My Whine, Your Wine (open access)

My Whine, Your Wine

Grapes hold the flavors of the lands where they grow, and when you make wine from them, those flavors of the land come through. Tasting wine from a place you've been can bring you back to that place with aromas and notes indicative of that place. A bottle of wine changes every day, and how it will taste depends on the moment you choose to release it from the glass walls. I have a vested interest in wine, because it is a living thing. I am compelled to make wine because its characteristics are like personality traits. Although some of those characteristics are harsh at times, I appreciate them all. Each trait plays an important role in the balance, the overall personality. Like my own personality flaws, wine's harsh tones can smooth over time. My relationship with wine is constantly evolving, with every new varietal, vintage, batch and blend. Believe me, after some of the jobs I had before my first day at Su Vino, I cherish every moment of my winemaking career. My Whine, Your Wine is the story of how it all started.
Date: December 2011
Creator: Abbott, Shannon Marie
System: The UNT Digital Library
Jacques-Antoine-Hippolyte, comte de Guibert: Father of the Grande Armée (open access)

Jacques-Antoine-Hippolyte, comte de Guibert: Father of the Grande Armée

The eighteenth century was a time of intense upheaval in France. The death of Louis XIV in 1715 and the subsequent reign of Louis XV saw the end of French political and martial hegemony on the continent. While French culture and language remained dominant in Europe, Louis XV's disinterested rule and military stagnation led to the disastrous defeat of the French army at the hands of Frederick the Great of Prussia in the Seven Years War (1756-1763). The battle of Rossbach marked the nadir of the French army in the Seven Years War. Frederick's army routed the French infantry that had bumbled its way into massed Prussian cavalry. Following the war, two reformist elements emerged in the army. Reformers within the government, chiefly Etienne François, duc de Choiseul, sought to rectify the army's poor performance and reconstitute France's military establishment. Outside the traditional army structure, military thinkers looked to military theory to reinvigorate the army from within and without. Foremost among the latter was a young officer named Jacques-Antoine-Hippolyte de Guibert, whose 1772 Essai général de tactique quickly became the most celebrated work of theory in European military circles. The Essai provided a new military constitution for France, proposing wholesale …
Date: May 2011
Creator: Abel, Jonathan, 1985-
System: The UNT Digital Library
Joint Schemes for Physical Layer Security and Error Correction (open access)

Joint Schemes for Physical Layer Security and Error Correction

The major challenges facing resource constraint wireless devices are error resilience, security and speed. Three joint schemes are presented in this research which could be broadly divided into error correction based and cipher based. The error correction based ciphers take advantage of the properties of LDPC codes and Nordstrom Robinson code. A cipher-based cryptosystem is also presented in this research. The complexity of this scheme is reduced compared to conventional schemes. The securities of the ciphers are analyzed against known-plaintext and chosen-plaintext attacks and are found to be secure. Randomization test was also conducted on these schemes and the results are presented. For the proof of concept, the schemes were implemented in software and hardware and these shows a reduction in hardware usage compared to conventional schemes. As a result, joint schemes for error correction and security provide security to the physical layer of wireless communication systems, a layer in the protocol stack where currently little or no security is implemented. In this physical layer security approach, the properties of powerful error correcting codes are exploited to deliver reliability to the intended parties, high security against eavesdroppers and efficiency in communication system. The notion of a highly secure and reliable …
Date: August 2011
Creator: Adamo, Oluwayomi Bamidele
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Relationship Between Supplemental Instruction Leader Learning Style and Study Session Design (open access)

The Relationship Between Supplemental Instruction Leader Learning Style and Study Session Design

The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the learning styles of supplemental instruction leaders at a large, public university during the fall 2010 semester and determine whether or not their personal learning styles influenced the way they designed and developed out-of-class study sessions. The total population of supplemental instruction leaders was 37, of which 24 were eligible to participate in the study. Of the 24 eligible supplemental instruction leaders, 20 completed the entire study. Participants in the study included nine male and 11 female supplemental instruction leaders with a median age of 22.25 years-old. Seventeen participants indicated their classification as senior, two as junior, and one as sophomore. Of the participants, 16 indicated white as a race or ethnicity, one indicated Asian, two indicated African American, and one indicated both American Indian/Alaska Native and white. Supplemental instruction leader learning style was assessed using the Kolb Learning Style Inventory. Leaders were then interviewed, and their study sessions were analyzed. Through triangulation of data from learning style, interviews and actual study session documents, four major themes emerged. The four themes were: 1) incorporation of personal experience into study session design, 2) the sense of impact on student learning, 3) a …
Date: May 2011
Creator: Adams, Joshua
System: The UNT Digital Library
Integrating Selective Herbicide and Native Plant Restoration to Control Alternanthera philoxeroides (Alligator Weed) (open access)

Integrating Selective Herbicide and Native Plant Restoration to Control Alternanthera philoxeroides (Alligator Weed)

Exotic invasive aquatic weeds such as alligator weed (Alternanthera philoxeroides) threaten native ecosystems by interfering with native plant communities, disrupting hydrology, and diminishing water quality. Development of new tools to combat invaders is important for the well being of these sensitive areas. Integrated pest management offers managers an approach that combines multiple control methods for better control than any one method used exclusively. In a greenhouse and field study, we tested the effects of selective herbicide application frequency, native competitor plant introduction, and their integration on alligator weed. In the greenhouse study, alligator weed shoot, root, and total biomass were reduced with one herbicide application, and further reduced with two. Alligator weed cumulative stem length and shoot/root ratio was only reduced after two applications. In the greenhouse, introduction of competitors did not affect alligator weed biomass, but did affect shoot/root ratio. The interaction of competitor introduction and herbicide did not significantly influence alligator weed growth in the greenhouse study. In the field, alligator weed cover was reduced after one herbicide application, but not significantly more after a second. Introduction of competitor species had no effect on alligator weed cover, nor did the interaction of competitor species and herbicide application. This …
Date: December 2011
Creator: Adams, Justin
System: The UNT Digital Library
Dynamic Measurement of Intraoral Pressure and Sound Pressure With Laryngoscopic Characterization During Oboe Performance (open access)

Dynamic Measurement of Intraoral Pressure and Sound Pressure With Laryngoscopic Characterization During Oboe Performance

Measurements of intraoral pressure (IOP) and sound pressure level (SPL) were taken of four oboists as they performed two sets of musical exercises: (1) crescendo-decrescendo from pp to ff and back to pp on the pitches D4, G4, C5 and A5, and (2) straight and vibrato performances of the same four pitches at mf. Video images of the vocal tract were also made using flexible fiberoptic nasoendoscopy (FFN). IOP and SPL data were captured in real time by the WinDaq®/Lite software package, with the dB meter located 8-9 inches in directly front of the oboe bell. The study yielded minimum and maximum values from 21.04 to 57.81 mm Hg and from 65.53 to 100.89 dB across all pitches examined. Discussion is included for the following topics: (1) the oboe’s sound envelope, or functional range of IOP and SPL values at different pitch levels, including the nonlinearity in the relationship between IOP and SPL on the oboe, (2) the static activation and kinetic maintenance thresholds for reed vibration, (3) the effect of vibrato on IOP/SPL, (4) the utilization of the vocal tract during execution of dynamic changes and vibrato, and (5) the impact of player experience on control of physical variables.
Date: December 2011
Creator: Adduci, Michael Douglas
System: The UNT Digital Library
Solvent Effects and Bioconcentration Patterns of Antimicrobial Compounds in Wetland Plants (open access)

Solvent Effects and Bioconcentration Patterns of Antimicrobial Compounds in Wetland Plants

This study looked at effects of organic solvents dimethylsulfoxide, dimethylformamide and acetone at 0.01%, 0.05% and 0.1% concentration on germination and seedling development wetland plants. Even at 0.01% level, all solvents affected some aspect of seed germination or seedling growth. Acetone at 0.01% was least toxic. Root morphological characteristics were most sensitive compared to shoot morphological characteristics. This study also looked at bioconcentration patterns of antimicrobial compounds triclosan, triclocarban and methyl-triclosan in wetland plants exposed to Denton Municipal Waste Water Treatment Plant effluent. Bioconcentration patterns of antimicrobial compounds varied among species within groups as well as within organs of species. The highest triclocarban, triclosan and methyltriclosan concentration were in shoot of N. guadalupensis, root of N. lutea and in shoots of P. nodous respectively.
Date: May 2011
Creator: Adhikari, Sajag
System: The UNT Digital Library
Consensus Building in Sensor Networks and Long Term Planning for the National Airspace System (open access)

Consensus Building in Sensor Networks and Long Term Planning for the National Airspace System

In this thesis, I present my study on the impact of multi-group network structure on the performance of consensus building strategies, and the preliminary mathematical formulation of the problem on improving the performance of the National Airspace system (NAS) through long-term investment. The first part of the thesis is concerned with a structural approach to the consensus building problem in multi-group distributed sensor networks (DSNs) that can be represented by bipartite graph. Direct inference of the convergence behavior of consensus strategies from multi-group DSN structure is one of the contributions of this thesis. The insights gained from the analysis facilitate the design and development of DSNs that meet specific performance criteria. The other part of the thesis is concerned with long-term planning and development of the NAS at a network level, by formulating the planning problem as a resource allocation problem for a flow network. The network-level model viewpoint on NAS planning and development will give insight to the structure of future NAS and will allow evaluation of various paradigms for the planning problem.
Date: May 2011
Creator: Akula, Naga Venkata Swathik
System: The UNT Digital Library
Modeling Student Perception of Web 2.0 Technologies Adoption in Kuwait (open access)

Modeling Student Perception of Web 2.0 Technologies Adoption in Kuwait

The primary focus of this dissertation was to explore students' perceptions of adopting Web 2.0 applications at the School of Basic Education (SBE) in Kuwait. Although Web 2.0 applications are becoming more popular among the digital generation, there is still no evidence of students' perceptions of adopting the innovation of Web 2.0 technologies in Kuwait. The problem this study addresses is that the current status of Web 2.0 technologies usage by academic students has remained educationally unknown in Kuwait. Therefore, there was a need to investigate the extent to which academic students in SBE are aware of and their usage of Web 2.0 technologies, as well as the factors and obstacles that affect using these technologies. Rogers' diffusion of innovation theory (DoI) is employed in this study to specify the factors that influence student perceptions of adopting Web 2.0 applications as learning tools. Data used in this dissertation was gathered via a survey instrument from 350 students at the SBE and was statistically analyzed to find out the answers of the research questions. This study identified the low rate of Web 2.0 awareness and adoption by the students. Descriptive statistical analysis, such as mean scores and standard deviation, were used …
Date: May 2011
Creator: Alajmi, Mohammad
System: The UNT Digital Library
Representations of New Technologies and Related Terminology in Textbooks for Learners of French and Spanish (open access)

Representations of New Technologies and Related Terminology in Textbooks for Learners of French and Spanish

The purpose of the thesis is to look at the presentation of vocabulary related to new technologies in four French and four Spanish textbooks for first-year university students to examine the relevance of the language presented in terms of its authenticity to French and Spanish as it is used today. The focus is on authenticity to show the correlation between what is presented to students versus what they will need to communicate effectively in ways that are linguistically, socially, and sociopragmatically appropriate with native speakers. The thesis also provides teachers with a pedagogical framework that will help them integrate new technologies and their related vocabularies into curriculum when textbooks fail to do so.
Date: August 2011
Creator: Allred, Michael Kay
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Threats to Compliance with International Human Rights Law (open access)

The Threats to Compliance with International Human Rights Law

In this project I investigate the factors shaping compliance with international human rights agreements and I provide a definition of compliance, which goes beyond “ratification.” I argue that compliance is a multistage process, built upon three different steps: ratification/accession, implementation, and what I call “compliant behavior.” As an alternative to the dominant structural and normative explanation of compliance, I suggest that the factors affecting compliance are not only endogenous to state characteristics, such as the democratic/non-democratic nature of governments, but also exogenous, such as the perceived level of threat to national security. I offer a twofold theory that looks at leaders’ behavior under conditions of stability and instability and I suggest that under certain circumstances that threaten and pressure government leaders, state compliance with international human rights law becomes more costly. I suggest that regardless of regime type, threats shape leaders’ behavior toward international law; states are faced with the choice to abide by international obligations, protecting specific human rights, and the choice to protect their national interests. I argue that when the costs associated with compliance increase, because leaders face threats to their power and government stability, threats become the predictor of non-compliant behavior regardless of the democratic or …
Date: December 2011
Creator: Aloisi, Rosa
System: The UNT Digital Library
Retinoic acid Treatment Affects Kidney Development and Osmoregulatory System in the Developing Chicken (Gallus Gallus) (open access)

Retinoic acid Treatment Affects Kidney Development and Osmoregulatory System in the Developing Chicken (Gallus Gallus)

Development is a dynamic process characterized by critical periods in which organ systems are sensitive to changes in the surrounding environment. In the current study, critical windows of embryonic growth and kidney development were assessed in the embryonic chicken. All‐trans retinoic acid (tRA) influences not only organogenesis and cell proliferation, but also targets metanephric kidney nephrogenesis. Embryonic chickens were given a single injection of tRA on embryonic day 8. tRA decreased embryo, kidney, and heart mass from day 16 to day 18. However, mass specific kidney and heart masses showed no differences. Whole blood, plasma, and allantoic fluid osmolality were altered in tRA treated embryos from day 16 to day 18. In addition, hematocrit, red blood cell count, and hemoglobin concentration were altered in tRA treated embryos. The results suggest that although nephrogenesis was not affected by tRA, the developing osmoregulatory system was altered in tRA treated embryos.
Date: May 2011
Creator: Alvine, Travis Douglas
System: The UNT Digital Library
Economic Motivation of the Ex-Dividend Day Anomaly: Evidence from an Alternative Tax Environment (open access)

Economic Motivation of the Ex-Dividend Day Anomaly: Evidence from an Alternative Tax Environment

Several studies have observed that stocks tend to drop by an amount that is less than the dividend on the ex-dividend day, the so-called ex-dividend day anomaly. However, there still remains a lack of consensus for a single explanation of this anomaly. Different from other studies, this dissertation attempts to answer the primary research question: How can investors make trading profits from the ex-dividend day anomaly and how much can they earn? With this goal, I examine the economic motivations of equity investors through four main hypotheses identified in the anomaly’s literature: the tax differential hypothesis, the short-term trading hypothesis, the tick size hypothesis, and the leverage hypothesis. While the U.S. ex-dividend anomaly is well studied, I examine a long data window (1975 to 2010) of Thailand data. The unique structure of the Thai stock market allows me to assess all four main hypotheses proposed in the literature simultaneously. Although I extract the sample data from two data sources, I demonstrate that the combined data are consistently sampled. I further construct three trading strategies: “daily return,” “lag one daily return,” and “weekly return” to alleviate the potential effect of irregular data observation. I find that the ex-dividend day anomaly exists …
Date: December 2011
Creator: Anantarak, Sarin
System: The UNT Digital Library
Comparing Latent Dirichlet Allocation and Latent Semantic Analysis as Classifiers (open access)

Comparing Latent Dirichlet Allocation and Latent Semantic Analysis as Classifiers

In the Information Age, a proliferation of unstructured text electronic documents exists. Processing these documents by humans is a daunting task as humans have limited cognitive abilities for processing large volumes of documents that can often be extremely lengthy. To address this problem, text data computer algorithms are being developed. Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) and Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) are two text data computer algorithms that have received much attention individually in the text data literature for topic extraction studies but not for document classification nor for comparison studies. Since classification is considered an important human function and has been studied in the areas of cognitive science and information science, in this dissertation a research study was performed to compare LDA, LSA and humans as document classifiers. The research questions posed in this study are: R1: How accurate is LDA and LSA in classifying documents in a corpus of textual data over a known set of topics? R2: How accurate are humans in performing the same classification task? R3: How does LDA classification performance compare to LSA classification performance? To address these questions, a classification study involving human subjects was designed where humans were asked to generate and classify documents …
Date: December 2011
Creator: Anaya, Leticia H.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Senior Graduating Nursing Students: Career Choices in Gerontological Nursing in Response to Expanding Geriatric Population (open access)

Senior Graduating Nursing Students: Career Choices in Gerontological Nursing in Response to Expanding Geriatric Population

Access to healthcare is needed and wanted by people of all ages and especially by those of the older population. The number of people in the 65 years of age and older population is rapidly growing with their needs expected to have a significant impact on the existing healthcare system and healthcare providers. The impact will be critical given the severe shortage of healthcare providers, especially of nurses and the rate of services being more often provided in non-hospital settings. The objectives of the study were to discover the plans of graduating nursing students as they choose their first place of employment, if they have future plans to pursue a nursing advance practice degree, and if they are very happy with their decision to become a nurse. Data for the study were obtained from a questionnaire presented to senior graduating nursing students. The findings were: (a) Most students prefer a hospital setting. (b) Younger students are three times as likely to seek out the hospital, and 1/3 of the students seek out the hospital setting because they were encouraged to become a nurse. (c) About 70% of the students want to work with their friends while 1/3 will seek the …
Date: December 2011
Creator: Anders, Judith E.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Predictive Relationships among Learner Characteristics, Academic Involvement, and Doctoral Education Outcomes (open access)

Predictive Relationships among Learner Characteristics, Academic Involvement, and Doctoral Education Outcomes

The literature identifies multiple factors pertinent to learner characteristics and learning experiences that may promote doctoral education outcomes, and yet little quantitative research has examined relationships between those factors deemed important in the effectiveness of doctoral education. This study sought to examine predictive relationships among doctoral students’ learner characteristics, their involvement in mentorship and intellectual community, and doctoral education outcomes. Using Astin’s theory of involvement and the literature on signature pedagogies in doctoral education as conceptual guides, a survey instrument was constructed for the purpose of measuring variables identified as relevant to the effective formation of scholars. Central to the conceptualization of this study was academic involvement as represented by mentorship and intellectual community. The instrument was validated in a two-stage pilot testing process and administered to doctoral candidates at three public Texas higher education institutions. Of the 217 participants, the majority were female, White (Non-Hispanic), US citizens, and were pursuing education doctorates. Data were analyzed using multivariate statistical analyses. Reliability and validity estimates indicated psychometric integrity of the 20 observed variables measured to represent the constructs of mentorship and intellectual community. Results indicated that doctoral students’ learner characteristics were not notably predictive of doctoral students’ degree of involvement in …
Date: December 2011
Creator: Anderson, Baaska
System: The UNT Digital Library
Factors Related to the Selection of Information Sources: A Study of Ramkhamhaeng University Regional Campuses Graduate Students (open access)

Factors Related to the Selection of Information Sources: A Study of Ramkhamhaeng University Regional Campuses Graduate Students

This study assessed students’ satisfaction with Ramkhamhaeng University regional library services (RURLs) and the perceived quality of information retrieved from other information sources. In particular, this study investigated factors relating to regional students’ selection of information sources to meet their information needs. The researcher applied the principle of least effort and Simon’s satisficing theory for this study. The former principle governs and predicts the selection of these students’ perceived source accessibility, whereas the latter theory explains the selection and use of the information retrieved without considering whether the information is optimal. This study employed a web-based survey to collect data from 188 respondents. The researcher found that convenience and ease of use were the top two variables relating to respondent’s selection of information sources and use. The Internet had the highest mean for convenience. Results of testing a multiple linear regression model of all four RURCs showed that these four independent variables (convenience, ease of use, availability, and familiarity) were able to explain 69% of the total variance in the frequency of use of information sources. Convenience and ease of use were able to increase respondents’ perceived source accessibility and explain the variance of the frequency of use of sources …
Date: August 2011
Creator: Angchun, Peemasak
System: The UNT Digital Library
Teacher Decision-Making: Cultural Mediation in Two High School English Language Arts Classrooms (open access)

Teacher Decision-Making: Cultural Mediation in Two High School English Language Arts Classrooms

Although studies have addressed high school English language arts (ELA) instruction, little is known about the decision-making process of ELA teachers. How do teachers decide between the resources and instructional strategies at their disposal? This study focused on two monolingual teachers who were in different schools and grades. They were teaching mainstream students or English Language Learners. Both employed an approach to writing instruction that emphasized cultural mediation. Two questions guided this study: How does the enactment of culturally mediated writing instruction (CMWI) in a mainstream classroom compare to the enactment in an ESL classroom? What is the nature of teacher decision-making in these high school classrooms during English language arts instruction? Data were collected and analyzed using qualitative methodologies. The findings suggest that one teacher, who was familiar with CMWI’s principles and practices and saw students as partners, focused her decisions on engagement and participation. The other teacher deliberately embedded CMWI as an instructional stance. Her decisions focused on empathy, caring and meaningful connections. These teachers enacted CMWI in different ways to meet their students’ needs. They embraced the students’ cultural resources, used and built on their linguistic knowledge, expanded thinking strategies to make difficult information comprehensible, provided authentic …
Date: August 2011
Creator: Araujo, Juan José
System: The UNT Digital Library
Mosques in France: The Visible Presence of Islam (open access)

Mosques in France: The Visible Presence of Islam

Numerous laws are being directed toward subduing the visible presence of Islam throughout France, and in return French Muslims are becoming bolder in the projection of their faith. This thesis examines the presence of Islam in France throughout history and in contemporary French civilization. Specifically, this thesis addresses the issues regarding the visible presence of Islam in France through such institutions as mosques and how they are the key symbols representing the prominence of Islam in France. It looks at what lies in the collective French mind that creates such an influence on today's policies and outlook, as well as identifies the key characters that dominate the current affairs surrounding Islam in France. The thesis reviews the country's past relations with the visible presence of Islam through the controversies surrounding the construction of famous mosques. In addition, this thesis underlines key areas where both the State and the Muslim population must make concessions in order to avoid further conflict.
Date: May 2011
Creator: Arnold, Ashley Patricia
System: The UNT Digital Library
Spanish Migration in Contemporary Spanish Literature and Film (open access)

Spanish Migration in Contemporary Spanish Literature and Film

Spain underwent drastic social and political changes in the last decades of the twentieth century which also affected the nation’s patterns of emigration. Contemporary Spanish literature and film that portray these decades reflect the country’s fluctuating characteristics of migration. ¡Vente a Alemania, Pepe! (1971) by Pedro Lazaga, Coto vedado (1985) by Juan Goytisolo, El hijo del acordeonista (2003) by Bernardo Atxaga, and Yoyes (2000) by Helena Taberna demonstrate Spain’s migration trends during the last years of Franco’s dictatorship and the transition to democracy. The nation’s highly increased socioeconomic development in the 1970s and 1980s which eventually led to a first-world status also affected emigration, which can be seen in Carlota Fainberg (1999) by Antonio Muñoz Molina, Kasbah (2000) by Mariano Barroso, Restos de carmine (1999) by Juan Madrid, and Map of the Sounds of Tokyo (2009) by Isabel Coixet.
Date: August 2011
Creator: Arzac, Sergio
System: The UNT Digital Library
Examining the Effect of Security Environment on U.S. Unilateral Military Intervention in Civil Conflicts (open access)

Examining the Effect of Security Environment on U.S. Unilateral Military Intervention in Civil Conflicts

This study focuses on how perceived security environment affect U.S. unilateral, military intervention in civil conflicts, using the concept of Bayesian learning to illustrate how threat perceptions are formed, how they change, and how they affect the U.S. decision to intervene militarily in civil conflicts. I assess the validity of two primary hypotheses: (1) the U.S. is more likely to intervene in civil conflicts with connections to a threatening actor or ideology; and (2) the U.S. is more likely to intervene in civil conflicts for humanitarian motives in a less threatening security context. To test these hypotheses, I compare U.S. military intervention in three temporal contexts reflecting more threatening security contexts (Cold War and post-9/11) and less threatening security contexts (1992-2001). Results of logit regression analysis reveal that a conflict’s connection to a threatening actor or ideology is the most statistically and substantively significant determinant of U.S. military intervention in civil conflicts, both in more and less threatening security contexts. They also indicate that humanitarian motives are not a statistically significant determinant of U.S. military intervention in civil conflicts, even in a more benign security environment. These findings imply that U.S. unilateral military intervention is reserved for more direct national …
Date: August 2011
Creator: Aubone, Amber
System: The UNT Digital Library
The Use of Evidence-based Practices in the Provision of Social Skills Training for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders: a National Survey of School Psychologists' Training, Attitudes, and Practices (open access)

The Use of Evidence-based Practices in the Provision of Social Skills Training for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders: a National Survey of School Psychologists' Training, Attitudes, and Practices

The purpose of this exploratory study was to examine school psychologists' use of evidence- based practices (EBP), in general, and more specifically in the area of social skills training (SST) for students with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Study participants, consisting of 498 school psychologists from across the nation, participated in an online survey that gathered information about their training, attitudes, and practices. The frequency with which specific EBP practices for social skills training for students with ASD was examined, as was prediction of use of these practices. Multiple-regression analyses revealed multiple independent variables that were predictors for overall use of EBP. Results indicated that over half of the participants provide SST for students with ASD. Although the majority of participants indicated that their graduate program included at least one course with information about ASD and EBP practices, in general, nearly half indicated that their coursework did not include any courses that directly addressed social skills training for students with ASD. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to determine the extent to which the data fit the factor model. Participants' perception of the importance placed on EBP by their school district, scores on the openness subscale of the Evidence Based Practices …
Date: August 2011
Creator: Austin, Jennifer E.
System: The UNT Digital Library
Uniformly σ-Finite Disintegrations of Measures (open access)

Uniformly σ-Finite Disintegrations of Measures

A disintegration of measure is a common tool used in ergodic theory, probability, and descriptive set theory. The primary interest in this paper is in disintegrating σ-finite measures on standard Borel spaces into families of σ-finite measures. In 1984, Dorothy Maharam asked whether every such disintegration is uniformly σ-finite meaning that there exists a countable collection of Borel sets which simultaneously witnesses that every measure in the disintegration is σ-finite. Assuming Gödel’s axiom of constructability I provide answer Maharam's question by constructing a specific disintegration which is not uniformly σ-finite.
Date: August 2011
Creator: Backs, Karl
System: The UNT Digital Library
An Examination of Contextual and Process Variables Influencing the Career Development of African-American Male Athletes and Non-Athletes (open access)

An Examination of Contextual and Process Variables Influencing the Career Development of African-American Male Athletes and Non-Athletes

The purpose of this study was to examine the career development of African-American male athletes and non-athletes. The study utilizes Gottfredson’s circumscription and compromise model of career development as a framework for understanding the way individuals go about selecting different career paths based on various contextual variables and career development processes. A sample of 71 African-American male college students completed self-report questionnaires measuring different aspects of their background make-up, relevant career development processes, and career development outcome variables. Results of the study suggest that non-athlete students have a more developmentally appropriate approach to careers. Results also suggest that perceived career barriers and career locus of control mediate the relationship between athletic status and maturity surrounding careers. Career development is a complicated process and further study on this population is very important, especially when considering athletes. Implications for the findings are discussed as are suggestions for directions of new research concerning African-American career development.
Date: August 2011
Creator: Bader, Christopher M.
System: The UNT Digital Library