VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Genetics and Epigenetics of Suicidal Behavior

According to the latest World Health Organization report (2012), suicide was the second leading cause of death among people. Approximately 90% of suicide victims or suicide attempters are diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder. Schizophrenia patients have been shown to be at an increased risk for suicide. Although many risk factors have been identified, few of these factors have a significant clinical impact on predicting suicide. Whether genetic and epigenetic alterations are potential risk factors for suicidal behavior in schizophrenia has yet to be investigated. A well-characterized sample of schizophrenia patients with a distinct suicide attempt history was recruited to evaluate the influence of genetic and epigenetic alterations as potential risk factors for suicidal behavior. Sociocultural and clinical variables were also examined. Selected genes were genotyped to test whether independently or combined, specific clinical variables and DNA variants can accurately predict suicidal behavior. Our study found no evidence that genetic or epigenetic factors have a significant influence on the risk for suicidal behavior in schizophrenia.

Keywords: CpG
DNA methylation
Epigenetics
Schizophrenia
single-nucleotide polymorphism
Suicidal behavior
Advisor: De Luca, Vincenzo
The Deep Metaphors of Dads’ Discourse: Exploring Conceptual Frameworks of Fatherhood

When parental leave for fathers comes into effect across Canada next year, public health agencies will start feeling pressure to design services that support father engagement in the first years of children’s lives. Unfortunately, those agencies have little knowledge of their target market. To support prospective health-promotion initiatives, I used Zaltman’s (2003) metaphor elicitation techniques as data gathering and analysis tools to explore the conceptual frameworks of engaged fathers in the Greater Toronto Area. With these techniques, I was given over 40 JOURNEY-centric or CONNECTION-centric images by fathers, which I used in 1:1 interviews to uncover a novel set of father-derived, values-based, emotionally compelling ways of thinking and talking about fathering. CONNECTION and JOURNEY were the deep metaphors engaged fathers used most. Typically, fathering was conceptualized as the most meaningful and important JOURNEY of CONNECTION a man could have across his life course. The main feelings of JOURNEY were joy, happiness, satisfaction, anticipation, hope, and pride. But often alongside those feelings were others, such as a worry, doubt, and frustration with regard to these fathers’ desire to implement their ideals. CONNECTION referred to a mutual sense of engagement, attachment and belonging between a father and his children. It felt joyous and deeply satisfying, while DISCONNECTION felt lonely and isolating. JOURNEY and CONNECTION were linked with three other deep metaphors—RESOURCE, CONTROL and BALANCE—each of which is described in detail within. These findings provide public health researchers with greater knowledge and appreciation of the imagery and mental models engaged fathers use to describe, understand and inspire their fathering. This novel view into engaged fathers’ conceptual frameworks can be used by public health practitioners to better engage fathers in public health programming in order to benefit the health of Ontario’s youngest children and their families.

Keywords: deep metaphors
early childhood development
father involvement
metaphor analysis
metaphor elicitation
public health
Advisor: MacNeill, Margaret
Norman, Cameron
In Pursuit of Guitar Excellence: The Effects of a Multifaceted Approach to Performance Training

The aim of this research is to study the effects of a many-sided training approach on classical guitarists currently at the outset of their professional career. Students from the University of Toronto were invited to participate in this six-week study that exposed them to various mental and physical exercises designed to model the multifaceted training approach of professional athletes. Prior to the study, interviews were conducted with mental health practitioners, physical training specialists, and professional classical guitarists to gather their opinions on performance optimization and to help inform the investigation period. The study was carried out using practical action research, and was comprised of a two-week initial period, followed by a four-week intervention period. Qualitative data from self-efficacy scales, self-assessment forms, and adjudication forms was used to assess the effectiveness of the mental and physical exercise interventions. Results from the intervention indicate that classical guitarists would benefit from incorporating mental and physical training exercises into their preparatory actions, as shown through improvements in performance self-efficacy. Future studies that include larger participation numbers and a longer intervention period could result in greater, more widespread implications for classical guitarists.

Keywords: guitar excellence
guitar performance
musical self-efficacy
music and health
musicians and athletes
performance optimization
Advisor: McFadden, Jeffrey J
Characterization and Functional Improvement of Nanoporous Metals

Dealloying of binary AgAu and ternary AgAuPt alloys has been proven to yield nanoporous metals (NPG and NPG-Pt) that are promising candidates as catalysts and smart materials. The alloy is exposed to electrolytic conditions at which it is favourable for one metal to dissolve, leaving behind a porous network of the other more noble metal(s). The applicability of such materials on a wide scale in the aforementioned fields is influenced by structural stability, and catalytic activity. Such properties are mainly affected by aspects including structural evolution, surface area stability and nanoscale composition. Achieving a deeper realization of the mechanisms that govern the nanoscale behaviour in this material at such small scale is vital for pushing forward this class of materials to industrial applications. Thus, the need for high-resolution characterization emerges, giving rise to the main goals of this research project, in which state-of-the-art characterization techniques are used to improve the already existing insights into the formation and tunability of nanoporous metals. In this thesis, atom probe tomography (APT) of as-dealloyed and thermally coarsened NPG is enabled by inner-pore potentiostatic deposition of Cu. A mechanistic view of the role of Pt during dealloying is achieved by the confirmation of Pt surface segregation during dealloying at unprecedented resolution. Surface enrichment in Pt is uniquely measured and correlated to increase in Ag retention during dealloying, and consequently correlated to increase in ligament sizes. APT analysis also confirmed the further segregation of Pt in NPG-Pt when coarsened in oxidative environments, and the desegregation of Pt in reductive environments. In situ TEM/STEM of thermal coarsening of NPG and NPG-Pt in hydrogen and oxygen has been carried out. Coarsening events such as ligament collapse, ligament coalescence and void annihilation are observed in situ for the first time. The addition of Pt to the precursor increases the thermal coarsening temperature threshold and alters the coarsening mechanism in hydrogen from ligament coalescence, to the Ostwald ripening of ligaments/ligament collapse. Also, the infiltration of NPG and NPG-Pt at significant depths serves to highlight their interesting electroactive properties, and the great prospects that lie in using NPG as a template for growth of 3D nanostructures.

Keywords: atom probe tomography
characterization
dealloying
electrodeposition
in situ TEM
nanoporous gold
Advisor: Newman, Roger C.
Perovic, Doug D.
Examination of the sugars contents of Canadian prepackaged foods and the role that nutrition labelling can play in helping Canadians identify foods consistent with World Health Organization Guidelines

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends free sugars intakes be limited to a maximum of 10% of energy intake. This thesis aims to characterize sugars in the Canadian prepackaged food and beverage supply and investigate whether the sugars information available on the food label (% Daily Value (%DV) and nutrient content claims) support the WHO free sugars intake guidelines. Three studies were conducted using the University of Toronto’s Food Label Information Program (FLIP) 2013 database that contains nutrient composition and labelling information for a large representative sample of prepackaged foods and beverages (n=15,342). In the first study, a novel method for calculating the free sugars contents was developed and applied to products in FLIP 2013. Free sugars were present in 65% of foods and beverages and contributed on average, 20% of calories and 64% of products’ total sugars content. In the second study, a free sugars DV of 50g, which aligns with WHO guidelines, was compared with a total sugars DV of 100g. A free sugars DV more consistently identified products with ≥10% of calories from free sugars (82% vs. 55%) and with suboptimal nutritional composition as defined by the Food Standards Australia New Zealand nutrient profiling scoring criterion (70% vs. 45%), than a total sugars DV. In the third study, products with sugar-related nutrient content claims had more favourable nutrient profiles than those without these claims, but 48% had ≥10% of calories from free sugars. Findings suggest the need for nutrition labelling and the food supply to more reliably support identification and consumption of products consistent with WHO free sugars intake guidelines. Together these results represent significant advancements in the field of sugars research and the calculation and addition of free sugars levels to FLIP can inform an array of future studies and policy actions related to free sugars.

Keywords: Canada
Food Supply
Nutritional Composition
Nutrition Labelling
Sugars
Advisor: L'Abbe, Mary R
Music as “Minor Literature”: Musical Syntax and Form in Gustav Mahler’s Lied von der Erde

In combining music theory and cultural studies, my dissertation explores the ways in which Gustav Mahler’s affiliation with a Jewish minority can be read into his musical work at the level of the musical structure. To this end, I devise a theoretical framework that combines Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s theory of Minor Literature with current theories of musical form, and conduct a close reading of Das Lied von der Erde. As minor literature, Mahler’s work manifests the approach of a minority group that deploys the conventional language of the majority—major language—in unique and unconventional manners. In transposing this conceptual framework to a musical realm, I identify the historical construct of a German musical heritage as the major language, whose conventional behavior is elucidated by various Formenlehre approaches, especially by William Caplin’s theory of formal functions. I conduct formal analyses that reveal Mahler’s relation to the idioms of German music, and demonstrate how these idioms are transformed, undermined, and “deterritorialized.” Of all of Mahler’s symphonic works, Das Lied von der Erde is one of the most suitable for the conceptual framework of minor literature. In its generic behavior and formal layout, it reveals a highly ambiguous approach toward the distinctively German genre of the symphony. Through the lens of minor literature, my research reveals how this generic ambiguity is symptomatic of a much deeper tension, a tension that exists at the core of musical expression, within the musical language itself. My dissertation endeavors to identify the traces of Mahler’s socio-historical situation in the musical structures themselves and by doing so contributes to ongoing discussions in several fields. As an analytical work in music theory, it addresses an issue that is rarely considered in Mahler literature, namely the examination of musical syntax and rhetoric at the technical level of thematic, melodic, and harmonic structures. Likewise, by construing Mahler’s music as an embodiment of the dialectical existence of minorities—living as foreigners in their own land—this study approaches a familiar and relevant topic in Jewish and modern thought in an unfamiliar manner that is no less relevant.

Keywords: Das Lied von der Erde
fin-de-siècle Vienna
Gustav Mahler
Minor Literature
Musical Form
Nineteenth-Century Symphonic Music
Advisor: Vande Moortele, Steven
The Impact of Geopolitical Interests on Peace Negotiations: A Critical Analysis of the Role of Third-Party Mediation in the Horn of Africa – The Case of Sudan

As a greater number of sub-national groups demand secession, the theory of mediation finds itself without concrete principles with which to respond. This research endeavors to introduce a critical theory discourse in mediation literature on the role of superpower intervention. I explore two shortcomings in mediation literature. First, unlike critiques available elsewhere, superpower participation in peace mediation is not considered a form of superpower hegemony. My research suggests that superpowers utilize mediation to serve their interests while ostensibly appearing to be ‘assisting’ the locals, out of humanitarian impulse, to restore ‘peace’ and ‘prosperity’. Second, despite the intricate nature of secessionist wars, they are not accorded appropriate consideration. In secessionist wars, separatist groups actively enlist the support of superpowers sympathetic to their cause. This research is guided by two questions: does mediation literature address how superpowers mediate secessionist conflicts in which they are sympathetic to the cause of separatist groups? And, if such analysis exists, does it attempt to deconstruct critically how superpowers enlist regional and local allies to influence the outcome of negotiations in favour of their own interests in secession? Using two case studies in Sudan, my findings illustrate that the negative role of superpower hegemony in mediation processes has been neglected and depoliticized in mediation literature. I argue that mediation literature should not rely on superpower leverage to mediate an end to secessionist wars ― embodied in the form of state-led Track I diplomacy processes ― since it only provides ready-made resolutions and legitimizes foreign intervention and exploitation. Therefore, I further argue that for mediation theory to be more relevant and useful in fostering an indigenous end to secessionist wars they are better off utilizing non-state actors ― as in the form of Track II diplomacy ― to mediate secessionist wars. Non-state actors, void of state interests, have the capacity to facilitate greater inter-elite negotiations, which, in turn, will strengthen local ownership of peace processes and foster consensus on indigenous resolutions.

Keywords: Mediation/Conflict Resolution
Peace Agreements/Peacemaking
Secession/Civil Wars
Sudan/South Sudan/Horn of Africa
Superpower hegemony
Track I/Track II diplomacy
Advisor: Teichman, Judith
The Relationship between Institutional Climate and Student Engagement and Learning Outcomes in Ontario Community Colleges

This study was designed to examine the relationship between institutional climate and student engagement in Ontario colleges. Climate and engagement data were gathered by questionnaires from a sample of 348 students from an Ontario community college. The climate data were collected by the Course Experience Questionnaire (CEQ), and student engagement was measured by a questionnaire compiled using items selected from the Ontario College Student Engagement Survey (OCSES). Statistical analyses of correlation and multiple-regression were applied to test the relationship between the variables, using SPSS Statistics Version 21. Results revealed that students’ perception of their learning environment was significantly related to both engagement and learning outcomes. The climate dimensions of good teaching practice, emphasis on independence, appropriate workload, and support for learners were found to be significant predictors of student engagement, which in turn was significantly related to learning outcomes. Findings provide empirical evidence that supports the feasibility of using institutional climate dimensions to predict student engagement and learning outcomes. Based on this, future studies may treat student engagement as a type of organizational behaviour that can be studied in relation to the social psychological context of educational institutions, thus broadening the scope of study on student engagement. From a practical point of view, the findings provide clear indications for college educators around building appropriate policies that encourage and support optimal student outcomes. As well, effective teaching practices that are appropriately conceived and implemented can make a significant difference that results in improved education quality.

Keywords: Community College
Higher Education
Institutional Climate
Learning Outcome
Organizational Climate
Student Engagement
Advisor: Hildyard, Angela
Skolnik, Michael
Sexual Selection and Condition Dependence in the Fruit Fly, Drosophila melanogaster

While natural selection acts to strengthen nonsexual fitness (i.e., survivorship and fecundity), the capacity for sexual selection to enhance this process is the source of much theoretical and empirical debate. The potential for sexual selection to reinforce natural selection in reducing the mutation load is rooted in condition dependence theory. This theory predicts that females select mates on the basis of condition, as indicated by condition-dependent sexual traits, and in doing so simultaneously sort them by genetic quality. The premise of condition-dependent mate choice is transferrable to non-female-choice components of selection; hence, sexual selection at its multiple stages is predicted to remove mutations deleterious to condition. Support for the notion that sexual selection in toto can reduce the mutation load is mounting; however, understanding which components of sexual selection are important in the removal of deleterious mutations remains an important challenge. To address this issue, I employed the Drosophila melanogaster model system. I demonstrated support for the capacity of sexual selection to remove deleterious mutations at multiple stages of selection (Chapters 2-4), before and after mating. Furthermore, I showed that the efficacy of sexual selection in eliminating deleterious mutations is dependent on the stage of selection (Chapter 4), and the source of mutation under selection (Chapters 2-4). I deviated slightly in research objective for my final thesis study (Chapter 5). There is mounting empirical support for precopulatory male mate choice across insect taxa, and emerging support for choice post-copulation (i.e., sperm and seminal fluid allocation). I manipulated perceived female mating status in D. melanogaster, and I demonstrated precopulatory male preference for females perceived as virgins, which suggests male choice for low ejaculate competition risk. At the postcopulatory level, males mated to perceived virgins outperformed those mated to perceived mated females in several key components of sperm competition defence; however, I did not detect a downstream fitness cost to this differential investment. Ultimately, my thesis has contributed valuable and novel results on the relative impacts of pre- and postcopulatory sexual selection on genetic quality in D. melanogaster, which collectively suggest that sexual selection can be effective against deleterious mutations.

Keywords: condition dependence
deleterious mutation
Drosophila melanogaster
male mate choice
sexual selection
sperm competition
Advisor: Rowe, Locke
Agrawal, Aneil F
Lessons from Stories of Diabetes Self-Management: Enunciating Culture in Health Decision-Making in the Third Space

Increasing rates of type 2 diabetes in Indigenous populations are a complex and critical problem. The requirements of diabetes self-management are challenging and few interventions have produced meaningful improvements for Indigenous people with diabetes. Studies have reported that when Indigenous people seek help with diabetes from the medical system they face racial discrimination and barriers rooted in cultural difference and misunderstanding. In this dissertation, I explore the intersections of culture and health care in the context of Indigenous peoples’ experience with diabetes self-management. This study combines critical ethnographic methods with the theory of postcolonial scholar Homi Bhabha to provide new insights into how members of a colonized group (the subaltern) experience the world from a figurative third space between the culture of the colonizer and the culture of the colonized. In the third space, experiences are translated uniquely, since the subaltern has knowledge of both the culture of the colonizer and their own culture. Based on this process of translation, a person in the third space enunciates their cultural difference through words and actions that challenge, unsettle, or infiltrate the colonial power. I conducted storytelling sessions with ten Indigenous community members in Fort Smith, Northwest Territories in Canada to explore how Bhabha’s third space theory can applied to the experiences of Indigenous people navigating the third space between the mainstream Canadian medical culture and Indigenous culture and enunciating cultural difference through diabetes self-management behaviours. This work disrupts the traditional understanding of individual level behaviour change by addressing the mechanism through which individual health decision-making is influenced by experience translated through the lens of colonization. I argue that, while the Western medical system is part of a colonial structure, the third space model provides an opportunity to understand how Indigenous people develop self-management behaviours that are culturally informed and discursively strategic.

Keywords: Behavioural Sciences
Cultural Identity
Diabetes
Indigenous Health
Postcolonial Theory
Advisor: Fox, Ann
Myers, Ted
Occupational Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Latent Structure and Risk Pathways

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) as a sequela of work-related incidents is associated with significant health and socioeconomic burden. The current study examined the latent structure of PTSD symptoms, their moderators and predictors, and explored a risk pathway model in a sample of trauma-exposed workers (N = 440). Six models, ranging from 1 to 5 factors, representing 17 PTSD symptoms described in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition (DSM-IV) and assessed by the Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale for DSM-IV (CAPS-DX; Blake et al., 1995), were tested using confirmatory factor analysis. The dysphoria model (Simms et al., 2002) had adequate fit, provided a parsimonious structure over competing models, and evidenced differential correlation patterns with symptoms of depression, anxiety and pain. Measurement invariance across gender and interpersonal violence was obtained for the dysphoria model. Differences due to gender and interpersonal violence in severity of the hyperarousal factor were found. Subsequently, the social cognitive theory of posttraumatic recovery (Benight Bandura, 2004) and epidemiological literature guided conceptualization of a risk pathway model using structural equation modeling. The model supported self-efficacy as a proximal predictor of PTSD. Further, it highlighted the role of trauma type (interpersonal violence), vulnerability (family psychiatric history, female gender, childhood adversity), and protective (education and social support) factors. While historical predictors or their impact may be difficult to change, coping self-efficacy is known to be amenable to psychological intervention with promising results (Benight Bandura, 2004). Coping self-efficacy may be an important target of psychological assessment and intervention.

Keywords: Latent structure
Posttraumatic Stress
PTSD
Risk pathway
Work-related incidents
Advisor: Stermac, Lana