VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Predictors of Post-stroke Aphasia Recovery

In order to elucidate the critical factors that bring about treatment-induced language improvements, researchers have investigated many predictors of aphasia recovery; however, the evidence is often mixed. The mechanisms underlying differential responses to therapy have yet to be delineated. In this dissertation, it was hypothesized that factors which stimulate access to- and induce (re)learning of linguistic content may hold important predictive value. Chapter 1 is a review of existing research on three such factors, i) responsiveness to cues, ii) during-treatment improvement with repeated practice of the treatment protocol, and iii) executive control (EC). Chapter 2 presents treatment data from ten individuals with chronic post-stroke aphasia, who received a structured, phonological therapy for anomia. Group analyses revealed significant short- and long-term treatment gains and generalization. Computational modelling of speech error production pre- to post-treatment suggests that generalization was mediated by a strengthening of lexical-phonological connections. Individual treatment outcomes additionally demonstrated differential response to treatment among participants. The predictors of these outcomes were subsequently examined. Responsiveness to cues emerged as a significant predictor of overall naming improvements immediately post-treatment, while early improvement in therapy was predictive of generalization at follow-up. In Chapter 3, current evidence on the predictive value of EC in aphasia treatment outcomes was systematically reviewed. The studies reviewed (N =15) were heterogeneous with respect to the treatment approaches taken, and the EC tasks used. In addition, EC was poorly defined; EC task selection was broad and often lacking theoretical rationale. Nevertheless, EC abilities emerged as important indicators of treatment outcomes, especially in studies using specific EC tasks and structured treatment approaches. In Chapter 4, the predictive value of EC on treatment outcomes was investigated in the same sample of ten individuals from Chapter 2. Addressing some of the limitations identified in the existing literature, EC was defined and measured based on a theoretical framework and using a large battery of specific tasks. EC emerged as a robust predictor of treatment maintenance, suggesting a critical role for EC in encoding and consolidating treatment-related (re)learning. In Chapter 5 these findings are summarized and their broader implications for aphasia rehabilitation are discussed.

Keywords: anomia
aphasia
executive control
intervention
prognosis
therapy
Advisor: Rochon, Elizabeth A
The Multi-contextual Effects Through Which Environmental Economic Declines Impact Older Persons’ Quality of Life

The effects of city and neighbourhood contexts on individuals’ well-being have long garnered sociological interest. Within this broader topic, scholarship has shown that the changing economic fortunes of cities and neighbourhoods influence residents’ quality of life. However, the dynamics that determine whether and how contexts in decline impact residents’ mental health and social lives are understudied. The three papers of this dissertation extend beyond current research by examining the mechanisms and contingencies that determined how declines in American cities and neighbourhoods through the Great Recession of 2007-2009 affected older residents’ quality of life. As this recession was the greatest economic crisis the world had experienced since the Great Depression of the 1930s, it is an ideal context within which to study the effects of economic declines. First, I study how rising home foreclosure rates and declining home prices in American cities led to rising depressive symptoms. Most research on the effects of this recession upon mental health has focused on personal financial losses. My results show that features of cities in decline affect residents’ depressive symptoms above and beyond the effects attributable to their own total household assets declines. Second, my results reveal how declining resources at the city level and rising concentrated disadvantage within city neighbourhoods interacted multiplicatively as they impacted depressive symptoms. Despite much scholarship arguing for a greater integration of city- and neighbourhood-level effects, few studies have investigated how these two contextual levels operate multiplicatively as they affect residents’ health and well-being. Third, my findings show that rising concentrated disadvantage in American neighbourhoods led to smaller social networks through time, largely due to less acquisition of new close social ties. Within the context of the Great Recession, each paper thus makes a unique contribution to our understanding of whether and how contexts undergoing economic declines affect an important dimension of older persons’ quality of life.

Keywords: depressive symptoms
economic declines
neighbourhoods
social networks
the Great Recession
urban studies
Advisor: Schafer, Markus H
Micromechanical and Acoustic Emission Analysis of Foliated Rock under the True Triaxial Stress Condition

A systematic investigation that links the mechanical aspects of foliated rocks at micro to macroscale is essential as research in this area is currently limited. This thesis aims to extend current knowledge by researching the impact of the induced 3D stress path on the coupled acoustic emission and micromechanical response of foliated rocks. A unique series of true-triaxial experiments were carried out on seventeen foliated samples taken from the Olkiluoto Underground Research Facility, Finland. Variation of the strike of dominant foliation planes with respect to the principal stress directions was the main difference in these experiments. By duplicating the field scenarios on systematic sets of foliated samples under a controlled laboratory environment, this research shed light upon many unknowns observed in the field. In the first part of this thesis, the mechanical response of the foliated samples is systematically investigated. Thin section and µCT investigations are compiled with acoustic emission data to better understand the fracture evolution at micro and mesoscale. In general, our observations on the micromechanics of the foliated samples under the true triaxial state of stress are in good agreement with previous studies performed under uniaxial or triaxial conditions and further corroborates them. A new concept of b-value state line is introduced which is found to correlate the AE catalogue b-value and the post-failure deformation. Finally, the scaling effect on rock behavior was investigated by comparing P-wave velocities passing through rock at different scales in the field and laboratory experiments. Field P-wave velocity was measured at specific ray paths in a fairly homogenous pegmatitic zone located at the third experimental hole ONK-EH3 of the POSE tunnel at Olkiluoto site, Finland. Three true-triaxial pegmatite samples were used as the source of laboratory data. The evolution of the stress tensor around the ONK-EH3 was calculated and used in an ellipsoidal model to estimate P-wave velocities for all the points located on the ray paths in the field. Calculated field P-wave velocities along the ray paths were in reasonable agreement with those measured in the field.

Keywords: Acoustic Emission
Field and Laboratory Comparison
Foliated Rock
Micromechanics
True Triaxial Experiment
Ultrasonic Investigation
Advisor: Young, Robert Paul
The Relationship of Testosterone, Appetite, Food Intake and Exercise in Male Adolescents

The hypothesis that testosterone has an interactive relationship with food intake and high intensity exercise in adolescent males was explored in three experiments. Combined (Experiment 1) and separate (Experiment 2) effects of acute glucose and protein ingestion on testosterone were observed. In Experiment 1, testosterone decreased by 18.6 ± 3.1% (p

Keywords: appetite
exercise
glucose
protein
puberty
testosterone
Advisor: Anderson, Gerald H
Hamilton, Jill K
Speech Network Regional Differences in Bulbar Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis: Neuroimaging and Neuropathology Investigations

Bulbar ALS has devastating consequences on survival and quality of life, and may be linked to increased burden of extramotor deficits. This dissertation is comprised of three studies addressing the goal of better understanding the neural anatomical underpinnings of bulbar Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) with a particular focus on the cortical speech network (SpN). The work has significant impact on ALS subtyping which is crucial for understanding disease pathogenesis, and clinical implications for diagnosis, prognosis, and recruitment into clinical trials. The first study characterized structural abnormalities in the SpN regions with relation to bulbar motor dysfunction using T1 and DTI neuroimaging in 16 patients with bulbar ALS. The results revealed left-lateralized differences in extramotor SpN regions with thinning in left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and diffusivity abnormalities underlying left primary auditory cortex (PAC) and posterior superior temporal gyrus (pSTG). Greater bulbar motor dysfunction was associated with greater structural abnormalities in selected SpN regions, while limb and disease severity were not. The second study systematically reviewed and compared published neuropathology data between bulbar-onset ALS (bALS) and spinal-onset ALS (sALS) in order to distinguish bulbar from spinal ALS. Neuropathology in IFG and pSTG were variable in bALS cases, however consistently spared in sALS. A subset of bALS cases also showed widespread tauopathy. Study three compared the anatomic distribution and types of neuropathology between 3 groups, namely: 3 bALS cases, 3 sALS with antemortem bulbar dysfunction (sALSwB), and 3 sALS without antemortem bulbar dysfunction (sALSnoB). SpN regions were most severely and extensively affected in the bALS cases, followed by sALSwB cases. Neuropathology in SpN regions was absent in sALSnoB cases. Two of the three bALS cases presented with atypical proteinopathy. Findings from the studies suggested that cortical SpN may be exclusively affected in bulbar ALS. The extent and severity of damage in SpN regions may be related to the severity of bulbar motor disease. Further, bALS may be associated with unique morphology and co-existing proteinopathy.

Keywords: Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis
MRI
neuroanatomy
neurodegenerative
neuropathology
speech
Advisor: Yunusova, Yana
In Situ Electron Microscopy for Characterization and Development of Clean Energy Nanomaterials

Since the industrial revolution, the hunt has been on for larger, cleaner, and more efficient energy systems. This growth has been met primarily by combustion of oil, coal, and gas; yielding an enormous amount of harmful emissions in the form of carbon nanoparticulates (i.e. soot). To mitigate the production of these pollutants, a more thorough understanding of how these products are formed is required. Apart from the harmful effects, flame formed carbon nanomaterials have crucial uses in material science - ranging from energy storage to rubber reinforcement. Through a deeper understanding of how nanomaterials form and change, we can not only achieve cleaner combustion but also apply this understanding to high volume, low cost production of the next generation of functionalized nanomaterials. Combustion formed nanoparticulates form and evolve in milliseconds, under high temperatures, and their reactions follow multiple branching pathways. These characteristics make the process ideal for high volume production, yet challenging to study and understand. Therefore new experimental methods are required to peek inside, model carbon nanoparticle formation, and fine tune production processes. The goal of this work has therefore been to collaborate with Hitachi Higher Technologies Canada in developing a new environmental transmission electron microscopy technique and applying it for the in situ studies of functional nanomaterials. Work was performed and published in three key areas: combustion produced soot, nanocatalysts for soot filtration, and applied carbon nanomaterials for energy storage. Following the publications in these areas, focus was then moved into upgrading the instrument for nanomaterial growth and synthesis. This consisted of funding, upgrade design, and professional development of the next generation of students advancing this work. Ultimately, this thesis summarizes the cumulative effort of over 5 years of research, 10 publications, 5 international collaborations, and presentation of our work at 8 conferences. Over this time, our work advanced research in soot oxidation, high pressure combustion, soot filtration, carbon black aftertreatment, nanomotors, and carbon/silicon battery materials. The outreach and collaborations have allowed us to apply our expertise to areas outside the traditional combustion lab focus and cement the in-situ ETEM technique in a wide range of nanomaterial fields.

Keywords: Combustion
Electron Microscopy
Environmental Transmission Electron Microscopy
In Situ
Nanomaterials
Oxidation
Advisor: Thomson, Murray J.
Essays on Information Transmission in Firm Networks and Financial Market Implications

This thesis consists of three chapters on firm-level production networks, information production and dissemination, and their impact on corporate policies and investment decisions. Chapter 1 provides an introduction of the essays and summarizes their main findings. Chapter 2 examines the role of international supply-chain relationships for the transmission of corporate Environmental and Social (E) policies, and the resulting impact on real E outcomes and firm performance. E policies propagate from customers to suppliers, especially when customers have higher bargaining power and suppliers are in countries with lower ESG standards. This transmission mechanism matters: suppliers subsequently reduce their toxic emissions, litigation and reputation risk decreases, and financial performance improves. Chapter 3 develops a measure for the speed of information diffusion along supply-chains and documents a causal relationship between the attention of key market participants, i.e. dual-covering analysts and cross-holding institutional investors, and the speed measure. The speed of information diffusion plays an important role for feedback effects from stock prices to corporate investments: supplier managers rely more on information in customer (supplier) stock prices when the speed of information diffusion along the supply chain is slower (faster). Consequently, the diffusion speed affects the coordination of relationship-specific investments between customers and suppliers and future operating performance of suppliers. Chapter 4 shows that international supply-chain links are an important channel for the propagation of financial contagion around the world. Following large country-level shocks, such as market-index jumps or natural disasters, dynamic conditional correlation (DCC) between U.S. suppliers and their foreign customers increases significantly, beyond country-level and industry effects. Consistent with a credit-chain mechanism, the effect is asymmetric for positive and negative shocks, more pronounced for supply-chain pairs with a closer relationship, higher leverage, lower cash holdings and firm profitability, and increases with the costs of bankruptcy resolution in the customers countries.

Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility
Financial Contagion
Price Feedback
Supply-Chains
Advisor: Doidge, Craig
Han, Bing
Promising Practices for Motivating and Engaging Kindergarten Writers Through Play-based Pedagogy: An Ethnographic Case Study

The purpose of this qualitative, ethnographic case study was to gain an understanding of how teachers provide a play-based environment in kindergarten while simultaneously meeting curriculum expectations in writing in an authentic, integrated, and meaningful way. The overarching research question was How do two teachers, with a play-based pedagogical approach to learning, provide opportunities for students to become writers in kindergarten? The research, rooted in sociocultural theory and using a constructivist lens, demonstrated the importance of a collaborative approach to learning as well as ample time for children to talk and play which related to their interests. Methods included classroom observations, semi-structured interviews, and document analysis. Classroom observations included a purposeful sampling of seven children to investigate their lives as composers of writing in their play-based worlds. Document analysis involved examination of Ontario’s Kindergarten Program, relevant accompanying ministry documents, teachers’ resources, and children’s writing - inclusive of drawings, early stages of orthographic representation, and digital photos and videos documenting play stories. Two kindergarten teachers and one administrator were interviewed on their perspectives and beliefs of play-based learning in children’s developing literacy lives to triangulate data. The findings revealed that there were multiple affordances that led the student participants to choose writing as an activity in a classroom filled with options as well as to see writing as playful and fun. These affordances included 1) the honouring of student voices and interests, 2) collaboration among children, 3) a strong sense of classroom and school community, 4) powerful stories taught through playful pedagogy involving drama, 5) long blocks of uninterrupted play, and 6) an environment acting as the third teacher. The research showed that the school’s focus on professional learning through a collaborative approach was also a significant contributor to developing promising practices to teaching writing, while respecting and celebrating the importance and value of play in kindergarten. Finally, this research allowed moving from theory to practice, offering promising practices on how to develop and motivate children’s emergent and early writing skills in an authentic and meaningful way in a play-based kindergarten environment.

Keywords: Drama
Early years
Kindergarten
Play
Play-based learning
Writing
Advisor: Gagne, Antoinette
‘Long’ Story ‘Short’: Serotonin Genes and Their Association with OC Trait Dimensions and Hoarding in a Community, Pediatric Sample and with Brain Volume Differences in a Clinical, Pediatric OCD Sample

Background: Serotonin genes are commonly studied in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), but findings have been inconsistent. OCD is phenotypically heterogeneous, with subgroups reflecting symptom dimensions, sex, and age of onset. The thesis aimed to reduce heterogeneity in pediatric samples, stratifying by sex and studying either homogenous symptom-based subgroups or studying structural brain imaging as putative intermediate OCD phenotypes. For Study 1, we hypothesized that different serotonin gene variants would be associated with different obsessive-compulsive (OC) trait dimensions. In Study 2, we examined hoarding traits more closely and hypothesized that unique serotonin gene variants would be associated with hoarding in the absence of other OC traits. For Study 3, we hypothesized that specific serotonin gene variants would differ in their relationship with regional brain volume between OCD patients and controls. Methods: We genotyped candidate serotonin genes in 5213 pediatric participants in the community (for Studies 1 and 2) and in 200 pediatric participants in the clinic (for Study 3). In Studies 1 and 2, we assessed the association between gene variants and trait groups in males and females separately. In Study 3, we conducted structural magnetic resonance imaging (sMRI) to measure regional brain volumes within cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical (CSTC) circuits. In males and females separately, we assessed the effect of genotype-diagnosis interaction on brain volume. Results: In Study 1, the [LG + S] variant in 5-HTTLPR was significantly associated with hoarding in males (P-value of 0.003). In Study 2, [LG + S] was significantly associated with hoarding alone in males (P-value of 0.009). In Study 3, there was a significant genotype-diagnosis interaction for two single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in HTR2C, rs12860460 (P-value of 9.70e-8) and rs12854485 (P-value of 2.07e-6) in females. Conclusions: Study 1 indicated that hoarding may be distinct in its underlying serotonin system genetics and Study 2 more specifically showed that hoarding traits alone were driving our findings in Study 1. Study 3 suggested that sequence variation in HTR2C influences ACC volume in female pediatric OCD. Future genetic association studies in OCD should similarly account for heterogeneity and study homogenous subgroups, where possible, to help further decipher the biological mechanisms driving symptoms.

Advisor: Arnold, Paul D
A Convergent Continuum Strong Coupling Expansion for Quantum Mechanics Quantum Field Theory/ String Tensions in Deformed Yang-Mills theory

This Thesis is a collection of three different works: "A Convergent Continuum Strong Coupling Expansion For Quantum Mechanics & Quantum Field Theory": The notion of an asymptotic weak coupling expansion about an exactly solvable model in QM and QFT is generalized to an all positive value coupling convergent expansion. This is done by rescaling the variables available in the theory by free parameters, then adding and subtracting the exactly solvable model. The rest (initial rescaled theory by free parameters + the subtracted exactly solvable model) is expanded about the added exactly solvable model. Evaluating finite orders of this expansion at its extremum points with respect to the free parameter(s) gives a sequence that converges to the result of the previous asymptotic expansion. This method is applied to quantum mechanics and quantum field theory. The electron g-factor calculation is improved at the one loop level using this method. "String Tensions in Deformed Yang-Mills Theory": Yang-Mills theory defined on R 3 × S 1 deconfines at high temperatures or small circle sizes S 1 . In order to have a confining theory for arbitrary small spacial circle sizes S 1 that can be studied analytically a deformation of Yang-Mills theory is considered. In this work we calculate the k-string tensions for SU(N) deformed Yang-Mills theory on R 3 × S 1 . The k-string tensions Tk for 2 ≤ N ≤ 10 are calculated in two different ways: by a numerical minimization and a (novel) analytical evaluation of the string tension action. We find that dYM k-string ratios Tk/T1 do not obey the well-known sine- or Casimir-scaling laws. Instead, we show that the ratios Tk/T1 are bound above by a square root of Casimir scaling, previously found to hold for stringlike solutions of the MIT Bag Model. Our results also indicate that, at large values of N, k-strings in dYM do not become free. "A Generalization of Picard-Lindelof Theorem/ The Method of Characteristics to Systems of PDE": Picard-Lindelof theorem of ordinary differential equations and the method of characteristics is unified/generalized to the following system of PDE: Cil(x, y)∂yi/∂xl + ∂yi/∂xm = Di(x, y).

Keywords: Asymptotic expansions
Confinement
Convergent expansions
mass gap
method of characteristics
Yang-Mills theory
Advisor: Poppitz, Erich