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The Children’s Hour Dramaturgical Research
No full textThis spring, the Theatre Department is producing The Children’s Hour by American playwright, Lillian Hellman. She tells the story of two headmistresses of a private boarding school who are accused of a scandalous affair by one of their wealthy students. The rumor spreads rapidly, and the two women are forced to fight to keep their lives together amidst a flurry of accusations and interrogations. The play is based on an essay titled: “Closed Doors, or The Great Drumsheugh Case,” which follows a real 1809 court case that took place in Scotland. When it was originally produced in 1934, the play was banned in Chicago, Boston, and London due to the allusions to homosexuality. Although Hellman has endured further banning and censoring of the play, it is revered as a great American dramatic work. As the dramaturg for this production, I conduct research on the play’s historical context in order to help the cast and creative team portray the complex relationships and situations presented in the play. I also compile materials to aid the audience’s understanding of the play, such as the lobby display and program note. The Children’s Hour addresses themes still present in our community today, and provides an opportunity to study the way those themes were punctuated and dealt with across the timeline of American theatre history
Microbial Tracking to Identify Fecal Contaminants in Recreational Surface Waters
No full textOver the past 2 years, the Pikaart research group has been working in parallel with the Outdoor Discovery Center to help remediate the Lake Macatawa Watershed. Project Clarity, is a $12M plan set forth by the Outdoor Discovery Center/Macatawa Greenway and other organizations to restore the watershed to its former glory. Project Clarity’s goals are to improve the water quality by reducing the amount of sediment, nutrients, and bacterial pollution. With a multi-faceted approach to long-term sustainability, best management practices, land restoration, and community education, the watershed can be restored in time. To further investigate the cleanliness of the water, the Pikaart group has been working to identify the fecal contaminants in the Lake Macatawa watershed. This is done by tracking the source of the contaminants using qPCR. With qPCR, the microbiological 16s RNA gene sequence is amplified based on primer sets to track the potential sources of the microorganisms. The findings from various sample locations will be discussed along with plans for the future
Promoting Catalysis and Expanding the Scope of Organometallic Nucleophiles Utilized in the Nickel-Mediated Decarbonylative Cross- Coupling of Substituted Phthalimides
No full textA new method for synthesizing ortho-substituted benzamides has been developed through the nickel-mediated decarbonylative cross-coupling of substituted phthalimides with various diorganozinc reagents. This reaction demonstrates broad substrate scope, including both electron-rich and electronpoor aryl phthalimide substituents and a variety of commercially available and in situ generated diorganozinc reagents. However, this reaction suffers from two key limitations. First, it requires a stoichiometric equivalent of nickel, which limits its application in synthesis. Second, diorganozinc reagents are either pyrophoric or must be synthesized in situ. Efforts to promote catalysis include altering the phthalimide substituent, ligand, solvent, and catalyst used. Recent work has also focused on expanding the scope of nucleophiles to include boronic acids, which are safer and more commercially available, while optimizing reaction conditions of this new system
Leg Alignment in Beach Chair Position Yielding Optimal Outcomes in Shoulder Surgery Patients
No full textShoulder surgeries are routine in the orthopedic setting; however, patients report high pain intensity and interference with daily life postoperatively. There are no specific standards for positioning patients in a beach chair position during shoulder surgery, which may influence patient outcomes. Complications due to beach chair position have included neurologic, cerebrovascular and cardiovascular problems in recent studies. This study aims to describe patient outcomes in the beach chair position by comparing frog and straight-legged alignment. Leavell and Clark’s Level of Prevention Theory provides the conceptual framework for the study because it emphasizes the importance of the nurses’ role in primary prevention. The study consists of adult participants undergoing outpatient shoulder surgery. Once recruited and informed consent is obtained, the nurses will administer a McGill Pain Questionnaire in addition to the established preoperative assessment. Subjects will be randomly assigned to a group: frog or straight-legged beach chair. A nurse will repeat the McGill Questionnaire in addition to the standard follow-up assessment one day postoperative. The sample size is to be determined. Research will be conducted at an outpatient surgical center in West Michigan. SPSS statistical software will be used for analysis. ANOVA tests will be used to determine whether frog or straight-legged beach chair has on average a significant difference in pain intensity. Results and conclusions are pending. The study’s small sample size, restrictive criteria for eligible participants and observation under only one surgeon limit the study’s generalizability. It is anticipated that this research will launch future studies examining the nurses’ role in positioning patients to reduce postoperative pain intensity and interference with daily activities
Technology and Exercise in Older Adults
No full textTechnology is expanding and becoming connected to many aspects of everyday life. Research is needed that investigates the connection between technology and daily life, especially where these intersect with health and in healthcare. This research project is based on Imogene King’s Interacting Systems Theory, as it focuses on health and outside interacting systems. The purpose of this research is to investigate relationships between frequency of exercise and perceived technology literacy in individuals over the age of 65 years. This will be investigated through a cross-sectional descriptive study in the form of a survey that will be administered via SurveyMonkey. The survey will be sent to a convenience sample of men and women who belong to an organization for retired professionals in Michigan. A sample size of 160 is expected. Data collected will be analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics using SPSS 19.0 software. Results and conclusions are pending. Anticipated limitations are the homogeneity of the sample being mostly of Caucasian descent, primarily of the same education level, and being from the same geographic area, limiting generalizability. It is expected that findings will increase nursing knowledge relative to technology and exercise in older adults and be used as groundwork for a larger nursing study that will investigate technology and exercise as an intervention to decrease hopelessness in cardiac patients
Utilizing Scanning Electron Microscopy to Characterize SCM Tip Degradation and Microsphere Deposition
No full textScanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) is a method by which the morphology of a sample can be determined. Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDS) can determine the elemental composition of the sample. This project examined two microsystems using these techniques. The first microsystem examined the quality of the coating on Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) tips. In contact AFM, a tip is physically dragged across the surface to determine the topography of the sample. The SCM model tips have a conductive coating, which can be damaged due to the dragging required to make the measurement. In the second microsystem, the SEM was used to examine the results of depositing polystyrene microspheres on gold substrates to determine what parameters lead to a closepacked monolayer
He Said, She Said: A Study of Gender, Framing, and Cultivation in the Ray Rice Domestic Violence Incident
No full textIn 2014, Ray Rice, a player in the National Football League, found himself at the center of a domestic violence incident. Rice attacked his then-fiancé in an elevator and a video of the incident leaked to the public. The purpose of this research is to examine how news portrayals of Ray Rice on this incident have affected viewers’ support and acceptance of domestic violence based on cultivation and framing theory. Television consumption is a significant predictor of the levels of acceptance of rape violence (Kahlor & Eastin, 2011). Similarly, this study will examine the impact of domestic violence coverage on viewers’ acceptance of domestic violence. It is hypothesized that heavy viewers of NFL-related television are more supportive of Rice compared to non-heavy viewers, females are likely to be less accepting of domestic violence in the Rice incident compared to males, and negatively-framed news coverage will create a negative evaluation of Rice and domestic violence compared to positively-framed news coverage. In a 2x2 between-subjects experiment (male vs. female and positive tone vs. negative tone), participants watched news reports with either male anchors or female anchors. The reports were either positively or negatively framed. Afterward, participants completed a questionnaire about their level of support for Rice, their level of acceptance of domestic violence, and their average amount of weekly NFL-related television consumption. Participants were undergraduate students at Hope College, enrolled in communication courses, and voluntarily completed the experiment for partial course credit or extra-credit. Based on the results, it can be suggested that reporters using victim-blaming and perpetrator-defending frames when covering domestic violence influence the audience to believe that domestic violence is not problematic. The results of this study can be used to challenge news media to report more neutrally to affect a reduction in domestic violence incidents
Hooked on Facebook: The Role of Social Anxiety and Need for Social Assurance in Problematic Use of Facebook
No full textThere is a growing concern that excessive and uncontrolled use of Facebook not only interferes with performance at school or work but also poses threats to physical and psychological well-being. The present research investigated how two individual difference variablessocial anxiety and need for social assuranceaffect problematic use of Facebook. Drawing on the basic premises of the social skill model of problematic Internet use, we hypothesized that social anxiety and need for social assurance would be positively correlated with problematic use of Facebook. Furthermore, it was predicted that need for social assurance would moderate the relationship between social anxiety and problematic use. A cross-sectional online survey was conducted with a college student sample in the United States (N=243) to test the proposed hypotheses. Results showed that both social anxiety and need for social assurance had a significant positive association with problematic use of Facebook. More importantly, the data demonstrated that need for social assurance served as a significant moderator of the relationship between social anxiety and problematic Facebook use. The positive association between social anxiety and problematic Facebook use was significant only for Facebook users with medium to high levels of need for social assurance but not for those with a low level of need for social assurance. Theoretical and practical implications of these findings were discussed
Factors Influencing the Reproductive Success of Three Cavity-Nesting Birds: Eastern Bluebird (Sialia sialis), Tree Swallow (Tachycineta bicolor), and House Wren (Troglodytes aedon)
No full textBecause of the Eastern Bluebird’s history of decline, it is important to understand how to manage the current populations by understanding what factors influence the reproductive success of the species. The objective of this study was to test the effect of species-specific nest-site occupancy and competitive interactions among species on the reproductive success of Eastern Bluebirds (Sialia sialis), Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor), and House Wrens (Troglodytes aedon) using nest boxes. Nest box data were collected from May through August in 1992, 1994, 1995, 1997-1999, 2001-2003, 2005, 2007, 2008, and 2010-2013 at the Consumer’s Energy J.H. Campbell Complex in West Olive, Michigan. Overall, reproductive success was greater when a particular species was using a box that was previously used by the same species, as compared with success when using a box previously occupied by a different species. This effect was also evident when examining each species separately for the Eastern Bluebirds (Χ=108.744, df=1, p\u3c0.0001), Tree Swallows (Χ=195.687, df=1, p\u3c0.0001), and House Wrens (Χ=100.756, df=1, p\u3c0.0001). Reproductive success also varied by species. House Wrens had the greatest reproductive success at 63.31%, followed by Tree Swallows (59.52%), and Eastern Bluebirds had the lowest reproductive success (45.99%) (F=3.283, df=2, p=0.047). However, it was not determined in this study what caused this difference. For continuing studies, it could be worthwhile to examine the effect of surrounding topography on the reproductive success of the occupant species. It also may be worthwhile to examine the relationship of the presence of mammals in neighboring boxes and the reproductive success of the occupant species