The problem of this study was to determine whether Kenyan Bible college students who receive instruction using a modified (highly structured) mastery learning model will demonstrate greater achievement in knowledge of Christian Church history as compared to Kenyan Bible college students who receive instruction using a traditional (minimally structured) non-mastery learning model. The subjects were 17 second-year Kenyan Bible college students enrolled in a course on Christian Church history, and they were randomly assigned to the two treatment conditions. The researcher served as instructor for both groups. The experimental group used a textbook, detailed syllabus, 200 page study guide (featuring an advance organizer to provide an ideational scaffolding), and a lesson-development feature (providing an enabling objective, congruent questions, and informative feedback for each lesson segment). The control group used a textbook and a less-detailed syllabus. Both groups shared the same classroom lectures, class discussions, required assignments, examinations, and review of examination items. Five tests of Christian church history were administered, including a pretest, three unit tests, and a comprehensive course examination. Test data were analyzed using a 2 x 5 (treatment x testing occasion) repeated measures analysis of variance (RM ANOVA). The percentage of students performing at mastery level (80% …

The majority of Web site design literature mainly concentrates on the technical and functional aspects of Web site design. There is a definite lack of literature, in the IS field, that concentrates on the visual and aesthetic aspects of Web design. Preliminary research into the relationship between visual design and successful electronic commerce Web sites was conducted. The emphasis of this research was to answer the following three questions. What role do visual design elements play in the success of electronic commerce Web sites? What role do visual design principles play in the success of electronic commerce Web sites? What role do the typographic variables of visual design play in the success of electronic commerce Web sites? Forty-three undergraduate students enrolled in an introductory level MIS course used a Likert-style survey instrument to evaluate aesthetic aspects of 501 electronic commerce Web pages. The instrument employed a taxonomy of visual design that focused on three dimensions: design elements, design principles, and typography. The data collected were correlated against Internet usage success metrics data provided by Nielsen/NetRatings. Results indicate that 22 of the 135 tested relationships were statistically significant. Positive relationships existed between four different aesthetic dimensions and one single success measure. …

Researchers have noted that by providing formal and informal social skills training (SST), the school can become a potential optimal setting that fosters the development of social competence in students with behavioral problems. Indeed, learning to get along with people is one of the most important skills that we can teach students. In order to maximize its effectiveness, SST must be motivating and personally relevant enough for students to want to use the skills. In addition, it must provide opportunities for learned skills to be practiced under varying conditions and in as close to natural situations as possible in order to enhance the transfer of training. The purpose of the study was to investigate the social competence of students aged from six to twelve, diagnosed with emotional/behavioral disorders (E/BD) in a public self-contained school setting, and to increase the students' social competence by using a literature-based method that employs multiage grouping, impersonation, and telecommunications. By providing intensive, literature-based training in a multiage classroom, the SST gave students opportunities to practice skills in a natural, real-life environment and, therefore, increased the likelihood of generalizing these skills in other settings. The employment of impersonation and telecommunications also enhanced students' acquisition of social …

Wayfinding is the process of using one or more tools to move from one location to another in order to accomplish a task or to achieve a goal. This qualitative study explores the process of wayfinding as it applies to locating information in a public library. A group of volunteers were asked to find a selection of items in three types of libraries-traditional, contemporary, and modern. The retrieval process was timed and the reactions of the volunteers were recorded, documented, and analyzed. The impact of various wayfinding tools-architecture, layout, color, signage, computer support, collection organization-on the retrieval process was also identified. The study revealed that many of the wayfinding tools currently available in libraries do not facilitate item retrieval. Inconsistencies, ambiguities, obstructions, disparities, and operational deficiencies all contributed to end-user frustration and retrieval failure. The study suggests that failing to address these issues may prompt library patrons-end users who are increasingly interested in finding information with minimal expenditures of time and effort-may turn to other information-retrieval strategies and abandon a system that they find confusing and frustrating.

This study identifies the biogeographic factors that structure small mammal communities on mountains of the Colorado Plateau and adjacent regions. Forty six isolated ranges were characterized across a 5-state study area encompassing the Colorado Plateau, including the central high plateaus of Utah and the Basin and Range Province (i.e. the Great Basin and mountains of Arizona and New Mexico). Presence/absence data of 25 montane mammal species were used to explore the interactions between historical and ecological processes affecting local and regional diversity patterns. Multivariate analyses, such as non-metric dimensional scaling, were used to explore factors which influence community composition. Results of these analyses revealed the Colorado River as a significant biogeographic barrier that affects montane mammal community structure. MtDNA cytochrome b sequence variation was analyzed among populations of the long-tailed vole, Microtus longicaudus, sampled from five interior ranges of the Colorado Plateau- Abajo, LaSal, Henry, and Chuska Mts., and Boulder Mountain of the Aquarius Plateau-and analyzed using traditional phylogenetic approaches (parsimony and likelihood) as well as nested clade analysis. Results support previous documentation of a major east-west phylogeographic break occurring between populations southeast of the Colorado River (eastern Arizona, Colorado, Wyoming and New Mexico) and all other western populations, which …

Due to concern about diminishing landfill space, the City of Denton contracted a municipal solid waste characterization study in 1999 that would identify materials for diversion. This paper describes the results of 5 1-week waste sorting events, a scale-house analysis, a recycling participation study, a recycler profile and a similar city study. The results of the characterization studies suggest that at least 50% of each waste stream is recyclable or divertible though paper products accounted for no more than 45% by weight of any waste stream. Curbside recycling participation rate was 71% during the 6-week study period though the average weekly set-out rate was 37%. Recycling participation rates varied significantly by zip code and by home value categories but not by gender. Denton is fairly progressive in its waste management approach when compared to demographically similar cities on a 15-question assessment though recommendations for improvement have been identified.

In this paper, exhaustivity, continuity, and strong additivity are studied in the setting of topological Riesz spaces. Of particular interest is the link between strong additivity and exhaustive elements of Dedekind s-complete Banach lattices. There is a strong connection between the Diestel-Faires Theorem and the Meyer-Nieberg Lemma in this setting. Also, embedding properties of Banach lattices are linked to the notion of strong additivity. The Meyer-Nieberg Lemma is extended to the setting of topological Riesz spaces and uniform absolute continuity and uniformly exhaustive elements are studied in this setting. Counterexamples are provided to show that the Vitali-Hahn-Saks Theorem and the Brooks-Jewett Theorem cannot be extended to submeasures or to the setting of Banach lattices.

In this dissertation we study the structure of spaces of operators, especially the space of all compact operators between two Banach spaces X and Y. Work by Kalton, Emmanuele, Bator and Lewis on the space of compact and weakly compact operators motivates much of this paper. Let L(X,Y) be the Banach space of all bounded linear operators between Banach spaces X and Y, K(X,Y) be the space of all compact operators, and W(X,Y) be the space of all weakly compact operators. We study problems related to the complementability of different operator ideals (the Banach space of all compact, weakly compact, completely continuous, resp. unconditionally converging) operators in the space of all bounded linear operators. The structure of Dunford-Pettis sets, strong Dunford-Pettis sets, and certain spaces of operators is studied in the context of the injective and projective tensor products of Banach spaces. Bibasic sequences are used to study relative norm compactness of strong Dunford-Pettis sets. Next, we use Dunford-Pettis sets to give sufficient conditions for K(X,Y) to contain c0.

The United States government began paying pensions to disabled Union veterans before the Civil War ended in April 1865. By 1890 its pension programs included any Union veteran who had fought in the Civil War, regardless of his financial means, as well as surviving family members, including mothers, fathers, brothers, and sisters. Union veterans did not hesitate to "wave the bloody shirt" in their attempts to liberalize pension laws. Pension programs for Confederate veterans were much slower to develop. Lacking any higher organization, each southern state assumed the responsibility of caring for disabled and/or indigent Confederate veterans and widows. Texas began paying Confederate pensions in 1899, Georgia in 1888 and Virginia in 1889. Unlike Texas, Georgia and Virginia provided artificial limbs for their veterans long before they started paying pensions. At the time of his enlistment in the 1860s, the typical future pensioner was twenty-five years of age, and fewer than half were married heads of households. Very few could be considered wealthy and most were employed in agriculture. The pensioners of Georgia, Texas, and Virginia were remarkably similar, although there were some differences in nativity and marital status. They were all elderly and needy by the time they asked …

The purposes of this study were to examine the prevalence of current substance use and early risk indicators for substance abuse and dependence, and to investigate the relationships among religiousness, current substance use, and early risk indicators among nursing students at seven Seventh-day Adventist colleges. Data for this descriptive study were collected through Efinger's Alcohol Risk Survey (EARS) (Efinger, 1984), the CAGE Questionnaire ( Ewing , 1984), and the Intrinsic/Extrinsic-Revised Scale (Gorsuch & McPherson, 1989). Participants were 241 nursing students enrolled in their first year of nursing courses at seven colleges and universities located across the United States . Findings indicated that 42% of students scored higher than the EARS mean; 24% reported current substance use; and 15% scored in the probable abuse/dependence category of CAGE. Students who reported current substance use and those scoring in the probable substance abuse/dependence category were significantly more likely to score above the EARS median. Intrinsic religiousness demonstrated a significant inverse relationship with current substance use. Significantly lower rates of current substance use were associated with higher rates of attendance at religious services. Respondents who indicated that their religion prohibited alcohol consumption reported significantly lower rates of current substance use than those who answered …

Most colleges and universities invest substantial resources in an effort to strategically plan for a sound financial base. The revenue for the financial base is dependent on student enrollment that must be effectively managed. Increases in the price of tuition and fees can lead to decreased enrollment and negatively impact the revenue of an institution. The increases can also impact the enrollment of certain student populations such as minority students and high school graduates enrolling in college for the first time. Many studies have analyzed the price elasticity and student price response models that have been developed over time by reviewing historical price increases and enrollment across institutions. Few studies have used the models to predict changes in the enrollment of students for one college or university after the increases in the cost of attendance are imposed on students. This study sought to analyze the effectiveness of the most commonly reviewed student price response and price elasticity models in predicting changes in undergraduate enrollment at one metropolitan academic university. The three models introduced by Leslie and Brinkman, St. John and Heller were used to analyze the tuition and fee increases and to identify the likely percentage of increase or decrease …

Cowpea, Vigna unguiculata (L.) Walp is an excellent source of protein, vitamins and minerals and a major food crop many parts of Africa. Optimal production levels are hampered by insect pests and diseases. Biotechnological techniques such as tissue culture and genetic engineering can aid in the development of varieties with resistance to insect pests and diseases. The objective of this study was to investigate conditions necessary for the development of a reproducible tissue culture system that can be applied to regenerate transformed cells from culture. The in vitro manipulation of cowpea using Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium, auxins and cytokinins resulted in the formation of callus and rhizogenesis. Calli that were formed were separated into six classes based on color and texture. Yellowish friable callus, yellowish compact, soft yellowish callus and green and white were composed of largely vacuolated cells and were non-regenerative. Friable green callus was the most prevalent callus type and could form of roots in some hormone combinations. Green spots were formed on hard compact green callus. The green spots became nodular, forming root primordia and ultimately giving rise to roots. None of the six calli types gave rise to the formation of shoots. Embryogenic callus was …

In this dissertation we study the Hamiltonicity and the uniform-Hamiltonicity of subset graphs, subspace graphs, and their associated bipartite graphs. In 1995 paper "The Subset-Subspace Analogy," Kung states the subspace version of a conjecture. The study of this problem led to a more general class of graphs. Inspired by Clark and Ismail's work in the 1996 paper "Binomial and Q-Binomial Coefficient Inequalities Related to the Hamiltonicity of the Kneser Graphs and their Q-Analogues," we defined subset graphs, subspace graphs, and their associated bipartite graphs. The main emphasis of this dissertation is to describe those graphs and study their Hamiltonicity. The results on subset graphs are presented in Chapter 3, on subset bipartite graphs in Chapter 4, and on subspace graphs and subspace bipartite graphs in Chapter 5. We conclude the dissertation by suggesting some generalizations of our results concerning the panciclicity of the graphs.

The purpose of this study was to ascertain if conditions or combinations of conditions existed within Oklahoma public schools that created inequities in the availability of classroom Internet connections. A stratified random sample of the 471 school districts was used to identify 300 specific schools for the purpose of data analysis. Data was gathered utilizing a database provided by the Oklahoma State Department of Education and a researcher developed questionnaire. The database provided data relating to four independent variables (region, district size, school type, and school size,). The dependent variable, percentage of classrooms connected to the Internet, was obtained by the researcher designed questionnaire. The state database also provided percentage information relating to students who qualify as minorities and qualify for free or reduced lunches. The data was tested using a series of ANOVAs and a Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient. The findings of the study are as follows: (a) The analysis of variance showed that none of the independent variables had a significant effect upon the percentage of classrooms connected to the Internet; (b) The Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient revealed little or no correlation between the percentage of disadvantaged or minority students and the percentage of classroom Internet connections.

This study was designed to determine how institutions accredited by the Council for the Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) meet the practicum requirements set forth in CACREP's 2001 standards. Practicum is a vital part of the matriculation process of counselors in training. This clinical based course allows students to practice the skills they have learned in previous, more didactic based courses. Trainees can stretch skills, all under the watch of a counselor supervisor with greater experience. Although CACREP instructs all accredited counseling programs to have such a course in place, the standards are not specific. Schools are often interpreting the standards in a multitude of ways, presumably to successfully meet the standards while still serving the student as well as the clientele who seek out mental health assistance (Pitts, 1992a). The purpose of this study was to determine what measures CACREP accredited institutions enact to meet the clinical practicum standards. The difference between this study and prior research that has addressed the practicum requirement is that the instrument used in this study specifically addressed every CACREP practicum standard, including technology, diversity, and concerns with supervision and meeting the direct client contact hour requirement. The results of the …

This study investigated the perceptions of influential relationships between Texas public university presidents, university system chancellors, and state legislators. The study's purpose was to examine Texas public universities engagement in lobbying type behaviors and whether public policy is affected through interaction and communication with legislative leaders. Moreover, of importance for this study was to identifying if Texas public universities actively work to influence the Texas legislature and if lobbying behavior exists whether or not that behavior influences public policy formation within the Texas legislative process. Lastly, this study focused on perceptions dealing with the Texas statute prohibiting state governmental agencies, including public universities and university systems, from influencing legislation through use of state funds. The study was conducted in the winter of 2003 and had 29 president / chancellor respondents and 88 legislator respondents. Three survey instruments were developed by the researcher to determine Texas public university president, system chancellor, and state legislator perceptions and attitudes concerning lobbying type activities, influence, and state statute compliance. Data reported consist of percentages, t-Test of significance, and Cohen's d effect size measure. Results from the study show agreement between the groups in areas of activities utilized to influence the legislative process and actual …

This study examined how technology-mediated distance education is used in special education courses in teacher preparation programs. The data are based on a 30-item survey administered to members of the Teacher Education Division of the Council for Exceptional Children, who identified themselves as serving in an instructional capacity within institutions of higher education. Technology-mediated instruction was characterized in terms course delivery methods and program attributes. An analysis of instructional design processes revealed that most instructors are largely autonomous and do not rely on a team-based approach. Most make use of course-design and management software. Training is linked to course strategy and evaluation, while experience is associated with implementation. Respondents emphasized communication and student feedback. While both users and non-users of distance education technology foresaw the increased use for course delivery in the future, a notable percentage (13%) of current users indicated a desire to discontinue use.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether a relationship exists between the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® (MBTI®) of first-term Air Force medical service corps (MSC) officers and their initial occupational placement matches (OCUPLACE MATCH), and, if so, whether this could it predict job satisfaction. The population consisted of 116 first-term Air Force MSC officers already assigned and working at their initial occupational placement. Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS®) computer software program was used for the statistical computation. Several techniques were used, including, frequency distribution, the Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient, and regression analyses, among others. Results showed a statistical significant correlation between the MBTI type of the first-term MSC officer matches and their initial occupational placement (OCUPLACE MATCH, r = .440, p < .01). Furthermore, results of a regression analysis showed no statistical significance for predication on job satisfaction (r = 492, F = .887, p < .05). Based on this study, the Air Force Personnel Center can match first-term MSC officers' personality type to an initial occupation placement; however, based on the second part of the hypothesis, prediction of job satisfaction may not be yield on less other aspects of the group are considered such as time …

The dynamics of growth and formation of surfaces and interfaces is becoming very important for the understanding of the origin and the behavior of a wide range of natural and industrial dynamical processes. The first part of the paper is focused on the interesting field of the random growth of surfaces and interfaces, which finds application in physics, geology, biology, economics, and engineering among others. In this part it is studied the random growth of surfaces from within the perspective of a single column, namely, the fluctuation of the column height around the mean value, which is depicted as being subordinated to a standard fluctuation-dissipation process with friction g. It is argued that the main properties of Kardar-Parisi-Zhang theory are derived by identifying the distribution of return times to y(0) = 0, which is a truncated inverse power law, with the distribution of subordination times. The agreement of the theoretical prediction with the numerical treatment of the model of ballistic deposition is remarkably good, in spite of the finite size effects affecting this model. The second part of the paper deals with the efficiency of the diffusion entropy analysis (DEA) when applied to the studies of stromatolites. In this case …

There were two major goals of this study - to examine validity of scores for the Boholst Life Position Scale and to examine potential associations between life positions and affective traits. Two hundred seventy-seven students enrolled in undergraduate psychology classes at a large university volunteered for the study. Concurrent validity of scores for the life position scale was supported based on two compared instruments. Pearson product-moment correlations for the comparisons were -.765 and .617, both statistically significant at the p < .001 level. Factor analysis demonstrated that the scale could accurately be conceptualized as consisting of two factors - an "I" factor and a "You" factor. MANOVA, ANOVA, multiple linear regression, and canonical correlation analysis were used to examine associations between life positions and the affective traits of angry, sad, glad, social anxiety, loneliness, and satisfaction with life. Subjects were catagorized into four groups representing their life position: "I'm OK, you're OK," "I'm OK, you're not OK," "I'm not OK, you're OK," and "I'm not OK, you're not OK." A MANOVA employing life position as the independent variable with four levels and the six affective traits as the dependent variables demonstrated statistical significance (p < .001 level) and h2 was …

Scholars have considered Italian chamber recitative laments only a transitional phenomenon between madrigal laments and laments organized on the descending tetrachord bass. However, the recitative lament is distinguished from them by its characteristic attitude toward the relationship between music and text. Composer of Italian chamber recitative laments attempted to express more subtle, refined and sometimes complicated emotion in their music. For that purpose, they intentionally created discrepancies between text and music. Sometimes they even destroy the original structure of text in order to clearly deliver the composer's own voice. The basic syntactic structure is deconstructed and reconstructed along with their reading and according to their intention. The discrepancy between text and music is, however, expectable and natural phenomena since text cannot be completely translated or transformed to music and vice versa. The composers of Italian chamber recitative laments utilized their innate heterogeneity between two materials (music and text) as a metaphor that represents the semantic essence of the genre, the conflict. In this context, Italian chamber recitative laments were a real embodiment of the so-called seconda prattica and through the study of them, finally, we more fully able to understand how the spirit of late Renaissance flourished in Italy in …

One of the main goals of computational methods is to identify reasonable geometries for target materials. Organometallic complexes have been investigated in this dissertation research, entailing a significant challenge based on transition metal diversity and the associated complexity of the ligands. A large variety of theoretical methods have been employed to determine ground state geometries of organometallic species. An impressive number of transition metals entailing diverse isomers (e.g., geometric, spin, structural and coordination), different coordination numbers, oxidation states and various numbers of electrons in d orbitals have been studied. Moreover, ligands that are single, double or triple bonded to the transition metal, exhibiting diverse electronic and steric effects, have been investigated. In this research, a novel de novo scheme for structural prediction of transition metal complexes was developed, tested and shown to be successful.

The purpose of the current study was to investigate the effects of a multidisciplinary pain management program on five measures of subjective psychosocial factors. Ninety-five participants in the comprehensive multidisciplinary treatment group and the standard medical intervention control group were surveyed about various psychosocial factors using Axis II of the West Haven - Yale Multidimensional Pain Inventory (MPI), pre- to post-treatment. It was hypothesized that post-treatment levels would be significantly lower than pre-treatment levels for all five psychosocial variables. Additionally, gender and ethnicity variables were examined. Based on preliminary analyses indicating pre-treatment differences between the experimental and control group, five 2 x 2 x 3 analyses of covariances (ANCOVAs) were used to examine the above hypotheses. Results indicated significant differences between the treatment conditions on measures of control, with the comprehensive group feeling more in control than the standard group at post-treatment. No other significant main effects for treatment condition were found on the measures of pain severity, interference with daily activities, negative mood, or social support. However, a significant gender main effect was found for social support at post-treatment, with females reporting more social support than males. A significant gender x ethnicity interaction was also found for post-treatment control, …

Cyanide utilization in Pseudomonas fluorescens NCIMB 11764 occurs via oxidative conversion to carbon dioxide and ammonia, the latter satisfying the nitrogen requirement. Substrate attack is initiated by an enzyme referred to as cyanide oxygenase (CNO), previously shown to require components in both high (H) (>30 kDa) and low (L) (<10 kDa) molecular weight cell fractions. In this study, tetrahydrobiopterin (H4biopterin) was identified as a cofactor in fraction L, thus making CNO appear as a pterin- dependent hydroxylase. CNO was purified 150-fold (specific activity 0.9 U/mg) and quantitatively converted cyanide to formate and ammonia as reaction products. When coupled with formate dehydrogenase, the complete enzymatic system for cyanide oxidation to carbon dioxide and ammonia was reconstituted. CNO was found to be an aggregate of known enzymes that included NADH oxidase (Nox), NADH peroxidase (Npx), cyanide dihydratase (CynD) and carbonic anhydrase (CA). A complex multi-step reaction mechanism is proposed in which Nox generates hydrogen peroxide which in turn is utilized by Npx to catalyze the oxygenation of cyanide to formamide accompanied by the consumption of one and two molar equivalents of oxygen and NADH, respectively. The further hydrolysis of formamide to ammonia and formate is thought to be mediated by CynD. The …