1925 research outputs found
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"Mom just forgot me at a gas station": A qualitative study of parental ADHD in the home.
No full textExisting literature suggests that the symptomatology for adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may have serious implications for parenting behavior. While presentation of symptoms for adults with ADHD may negatively impact an individual’s ability to successfully and confidently fulfill parenting responsibilities (e.g., timeliness, organization, routine, responsiveness, and involvement), very little is known about how the disorder may affect children in the home. The few qualitative studies identifying this issue are limited in breadth to the lived experiences of children who grow up with a parent reported to experience the diagnosis; specifically, the existing qualitative studies include either unclear interpretation or a sample consisting of children under the age of 18. The aim of the current study was to address this gap in the literature by assessing the retrospective experiences of emerging adults as they grew up with a parent with ADHD. This research study was conducted using 16 semi-structured interviews with emerging adults who were between the ages of 18 and 25. Thematic analysis methodology was utilized to qualitatively examine themes across individuals. Analysis revealed that individuals often feel an inherent obligation to be responsible for their parent’s ADHD symptoms, and frequently identify feelings of guilt and resignation with these responsibilities. Additionally, individuals identified a lasting, existential impact on the way they view and interact with the world and the people around them as a result of their experiences with their ADHD parents. Finally, a large aspect of growing up with ADHD parents was navigating assumptions about parenting responsibilities which were perceived as shattered as a direct result of ADHD symptomatology. Oftentimes, perceived broken assumptions were followed by feelings of missing out, parental blame, or shame. This study contributes to the literature by adding to the field’s understanding of adult ADHD and its impact on the home environment from the perspective of the child, as well as adding to the limited number of qualitative studies in this area
Evaluating the health outcomes of COVID-19 policies in U.S. prisons
No full textCOVID-19 created a public health crisis behind bars, with people incarcerated in prison experiencing cases at four times the U.S. national rate. Individuals incarcerated in prisons experience higher rates of comorbidities for COVID-19, including chronic disease, mental illness, and substance abuse, compared to the general population. The incarcerated are confined to small, densely populated areas during their time in prison. Additionally, copayments for health care interactions in prisons are required, limiting who and when people can access medical services. One strategy to combat COVID-19 in prisons is to adopt and implement policies that have lasting impacts on health. However, policy decisions are often made without an evidence-based plan. Thus, the primary objectives for this dissertation are to (1) discuss the frameworks that explain the impact of law and policies on COVID-19 health outcomes in U.S. prisons, and (2) assess the impact of policy adoption on COVID-19 transmission in prisons across the U.S.Theoretical frameworks - disparate treatment and impact and the social and structural determinants of health - and a methodological framework - Public Health Law Research - provide guidance for two legal evaluation studies. This dissertation assessed the associations between (1) COVID-19 mitigation and containment strategies and (2) health care copayment policy adoption during the COVID-19 pandemic in prisons in all 50 states and ICE-run institutions with COVID-19 transmission (estimated by percent positivity). Associations were assessed using ordinal logistic regression models, and generalized estimating equations were used to address clustering of facilities at the state level.
COVID-19 policies have the potential to control the spread of COVID-19 in prisons. States with facilities that had mass testing, mask wearing in group programs, or social distancing in sleeping quarters had lower COVID-19 transmission when compared with those jurisdictions and facilities that did not adopt these policies. Facilities and jurisdictions that suspended copayments for COVID-19 related visits had higher COVID-19 transmission when compared to facilities that suspended all copayments. This dissertation can help guide policy adoption and practice implementation in prisons to prevent and control the spread of infectious disease, whether during a pandemic, epidemic, or an outbreak in a facility
The tensile behavior, fracture, and power harvesting potential of nickel-manganese-gallium magnetic shape memory alloys
Full text linkThe shape memory effect in Ni2MnGa MSMAs is driven by the magnetic field-induced or stress-induced motion of twin boundaries. The Ni2MnGa microstructure consists of tetragonal martensite variants with magnetic easy axis aligned with the short axis (of the unit cell), which aligns in either the direction of the applied magnetic field or mechanical stress causing a reorientation of the microstructure. The reorientation strain and the change in the material’s magnetization during variant reorientation, drive the development of MSMA-based applications. The overarching objective of this dissertation study is to inform the development of new MSMA-based applications and to improve the efficiency and reliability of current MSMA-based applications by studying the tensile behavior, fracture mechanics, and power harvesting potential of Ni2MnGa MSMAs. Historically, MSMAs have been studied extensively under combined compressive and/or magnetic loads, and applications only use MSMAs in compression. The tensile study investigates the strain fields developed in Ni2MnGa samples, with fine and coarse twin structures when loaded in tension and/or with a magnetic field. The strain fields are recorded using digital image correlation, which allowed for the observation of the evolution of the strain field over the entire sample, concurrent with the evolution of the sample’s twin microstructure. The results show that the twin density, the uniformity of the magneto-mechanical loading along the sample, and the presence of pinning sites are all contributing to the profile of the tensile strain field; the presence of pinning sites along the sample inhibits variant reorientation and recovery. Both samples showed no visible signs of damage during tensile testing, and the magneto-mechanical response in tension was found to be comparable to that in compression for both sample types. The fracture mechanics study involves the experimental research of the fracture mechanisms in MSMAs and the development of an MSMA fracture mechanics modeling framework; the brittle nature of Ni2MnGa MSMAs causes cracks to develop in them hampering their function in MSMA-based applications. The phase-field method is proposed for the modeling framework since this method is able to capture complex crack patterns, and Vickers microindentation is used for the experimental study to determine the fracture energy of the material and study crack evolution characteristics under magneto-mechanical loading. The Vickers microindentation results suggest that transverse magnetic fields facilitate crack growth and decrease the fracture energy of the MSMA, while the axial compressive stress impedes crack growth and increases the fracture energy. Lastly, the power harvesting study reports new power harvesting data generated with a biaxial magnetic field and a surrounding coil, and full strain field data for an MSMA subject to load similar to what is seen during power harvesting, then compares theperformance of MSMA-based power harvesters with different designs to determine which give the best output. For this comparison, a framework for evaluating the performance of (side coil and surrounding coil type) MSMA-based power harvesters reported in the literature is developed. This framework involves normalizing the results to the design characteristics of the respective harvesters. The strain maps reveal the potential for perpendicular twin boundaries that limit variant reorientation and correspondingly the harvester’s power. The power harvesting study concludes that the largest change in magnetic flux density, which is the driver for power harvesting, occurs in the side coil setup with an optimized magnetic circuit and it recommends using this configuration for future MSMA-based power harvesters for maximum power
Efficient Euclidean distance calculations and distance similarity searches: an examination of heterogeneous CPU, GPU, and Tensor Core architectures
Full text linkThe Euclidean distance is a measure frequently used in numerous applications, including data-analysis algorithms, to determine the similarity between objects, as a function of the distance between them. Given a set of objects, performing a distance similarity search consists of finding objects that are considered similar, i.e., finding objects within a threshold search distance of a given object, where the distance measure often employs the Euclidean distance formula. Distance similarity searches can be used as a building block for other algorithms, including the distance similarity join, k-Nearest Neighbors (kNN), k-Means, or the Density-Based Spatial Clustering of Applications with Noise (DBSCAN) algorithms. As such, optimizing the computation of Euclidean distances will improve the performance of distance similarity searches, and improving distance similarity searches will improve the performance of numerous other algorithms. Consequently, optimizing both Euclidean distance calculations and distance similarity searches is critical to improve the performance of many data-analysis algorithms, including the ones mentioned above, in addition to applications in other domains such as fields that require modeling and simulation.
The literature is rich with methods to improve the performance of Euclidean distance calculations and distance similarity searches, particularly using Central Processing Units (CPUs). While multicore CPUs can offer great parallel performance, they are outclassed by the higher computational throughput of Graphics Processing Units (GPUs). Using GPUs for these problems is relatively recent and there are, consequently, significantly fewer proposed work that use the GPU instead of the CPU. However, the design space for GPU algorithms is large, thus some algorithm designs have been neglected, including those that carefully exploit GPU resources. Furthermore, while both CPUs and GPUs have been extensively studied on their own, very little work has been conducted where both architectures are leveraged concurrently.
Tensor Cores (TCs) are a recent addition to certain GPU architectures. As an Application-Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), TCs are designed to compute Matrix Multiply-Accumulate (MMA) operations, at a higher throughput than other general-purpose cores. In the literature, TCs are primarily used for machine learning and other related fields involving linear algebra, yielding great performance improvements. Despite their specificity, TCs can be leveraged for any algorithm where the computation can be expressed using MMA operations. Nevertheless, leveraging TCs for general-purpose scientific algorithms remains an open problem.
We propose in this dissertation to optimize the performance of Euclidean distance calculations and more generally distance similarity searches, by examining: (i) GPU resource utilization; (ii) the joint use of both CPUs and GPUs for computation; (iii) the use of TCs to compute Euclidean distances; (iv) the joint use of general-purpose GPU cores and TCs to compute Euclidean distances
Negotiating masculinities as African students at Northern Arizona University
Full text linkThis study explores the experiences and perceptions of African students at an American university, focusing on their experiences of negotiating their masculinities in their new cultural context. In this study, the objective was to explore African students’ expectations of being a man both in their home countries and in the US, and how they negotiate their masculinities at Northern Arizona University (NAU).This study assumes that masculinity is a social construct, and among African graduate students at NAU, additional culturally specific ideologies may influence the way they perceive their identity and experiences of being a man, and also the means by which they negotiate their masculinities.
The study adopted purposive sampling and semi-structured, in-depth interviewing in selecting and interviewing participants. Participants were male African students pursuing a graduate degree program at NAU who had successfully completed a semester on campus. Specifically, 10 participants were sampled from Malawi, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, and Ghana.
The study explored expectations of being a man and masculinities among African graduate students at NAU. The study found that among participants, expectations of being a man were responsibilities, head of family/household, and financial obligations. Participants' understanding of masculinity emphasized the male genitalia, being in charge, and emotional restriction. In the US, participants believed that norms of masculinity primarily relate to shared responsibility and freedom of gender expression. Also, respect for cultural differences, avoiding interactions, and cultural association with other African men were stances that characterize mechanisms participants adopt in negotiating their masculinities
Culturally and linguistically diverse parental perceptions and evidence of parental input in IEP documents
Full text linkAmerican public schools must allow parents the ability to be involved in the collaboration and planning aspects of their child’s individualized education program (IEP). However, many parents have reported feeling like an outsider in IEP meetings. Historically, families from culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) backgrounds have reported barriers to participation in school-based meetings about their child. Although there is research that helps explain the barriers CLD parents face in IEP meetings, there has been insufficient qualitative research that addresses the experiences of CLD parents from southern Arizona. Further, there is a lack of research that identifies what parents remember from IEP meetings and examines the IEP document for evidence of parental input. This study explores how CLD parental input is evidenced in the IEP document. Using abstraction and content analysis, the researcher identified themes as they emerged from two data sets: parental interview transcripts and IEP documents. The study reveals how the CLD parental input was documented in the IEP paperwork. Future research questions are offered, and the researcher intends to use this study to inform stakeholders better
Patterns and implications of language used in restrictive state abortion laws
Full text linkFollowing the 2022 Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization Supreme Court decision that overturned Roe v. Wade and turned abortion regulation over to the states, many states across the country have banned or restricted abortion. While a significant amount of coverage has been afforded to the reactions of both pro-choice and anti-abortion politicians and activists surrounding the ruling, as well as the subsequent policy changes in various states, there has been an overall lack of attention paid to the actual language used in restrictive state abortion laws, both in popular media and academic literature. Thus, this thesis examines the patterns and themes present across language used in these laws, as well as the potential implications of this use of language. An exploratory qualitative textual analysis approach was utilized to identify important themes that appeared throughout the data, including selective humanization, exceptions to abortion restrictions, and moral appeals. These themes were then interpreted and discussed in the context of the reproductive justice framework and intersectional feminism, as well as other relevant social and political contexts
The combined effects of online harassment on social media users
Full text linkPrevious studies have shown that online harassment has negative psychological, physiological and economic impacts on those who experience it. This study adds to existing literature by testing the combined impacts of online harassment together in concert on users across genders. This study also adds to existing literature by examining the economic impacts that online harassment has on influencers specifically while examining this effect across genders. Social media influencers and users (N=708) were solicited to participate in a self-administered survey which measured the experience of harassment behaviors along with psychological, physiological and economic impacts. Results indicate that higher levels of harassment are associated with higher combined impacts compared to the impact of any singular type of impact alone. Gender had no impact on a respondent’s likelihood of experiencing combined impacts. This study also indicates that online harassment likely has negative economic impacts for influencers whose income potential depends entirely on their engagements on social media platforms. According to terrestrial workplace harassment laws, social media corporations can be framed as liable for the harassment of the influencer population and should provide benefits to mitigate the harms experienced
Ammonia as a tool for removal of invasive crayfish
Full text linkSeveral species of invasive crayfish have been introduced globally, impacting ecosystem functioning and biodiversity. The opportunistic feeding habits of nonnative crayfish have negatively affected native aquatic species in the Southwestern United States, and their ability to travel between isolated aquatic systems make them difficult to control once they become established. Efforts to manually remove crayfish from invaded habitats have met with limited success and few chemical tools are available. With increasing numbers of invasive species in aquatic systems comes a growing need for additional management methods. The use of ammonia has shown promise as a removal tool for introduced fish and has several advantages over other chemical removal methods. An ammonia-based tool could be a cost-effective way to eradicate invasive crayfish and support conservation of native aquatic species while utilizing the natural nitrogen cycle to remove the ammonia from the environment and return an ecosystem to baseline conditions. I used laboratory experiments to develop and test lethal concentrations of ammonia for Northern crayfish (Faxonius virilis) and Red Swamp crayfish (Procambarus clarkii). I used a formulation of ammonium sulfate to elevate ammonia concentrations to 50mg/l, sodium carbonate to increase pH to 9.5, and sodium sulfite to lower dissolved oxygen to 0mg/l. The formulation achieved 100% mortality of F. virilis in 24 hours in a laboratory setting, but only 90% mortality of P. clarkii. A field trial with P. clarkii achieved mortality of most of the crayfish exposed to the ammonia treatment; however, live crayfish were found around the pond after the treatment. These results suggest that an ammonia-based chemical tool could be utilized for invasive crayfish management. I recommend that additional laboratory and field trials focus on further exploring species differences and the effectiveness of ammonia treatments under diverse field conditions
Convirtiendome en mi: the materialization of self in latino transgender men
Full text linkTransgender-identifying individuals and members of racial and ethnic minority groups belong to marginalized populations that may experience health inequity, discrimination, and prejudice in
the United States. However, there is very little research on the intersection of men who are both
Latino and transgender. This study explored the lives of Latino transgender men: How they have
constructed their gender identity over time and how their identities as both Latino and
transgender have influenced their views on their transition journey. Thirteen semi-structured
interviews with self-identified Latino transgender men between the ages of 19 and 63 were
conducted. Thematic analyses from interview data revealed three main themes: family and
culture, female-to-male invisibility, and transition process. Individuals highlighted the
importance of family and culture when talking about self-identification and overall well-being.
Additionally, participants noted the lack of visibility for transgender men which was beneficial
for passing privilege but harmful in terms of positive media depictions and representation.
Finally, men talked about their personal experience with transitioning both medically and
socially and how this lifelong process shaped them into the resilient men they are today