A Journey to happiness

This thesis represents a coming to terms with my feelings of being a victim of rape. The body of paintings that I completed communicates an active involvement on my part to use art as a healing process. By using abstract floral forms I have worked towards achieving a feeling of inner peace. I have realized that by expressing myself through my work I was able to confront my feelings of vulnerability but have also begun to develop and assert my feelings of stregnth. This paper reflects my ability to speak of the crime, and by looking at some of the reasons behind the rape expressing my feelings about the incident in my life and discussing the individual pieces of work and their relationship the process of healing that they represent

012— Disentangling Nature versus Nurture in a Mouse Model of Alcohol Use

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a significant issue with a lifetime prevalence of 29.1% in the U.S. (Grant et al., 2015), so understanding how it develops is a crucial point of research. This research investigates the role of parenting on the development of AUD in mice. Two strains of mice, one genetically predisposed to drink alcohol (B6) and the other not genetically predisposed (FVB), were cross-fostered. It was hypothesized that pups not predisposed to drink reared with dams predisposed to drink would drink more alcohol. It was also hypothesized that mice predisposed to drink reared with dams not predisposed to drink would drink less alcohol

Female Pleasure and Theories of Desire in Narrative Structure: Evolution, Futurity, and Species Survival in the Post-Human and Science Fiction Imaginary

This dissertation explores the complex relationship between an expanded narratological theory of narrative desire, inseparable in its relation to evolution and biological reproduction, and the future survival of humanity imagined across the narrative structures of three 21st-century works of dystopian science fiction. By examining the genre\u27s potential to address species survival specifically through female forms of desire identified as narrative recurrence, prolonged duration, and emotional resolution, this study concurrently develops a metatextual methodology that cultivates the overlooked liminal space of quiescence. This analytical framework emphasizes narrative structure over theme-based analysis to unlock the radical imagination present in the texts by highlighting the challenges of narrativizing a post-human future in Battlestar Galactica, Mass Effect 3, and Octavia Butler\u27s Parable of the Trickster. The reimagined television series Battlestar Galactica self-consciously poses questions regarding its own structural design. A moment of quiescence, positioned after the end and before the beginning of a narrative cycle in the epilogue, exists as a phase of unlimited potentiality beyond the activity of the diegetic text. In Mass Effect 3, the third installment of the massively successful video game franchise, the protests of dissatisfied gamers resulted in the creation of new ending options, revealing how quiescence can also be understood as the space surrounding the text as paratextual elements, existing adjacent to but separate from the main text, that directly influence interpretation and meaning. Finally, the archival materials of the unfinished book Parable of the Trickster, held at the Huntington Library and written by acclaimed science fiction author Octavia Butler, offers insights into quiescence as a location that exists akin to this pre-textual space. The archives reveal Butler’s struggle with severe writer’s block as a testament to the challenges and foreboding nature of envisioning humanity\u27s future as it pertains to evolution and species survival. By incorporating female sexuality into narrative desire, I propose that reviving this theory may offer value in contemporary structural analysis of plots, especially since the concept of quiescence allows us to explore aspects beyond the confines of the diegetic text in a world where narrative is becoming ever more interactive, multi-modal, intertextual, and transmedial. Science fiction during this era of convergence is also seeing a rapid transformation. As humanity increasingly faces existential threats such as artificial intelligence, pandemics, climate change, and nuclear apocalypse, innovative strategies and skills for survival must be developed that transcend our anthropocentric limitations. Although human reproduction is traditionally based on biological foundations that involve erotic desire, the reality of human survival - and reproduction - is rapidly evolving. The development of non-erotic desires such as scientific literacy, global cooperation, and ethical reasoning will become increasingly essential for species survival and, as this occurs, alterations to our human biology may fundamentally reshape our narrative constructs and forms of narrative desire. Ultimately, these texts reveal attempts at post-human forms of relationality within a genre of possibilities that self-consciously struggles to answer what form human survival may take in the future

Hydrologic and Nutrient Monitoring of the Lake Decatur Watershed: Final Report 1993-2008

Lake Decatur is the water supply reservoir for the City of Decatur. The reservoir was created in 1922 by constructing a dam to impound the flow of the Sangamon River. The dam was modified in 1956 to increase the maximum capacity of the lake to 28,000 acre-feet. The lake receives water from the 925-square-mile watershed of the Upper Sangamon River which includes portions of seven counties in east-central Illinois. Lake Decatur has high nitrate-N concentrations which have been consistently exceeding the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency (IEPA) drinking water standard of 10 milligrams per liter (mg/L) since 1980. This has created a serious situation for the drinking water supply of the City of Decatur, since nitratenitrogen (N) cannot be removed from finished drinking water through regular water purification processes. Since 1993, the Illinois State Water Survey (ISWS) has been monitoring the Lake Decatur watershed for trends in discharge, nitrate-N concentration, and nitrate-N yield and to identify any significant changes in the watershed. The purpose of the monitoring was to collect reliable scientific data throughout the watershed for use by city planners and resource managers to develop watershed management alternatives based on scientific data. The ISWS originally established eight monitoring stations in the Upper Sangamon River watershed. Three of those stations have been in continuous operation from May 1993 to April 2008. A companion study funded by the Agricultural Watershed Institute allowed for continued monitoring at those three stations from May 2008 through September 2008. The purpose of this report is to document and present the discharge, nitrate-N concentration, and nitrate-N yield data for the 15 water years of monitoring (October 1993–September 2008), as well as to determine any annual trends in the Lake Decatur watershed. The intended purpose of the monitoring data and trends investigation results is to assist the City of Decatur planners and resource managers in developing watershed management alternatives to manage the current and future city water supply. In summary, eight of the 15 water years experienced above or extremely above normal precipitation. Based on the 100-year streamflow record at the Monticello station, 4 of the top 11 total annual discharges occurred during the monitoring period (Water Year (WY) 1993 - 2nd, WY2008 - 3rd, WY1994 - 10th, and WY1998 - 11th), whereas WY2000 had the fourth lowest annual discharge. The 15-year mean annual nitrate-N yield delivered to Lake Decatur from the Upper Sangamon River watershed was 23 lb/acre and varied from 6 lb/acre (WY2000) to 42 lb/acre (WY2008). During the 15-year monitoring period, there were no significant trends in discharge and nitrate-N yields for the Long Creek (101), Friends Creek (102), and Monticello (111) stations in the Lake Decatur watershed. Annual average nitrate-N concentration for the Monticello (111) station had a statistically significant increasing trend with an increase of 0.087 mg/L per year based on the statistical fit of the annual average data. This dataset was augmented by a longer data record (WY1975–2006) from the downstream gaging station near Oakford to investigate longer-term trends in the Sangamon River watershed. There were no trends detected for nitrate-N concentration or yield within the 32-year record from the Oakford gage.published or submitted for publicationis peer reviewe

Three-sublattice order in the SU(3) Heisenberg model on the square and triangular lattice

We present a numerical study of the SU(3) Heisenberg model of three-flavor fermions on the triangular and square lattice by means of the density-matrix renormalization group (DMRG) and infinite projected entangled-pair states (iPEPS). For the triangular lattice we confirm that the ground state has a three-sublattice order with a finite ordered moment which is compatible with the result from linear flavor wave theory (LFWT). The same type of order has recently been predicted also for the square lattice [PRL 105, 265301 (2010)] from LFWT and exact diagonalization. However, for this case the ordered moment cannot be computed based on LFWT due to divergent fluctuations. Our numerical study clearly supports this three-sublattice order, with an ordered moment of m=0.2-0.4 in the thermodynamic limit.Comment: Published version. 11 pages, 6 figure

Using Fad Diets to Teach Information Evaluation

In Spring 2021, the librarian presenters partnered with Laura Bauer, a Nutrition faculty member, to teach students in introductory Nutrition classes information evaluation skills. The instructor\u27s assignment originally asked the class of non-science major students to find a recipe online that met a personal nutrition goal based on current recommendations. The assignment evolved for a class of pre-health science students into an evaluative assignment where students were asked to research a fad diet online and compare those findings with the scholarly literature, all while considering diet culture through a social justice lens. In this session we\u27ll discuss how the librarians and professor collaborated to create an assignment that incorporated the learning objectives of the course into a real-life scenario where students would be expected to critically evaluate information. Over our two-part library instruction session with the pre-health science majors, we introduced two evaluation methods to students in the class: SIFT (Stop, Investigate the source, Find trusted coverage, Trace the claims) and TRAP (Timeliness, Relevance, Authority, Purpose). We will explain these evaluation techniques and how they can be applied to evaluate various types of information. We will also discuss our plans to incorporate the fad diet assignment into courses for non-science majors in the fall, replacing the more basic recipe assignment

Self-esteem and School : associations between 6 graders' self-esteem, learning difficulties, school value and school environment

The aim of this study was to examine 6th graders' self-esteem and find out what kind of factors in the school environment are interrelated with it. This study examined interrelation between self-esteem and gender, learning difficulties, school value, school satisfaction, teacher's behavior, being bullied and participating in bullying. These different variables were chosen based on previous studies about self-esteem. The aim is to gain better understanding of the different factors that influence students' self-esteem in the school environment and therefore provide help for teachers battling with issues regarding self-esteem enhancement. The data was collected in the spring of 2013 as part of the Mind the Gap -project. Participants (n=735) were 6th grades from 33 different schools. Three different groups according to self-esteem were formed: weak, mediocre, and strong self-esteem in relation to other respondents. Relations between self-esteem and other variables were examined by Pearson's product-moment coefficient and Independent-Samples T test was used to examine differences between genders. Finally two-way ANOVAs were conducted to investigate self-esteem and gender differences regarding the different variables. According to the results 6th graders evaluated their self-esteem as relatively good. Boys reported better self-esteem than girls. However the boys also experienced more learning difficulties and took part in bullying more than girls. Girls' reported their school value, on the other hand, higher than boys'. There were no differences between genders in school satisfaction, experiencing teacher's behavior nor being bullied. The effect of self-esteem was clearly higher than the effect of gender on all the variables. Also an interaction effect of self-esteem and gender was found regarding being bullied. In the mediocre self-esteem group boys experienced more bullying than girls. The boys of the mediocre self-esteem group also participated in bullying the most.Tämän tutkimuksen tavoitteena oli tarkastella, minkälainen kuudesluokkalaisten koettu itsetunto on ja mitkä asiat kouluympäristössä ovat siihen yhteydessä. Itsetuntoa tutkittiin suhteessa sukupuoleen, oppimisvaikeuksiin, kouluarvostukseen, kouluviihtyvyyteen, opettajan toimintaan sekä kiusatuksi tulemisen kokemuksiin ja kiusaamiseen osallistumiseen. Nämä muuttujat valittiin perustuen aikaisempiin tutkimuksiin. Tutkimuksen avulla on tarkoitus ymmärtää paremmin niitä tekijöitä, joilla voi koulumaailmassa olla heikentävä tai vahvistava vaikutus oppilaan itsetunnolle. Näin tutkimus voi auttaa opettajaa ratkaisemaan oppilaan itsetunnon tukemiseen liittyviä haasteita. Tutkimusaineisto kerättiin 2013 vuoden keväällä osana Mind the Gap -pitkittäistutkimushanketta. Tutkimukseen osallistui (n= 735) kuudesluokkalaisia oppilaita 33 eri koulusta. Vastaajat jaettiin koetun itsetunnon perusteella kolmeen eri itsetuntoluokkaan: Heikko, keskiverto, ja vahva itsetunto suhteessa muihin vastaajiin. Vastaajien koettua itsetuntoa suhteessa riippuviin muuttujiin tutkittiin Pearsonin tulomomenttikorrelaatiokertoimen avulla. Riippumattomien parien t-testillä tarkasteltiin oliko sukupuolten välillä eroja. Lopuksi tutkittiin kaksisuuntaisen varianssianalyysin avulla itsetunnon ja sukupuolen sekä niiden yhteisvaikutusta muuttujiin. Tämän tutkimuksen mukaan kuudesluokkalaiset kokivat itsetuntonsa keskimäärin melko positiiviseksi. Pojilla itsetunto oli keskimäärin vahvempi kuin tytöillä. Pojilla oli toisaalta myös enemmän koettuja oppimisvaikeuksia ja he osallistuivat enemmän kiusaamiseen. Tytöillä taas kouluarvostus oli korkeammalla tasolla. Kouluviihtyvyyden, opettajan toiminnan ja kiusatuksi tulemisen kokemuksissa ei löytynyt eroja sukupuolten välillä. Itsetunnolla oli kaikkien muuttujien kohdalla suurempi selittävä tekijä kuin sukupuoli. Kiusatuksi tulemisen osalta löydettiin itsetunnon ja sukupuolen yhteisvaikutus ja selvisi, että keskiverto itsetunnon luokassa pojat kokevat enemmän kiusaamista kuin tytöt. Saman ryhmän pojat toisaalta myös osallistuivat eniten kiusaamiseen