Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Evidence Informed Strategy To Improve Organizational Learning Engagement, Glenn G. Barton

The Dissertation in Practice at Western University

The ability of an organization to effectively learn and apply knowledge not only equates with highly agile performance, it is increasingly important to surviving in a knowledge based economy. Organizational learning has been widely popularized in recent decades, however defining, coordinating, and maximizing this collective learning capability within organizations remains challenging. In part this difficulty may lie in conflicted views about the purposes of learning and who it benefits, varied ways in which learning or leading it can happen, and most importantly in employee’s different motivations to engage in learning at all. This plan examines organizational learning engagement and targets …

St. Francis Of Assisi Catholic Church And Center For The Deaf Sunday Bulletin, August 16, 2020

Saint Francis of Assisi Catholic Church and Center for the Deaf Sunday Bulletin

A newsletter published for Deaf Catholics in Landover Hills, MD

St. Francis of Assisi Catholic Church and Center for the Deaf Sunday Bulletin Finding Aid

China And Natural Gas: The Importance Of Natural Gas To China With Regard To The South And East China Sea Conflicts, Erin Foelker

Honors Theses

China has a strong interest in natural gas, as it is a resource of which usage can lead to economic growth, energy security, domestic social stability, and reduced climate change impacts. One of the best ways for China to gain easier access to this resource is to obtain legal rights to what they claim is their territory in the South and East China Seas. In this thesis, I review the situations in these two areas and I argue that natural gas is a significant motivator for the conflicts that are occurring.

The Law Of Black Mirror - Syllabus, Yafit Lev-Aretz, Nizan Packin

Open Educational Resources

Using episodes from the show Black Mirror as a study tool - a show that features tales that explore techno-paranoia - the course analyzes legal and policy considerations of futuristic or hypothetical case studies. The case studies tap into the collective unease about the modern world and bring up a variety of fascinating key philosophical, legal, and economic-based questions.

Tech Policy And Legal Theory Syllabus, Yafit Lev-Aretz, Nizan Packin

Open Educational Resources

Technology has changed dramatically over the last couple of decades. Currently, virtually all business industries are powered by large quantities of data. The potential as well as actual uses of business data, which oftentimes includes personal user data, raise complex issues of informed consent and data protection. This course will explore many of these complex issues, with the goal of guiding students into thinking about tech policy from a broad ethical perspective as well as preparing students to responsibly conduct themselves in different areas and industries in a world growingly dominated by technology.

Letter Report, Re: Analysis By Xrf Of Chert And Jasper Artifacts From Antelope Springs, Matthew Boulanger

Anthropology Research

No abstract provided.

Predictors Of Social Distancing And Mask-Wearing Behavior: Panel Survey In Seven U.S. States, Plamen Nikolov, Andreas Pape, Ozlem Tonguc, Charlotte Williams

Economics Faculty Scholarship

This paper presents preliminary summary results from a longitudinal study of participants in seven U.S. states during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to standard socio-economic characteristics, we collect data on various economic preference parameters: time, risk, and social preferences, and risk perception biases. We pay special attention to predictors that are both important drivers of social distancing and are potentially malleable and susceptible to policy levers. We note three important findings: (1) demographic characteristics exert the largest influence on social distancing measures and mask-wearing, (2) we show that individual risk perception and cognitive biases exert a critical role in influencing …

Living With Multiple Sclerosis: A Phenomenological Study Of Worries, Concern And Psychological Problems In Iranian Patients With Ms, Zahra Abdekhodaie, Shahriar Shahidi, Mohammad Ali Mazaheri, Laily Panaghi, Vahid Nejati

The Qualitative Report

Multiple sclerosis (MS), as a progressive and degenerative illness, has an impact on different aspects of individual lives and may lead to difficulties, concerns, and worries in patients. The aim of the present study was to investigate concerns, worries and problems in patients with MS. We used a descriptive phenomenological qualitative approach. Participants were volunteers purposively selected based on their availability. We carried out deep interviews with 15 MS patients and analyzed the detailed information obtained from these interviews by using Colaizzi’s method. We extracted six essential themes and thirty-four sub-themes associated with MS from the content of the interviews. …

“¿Porque No Está En Español?”: Voices Of Latinx Mothers Within The Special Education System In The South Bronx, Anyi Rescalvo '22

Student Scholarship

This research focuses on the barriers Latinx mothers face within the Special Education system in the South Bronx. Using an interview-based qualitative research methodology, I interviewed 10 Latinx mothers in the South Bronx about their experiences navigating the Special Education system and found that the main topics they brought up ranged from: not receiving much guidance from teachers, difficulties with translations, having to self-advocate, enduring emotional labor and self-blaming. All these shared experiences of the 10 participants highlights the need for schools to provide more support to Latinx parents who are not familiar with the Special Education system. Schools need …

Cedarville University Confirms First Positive Covid-19 Case, Mark D. Weinstein

News Releases

Cedarville University leaders were notified today that one student has tested positive for the coronavirus. The student has followed university COVID-19 protocols and is currently in isolation in a separate residence hall on campus. Below is a letter to the Cedarville University campus community from Dr. Thomas White, president, concerning this matter.

Microrna Gene Expression States Underlying Individual Variation In Aging And Lifespan In Isogenic C. Elegans, Holly Kinser

McKelvey School of Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Average lifespan differs greatly between species, but lifespan among same-species individuals is also highly variable. While much effort has been devoted to uncovering longevity-associated traits and lifespan-extending perturbations in humans and model organisms, how differences in lifespan arise between individuals is unknown. Studies of human identical twins demonstrate that surprisingly little of the variation in lifespan between individuals can be explained by genetics and shared environment. Furthermore, even genetically identical C. elegans reared in highly homogeneous environments display a degree of variability in lifespan similar to that of outbred human populations. Thus, longevity must be determined at least in part …

A Mega-Analysis Of Personality Prediction: Robustness And Boundary Conditions, Emorie Danielle Beck

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Decades of research suggest that personality is an important and robust predictor of life outcomes. However, previous investigations of personality-outcome associations have not adequately accounted for reverse causality and selection bias nor have they examined the boundary conditions of the effects, which has left the robustness conditions of personality-outcome associations unknown. The present study examines the robustness and boundary conditions of personality prediction using 14 personality characteristics to predict 14 health, social, education/work, and societal life outcomes across eight different person- and study-level moderators in 10 longitudinal panel studies in a mega-analytic framework coupled with propensity score matching to control …

Decision-Making Difficulty In Major Depression: Understanding Indecisiveness And The Role Of Expected Affect, Haijing Wu Hallenbeck

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Decision-making difficulty is a prevalent symptom among individuals with major depressive disorder (MDD). Decision-making difficulty has been found to be pervasive across different areas of decision-making in current MDD; however, its exact nature for some areas (e.g., indecisiveness) is not well characterized, and the extent to which it is a scar of MDD is not determined. Furthermore, affective disturbances (e.g., in expected affect) have been theorized to contribute to decision-making difficulty in MDD, but empirical studies are needed to test this theory. In my two-study dissertation on depression, Study 1 focused on the dimensionality and validity of indecisiveness, and Study …

Vocational Expectations From Adolescence To Early Adulthood: An Integrative Exploration Of Their Formation, Consistency, Change, And Predictive Value, Leah Hope Schultz

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Career expectations show predictive validity for future job selection and work outcomes above traditional vocational interest inventories, yet are rarely tracked longitudinally. The current study explored characteristics of adolescents’ freely reported career expectations by examining their formation, typical trajectories of their development, individual differences in their development, and their utility as predictors of life outcomes. Though some past research has examined longitudinal trends in adolescents’ career expectations, this was the first study to assign dimensional RIASEC scores to participants’ expected occupations rather than a single categorical code. Using data from 21,444 students in the High School Longitudinal Study (HSLS 09:16; …

Safekeeping: Slavery, Capitalism, And The Carceral State In Washington, D.C., 1830-1863, Brandon Wilson

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

By the 1830s, incarceration emerged as a two-pronged solution for racial control and economic expansion. Local and federal government built jails around the District of Columbia to detain "rowdy negro boys," men, and women, as a means to stymie their rapid movement and fuel a burgeoning domestic slave trade. People were jailed, fined, and often sold to the Deep South, providing a wellspring of capital for enslavers, justified through the lens of criminality. For the crime of petty theft, missing free papers, or in at least one case "using foul language," black people of the Washington region could find themselves …

Self-Efficacy In The Transition To Parenthood, Nicole Marsden

Doctoral Dissertations

The transition to parenthood is considered both an exciting and inherently stressful time. The related changes and challenges may be associated with increased levels of anxiety and depression. Parental self-efficacy (PSE), or parents’ perceived ability to succeed at parenting-related tasks and challenges, may be both a product and predictor of mental health during this time. There is little research on the relationship between general self-efficacy (GSE) and PSE, although theory suggests that GSE may influence PSE. This quantitative study utilizes a longitudinal and dyadic design to examine the relationship between GSE, PSE, and mental health across the transition to parenthood …

Experiences Of Latinx's Adult Transition To The U.S. And The Clinical Implications That Arise In Acclimating Into The Dominant Culture: An Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis, Gabriela Olavarrieta

Doctoral Dissertations

There has been a significant gap in the literature regarding the lived experience of the Latinx adult transition to the United States and the clinical implications that arise in acclimating to the dominant culture, particularly under the Trump Administration. The approach for the current research examined Latinxs’ adulthood transitions to the United States, experiences of acculturative stress, including instances of discrimination as well as their experiences acclimating or assimilating into the dominant culture. This study also examined what seeking, or being unable to seek, mental health services looked like in the current sociopolitical climate. Interpretive phenomenological analysis was utilized to …

A Qualitative Evaluation Of The Phoenix Project: A Strengths-Based, Trauma-Informed Care Intervention For African American, Transitional Age, Young Adults Living In San Francisco’S Public Housing Community, Lena Miller

Doctoral Dissertations

A QUALITATIVE EVALUATION OF THE PHOENIX PROJECT: A STRENGTHS-BASED, TRAUMA-INFORMED CARE INTERVENTION FOR AFRICAN AMERICAN, TRANSITIONAL AGE, YOUNG ADULTS LIVING IN SAN FRANCISCO’S PUBLIC HOUSING COMMUNITY

Abstract

Persistent community violence has had a profound and destructive impact on many urban communities throughout the country. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) resulting from community violence is becoming an increasingly frequent diagnosis of African American youth and young adults residing in San Francisco’s Bayview-Hunters Point (BVHP) community (San Francisco Department of Public Health, 2012). The Phoenix Project was designed to specifically address and heal symptoms of trauma and facilitate resilience among youth and young …

Indonesia’S Mental Health Services: Availability And Current Challenges, Alexander Gronowski

Master's Projects and Capstones

The deep deficits in Indonesia’s mental health care system seem to currently lack explanation. While Indonesia’s economic growth may outstrip even that of its neighbors, the country still appears to significantly lack parity in provided mental health resources. Due to the paucity in available information and studies on the topic, this paper seeks to inspect the issue directly through the use of direct interviews supplemented by available literature. Through the interviews of Indonesian self-identified patients, non-patients, and mental health care providers, it appears that the apparent weak state of Indonesia’s mental health care system stems from widely held cultural beliefs. …

The Masks We Wear In The Workplace Masquerade: An Examination Of Antecedents Of Facades Of Conformity And The Impact Of Abusive Supervision, Kevin Sansberry Ii

Dissertations

Years of research conducted into abusive supervision (Tepper, 2000) have provided a greater understanding of how abusive supervision impacts workers including various negative outcomes as well as employee coping mechanisms. One of the possible ways that an employee may respond to abusive supervision is feigning their agreement with organizational values. The literature is somewhat deficient, however, in examining the manifestation of these facades of conformity (Hewlin, 2003). In this study, the relationship between abusive supervision and facades of conformity was examined, as well as several moderators of this relationship. The results indicated that abusive supervision was positively and significantly related …

On Staying Open While Seeing Red: Predicting Open-Mindedness And Affect In Politics, Emily Hanson

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines whether people who claim to be dispositionally open-minded, do in fact, demonstrate such open-mindedness when they are actually presented with political opinions that run counter to their own. In Study 1, participants rated their partisan identity and dispositional open-mindedness prior to reacting to a series of fictional Facebook posts that varied in both their political ideology and political extremity. The results of this study demonstrated that the most consistent predictor of �open� reactions (operationalized in terms of both cognitive judgements and affective reactions) to each type of Facebook post was whether it was congruent with the participants� …

Schisms And Boundaries: Islamic Organizations And Sectarianism Between South Asia And Spain, Guillermo Martín-Sáiz

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Since the September 11 attacks, numerous researchers—from security experts and political scientists to sociologists and anthropologists—have discussed how Islamic organizations establish within mosques across Europe and spread sectarianism among Muslims in the region. While these researchers have provided valuable insights, the dynamics that characterize the relationship between these mosques and organizations and the resulting sectarianism seem far from self-explanatory and remain rather unclear.

This dissertation focuses on how the intersections between global and local phenomena—the so-called War on Terror and Clash of Civilizations on the one hand, and urban transformations and gentrification on the other—shape support for—and opposition to—Islamic organizations …

Adding Production To High Variability Phonetic Training, Caleb Crosby

Honors Theses

The effectiveness of adding a production component to a High Variability Phonetic Training (HVPT) regimen to improve native Japanese speaker’s pronunciation of English [b], [v], [f], and [h] was investigated. L1 Japanese-speaking English learners were recruited as participants, and a pretest-posttest procedure was used to evaluate improvement at production of the target consonants. For the pretest and posttest, recordings were taken of participants pronouncing twelve tokens, and the recordings were rated for intelligibility by a phonetically trained native English-speaking rater. Participants were divided into two groups. Group A received only HVPT training, and group B received a regimen of half …

The State Of Journal Production And Access 2020: Report On Survey Of Society And University Publishers

Copyright, Fair Use, Scholarly Communication, etc.

“The State of Journal Production and Access” survey ran between March and June 2020 and received 63 responses from individuals working with academic organizations that publish one or more peer-reviewed journals independently (i.e., not outsourced to a separate publisher). The survey encompassed questions in two areas: 1. journal production, including article formatting, layout, and metadata tagging practices and priorities; and 2. journal access, including publishers’ current access and funding models as well as respondents’ perceptions of the viability of alternate options. Among the main findings on the topic of journal production were: • Less than half of publishers surveyed reported …

Landesque Capital And Community Organization In A Maya Economic Center: A Case Study At Salinas De Los Nueve Cerros, Guatemala, Alexander Ernesto Rivas

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Many ancient Maya lowland cities developed water-rich landscapes that met the multiple needs of growing populations. The development of landesque capital, in which permanent changes in infrastructure, water procurement, and agricultural productivity are best understood at sites with a long history of occupation. Salinas de los Nueve Cerros was an ancient Maya center that was occupied for approximately 2000 years, surviving the ‘Maya Collapse.’ This site, located in the Maya lowlands, had ties to both highland and lowland communities through its primacy in exporting salt. However, what is not yet understood is whether the commercial population of Nueve Cerros practiced …

Sustainable Diets For Planetary Health: A Study Of Indigenous Based Agri-Food Systems In A Community Of The Central Highlands Of Ecuador, Carlos Andres Gallegos-Riofrio

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

In order to explore the psychosocial and agroecological dimensions of sustainable diets and their roles in the rural Andean community of Caliata in the Ecuadorian highlands, I conducted a community-centered participatory mixed-methods study. Thirty-nine focus groups and ten key informant interviews were conducted, recorded, translated, transcribed, and analyzed using three-stage coding. The information was triangulated using participant observation, local records, and descriptive statistics from a survey of 57 female household heads, which included a modified 48-hour dietary recall module. Rural appraisal research assessed agroecological dimensions. Ten purposively selected sites were studied alongside local informants in order to obtain diversity indexes …

Personalized Models Of Social Anxiety Disorder And Depression, Marilyn L. Piccirillo

Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is an important risk factor for major depressive disorder (MDD) and together this comorbidity constitutes a highly impairing syndrome and vicious cycle of symptomatology, associated with tremendous health costs and societal burden. Despite much group-level research examining risk factor for MDD specifically, there is limited group and individual-level research evaluating how individuals with SAD transition into depressive episodes. Clinical and theoretical evidence suggests that each patient may exhibit a unique personalized pattern of risk factors. These idiographic patterns may contradict relationships seen at the group level. In this dissertation, women (N = 35) with SAD and …

Renewable-Energy Resources, Economic Growth And Their Causal Link, Yiyang Chen

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis examines the presence and strength of predictive causal relationship between re-newable energy prices and economic growth. We look for evidence by investigating the cases of Norway, New Zealand, and Canada’s two provinces of Alberta and Ontario. The usual vectorautoregressive model (VAR) and its various improved versions still assume constant parametersover time. We devise a Markov-switching VAR (MS-VAR) model in order to accommodate the observed time-dependent causal relation changes. Our proposed modelling approach is induced by the hidden Markov model methodologies in terms of an online parameter estimationthrough recursive filtering. The parameters of the MS-VAR model are governed by …

Exploring How Social Networks Contribute To African Immigrants’ Ability To Procure A Sustainable Livelihood In New York City, Richmond Opoku Donyina

Capstone Collection

This research explores the effects of social networks on the ways that African immigrants in New York City secure, and sustain their livelihoods. Through lines of inquiry including social capital, livelihood resources, and economic activities, this research explores possible livelihood outcomes of Africans immigrants in New York City in relation to their social networks. By exploring themes through case studies of immigrants from different countries on the African continent, this research illustrates how becoming embedded in social networks in ones’ geographical jurisdiction widens an individual’s social capital, which in turn contributes to the probability of that individual in securing and …

Spanish Language And Culture In Buenos Aires And Córdoba, Argentina, Sarah Eidt

Capstone Collection

The Spanish Language and Culture in Buenos Aires and Córdoba, Argentina program is a theoretical faculty-led multi-site semester-long program that is designed for Boston University students for the fall semester of 2022. The purpose of the program is to give student participants the opportunity to learn Argentine history and culture at two distinct locations with different sets of host families and speaking partners, while visiting contrasting regions around Argentina in order to obtain a more complete understanding of the country. Students will become more proficient in the Spanish language and gain a greater understanding of Argentine culture by immersing in …