VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
The Interrelationships Between Behavioural Inattention, Working Memory and Academic Outcome in a Community Sample of Elementary School-aged Children

A body of empirical studies has found that inattentive behaviour in the classroom is linked to low academic functioning. The literature suggests that poor working memory (WM), as well as behavioural inattention and academic underachievement, comprise a developmental risk triad. The nature of this relationship triad is not yet understood. There were two overall objectives of this dissertation research: one was to examine the strength of the evidence for a relationship between behavioural inattention and academic underachievement. The second was to investigate the role WM plays in relation to inattention and academic outcomes. Firstly, a systematic review was conducted to evaluate the evidence and strength of association of the relationship between inattention and lower standardized test scores and classroom performance. Large heterogeneity in the results of individual studies pointed to differences based on covariates, outcome measures and ages of participants. Overall, there was a consistent evidence-based link between inattention and lower academic achievement. The heterogeneity in results raised questions about other factors that play a role in the relationship between inattention and academic achievement. The second objective was addressed through two sets of analyses using contemporaneous and longitudinal data from a community sample of school children. Mediation analysis was used to assess whether WM is a mediator of the relationship between inattention and poor achievement. The first analysis demonstrated that the contemporaneous nature of the connections among inattention, WM and academic outcomes was such that inattention had both a direct relationship and an indirect relationship to math and reading fluency through auditory-verbal WM. The second set of analyses examined this same relationship across time. Results indicated that across time, auditory-verbal WM continues to be important for reading fluency, but visual-spatial WM becomes more important when predicting math outcomes for boys. This pattern was the same when classroom performance was used as an outcome measure. Results provide insight into the nature of the relationship between inattention, WM and poor achievement in the general elementary classroom population.

Keywords: Academic achievement
Attention
Inattention
Working memory
Advisor: Tannock, Rosemary
An Ecological Momentary Assessment Study of the Functions of Non-Suicidal Self-Injury in Young Adults with and without a History of Interpersonal Trauma

Non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) involves acute deliberate damage to oneâ s body without suicidal intent. Considerable heterogeneity has been reported in NSSI characteristics and in the functions NSSI serves for individuals who engage in it. The present study investigated a theorized link between NSSI functions, particularly self-punishment, and interpersonal trauma history. As well, cross-sectional and experience sampling methodologies were compared. Participants were 39 community-based young adults (ages 18 to 30; 90% female) with a history of repeated NSSI and at least 2 NSSI urges in the previous 2 weeks. The sample was diverse: 44% identified non-European ethnocultural backgrounds and 46% identified nonheterosexual orientations. Electronic daily diary methodology was used. Participants tracked NSSI urges and acts for 21 days, completing measures of NSSI characteristics, urge severity, and functions. All participants completed the study (M = .49 missed days). All participants reported NSSI urges or acts (M = 5, SD = 4.21). NSSI characteristics related to trauma severity were number of NSSI methods, number of NSSI functions, and urge severity. NSSI functions related to trauma severity were affect regulation, interpersonal boundaries, anti-dissociation, self-care, and marking distress. In multiple regression analysis, a model including number of NSSI functions and the relevance scores for anti-dissociation and interpersonal boundaries functions predicted 34.2% of the variance in trauma severity and remained significant when controlling for the number of NSSI functions (p = .002). Although self-punishment did not correlate with trauma severity, it was endorsed by 95% of participants and for 81% of NSSI urges and acts. Experience sampling data reflected cross-sectional data, with significant correlations between measures of NSSI functions, urge severity, and NSSI method use. However, experience sampling contributed information about variation over time both across and within participants. Relevant to explanatory models of NSSI, some NSSI functions (e.g. anti-dissociation) exhibited more variation between participants and over time than others (e.g. affect regulation). Findings indicate that interpersonal trauma is important in explaining the heterogeneity of NSSI functions. Explanatory models of NSSI should account for the role of contextual factors such as trauma, and address the multiplicity of NSSI functions and the importance of self-punishment. Clinical and research implications are discussed.

Keywords: Non-suicidal self-injury
Trauma
Young adults
Advisor: Stermac, Lana
Be All You Can Be or Longing to Be: Racialized soldiers, the Canadian military experience and the Im/Possibility of belonging to the nation

Military conquest and intervention have played a central role in the making and maintaining of empires for centuries. The question of who serves in those militaries remains extremely significant in settler societies, particularly in the contemporary negotiation of citizenship, immigration, national belonging and identity. In this dissertation I ask the following questions: Who is the racialized soldier subject? How do racialized soldiers negotiate national belonging? What are their experiences in the Canadian military? This research study examines the racial underpinnings of citizenship through an exploration of the experiences of racialized soldier subjects in the Canadian Forces in the post 9/11 era. The study is based on in-depth interviews with twenty-five reserve and retired soldiers, both men and women from various racialized communities in Canada. Drawing on a â race cognizantâ poststructuralism and feminist critical race theories of subjectivity, masculinity, nation formation, citizenship and racial discourse, this research reveals several important findings. First, this dissertation reveals that while the Canadian military projects itself as a racially diverse institution, the reality is quite different. In this thesis, I theorize military recruitment as a project of inclusion into a white culture. Racialized soldiers join the military family for a number of reasons, but often experience the military as duplicitous and are at times met with enormous bureaucracy. Their journeys into the military reveal complex structural conditions that make joining the military a viable option. Once in the military, interviews with racialized soldiers reveal the visceral nature of whiteness within the Canadian military apparatus. The narratives of soldiers of colour also show that despite the amount of racial labour involved in negotiating this white space, there still remains a desire to belong. In battle zones, soldiers of colour often display an ambivalence if not a critique of the racist and Orientalist underpinnings of war. Yet they remain dedicated and are proud of their military service. These findings have important implications for understanding institutional diversity, the experiences of military life and finally, the undeniable role of racism in modern day warfare.

Keywords: Canadian Military
Citizenship
Multiculturalism
Race
Soldiers
Whiteness
Advisor: Razack, Sherene H.
Uniformity and Nonuniformity in Proof Complexity

This thesis is dedicated to the study of the relations between uniform and nonuniform proof complexity and computational complexity. Nonuniform proof complexity studies the lengths of proofs in various propositional proof systems such as Frege . Uniform proof complexity studies the provability strength of bounded arithmetic theories which use only concepts computable in specific computational complexity classes, e.g. the two-sorted bounded arithmetic theory VNC1 uses only concepts computable in NC1. We are interested in transferring concepts, tools, and results from computational complexity to proof complexity. We introduce the notion of proof complexity class which corresponds to the notion of computational complexity class. We show the possibility of developing a systematic framework for studying proof complexity classes associated with computational complexity classes. The framework is based on soundness statements for proof complexity classes and evaluation problems for circuit complexity classes. The soundness statements are universal for proof complexity classes as circuit evaluation problems are complete for computational complexity classes. We introduce the notion of io-typed theories to design theories corresponding to computational complexity classes which are not closed under composition. We use io-types to control the composition of provably total functions of theories. We design a new class of theories n^ε-ioV∞ (ε

Keywords: AltTime
Bounded Arithmetic
Computational Complexity
NC1
Proof Complexity
Subexponential-size Bounded-depth Frege
Advisor: Cook, Stephen A.
TIFA-Mediated Innate Immune Recognition of the Bacterial Metabolite HBP and its Role in Host Defense

Host recognition of pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs) initiates an innate immune response that is critical for pathogen elimination and engagement of adaptive immunity. Here I show that mammalian immune and nonimmune cells can detect and respond to the bacterial derived monosaccharide heptose-1,7-bisphosphate (HBP). A metabolic intermediate in lipopolysaccharide (LPS) biosynthesis, HBP is highly conserved in Gram-negative bacteria, yet absent from eukaryotic cells. Detection of HBP within the host cytosol activated the NF-ÎşB pathway in vitro, and induced innate and adaptive immune responses in vivo. HBP-induced signaling was independent of known pattern recognition receptor pathways. Therefore, I used a genome-wide RNAi screen to uncover an innate immune signaling axis, mediated by the TRAFinteracting protein with forkhead-associated domain (TIFA). Contamination of the host cytosol with HBP induced TIFA phosphorylation-dependent oligomerization and concomitant activation of the ubiquitin ligase TRAF6. In addition to recognizing HBP released upon bacterial lysis extracellularly or within the phagolysosome, I show that TIFA is an innate immune sensor for cytosol-invasive Gram-negative bacteria, as invasive Shigella flexneri, or a vacuole-escaping Salmonella mutant, released the HBP during cytosolic growth, triggering a sustained wave of TIFA activation that followed transient activation of the NOD1 pathway. Bacterial growth within the cytosol was essential for HBP release and concomitant TIFA activation, since prolonged infection with wild-type Shigella, but not metabolically attenuated invasive mutants, triggered TIFA-oligomerization and signaling to drive a massive NF-ÎşB response from human epithelial cells. My findings identify HBP as a novel PAMP, and as a corollary, TIFA as a new innate immune signalling effector that is the keystone of an immunosurveillance system that detects Gram-negative bacterial infection, and which escalates the immune response to invasive bacteria that exploit the host cytosol as a niche for growth and replication.

Keywords: Infection
Innate Immunity
Advisor: Gray-Owen, Scott D
Medicine Wheel Surviving Suicide-Strengthening Life Bundle

Medicine Wheel Surviving Suicide-Strengthening Life Bundle Deborah Danard Doctor of Philosophy Department of Social Justice Education Ontario Institute for Studies in Education University of Toronto 2016 Abstract The Medicine Wheel Surviving Suicide-Strengthening Life Bundle (2016) responds to the disproportionately high number of completed and attempted suicides in Aboriginal communities (past, present and anticipated future) and the need for advancing traditional knowledge as a sustainable long-term community centred approach that demonstrates strengthening life promotion as the wholistic lens to address the complex issue of suicide. Traditional knowledge gathered through literature reviewed, oral teachings and stories is the central component of this research study that spans over a decade, building on foundational traditional knowledge and teachings that informed the Medicine Wheel praxis in Finding Our Way - Culture as Resistance to Suicide In Indian Country (Danard, 2005). This research study is my contribution to the (then) Indian Affairs Minister Bob Nault who said, attempt[s] to tackle the suicide problem haven’t worked, and he was open to suggestions from ‘Anyone who will give us some recommendations about how to deal with suicide’ (Hicks, 1999). Developing the research study from a social justice education lens applying traditional knowledge methods and methodology examines the relationality of transforming traditional knowledge context into practice to enact systemic change at the community level and further Chandler and Lalonde’s (1998) findings that list cultural continuity factors as a ‘hedge’ against suicide, including self-government, land claims, education, health services, cultural facilities, child protection, women in leadership and police/fire services. Every generation has their challenges, past generations have survived colonial expansion and cultural genocide such as residential schools, the sixties scoop, the Indian Act, loss of identity, Bill C-31, alcohol and drug use, loss of language, and dispossession and forced removal from traditional land base and territories (AFHJSC, 1993; AHF, 2007; Duran Duran, 2000; Chrisjohn Young, 1997; Antone Hill, 1992). From an Anishinaabe researcher location and way of being Anishinaabe, this research study is my recommendation for surviving suicide – strengthening life as one of this generation’s challenges that requires “retracing” our ancestral knowledge (Benton-Benai, 1988) and gathering traditional knowledge to mobilize culture as resistance to the survival of suicide (Danard, 2005) and ultimately “survivance” (Vizenor, 1999) of this generation and coming generations.

Keywords: Education
Indigenous worldview
Life path teachings
Life Promotion
Medicine Wheel
Suicidology
Advisor: Restoule, Jean Paul
Photoinduced Spin Crossover in Single Crystal [FeII(bpy)3](PF6)2

Spin crossover (SCO) is a phenomenon in which the spin state of a molecular system is changed by photoexcitation or a change in temperature/pressure. Research in SCO has been driven by potential applications in data storage and solar energy generation. SCO also has biological relevance, as it is involved in the function of certain metalloproteins. [FeII(bpy)3]2+ is an SCO system that undergoes a low-spin (LS) to high-spin (HS) transition following photoexcitation. In aqueous solutions, this process is extremely fast, with the HS state being populated within 100 fs of the initial excitation. While the dynamics of this system have been extensively studied in solution, comparatively little research has been done in the solid phase, which would be a requirement for potential applications. Herein, the ultrafast SCO dynamics in single crystal [FeII(bpy)3](PF6)2 are characterized using transient absorption (TA) spectroscopy to elucidate the effects of the crystal environment on the SCO process. This environment is of particular interest for probes sensitive to the nuclear motions involved in the SCO transition such as time-resolved electron diffraction. To this end, a TA spectrometer capable of collecting high-quality data over a broad spectral range in both liquid and solid samples was developed. The results show that the ultrafast dynamics following excitation are very similar those in aqueous [FeII(bpy)3]2+, while dynamics on longer time scales are perturbed in the crystal environment. The spectral signatures associated with subpicosecond SCO in aqueous [FeII(bpy)3]2+ are also present in the crystal case. However, oscillations observed on this time scale suggest more complicated nuclear motions than those observed in aqueous samples. At longer times after excitation, the HS state decays back to the LS ground state almost an order of magnitude faster than in the aqueous case because of chemical pressure exerted by the lattice. The effects of a long-range acoustic phonon also manifest themselves as periodic modulations of the absorption peaks. It is concluded that SCO in single crystal [FeII(bpy)3](PF6)2 is a local molecular process similar to that in aqueous [FeII(bpy)3]2+, with effects specific to the crystal environment primarily manifesting long after the relaxation to the HS state is complete.

Keywords: Coordination Complex
Pulse Shaping
Single Crystals
Spin Crossover
Ultrafast Spectroscopy
Advisor: Miller, Dwayne R. J.
Sahel and Congo Basin Precipitation: Variability and Teleconnections

Future projections of African precipitation are still mired in uncertainty. Reducing this uncertainty requires a better understanding of the processes that drive variability in present day African precipitation. Using the Community Earth System Model (CESM), we examined the linkages between regional and local atmospheric circulation patterns and their impact on precipitation in the Sahel and Congo Basin, with a particular focus on the influence of the Indian Ocean on precipitation in these regions. The influence of the Indian Ocean on Sahel precipitation was investigated using a series of sea surface temperature (SST) sensitivity experiments. We identified two mechanisms by which the Indian Ocean can alter Sahel precipitation. The first mechanism is associated with perturbations on the equator that alter Sahel precipitation by modulating the Asian monsoon circulation and driving changes in descent in North Africa. The second mechanism is associated with SST perturbations that cover more of the basin and alter the overturning circulation between the Indian and Atlantic Oceans. These two mechanisms result in different precipitation responses in the Sahel. The first mechanism induces an increase in precipitation as a result of warming in the Indian Ocean, whereas the second mechanism produces a decrease in Sahel precipitation in response to warming. Congo Basin precipitation was examined with regional water tagging and stable isotope tracers in CESM. Using regionally defined water tags, the moisture contribution from different sources to Congo Basin precipitation was investigated. We found that the Indian Ocean and evaporation from the Congo Basin are the dominant moisture sources, and that the Atlantic Ocean is a comparatively small source of moisture. Variability in Congo Basin precipitation was found to be a result of changes in the available moisture and in the atmospheric circulation in the region. In wet years, more of the precipitation in the Congo Basin is derived from Indian Ocean moisture, although the spatial distributions of the dominant sources is shifted, reflecting changes in the mid-tropospheric circulation over the Indian Ocean. The isotopic signatures in precipitation were consistent with the dominant influence of moisture from local evaporation and the ocean sources.

Advisor: Jones, Dylan B A
Whole-System Patient Flow Modelling for Strategic Planning in Healthcare

Health systems are under pressure to deliver high quality care to improve outcomes, access and financial sustainability. In the past decade, Ontario pursued such improvements through a series of transformation initiatives aimed at moving care provision to the community settings and integrating care around patient pathways through system. In this dissertation we present operational research (OR) approaches to facilitate whole-system strategic planning for health systems, with a focus on patient flow among care sectors to address transformation challenges in Ontarioâ s health care system and its regional health authorities. Firstly, we expand on Soft OR methods to collaboratively develop a qualitative model to capture the boundary and transitional view of patient flows across major care sectors in a health region. The model is not scoped around a specific question, but is meant to be a broad platform for exploring the patient flow relationships among multiple care domains. Secondly, we build on the findings of the qualitative model, and leverage the administrative datasets across these major care sectors to develop a high fidelity simulation model to evaluate the effects of policy interventions and their effects on system-wide patient flows. Methodologically this simulation builds on the structural simplicity of system dynamics with comprehensive, patient-level data to achieve a highly flexible simulation to model flows for a broad and modifiable range of patient cohorts and interventions. Finally, we implement both models in the analysis of whole-system care policies. The qualitative model is used for the analysis of slow stream rehabilitation policy options and is utilized to identify conflicts of this initiative with existing patient flow interventions. The simulation model is used to assess the cross-sector patient flow impacts of implementing stroke best practices. The results highlight the importance of community care investments and cross-sector referral patterns in realizing the greatest benefits from this policy.

Keywords: patient flow
rehabilitation
stroke
system dynamics
whole-system simulation
Advisor: Carter, Michael W
Organomineralization of Cyanobacteria Cell Envelopes: Insights from Laboratory Studies and Implications to Carbonates Nucleation, Mineralogy and Carbon Cycling

The organomineralization of cyanobacterial cell envelopes is a widespread phenomenon. Yet, the factors that trigger the nucleation and define the morphology of the minerals formed on cyanobacteria surfaces remain unclear. This dissertation explores the role of the surface chemistry of different cyanobacteria in the formation of calcium and magnesium carbonates. The main goal was to identify characteristics inherent to cyanobacterial cell envelopes that control the nucleation, the chemistry and the structure of carbonates minerals. Studies with marine and freshwater Synechococcus strains showed that the relative proportion of carboxyl to phosphoryl groups in different species regulates the kinetics and morphology of the carbonates. Moreover, the cell envelope composition appears also to vary as a function of the phosphorus concentration in the culture media. These variations cause not only changes in the surface reactivity but were shown to have an effective impact on the organomineralization capacity of Synechococcus. The impact of cyanobacterial extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) in the formation of proto-dolomite, a precursor of dolomite, in sabkhas sediments was also explored in this dissertation. Raman spectroscopy mapping was first used to show that the cyanobacterial EPS molecules and dolomite are spatially associated in the sediments. Solutions seeded and non-seeded with cyanobacterial EPS and exposed to different temperatures (25ยบC and 40ยบC) suggest that dumbbells and spheroids, morphologies often identified as proto-dolomite, formed only in the presence of EPS. This mechanism may be supported by the rich content in carboxyl functional groups and polysaccharides in EPS. This work provides evidence for how the surface reactivity of cyanobacteria promotes the fast precipitation of carbonates and controls the morphology of the precipitates often without any contribution from photosynthesis. Moreover, it recognizes the importance of characterizing microbial molecules in sediment in order to significantly improve our understanding of carbonate precipitation dynamics in modern environments.

Keywords: Carbonates
Cyanobacteria
Microbial dolomite
Organomineralization
Raman spectroscopy
Advisor: Dittrich, Maria