Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Sleep Hygiene And Sleep Quality In Italian And American Adolescents, Monique K. Lebourgeois, Flavia Giannotti, Flavia Cortesi, Amy Wolfson, John R. Harsh

Faculty Publications

This study investigated cross-cultural differences in adolescent sleep hygiene and sleep quality. Participants were 1348 students (655 males; 693 females) aged 12-17 years from public school systems in Rome, Italy (n = 776) and Southern Mississippi (n = 572). Participants completed the Adolescent Sleep-Wake Scale and the Adolescent Sleep Hygiene Scale. Reported sleep hygiene and sleep quality were significantly better for Italian than American adolescents. A moderate linear relationship was observed between sleep hygiene and sleep quality in both samples (Italians: R =.40; Americans: R =.46). Separate hierarchical multiple regression analyses showed that sleep hygiene accounted for significant variance in …

Semantic Analysis For Monitoring Insider Threats, Svetlana Symonenko, Elizabeth D. Liddy, Ozgur Yilmazel, Robert Del Zoppo, Eric Brown

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

Malicious insiders’ difficult-to-detect activities pose serious threats to the intelligence community (IC) when these activities go undetected. A novel approach that integrates the results of social network analysis, role-based access monitoring, and semantic analysis of insiders ’ communications as evidence for evaluation by a risk assessor is being tested on an IC simulation. A semantic analysis, by our proven Natural Language Processing (NLP) system, of the insider’s text-based communications produces conceptual representations that are clustered and compared on the expected vs. observed scope. The determined risk level produces an input to a risk analysis algorithm that is merged with outputs …

A Framework For Creating A Facetted Classification For Genres: Addressing Issues Of Multidimensionality, Kevin Crowston, Barbara H. Kwasnik

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

People recognize and use document genres as a way of identifying useful information and of participating in mutually understood communicative acts. Crowston and Kwasnik [1] discuss the possibility of improving information access in large digital collections through the identification and use of document genre metadata. They draw on the definition of genre proposed by Orlikowski and Yates [3], who describe genre as "a distinctive type of communicative action, characterized by a socially recognized communicative purpose and common aspects of form" (p. 543). Scholars in fields such as rhetoric and library science have attempted to describe and systematize the notion of …

Effective Work Practices For Software Engineering: Free/Libre Open Source Software Development, Kevin Crowston, Hala Annabi, James Howison, Chengetai Masango

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

We review the literature on Free/Libre Open Source Software (FLOSS) development and on software development, distributed work and teams more generally to develop a theoretical model to explain the performance of FLOSS teams. The proposed model is based on Hackman's [34] model of effectiveness of work teams, with coordination theory [52] and collective mind [79] to extend Hackman's model by elaborating team practices relevant to effectiveness in software development. We propose a set of propositions to guide further research.

Organizational Cultures Of Libraries As A Strategic Resource, Michelle L. Kaarst-Brown, Scott Nicholson, Gisela M. Von Dran, Jeffrey M. Stanton

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

Theorists have suggested that organizational culture is a strategic resource that has value in ensuring the continuing existence and success of organizations (Michalisin, Smith, & Kline, 1997; Barney, 1986, 1991; Hult, Ketchen, & Nichols, 2002; Gordon, 1985). This assertion is supported by various studies that have linked organizational culture to broad strategic outcomes such as an organization’s ability to manage knowledge (Davenport, Long, & Beers, 1998; Storck & Hill, 2000), innovation capability (Hauser, 1998), and strategic management of information technology (Kaarst-Brown & Robey, 1999; Reich & Benbasat, 2000; Schein, 1985). Based on this research, we suggest that there are characteristics …

The Perils And Pitfalls Of Mining Sourceforge, James Howison, Kevin Crowston

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

SourceForge provides abundant accessible data from Open Source Software development projects, making it an attractive data source for software engineering research. However it is not without theoretical peril and practical pitfalls. In this paper, we outline practical lessons gained from our spidering, parsing and analysis of SourceForge data. SourceForge can be practically difficult: projects are defunct, data from earlier systems has been dumped in and crucial data is hosted outside SourceForge, dirtying the retrieved data. These practical issues play directly into analysis: decisions made in screening projects can reduce the range of variables, skewing data and biasing correlations. SourceForge is …

Discerning Emotions In Texts, Victoria L. Rubin, Jeffrey M. Stanton, Elizabeth D. Liddy

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

We present an empirically verified model of discernable emotions, Watson and Tellegen’s Circumplex Theory of Affect from social and personality psychology, and suggest its usefulness in NLP as a potential model for an automation of an eight-fold categorization of emotions in written English texts. We developed a data collection tool based on the model, collected 287 responses from 110 non-expert informants based on 50 emotional excerpts (min=12, max=348, average=86 words), and analyzed the inter-coder agreement per category and per strength of ratings per sub-category. The respondents achieved an average 70.7% agreement in the most commonly identified emotion categories per text. …

The Digital Reference Research Agenda, R. David Lankes

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

This article presents a research agenda for the study of digital reference. The agenda stems from a research symposium held at Harvard in August 2002. The agenda defines digital reference as "the use of human intermediation to answer questions in a digital environment." The agenda also proposes the central research question in digital reference - "How can human expertise be effectively and efficiently incorporated into information systems to answer user questions?" The definition and question are used to outline a research agenda centered on how the exploration of digital reference relates to other fields of inquiry.

The Post-.Com Internet: Toward Regular And Objective Procedures For Internet Governance, Milton Mueller, Lee Mcknight

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

This paper makes the case for using regular and objective procedures to assign new Internet top-level domain names (TLDs) instead of the unscheduled, irregular, discretionary and ad hoc processes and criteria currently used by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). Adopting a regularized process is past due: after 5 years of existence, ICANN has yet to define a method for managing TLD additions to the root. Yet, the root of the DNS is an important international resource, and handling applications for new TLDs is one of ICANN’s most significant policy responsibilities. The paper shows that ICANN’s current …

Context-Based Question-Answering Evaluation, Elizabeth D. Liddy, Anne R. Diekema, Ozgur Yilmazel

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

In this poster, we will present the results of efforts we have undertaken to conduct evaluations of a QA system in a real world environment and to understand the nature of the dimensions on which users evaluate QA systems when given full reign to comment on whatever dimensions they deem important.

Coordination Theory: A Ten-Year Retrospective, Kevin Crowston, Joseph Rubleske, James Howison

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

Since the initial publication in 1994, Coordination Theory (Malone and Crowston, 1994) has been referenced in nearly 300 journal articles, book chapters, conference papers and theses. This chapter will analyze the contribution of this body of research to determine how Coordination Theory has been used for user task analysis and modelling for HCI. Issues that will be addressed include: 1) how the theory has been applied; 2) factors that led to the success of the theory; and 3) identification of areas needing further research.

Towards A Portfolio Of Floss Project Success Measures, Kevin Crowston, Hala Annabi, James Howison, Chengetai Masango

School of Information Studies - Faculty Scholarship

Project success is one of the most widely used dependent variables in information systems research. However, conventional measures of project success are difficult to apply to Free/Libre Open Source Software projects. In this paper, we present an analysis of four measures of success applied to SourceForge projects: number of members of the extended development community, project activity, bug fixing time and number of downloads. We argue that these four measures provide different insights into the collaboration and control mechanisms of the projects.

Paving The Path: Preparing For Microbicide Introduction—Report Of A Qualitative Study In South Africa, Julie Becker, Rasha Dabash, C. Elizabeth Mcgrory, Diane Cooper, Jane Harries, Margaret Hoffman, Jennifer Moodley, Phyllis Orner, Hillary J. Bracken

HIV and AIDS

With recently accelerated support for the development of microbicides to prevent HIV transmission and the urgency of the global AIDS epidemic, it is important to begin to identify strategies for introducing a microbicide once it is proven safe and effective and is approved for use. This report presents results from a qualitative study that explored a range of issues likely to influence microbicide introduction—positively or negatively—at three levels: community, health service, and policy. The study, which identified critical issues to be addressed in building support for microbicides and facilitating a smooth introduction, was conducted between September 2002 and September 2003 …

Research, Publication, And Service Patterns Of Florida Academic Librarians, Deborah Boran Henry, Tina M. Neville

USF St. Petersburg campus Faculty Publications

In an effort to establish benchmarks for comparison to national trends, a web-based survey explored the research, publication, and service activities of Florida academic librarians. Participants ranked the importance of professional activities to the tenure/promotion process. Findings suggest that perceived tenure and promotion demands do influence research productivity.

Improving Implicit Beliefs And Expectations In Academic Achievement For Postsecondary Students With Disabilities, Kelly B.T. Chang

Faculty Publications - Psychology Department

In this article, the author introduces the sociocognitive theory of implicit theories of intelligence (developed by Carol S. Dweck and her colleagues) to the field of rehabilitation, and analyzes disability issues in postsecondary academic achievement within this framework. This sociocognitive theory highlights the utility of the social model of disability. People hold two types of implicit beliefs about intelligence. An entity belief can lead to helplessness and negative self-concepts in the face of failure, because it focuses on labels and stable traits. An incremental belief leads to greater resilience in the face of failure by focusing on strategy and effort …

Adequacy Of Earnings Replacement In Workers' Compensation Programs: A Report Of The Study Panel On Benefit Adequacy Of The Workers' Compensation Steering Committee, National Academy Of Social Insurance, H. Allan Hunt, National Academy Of Social Insurance

Upjohn Press

The Workers’ Compensation Steering Committee of the National Academy of Social Insurance formed the Benefit Adequacy Study Panel to review the literature on benefit adequacy and to develop an approach to document what is currently known—and not known—about benefit adequacy in WC programs. The panel documents the extent to which WC cash benefits replace workers’ lost wages, and assesses the adequacy of that wage replacement.

Does "Trickle Down" Work?: Economic Development Strategies And Job Chains In Local Labor Markets, Joseph Persky, Daniel Felsenstein, Virginia Carlson

Upjohn Press

Persky, Felsenstein, and Carlson explore a new framework for evaluating state and local economic development efforts. They propose a method, referred to as the “job-chains approach,” that they say clarifies the potential justifications for economic development subsidies as well as the limitations surrounding these efforts. This innovative approach addresses not only the number of job vacancies created as a result of a subsidized business investment or expansion, but also the extent to which gains are achieved by the unemployed and the underemployed, whether skilled or unskilled.

Job Exit Queues: Corporate Mergers And Gender Inequality, Terceira A. Berdahl, Helen A. Moore

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Purpose: to explore the experiences of employees in a local bank merger in the United States and examine the concept of job exit queues. We introduce the concept of a job exit queue, which describes how workers position themselves or are positioned by employers to leave jobs and enter new jobs following the announcement of a corporate merger.
Design/methodology/approach: Qualitative interviews with mid-level managers, technical specialists and low status workers during the sale and merger process were conducted and coded thematically. We explore: 1) how workers and managers describe the job search as an “opportunity” or as a recurring cycle …

Hull-House Maps And Papers, Mary Jo Deegan

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Hull-House Maps and Papers (HHMP) was a groundbreaking text published in 1895 by the residents of Hull House, led by Jane Addams and Florence Kelley. They described and measured group patterns associated with immigrants, working conditions, specific laborers, labor unions, social settlements, and the function of art in the community. Women's moral agency was central to their use of social science to improve democracy and the lives of the disenfranchised.

The mapping of social and demographic characteristics of a population within a geographical area became the core methodology of sociologists at the University of Chicago during the 1920s and 1930s. …

An Introduction To Harriet Martineau’S Lake District Writings, Michael R. Hill

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

This complation presents an engaging, insightful, and inspiring smorgasbord of essays (and one didactic tale) selected from Harriet Martineau's Lake District writings from the mid-1800s. As a source of inspiration, the English Lake District has been profitably mined by scores of writers, including Martineau. The selections included here are more or less available (usually less) in scholarly and rare book collections, but are not generally obtainable for a pleasant armchair read at home or, as Martineau would certainly encourage, to tote along in one's knapsack on a weekend ramble among the lakes and hills of Cumbria. The majority of the …

Introduction: Charlotte Perkins Gilman’S Sociological Perspective On Ethics And Society, Michael R. Hill, Mary Jo Deegan

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

Social Ethics: Sociology and the Future of Society provides a complex yet accessible statement of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's mature sociological theory of ethical life. Her perspective is welded intellectually to sociology and evolutionary thought and concretely to the well-being of children throughout the world. We have failed, writes Gilman in Social Ethics, to teach even "a simple, child-convincing ethics based on social interactions, because we have not understood sociology" (emphasis added). For Gilman, a world in which children are not loved, well fed, properly clothed, thoughtfully educated, and humanely disciplined is a world ethically at odds with logic and itself. …

The Combined Effects Of Frequency Of Satisfaction And Domain Equity On Relational Satisfaction, Amanda Dawn Coho

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Romantic relationship research has yet to identify the relationship between conflict, an interpersonal variable, and equity, an intrapersonal variable. The current study represents the first attempt to understand these variables’ contribution, separately and interactionally, on individual partner’s feelings of relationship satisfaction. A total of 106 undergraduate and graduate participants completed questionnaires gauging their frequency of conflict and perceptions of equity across each of five relational domains: Love, Status/Power, Money, Services, and Sex, in addition to reporting general levels of relationship satisfaction. Data were interpreted in three separate relationships: conflict and satisfaction, equity and satisfaction, and the interaction of conflict and …

Critical Digital Infrastructure Protection: An Investigatoin Into The Intergovernmental Activities Of Information Technology Directors In Florida Counties, Joah Nicole Devenny

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As cyber attacks become more sophisticated, the risk to all networked computer systems increases. Whether public or private, whether federal, state, or local, the threat is equally real. Consequently, local governments must respond accordingly to understand the threats, take measures to protect themselves, and determine how to respond in the event of a system breach. Additionally, since cyber criminals do not respect geographic or administrative boundaries, local leaders must be prepared to instantly interact with other governments, agencies, and departments to suppress an attack. Guided by the theory of intergovernmental management (IGM), this exploratory research investigated how Information Technology (IT) …

Female Sexual Offenders-An Underexamined Population, Creaig Anthony Dunton

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Sex crimes are considered to be among the most damaging and heinous forms of social deviance in existence. Besides the acts perpetrated by the offenders, the social stigma attached to being victimized is often just as injurious to the victim. Society sees males as the sole perpetrators of acts of sexual abuse, but this is not the case. The extant literature shows that women, while fewer in number, also perpetrate acts of sexual abuse and assault against other adults and children. This thesis is a preliminary typology that classifies female sexual offenders based upon the acts perpetrated, using cases presented …

Improving Comprehension Of Capital Sentencing Instructions: A Bias Reduction Approach, Charles W. Otto

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Previous research has demonstrated that judicial instructions on the law are not well understood by jurors tasked with applying the law to the facts of a case. The past research has also shown that jurors are often confused by the instructions used in the sentencing phase of a capital trial. Social scientists have used two different methods to improve juror understanding of legal instructions, psycholinguistic rewrites and bias-reduction techniques. Psycholinguistic rewrites of legal instructions have been shown consistently to improve juror comprehension of general legal instructions and instructions used in the sentencing phase of a capital trial, however, there has …

A Rhetoric Of Technology: The Discourse In U.S. Army Manuals And Handbooks, Sherry Ann Steward

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the historical technical publications of the United States Army from 1775-2004. Historical research in Army technical communication reveals the persuasive characteristics of its technical publications. Elements of narrative, storytelling, and anthropomorphism are techniques writers used to help deliver information to readers. Research also reveals the design techniques writers adopted to unite the situated literacies of the troops. Analyses of print, comic, and digital media expose the increasing visualization of information since the eighteenth century. The results of such historical research can be applied to new media designs. Automating processes captured in paper-based technical manuals and adding intelligent …

Cell Phone Distraction Analysis Of Motor Response In A Simulated Driving Environment, Anusha Ravishankar

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Does the use of a cell phone while driving influence the driver's ability to execute a proper turn? Is there difference between genders pertaining to motor skill while driving in a simulated driving environment? To accomplish this task, three groups of ten participants (5 women and 5 men) each were tested using a scripted test scenario focusing on left and right turns. The participants were made to drive through a test scenario to get used to the driving simulator. The scenario for the experimental group was an inner-city training scenario with the presence of vehicular traffic and the main focus …

A Comparative Static Analysis For Invasive Species Management Under Risk Neutral Preferences, Pamela Safford

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates the optimal ex-ante mix of self-protection and self-insurance technologies employed to reduce the risk of biological invaders in the presence of exogenous variables within the probability and damage functions. This is accomplished by using a theoretical endogenous risk model that extends previously developed frameworks. This thesis contributes to the previous work in two ways. (1) Employing a general framework with simultaneous decision making over self-protection and self-insurance, this thesis analyzes how each parameter including income, the costs of each activity, an exogenous factor that affects only the probability of an invasion, and a separate exogenous factor that …

Nursing Leadership Characteristics: Effect On Nursing Job Satisfactio, Sandra Swearingen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research is to determine the degree to which a positive experience with nursing leadership increases nurse's job satisfaction. The different values and norms of the generational cohorts result in each cohort perceiving leadership characteristics differently. Factors such as length of exposure to leadership, location, shift worked, clinical versus non-clinical positions and the presence or absence of Servant-Leadership, all have the potential to impact nursing satisfaction. Nursing satisfaction, or dissatisfaction impacts retention, further modifying nursing leadership practices. Conflict, Cohort, Servant-Leadership, and Self-Discrepancy theories were utilized to identify the relationships of generations to each other and to the …

Job Satisfaction Of Club Financial Executives, Raymond S. Schmidgall Ph.D., Cpa, Agnes Defranco

Hospitality Review

Studying the job satisfaction of financial management personnel in the club industry may offer additional information to management of clubs to better work with and retain their associates. It is also hoped that the results of this study will provide hospitality students aspiring to become financial management personnel in the club industry with a glimpse of the job satisfaction level of financial executives in the club industry