Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Human Things: Rethinking Guitars And Ethnography, Matthew L. Hale

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This work is about objects and their makers, their relationship, and the negotiation between tradition and innovation in the creation of things. I explore the relationship between tradition, innovation, and technology as it pertains to the creation, perception, and interaction with acoustic steel string guitars and ethnographies. First, I focus on the works of two Nashville based guitar makers, Grant and Cory Batson. I investigate the ways in which the Batsons critically evaluate traditional construction techniques and design features as they create their instruments, looking at their theories of tone production, methods of construction, and their perceptions and uses of …

Impact Of Stress Management On Learning In A Classroom Setting, Pankaj Mandale

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Stress is an important feature of the lives of college students and can impact negatively on learning. The effectiveness of an in-class stress management intervention for improving course content retention was tested with a cross-over design in two introductory graduate biostatistics classes. Each class met one day per week for the duration of the semester, and was taught by the same instructor, following the same syllabus. A pretest duplicating items on the midterm and final exam was administered to all students at the first class meeting. Identical midterm and final exams were administered in both classes. During the first half …

Internet Gis As A Historic Place-Making Tool For Mammoth Cave National Park, Ann E. Epperson

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

This project laid the groundwork for an Internet-delivered Public Participation Geographic Information System to facilitate exploration and discovery of the past communities of the Mammoth Cave Park area. The emergence of Internet Web 2.0 design along with distributed GIS services allows for anyone to interact with and add to the information found on central Internet sites. Historical geography often relies upon public participation from individuals outside the academic world to provide narrative descriptions, photographs and manuscripts of past places and events to augment information held by institutions and academia. A public-participation website for the Mammoth Cave Historic GIS (MCHGIS) created …

Ibpi: Bicycle And Pedestrian Education Program, Jennifer Dill, Lynn Weigand, Karen Dixon

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

Since the 1990s, the amount of attention and funding for bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure has increased significantly. This, combined with the role of transportation in public health and environmental concerns, has raised expectations for engineering and planning practitioners to possess more knowledge and skills related to pedestrian and bicycle planning and design. This demand requires more education around these topics but university curriculum doesn?t reflect these important shifts in the field. This project was intended to begin addressing the need for more bicycle and pedestrian curriculum in two ways: (1) Determine the existence of and need for courses and curriculum …

Cultivating The Commons An Assessment Of The Potential For Urban Agriculture On Oakland’S Public Land, Nathan Mcclintock, Jenny Cooper

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

This is an inventory of open space with potential for agricultural production on land both owned by public agencies and within the city limits of Oakland, California. The inventory was conducted between the summer of 2008 and spring of 2009 and is part of an ongoing movement to develop a more resilient, sustainable, and just food system in Oakland. This project aims to locate Oakland’s "commons"—land that is owned by public agencies and therefore a public resource—and assess the potential for urban agriculture (UA) on this land. We hope that this assessment can be used 1) to inform policy decisions …

Neuroeconomics: Constructing Identity, John B. Davis

Economics Faculty Research and Publications

The paper asks whether neuroeconomics will make instrumental use of neuroscience to adjudicate existing disputes in economics or be more seriously transformed by neuroscience in ways that might transform economics. The paper pursues the question by asking how neuroscience constructs an understanding of individuals as whole persons. The body of the paper is devoted to examining two approaches: Don Ross's neurocellular approach to neuroeconomics and Joseph Dumit's cultural anthropological science organization approach. The accounts are used to identify boundaries on single individual explanations. Within that space Andy Clark's external scaffolding view and Nathaniel Wilcox's socially distributed cognition view are employed.

Composite Of Complexity: Manifestations Of Whiteness And Class Among Las Vegas Italian Americans, Danielle Nicole Axt

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Conventional terminology and conventional boundaries, in regard to ethnicity, are no longer applicable to the ever shifting population of the United States. In specific, the various degrees of White ethnic identity does not easily transition into convenient all encompassing categories such as Caucasian or more simply, White. Whiteness studies have been at the forefront of this critique, most recently asserting that White ethnic identity is heavily influenced by context. However, although many studies are now recognizing the impact of multiple layers of White ethnic identity (along the lines of gender, locale, socioeconomic level etc.) many still neglect to identify a …

Design Standards Within Constructed Wetlands For The Reduction Of Mosquito Populations In Clark County, Nevada, Phillip C. Bondurant

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Wetlands are considered one of the most productive ecosystems in the world and provide many benefits to the environment. However, the slow moving and sometimes stagnant water created by the vegetation in the wetland creates an ideal environment for the proliferation of mosquitoes. Mosquitoes are the most important insect disease vector worldwide. The presence of mosquitoes within wetlands increases the risk of disease transmission among workers and visitors creating a public health concern. Effective design standards aimed at reducing mosquito breeding habitat should be implemented during the construction and planning phase of wetland development to effectively reduce the mosquito populations. …

Plato’S Gorgias: Rhetoric, The Greatest Evil, And The True Art Of Politics, Paul A. George

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The interweaving of rhetoric, the greatest evil, and the true art of politics create the unity of the dialogue. Whereas Gorgianic rhetoric is pleasure seeking flattery which inspires belief without knowledge, noble rhetoric is refutative, inspiring the acknowledgment of falsity or ignorance. Moreover, it is self-refutation, meaning that the person being persuaded arrives at the conclusion of his ignorance by his own realization; the noble rhetor does not connect all the dots for them. The greatest evil is to have a false opinion about justice. A just penalty for suffering from the greatest evil is to face selfrefutation in hopes …

Bordered Identities: Class, Ethnicity, And Transnational Social Networks, Rayette Ellen Martin

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This thesis looks at the bordered identities of middle class second generation Mexican Americans in Las Vegas, Nevada. Through an analysis of the borderlands or gray spaces that occur at the intersections of class practices, transnational relationships and ethnic identities, participants’ bordered identities were found to be reinforced, contested, and generally negotiated. Participants’ identities are flexible; their expressed identities change in relation to context or situation. In the United States, Mexicans and Latinos more generally have been subjected to racial and ethnic oppression since the Mexican American war ended in 1848.This long history of discrimination has maintained perceptions that all …

Analysis And Evaluation Of Safety Impacts Of Median Types And Midblock Left Turn Treatments For Urban Arterials, Timur Mauga

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Urban growth leads to new land-uses abutting arterials requiring driveways for their accessibility. Uncontrolled number and locations of such access points causes safety, mobility and accessibility problems. The solution to these problems is access management (AM) which controls the number and location of the access points. AM techniques are normally documented in the form of guidelines for engineers and planners to follow when implementing the techniques. However, AM guidelines may not cover every technique due to the fact that AM is still growing. For example, the current AM guideline prepared by The Nevada Department of Transportation addresses many AM techniques. …

Commercial Sex Workers: Lives And Practices, Sarah J. Knowles

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Commercial sex workers epitomize a population who is both stigmatized and underrepresented in marriage and family therapy research. Through this research I hope to gain understanding about the gains of being a commercial sex worker, which many people may overlook due to their moral opposition to the occupation. I will also be exploring some of the challenges that commercial sex workers face that are unique to their line of work, especially in regards to their relationships, as many aspects of this may have been generalized or disregarded. Finally, I plan to address any implications for therapists who work with commercial …

Study Of Stemming Algorithms, Savitha Kodimala

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Automated stemming is the process of reducing words to their roots. The stemmed words are typically used to overcome the mismatch problems associated with text searching.

In this thesis, we report on the various methods developed for stemming. In particular, we show the effectiveness of n-gram stemming methods on a collection of documents.

Verbal Cues: Producing The Same Results In Stereotype Threat Research?, Tarryn E. Mcghie

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This study examined the notion that stereotype threat experiments can be influenced through linguistic manipulation. The cueing of a phrase (whether stereotypical or non-stereotypical) can produce performance differences between groups, rather than cueing of a stereotype, as used in previous research. Participants (n=95) mostly Caucasian females (68%) ranging in age from 18-45 (M=22.7). The design involved three groups and participants were randomly assigned in order to control for consequential affects. The control group received no verbal cues. The stereotypical group received a stereotypical cue (i.e. men tend to do better on this test than women). The counter-stereotypical group received a …

Management Research In The Hospitality And Tourism Industry, Xu Cheng

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this study is to identify the current research trends and clarify the changing direction of scholarly studies on knowledge management. The context of this study is hospitality and tourism research with a focus on research publications between 2006 and 2010. Published scholarly studies within this period are examined through content analysis, using such keywords as knowledge management, organizational learning, hospitality, tourism, tourist destinations, travel industry, hotels, lodging, motels, hotel industry, gaming, casino hotel and convention to search scholarly research journals. All contributions found are then screened for a hospitality and tourism theme and KM as the main …

The Write Moves: An Autoethnographic Examination Of The Media Industry, Danielle Gomes

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This thesis examines the current media environment through the use of adaptation theory, political economy theory, and media ecology theory. More specifically, this thesis is an autoethnography of this author‟s attempts to release content into the mass-media.

This thesis expects to find that in the current conglomerate controlled media environment content that has multi-media potential is preferred. Vertical integration is the standard in these massive media corporations. Consequently, the adaptation of content into multiple media is no longer an afterthought to creation, it is forethought.

Predictors Of Recall And Reading Time For Seductive And Nonseductive Text Segments, Ivan V. Ivanov

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This correlational study explored how concreteness, relevance, importance, and interestingness related to the recall of seductive details and base text, while controlling for text coherence, and student background knowledge. Previous research has provided evidence for the significant relationship between these variables and the seductive details effect in particular and text recall in general. However, this is the first study to consider all these variables simultaneously. A group of 68 undergraduates read an expository text on lightning formation, performed an immediate test on free recall, and rated each text sentence for concreteness, relevance, importance, and interestingness. A simple regression analysis revealed …

The Multiple-Choice Concept Map (Mccm): An Interactive Computer-Based Assessment Method, Ioan C. Sas

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This research attempted to bridge the gap between cognitive psychology and educational measurement (Mislevy, 2008; Leighton & Gierl, 2007; Nichols, 1994; Messick, 1989; Snow & Lohman, 1989) by using cognitive theories from working memory (Baddeley, 1986; Miyake & Shah, 1999; Grimley & Banner, 2008), multimedia learning (Mayer, 2001), and cognitive load (Chandler and Sweller, 1991, 1992; Cerpa, Chandler, & Sweller., 1996) to identify potential design weaknesses of traditional select-and-fill-in (SAFI) concept map assessment and then to guide the design of the new and improved multiple-choice concept map (MCCM) assessment method. The primary objective of this study was to evaluate the …

Selling Knowledge: A Sociological Analysis Of Attorney Advertisement In Las Vegas, Giselle Velasquez

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

I analyze how Las Vegas attorneys represent themselves, their associates and clients in televised law firm commercials. I use attorney commercials as a case to explore cultural beliefs in media representations. Using an inductive method, I analyze the textual, visual, and aural symbols that appear most frequently in television commercials to interpret how law firm advertisements convey themes of attorney expertise, knowledge, ethnic and gender stereotyping. I introduce this study with a historical evaluation of the rise of advertisement in the United States. I continue discussing how the media is an important realm of discourse that affects people's identity. Using …

Altering Explicit And Implicit Racial Prejudice Towards African American Males, Veronica A. Glover

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Researchers tested 281 undergraduates to determine if positive behavior messages about African American males presented during a learning task affected scores on explicit and implicit racial prejudice measures. During the learning task, we manipulated how many positive messages the participant viewed (100 vs. 150 or none) and the amount of African American males these messages applied to (1 vs. 3). Participants who viewed 150 positive messages about one African American male displayed more explicit prejudice than participants in control groups or participants learning 100 messages about one person. Results for the implicit measure indicated that participants who learned about three …

Teaching, Learning, And Writing In The Third Space: A Study Of Language And Culture Intersecting With Instruction, Susan Toma-Berge Edd

Dissertations

The purpose of this dissertation was to compare the characteristics and attributes of an effective first grade teacher of writing to English learners through the lens of the "third space." The "third space" represents a place where sociocultural theory interacts with language and culture, and authentic, integrated literacy instruction. Because there is no empirical evidence to support the theory of the "third space" the observation and interview data were analyzed using literature that draws on three areas of study: English learners, first grade literacy, and urban schools. The key findings from this study produced three themes that came about by …

Buffering Effects Of Positive Mentoring On Mentor Burnout: Generative Concern And Perceived Organizational Support As Moderators, Meline Schaffer

All Theses

Burnout among employees has personal and organizational consequences. Negative effects of burnout include lowered individual adjustment as well as disengagement from the organization. Given this, both psychologists and practitioners may benefit from understanding ways to decrease this factor among employees.
One organizational experience that has the potential to decrease burnout is mentoring. While the advantages of mentoring relationships for protŽgŽs are well-documented, this study examines the potentially beneficial effects of positive mentoring relationships for the mentor, focusing on the reduction of burnout as a dependent variable. While benefits of mentoring may lead to reduced burnout, recent research suggests that negative …

Complex Decision Support For Older Adults: Effects Of Information Visualization On Decision Performance, Margaux Price

All Theses

Older adults are faced with complex decision tasks that impose high working memory demands. A representative task is choosing a prescription drug plan from a multitude of options that must be evaluated along many factors. The combined effect of the quantity of complex information, and reduced working memory capacity puts older adults at a disadvantage. However, research with younger adults suggests that the working memory burden of decision tasks can be reduced using well-designed, graphical decision aids (i.e., environmental supports). The current study examined the use of environmental supports to support complex decision-making for older adults. Two experiments were conducted; …

Animal-Human Relationships In Child Protective Services: Getting A Baseline, Christina Risley-Curtiss, Lisa Anne Zilney, Rebecca Hornung

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Inclusion of certain aspects of animal-human relationships (AHR), such as animal abuse and animal-assisted interventions, can enhance child welfare practice and there are resources available to promote such inclusion. However, there is little knowledge of whether this is being accomplished. This study sought to fill this gap by conducting a national survey of state public child welfare agencies to examine AHR in child protective services practice, their assessment tools, and crossreporting policies.

The Life Of An Unknown Assassin: Leon Czolgosz And The Death Of William Mckinley, Cary Federman

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The purpose of this essay is to examine the discourses that surrounded the life of Leon Czolgosz, the assassin of President William McKinley. The gaps in Czolgosz’s life, his peculiar silences, his poor health and the ambiguity and thinness of his confession, rather than taken as instances of mental and physical distress, have, instead, been understood as signs of a revolutionary anarchistic assassin. Czolgosz is an expression of a cultural tradition in somatic form. I argue that the discursive construction of criminality, already present in the late nineteenth century within the medical and human sciences, is what shaped Czolgosz’s life …

Placing İsmayıllı Lezgi Among The Lezgi Dialects, Jessica Smith

Theses and Dissertations

There is a cluster of three Lezgi villages in the İsmayıllı district of Azerbaijan that is separated by the Caucasus Mountains from the three main Lezgi dialects—Standard (SL), Axti (AL), and Quba (QL) Lezgi. This study places İsmayıllı Lezgi (IL) among the other dialects by comparing many of the varieties' attributes.

Five approaches are taken in this comparison: 1) comparing the similarities and differences of IL's phonological inventory to that of SL and AL; 2) contrasting the noun case system of IL versus that of SL; 3) comparing their verbal morphology; 4) looking for lexical similarities between IL and SL/AL/QL …

Digital Collections Manual (Version 1.0), Ellen Corrigan

Faculty Research & Creative Activity

No abstract provided.

Doppler-Broadening Of Light Nuclei Gamma-Ray Spectra, Melinda D. Whitfield

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

Non-destructive methods of material interrogation are used to locate hidden explosives and thwart terrorism attempts. In one such method materials are bombarded with neutrons which react with the nuclei of the atoms within causing a de-excitation process emitting a gamma-ray. The spectrum displayed by the collection of these gamma-rays gives valuable information regarding the material’s elemental make-up. It has been hypothesized that gamma-rays from neutron-induced gamma-ray reactions on light elements with atomic numbers less than 20, including most of the gamma-rays of interest in explosives detection, are Doppler-broadened. This thesis focuses on the gamma ray spectra from the 4438 keV …

Return To College Education Revisited: Is Relevance Relevant?, Olga Yakusheva

Economics Faculty Research and Publications

This study examines whether the size of the college earnings premium varies depending on the quality of the match between an individual’s degree field and his/her occupation. The study uses the Occupational Information Network (O*NET) to obtain a new measure of the quality of occupational match for a sample of 2268 young adults with post-secondary degrees from the restricted use High School and Beyond (1980/92) data. The study finds that people whose occupations better match their degree fields earn significantly higher returns to post-secondary schooling. This result is robust to controlling for an extensive set of pre-existing differences among individuals, …

Sex Education Decision Making At The Independent School District Of Boise, Annabeth D. Elliott

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

A needs assessment was conducted in Boise in 2008 to address pregnancy, abortion. and sexually transmitted diseases in teens. Key informants indicated students lacked knowledge about sexuality and agreed that comprehensive sex education was the best strategy for improving teen sexual health (Elliott, 2008). Because the Independent School District of Boise (ISDB) had an abstinence-only policy, the strategy could not be implemented until the policy was changed.

The purpose of this case study was to cultivate an in-depth understanding of the influences on sex education policy decisions at the ISDB and to add to the body of knowledge, which may …