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Recurring Images Rising Out of a State of Obscurity (open access)

Recurring Images Rising Out of a State of Obscurity

Through this study I intended to analyze and determine the significance of the recurring imagery that emerged as an integral part of my compositions. Furthermore, I attempted to discern the importance and over all the effects of the small scale upon my work and determine how vital is the spontaneity that is used to obtain each composition.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Aberu, Nancy E. Vendrell
System: The UNT Digital Library
Post-Traumatic Symptomatology in the Luby's Shooting (open access)

Post-Traumatic Symptomatology in the Luby's Shooting

The role of exposure to a human-made disaster and the subsequent development of post-traumatic stress reactions were examined. Subjects included 49 males and 30 females who were variously exposed to the Luby's shooting incident in Killeen, Texas in October of 1991. Post-traumatic stress symptomatology was measured by the SCL-90R. Exposure was operationalized by using a scenario-rating scheme with independent raters estimating each subject's level of exposure. A regression and commonality analysis revealed that exposure is an important predictor in post-traumatic symptomatology. Premorbid functioning and gender were also found to play important roles, with females expressing higher levels of symptomatology.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Adams, Pam, 1964-
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Organizational Improvement of the Village Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in Fort Worth, Texas, 1969-1988: a Case Study of Forces Responsible for Organizational Change (open access)

The Organizational Improvement of the Village Creek Wastewater Treatment Plant in Fort Worth, Texas, 1969-1988: a Case Study of Forces Responsible for Organizational Change

This study documents that external and internal forces were causes of change at VCWTP. External forces caused. Fort Worth to reorganize and introduce new management at VCWTP after 1982. These improvements led to VCWTP being selected best managed wastewater treatment plant in the nation by EPA in 1988. This study first analyzes external and internal forces responsible for changes at VCWTP. A history of plant operations also is reviewed. Personnel interviews were conducted of perceptions of employees. Finally, statistics obtained of the plant operation from 1969 to 1988 are compared with personal interviews. Five forces effect change at VCWTP; population, regulatory requirements, political conflicts, an organizational and managerial factors. Turnaround occurred as external and internal corrections were made.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Akidi, Innocent O. (Innocent Okechuknu)
System: The UNT Digital Library
An Efficient Hybrid Heuristic and Probabilistic Model for the Gate Matrix Layout Problem in VLSI Design (open access)

An Efficient Hybrid Heuristic and Probabilistic Model for the Gate Matrix Layout Problem in VLSI Design

In this thesis, the gate matrix layout problem in VLSI design is considered where the goal is to minimize the number of tracks required to layout a given circuit and a taxonomy of approaches to its solution is presented. An efficient hybrid heuristic is also proposed for this combinatorial optimization problem, which is based on the combination of probabilistic hill-climbing technique and greedy method. This heuristic is tested experimentally with respect to four existing algorithms. As test cases, five benchmark problems from the literature as well as randomly generated problem instances are considered. The experimental results show that the proposed hybrid algorithm, on the average, performs better than other heuristics in terms of the required computation time and/or the quality of solution. Due to the computation-intensive nature of the problem, an exact solution within reasonable time limits is impossible. So, it is difficult to judge the effectiveness of any heuristic in terms of the quality of solution (number of tracks required). A probabilistic model of the gate matrix layout problem that computes the expected number of tracks from the given input parameters, is useful to this respect. Such a probabilistic model is proposed in this thesis, and its performance is …
Date: August 1993
Creator: Bagchi, Tanuj
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Angoff Method and Rater Analysis: Enhancing Cutoff Score Reliability and Accuracy (open access)

The Angoff Method and Rater Analysis: Enhancing Cutoff Score Reliability and Accuracy

At times called a philosophy and other times called a process, cutting score methodology is an issue routinely encountered by Industrial/Organizational (I/0) psychologists. Published literature on cutting score methodology appears much more frequently in academic settings than it does in personnel settings where the potential for lawsuits typically occurs more often. With the passage of the 1991 Civil Rights Act, it is no longer legal to use within-group scoring. It has now become necessary for personnel psychologists to develop more acceptable selection methods that fall within established guidelines. Designating cutoff scores with the Angoff method appears to suit many requirements of personnel departments. Several procedures have evolved that suggest enhancing the accuracy and reliability of the Angoff method is possible. The current experiment investigated several such procedures, and found that rater accuracy methods significantly enhance cutoff score reliability and accuracy.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Baker, Charles E., 1957-
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Sculptural Creation of a New Form of Visual Awareness Concerning Predators: The Cheetah and the Wolf (open access)

The Sculptural Creation of a New Form of Visual Awareness Concerning Predators: The Cheetah and the Wolf

The problem I have addressed this year revolves around my search for a means to visually challenge mankind's present concepts and ideology concerning the wolf and the cheetah. At the same time, it was essential that I find a way to visually challenge previous artistic interpretations of these animals. This involved the discovery of a new form of animal representation relevant to modern societies' problems concerning the future of wildlife and the significance of the predator.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Ballmann, Elizabeth
System: The UNT Digital Library
Saul Bellow's Creation of Ambiguity and Deception in Herzog and The Dean's December (open access)

Saul Bellow's Creation of Ambiguity and Deception in Herzog and The Dean's December

Argues that Bellow purposefully creates ambiguity and deception using impersonal narration and free indirect discourse in order to present Herzog and The Dean's December as reflections of an ambiguous and deceptive world. The discussion of impersonal narration is based on Wayne Booth's theories about the confusion of distance resulting from impersonal narration; the discussion of free indirect discourse is drawn from a number of definitions. Utilizes a number of specific references to the texts and to criticisms of the texts to demonstrate the absence of norms and the effect that the ambiguity and deception may have on readers.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Banks, Paul J. (Paul Jerome)
System: The UNT Digital Library
From Boyd City to the Big City and Beyond: Six Stories with a Critical Introduction (open access)

From Boyd City to the Big City and Beyond: Six Stories with a Critical Introduction

The critical introduction to this collection of short fiction argues that writing is reading and that reading is writing. The argument draws descriptions of writing as reading from such diverse sources as Sherwood Anderson, Roland Barthes, Neil Simon, J. Hillis Miller and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, as well as from the author's own experience. Descriptions of reading from phenomenological and subjective criticism, including the theories of Georges Poulet, Wolfgang Iser, Stanley Fish and David Bleich, affirm the creative role of the reader, show that the reader, in fact, writes the text in the process of reading. The introduction concludes that reader, writer and text are all constructs of language, that both reading and writing are, ultimately and primarily, thought.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Barringer, Bobby D. (Bobby Dewayne)
System: The UNT Digital Library
In Search of Depth (open access)

In Search of Depth

In this proposed study, I hoped to discover compositional elements that once added to the work would convey my conceptual ideas. I was interested in exploring the addition of deep pictorial space and increasing the size disparity between the figures as possible solutions for injecting a level of irony and/or eluding to the subverted agenda of the content. I wanted to see if these two secondary compositional adjustments subtly conveyed not only a strategic contradiction of the art historical concept of expressionism but the numerous accepted truths in society.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Bhagwat, Tanya A.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Wuthering Heights: A Proto-Darwinian Novel (open access)

Wuthering Heights: A Proto-Darwinian Novel

Wuthering Heights was significantly shaped by the pre-Darwinian scientific debate in ways that look ahead to Darwin's evolutionary theory more than a decade later. Wuthering Heights represents a cultural response to new and disturbing ideas. Darwin's enterprise was scientific; Emily Brontë's poetic. Both, however, were seeking to find ways to express their vision of the nature of human beings. The language and metaphors of Wuthering Heights suggest that Emily Brontë's vision was, in many ways, similar to Darwin's.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Bhattacharya, Sumangala
System: The UNT Digital Library
Stressors, Resources, and Psychological Symptomatology for Family Caregivers of Alzheimer's Patients (open access)

Stressors, Resources, and Psychological Symptomatology for Family Caregivers of Alzheimer's Patients

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between life stressors, resources, and psychological symptomatology of 20 family caregivers of Alzheimer's patients. Stressors were categorized as stressors specific to the caregiving role and general life stressors. Resources were also categorized as resources specific to the caregiving role and general life resources. Multiple regression determined which stressors, resources, and demographic variables predicted psychological symptomatology. Specific stressors that were significant predictors included: caregiving events, caregiving event chronicity, and mean burden scores. Significant general stressors included: size of caregivers' household, non-caregiving events and non-caregiving event chronicity. Significant resources included: other caregivers, the duties other caregivers provided, and caregiver's educational level. No Other Demographic Variables were found to be significant predictors.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Bizzell, Laurie
System: The UNT Digital Library
Edgar Allan Poe's Use of Archetypal Images in Selected Prose Works (open access)

Edgar Allan Poe's Use of Archetypal Images in Selected Prose Works

This study traces archetypal images in selected prose fiction by Edgar Allan Poe and shows his consistent use of such imagery throughout his career, and outlines the archetypal images that Poe uses repeatedly throughout his works: the death of the beautiful woman, death and resurrection, the hero's journey to the underworld, and the quest for forbidden knowledge. The study examines Poe's use of myth to establish and uphold archetypal patterns. Poe's goal when crafting his works was the creation of a single specified effect, and to create his effects, he used the materials at hand. Some of these materials came from his own subconscious; however, a greater portion came from a lifetime of study and his own understanding of the connections between myth and archetypal images.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Brackeen, Stephanie E. (Stephanie Ellen)
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Influence of Pragmatism in the Essays of Randolph Bourne (open access)

The Influence of Pragmatism in the Essays of Randolph Bourne

This study traces the influence of the American philosophy of pragmatism in the writing of the Progressive Era intellectual Randolph Bourne (1886-1918),. In courses with John Dewey at Columbia University and through the books of William James, pragmatism became a major intellectual factor in Bourne's social and cultural criticism. The philosophy remained so to the end of his brief career. From pragmatism, Bourne learned a method of challenging a restrictive status quo. In his essays, Bourne sought harmony between analytical reasoning and the imagination in order to promote self-growth along with the creation of a more humane society. Bourne promoted individualism and the need for transcendent values in modern industrial society.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Brown, Byron D. (Byron Delano)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Nutrition Knowledge and Attitudes of Students in Four-Year Hospitality Programs (open access)

Nutrition Knowledge and Attitudes of Students in Four-Year Hospitality Programs

The purpose of this research was to determine the level of nutrition knowledge of students in four-year hospitality programs; their attitudes toward nutrition in general (general attitudes); and their attitudes toward its role in commercial foodservice (restaurant attitudes). Correlations between knowledge and attitudes and differences based on gender, age, college classification, and completion of a college nutrition course were also examined. Hospitality management majors in baccalaureate programs at three Texas universities completed 454 usable questionnaires. Although knowledge was not extensive, general and restaurant attitudes were positive. Knowledge was influenced by all factors except gender. General attitudes were influenced by gender, age, and classification. Only gender influenced restaurant attitudes. Knowledge was positively correlated with favorable attitudes.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Bruce, Agnes R. (Agnes Rodriguez)
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Critical Analysis of Newspaper Development in Taiwan Since the Lifting of Martial Law (open access)

A Critical Analysis of Newspaper Development in Taiwan Since the Lifting of Martial Law

This study reviews the changes in Taiwan's newspaper industry during its current period of transition. Contemporary newspaper development in Taiwan after the lifting of martial law in July 1987 is evaluated in relation to transformations in the newspaper marketplace, journalistic practices, labor relations, and freedom of expression. This study concludes that changes in Taiwan's newspaper business are closely related to changes in the country's political atmosphere. The lifting of the Ban of Newspaper brought freedoms for which journalists had fought for decades; however, journalistic quality has not improved at the same speed. Changes will continue in the journalism industry; whether it grows in a healthy way is a topic for future study.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Chen, Yu-Jen, 1957-
System: The UNT Digital Library
A Survey of Two-Year And Four-Year Hospitality Management Programs To Describe Characteristics of Hotel Front Office Management Courses (open access)

A Survey of Two-Year And Four-Year Hospitality Management Programs To Describe Characteristics of Hotel Front Office Management Courses

This study focused on the hotel front office management course and how this course and related topics were taught in hospitality management programs. The results of the study can guide faculty in developing and expanding the hotel front office management course, related textbooks and teaching resources to best prepare students to meet the future needs of the lodging industry.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Chiang, Rhu-rong
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Last Seven Words (open access)

The Last Seven Words

The Last Seven Words is an orchestral piece with double woodwind, double brass, and two sets of timpani. The duration of the work is seventeen minutes. The forty-six pages which precede the musical score present a discussion and an analysis of the composition. The purpose of this project was to provide the composer an opportunity to write an orchestra piece with a single scale and seven rhythmic patterns.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Chong, Lok-Shing
System: The UNT Digital Library
Loss Versus Hope: A Printmaker's Investigation (open access)

Loss Versus Hope: A Printmaker's Investigation

Using this conflict between death and dying versus hope and new life, I searched for an undogmatic way to convey a Christian antidote to the despair and ugliness of post modern art. The struggle was to find the imagery, format, and media combinations to express a vision, with realism and hope, for the late twentieth century, in a unique and interesting context.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Clevenger, Sara Lisbeth Brown
System: The UNT Digital Library
Charles Dickens and Idiolects of Alienation (open access)

Charles Dickens and Idiolects of Alienation

A part of Charles Dickens's genius with character is his deftness at creating an appropriate idiolect for each character. Through their discourse, characters reveal not only themselves, but also Dickens's comment on social features that shape their communication style. Three specific idiolects are discussed in this study. First, Dickens demonstrates the pressures that an occupation exerts on Alfred Jingle from Pickwick Papers. Second, Mr. Gradgrind from Hard Times is robbed of his ability to communicate as Dickens highlights the errors of Utilitarianism. Finally, four characters from three novels demonstrate together the principle that social institutions can silence their defenseless constituents. Linguistic evaluation of speech habits illuminates Dickens's message that social structures can injure individuals. In addition, this study reveals the consistent and intuitive narrative art of Dickens.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Coats, Jerry B. (Jerry Brian)
System: The UNT Digital Library
Test Order Effects on Children's Rorschachs (open access)

Test Order Effects on Children's Rorschachs

Thirty-three children from a community sample, ages 5 to 13, were administered the Rorschach Inkblot Test, along with projective Draw-an-Animal and Draw-a-Person tasks and other psychological measures. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of three test order conditions: Draw-an-Animal followed by the Rorschach, Draw-a-Person followed by the Rorschach, and Rorschach before any other projective test. The number of Human and Animal contents in the test records was examined. Analysis showed no significant differences among the three groups for production of the content variables, suggesting that the Rorschach Inkblot Test is relatively robust with respect to test order effects.
Date: May 1993
Creator: Coyle, Edward L. (Edward Louis), 1965-
System: The UNT Digital Library
Animations: A Composition for Percussion and Computer Music on Tape (open access)

Animations: A Composition for Percussion and Computer Music on Tape

Animations is a composition in six movements (Fish, Seals, Birds, Cats, Zebras, Snakes) for percussion and computer music on tape. One percussionist performs on various percussion instruments: two suspended cymbals, crotales, triangle, vibraphone, glockenspiel, marimba, three bongos, snare drum, field drum, large tom-tom, bass drum, kettle drum, temple blocks and vibraslap. The computer music on tape employs sampled sounds in a MIDI sequencing environment. The melodic and harmonic materials for the piece are derived from a matrix of twelve heptatonic scales. The individual movements are notated using both traditional and proportional notation systems. The score is 37 pages long with a twenty-two page analysis preceding the score. Animations is approximately nine minutes in duration.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Criswell, Madeleine L.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical by Gerome Ragni and James Rado: An Annotated Edition with Introduction (open access)

Hair: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical by Gerome Ragni and James Rado: An Annotated Edition with Introduction

The epochal musical Hair is based predominantly on the actions and reactions to the cultural and societal occurrences of the Sixties. So, what can be done to help in the understanding of this historic musical? The answer: to produce an annotated text of the musical that will offer support to director and cast. The study consists of four chapters; the first, an introduction to the study; the second, a historical review (1960-1970); the third, the annotations which seeks to identify and explain all unfamiliar or unusual words, cultural obscurities, or personalities that might confuse, or otherwise mislead a full and comprehensive understanding of the author's original concept; and fourth, the worldwide performances of Hair and revivals after the original Broadway production.
Date: August 1993
Creator: Culver, William Marc
System: The UNT Digital Library
Women Becoming: a Feminist Critical Analysis of Mother-Daughter Relationships in Amy Tan's "The Joy Luck Club" and "The Kitchen God's Wife" (open access)

Women Becoming: a Feminist Critical Analysis of Mother-Daughter Relationships in Amy Tan's "The Joy Luck Club" and "The Kitchen God's Wife"

This analysis of Tan's first two novels reveals that her female characters suffer from the strains critics like Amy Ling say result from the double paradox of filling the roles of mother or daughter as minority women in a white, male society. Recognizing this double paradox offers Tan's characters, and her readers, the opportunity to resolve the conflicts between mothers and daughters in The Joy Luck Club. Using the theories of psychologist Kathie Carlson helps readers understand how the protagonist of The Kitchen God's Wife resolves similar conflicts with her daughter and her own mother by seeking support from a mythic mother-figure, a Goddess of her own making.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Curton, Carman C.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Isomorphism as a Paradigm for Examining Self-Managed Work Teams and Work Spillover (open access)

Isomorphism as a Paradigm for Examining Self-Managed Work Teams and Work Spillover

This study investigates the effects of a participative-type management approach termed self-managed work teams (SMWTs) and work spillover into the family environment. The perspective of isomorphism by Aldous (1969), and Rapoport and Rapoport (1965), was used as a paradigm to examine both positive and negative effects of the work-family relationship. A total of 76 employees from the Department of Defense's Quality Division was used in the regression analysis, due to recent transitions into SMWTs. Results reported overwhelming support for the perspective of isomorphism: over 40% of the variation in positive work spillover was explained by SWMT characteristics. Communication with other teams was the single most important factor found to have a significant effect on positive work spillover.
Date: December 1993
Creator: Cyphers, Amy E. (Amy Elizabeth)
System: The UNT Digital Library