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Analytics & Insights Internship at Market Performance Group
Get PDFAn Honors Thesis discussing the growth of analytics in the corporate world
Customer and Employee Centricity: Insights from a Walmart Merchandising Internship
Get PDFThis thesis explores the application of customer and employee centric principles through the lens of a merchandising internship at Walmart. Over an eight week period, the author gained firsthand experience in Walmart’s School and Office Supplies category during the Back-to-School season. The project involved developing a new modular and assortment strategy grounded in data analysis, customer insights, and field research. Central themes include the value of curiosity, hands on learning, and the power of purpose driven leadership. The experience emphasizes how aligning merchandising strategies with real customer needs can drive success
Corporate Partnerships: The Heartbeat of an Organization
Get PDFA deep-dive into the world of Corporate Partnerships for large sporting events. This thesis includes day-to-day responsibilities and takeaways from a ten-week internship with the 2024 Men\u27s Basketball Final Four event
ZYNfluencers: Decoding the New Wave of Nicotine Culture on TikTok
Get PDFSignificance: This research is crucial for understanding how ZYN, a leader in the rapidly growing nicotine pouch market, influences younger generations through platforms like TikTok. With the nicotine pouch industry projected to grow from 22.98 billion by 2030, ZYNfluencers play a key role in shaping trends, building brand loyalty, and attracting new users. This phenomenon poses a challenge to tobacco control policies, as marketing strategies targeting youth—potentially with modified risk claims—could undermine efforts to limit nicotine\u27s appeal. By examining ZYN’s impact on social media, this study highlights the need for updated regulations to address the evolving influence of influencers and the digital marketing landscape.
Methods: A sample of 123 TikTok videos videos relevant to ZYN content posted by September 1st, 2024 were collected via (API) a TikTok application programing interface from https://console.apify.com/ using the popular hashtags #ZYN ( 1.5 B views) #ZYNtok ( 154 M views) #ZYNfluencer ( 56.6 M views). A codebook was developed using the first 50 videos, where each author analyzed and captured key themes. In the final codebook, all of the collected data was annotated and classified by if the video contained content regarding discussions about ZYN whether those are positive, negative or neutral, the presence of fitness or sports themes, celebrity endorsements, popular music, the physical appearance of the presenter, such as youth, comedy, methods of normalization, and abundant collections. We defined if the account was operated by “influencers” via the following count (\u3e1,000) and the users appeal towards nicotine use, specifically with ZYN products.
Results: Overall, 39.8% of the videos analyzed were directly related to ZYN content creators and the promotion of ZYN use. Among the relevant videos, 24.4% featured the normalization or casual portrayal of ZYN in social and cultural contexts. 16% of the videos discussed the product itself, with the sentiment breakdown as follows: 37.5% of these discussions were negative, 25% were neutral, and 37.5% were positive. Additionally, 10.2% of the videos incorporated humor, using memes or jokes to depict ZYN. 14.2% of the users featured in the videos appeared to be youthful, and 6% of the videos included celebrity endorsements or promotional content.
Implications: The rise of ZYN and its promotion by influencers on TikTok highlights regulatory gaps in nicotine pouch marketing, particularly targeting youth. Many young users may perceive these products as safer alternatives to cigarettes, despite the risks of nicotine addiction and health issues like heart disease and cancer. This underscores the need for stronger regulations to protect younger generations from the growing influence of digital marketing and nicotine use.https://scholarworks.uark.edu/hnrcsturpc25/1042/thumbnail.jp
Stakeholder Perspective-Taking in Engineering Design; A Neurocognitive Approach
Get PDFDuring the engineering design process, the ‘black box’ of a designer\u27s mind determines who the stakeholders are, which stakeholder needs they are addressing and how they will address them. This process can build bias into engineering designs, leading to less equitable, accessible, and inclusive engineered artifacts. Design neurocognition, a new field that aims to determine the unknowns of a working designer’s mind, has arisen because of this uncertainty. The fNIRS (Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy) allows insight into the prefrontal cortex during decision making processes by analyzing the change in oxygenated blood in the surface of the prefrontal cortex, about 3 cm (about 1.18 in) in depth. Triangulating the data received from both brain activity (from the fNIRS), with the traditional methods of design cognition and design thinking exercises results in a more robust emotional evaluation of the problem at hand. This study\u27s objective is to analyze through interviews before and after data collection whether assuming stakeholder perspectives impacts the student perceptions of the importance of stakeholder engagement within the design process. The study is built upon design vignettes, a snapshot of an engineering problem that participants can clearly visualize. In this case, stormwater management in Northwest Arkansas. The participants will be asked to assume three stakeholder perspectives, a resident experiencing flooding, an engineer working toward a solution for stormwater management, and a City Public Works director, in random order and identify all needs and concerns they would have as their given stakeholder. The participants will be interviewed before and after data collection about the perceived effects of stakeholder engagement. The fNIRS data, which will be collected during the entire sequence of events, will be triangulated with the identified needs and interview data to determine whether different patterns of brain activation are associated with different design outcomes. Case studies alone have been shown to engage students more effectively than plain information, but little research has been done on what is happening differently within the student’s brain during such case studies. The results from this work build a stronger argument that stakeholder engagement should be incorporated more heavily into engineering courses, as in the long term, this learned procedure of stakeholder engagement and empathy leads to the lessening of repeated marginalization of certain disregarded groups, creating a better design for each stakeholder involved in the issue.https://scholarworks.uark.edu/hnrcsturpc25/1040/thumbnail.jp
Can Shame and Guilt be Used as a Deterrent for Substance Use and Crime Recidivism?
Get PDFThe present study focuses on how shame and guilt can be used as a deterrent for substance use and substance-related crime recidivism. This research is significant because of on-going alcohol and other drug crime recidivism in the United States. 68% of drug-involved offenders have been found to recidivate within 3 years of their release from prison (Langan & Levin, 2002). Understanding how guilt and shame affect one\u27s drug use and crime recidivism is important in recovery. This study has been influenced by John Braithwaite\u27s theory of reintegrative shaming: using guilt and shame as the specific deterrent for recidivism. Based on this theory, we developed vignettes to manipulate feelings of guilt and shame in the participant as a function of the degree to which the crime was publicly known versus private. Four vignettes are included: 2 drunk-driving (private and public) and 2 driving under the influence of marijuana (private and public), all of which were first piloted with students and experts. After the participant reads their vignette, they are asked questions on a 5-point Likert scale regarding their levels of guilt, shame, and likelihood to use the substance and commit the crime again. Preliminary data from 41 participants (61% women; ages 18-31) were used to evaluate the hypotheses that (H1) elevated levels of shame/guilt will be correlated with lower likelihood of recidivism, and (H2) a public (vs. private) scenario will induce more shame and lower likelihood of recidivism. Results show support for H1 and partial support for H2. Shame/guilt were negatively related to intentions to recidivate; there was a trend for shame/guilt to be higher trend in drunk-driving public outcome scenario than the private. If the hypotheses are confirmed when we complete data collection in a larger sample, then this study can support Braithwaite\u27s theory of reintegrative shaming. The vignettes can be used in future research to better understand the connection between shame and guilt in response to impaired driving as a predictor of future re-offending. Future research can continue to understand how these results may differ among individuals with more severe drug-related crimes, and among other populations who have interacted with the criminal justice system (i.e., drug court participants, incarcerated adults).https://scholarworks.uark.edu/hnrcsturpc25/1014/thumbnail.jp
Heinrich Krieger and the Nazi Vision of the United States
No full textOn June 5, 1934, seventeen Nazi lawyers, jurists, scholars, and officials met to discuss how Nazi Germany would go about identifying and persecuting their Jewish population. This crucial meeting would lay the foundation for the Nuremberg Laws that were later created and passed in 1935. From the records of this meeting we know that US race laws concerning its black and Indian population was used as a model for the Nazi lawyers and much of the information on US race laws was obtained from research conducted by a Nazi scholar named Heinrich Krieger that was influential during the meeting.
Before this meeting Heinrich Krieger had spent a year at the University of Arkansas as a foreign exchange student during the 1933-1934 school year. While in Arkansas Krieger would partake in multiple campus activities and write a seminar paper on Nazi German labor policies as an apologist on behalf of Germany to the US. However while spending time in Arkansas Krieger would begin to notice race relations in the state that would lead him to study US race laws that would be used by Nazi officials to create the Nuremberg laws.
This thesis will study the development of Krieger while a student in Arkansas to reveal how Krieger and the Nazi party had no master plan to use the US and its race laws as a model for the Nuremberg laws. Rather by examining Krieger\u27s development from labor scholar to race scholar, we can see how Krieger and Nazi officials were opportunists who came across US race laws and saw its potential. Also, Arkansas and its race laws and race relations will be examined to learn how the state influenced Krieger\u27s research and understanding of US race laws
Parental Perceptions of Child Life Specialists
Get PDFMost children spend time in the hospital at some point during their childhood whether it is for a short visit or a long-term stay. Hospitalization can be a very stressful experience for children and their families. Child life specialists work in hospitals to help families navigate hospitalizations and cope with stress. This study aimed to investigate parental perceptions of child life specialists, including parents’ familiarity with their role, recognition of its importance, appreciation for help provided, and the formation of meaningful relationships with child life specialists. A survey was conducted among child life specialists who had worked with children and families in hospital settings, and ninety-one responses were collected. The findings indicate that parents were generally unfamiliar with the role of a child life specialist before entering the hospital. However, after interacting with a child life specialist, parents came to recognize the importance and value of the child life specialists’ role and appreciated the help that they provided for their child and family. Child life specialists also feel that they can form meaningful relationships with the parents they work with. Overall, the study emphasizes the crucial role that child life specialists play in supporting children and families throughout hospitalization
Hepatic Lipid Metabolism of High and Low Water-Efficient Broiler Lines Under Heat Stress
No full textHeat stress (HS) is one of the most critical environmental challenges negatively impacting global poultry production, significantly compromising broiler performance, welfare, and economic viability. Specifically, heat stress profoundly disrupts physiological and metabolic processes, including hepatic lipid metabolism. Two broiler lines were divergently selected for high (HWE) or low (LWE) water efficiency. Heat-stressed HWE birds showed reduced fat content compared to their LWE counterparts, and HS reduced abdominal fat content in both lines. The purpose of this study was to determine the difference in underlying molecular mechanisms involved in this divergent fat content between the lines. Day-old chicks were placed in 12 environmentally controlled chambers (2 pens/chamber, 20 birds/pen). On day 29, daily cyclic heat stress (36°C, 9h/day) was applied to half of the chambers, while the others remained at 25°C, in a 2x2 factorial design. On day 49, liver samples were collected for lipid metabolism-associated gene and protein expression analyses. Data were analyzed by Two-Way ANOVA and Tukey’s HSD test using Graph Pad Prism. Data are expressed as mean ± SEM and were considered significant at P≤0.05. HWE birds exhibited higher fatty acid synthase FASN protein levels under thermoneutral (TN) conditions (P=0.0011), with both lines showing decreased FASN protein levels under HS. Malic enzyme (ME) protein expression was also significantly higher in HWE compared to LWE birds under both TN and HS conditions. LWE birds showed higher ATP citrate lyase (ACLY) gene expression under HS. The findings of this study showed that the main transcription factors are also upregulated, suggesting whether there is other main lipogenic protein effectors or high hepatic lipolysis rate in HWE birds that merit further in-depth investigations
Firm Disclosures and Retail Investor Behavior: The Role of Information Type, Disagreement, and Social Networks
No full textThis paper examines whether disclosure characteristics–specifically hard versus soft information–influence disagreement among retail investors, whether due to differences in information sets or interpretation, and how such disagreement subsequently affects trading volume. Using a sample of 85,050 earnings conference calls and StockTwits disagreement data from 2010 to 2021, I find that hard information (i.e., earnings figures) is negatively associated with investor disagreement, while soft information (i.e., forward-looking statements) is positively associated with it. Further analysis reveals that the disclosure characteristics impact trading activity only indirectly, through their influence on investor disagreement. Additionally, I examine the moderating role of social network centrality, which is proxied by the centrality of the firm’s headquarters county. Results offer limited evidence that network centrality reduces interpretative disagreement associated with soft information. Cross-sectional analyses show that penny stock investors respond differently to disclosures, likely reflecting variation in investment preferences and information processing. Lastly, the results remain robust when excluding the post-COVID period, which saw an influx of a new group of retail investors. This study contributes to the literature on disclosure processing, retail investor behavior, and the informational sources of market disagreement, as well as its trading implications