Matching Items (43,917)
Description
Community Supported Agriculture programs (CSAs) have become a viable local source of fresh agricultural goods and represent a potentially new way to improve fruit and vegetable consumption among individuals and families. Studies concerning CSAs have focused mainly on characteristics of the typical CSA member and motivations and barriers to join a CSA program. The purpose of this study was to examine whether behavior and attitudinal differences existed between current CSA members and a nonmember control group. Specifically, ecological attitudes, eating out behaviors, composting frequency, and family participation in food preparation were assessed. This study utilized an online survey comprising items from previous survey research as well as newly created items. A total of 115 CSA member and 233 control survey responses were collected. CSA members were more likely to be older, have more education, and have a higher income than the control group. The majority of CSA members surveyed were female, identified as non-Hispanic and Caucasian, earned a higher income, and reported being the primary food shopper and preparer. The majority of members also noted that the amount and variety of fruits and vegetables they ate and served their family increased as a result of joining a CSA. CSA members were more ecologically minded compared to the control group. Frequency of eating out was not significantly different between groups. However, eating out behaviors were different between income categories. CSA members spent significantly more money at each meal eaten away from home and spent significantly more money on eating out each week. In both cases, controlling for income attenuated differences between groups. CSA members composted at a significantly higher rate and took part in other eco-friendly behaviors more often than the control group. Finally, no significant difference was evident between the two groups when analyzing family involvement in food preparation and meal decision-making. Overall, some significant attitudinal and behavioral differences existed between CSA members and non-CSA members. Further research is necessary to examine other distinctions between the two groups and whether these differences occur as a result of CSA membership.
Contributors
MacMillan Uribe, Alexandra L (Author) / Wharton, Christopher (Christopher Mack), 1977- (Thesis advisor) / Winham, Donna (Committee member) / Eakin, Hallie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
Biological membranes are critical to cell sustainability by selectively permeating polar molecules into the intracellular space and providing protection to the interior organelles. Biomimetic membranes (model cell membranes) are often used to fundamentally study the lipid bilayer backbone structure of the biological membrane. Lipid bilayer membranes are often supported using inorganic materials in an effort to improve membrane stability and for application to novel biosensing platforms. Published literature has shown that a variety of dense inorganic materials with various surface properties have been investigated for the study of biomimetic membranes. However, literature does not adequately address the effect of porous materials or supports with varying macroscopic geometries on lipid bilayer membrane behavior. The objective of this dissertation is to present a fundamental study on the synthesis of lipid bilayer membranes supported by novel inorganic supports in an effort to expand the number of available supports for biosensing technology. There are two fundamental areas covered including: (1) synthesis of lipid bilayer membranes on porous inorganic materials and (2) synthesis and characterization of cylindrically supported lipid bilayer membranes. The lipid bilayer membrane formation behavior on various porous supports was studied via direct mass adsorption using a quartz crystal microbalance. Experimental results demonstrate significantly different membrane formation behaviors on the porous inorganic supports. A lipid bilayer membrane structure was formed only on SiO2 based surfaces (dense SiO2 and silicalite, basic conditions) and gamma-alumina (acidic conditions). Vesicle monolayer adsorption was observed on gamma-alumina (basic conditions), and yttria stabilized zirconia (YSZ) of varying roughness. Parameters such as buffer pH, surface chemistry and surface roughness were found to have a significant impact on the vesicle adsorption kinetics. Experimental and modeling work was conducted to study formation and characterization of cylindrically supported lipid bilayer membranes. A novel sensing technique (long-period fiber grating refractometry) was utilized to measure the formation mechanism of lipid bilayer membranes on an optical fiber. It was found that the membrane formation kinetics on the fiber was similar to its planar SiO2 counterpart. Fluorescence measurements verified membrane transport behavior and found that characterization artifacts affected the measured transport behavior.
Contributors
Eggen, Carrie (Author) / Lin, Jerry Y.S. (Thesis advisor) / Dai, Lenore (Committee member) / Rege, Kaushal (Committee member) / Thornton, Trevor (Committee member) / Vogt, Bryan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
Using Spencer-Oatey's rapport management approach, the present study evaluates the interlanguage pragmatic development of 17 native English-speaking American learners over the course of a semester in Spain, specifically in terms of the strategies they used in their second language (L2) to manage rapport in an advice-giving, oral role-play situation at semester start and semester end. To allow for a more in-depth analysis of the effect that a semester abroad has on Spanish L2 advice-giving behaviors, the learners were grouped into two distinct proficiency levels. Group 1 (n=9) represents learners who entered the semester abroad with a beginning to intermediate-low proficiency level and group 2 (n=8) represents learners who entered the semester abroad with an intermediate-high proficiency level. The results indicate that both learner groups had similar overarching behavioral expectations in this context. Specifically, both sets of learners expressed empathy, involvement, and respect for the interlocutor, while at the same time they used advice-giving strategies of varied illocutionary force to claim authority in addressing the interlocutor's dilemma. Both groups also balanced face sensitivities through strategies that both enhanced and challenged the interlocutor's identity face. However, it is argued that in this context claiming authority and challenging the interlocutor's identity face were permitted behaviors that emphasized the relational goals of the participants. Additionally, when developmental differences between the two proficiency levels were analyzed, the results showed that learner proficiency had an impact on specific strategy choices.
Contributors
Baca, Evelyn C. (Author) / García, Carmen (Thesis advisor) / Lafford, Barbara (Thesis advisor) / Elorrieta, Jabier (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
Rapidly increasing demand for technology support services, and often shrinking budgetary and staff resources, create enormous challenges for information technology (IT) departments in public sector higher education. To address these difficult circumstances, the researcher developed a network of IT professionals from schools in a local community college system and from a research university in the southwest into an interorganizational community of practice (CoP). This collaboration allowed members from participating institutions to share knowledge and ideas relating to shared technical problems. This study examines the extent to which the community developed, the factors that contributed to its development and the value of such an endeavor. The researcher used a mixed methods approach to gather data and insights relative to these research questions. Data were collected through online surveys, meeting notes and transcripts, post-meeting questionnaires, semi-structured interviews with key informants, and web analytics. The results from this research indicate that the group did coalesce into a CoP. The researcher identified two crucial roles that aided this development: community coordinator and technology steward. Furthermore, the IT professionals who participated and the leaders from their organizations reported that developing the community was a worthwhile venture. They also reported that while the technical collaboration component was very valuable, the non-technical topics and interactions were also very beneficial. Indicators also suggest that the community made progress toward self-sustainability and is likely to continue. There is also discussion of a third leadership role that appears important for developing CoPs that span organizational boundaries, that of the community catalyst. Implications from this study suggest that other higher education IT organizations faced with similar circumstances may be able to follow the model presented here and also achieve positive results.
Contributors
Koan, R. Mark (Russel Mark) (Author) / Puckett, Kathleen S (Thesis advisor) / Foulger, Teresa S (Committee member) / Carmean, Colleen M (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
The purpose of this practitioner inquiry was to explore the use of Guided Critical Reflection (GCR) in preparing preservice teachers for English learners (ELs). As a teacher researcher, I documented, analyzed, and discussed the ways in which students in my course used the process of GCR to transform their passively held understandings about ELs. Specifically, the research questions were: 1) What are preservice teachers' common sense about teaching and learning related to ELs? 2) How does GCR transform preservice teachers' common sense about ELs? 3) What is my role as an educator in creating opportunities for GCR? I utilized methods for data collection that fit my teaching practices. Data sources included three types of observations (self-reflective field notes, audio recordings of each class, and notes documented by an outside observer), student-work artifacts, and my audio reflection journal. I analyzed data inductively and deductively using a modified analytic induction approach. Building on previous research concerning the use of reflection in teacher preparation, I define GCR as the process in which I guided preservice teachers to acknowledge and examine their common sense about ELs, reframe what they know in light of course learning, and transform their understandings. Five major findings emerged from this study. First, preservice teachers entered the course with common sense notions about ELs rooted in their educational and life experiences. Students felt comfortable sharing what they knew about ELs, but needed to be scaffolded to examine how their life experiences shaped their common sense. Within the course, preservice teachers framed and reframed their common sense in different ways. Through the process of GCR, students evidenced a renewed sense about ELs. Finally, my role as a teacher involved establishing a comfortable learning environment, valuing my students' common sense as the catalyst for course learning, and guiding students through their reflective work. Ultimately, I was able to create opportunities for GCR because I too was reflecting on my practices, just as I was asking my students to reflect on their common sense about ELs.
Contributors
Markos, Amy Michele (Author) / Arias, M. Beatriz (Thesis advisor) / Faltis, Christian (Committee member) / Hudelson, Sarah (Committee member) / Wiley, Terrence G. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
In many classication problems data samples cannot be collected easily, example in drug trials, biological experiments and study on cancer patients. In many situations the data set size is small and there are many outliers. When classifying such data, example cancer vs normal patients the consequences of mis-classication are probably more important than any other data type, because the data point could be a cancer patient or the classication decision could help determine what gene might be over expressed and perhaps a cause of cancer. These mis-classications are typically higher in the presence of outlier data points. The aim of this thesis is to develop a maximum margin classier that is suited to address the lack of robustness of discriminant based classiers (like the Support Vector Machine (SVM)) to noise and outliers. The underlying notion is to adopt and develop a natural loss function that is more robust to outliers and more representative of the true loss function of the data. It is demonstrated experimentally that SVM's are indeed susceptible to outliers and that the new classier developed, here coined as Robust-SVM (RSVM), is superior to all studied classier on the synthetic datasets. It is superior to the SVM in both the synthetic and experimental data from biomedical studies and is competent to a classier derived on similar lines when real life data examples are considered.
Contributors
Gupta, Sidharth (Author) / Kim, Seungchan (Thesis advisor) / Welfert, Bruno (Committee member) / Li, Baoxin (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
Following the success in incorporating perceptual models in audio coding algorithms, their application in other speech/audio processing systems is expanding. In general, all perceptual speech/audio processing algorithms involve minimization of an objective function that directly/indirectly incorporates properties of human perception. This dissertation primarily investigates the problems associated with directly embedding an auditory model in the objective function formulation and proposes possible solutions to overcome high complexity issues for use in real-time speech/audio algorithms. Specific problems addressed in this dissertation include: 1) the development of approximate but computationally efficient auditory model implementations that are consistent with the principles of psychoacoustics, 2) the development of a mapping scheme that allows synthesizing a time/frequency domain representation from its equivalent auditory model output. The first problem is aimed at addressing the high computational complexity involved in solving perceptual objective functions that require repeated application of auditory model for evaluation of different candidate solutions. In this dissertation, a frequency pruning and a detector pruning algorithm is developed that efficiently implements the various auditory model stages. The performance of the pruned model is compared to that of the original auditory model for different types of test signals in the SQAM database. Experimental results indicate only a 4-7% relative error in loudness while attaining up to 80-90 % reduction in computational complexity. Similarly, a hybrid algorithm is developed specifically for use with sinusoidal signals and employs the proposed auditory pattern combining technique together with a look-up table to store representative auditory patterns. The second problem obtains an estimate of the auditory representation that minimizes a perceptual objective function and transforms the auditory pattern back to its equivalent time/frequency representation. This avoids the repeated application of auditory model stages to test different candidate time/frequency vectors in minimizing perceptual objective functions. In this dissertation, a constrained mapping scheme is developed by linearizing certain auditory model stages that ensures obtaining a time/frequency mapping corresponding to the estimated auditory representation. This paradigm was successfully incorporated in a perceptual speech enhancement algorithm and a sinusoidal component selection task.
Contributors
Krishnamoorthi, Harish (Author) / Spanias, Andreas (Thesis advisor) / Papandreou-Suppappola, Antonia (Committee member) / Tepedelenlioğlu, Cihan (Committee member) / Tsakalis, Konstantinos (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
Envy may be an emotion shaped by evolution to resolve large resource disparities in zero-sum ancestral environments. Previous research has found evidence for two types of envy: benign envy, which drives greater effort and self-improvement; and malicious envy, which drives hostility toward the better-off target. We predicted that perceived resource scarcity would stoke either type, moderated by individual differences. Specifically, we predicted that high self-esteem would steer people toward benign envy and self-improvement, whereas narcissism would spark malicious envy. After completing the Rosenberg self-esteem scale and the Narcissism Personality Inventory (NPI-16), participants were randomly assigned to either read an article detailing severe cuts to university financial aid budgets (scarcity) or an article summarizing various forms of financial aid (control). Each article ended with the same envy-inducing paragraph about a particularly affluent scholarship-winner, after which participants completed a measure of both envy types, capturing feelings, appraisals, and behavioral tendencies. Results show that self-esteem predicts less malicious envy, while narcissism and scarcity predict more. Self-esteem and narcissism interact such that self-esteem dampens the effect of narcissism on malicious envy. Self-esteem predicted benign envy when narcissism was low, but not when it was high.
Contributors
Duarte, Jose L (Author) / Shiota, Michelle N. (Thesis advisor) / Kwan, Sau Y (Committee member) / Kenrick, Douglas (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
Fish farming is a fast growing industry, which, although necessary to feed an ever growing worldwide population, has its share of negative environmental consequences, including the release of drugs and other waste into the ocean, the use of fish caught from the ocean to feed farm raised fish, and the escape of farm raised fish into natural bodies of water. However, the raising of certain types of fish, such as tilapia, seems to be an environmentally better proposition than raising other types of fish, such as salmon. This paper will explore the problems associated with fish farming, as well as offer a model, based on the literature, and interviews with fish farmers, to make small-scale fish farming both more environmentally, and more economically, sustainable. This paper culminates with a model for small-scale, specifically semi-subsistence, fish farmers. This model emphasizes education of the fish farmers, as well as educators learning from the fish farmers they interact with. The goal of this model is to help these fish farmers become both more environmentally and economically sustainable.
Contributors
Longoni, Robert A (Author) / Parmentier, Mary Jane (Thesis advisor) / Grossman, Gary (Committee member) / Macia, Narciso (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011
Description
As digital technology promises immediacy and interactivity in communication, sight and sound in motion graphics has expanded the range of design possibilities in advertising, social networking, and telecommunication beyond the visual realm. The experience of seeing has been greatly enriched by sound as visual solutions become dynamic and multi-dimensional. The ability to record and transfer sight and sound with new media has granted the designer more control in manipulating a viewer's experience of time and space. This control allows time-based form to become the foundation that establishes many interactive, multisensory and interdisciplinary applications. Is conventional design theory for print media adequate to effectively approach time-based form? If not, what is the core element that is required to balance the static and dynamic aspects of time in new media? Should time-related theories and methodologies from other disciplines be adopted into our design principles? If so, how would this knowledge be integrated? How can this experience in time be effectively transferred to paper? Unless the role of the time dimension in sight is operationally deconstructed and retained with sound, it is very challenging to control the design in this fugitive form. Time activation refers to how time and the perception of time can be manipulated for design and communication purposes. Sound, as a shortcut to the active time design element, not only encapsulates the structure of its "invisible" time-based form, but also makes changes in time conspicuously measurable and comparable. Two experiments reflect the influence of sound on imagery, a slideshow and video, as well as how the dynamics in time are represented across all design media. A cyclical time-based model is established to reconnect the conventional design principles learned in print media with time-based media. This knowledge helps expand static images to motion and encapsulate motion in stasis. The findings provide creative methods for approaching visualization, interactivity, and design education.
Contributors
Cheung, Hoi Yan Patrick (Author) / Giard, Jacques (Thesis advisor) / Sanft, Alfred C (Committee member) / Aisling, Kelliher (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created
2011