Recent scholarly efforts have sought to examine the cumulative impact of deleterious adverse childhood exposures on various mental health outcomes. Lifetime prevalence rates for depressive disorders are approximately 20% among adolescents. Depression is ranked as the leading cause for disability and fourth leading contributor to the global burden of disease in the world. The purpose of this study was to determine the cumulative impact of adolescent adverse experiences on outcomes of depression, suicide ideation, and overall mental distress in a cohort of 125 adolescent girls receiving public assistance. The adverse exposures studied were personal victimization, household dysfunction, and community violence exposures. Across the three categories of exposures, adolescents reported that community exposures were the highest 92.8%, followed by household dysfunction 89.6 %, and lastly, personal victimization 80%. Over 40% reported experiencing more than seven adverse exposures. There was a doubling in the incidence of depression by the fourth year, and an almost ten percent increase in mental distress by the fourth year. Evidence of a significant direct association was found for those experiencing victimization with depression and suicide ideation. The total Adolescent Adverse Exposures (AAE) score was positively correlated with the CES-D scores in the last three years of the study, however not with suicide ideation. The cumulative impact or 'dose-response' relationship of such exposures on depression, suicide ideation, or change over time was not found. In contradiction with general beliefs and existing literature, a significant negative association was found with depression and having a parent incarcerated or experiencing the divorce of parents. This finding suggests given the homogeneity of this population, experiencing both poverty and high levels of exposure to victimization, that having an incarcerated parent or parental divorce may be potentially protective mitigating the stressful experiences of continued victimization. The results of this study offer evidence of high prevalence rates of adversity occurring in the lives of these already at risk adolescents. A call for efforts to reduce community violence and personal victimization in the context of poverty are needed to prevent the growing rates of depression and suicide ideation for these fragile families and adolescence.

Increased land use intensity has adversely affected aquatic ecosystems within Canada. Activities that occur over the landscape are individually minor but collectively significant when added to other past, present, and reasonably foreseeable future actions, and are defined as cumulative effects. Existing approaches to cumulative effects assessment for river systems within Canada are ineffective. This thesis aims to improve the practice of cumulative effects assessment by evaluating current methodology for linking landscape change and river response over a large spatiotemporal scale. As part of this goal, I offer a framework for better incorporating science into current practices for cumulative effects assessment. The framework addresses the challenges involved in cumulative effects assessment, such as defining appropriate spatial and temporal scale, complex ecological and hydrologic pathways, predictive analysis, and monitoring. I then test the framework over a large spatiotemporal scale using a case study of the lower reaches of the Athabasca River Basin, Alberta. Three objectives are addressed: 1) changes in land use and land cover in the lower ARB for several census dates (1981, 1986, 1991, 1996, 2001) between 1976 (historic) and 2006 (current day) are identified; 2) linkages between landscape change and river water quality and quantity response are evaluated; and 3) results of the different methods used to link landscape stressors with stream responses are compared. Results show that the landscape has changed dramatically between 1976 and 2006, documented by increases in forest harvesting, oil sands developments, and agricultural intensity. Secondly, results suggest that linear regression tests combined with regression trees are useful for capturing the strongest associations between landscape stressors and river response variables. For instance, water abstraction and agricultural activities have a significant impact on solute concentrations. This suggests that water abstraction and agriculture are important indicators to consider when conducting a watershed cumulative effect assessment on a similar spatiotemporal scale. The thesis has strong implications for the need for improved water quality and quantity monitoring of Canada‟s rivers. The research provides a means of identifying appropriate tools for improved watershed cumulative effects assessment for scientists and land managers involved in the environmental impact assessment process and protection of Canada‟s watersheds.

The accumulating impacts from human development are threatening water quality and availability in the watersheds of Western Canada. While environmental impact assessment (EIA) is tasked with identifying such cumulative impacts, the practice is limited to individual projects, is not widely applied, overlooks activities occurring on the landscape, and fails to capture the effects of multiple projects over time. Limitations of the project-by-project approach are spurring the emergence of a regional framework for assessing aquatic cumulative effects within watershed boundaries. Watershed-based cumulative effects assessment (WCEA) will need a standard set of ecosystem components and indicators for assessment across the watershed, but it is not clear how such valued ecosystem components (VECs) and related measurable parameters should be identified. This study examined how aquatic VECs and indicators were used within project-based EIA in the South Saskatchewan River watershed and considered whether they could be scaled up for use in WCEA. A semi-quantitative analysis compared a hierarchy of assessment components and measurable parameters identified in the environmental impact statements of 28 federal screening, 5 federal comprehensive and 2 provincial environmental assessments from the South Saskatchewan River watershed, and examined factors affecting aquatic VEC selection. While provincial assessments were available online or at a central archive, federal assessments were difficult to access. Results showed that regulatory compliance was the dominant factor influencing VEC selection, followed by the preferences of government agencies with different mandates, and that provincial licensing arrangements interfered with VEC selection. The frequency of VECs and indicators used for aquatic assessment within EIA does not reflect the aquatic cumulative effect assessment (CEA) priorities for the watershed. The effective selection of VECs and indicators for aquatic cumulative effects assessment in practice requires both the implementation of WCEA and updating of guidelines for project-based EIA.

We investigate whether multiple large shareholders (MLS) play an internal corporate governance role in mitigating agency problems between the controlling shareholder and minority shareholders in a cross-country sample of public firms. We draw our conclusion by examining the market reaction (in terms of bidder announcement period abnormal returns) to acquisition announcements made by firms with and without MLS in their ownership structure. Using an international sample of acquisition announcements made by firms with at least one large shareholder from 10 Western European and 5 East Asian countries between 1996 and 2000, we find the presence of MLS, their voting rights, relative voting power, the number of blockholders and the relative voting power of these blockholders have a positive and significant impact on bidder announcement period abnormal returns. We also find that the legal institutions such as disclosure requirement, investor protection, common-law legal origin and anti-self-dealing have positive effects on bidder announcement period abnormal returns.

We investigate whether multiple large shareholders (MLS) play an internal corporate governance role in mitigating agency problems between the controlling shareholder and minority shareholders in a cross-country sample of public firms. We draw our conclusion by examining the market reaction (in terms of bidder announcement period abnormal returns) to acquisition announcements made by firms with and without MLS in their ownership structure. Using an international sample of acquisition announcements made by firms with at least one large shareholder from 10 Western European and 5 East Asian countries between 1996 and 2000, we find the presence of MLS, their voting rights, relative voting power, the number of blockholders and the relative voting power of these blockholders have a positive and significant impact on bidder announcement period abnormal returns. We also find that the legal institutions such as disclosure requirement, investor protection, common-law legal origin and anti-self-dealing have positive effects on bidder announcement period abnormal returns.

The main focus of this study was to investigate how Swedish military veterans experience that events during an international service affect them after completed mission. This also includes the contact with their relatives. Secondly, this study deals with the course of the crisis, personal defense mechanisms, cumulative stress and post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD). The study was performed using a qualitative method and comprises individual interviews with six Swedish veterans. The responders were all men of different military positions, who participated in one or more international missions during 1993 to 2011. The results of this study show that, according to the veterans, the return back home is the most strenuous part of an international mission. With all the new experiences that an international service brings fresh in their memories, it is hard to re-adjust to the life of a civilian. In connection with the return back home, different degrees of stress reactions were also commonly seen, for example sleep disturbance, restlessness and exhaustion. One of the veterans being interviewed was also affected by post-traumatic stress syndrome, although healthy again at the time of the study.

In many areas of Artificial Intelligence (AI), we are interested in helping people make better decisions. This help can result in two advantages. First, computers can process large amounts of data and perform quick calculations, leading to better decisions. Second, if a user does not have to think about some decisions, they have more time to focus on other things they find important. Since users' preferences are private, in order to make intelligent decisions, we need to elicit an accurate model of the users' preferences for different outcomes. We are specifically interested in outcomes involving a degree of risk or uncertainty. A common goal in AI preference elicitation is minimizing regret, or loss of utility. We are often interested in minimax regret, or minimizing the worst-case regret. This thesis examines three important aspects of preference elicitation and minimax regret. First, the standard elicitation process in AI assumes users' preferences follow the axioms of Expected Utility Theory (EUT). However, there is strong evidence from psychology that people may systematically deviate from EUT. Cumulative prospect theory (CPT) is an alternative model to expected utility theory which has been shown empirically to better explain humans' decision-making in risky settings. We show that the standard elicitation process can be incompatible with CPT. We develop a new elicitation process that is compatible with both CPT and minimax regret. Second, since minimax regret focuses on the worst-case regret, minimax regret is often an overly cautious estimate of the actual regret. As a result, using minimax regret can often create an unnecessarily long elicitation process. We create a new measure of regret that can be a more accurate estimate of the actual regret. Our measurement of regret is especially well suited for eliciting preferences from multiple users. Finally, we examine issues of multiattribute preferences. Multiattribute preferences provide a natural way for people to reason about preferences. Unfortunately, in the worst-case, the complexity of a user's preferences grows exponentially with respect to the number of attributes. Several models have been proposed to help create compact representations of multiattribute preferences. We compare both the worst-case and average-case relative compactness.

Increased land use intensity has adversely affected aquatic ecosystems within Canada. Activities that occur over the landscape are individually minor but collectively significant when added to other past, present, and reasonably foreseeable future actions, and are defined as cumulative effects. Existing approaches to cumulative effects assessment for river systems within Canada are ineffective. This thesis aims to improve the practice of cumulative effects assessment by evaluating current methodology for linking landscape change and river response over a large spatiotemporal scale. As part of this goal, I offer a framework for better incorporating science into current practices for cumulative effects assessment. The framework addresses the challenges involved in cumulative effects assessment, such as defining appropriate spatial and temporal scale, complex ecological and hydrologic pathways, predictive analysis, and monitoring. I then test the framework over a large spatiotemporal scale using a case study of the lower reaches of the Athabasca River Basin, Alberta. Three objectives are addressed: 1) changes in land use and land cover in the lower ARB for several census dates (1981, 1986, 1991, 1996, 2001) between 1976 (historic) and 2006 (current day) are identified; 2) linkages between landscape change and river water quality and quantity response are evaluated; and 3) results of the different methods used to link landscape stressors with stream responses are compared. Results show that the landscape has changed dramatically between 1976 and 2006, documented by increases in forest harvesting, oil sands developments, and agricultural intensity. Secondly, results suggest that linear regression tests combined with regression trees are useful for capturing the strongest associations between landscape stressors and river response variables. For instance, water abstraction and agricultural activities have a significant impact on solute concentrations. This suggests that water abstraction and agriculture are important indicators to consider when conducting a watershed cumulative effect assessment on a similar spatiotemporal scale. The thesis has strong implications for the need for improved water quality and quantity monitoring of Canada‟s rivers. The research provides a means of identifying appropriate tools for improved watershed cumulative effects assessment for scientists and land managers involved in the environmental impact assessment process and protection of Canada‟s watersheds.

The accumulating impacts from human development are threatening water quality and availability in the watersheds of Western Canada. While environmental impact assessment (EIA) is tasked with identifying such cumulative impacts, the practice is limited to individual projects, is not widely applied, overlooks activities occurring on the landscape, and fails to capture the effects of multiple projects over time. Limitations of the project-by-project approach are spurring the emergence of a regional framework for assessing aquatic cumulative effects within watershed boundaries. Watershed-based cumulative effects assessment (WCEA) will need a standard set of ecosystem components and indicators for assessment across the watershed, but it is not clear how such valued ecosystem components (VECs) and related measurable parameters should be identified. This study examined how aquatic VECs and indicators were used within project-based EIA in the South Saskatchewan River watershed and considered whether they could be scaled up for use in WCEA. A semi-quantitative analysis compared a hierarchy of assessment components and measurable parameters identified in the environmental impact statements of 28 federal screening, 5 federal comprehensive and 2 provincial environmental assessments from the South Saskatchewan River watershed, and examined factors affecting aquatic VEC selection. While provincial assessments were available online or at a central archive, federal assessments were difficult to access. Results showed that regulatory compliance was the dominant factor influencing VEC selection, followed by the preferences of government agencies with different mandates, and that provincial licensing arrangements interfered with VEC selection. The frequency of VECs and indicators used for aquatic assessment within EIA does not reflect the aquatic cumulative effect assessment (CEA) priorities for the watershed. The effective selection of VECs and indicators for aquatic cumulative effects assessment in practice requires both the implementation of WCEA and updating of guidelines for project-based EIA.

A basic understanding of the hydrodynamic response behavior of the two-body system is important for a wide variety of offshore operations. This is a complex problem and model tests can provide data that in turn can be used to retrieve key information concerning the response characteristics of such systems. The current study demonstrates that the analysis of these data using a combination of statistical tools and system identification techniques can efficiently recover the main hydrodynamic parameters useful in design. The computation of the statistical parameters, spectral densities and coherence functions provides an overview of the general response behavior of the system. The statistical analysis also guides the selection of the nonlinear terms that will be used in the reverse multi-input / single-output (R-MI/SO) system identification method in this study. With appropriate linear and nonlinear terms included in the equation of motion, the R-MISO technique is able to estimate the main hydrodynamic parameters that characterize the offshore system. In the past, the R-MISO method was primarily applied to single body systems, while in the current study a ship moored to a fixed barge was investigated. The formulation included frequency-dependant hydrodynamic parameters which were evaluated from the experimental measurements. Several issues specific to this extension were addressed including the computation load, the interpretation of the results and the validation of the model. Only the most important cross-coupling terms were chosen to be kept based on the estimation of their energy. It is shown that both the heading and the loading condition can influence system motion behavior and that the impact of the wave in the gap between the two vessels is important. The coherence was computed to verify goodness-of-fit of the model, the results were overall satisfying.