bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Not Just About a Piece of Cloth: Three Content Analysis of an Online Anti-Mandatory Hijab Movement in Iran
Authors:   , Basmechi Farinaz
Published: January 2025

This dissertation investigates the My Stealthy Freedom (MSF) movement, an online movement against mandatory hijab laws in Iran, building on two leading lead social movements' theories, political processes and framing processes theories. Study 1 explores the utility of a tactical approach for explaining the movement's pace of insurgency. I employ a conceptual repertoire focused upon the political process model's core concepts of tactical innovation and tactical adaptations, supplementing these older concepts with the more recently proposed concept of tactical freeze and a newly proposed concept of tactical hashtags that is of particular relevance to online movements. Study 2 focuses on extracting hidden patterns and emotional characteristics in the MSF movement by conducting a topic modeling study on the text appearing in the captions of the main account of the movement on Instagram. It was shown that the actions of Masih Alinejad, the founder of the movement, represented by her online activity and extracted by means of topic modeling, is directly affected by the sequence of important events happening in Iran concluding to a transformation of a social movement to political one. Study 3 models how social movements use social media in the formation of affective publics and apply this model to Instagram post data from the MSF movement. Thematic analysis applied to samples of posts and comments revealed six main themes, one of which, aggression, includes three subthemes related to verbal aggression and physical violence. As the level of aggression increased in Instagram videos, the level of aggression in the comments increased as well, and videos containing verbal aggression and physical violence had more likes and comments than did non-aggressive and non-violent videos. In the conclusion, I consider implications of the three studies for social movement framing research and research on emotions and social movements.
The Development of Potential Therapeutic Anti-Myosin S2 Peptides that Modulate Contraction and Append to the Heart Homing Adduct Tannic Acid without Noticeable Effect on Their Functions
Authors:   , Qadan Motamed
Published: January 2025

This dissertation aimed to explore the S2 region with an attempt to modulate its elasticity in order to tune the contraction output. Two peptides, the stabilizer and destabilizer, showed high potential in modifying the S2 region at the cellular level, thus they were prepared for animal model testing. In this research, (i) S2 elasticity was studied, and the stabilizer and destabilizer peptides were built to tune contraction output through modulating S2 flexibility; (ii) the peptides were attached to heart homing adducts and the bond between them was confirmed; and (iii) it was shown that minor changes were imposed on the modulating peptides' functionality upon attaching to the heart homing adducts. S2 flexibility was confirmed through comparing it to other parts of myosin using simulated force spectroscopy. Modulatory peptides were built and computationally tested for their efficacy through interaction energy measurement, simulated force spectroscopy and molecular dynamics; these were attached to heart homing adducts for heart delivery. Interaction energy tests determined that tannic acid (TA) served well for this purpose. The stoichiometry of the bond between the TA and the modulating peptides was confirmed using mass spectroscopy. The functionality of the modulating peptides was shown to be unaltered through expansion microscopy where they located to the same position on the sarcomere with and without TA. They were also shown to cause the sarcomeres to contract similarly with and without the TA in contractility assay. Taken together, this work prepared the modulating peptides for animal model tests by attaching them to tannic acid.
Continuing the Work of Our Ancestors: Black Radical Leadership and Disruptive Pedagogies in Affirming the Well-being of Black Students
Authors:   , Foster Marquita Delorse
Published: January 2025

Using Black feminist thought and BlackCrit/critical race theory frameworks, this qualitative study examined Black educators' practices in addressing the behavior of their students in an urban school district. It utilized counternarratives and storytelling to explore the cultural dynamics at play between Black educators and their Black students. The Black educators in this study operated under several behavior systems, including positive behavioral interventions and supports (PBIS), socio-emotional learning (SEL), restorative practices (RPs), and zero tolerance policies (ZTPs). Such systems have been implemented based on research that they have the capacity to train Black students to make appropriate decisions regarding their behavior. These systems are also reinforced under the notion that they create learning spaces which promote academic achievement. Due to their own experiences and understanding about how institutional practices and disciplinary interventions result disproportionately in oppression and violence against Black students, these educators disrupted these practices and utilized cultural approaches that centered Black-ness. In doing so, they were able to address behavior and affirm Black students' well-being. The cultural approaches conceptualized as disruptive pedagogies include aspects of othermothering, otherfathering, critical caring, sermonizing, womanist caring, and Black masculine caring. An analysis of the stories and counternarratives illustrated that Black principals, counselors, and teachers draw from the long tradition of Black resistance and Black radical leadership to create educational spaces that support both emotional well-being and academic excellence. Implications, recommendations and future research are discussed.
Involving Children in the Assessment Process: Experiences of a Developmentally Appropriate Feedback Model
Authors:   , Weeks Sara Eaton
Published: January 2025

Assessment is a foundational part of counseling practice, which includes the process of providing assessment feedback to those tested. Millions of children are assessed across the United States through the public-school system, hospital, agency, and private practice settings. Though millions of children are assessed yearly, there has been little research surrounding providing assessment feedback with children. In this study, the author qualitatively explored children's experiences with a developmentally appropriate feedback model, the young children's assessment feedback (YCAF). Participants included ten 6 to 10-year old children, who had not previously gone through psychoeducational testing within the last year. Participants completed a battery of psychoeducational assessments and the YCAF feedback process. Data sources included session transcriptions, session observation notes, child interviews, parent interviews, and expressive arts observation notes. In order to explore the perceptions regarding the YCAF, the author utilized interpretative phenomenological analysis to understand the children's feedback experiences. Findings included the following themes: freedom for self-direction, self-concept, therapeutic relationship, affective responses of child, systemic shifts, and developmental considerations. The themes show that the children in this study saw a variety of benefits and experiences surrounding receiving their own personalized, developmentally appropriate assessment feedback.
Motivating Adolescent Students to Read for Pleasure: Influences on Rural Teachers' Practice
Authors:   , McDaniel Lisa G
Published: January 2025

The purpose of this descriptive case study was to explore the self-perception of three rural, intermediate, ELA teachers to motivate their students to read for pleasure. The methods utilized in this study included one-on-one interviews, and a focus group discussion, including all three participants and the researcher. The subjects shared teaching strategies from their childhoods that succeeded and failed in motivating them to read. The biographical perspective proposed by Kelchtermans and Vandenberghe allows us to see how the teachers' biographies influenced their instructional beliefs. Through this lens, it was revealed that, in their current classrooms, the teachers in this study utilize strategies they recalled from childhood as motivational. For example, they have confidence in read-alouds, literary freedom of choice, the development of positive student-teacher relationships, and engaging lessons that are significant to the students. Further, they avoid strategies they recollect from childhood that failed to motivate them to read such as teacher-chosen literature and lessons they believed were irrelevant. Findings have the potential to inform teachers, teacher educators, school administrators, and in-service providers of the nature of beliefs and intentions regarding reading motivation that rural, ELA teachers possess.
Intersectional Analysis of Perceived Racism as a Determinant of Children's Mental Health
Authors:   , Monasterio Ronaldo
Published: January 2025

Youth in the United States are experiencing a steep increase in mental health issues. Concurrently, unique political, economic and social dynamics in the U.S. make the circumstances of nonwhite children's mental health partially contingent on experiences of racism. In this study, I examine the relationship between racial minority children's mental health and perceived racism, while also examining the moderating effects of gender on this relationship. I first review prior research which suggest that racism is a salient determinant of several health outcomes among racial minorities and racial minority children, including depression and anxiety. I then review research on both gender and racial socialization and posit possible implications of these differentials on mental health. Considering both the racialized and gendered factors contributing to youth's mental health outcomes, this study fills a gap in previous research by exploring the differences by gender and race in the effect of perceived racism on children's mental health. I use data from the National Survey of Children's Health from 2016 to 2019. Using average marginal effects, calculated from a series of logistic regression models predicting depression, anxiety, behavioral and emotional problems, I find support for previous research which suggests that perceived racism predicts poor mental health among non-white children. I elaborate further by adding the intersection of gender, splitting and comparing the sample across race and gender subgroups. I find considerable variety in the effects of perceived racism across race and gender, such that Latina and Asian girls who experience racism are at heightened risk for being diagnosed with mental health conditions.
Performative Resistance as Ecofeminist Praxis?
Authors:   , Johnson Benjamin D
Published: January 2025

Erika Cudworth's Developing Ecofeminist Theory provides a helpful foundation for a non-essentialist, properly intersectional ecofeminist account of oppression, marginalization, and domination, but her rejection of what she refers to as "postmodernism" appears to be based on a misreading of Judith Butler. I attempt to provide a synthesis of Cudworth's framework with Butler, particularly through the use of Karen Barad's agential realism, in order to provide possibility for new alliances between ecofeminism and other anti-oppressive frameworks. I then examine what it might look like to do ecofeminist praxis, given the complex view of agency, ontology, and intersectionality rendered by such a synthesis. I draw from bicycling as an example from which to extrapolate what it means to resist oppression, and then draw from the Philosophy for Children movement to consider what such resistance might look like within the classroom. This dissertation thus attempts to move from theory to practice, recognizing that "the real world" is both always at hand and also subject to performative deconstruction.
Neurociencia Bicultural: Testing the Effects of Culture on Recognition Memory in Bicultural Latinxs
Authors:   , Carbajal Ivan
Published: January 2025

Past research has provided evidence for cultural differences in episodic memory when comparing European American and East Asian samples. However, cultural cognitive neuroscience has become over-dependent on European American vs. East Asian samples, which has left very little research into groups outside of this dichotomy. The aim of this dissertation was to address the need of more diverse samples in cultural cognitive neuroscience and to address the lack of research on Latinx biculturals. In this dissertation I explored how language could serve as a priming method to activate specific cultural systems, how bicultural Latinxs may switch cultural frames through language priming, and how priming of cultural systems affects their perception and recognition memory for certain visual information. The present study was designed to include a specific technique to investigate the potential cross-modal effect of cultural priming through language on visual cognition in bicultural and bilingual Latinxs. Results suggest that language did prime bicultural Latinxs to perform differently in a behavioral task, where images encoded in Spanish were more likely to be identified as incorrect and images encoded in English were more likely to be identified as correct. Additionally, we found that Cultural Blendedness directly predicted recognition accuracy, where higher identification led to more incorrect answers, and lower identification led to more correct answers. Implications, limitations, and areas of future study are discussed.
Preservice Music Educators' Perceived Development from Collegiate Large Ensemble Experiences
Authors:   , Grey Alyssa
Published: January 2025

The purpose of this study was to investigate preservice music educators' perceptions of collegiate large ensemble experiences. The researcher created and tested a survey designed to explore how preservice music educators perceived their large ensemble experiences may impact their pedagogy skills and musicianship skills. Local (n = 101) and national (n = 77) respondents answered agreement statements about ensemble experiences, course enrollment questions, and a ranking question. An exploratory factor analysis on data from the instrument yielded four factors: Conducting Gesture Growth, Musical Skills and Pedagogy Skills, Repertoire and Literature Selection, and Other with a Cronbach's alpha of .92. Composite score results indicated that there was a statistically significant difference for one factor by primary teaching identity. Preservice music educators observed the most musical skills growth for their conducting gesture. Participants gave the highest pedagogy skills ratings for statements about large ensembles preparing them for a career in music education, improving their teaching effectiveness, and ensemble experiences altering their perceptions of music teaching.
A Technical Preparation Guide for the "Dragonetti Concerto" in A Major for Double Bass and Orchestra by Édouard Nanny
Authors:   , Sabuncu Irmak
Published: January 2025

One of the essential difficulties encountered while preparing a piece for a pre-professional player is defining the piece's technical challenges and doing exercises or etude studies accordingly. Based on this fact, in my thesis, I described the technical challenges of Edouard Nanny's Dragonetti A Major concerto under the headings and suggested technical studies suitable for these difficulties. The titles represented are string crossing, bow strokes, thumb position and vertical-horizontal approaches, harmonic arpeggios and horizontal playing in harmonics, intonation and shifting, and double stops. In the last step of each heading, I associate these technical studies with an excerpt from a more advanced piece than this concerto in the double bass repertoire. Accordingly, the thesis aims to define a working path for Nanny's Dragonetti A Major Double Bass Concerto and, at the same time, to be a preliminary preparation for the more technically challenging works of the repertoire.
Making Sense of Things
Authors:   , Fox West
Published: January 2025

Making Sense of Things is a piece composed through consideration of the relationship between music, meaning, and materiality. The piece, written for voice, flute, percussion, and live electronics, explores topics of the "sensible" and "nonsensical" in music, moving through a variety of sonic episodes that feature different notational approaches, electronic textures, technical instrumental practice, and theatrical elements in order to explore a variety of expressive possibilities while unified around the central musical ideas of scratching sounds and metal bars. The critical essay examines the relationship between the piece and the theoretical writings which inspired it. Reading through the work of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, I examine the relationship between Making Sense of Things and new materialist discourses, affect theory, and semiotics.
A Single Case Study of a MakerBus in K-12 Education
Authors:   , Daughrity Lea Anne
Published: January 2025

MakerBuses are travelling makerspaces that deliver hands-on tools and resources to community-wide locations to foster 21st century learning and development. Often found in K-12 schools, MakerBuses provide accessible and tangible learning opportunities for all learners, even in the most underserved communities. This single, typical case study provided a foundational look at how one MakerBus started as a simple idea and evolved into a learning experience used throughout the community it serves. Through discovery it was evident that accessibility, community outreach, tool distribution, and active learning were the critical elements that made this makerbus a unique tool for education.
Client Narcissism and the Decision to Switch Tax Professionals
Authors:   , Kaszak Steven E
Published: January 2025

Contentious interactions may arise between a tax professional and client upon a disagreement over a tax position. In an increasingly competitive tax return preparation market, these contentious interactions represent a significant threat to tax practitioners' client satisfaction and retention objectives. I conduct an experiment in which I examine the effect of three factors on tax clients' (1) likelihood to accept the advice of the tax accountant and (2) likelihood to switch tax accountants upon receiving professional advice counter to their preferred tax position. The three factors are: (1) clients' antagonistic narcissism; (2) clients' relationship with the accountant; and (3) how the advice is framed by the tax accountant. The results are based on a sample of 93 taxpayers. First, this study examines how clients' measured levels of narcissistic antagonism (hereafter, antagonism) impacts their reaction to "being told no" by their tax professional. Results indicate that upon the receipt of advice contrary to their preferences, highly antagonistic clients are more likely to (1) engage in a contentious interaction with their professional and (2) switch to a new tax professional. Supplemental path analyses document that individuals with high levels of antagonism cognitively react to instances of "being told no" by simultaneously devaluing their professionals' credibility and role as a client advocate, leading to these aggressive behaviors. This study also examines how the social closeness of the professional-client relationship influences the argue and switch decisions. Multivariate analysis indicates that social closeness is significantly related to the argue and switch decision. However, univariate results do not show significant relationship between social closeness and each of the decisions individually. That is, I find partial support for the professional publications and AICPA recommendations that tax practitioners should develop personal relationships with their clients to improve client satisfaction and likelihood of retention. Clients are marginally more likely to retain their current tax professional for future years when they feel they have a personal relationship with their tax practitioner, as opposed to those in a purely professional relationship. Finally, this dissertation considers the manner in which a tax professional frames his/her advice that is counter to a client's preferences. Results indicate that contrary advice that focuses on the potential downsides of an aggressive tax position (e.g., IRS audits and penalties) significantly dissuades client argument with the professional and significantly deters switching to a new tax accountant as compared to advice that is framed as being in the clients' "best interest."
Czech Opera Arias: An Anthology for Soprano
Authors:   , Nichols Bree
Published: January 2025

This anthology of late 19th- and early 20th-century Czech opera arias for soprano focuses on works that lack existing scholarship, bridging the language gap through translations and pronunciation materials for English-speaking singers. Its 24 arias supplement the works of Smetana, Dvořák, and Janáček with those of contemporaneous composers Karel Bendl, Zdeněk Fibich, Josef Bohuslav Foerster, Karel Kovařovic, Vítězslav Novák, and Otakar Ostrčil. Its musicological scope provides vignettes of the musical-cultural landscape of Czech opera around the turn of the 20th century, the transformation of Czech declamation during that period, and the language knowledge needed to sing the works thereof. Chapter 2 elucidates the methodology used in the anthology's phonetic transcriptions and discusses the unique articulatory demands of singing in Czech. Chapter 3 grounds contemporaneous discussion of Czech declamation as late 19th- and early 20th-century composers and librettists sought to shape a musical voice suited to the features of their language. The following chapter is a look at Janáček's unique solution to this challenge. In Chapter 5, the relationship between criticism and composition is examined for these two faces of Czech modernism. Finally, Chapter 6 includes new performance editions of the arias curated for the anthology. Each aria is accompanied by an idiomatic translation, an inline phonetic transcription and word-for-word translation, a brief biographical introduction of the composer, and background information contextualizing the aria and the work from which it is derived. The objective of the anthology is to facilitate a broader range of well-informed performances of Czech repertoire as well as the acquisition of Czech lyric diction for singers at various experience levels.
The Early Songs (1880–1885) of Claude Debussy: An Analytical Approach to Defining a Repertoire
Authors:   , Waldroup William Allan
Published: January 2025

The period between 1880 and 1885 was a significant time in Claude Debussy's life and compositional career. 1880 marks the date of his first published composition, "Nuit d'étoiles," and 1885 is the year in which he began his two-year tenure in Rome after winning the coveted Prix de Rome in 1884. During the intervening time Debussy composed about forty songs. Scholarly literature, especially analytical literature, tends to focus heavily on music in Debussy's mature style, often casting his early compositions in an unfavorable light. Writing on Debussy is scattered with references to the early songs but authors almost always situate them on one end of a continuum that shows an evolution of compositional style culminating in maturity. Such a view tends, if only tacitly, to regard early works as inferior instances of juvenilia rather than works worthy of study in their own right. In this dissertation I establish a foundation for regarding Debussy's early songs as significant compositions in their own right, independent from anachronistic comparisons with his more mature compositional style, and provide justification for considering the songs as a unified, identifiable repertoire within Debussy's larger œuvre. Using a modified Schenkerian analytical approach, I identify consistencies among the songs that give them an independent identity and provide support for their classification as an identifiable collection of works. I consider the songs within a proper historical narrative and in close association with poetry, French musical culture, and issues related to Debussy's biography. Furthermore, I delineate Debussy's compositional aesthetic in the early songs and examine his relationship to other notable contemporary composers of the mélodie, thus showing how his early style emerged from the tradition of the mélodie, how he participated in late-nineteenth century art-song culture, and how he ultimately pushed the genre of the mélodie forward.
Defect-Engineered Two-Dimensional Transition Metal Dichalcogenides for High-Efficient Piezoelectric Sensor
Authors:   , Kim Junyoung
Published: January 2025

Piezoelectricity in two-dimensional (2D) transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) has attracted significant attention due to their unique crystal structure and the lack of inversion centers when the bulk TMDs thin down to monolayer. Although the piezoelectricity effect in atomic-thickness TMDs has been demonstrated, they are not scalable. Herein, we demonstrate a piezoelectric effect from large-scale, sputtered MoS2 and WS2 using a robust defect-engineering based on the thermal-solvent annealing and solvent immersion process. This yields a higher piezoelectric output over 20 times after annealing or solvent immersion. Indeed, the piezoelectric responses are strengthened with the increases of defect density. Moreover, the MoS2 or WS2 piezoelectric device array shows an exceptional piezoelectric sensitivity with a high-level uniformity and excellent environmental stability under ambient conditions. A detailed study of the sulfur vacancy-dependent property and its resultant asymmetric structure-induced piezoelectricity is reported. The proposed approach is scalable and can produce advanced materials for flexible piezoelectric devices to be used in emerging bioinspired robotics and biomedical applications.
An Extensible Computing Architecture Design for Connected Autonomous Vehicle System
Authors:   , Hochstetler Jacob Daniel
Published: January 2025

Autonomous vehicles have made milestone strides within the past decade. Advances up the autonomy ladder have come lock-step with the advances in machine learning, namely deep-learning algorithms and huge, open training sets. And while advances in CPUs have slowed, GPUs have edged into the previous decade's TOP 500 supercomputer territory. This new class of GPUs include novel deep-learning hardware that has essentially side-stepped Moore's law, outpacing the doubling observation by a factor of ten. While GPUs have make record progress, networks do not follow Moore's law and are restricted by several bottlenecks, from protocol-based latency lower bounds to the very laws of physics. In a way, the bottlenecks that plague modern networks gave rise to Edge computing, a key component of the Connected Autonomous Vehicle system, as the need for low-latency in some domains eclipsed the need for massive processing farms. The Connected Autonomous Vehicle ecosystem is one of the most complicated environments in all of computing. Not only is the hardware scaled all the way from 16 and 32-bit microcontrollers, to multi-CPU Edge nodes, and multi-GPU Cloud servers, but the networking also encompasses the gamut of modern communication transports. I propose a framework for negotiating, encapsulating and transferring data between vehicles ensuring efficient bandwidth utilization and respecting real-time privacy levels.
The Emergence of Receptive and Expressive Language through Stimulus-Specific Consequences
Authors:   , Spurgin Destiny
Published: January 2025

An important question in teaching language is, what accounts for the emergence of either receptive or expressive labels when teaching only one of them? The teaching procedures in the present study were intended to reproduce the natural development of bidirectional naming in which caregivers comment on the items a child is interacting with and children echo those vocalizations they hear. Thus, the only vocalizations presented by the researcher during teaching occurred after the learner pointed to a specific stimulus, and were specific to the stimulus being targeted. These vocalizations are referred to in this study as stimulus-specific consequences. The purpose of this research was to investigate if the stimulus-specific consequences could become discriminative stimuli for receptive labels, and lead to the emergence of expressive labels. Three studies were conducted, each with four adults. Results demonstrated that using a stimulus-specific consequence during teaching led to receptive labels for all participants, but led to the emergence of expressive labels for only four participants. In other words, bidirectional naming did not occur for the majority of participants. Factors that may improve interrelations between receptive and expressive labels were analyzed, but further evaluations are needed to account for the inconsistent demonstrations of naming.
Foreign Direct Investment and Sustainable Peace During/After Civil Conflicts
Authors:   , Jeong Bora
Published: January 2025

This dissertation examines the impact of FDI on peace in civil conflict-experienced states. While economic grievances have often been pointed out as a major cause of civil war within the literature, scholarship on post-conflict peace has focused mainly on political settlements, such as one-sided victories or power sharing, largely ignoring the importance of economic conditions. Thus, this dissertation aims to examine how FDI can affect sustainable peace in conflict-experienced states in terms of prevention of conflict recurrence and regime stability. FDI can be conducive to peace during/after civil conflicts, as it can bring capital which can be used for economic reconstruction and development in conflict-experienced states. Furthermore, this dissertation focuses on the impact of bilateral FDI. When a third party intervenes in a conflict management process and the third party has a great deal of economic interaction with the conflict experienced state, this economic interdependency will affect the third party's motivation to make the conflict-experienced state stable. It also provides third-party with greater leverage over peace efforts. Eventually, this third-party leverage will affect peace during/after civil conflicts. This dissertation is built around three interrelated empirical chapters: (1) determinants of FDI in conflict-experienced states, (2) the impact of FDI on conflict recurrence, and (3) the impact of FDI on regime stability. U.S. and Chinese FDI are used as focal cases for the analysis. This is because they have the most powerful economic and military influences in the world. As a result, this dissertation examines the impact of U.S. and Chinese FDI on peace in civil conflict-experienced states.
Procurement of Smart City Technologies: Smart City or Smart Governance?
Authors:   , Tao Jie
Published: January 2025

This dissertation argues that the core of building smart cities is through the procurement and implementation of smart city technologies (SCTs) by either individual (i.e., smart city) or collaborative endeavors (i.e., smart governance). Given that urbanization problems (e.g., air pollution) usually spill over city boundaries, building smart cities as silos may not solve these problems. Therefore, utilizing smart governance in SCT procurement and implementation should be a better approach. Considering the potential benefits of smart governance, this dissertation addresses three overarching questions: (1) What is a smart city? (2) What is smart governance? and (3) Why do some cities choose to participate in smart governance while others do not? By developing a typology of smart governance, this dissertation categorizes three levels of smart governance based on cities' participation in cooperative procurement and implementation of SCTs. Data collected from the 2019 Smart Governance Survey confirm that the level of smart governance does vary among Texas cities. Applying transaction costs and institutional collective action (ICA) frameworks, the dissertation finds that public managers' perceptions on transaction costs and joint gains as well as cities' extant ICA mechanisms affect cities' participation in smart governance.
Francis Bacon's New Atlantis: The Quiet Revolution of Science, Religion, and Politics
Authors:   , Lowe Evan M.
Published: January 2025

Francis Bacon (1561-1626) is recognized as a founder of the modern scientific project and a forerunner of the modern era of political thought. He advocated the development of an active science that would enable human beings to control nature in order to relieve man's estate. To accomplish this, Bacon argues that we must reconstruct all arts and sciences upon a more solid foundation. In reconstructing the arts and sciences, Bacon subtly changes the meaning of foundational religious, political, and scientific notions in order to better suit his project of progress. As the inheritors of his vision, turning to Bacon helps recover foundational considerations that have been forgotten as a result of his success. This dissertation approaches Bacon's thought through an analysis of his New Atlantis, a fable that envisions the completion of his project. I also turn to his other political, scientific, and religious works as appropriate to supply what is omitted in the fable. I find that although his revision of religious, scientific, and political foundations is conducted subtly they are nevertheless revolutionary, and essential for preparing the various outlooks that characterize the modern world.
Effects of Attachment Height and Rail Material of Resistance Training Sled on Trunk Lean and Jerk During Linear Acceleration Training
Authors:   , Fitzgerald Sean
Published: January 2025

Sprint acceleration training has been highly researched and found that resistance sleds are one of the most effective tools for maximizing training adaptations. The resistance sled is being used by many of the world leaders in athletic training but has yet to be researched for the kinetic and kinematic effects some of its key components cause. The aim of this study was to better understand the effects of the attachment height on the sled and sled rail material on the user's trunk lean and jerking effect caused by the sled. This was done because it was hypothesized that the attachment height has a direct impact on trunk lean and sled rail material has a direct impact on jerk caused by the sled. To test these assumptions, experimental and theoretical data was collected using a single subject study analyzing trunk lean and acceleration values of the sled. The results presented a significant decrease in trunk lean (more horizontal line of action) when the attachment height was raised. Additionally, no significant values were attained to support the assumption that by modifying the sled rail material, jerking effects will decrease. The results indicate that there is a direct correlation between attachment height and trunk lean. More research is needed to better understand the relationship between sled rail material and jerk.
The Decolonization of United States History: Exploring American Exceptionalism
Authors:   , Walsh Leah Sydney Pearce
Published: January 2025

Like many institutions of high education throughout the United States, the University of North Texas requires all students to pass introductory United States History courses. While the purpose of these courses should be to create a population well versed in U.S. history and sociopolitical and economic context, the foundational textbooks utilized in these courses promote American exceptionalism and U.S. supremacy. Their omission of the complex and controversial history of the United States creates a false master narrative based on an idealized version of U.S. history. Even textbooks that include diversity continue to uphold a progressive master narrative that ignores issues of systemic racism, sexism, and homophobia. My theoretical analysis of the required textbooks, Exploring American Histories: A Survey with Sources, is applicable to all introductory U.S. history textbooks. Decolonialism, critical race, and intersectional feminism are theoretical lenses that disentangle and highlight otherwise invisible aspects of American exceptionalism and the serious consequences of the subjugation of subaltern historical narratives. This thesis applies theory with examples of how textbooks or supplemental teaching can expose foundational oppression, violence, and discrimination to teach students critical thinking and help them see connections between the past and their present.
Teacher Perceptions of Supports that Promote Computer Self-Efficacy and Transformational Digital Pedagogy in One-to-One Learning Environments
Authors:   , Kent Paula J
Published: January 2025

Although one-to-one technology programs are rapidly expanding in secondary schools, the literature about how to effectively leverage these programs to improve teaching and learning is relatively small. Little guidance is available for school leaders attempting to improve teachers' willingness and ability to incorporate technology effectively into their instruction. The purpose of this mixed-methods case study was to discovery what supports school leaders provide to promote high levels of computer self-efficacy and transformational digital pedagogies in one-to-one learning environments. Data were collected from English language arts, Social Studies, and science teachers in three high schools in a suburban school district in northeast Texas using an online survey, eight virtual semi-structured interviews, and two virtual focus group interviews. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and deductive and inductive analysis. The findings of the study reveal most teachers perceived their ability to effectively deliver digital instruction as strong, and most were able to incorporate technology into their lessons at transformational levels. The following themes emerged from data regarding teachers' perceptions of support: shared vision, realistic and supportive climate, collaboration, encouragement, job-embedded professional learning, continuous improvement, equity, and safe, legal, and ethical use. The findings of this study serve as a foundation for understanding how school leaders can best support teachers as they attempt to integrate one-to-one technology into their lessons.
Benefits of Probiotics on Mortality, Growth Performance, Physiological Condition and Gut Histomophology of Juvenile Red Drum (Sciaenops ocellatus)
Authors:   , Busby Wren Adell
Published: January 2025

Results from the present study found for the first time that the use of bacterial strains of Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus casei, Bifidobacterium thermophilum, and Enterococcus faecium from the commercial product PrimaLac® had the potential to act as a possible probiotic for juvenile red drum. The addition of PrimaLac® probiotics [whether as a water-soluble probiotic (WSP) or in a probiotic enhanced starter feed (PESF)] reduced mortality (%M), enhanced growth rates (MW, LT, SGR, and DGR), improved feed conversion efficiencies (FCEs), and physical condition factors in the juvenile red drum. Improvement was quantified using external morphological condition indices (MCIs) and blood physiological condition indices (PCIs). Results showed a strong positive relationship between MCIs and PCIs, which suggested that probiotics treated fish were in better health (lower MCIs) with lower fasting blood glucose and lactate levels than control fish. Addition of probiotics also resulted in improved water quality (lower nitrate, nitrite, and ammonia) in the treatment tanks compared to controls. Application of PrimaLac® probiotics on the morphology and histology of three different regions of the intestine (proximal, mid-and distal) improved intestinal length (Li), mass (Mi), and digesta mass (Md). In 5μm histological sections examined for differences among treatments (probiotics vs. controls), five variables within each intestinal region were also quantified: (i) perimeter ratio (PR) between the internal perimeter (IP) of the intestinal lumen and the external perimeter (EP) of the intestine where, PR = IP/EP; (ii) width of lamina propria (wLP); (iii) thickness of the muscle layer (tM); (iv) the number of goblet cells per segments (GC); and (v) height of enterocytes (hE). Overall, Li and Mi significantly increased by 13.4 ± 1.2% and 11.8 ± 0.9%, respectively, and Md decreased by 33.2 ± 1.21% compared to controls. Significant increases in microvilli heights, PR (by 21.3 ± 1.2%), tM (by 18.4 ± 0.9%), and increased numbers of GC (by 35.1 ± 2.8%) provided evidence that bacteria species from PrimaLac® (whether in WSP or PESF) affected the intestinal histomorphology of juvenile red drum. Collectively, these changes were partially responsible for increased feed assimilation (supported by reduced digesta) and improved overall juvenile red drum growth and condition. These results will add significantly to the limited database on how probiotics, as possible standard practice at the fish farm, may offer significant benefits for fish production and fish health. Addition of probiotics will also be of benefit to most aquaculture species and not only for red drum, but also for other high-value carnivorous species, such as Atlantic salmon, without threat to natural populations or damaging fisheries-based ecosystems that are already on the edge of collapse from over fishing and pollution.
Engine Running: Essays
Authors:   , Mason Chesley Cade
Published: January 2025

Engine Running: Essays is a collection of creative nonfiction that explores, in parts, a persona's distancing from home and self against the backdrop of an increasingly fractured family doing the same. Through a variety of forms, the essays seek to balance themes like loss, self-discovery, and manhood in reflections on the role of childhood memory, the early revelations and experimentation of sexuality, and the carving-out of personal identity in West Texas.
Object Detection for Aerial View Images: Dataset and Learning Rate
Authors:   , Qi Yunlong
Published: January 2025

In recent years, deep learning based computer vision technology has developed rapidly. This is not only due to the improvement of computing power, but also due to the emergence of high-quality datasets. The combination of object detectors and drones has great potential in the field of rescue and disaster relief. We created an image dataset specifically for vision applications on drone platforms. The dataset contains 5000 images, and each image is carefully labeled according to the PASCAL VOC standard. This specific dataset will be very important for developing deep learning algorithms for drone applications. In object detection models, loss function plays a vital role. Considering the uneven distribution of large and small objects in the dataset, we propose adjustment coefficients based on the frequencies of objects of different sizes to adjust the loss function, and finally improve the accuracy of the model.
Exploring Factors Affecting Public Service Motivation: An Investigation of Public Service Motivation in Saudi Arabia
Authors:   , Alotaibi Saud G.
Published: January 2025

This research builds on social exchange theory and self-determination theory to better understand the relationships between employee engagement, demographic and personal attributes, and public service motivation (PSM). It hypothesizes that employee engagement and demographic and personal characteristics (education, income, gender, and parents working in civil service) will directly affect PSM. I also hypothesize that education, income, and gender will have an indirect effect and moderate the relationship between employee engagement and PSM. This dissertation uses a quantitative approach to investigate the hypotheses introduced with the conceptual model. This research uses structural equation modeling as a data analysis technique. Based on 704 valid questionnaires distributed to Saudi public employees in Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam, and Assir, the analysis shows that a higher level of employee engagement will lead to a higher level of public service motivation. It also reveals that a higher level of education will lead to a higher level of PSM.; the hypothesis that income positively affects PSM is not supported. Thus, this study finds that there is no significant relationship between income and PSM. Being female is found to be negatively associated with PSM. Therefore, the hypothesis that females are lower PSM than males is supported. Parents of public employees whose parents work or have worked in civil service demonstrated a high level of PSM compared with employees whose parents do not work in civil service. Regarding the moderation hypotheses, interestingly, the analysis shows that education, gender, and income do not moderate the effect of employee engagement on public service motivation.
A Comparative Analysis of the Orchestral and Piano Versions of Finlandia by Jean Sibelius in Relation to His Compositional Style, 1899–1904
Authors:   , Teppo Ruusamari
Published: January 2025

While he was composing his important orchestral tone poem Finlandia in 1899–1900, Jean Sibelius (1865–1957) made his own piano arrangement of it. The purpose of this study is to compare the piano arrangement and orchestral version and to see further the similarities with Sibelius's other piano compositions from the same time period (1899-1904). Through this study I have found compositional patterns, which are typical for the composer and defined his composition style for piano during his "Kalevala-Romantic" phase. Sibelius's piano style was characterized as unpianistic and bulky by some. However, through my research I can show that with an analysis of certain harmonic structures, subtle use of pedal and correct voicings, his piano texture is indeed very thoughtful and transparent with a clear focus on counterpoint while remaining pianistic and comfortable to play. In order to fully understand the idiosyncrasies of the two versions of Finlandia, a detailed comparative analysis of the piano and orchestral scores is necessary. For this purpose, I primarily used the printed scores of both the piano and orchestral versions. In addition, the manuscript of the piano version of Finlandia was consulted as an important resource. From the orchestra manuscript, only one page has been found. The analysis focuses on the comparison between the textures of both versions, the score and the piano arrangement. I also applied the results of the comparison to the other scores of Sibelius's piano compositions from that time period to show his consistency in his use of the described arrangement techniques. With using the orchestration possibilities of the piano Sibelius's writing allows the instrument to stand completely on its own using all the possibilities of the piano sound while maintaining a highly pianistic texture. The goal of my research is to provide insight to understanding Sibelius's early piano style, introduce some performance practice ideas appropriate to this period, and highlight his smaller-scale works such as the character pieces and songs of this period.