Rethinking ‘Feminicide’: The Role Of Organized Crime Groups In Increased Rates Of Feminicide In Mexico, Giselle Figueroa

Undergraduate Honors Theses

Why has feminicide significantly increased in Mexico over the past two decades? Previous feminicide research in Mexico has centered around the idea that the introduction of neoliberal politics changed family structures and increased the vulnerability of women as they entered the workforce. However, this explanation does not fully explain patterns of political violence against women in Mexico. I argue that Mexico’s War on Drugs and the intrinsic patriarchal ideologies and structures of organized crime groups (OCGs) reinforce gender hierarchies and increase the vulnerability of women. To evaluate my argument, I analyze state-level public government data on organized crime and feminicide …

Bad Asians: How Heritage Language Ability And Perception Affects Korean And Chinese College Students’ Identity, Grace Liscomb

Undergraduate Honors Theses

I explore east Asian-Americans’ negotiation of identity through the attitudes they take towards their respective abilities to speak their heritage languages (HL). In this project, heritage language refers to a minority language that children learn at home, typically from parents and family members. Ideologically, I call upon He’s (2006) notion that identity is negotiated through speech. I utilize Corbin and Strauss’ (1990) grounded theory as a method of open analysis. The data I analyze is from 8 sociolinguistic interviews with 3 Korean-Americans and 5 Chinese-Americans. The first round of open coding has revealed a larger theme: in support of the …

Book Review: Diary Of A Rock And Roll Tour Manager: 2,190 Days And Nights With The South’S Premier Rock Band, Judy Reardon

Georgia Library Quarterly

No abstract provided.

A Review Of Health Wearable-Based Physical Activity Interventions Among Children And Adolescents, Suryeon Ryu, Pablo Rodriguez-Gonzalez, Zan Gao

International Journal of Physical Activity and Health

Health wearable technologies have become popular in recent decades to improve individual physical activity (PA) behavior. Thus, this paper aims to examine the health of wearable-based PA intervention among children and adolescents and provide narrative overviews. This paper retrieved articles based on the following inclusion criteria: (1) experimental design; (2) studies among healthy children and adolescents aged from 5 to 18 years; (3) studies using health wearables as a medium to enhance PA or reduce sedentary behavior; and (4) studies with PA assessments as an outcome. Relevant articles were searched based on recent preceding review papers published in 2021 and …

Perceptions Of Sub-Saharan African International Students In United States: Mental Health Concerns And Help-Seeking Behavior, Adekemi L. Ekanoye

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

International students face a lot of challenges while studying abroad, with or without the supportive system that their families provide. Sub-Saharan Africa international students consists of 3.7 percent of the population, which indicates a 2.1 percent increase prior to previous year. While in the host country, this population is saddled with the self-responsibilities of maintaining their values, cultural identities, personality, language ability, self-perceptions, and attitudes. African international students adopt a masking behavior in the form of adaptive strategies that could hide the mental health concerns experienced.

The purpose of this constructivist grounded theory study was to explore the untold lived …

A Pelican's Journey To Flight: A Louisiana National Guardsman, The Development Of The United States Army Air Service, And The Human Cost Of Military Innovation, James H. Smith

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

George E. Dicks deployed to the Mexican Punitive Expedition and World War I with the Louisiana National Guard. He recorded his experience in writing and photography, which reside in the Jackson Barracks Military Museum in Chalmette, Louisiana. His memorabilia reflect an officer’s perspective on early military aviation and parallel to the United States military’s experimentation with aviation. Through experimentation, Dicks became an aerial observer in World War I.

This thesis explores George E. Dicks’ memorabilia and how it both represents the development of the American Air Service and the human cost of military aviation with photographic evidence. By representing aviation’s …

Climate Change And Coastal Megacities: Adapting Through Mobility, Susan S. Ekoh, Lemir Teron, Idowu Ajibade

Geography Faculty Publications and Presentations

Climate change poses threats to individuals, communities, and cities globally. Global conversations and scholarly debates have explored ways people adapt to the impacts of climate change including through migration and relocation. This study uses Lagos, Nigeria as a case study to examine the relationship between flooding events, migration intentions as a preferred adaptation, and the destination choices for affected residents. The study draws on a mixed-methods approach which involved a survey of 352 residents and semi-structured interviews with 21 residents. We use a capability approach to analyze mobility decisions following major or repetitive flood events. We found that the majority …

Awareness And Adoption Of Mobile Technology-Based Library Services In Federal Polytechnics In Southwest Nigeria, Tunde Idris Yusuf, Omotayo Jimoh Jimoh

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

The paper examines the awareness and adoption of mobile technology-based library services in Federal Polytechnic in Southwest Nigeria. To achieve the set objectives, the study adopted descriptive survey with a mixed method that is quantitative and qualitative approaches. The targeted population for the study was registered users for 2021/2022 and 2022/2023 academic sessions of Federal Polytechnics in Southwest Nigeria. The sample size for the study was 390 registered users which represented 10% of the student’s population and 10 library staff was justified by the recommendation made by Nwana (1992). The convenience sampling technique was be used. The data were analysed …

Green Library Initiative In Nigeria: Insights And Levels Of Implementation In Academic Libraries, Emo Okpidi-Urhibo

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Evolution is one recurrent phenomenon that affects almost every facet of human endeavour. Libraries have had their own share in many ways. The green library concept, although, a relatively new-sprung initiative, have not been given full attention. The understanding of librarians, and the levels of adoption of the green library concept in Nigeria is reported herein. The descriptive survey approach was used. Results showed that librarians have the right perception about the concept, and have implemented or currently translating their policies, practices, and services in compliance with environmental sustainability objectives. However, much more needs to be done as the libraries …

Seeking Second Skins, Alisa Scott

University Honors Program Senior Projects

Seeking Second Skins, a mini magazine serving as a slight counter to mainstream fashion reporting. This creative project unpacks clothing’s role in impression management, the modern fashion industry’s role in hypercommercialism and more.

The project will open with images and this conversational note, titled A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR, explaining my process and main ideas:

Hello,

I’m an NEIU senior and University Honors Program member pursuing a bachelor’s in interdisciplinary studies. On November 24, 2020, I donated nine large bags of clothes, shoes and bags. This experience made me wonder how and why people collect material things— clothing specifically. …

Relative Political Capacity: A Dataset To Evaluate The Performance Of Nations, 1960–2018, Ali Fisunoglu, Kyungkook Kang, Tad Kugler, Marina Arbetman-Rabinowitz

Arts & Sciences Faculty Publications

Measuring the ability of governments to implement policy remains one of the most significant questions of political science. This paper presents the latest iteration of the Relative Political Capacity (RPC) dataset and introduces the Absolute Political Capacity measure. It then investigates the trends in political performance measures across time and space, and different political and economic characteristics. Covering 168 countries from 1960 to 2018, the RPC offers a comprehensive measure of state capacity that allows direct comparisons to be made across countries from all levels of development and will help researchers explore different dimensions of capacity and power.

Services Available In The Mixtec Community And The Barriers To Those Services, Currie Bailey Carmon

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Purpose: While outreach and services continue to expand within marginalized communities, this research aims to identify services accessible to the Mixtec population within the North County of San Luis Obispo and identify the barriers to accessing those services. Methods: This study was conducted by interviewing service providers 18 years or older, who work within the Mixtec community in the private sector, child welfare services and within the school settings. The researcher utilized the post positivist paradigm, and data was gathered through semi-structured Zoom interviews with the service providers. Results: The study sample featured 6 participants who work within the Mixtec …

Students' Educational Outcomes For Hybrid Msw Program, Carolina Profeta

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly changed post-secondary social work program mode of learning throughout the nation. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, social work program transitioned from in-person to hybrid a modality. The purpose of this study is to explore the effects of the social work program’s hybrid modality on students’ learning outcomes. Specifically, this study will examine participants’ cognitive presence, perceived effectiveness, and student perceptions. This study is important, as there is no research on social work program’s hybrid modality on students’ learning outcomes. This is a quantitative study and uses online surveys to gather results. The ANOVA and chi …

Livestock Risk Protection: An Analysis Of Coverage Length And Level To Determine Optimal Contract Selection, Logan B. Haviland

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

We evaluate the historically optimal producer-selected coverage options comprised of coverage length and level for each marketing month for various types of livestock insured with Livestock Risk Protection insurance. We begin with feeder cattle steers (600-900lbs) and then analyze the other types of feeder cattle, followed by fed cattle and swine. The optimal contracts are identified as those that have historically provided the highest probability of a positive net return and the highest average net return. We find that regardless of marketing month, the optimal contracts consist of relatively high coverage levels whereas the optimal length of the contracts varies …

Family Communication Patterns, Emotion Regulation, And Coping Behaviors In Young Adults, Caleb J. Price

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Family communication establishes expectations for a variety of behaviors, including emotion expression. This study explored if patterns of family communication were related to five behaviors that young adults might use to cope (drinking alcohol, watching TV, masturbating, eating, and exercising) via emotion regulation strategies. The data used for this study came from 504 young adults living across the United States who completed an online survey which asked them questions about how their family communicated when they were adolescents, their emotion regulation strategies, and how often they use the five coping behaviors listed above. The participants were between 18 and 30 …

Exploring Sex Differences In Conditioned Place Aversion, Houda Hussein Chamseddine

Psychology Theses

Substance use disorder is a chronic condition characterized by cycles of intoxication, withdrawal, and relapse. Negative affective and somatic symptoms commonly accompany cessation of substance use. These symptoms can be incredibly aversive, to the extent that they can be classically conditioned to be associated with cues or environments. Women show greater cue-reactivity to drug-associated stimuli and progress from casual drug use to abuse at a faster rate compared to men. Human and animal literatures strongly suggests that these elevated vulnerabilities in females are associated with changes in levels of circulating ovarian hormones. Studies investigating sex differences and hormonal influences during …

Lost In Your Halo: The Influence Of Group Attractiveness And Diversity On Perceived Group Performance Ratings, Jade C. Chacon

Psychology Theses

Research on attractiveness suggests that more attractive individuals are assumed to have superiority on several traits, such as happiness and extraversion. This is termed the halo effect. Additionally, within the diversity literature, although inconsistent, there is evidence supporting the importance of diversity within a team to promote better group performance and to foster creativity and innovation. This study examined, for the first time, whether the physical attractiveness halo effect applies to groups. Particularly, overall group attractiveness, group diversity, and their interactive influence on perceived group creative performance were examined. This experiment manipulated both the attractiveness and the diversity of the …

Ethnic Group Political Efficacy: Scale Development And Latino Political Participation, Norma Elizabeth Garza Reyes

Psychology Dissertations

Latinos have grown to be the largest ethnic minority group in the U.S. since the 2000 U.S. Census count but have historically voted at lower numbers compared to White Americans. Two studies examined a new construct, ethnic group political efficacy (GPE), to understand better marginalized groups voting participation. Study 1 developed a group political efficacy scale (GPE). Using exploratory factor and item response theory analysis, results revealed that the scale has three factors: internal, external, and power GPE. More importantly, minorities’ voting intent was partially explained by ethnic GPE. Next, a focal second short-term longitudinal study with an online national …

Racialized Experiences Of Covid-19: Help-Seeking Patterns In Response To Racial Discrimination Among Asian American College Students, Jeeyun Lee

Student Theses

In the United States, reported anti-Asian hate crimes increased by 164% from 2020 to 2021, with New York demonstrating a difference of 223% (Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism, 2021). Ample evidence suggested its deleterious emotional impact; COVID-19-associated racial discrimination was found to be significantly associated with increased levels of mental distress, such as anxiety, depression, and PTSD symptoms (e.g., Hahm et al. 2021). With an aim of addressing the significant dearth of research on Asian Americans’ help-seeking behaviors in response to COVID-19-associated racism and distress, this study employed grounded theory to explore the experiences of 10 self-identified …

The Association Between Mental Health Diagnoses And Trial Competency Assessments In Defendants: A Meta-Analysis, Danielle C. Severe

Student Theses

In the realm of trial competency evaluations, there are a variety of methods used to evaluate whether an individual is fit to stand trial. Presently, forensic psychologists conduct trial competency evaluations in order to assess one’s ability to stand trial, but for persons with a mental health diagnosis, the generic competency measures are not the most effective means to assess one’s ability to stand trial, as mental health diagnoses impair cognitive functions that are required in judicial proceedings. Forensic psychologists have opted to utilize other assessment methods such as the MacArthur Competence Assessment Tool – Criminal Adjudication [MacCAT-CA] and Fitness …

“The Same Information Is Given To Everyone”: Algorithmic Awareness Of Online Platforms, Meghan Lindsey Dowell

Theses and Dissertations

After years of discourse surrounding the concept of “filter bubbles,” information seekers still find themselves in echo chambers of their own thoughts and ideas. This study is an exploratory, mixed methods analysis of platform privacy/data policies and user awareness of the personal and usage data collected and user awareness of how platforms use this data to moderate and serve online content. Utilizing Bucher’s (2018) framework to research algorithms through the black box heuristic, this project learns how users inform themselves about data collection and use policies, and their awareness of algorithmic curation. The algorithmic systems that return search results or …

The Perfect Fit? Relationships Between Recreationist-Environment Fit, Benefit Attainment, And Place Attachment, Tristan Jilson

All Theses

Management efficacy in parks and protected areas can be assessed and improved with knowledge about park visitors’ compatibility with the setting, their ability to attain desired visitation or recreational benefits, and the development of place-based connections. Additionally, the relationships between compatibility (i.e., recreationist-environment fit), the attainment of benefits, and place-based connections such as place attachment have been perennial interests to a suite of disciplines, including landscape architecture, urban and regional planning, environmental psychology, conservation social sciences, and human-dimensions of natural resource management. Therefore, this study employed a quantitative, cross-sectional survey research design to determine the degree that the attainment of …

Refinement Of Saliva Microrna Biomarkers For Sports-Related Concussion, Steven D. Hicks, Cayce Onks, Raymond Y. Kim, Kevin J. Kim, Kevin J. Zhen, Jayson Loeffert, Andrea C. Loeffert, Robert P. Olympia, Gregory Fedorchak, Samantha Devita, Zofia Gagnon, Callan Mcloughlin, Miguel M. Madeira, Scott L. Zuckerman, Timothy Lee, Matthew Heller, Chuck Monteith, Thomas R. Campbell, Christopher Neville, Elise Fengler, Michael N. Dretsch

Rehabilitation Sciences Faculty Publications

Purpose

Recognizing sport-related concussion (SRC) is challenging and relies heavily on subjective symptom reports. An objective, biological marker could improve recognition and understanding of SRC. There is emerging evidence that salivary micro-ribonucleic acids (miRNAs) may serve as biomarkers of concussion; however, it remains unclear whether concussion-related miRNAs are impacted by exercise. We sought to determine whether 40 miRNAs previously implicated in concussion pathophysiology were affected by participation in a variety of contact and non-contact sports. Our goal was to refine a miRNA-based tool capable of identifying athletes with SRC without the confounding effects of exercise.

Methods

This case-control study harmonized …

Disaster Risk Perception, Climate Change Awareness, And Disaster Preparedness Among University Of Texas Rio Grande Valley Students, Anandita Roy

Theses and Dissertations

University students are usually young and have low-income resources, live in dormitories or low-rent housing near the university, and have little to no disaster experience. Therefore, they are vulnerable to disasters due to a lack of resources for preparation. To better understand the vulnerability of students to disasters, the study aims to assess the perceptions of disaster risk, climate change awareness, and the level of disaster preparedness of students at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV). In this study, we collected data from 320 students who participated in an online survey. The study’s findings provide an understanding of …

Impacts Of Online Debate On Ipda Inter-Team Communication, Ethan Riley Arbuckle

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This paper looks to analyze the differences in inter-team communication created by the International Public Debate Association’s (IPDA) switch to the virtual debate format. The analysis includes a breakdown of literature covering virtual communication, the history of the IPDA, and virtual debate. Literature has shown negative gender representation, and that virtual communication has significant internal batters to the same function as face-to-face communication. Given the impacts that virtual communication has had on connectivity, and speech patterns this research attempts to find if those impacts have been consistent in its application to the IPDA. The study uses a quantitative survey methodology …

An Examination Of The Legal Responses By United States To Technological Advances In Organized Drug Smuggling, Abdulwahab Aldossary

University Honors Program

Recent advances in technology have aided terrorists in their ability to smuggle drugs in order to finance their operations. Drug trading routes have changed and so have methods of transportation and financial transaction. This study investigates the improved technology utilized by transnational organized crime groups and how the present laws and policies address the use of the improved technology for drug smuggling. The study will first look into the current models, such as the Counter-Terrorist Funding and Money Laundering model, and understand its weaknesses regarding drug smuggling within the United States. Moreover, the paper will focus on the current laws …

Finding Their "Why": Examining The Development Of Sense Of Purpose During The University Years And Its Role In Student Well-Being, Michael Q. King

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Nearly 20 million students were expected to be enrolled for college or university studies during the 2020-2021 academic year. These institutions often advertise to prospective students that, in addition to advancing their education, they will discover their purpose. Given previous work and current interest in sense of purpose, additional attention on sense of purpose in the university setting is worthwhile. In addition, as many university stakeholders are concerned about an ongoing mental health crisis, a further examination into a developmental construct (i.e. sense of purpose) thought to provide a “sheltering fortress in a world of constant threat” seems …

Understanding Parent-Adolescent Transmission Of Values, Jesse P. Higgins

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this dissertation was to better understand the way that parents attempt to influence the values that may influence their adolescent children’s behavior and goals. In the first study, we use a newly created questionnaire, the Transmission of Values Scale or TVS, that measures the use of 27 parenting strategies that influence value transmission. Examples of strategies included in the TVS include being an example of good values, encouraging family discussion about values, and even using coercive strategies like guilt to encourage valued behavior. The results of this study found that these strategies work together to explain how …

County Characteristics And Opioid Mortality Rates In The United States, Baksun Sung

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Opioid overdose deaths are not equally distributed across the United States. While some areas have a less severe problem with opioid abuse, others face serious challenges, which are affected by various social factors. To address that question, in Chapter 1, I investigate how opioid mortality trends differ according to opioid types, race, and region to identify susceptible populations and areas. In Chapter 1, I contend that synthetic opioid is a main trigger for the current opioid epidemic and that the epidemic is concentrated among blacks and in the Eastern United States. Next, the following studies examine how varying social vulnerabilities …

The Relation Between Racial Attitudes And Facets Of Impulsivity, Diana M. Perez

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Racism is an ongoing issue in U.S. society. The present study examined the relation between racial attitudes and two types of impulsivity (i.e., behavioral inhibition and delay discounting). Prior research has not touched upon the relationship between impulsivity and racial bias; nonetheless, the factors that influence the ability to interfere with automatic thinking and bad decision making may be a way to address racial bias. One hundred eighty-seven White adult participants were recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), an online survey taking website. The value participants place on future rewards (i.e., delay discounting) and the ability to stop their behavior …