MacEwan Open Journals (MacEwan University)
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Why do some offenders get more jail time than for the same offense? The effects of the offender/victim relationship, offender remorse, and use of weapons
No full textThis study aims to examine sentencing decisions for homicide cases made by judges in Canada from 1995 to 2015. Specifically, the association between the length of incarceration assigned to homicide offenders and each of three factors, namely, the victim-offender relationship, the presence of remorse (as noted by the judges), and the offender’s choice of weapon, will be analyzed. Data was identified and coded from the Canadian Legal Information Institute website. Based on previous research it is predicted that there would not be any statistically significant difference in the length of jail time for offenders who murder intimate partners/family and strangers but for homicides committed against acquaintances/friends the jail sentencing will be slightly longer. It is also expected that jail sentencing would be shorter if judges noted remorse from the offender. Lastly, it is predicted that offenders who used edged weapons would receive the longest sentencing.
Discipline: Psychology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Sandy Jun
The Effects of Different Types of Warnings with Timeout on Child Compliance to Parental Instructions
No full textPrevious research has shown that time-out procedures can have a positive influence on compliance. The effect of giving a warning prior to a time-out has also been investigated with results showing that in the short run compliance improves when warnings are given; however, in the long run, compliance is better when warnings are not given. The current study will examine whether similar results will be found if multiple warnings are given before a time-out. The participants will be children with a history of noncompliance. Parents will implement the procedure and receive pre-training and post session feedback. We predict that percentage compliance to initial instruction will be highest in the no warning condition followed by the one warning condition and lowest in the multiple warnings condition. We also predict that overall compliance will be higher than compliance to initial instruction in the two warning conditions. The results of this study may benefit parents as they gain an understanding of the factors that influence compliance, which they can then implement in home or community.
Discipline: Psychology Honours
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Russ Powel
Hashtag Politics: A Twitter sentiment analysis of the 2015 Canadian Federal Election
No full textOur goal was to determine the sentiment to which people talked about federal political parties on the social media platform Twitter in the weeks prior to the 2015 Canadian Federal Election. We developed a split plot design model for analysis of Twitter messages (“tweets”) about the election written by Twitter users. Our factor of interest was sentiment in regards to popular political party “hashtags” (a topic indicator used in various social media platforms). Data was collected from Twitter’s Application Programming Interface (API) using statistical program R, which collected 50 tweets for each hashtag at a time. The experiment was replicated 12 times over three weeks prior to the election for a total of 7,200 tweets. Using a word lexicon that attributes scores to words associated with sentiment, we summed the score of each tweet, and tested scores of tweets containing hashtags of interest using an ANOVA test.
Our results suggested that the Liberal Party and New Democratic Party had more positive sentiment than the Conservative Party and the tag for general Canadian politics. The results of the election coincide with our results for the Liberal Party (which won 148 new seats) and the Conservative Party (which lost 60 seats), but positive sentiment for the New Democratic Party did not correspond to seat wins. While we may not yet have the ability to predict an election based on sentiment analysis, it could become a strategic tool in government and election campaigns as online presence and reputation becomes increasingly important.
*Indicates faculty mento
High Resolution Melt Analysis as an SNP Genotyping Tool in Arabidopsis thaliana
No full textSingle nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are a common type of mutation in most species. An insertion/deletion mutation (in/del) is a type of SNP which denotes the addition or removal of nucleotides, and are genotyped using the same methodology as SNPs. SNPs are typically genotyped by using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to amplify a specific fragment of the genome and use various sequencing methods to detect the SNPs present. High resolution melt analysis (HRM) is a technique used to precisely measure the annealing temperatures of the product DNA during quantitative PCR. Here, we report HRM analysis to screen for tt4-4, an in/del mutation of the TRANSPARENT TESTA (TT4, At5g 13930) gene in A.thaliana, in which there exists an extra C:G base pair. With HRM we can accurately determine the zygosity of each plant based on the slight differences in annealing temperatures between the amplicons produced by the wildtype and mutant alleles. HRM provides us with an inexpensive, high-throughput method of genotyping SNPs, which is used in a number of applications, including fast medical diagnostics, zygosity testing, and screening for DNA methylation patterns (Wojdacz & Dobrovic 2007, NAR 35(6):e41).
* Indicates faculty mentor
The terrestrial trace fossil Taenidium in the McMurray-Wabiskaw transition of north-central Alberta and its application to sequence stratigraphy
No full textDuring the growth of the Rocky Mountains in the Cretaceous, there was a major sea level rise event that flooded valleys and land that had been continental for millions of years prior. The Albian Wabiskaw Member of the Clearwater Formation represents the initial flooding of the Boreal Sea across Alberta. Examination of trace fossil assemblages, and sedimentology, in three subsurface core samples from the McMurray-Wabiskaw transition in north-central Alberta has shown that terrestrial trace fossils (Taenidium) are present. A north-south cross-section was constructed showing fully marine trace fossil assemblages to the north and terrestrial trace fossils to the south. The cross-cutting nature, lack of marine trace fossils, and associated presence of rootlets, coal, and synaeresis cracks are the major lines of evidence to support the terrestrial trace fossil interpretation. Other examples in the Cretaceous of Alberta (e.g, Cardium Formation; Belly River Group) seem to suggest that terrestrial trace fossils are associated with sequence boundaries before lowstand, or after forced regressive conditions. The recognition of terrestrial trace fossils could serve as a potential sequence stratigraphic tool for other rock units that contain terrestrial traces, including those as old as the latest Silurian (more than 400 million years ago).
* Indicates faculty mentor
Youth Disengagement: What\u27s CARE got to do with it?
No full textDo youth who disengage from society find their way into the criminal justice system or does the criminal justice system lead youth to disengage from society? This paper aims to contribute a student’s perspective on the (dis)engagement debate. In other words, to dispel the myth that “disengaged youth” just don’t care. Drawing on a critical, youth justice perspective, I conceptualize youth engagement, examine the bridges and barriers contributing to social inclusion/exclusion. I develop a CARE model for increasing access for youth. I pose practical questions concerning social support availability and opportunities for young people to contribute in meaningful ways to their community.
Discipline: Sociology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Joanne Minake
Canid Signal Detection in Live versus Dead Hides
No full textDomestic dogs are increasingly used in detection of species that are difficult to locate or are relatively low in abundance due to conservation related issues. In conjunction with the University of Alberta, Dr. Shannon Digweed, and Dr. Randal Arsenault have been exploring various aspects of incorporating scent dogs into conservation and behavioural research programs. This project will focus specifically on signal detection of live versus dead scent training. Research has suggested that there is a distinct olfactory difference between training scent dogs on ‘live hides’ versus ‘dead hides’ (of North American red squirrels). As the majority of work with our dog group has been scent training on dead hides we are interested in investigating the detection abilities of dogs that have only been trained on dead versus those that have only been trained on live. Additionally, this project has an applied aspect to it. The student and trainers will also be using data collected to promote a conservation scent detection business. The goal of this project is to assist the trainers with appropriate procedures for learning scent detection.
Discipline: Psychology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Shannon Digwee
Successful Transition Off of Academic Probation`: A Qualitative Analysis
No full textAcademic probation is a designation colleges and universities use to indicate that a student is not meeting specific Grade Point Average (GPA) requirements. According to MacEwan University policy, students are placed on academic probation for one academic year if they achieve a GPA below 2.00 from the previous academic year. The purpose of this study was to identify the factors that helped contribute to a successful transition off of academic probation for MacEwan students, to better understand the existing resources that have been useful for helping with the transition, and to see if other resources or strategies could be helpful for a successful transition. To understand students’ experiences with transitioning off of academic probation, focus groups were conducted with MacEwan University students who were enrolled in any of the main faculties/schools and who had successfully transitioned off of academic probation. This presentation highlights key findings from the focus group sessions. The findings may help future students successfully transition off of academic probation based on knowledge of what worked well for participants and could also lead to improvements in existing resources at MacEwan University or the development of new ones.
Discipline: Sociology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Diane Symbalu
Exploring factors that influence climate change
No full textClimate change is becoming an increasingly hot topic in the scientific and everyday world as the impacts are being seen more frequently. Increasing amounts of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is the principle driver of climate change. The purpose of this study is to discover what factors in the socioeconomic world have a significant relationship with the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. In seeing which factors cause an increase in greenhouse gases, climate scientists, governments and geoengineers can implement certain tactics pertaining to these to reduce climate change. Data from the years 1990 and 2012 was gathered from 97 randomly selected countries (removed 3 countries due to insufficient amounts of data) in order to model the changes over a twenty year period. This study will be using greenhouse gas emissions, forested area, agricultural land, livestock production and a few other factors to determine if said factors have a significant relationship on whether or not greenhouse gas emissions increased or decreased between 1990 and 2012. Results showed that livestock production and agricultural land had a significant relationship on the change in greenhouse gas emissions. Also, the difference in methane emissions, livestock production and forested area had a significant impact on whether or not greenhouse gases increased or not. Key Words: Climate Change, Countries, Greenhouse Gases
Discipline: Statistics
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Karen Bur
A Time Series Analysis Of The Toronto-Dominion Bank Stock Price
No full textThis paper presents a time series analysis of the Toronto-Dominion Bank stock (TD) for 10 months into the future. The data set was collected from Yahoo Finance. The time period of the dataset is from January 2008 to November 2015 and the prediction goes till September 2016. The attribute measured is the value of the stock measured at the beginning of the month. The data was analyzed using the TSA package in the R statistical language. Exploring the data through multiple tests gave five possible models that could represent the trends in the data. The model\u27s predictions were then compared using MPE, MSE, MAE, and MAPE to find the prediction accuracy. The Regression AR(1) model was clearly the best model after looking at these values. This model also did not have insignificant coefficients that were an issue for the other models. The value of a company is the results of many factors both external and internal, despite this, the Regression AR(1) model was still able to give fairly accurate predictions 10 months into the future.
Discipline: Statistics
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Cristina Anto