Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

"Written In Indian": Creating Legitimized Literacy And Authorized Speakership In Koasati., Stephanie Hasselbacher

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Board Minutes From January 29, 2015-December 8, 2023, Texas Silver-Haired Legislature

Texas Silver-Haired Legislature

Texas Silver-Haired Legislature Foundation and Texas Silver-Haired Legislature Amended Bylaws from 2021 and 2023.

Defense Against Defensiveness: How Important Personal Values Can Promote More Adaptive Responses To Severe Environmental Threat, Kathryn Schuett

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

People respond defensively to threatening risk information about the future. For example, people may respond with denial to threatening information about environmental consequences, resulting in inaction which ironically increases the risk. The current thesis was designed to examine individuals’ responses to future climate change risk when under different types and levels of threat. We predicted defensive response under threat, but also sought to investigate a factor that might mitigate defensiveness: reflecting on personally important values. In Study 1 we sought to examine individuals’ responses to a climate risk message after they were induced to feel low or high personal control …

Starting A Research Data Management Program Based In A University Library, Margaret Henderson, Teresa L. Knott

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

As the need for research data management grows, many libraries are considering adding data services to help with the research mission of their institution. The Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Libraries created a position and hired a director of research data management in September 2013. The position was new to the libraries and the university. With the backing of the library administration, a plan for building relationships with VCU faculty, researchers, students, service and resource providers, including grant administrators, was developed to educate and engage the community in data management plan writing and research data management training.

The War Justified, Margaret T. Kidd

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

This article explores how Methodist ministers, particularly Richmond Christian Advocate editor Rev. James A. Duncan, justified their support of the Confederacy and slavery. Also discussed is the Address to Christians Throughout the World, written by Duncan and signed by ministers of various denominations. It was billed as the "Christian response" to Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation.

Vcuhs Inquiry Process Diagram, Roy E. Brown, Dale Wright, Vcuhs Ebp Translation Committee

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

This diagram outlines the nursing inquiry process when it comes to answering questions that arise in the clinical setting. The diagram shows how a nurse proceeds through the process and when the question is answered though either a evidence based practice project (EBP), a performance improvement (PI) project or when it becomes a research project.

Embedding Into The Nursing Community On An Academic Health Center Campus, Roy E. Brown

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

Objectives: To describe and evaluate the process by which a librarian became embedded into the nursing community on an academic health sciences center campus from 2010-2014. These efforts will be evaluated through qualitative and quantitative measures to determine the success of serving the nurses on campus and to address potential improvements.

Methods: In 2010, the library liaison program was enhanced with the goal of embedding into the professional schools. The nursing liaison leveraged relationships with faculty, staff and students to address the educational, research and clinical needs of the school of nursing as well as the nurses in the health …

Moving Users, Moving Results: Exploring Customer Engagement For Deeper Relationships, Bettina Peacemaker, Jill Stover Heinze

VCU Libraries Faculty and Staff Publications

Successful businesses know that customers make purchase decisions based on a complex bundle of rational and emotional factors that vary in degree and importance depending upon the context. In crowded markets where potential customers have many comparable options, it is often the emotional relationships that they have with businesses that influence where they spend their dollars. Recognizing this reality, businesses have been shifting from transacting with customers to “engaging” with them. This paper outlines the need for librarians to understand engagement more fully, and it points to guidance from the business literature on how to define and create engagement.

Best Practices For Talent Acquisition In 21st-Century Academic Libraries, Kimberley Bugg

Publications and Research

Building a qualified and capable staff to engage students, faculty, and staff in a 21st century academic libraries requires that libraries rethink traditional approaches to recruitment and retention. This article draws attention to four phases: strategic planning, branding, pipe-lining, and candidate experience as essential to talent acquisition.

Is Downsizing Prisons Dangerous? The Effect Of California’S Realignment Act On Public Safety, Jody Sundt, Emily Salisbury, Mark G. Harmon

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications and Presentations

Research Summary: Recent declines in imprisonment raise a critical question: Can prison populations be reduced without endangering the public? This question is examined by testing the effect of California’s dramatic efforts to comply with court-mandated targets to reduce prison overcrowding using a pretest-posttest design. The results showed that California’s Realignment Act had no effect on violent or property crime rates in 2012, 2013, or 2014. When crime types were disaggregated, a moderately large, statistically significant association between Realignment and auto theft rates was observed in 2012. By 2014, however, this effect had decayed and auto theft rates returned to pre-Realignment …

Variations In Specialized Policing Response Models As A Function Of Community Characteristics- A Survey Of Crisis Intervention Team Coordinators, Anna M. Young

Theses and Dissertations

Although a specific program called the Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) has been generally recognized as the best-practice model that addresses the needs of the police officers in responding to mental health calls, many jurisdictions across the country have not only adopted the full CIT model but also have taken the liberty of adding new components and/or removing components of the original model in order to create a unique program that fits the needs of their individual community. The issue of differentiated adaptations of the original CIT model has created a controversy around best practice in the area of police response …

Gender And Representative Bureaucracy: The Career Progression Of Women Managers In Male-Dominated Occupations In State Government, Velma J. Ballard

Theses and Dissertations

The tenets of representative bureaucracy suggest that the composition of the bureaucracy should mirror the people it serves including women in order to influence the name, scope, and implementation of public policies. Women are still underrepresented in mid-to-upper management in male-dominated occupations. When women are under-represented in mid-to-upper levels of management in government, there are implications regarding representative bureaucracy.

This study examined the career progression experiences of women who were successful in reaching mid-to-upper levels of management in male-dominated occupations in state government. Specifically, the study explored how women perceive various occupational factors including their rates of participation, experiences, gender, …

An Evaluation Of The Raise 5 Project: Preventing Hiv And Substance Abuse Among African American College Students, Joshua K. Brevard

Theses and Dissertations

African Americans have been disproportionately affected by HIV since the beginning of the epidemic and the disparities have worsened over time (CDC, 2013a). African Americans comprise about 12% of the U.S. population but represented about 44% of all new HIV infections in 2010 (CDC, 2014a). Young people (age 13–24) accounted for 26% of all new HIV infections in 2010, despite persons in this age range comprising just 17% of the population (CDC, 2014c). Young African Americans (age 13-24) are affected in particular. In 2010, they comprised 57% of infections in this age range (CDC, 2014c). Substance use is a major …

Race & Non-Racial Characteristics In Sentencing Length And Sentencing Type Disparity, Davis A. Estes

Theses and Dissertations

Utilizing data from the United States Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities (SISCF) 2004, this research investigates the possibility that African American drug offenders receive lengthier prison sentences and are imposed more range of time or indeterminate sentences as opposed to flat sentences based on race and/or non-racial characteristics; specifically parole status prior to sentencing, plea agreement status, prior criminal history, education status prior to arrest, employment status prior to arrest, and parental incarceration. While regression analysis revealed racial sentencing disparity for length of sentence and type of sentence (p< .05 and p< .001 respectively), among non-racial characteristics, only education status prior to arrest proved a significant predictor for length of sentence (p≤ .001). African American drug offenders were more likely sentenced to indeterminate sentences as opposed to flat sentences and were less likely to receive short sentences of 0 to 4 years or medium sentences of 4 to 10 years as compared to long sentences of 10 or more years. Potential research implications include the necessity for additional research regarding racial sentencing disparity as length or type of sentences as opposed to disparity as a numerical or a percentage difference between racial groups as well as the utilizing of inmate data that encompasses recent changes in drug sentencing laws, e.g. crack cocaine versus powder cocaine. Future research might also consider the evolution of marijuana laws in the United States and the potential impact on racial sentencing disparity.

Fear, Funding And Ambiguity: The Policy Dilemmas Of Undocumented Students In Virginia Institutions Of Higher Education, Sybil C. Halloran

Theses and Dissertations

Although immigration is considered the responsibility and authority of the federal government, there is no clear federal policy regarding undocumented students and higher education. This leaves the power to regulate undocumented students in higher education to state governments. In Virginia, there is no specific, state-wide policy that addresses undocumented students and admission and enrollment in public higher education. Because of this, policies and practices related to the admission and enrollment of undocumented students are created at the university level. There is, however, state policy in Virginia related to legal immigration status and eligibility for in-state tuition. This creates a complex …

Dispersal: A Multidisciplinary Investigation Of Plant Life, Alexandra E. Arzt

Theses and Dissertations

Using plants as a basis for exploring the interstices between the human and nonhuman, this thesis investigates ideas of awareness, intelligence, deep time, animism, and the fluctuating human perception of the agency of Nature. It outlines environmental art practices since the 1950s involving vegetal life. In addition, the paper provides a critical analysis of plant perception of Jakob von Uexküll’s work and theories of vital materialism and “critical plant studies” while noting recent studies in plant neurobiology. In my work, plants become active participants via their movement, seeding, and smell. This study takes the form of imitation, purposeful symbiosis, anthropomorphism, …

Rebels, Reformers And Empire: Alternative Economic Programs For Egypt And Tunisia, Karen Pfeifer

Economics: Faculty Publications

For 20 years leading up to the uprisings of 2010-2011, Egypt and Tunisia suffered the ill effects of neoliberal economic reform, even as the international financial institutions and most economists hailed them as beacons of progress in the Arab world. For the preceding ten years, workers and civil society organizations led a burgeoning protest movement against the liberalizing and privatizing trajectories of the Mubarak and Ben Ali regimes. Then came the uprisings, which brokered the possibility of not only new political beginnings but also alternative economic programs that would put the needs of the struggling middle, working and poorer classes …

Review Of: Human Development In Iraq, 1950–1990, Bassam Yousif (2013), Karen Pfeifer

Economics: Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Diagnosing An International Health Crisis: A Structural Exploration Of Ebola 2014, Maddison Zayn Jansen

Honors Program Theses

The Ebola crisis of 2014, though concentrated most heavily in three small countries in western Africa, awoke the international community to its lack of effective health crisis infrastructure. As the disease rocked the globe, multinational groups scrambled to help those directly affected and protect the overwhelming majority of people not directly affected. Most preventative measures failed, and pre-existing initiatives to stem the flow of the disease only served to open the floodgates more. After careful examination of the literature surrounding medical, cultural, financial, national, and global circumstances enabling Ebola to flourish, as well as applying individual analysis and examination, it …

Economic Freedom Studies At The State Level: A Survey, Joshua C. Hall, Dean B. Stansel, Danko Tarabar

Economics Faculty Working Papers Series

This chapter synthesizes and elaborates on much of the existing research using the Economic Freedom of North America (EFNA) index. Our consensus after reading this literature is that the EFNA index, similarly to the Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) index, is largely positively related with “good” outcomes, and negatively related with “bad” ones, although there are a few exceptions. The literature using the EFNA is growing rapidly and can provide a useful guide towards future policy changes and economic outcomes.

Financial Competence, Overconfidence, And Trusting Investments: Results From An Experiment, Bryan C. Mccannon, Colleen Tokar Asaad, Mark Wilson

Economics Faculty Working Papers Series

Financial transactions sometimes occur in an environment where third-party enforcement is lacking. Behavioral explanations typically allude to the social preferences, where an individual’s utility is directly affected by another’s outcome, as the driver of the trusting investments and reciprocal returns. We hypothesize that, in part, these decisions are determined by an individual’s financial literacy. Experimental evidence is coupled with an innovative financial literacy assessment, which measures general competence, numeracy skills, and overconfidence in one’s knowledge. Results indicate that overconfidence is a significant determinant of behavior. Specifically, overconfident individuals make larger contributions in the investment game. We also document that there …

Nonpublic Competition And Public School Performance: Evidence From West Virginia, Richard J. Cebula, Joshua C. Hall, Maria Y. Tackett

Economics Faculty Working Papers Series

In this study, we investigate whether nonpublic school enrollment affects the performance of public school districts. If homeschooling and private schools act as competition, public school districts test scores should be positively associated with nonpublic enrollment. Using data on West Virginia county school districts, and controlling for endogeneity with an instrumental variables approach, we find that a one standard deviation increase in relative nonpublic enrollment in a county is associated with statistically significant increases in public school district test scores. Our findings thus confirm that nonpublic enrollment and the competition it provides act to improve, rather than impede, public school …

Explaining The Worldwide Decline In Military Conscription: 1970- 2010, Danko Tarabar, Joshua C. Hall

Economics Faculty Working Papers Series

We empirically investigate the determinants of the decline in compulsory military service (conscription) from 1970 to 2010 using data on military conscription from the Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) index. We find that the probability of a shorter military service time is strongly associated with the percentage of the population over the age of 65 and the size of government, while the presence of political violence works in the opposite direction. Our results are robust to dynamic panel and ordered probit estimations.

Jack Soper: A Pioneer In Economic Education, J.R. Clark, Joshua C. Hall, Ashley Harrison

Economics Faculty Working Papers Series

John “Jack” Soper passed away on August 9, 2013. A prolific researcher who retired as the John J. Kahl Sr. Chair in Entrepreneurship at John Carroll University, Soper was a leading light in the field of economic education. His scholarship in the 1970s and 1980splayed a very important role in establishing the field. In this educational note, we summarize and highlight his contributions to the measurement of economic literacy and the modelling of student learning in the collegiate and precollege classrooms.

Texas Silver-Haired Legislature Foundation Financials Tax Returns 2015-2023, Texas Silver-Haired Legislature

Texas Silver-Haired Legislature

The Texas Silver-Haired Legislature Foundation Financials Tax Returns, 2015-2023.

Bridging The Blue-Green Divide: The Role Of Environmental Ngos In Tackling Environmental Problems In Taiwan, Yttrium Sua

Pomona Senior Theses

This thesis attempts to provide a brief historical outline of the environmental movement in Taiwan and the unique political situation that has directly affected how the movement has progressed. Thereafter, it looks at some examples of environmental disputes that have occurred in recent years, paying special attention to the ways the environmental movement has interacted with the government. This provides the background to frame the analysis, which will shed light on the reasons for the current state of distrust and antagonistic interactions between the environmental movement and the government. Finally, the thesis evaluates whether such interactions with the government is …

Looking Beyond Fossil Fuel Divestment: Combating Climate Change In Higher Education, Robin Xu

Pomona Senior Theses

The young fossil fuel divestment movement is altering the landscape of climate change activism on US campuses. Student-run divestment campaigns are now pushing for institutions of higher education to withdraw their investments from the top 200 public fossil fuel companies. Despite student fervor, however, divestment has remained a controversial tactic for combating climate change. The first half of this thesis examines the stated motives of a selection of institutions that have officially agreed or declined to divest, and investigates the hypothesis that pushing for divestment alone will not achieve broad success because it does not appeal to a wide enough …

Integration And Differentiation As Distinct Dimensions Of Personality, Victoria Claire Oleynick

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Influence Of Emotional Stimuli On Working Memory In Schizotypy, Docia L. Demmin

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.

Stressed, Pregnant, And Behind Bars, Caroline Malory Kelsey

Dissertations, Theses, and Masters Projects

No abstract provided.