Adult Female Western Gorillas (Gorilla Gorilla Gorilla), Claudia Martinez

Theses and Dissertations

In May of 2015, an attempt to introduce a new silverback (adult male) to an established group of six western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) housed at Gladys Porter Zoo failed. The introduction process was halted and only protected contact among the gorillas was allowed. On May 1, 2018 another introduction was initiated to three adult females.Twelve months of behavioral data were compared across three time periods and two environments. We predicted that an increase in agonistic and affiliative behaviors would occur while anxious behaviors would decrease. We observed a significant increase in affiliative behavior and a significant decrease in …

Knowledge, Trait Mindfulness And Perceived Discrimination As It Relates To Coping Self-Efficacy In African American Women, Collins D. Nelson

Theses and Dissertations

This is a cross-sectional study that investigated the relationship between preconception care knowledge, trait mindfulness, perceived discrimination, and coping self-efficacy. It addressed the lack of research into the effects of pregnancy-related distress on maternal mortality in African American women. There were 117 participants ages 18 -30 whose data was collected through an online survey. The results suggest that greater preconception care knowledge predicts greater pregnancy-related distress coping self-efficacy. Trait mindfulness also predicted pregnancy-related distress coping self-efficacy. Perceived discrimination did not predict coping self- efficacy in a negative direction as expected.

Investigating The Contents Of A Maya Tomb: An Analysis Of The Milwaukee Public Museum's Ceramic Collection From Chajul, Guatemala, Emma Eisner

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines a collection of 120 artifacts recovered from a tomb at the highland Maya site of Chajul, Guatemala, and currently housed at the Milwaukee Public Museum (MPM). Prior to this study, research on the MPM collection was very limited and there were few publications related to Chajul. The study focuses primarily on the 84 ceramic objects in the Museum’s collection. Detailed analysis of these artifacts was undertaken in order to collect data on their likely dates of production, forms, surface treatment’s, functions, and iconography. Contextual information from the tomb is also considered, including details of its construction as …

Practical Problems And Moral Discourses: An Ethnography Of Breastfeeding, Tara Ann Gallagher

Theses and Dissertations

Universal and bioactive, breastfeeding is a burgeoning biocultural topic because it incorporates biological and social determinants of human behavior. The topic has amassed media attention framed as part of a bigger imagining of motherhood as an idealized state directed at the female body’s performance. This paper questions media and public policy’s role in the dissemination of culture and the symbolic value of breastmilk. This study examines breastfeeding discourses through the lens of an American, mostly white, Midwestern middle-class social structure. Using participant observation data of two postpartum support groups and semi-structured interviews with six primiparous mothers, my data suggests that …

The Business Of The Girl: Celebrity And The Professionalization Of Girlhood In Early Twenty-First Century Media Culture, Jessica Elizabeth Johnston

Theses and Dissertations

The achieving “can-do” girl, who thrives in her personal, academic, and aspirational endeavors, emerged in response to self-help crisis literature of the 1990s urging mothers to manage their daughters’ low self-esteem. However, even as media industries have adopted the successful girl subject in popular film, television, and digital marketing campaigns, public conversations of tween and teenage girls still identify rising levels of anxiety and self-doubt that diminish girls’ confidence well into adulthood. Responding to what critics call the “confidence gap,” girl culture of the twenty-first century has organized itself around the affordances of social media and digital celebrity in the …

Simultaneous Marijuana And Alcohol Use And Intimate Partner Violence Perpetration In College Students, Haley Kolp

Theses and Dissertations

Intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization is a prevalent public health problem in college students and is associated with a variety of negative outcomes, such as suicidal ideation and depressive symptoms. Alcohol use and IPV perpetration are strongly and positively associated in college students, but the literature is less clear when examining the relationship between marijuana use and IPV perpetration. Further, no study has examined the relationship between simultaneous marijuana and alcohol (SAM) use (i.e., using alcohol and marijuana at the same time so that the effects overlap) and IPV perpetration in college students. Thus, the current thesis cross-sectionally examined the …

Predictors Of Parent Stress And Internalizing Symptoms Using The Multidimensional Feeding Questionnaire: An Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling Approach, Paulina Lim

Theses and Dissertations

Pediatric feeding problems (FP) are common behavioral difficulties among typically developing children. Most studies focused on understanding the etiology and impact of pediatric feeding disorders (PFD) in clinical inpatient or outpatient settings. Although studies have documented the impact of PFD on parent stress and internalizing symptoms, these studies did not examine multiple feeding domains (e.g., child mealtime problems, parent feeding strategies, and the parent-child feeding relationship). The current study evaluated the psychometric properties of the Multidimensional Feeding Questionnaire (MFQ) and the association between feeding related variables and parent stress and internalizing symptoms among community parents and children. Results indicated that …

How Adult Christians Incorporate Their Faith With The Psychology Of Forgiveness: A Qualitative Methods Study, Sonia Marta Pinero Lucci

Theses and Dissertations

This study examines Christian adult’s perceptions, practices of, and tendencies towards the phenomenon of forgiveness. Research in the field up to this date is valuable in understanding forgiveness theory, efficacy of forgiveness models, as well as the impact of religion and spirituality on forgiveness. However, research has progressed to reduce forgiveness, as well as religion and spirituality to its parts, thus research has moved away from the complete, whole concepts of forgiveness and faith. Lately, research has attempted to fill this gap by understanding how people of faith forgive, though faith groups likely perceive and practice forgiveness differently. Therefore, the …

Flexibility Of A Conditioned Response: Exploring The Limits Of Attentional Capture By Fear, Greta Nicole Minor

Theses and Dissertations

Recent work from the attention capture literature suggests that attention may be captured by stimuli with learned aversive value, even when these fear conditioned stimuli (CS) are task-irrelevant and not physically salient. Moreover, relatively little work in the human fear conditioning literature has investigated whether conditioned fear responses can flexibly transfer to a neutral associate of a CS. We examined, for the first time, whether fear-conditioned capture effects were able to transfer to the associate of a CS. Twenty-seven participants encoded novel scene-object pairs. Following encoding, scenes were presented alone during a conditioning phase. Scenes co-terminated with shock 100% (CS100), …

The Effects Of Instagram User Weight And Health Orientation On Perceptions Of Food Posts, Alese M. Nelson

Theses and Dissertations

Past research has shown that social factors, such as social facilitation, influence what and how much people eat (Zajonc, 1965). One key factor seems to be others’ weights; people have a tendency to dissociate themselves with obese eaters (Barthomeuf, Rousset, & Droit-Volet, 2012; McFerran, Dahl, Fitzsimons, & Morales, 2010). A pilot study was completed to assess how people viewed food photos posted to Instagram, as well as their social media habits. These findings were used in the design of the present study; the purpose of the present study is to determine whether social factors involved in eating, like others’ weight, …

A Collection Divided: An Analysis Of Accession 16082, The Ohio Hopewell Site Collection At The Milwaukee Public Museum, Katrina N. Schmitz

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates and documents sixty-one Ohio Hopewellian objects that form a collection currently housed at the Milwaukee Public Museum (MPM). The objects were excavated from the Hopewell site of Ross County, Ohio which lends its name to a renowned and geographically expansive archaeological cultural horizon. The meaning and interpretation of these MPM objects, and the site itself have evolved over time through decisions made by Native peoples, archaeologists, and museum curators. The MPM’s collection can be used as a conduit enabling discussion of the evolution of interpretations for the entire Hopewell site and the extraordinary number of artifacts which …

German-American Wpa Murals At The Milwaukee Public Museum And National Socialist Schultafeln: A Comparative Analysis, Katherine J. Santell

Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this thesis was to systematically examine and compare the themes and styles present in the Works Progress Administration (WPA) paintings housed in the Milwaukee Public Museum to a selection of National Socialist Schultafeln in Germany. The research conducted on the WPA paintings concentrated on pieces from the A.O. Tiemann collection and other works by painters who emigrated from Germany in the early 20th century or were of German descent. This was further narrowed to an in-depth analysis of pieces that depict lake dwelling sites of the European Neolithic and Bronze Ages in both US Museums and selected …

Compositional Analysis Of Pottery From Middle Woodland Waukesha Phase Sites In Southeastern Wisconsin And Havana Hopewell Related Sites In Northeastern And Northwestern Illinois, Megan Elizabeth Thornton

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis provides a compositional analysis of a selected sample of Middle Woodland ceramic sherds from sites in southeastern Wisconsin and northern Illinois. The analysis compares the ceramic pastes from Middle Woodland pottery from nine different archaeological sites. These sites include the Peterson, Finch, Alberts, and Crab Apple Point sites in Wisconsin, the Sloan, Albany Village, Blythe, DeWitte/Liphardt Habitation sites in northwestern Illinois, and the Kautz site in northeastern Illinois.

The analysis includes a review of available documentation, as well as descriptions and characterizations of sherds utilizing an attribute-based analysis of metric, morphological, and petrographic data. In southeastern Wisconsin, the …

The Ensemble Mesh-Term Query Expansion Models Using Multiple Lda Topic Models And Ann Classifiers In Health Information Retrieval, Sukjin You

Theses and Dissertations

Information retrieval in the health field has several challenges. Health information terminology is difficult for consumers (laypeople) to understand. Formulating a query with professional terms is not easy for consumers because health-related terms are more familiar to health professionals. If health terms related to a query are automatically added, it would help consumers to find relevant information. The proposed query expansion (QE) models show how to expand a query using MeSH (Medical Subject Headings) terms. The documents were represented by MeSH terms (i.e. Bag-of-MeSH), which were included in the full-text articles. And then the MeSH terms were used to generate …

Ethiopian Art: Christian Narratives From The Kebra Nagast, Morgan Ellsworth

Theses and Dissertations

King Ezana declared Christianity as Ethiopia’s state religion in 330 C.E. Ethiopia was the first country to mint a coin with the symbol of a cross. The Christian religion was established as a political move to strengthen economic ties with the Mediterranean world. Christianity has been used to keep Ethiopia independent. The Ethiopian artworks discussed here depict themes based on Christian narratives with multiple groupings of similar motifs and identical religious iconography. The Ethiopian art market still creates these motifs today to spread a repeated political message of the country’s pride, history, and represent their rulers’ legitimacy. I explore these …

“Noah Fires An Arrow!” The Rise Of Narrative Mechanics In Tabletop Role-Playing Games 1979-1989 And The Importance Of Archiving The Human Element, Cameron Jp Fontaine

Theses and Dissertations

Tabletop role-playing games (TRPG) emerged out of the war gaming and science fiction subcultures in the mid-1970s. During the latter half of the 1970s these games shifted away from their combat focused wargaming roots to forge their own identity separate from miniature wargaming. In the 1980s the industry expanded rapidly and many of the new games focused their efforts on crafting narrative rather than combat based mechanics. It was this focus on narrative mechanics and unique settings which enabled the industry to both directly and indirectly engage with the socio political and cultural movements of the 1980s in Reagan’s America. …

“Penniless And Unknown”: Temporality Of The Milwaukee County Poor Farm Cemetery - A Gis Analysis, Eric Eugene Burant

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis uses GIS modeling techniques of spatial data, archaeological data, and historical documentation to determine patterning of material culture associated with interments at the Milwaukee County Poor Farm Cemetery (MCPFC), an unmarked cemetery located in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. Archaeological excavations at the MCPFC in 1991-1992 and again in 2013 recovered over 2,400 individuals associated with Milwaukee County’s practice of providing burial for institutional residents, unidentified or unclaimed individuals sent from the Coroner’s Office, the remains of cadaverized individuals, and community poor from 1862 through 1925 (Richards 2016).

Previous research identified two distinct material culture classes; grave goods and grave inclusions. …

Hypersensitivity Adverse Event Reporting In Clinical Cancer Trials: Barriers And Potential Solutions To Studying Severe Events On A Population Level, Christina E. Eldredge

Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

HYPERSENSITIVITY ADVERSE EVENT REPORTING IN CLINICAL CANCER TRIALS: BARRIERS AND POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS TO STUDYING ALLERGIC EVENTS ON A POPULATION LEVEL

by

Christina Eldredge

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 2020

Under the Supervision of Professor Timothy Patrick

Clinical cancer trial interventions are associated with hypersensitivity events (HEs) which are recorded in the national clinical trial registry, ClinicalTrials.gov and publicly available. This data could potentially be leveraged to study predictors for HEs to identify at risk patients who may benefit from desensitization therapies to prevent these potentially life-threatening reactions. However, variation in investigator reporting methods is a barrier to leveraging this data …

Labor Rights And Foreign Direct Investment In Latin America: The Empirical Analysis Of Proximity Hypothesis, Cesar H. Villegas

Theses and Dissertations

What impact do labor rights practices have on foreign direct investment (FDI) in Latin America? While existing research shows how participation in the global production network influences host country’s labor standards, few studies delve into reversed causal mechanisms whereby changes in labor standards affects FDI inflows. While conventional wisdom says protection of labor rights has negative influence on FDI, I argue that for Latin American countries, practical protection of labor rights attracts FDI. Practical protection of labor right acts as a proxy and signals that host government could protect foreign assets that are under the risk of expropriation. I expect …

Intersectional Experiences Of Violence: Studying The Serial Murder Of 16 Men And Boys In Milwaukee, 1987-1991, Sally Svetic

Theses and Dissertations

Between the years of 1987 and 1991, 16 multiply-marginalized men and boys went missing in the City of Milwaukee; few other than their family and friends noticed. In 1991, it was discovered that they were murdered by Jeffrey Dahmer, a white man living on Milwaukee’s near west side. This paper argues that state power, racial capitalism, and white supremacy devalued the lives of Black, queer, young and poor people and created conditions that allowed Dahmer to commit 16 murders without detection by the Milwaukee Police Department. In this thesis, responses from Black, Lao, queer and Othered people are centered. In …

Public Transit And Micro-Mobility: Identifying The Impacts Of Bikeshare On Public Transit Ridership In The City Of Chicago, Shamsi Mosharraf Trisha

Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

PUBLIC TRANSIT AND MICRO-MOBILITY: IDENTIFYING THE IMPACTS OF BIKESHARE ON PUBLIC TRANSIT RIDERSHIP IN THE CITY OF CHICAGO

The variation of transit and bike share access amongst the communities in Chicago, in terms of their social, ethnic and economic segregation was investigated. The findings identify the area suitable for implementation of micro mobility as a first and last mile option. Based on transit connectivity and population mix, the communities are ranked into five groups: 1) Central: excellent transit and bike share access serving the micro mobility purpose; 2) North Side : good transit access which can be improved further …

Situating Worker Cooperatives: The Urban, Racial And Gendered Geographies Of Cooperative Development In New York City’S Worker Cooperative Business Development Initiative, Rebecca Wolfe

Theses and Dissertations

Worker cooperatives are gaining increased traction as an urban economic development strategy aimed to better support low-income women, immigrants and communities of color. Worker cooperatives are businesses that are owned and managed by its workers, and their supporters see them as a more equitable form of development that facilitates enhanced economic agency and access to ownership and wealth building. Reflecting and reinforcing growing cooperative momentum, New York City developed the nation’s first municipal-sponsored cooperative development initiative in 2014. The Worker Cooperative Business Development Initiative (WCBDI) brings together policy makers, city administrators and nonprofit community-based organizations to provide educational programming, cooperative …

Examining The Needs Of First-Generation Students, Ashley A. Mayer

Theses and Dissertations

First Generation Students at Columbus State University identify as having a lack of resources that are helpful to them. This research paper analyzes the problems faced by first generation college students at Columbus State University. These needs were assessed using an electronic survey that was distributed to first generation students. The proposed goals are based around supporting the academic and social well-being of FGS at CSU. A set of strategies and tactics are proposed for reaching these goals.

A Comparison Of Response-Contingent And Response-Independent Autoshaping Trials In Rats, Jenna E. Gaskins

Theses and Dissertations

Autoshaping is a procedure, combining both operant conditioning and classical conditioning, used in animal training to jump-start a target behavior. Lepper and Petursdottir (2017) found that response-contingent pairings (RCP) were more effective than responseindependent pairings (RIP) in producing vocalizations in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). RIP procedures entail a time-based intertrial interval (ITI) followed by the beginning of a trial, whereas RCP procedures include a response initiation period between the ITI and the trial. The current study compared RCP and RIP procedures to determine which one was more effective for acquisition of nose poking in rats. Number of days …