1925 research outputs found
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Investigating interactivity and its relationship to language use and task variables in l2 peer interaction
Full text linkInteraction has received attention in different fields of applied linguistics. In the field of Second Language Acquisition (SLA), scholars have perceived interaction as a platform where L2 learners can engage in language experimentation. It has been considered in light of Long's (1981) Interaction Hypothesis, which posits that negotiation of meaning is the basis of L2 learning. Researchers also examined interaction from a different perspective, where they described salient features exhibited in different patterns of peer interaction to understand the underlying construct of conversation management in the context of L2 assessment (Galaczi, 2008). Previous studies that investigated L2 interaction mostly used qualitative methods over small datasets. The present study adopted a quantitative approach to understand the construct of interaction. To do so, L2 pair interaction was measured by creating a composite score of interactivity level to understand the relationship between students’ degree of interactivity and their use of lexico-grammatical features as well as their L2 fluency. The study also examined the effect of tasks on L2 pair interactivity level. Pearson’s correlation tests, as well as Spearman's rank correlation tests, showed that interactivity is associated with discourse particles, response forms, wh-questions, and second-person pronouns, while it was negatively associated with nominal forms (i.e., all instances of nouns, common nouns, and the length of the word) and hesitators. Furthermore, the results showed that interactivity was associated with more fluent L2 talk, where students of higher interactivity levels tended to produce faster speech rates and fewer silent pauses. Additionally, an ANOVA test showed a large effect of task on L2 interactivity. Further analyses suggested that the general communicative purpose of task has a limited effect on L2 pair interactivity. However, the task prompt showed patterns that relate the type of information (e.g., lists of sentences, scientific graphs, words/phrases, images) provided to students in the prompt to patterns of L2 interactivity levels. The study provides insightful information for scholars interested in L2 interaction in oral assessment and L2 dialogic tasks
Effectiveness of transgender health training on healthcare students’ knowledge, attitudes, and perceived competency providing gender-affirming healthcare
Full text linkGender-affirming healthcare is essential and potentially lifesaving for many transgender people; however, a dearth of healthcare professionals is available to provide this care. Transgender health literature has identified key barriers among healthcare professionals that decrease their likelihood of providing gender-affirming healthcare. Three of the most common barriers, attitudes towards transgender people, transgender health knowledge, and transgender health perceived competency are the dependent variables in this study. This repeated measures mixed-methods study investigated whether the Transgender Health Learning Series (THLS), an online transgender health training, improved healthcare students' attitudes, knowledge, and perceived competency in transgender health. Thirty-one nursing and physician assistant students at Northern Arizona University (NAU) participated in the study. Participants completed three measures to obtain baseline scores on each dependent variable. They then completed the same measures after the THLS to ascertain whether scores were significantly improved on one or more of the dependent variables. Participants also responded to written open-ended questions regarding their subjective experiences upon training completion. Twenty-one participants were interviewed to obtain richer qualitative data than possible with written responses. Quantitative data were analyzed using a repeated measures MANOVA followed by ANOVAs on each dependent variable. The qualitative data were coded into thematic categories. Results found a statistically significant multivariate effect, with univariate effects for knowledge and perceived competency, and there was no univariate effect for attitude. These results indicated that participants' knowledge and perceived competency in transgender health improved after completing the THLS, while their attitudes towards transgender people remained the same. Statistical results were supported by the qualitative data, which provided context for the statistics and feedback on possible enhancements to the THLS. Implications include that the THLS may be an effective addition to the university curriculum to improve healthcare students' knowledge and perceived competency in transgender health. Future research can help determine whether THLS maintains its effectiveness with licensed healthcare professionals and the generalizability of findings beyond NAU students
Best available scientific information for wildfire in the U.S. Southwest: current needs, barriers, and opportunities
Full text linkBest available scientific information (BASI) – science that is identified as the most accurate, reliable, and relevant to the issues being considered – is increasingly sought after in wildfire and forest management contexts. Many land management policies now require the identification and use of BASI to make decisions, but little is known about how fire professionals access and exchange BASI to progress these efforts. This research aims to understand the most prominent scientific needs of fire professionals and the barriers that prevent their use of BASI in Arizona and New Mexico. I utilized a mixed-method approach to gather insights via semi-structured interviews and an online survey of fire professionals engaged in the Southwest Fire Science Consortium. Findings included the identification of four critical research areas where BASI can be expanded in the Southwest: (1) firefighter health, safety, and well-being, (2) planning strategies for fuels treatments, (3) post-fire ecological effects, and (4) strategies or factors related to increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion in fire science. Several barriers to current access of BASI emerged among participants, including difficulty keeping up with emerging science and conflict about what constitutes BASI in specific contexts. Barriers varied depending on respondent’s job position and employer, allowing the development of recommendations for reducing barriers to BASI across the Southwest fire workforce. This research improves understandings of fire professionals' interactions with BASI and provides recommendations that science-exchange partnerships, research entities, and management organizations can use to improve the use of BASI on the ground
Refining measurement structure of parenting dimensions: an item response theory approach
Full text linkNumerous studies have linked aspects of parenting to psychological outcomes including anxiety, depression, and problem behavior. More recently, there has been a shift in focus from parenting styles (e.g., authoritarian, authoritative, permissive, uninvolved) to parenting dimensions (e.g., warmth, rejection, control). This research has produced a large number of parenting dimension measures that, while useful in exploring what components may be most important in predicting child developmental outcomes, have accumulated in overwhelming numbers. The amount of available parenting measures, each with different factor structures and many overlapping labels for constructs, can make measure selection in research studies feel arbitrary and creates ambiguity in our measurement and interpretation of parenting. No published study has yet attempted to comprehensively review and consolidate the large number of dimensions across several measures. The present study attempts to do so through adopting an item response theory approach to data reduction. Item response theory (IRT) is a psychometric framework that identifies measure items with the most reliable, valid, and informative properties. In this study, 998 participants completed a survey of 251 items across 14 measures including 119 parenting dimension items extracted from five established measures, demographics, childhood trauma, adverse childhood experiences, trait affect, self-esteem, anxiety, depressive symptoms, externalizing problem behavior, and flourishing/well-being. Data was split into two samples using a cross-validation approach. Ordinal factor analysis on sample one was used to identify the factor structure with best fit and to select the best items for each factor. The model and selected items were then confirmed using sample two data. This produced a 48-item long form and 24-item short form self-report measure that captured six parenting dimensions and had reliability comparable to previously established measures, although one factor related to Involvement appeared weaker than the rest. Explanations and recommendations for future research are offered. Overall, the consolidated and improved measure of parenting dimensions should help to clarify construct ambiguity in the field and further research on parenting and its relation to adult mental health
Linking surface temperatures to past environments on Mars through remote sensing, modeling, and analog study
Full text linkInfrared imagers orbiting Mars have collected an astoundingly complete record of surface temperatures spanning over five decades. Because the physical nature of different rocks and sediment affect how quickly they can heat up or cool down, temperature measurements provide a valuable tool for studying geology in areas where ground measurements are limited or absent. Inferred sedimentary features can be used to help interpret past environmental processes, which for Mars inform us as to whether habitable conditions might have once existed at the surface. However, the task of directly quantifying how a given temperature response aligns with a sediment type, and thus past environmental setting, faces numerous challenges. Combinations of surface materials lead to nonunique thermal signals, and uncertainties associated with orbital remote sensing add to the difficulty. This dissertation is an effort to expand the limits of thermophysical interpretation of Martian sedimentary deposits. Progress is achieved through three distinct projects that incorporate remote sensing observations, thermophysical modeling, and experiments at Mars analog sites on Earth. The result is both a new approach to conducting thermophysical studies on Earth as well as new insights into the nature and formation of materials on the Martian surface. These advances build on decades of research into thermophysical processes and take an innovative step that opens the door to a new generation of investigations to come
Improving the accuracy of solar system small body period derivation through de-aliasing and survey cadence
Full text linkCurrently, deriving small body rotation periods is one of the most challenging problems in small body astronomy. An added challenge is that data from ground-based surveys have to overcome the day-night cadence of the Earth, which causes aliasing. I used real data from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) and synthetic data from the Legacy Survey of Spaceand Time (LSST), several ways were tried to improve the match rate of derived small body periods to their physical state. The two main ways were (1) removing cadence based aliasing solutions after a survey has acquired observations and (2) finding a cadence for a survey that results in the highest match percentage, each of them comprising their own paper.
In my first paper, I used four different methods — three from the literature and a new one that we developed — were examined that remove aliases to improve the accuracy of period-finding algorithms. We investigate the effectiveness of these methods in decreasing the fraction of aliased period solutions by applying them to the ZTF and the LSST Solar SystemProducts Database (SSPBD), a synthetic LSST small body dataset, asteroid datasets. We find that the VanderPlas method had the worst accuracy for each survey. The mask and our newly proposed window method yields the highest accuracy when averaged across both datasets. However, the Monte Carlo method had the highest accuracy for the ZTF dataset, while for SSPDB, it had lower accuracy than the baseline where none of these methods are applied. Where possible, detailed de-aliasing studies should be carried out for every survey with a unique cadence.
In my second paper, I used simulations of LSST to determine the best cadence for deriving small body rotation periods. LSST has already made simulations of LSST observations using different cadences to try to determine which one is the best for many different science cases. However, these science cases do not address the derivation of small body rotation periods. We implanted synthetic asteroids in 141 different simulations, all 139 version v2.1 simulations and two from the version 1.7/v1.7.1 simulations, to determine the best and worst cadences for rotation period derivation. We found that cadences with long exposures (small errors) and cadences that repeatedly observe one field had the best derived period match rate. Conversely, short exposures and non-repeated fields had the worst match rate. We also examined the match rate as a function of survey length to examine when periods would be successfully derived. We found, with a minimum observation cut, that at least 90% of the year ten match rate is achieved in year 1. We also found that the match rate does not plateau, meaning that a longer survey would result in higher match rates.
My work in this thesis leads to several lines of future investigation: (1) Develop methods for removing pseudo-aliases, (2) Develop a “confidence” metric for period solutions, (3) testing the de-aliasing methods and the effects of cadence on period derivation on stellar and non-sinusoidal sources, and (4) analyzing the difference between the real LSST period results and the synthetic
Hope and caring: a portraiture study of effective teachers of historically marginalized students
Full text linkEquitable education for all students is an enduring issue in public schools, especially for schools serving marginalized students living in poverty. Providing equitable educational opportunities to students in their K-12 careers increases the likelihood that historically marginalized populations will improve their social mobility and increase post-high school opportunities. This study examined the dispositions and practices of teachers who effectively teach historically marginalized populations. This study aimed to determine how Hope and Caring manifest in teachers who effectively promote rigorous learning and engagement for historically marginalized students. The following questions guided this study: (1) How do hope and caring manifest in teachers’ work? (2) What lived experiences have prompted teachers to exhibit hopeful and caring dispositions? (3) How do hopeful and caring teachers resist the dehumanizing effects of teacher accountability based on high-stakes testing? Using portraiture methodology, the data for this study was collected through an interview with each participant and many hours of classroom observations. The study participants were two secondary teachers and their individual stories and experiences were captured in portraits. The findings of this study revealed that teachers must have the disposition and the pedagogical knowledge to go beyond the technical aspects of teaching to create humanistic, safe environments conducive to students’ learning. First, teachers must have the political clarity to understand the systemic links between schools and society that substantially impact students’ success or failure. The participants’ political clarity was the foundation on how they created humanizing learning environments. Second, teachers must understand their identity to effectively teach marginalized students. In doing so, they are better equipped to teach their students how to navigate dehumanizing school practices and society. Lastly, the participants’ main priority was building relationships with students and creating a classroom community that included honoring students’ voices. They created a classroom community where students felt valued, seen, and heard
Gathering provider perspectives on using a parent-implemented autism intervention with traditionally underserved populations
Full text linkParent-mediated interventions for children on the autism spectrum are recognized as evidence-based practice. The PLAY Project autism intervention, the focus of this research, is a parent-mediated model that has been implemented on a large scale, but its effectiveness with traditionally underserved families has not been evaluated. The aim of this study was to obtain PLAY Project Consultants’ (PPCs’) perspectives on using PLAY with children on the autism spectrum or who have an increased likelihood of being diagnosed with autism whose families are rural-dwelling, culturally diverse, and/or low-resourced (“traditionally underserved families”). Furthermore, the study aimed to determine what adaptations could be made when using the PLAY Project, according to PPCs, to facilitate its implementation and increase its effectiveness for traditionally underserved populations while maintaining its fidelity. The study’s mixed-methods analysis examined provider perspectives on barriers and facilitators to using the PLAY Project with traditionally underserved families. PPC survey data were analyzed using independent group t-tests, and thematic analysis was used to analyze follow-up semi-structured interviews with providers. Survey questions, interview questions, and qualitative themes were guided by the eight key dimensions of the Ecological Validity Model and viewed through a Theory of Change lens. Results of this study may inform adaptations to the PLAY Project intervention, in a way that maintains fidelity, which may be helpful for serving the broader population of children on the autism spectrum and their families. Findings and recommendations of the research may also be transferable to a variety of autism interventions
Exploring academic and athletic identity amongst female student-athletes
Full text linkTwo samples of female student-athletes were surveyed to explore dimensions of athletic and academic identities in Division I female student-athletes. Quantitative methods used a refined version of the 2010 NCAA Growth, Opportunities, Aspirations, Learning of Students in college (GOALS) survey to explore constructs underlying female student-athletes' athletic and academic identities using exploratory factor analyses, tests of internal reliability, and independent t-tests. Qualitative methods used interviews to further explicate quantitative findings by exploring female student-athletes' self-expressed perspectives about their identities as students and athletes. EFA and Cronbach’s alpha results suggest a possible 2-factor or 3-factor model underlying athletic and academic identity in female student-athletes. Results showed that female student-athletes are equally dedicated to athletic and academic pursuits, although athletic identity is dominant in their lives. Participants expressed similarities in descriptions of self as students and athletes and used similar approaches to athletic and academic expectations. Current findings of this initial study exploring athletic and academic identities using the refined GOALS survey offer critical insights into appropriate techniques for measuring female student-athletes' athletic and academic identities and could be explored further in future studies with larger sample sizes