Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

When Does The Straw Break The Camel's Back?: Examination Of The Exclusion-Elicited Anti-Social Behavior Model, Douglas Phillip Cooper

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Being excluded should motivate pro-social behaviors. Yet, exclusion can incite aggressive and anti-social responses. Two studies were conducted to examine how frequent experiences of exclusion impact self-esteem, perceptions that exclusion is typical of social experiences, and anti-social behaviors. In Study 1, participants completed pre and post-measures of exclusion typicality and self-esteem and reported, over eight weeks, feelings of exclusion and state self-esteem. Results supported the hypotheses in that experiences feeling excluded have direct and indirect effects on state and trait self-esteem as well as on exclusion typicality. In Study 2, participants were exposed to an exclusion manipulation and subsequent aggressive …

School Uniforms, Nicole Waytenick Reuter

Graduate Research Papers

The need for education reform is evident in public schools across the nation. Researchers, school officials, parents, and teachers have been looking at different ways to promote a better learning environment that will allow students to feel safe, equal, and free to express themselves in different ways within the classroom. In recent years, many of these same people have contended that implementing school uniform policies within schools is the way to create that kind of learning environment.

Within this paper, a closer look at the issues surrounding school uniform policies will be examined. Both sides of the issues will be …

Administration Response Of Nonprofit Organizations Due To The 2007-2009 Recession, Kelsey Belle Marie Wegner

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

In December of 2007, a recession began in the United States that affected nearly every aspect of the economy. The Great Recession created a global meltdown of numerous sectors including the nonprofit sector. The nonprofit sector is a significant part of the United States economy, making up more than 10 percent of employment and has approximately 1.4 million nonprofit organizations registered with the Internal Revenue Service. The researcher examined what effect the recession had on nonprofit organizations. The purpose of the study is to determine how the recession that began in 2007 has impacted 501(c) nonprofit organizations in five United …

A Study Of The Relationship Between Mental Toughness And Success In College Basketball, Nathan T. Oakland

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Mental toughness has been viewed as a vital attribute and characteristic in the world of athletics since the beginning of sport. Mental Toughness began to gain notoriety in the public forum however, when Vince Lombardi won Super Bowl I in 1967 as the Head Coach of the Green Bay Packers. Coaches and athletes alike often speak of mental toughness and its importance, though in the world of athletics, the challenge has been the overall lack of a sound definition of mental toughness. Until recently, research has been sparse on the topic which has led to confusion and misunderstanding of mental …

A Descriptive Study Of The Leadership Behaviors Of Ncaa Division I And Ii Head Basketball Coaches As They Pertain To The Path-Goal Theory, Troy Curtis Muilenburg

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this study was to examine perceived leadership behaviors of National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I and II men's basketball head coaches. Specifically, this study examined the training and instruction, social support, and positive feedback behaviors as assessed using the Leadership Scale for Sport (LSS) (Chelladurai & Saleh, 1980). A secondary purpose was to examine potential relationships between these behaviors, win/loss percentages, and head coaching experience. Based on path-goal theory, it was hypothesized that the scores for the training and instruction, social support, and positive feedback behaviors would be high, and there would be a positive relationship …

Analysis Of Selected Team Performance Measures And Their Correlation With Game Outcome In 1-Aa College Football, John Paul Hildebrand

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

While the popularity of American Football has grown over the last century, so has the complexity with which the game is played. The hours spent by coaches, players, fans, and experts dissecting every aspect of the game is astonishing. While some people analyze football as a hobby or to report the game, coaches and player's careers are drastically affected by what they can draw from the data research. Statistical analysis strategies in football have become more complex and more widespread over the last 25 years, particularly since the use of computers and computer software has become so common place. Any …

The Social Origin Of Violent Behavior, Todd Arthur Mensink

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

This study examines the social origins of extremely violent behavior. Numerous explanations of violent offenders have focused on biological, psychological, environmental or a combination of these factors to explain violence. Most explanations of violent behavior fail to take a holistic approach to understand the cause of violent behavior. This study is an analysis of the applicability of the violentization theory. Data was obtained through in-depth semi-structured interviews from six violent offenders in a residential treatment faciIity in the Midwest. Findings indicate that for most offenders, the violentization theory is consistent with their social experiences. However, two exceptions pertained to the …

Accelerated Reader And Sustained Silent Reading's Impact On Students' Motivation To Read, Amy Benedict

Graduate Research Papers

The purpose of this study was to determine if students' motivation to read is influenced by the use of Accelerated Reader or SSR in their school. Fourth grade students had been selecting books to read based on Accelerated Reader levels. After reading each book the students took a quiz. SSR was implemented for two weeks to determine if students' attitudes towards reading would improve.

A mixed-methods approach was used in this research design. Quantitative data were collected through the MRP survey, administered both before the introduction of SSR and after implementing SSR. Qualitative data were collected through an individual conversational …

Student Motivation And No Child Left Behind, Tiffany Kleckner

Graduate Research Papers

The No Child Left Behind Act was developed in 2002 by the administration of George W. Bush. The purpose of this piece of legislation was to increase student achievement in America. Regulations and requirements have been put in place by the administration such as standardized testing. This paper discusses the history of NCLB, the current issues with the legislation, and how student motivation and achievement has been effected due to the NCLB law.

Life Of Chaos, Life Of Hope: Dystopian Literature For Young Adults, Lisa Newgard

Graduate Research Papers

As dystopian literature grows in popularity, teacher librarians many not fully understand the themes found within this new subgenre. The purpose of this research was to describe the themes in positively reviewed dystopian literature for young adults. Themes found during the research included: resilience of the protagonist, survival, government control, social conformity, and love between the protagonist and another young adult. Novels from 2001-2010 were analyzed for themes and lessons for young adults. Thirteen positively reviewed novels were chosen, read, and coded by the researcher. After the first reading of the novels, one novel was eliminated, leaving 12 novels to …

Are Students Ready For Post-Secondary Research?, Paula Winward

Graduate Research Papers

According to faculty interviews, entering college freshmen frequently did not exhibit consistent knowledge of information literacy skills needed to be successful. Schools have increasingly used models of team teaching between librarians and professors to ensure students have information literacy skills. The purpose of this study was to explore the expectations and deficiencies in information literacy skills of entering college freshmen. The researcher questioned professors about (1) what skills they expected college freshmen to have, (2) students dispositions and responsibilities, (3) research inadequacies of students, and (4) the effect they felt using embedded librarians would have in other college departments. The …

Supervision In The School Library Program: Administrator Expectations Of Paraprofessionals And Traveling Teacher Librarians, Dixie Forcht

Graduate Research Papers

The purpose of this grounded theory research was to develop an understanding of administrators' expectations of the responsibilities, roles, and tasks of paraprofessionals and teacher librarians in Iowa schools where the teacher librarian travels between three or more buildings while paraprofessionals serve in the day-to-day operations of the school library. The findings from this research indicated that individuals involved in the upper echelons of administration and support for public schools possessed knowledge about and expectations for the role of school library programs, teacher librarians, and library paraprofessionals in Iowa schools. Because invited school-level administrators were unwilling to participate in this …

Pce Groundwater Quality Assessment Of The University Of Northern Iowa Campus Area, Brian Gedlinske

Graduate Research Papers

Perchloroethylene (PCE), is a colorless, nonflammable, and relatively insoluble chlorinated solvent once widely used for dry cleaning and metal degreasing operations. Because of its past widespread use, poor solvent management practices, and environmental persistence, PCE is a common contaminant found in groundwater supplies. Potential health concerns include liver problems and increased cancer risk.

This research paper presents the findings of an effort to better characterize the spatial, temporal, and transport attributes of a PCE groundwater plume that exists within the Devonian aquifer underlying the University of Northern Iowa campus and the surrounding area in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Findings reveal the …

Transforming Lives: Exploring The Impact Of Transitioning On Female-To-Male Transpersons And Partners Of Female-To-Male Transpersons, Megan Marie Tesene

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Recent trends in gender scholarship point to an increased research focus on transidentified persons. However, the majority of it revolves around the experiences of transpersons as individuals while ignoring the influence that transitioning has on intimacy in personal relationships. Furthermore, while previous research on FtM transpersons tends to emphasize the benefits that transmen receive from transitioning, the current study focuses on some of its negative implications. Through ten semi-structured, in-depth interviews, this research explores the experiences of four transmen and six partners of transmen who were involved in a romantic relationship during the transition process. My findings indicate that transitioning …

Risk Factors For Driving Cessation Vary By Race And Ethnicity, Elizabeth Dugan, Frank Porell, Chae Man Lee

Gerontology Institute Publications

Driving is related to our identity and independence as well as allowing us to get needed goods, services, and social opportunities that enrich daily life. Yet with increasing age, the risk for developing threats to medical fitness to drive increases. Driving cessation is related to a long list of negative outcomes, such as: depression, social isolation, diminished access to health care, and diminished quality of life. We investigated risks for driving cessation, paying close attention to racial differences. This study used data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), 1998-2008. The study included N=46, 528 older people (age 65 and …

The Obstacles To The Integration Of Muslims In Germany And France: How Muslims And The States Impair The Smooth Transition From Immigrant To Citizen, Yael R. Cohen

Masters Theses

The place of Islam has been an ongoing debate for decades and still remains unresolved. Since the inception of the guest worker program initiated by European countries following the devastation of WWII, particularly France and Germany, Europe’s largest economies, the unanticipated occurred; what was conceived to be a temporary imported labor force which would eventually return home, turned into permanent settlement. For France, the labor pool emanated from colonial holdings predominantly from Maghreb, North Africa. Germany had no such labor source, but had a long ongoing relationship with Turkey which dated back to the Ottoman Empire. The entrance of this …

The Ramat Bet Shemesh Regional Project: Landscapes Of Settlement From The Paleolithic To The Ottoman Periods, Yehuda Dagan

IAA Reports—Monograph Series of the Israel Antiquities Authority

The Ramat Bet Shemesh Project was a high-resolution regional study of an area in the Judean Shephelah designated for urban developments, which aimed at recording the ancient remains as well as the natural environment that were to be completely destroyed. The first volume, the Gazetteer (IAA Reports 46), described all the sites surveyed during the project, as well as the results of 100 small-scale excavations. This second volume presents the methodology and field techniques of the project, the ecological and environmental studies, the use of GIS technology, and discussions of the settlement patterns and agricultural activity of each period, as …

Bet She’An Ii: Baysān The Theater Pottery Workshop, Rachel Bar-Nathan, Walid Atrash

IAA Reports—Monograph Series of the Israel Antiquities Authority

This is the second volume of publications of the Bet She’an Archaeological Project, the large-scale IAA excavations at the site of Bet She’an – ancient Nysa-Scythopolis. In the Umayyad period, the southern part of the Roman-Byzantine city, now known as Baysān, was converted to industrial use. This volume describes the excavation of the pottery workshop in the Severan theater, one of the largest in Umayyad Baysān, as well as the pottery and glass finds, and discusses traditional pottery workshops and production processes of the period.

The Jewish Studies Book Awards: A Collection Development Strategy For Non-Sectarian Academic Libraries, Izabella Taler

Publications and Research

Article provides an alternative method of building quality collections for Jewish Studies collection development professionals in small and medium-sized academic libraries

Six Titans Of The Cambridge School: A Review Article, Harvey Gram

Publications and Research

Six volumes in the Great Thinker in Economics Series were chosen by the Editors for this review, which focuses on The Cambridge School of Economics, so very different from the mainstream theory of general economic equilibrium which gives formal expression to Lionel Robbins’ famous definition of the subject as the allocation of scarce means among alternative uses. In recognition of a distinct Cambridge School, the authors of these volumes present a variety of arguments within which three overlapping themes can be discerned: the relationship between ethics and economics; the role of stocks and flows in economic analysis; and the epistemic …

That Is Bad! This Is Good: Morality As Constructed By Viewers Of Television Reality Programs, Joseph Charles Losasso

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Reality shows that feature people going about their presumed daily lives are not base entertainment. Internet message boards about reality programs are sites where moral work happens. Viewers write about the appearance and actions of show characters and construct moral lessons. Through naturally occurring data produced by fans of these shows, I find that viewers generally express a traditional heteronormative morality around class and gender through stating moral lessons, explaining what is wrong with the characters, or through ridicule and praise.

General Strain Theory And Juvenile Delinquency: A Cross-Cultural Study, Wen-Hsu Lin

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

General strain theory (GST) (Agnew, 1992, 2001, 2006a) is an established criminological theory. Although the theory has been examined by many and enjoys empirical support, some limitations of previous studies need to be addressed. First, previous studies have not incorporated all major types of strain in their models; hence, the effects of these strains on delinquency are unclear. Second, many previous studies did not include negative emotions and even negative emotions other than anger. Finally, and the most serious limitation, many previous studies rely heavily on samples from Western countries, mostly the U.S.; thus, possible cultural influences are ignored. Although …

Road-Based Landscape Metrics For Quantifying Habitat Fragmentation, Rebecca Whitehead Loraamm

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Landscape metrics measure the composition and configuration of habitats within landscapes; often the goal is to measure fragmentation. While a variety of existing metrics characterize the connectivity and contiguity of habitat patches, most do not explicitly consider the fragmenting effects of roads in their formulations. This research develops a set of new landscape metrics that explicitly quantify how roads disconnect and break apart habitat patches. This research introduces the following four metrics to consider the fragmenting effects of transportation networks: (1) Number of Connected Patches, a measure of connectivity; (2) Euclidean Nearest Neighbor-Roads, a measure of proximity; (3) Road Density, …

Transition Experiences Of Adolescent Survivors Of Childhood Cancer: A Qualitative Investigation, Alana Delores Lopez

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Adolescent survivors of childhood cancer are a growing population with unique needs as they face a combination of challenges associated with normal development and returning to life after treatment completion (Wakefield et al., 2010). One specific need identified in the research literature includes the effective delivery of transitional care and planning (Hewitt, Greenfield, & Stovall, 2005). It has been suggested that the provision of transition care and planning can help facilitate the shift from one phase of care to another and promote positive transition experiences (National Cancer Institute, 2008). The shift from off-treatment to post-treatment and school reintegration have been …

Operational Performance Evaluation Of Four Types Of Exit Ramps On Florida's Freeways, Linjun Lu

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research focuses primarily on the analysis of exit ramp performance related to safety and operations. The safety analysis focuses on the impacts of different exit ramp types for freeway diverge areas and different factors contributing to the crashes that occur on the exit ramp sections. The operational analysis is based mainly on simulations by TSIS-CORSIM. Different ramp effects and guidance for selecting optimal exit ramp type are concluded. Issues related to ramp sections and crossroad sections are also demonstrated. Minimum ramp length and minimum distance between ramp terminal and downstream or upstream intersections are calculated. The operational analysis was …

Internet Use And Economic Development: Evidence And Policy Implications, Joseph J. Macdougald

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation explores how Internet use impacts four different measures of economic development using several econometric techniques on multi-country panel data. The economic development outcomes investigated are: per capita GDP, per capita export revenues, per capita market capitalization, and societal well-being as measured by the United Nations Human Development Index (HDI). Data from the World Bank, the International Telecommunication Union, and the United Nations –covering 202 countries over the period 1996 to 2007– are combined to allow for empirical investigation using dynamic panel data and finite mixture model estimation techniques on the total sample and subsamples stratified by country income …

Framing 10/12 And 3/11 In American And European News, Andrea Lypka

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This media analysis of the incidents in Bali in 2002 (10/12) and Madrid in 2004 (3/11) reveals the black and white portrayal of these attacks in western news through the localization of international terrorism occurrences, pro-government perspective, and internalization of U.S. policies. The Old Europe and New Europe debate further fractures the European press. Such rhetoric perpetuates the "us versus them" schism by contrasting the goals of the alleged perpetrators with the western values of democracy and freedom. Governmental sources remain central news sources during these crises. In addition, 9/11, war on terrorism, and fear from further attacks dominate news …

Repeated Binge Pattern Ethanol Administration During Adolescence Or Adulthood: Long-Term Changes In Voluntary Ethanol Intake And Mesolimbic Dopamine Functionality In Male Rats, Antoniette Michelle Maldonado-Devincci

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Binge alcohol consumption is a rising concern in the United States, especially among adolescents as during this developmental period alcohol use is usually initiated and has been shown to cause detrimental effects on brain structure and function. These findings have been established through the use of binge models in animals, where animals are repeatedly administered high doses of ethanol typically over a period of three or four days. While such work has examined the effects of a four-day and repeated three-day binge, there has been almost no work conducted aimed at investigating the long-term behavioral and neurochemical and/or functional consequences …

The Relationship Between Systems-Change Coaching And Levels Of Implementation And Fidelity Of Problem-Solving/Response To Intervention (Ps/Rti), Amanda March

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study examined the extent to which coaching facilitates the successful implementation of the Problem-Solving/Response to Intervention (PS/RtI) model in schools, as well as the extent to which coaching enhances the fidelity of implementation of PS/RtI practices in those schools. Data from 34 schools in seven districts participating in three years of a statewide initiative to implement PS/RtI practices with assistance of a PS/RtI coach were used to evaluate the relationship between coaching activities and levels of implementation and integrity outcomes. Data on various coaching-related factors (i.e., perceived coaching quality, coach continuity, frequency and duration of training and technical assistance), …

The Influence Of Meteorological Parameters On Rainfall And Severe Weather In Pinellas County, Fl, Cristina A. Mazza

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Pinellas County is located on a peninsula in Florida that experiences daily patterns of sea breeze associated rainfall mainly during the summer months of June through August. Previously, rainfall patterns, amounts and timing and severe weather in Pinellas County have not been examined considering dominant wind flow patterns, sea breeze circulations and other atmospheric variables. To improve forecasting of local mesoscale phenomena, this project examined the rainfall patterns, amounts and timing and severe weather occurrences that occur as a result of sea breezes and associated prevailing wind regimes within Pinellas County for the months of June, July and August for …