Performance-based funding is becoming the norm in higher education. High-impact practices like first-year seminars hold promise for improving some of the key metrics in the funding model, such as first-year retention rate and first-year institutional GPA. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationship of retention rate and institutional GPA between first-time-in-college (FTIC) students who completed a first-year seminar and those who did not. Additional data regarding pre-college experiences and expectations for college were investigated to gain insight into retention and academic success behaviors of FTIC students. Three years of data including institutional Beginning College Survey of Student Engagement (BCSSE) scores, high school GPAs, enrollment data, and student grades were collected. Due to a significant difference in high school GPA between summer and fall admits, all analyses were conducted separately for each group. For both summer and fall admits, results from the chi-square tests of homogeneity and independent samples t tests indicated no significant difference in retention rates or mean institutional GPA between FTIC students who completed a first-year seminar and those who did not. Logistic and multiple linear regression tests were conducted to determine whether FTIC student retention and institutional GPA could be predicted by pre-college experience and expectations as measured by the BCSSE. For fall admits only, two of the nine BCSSE scales, expected academic perseverance and perceived academic preparation were significant predictors for retention. For predicting institutional GPA, summer and fall admits shared two significant predictors from the BCSSE: high school learning strategies and importance of campus environment. For fall admits only, there were three additional significant predicators: high school quantitative reasoning, expected collaborative learning, and perceived academic preparation. The results of this study may encourage higher education institutions to consider assessment of their own first-year seminars. The impact of a first-year seminar may be improved by developing curriculum that addresses the skills, experience, and expectations unique to each institution’s first-year students.

Caries of the pits and fissures of permanent teeth continues to be a problem for children. Newly erupted permanent molars are particularly at risk. Oral hygiene measures have been shown to be able to reduce the incidence of caries. The aim of this study was to compare the caries preventive effects of a professional tooth cleaning and oral health education programme (test) with a standard preventive programme (comparison), comprising selective fissure sealing and application of topical fluorides on newly erupted first permanent molars. School Dental Service clinics of the Health Department of Western Australia, in Perth, were assigned to test (4)or comparison (4) clinics. Schoolchildren, mean age 6.3 plus or minus 0.3 (s) yr with, sound, newly erupted first permanent molars were included in the study (n=404; 207 test; 197 control).Children were examined after twelve and twenty-four months by an examiner who was 'blind' to the test or control status of the children. After twelve months, 186 test and 163 control children were examined, and after twenty-four months, 179 test and 156 control children were examined. Three hundred and twenty children were examined in both years. After twenty-four months, 32 children in test and 31 children in control developed caries of the first permanent molars, the estimated risk ratio was 0.90 (95% CI 0.58, 1.41); and children in the test group had an average DFT score of 0.30 plus or minus 0.75 compared with 0.30 plus or minus 0.70 DFT in the control group (t-test, p=0.96). The results suggest that, after two years, there was no statistically significant difference between the caries preventive effects of a professional tooth cleaning and oral health education programme and a programme based on selective fissure sealing and application of topical fluorides.Baseline deciduous caries experience, presence of hypomineralised first ++ / permanent molars and frequency of toothbrushing were statistically significant factors in predicting molar caries. Using baseline deciduous caries experience as a screening criterion to predict permanent molar caries, sensitivity of 0.67 and specificity 0.61 were obtained at a cutpoint of 1 dmfs. Sensitivity and specificity values were maximised at 0.72 by using a combined baseline dmfs and hypomineralisation as screening criteria. Cost-effectiveness analysis indicated an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio of $40/child/year. The test programme was more costly and produced similar outcomes and does not warrant adoption on economic grounds.

This research was concerned with furthering theoretical and practical understanding of student learning at university through a longitudinal, cross-sectional, in-depth study of first year students in a specific learning context, namely Educational Psychology. The main aim of the study was to investigate ways of assisting students to be effective learners. The particular role that affect played in learning and the relationship between learning behaviour and learning outcomes, was explored. A Conceptual Model of student learning incorporating student cognition, metacognition, motivation, affect and academic performance in a specific social and cultural context, underpinned the study. The study documented the design, implementation and evaluation - from both the students' and teacher's perspectives - of an in-context learning support program for first year students, using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies.The program was based on a theoretical framework which integrated cognitive, behavioural and social learning perspectives and focussed on increasing students' repertoire of learning strategies, promoting their higher level thinking and understanding, developing their metacognitive skills and managing their affect. It included an emphasis on student goal setting and time management, reading and writing strategies, learning for tests and exams, self-management, reflecting on and evaluating learning, and dealing with test anxiety.The main findings of the study were that providing in-context learning support was associated with positive changes in students' learning strategy use, motivational orientations, and affective reactions. Students valued teacher support and instructional strategies that promoted active learning. The instructor found that providing learning support was more challenging and rewarding than teaching content alone. The role of context - ++ / in particular, assessment tasks - in learning, was highlighted. The implications for teaching and learning were examined and the Conceptual Model was further refined. The research resulted in a more holistic and integrated perspective on learning support provision and on the role of cognitive, metacognitive, motivational and affective factors, and academic performance, in student learning.

This thesis contributes to the field of Game Studies by presenting the hypothesis that the player(s) and soundscape(s) in the first-person shooter (FPS) game, and the relationships between them, may be construed as an acoustic ecology. It explores the idea that the single-player FPS game acoustic ecology has the basic components of player and soundscape and that the relationships between these two lead to the creation and perception of a variety of spaces within the game world constituting a significant contributing factor to player immersion in that world. Additionally, in a multiplayer FPS game, these individual acoustic ecologies form part of a larger acoustic ecology which may be explained through autopoietic principles. There has been little written on digital game sound (much less on FPS game sound) and so the research contained within this thesis is an important contribution to the Game Studies field. Furthermore, the elaboration of the hypothesis provides insight into the role of sound in the perception of a variety of spaces in the FPS game, and player immersion in those spaces, and this has significance not only for Game Studies but also for other disciplines such as virtual environment design and the study of real-world acoustic ecologies. A text-based methodology is employed in which literature from a range of disciplines is researched for concepts relevant to the hypothesis but, where necessary, new concepts will be devised. The aim of the methodology is to construct a conceptual framework which is used to explicate the hypothesis and which may, with future refinement, be used for the study of sound in digital game genres other than FPS.

This program of research had two related aims: (1) to explore the problem of student attrition in the context of an Australian higher education institution, and (2) to investigate the efficacy of peer-mentoring as a retention strategy. Participants in this program of research were students commencing first-year studies in the School of Applied Psychology across two cohort years: 1996 and 1997. In 1996, a classic pre-test/post-test experimental design was adopted, with students (N = 118) randomly assigned to either a peer-mentoring treatment group or a control group. In 1997, while a classic pre-test/post-test design was also adopted, all students from this year (N = 162) participated in the peer-mentoring program. Thus, it was intended that the 1996 control group would be utilised for comparison with both the 1996 and 1997 treatment groups. Students were surveyed pre- and post-intervention across a number of personal, demographic, and academic achievement (e.g., tertiary entrance rank, and grade point average) variables. Students’ academic integration, social integration, institutional commitment, and goal commitment were measured using the Institutional Integration Scales (adapted from Pascarella and Terenzini, 1980). Students participating in the peer-mentoring program also completed a range of measures in order to evaluate its efficacy. The first part of the research program focused on the measurement and prediction of student retention and academic performance. The results of confirmatory factor analyses indicated that a six first-order factor solution provided the most parsimonious explanation of students’ responses to the Institutional Integration Scales. The six Institutional Integration Scales demonstrated moderate to good levels of reliability, with results being comparable to those achieved in previous studies. The results of structural equations modelling analyses suggested that students’ peer group interactions influenced their interactions with faculty, and both of these factors, along with their faculty concern for student development and teaching, influenced students’ academic and intellectual development, which in turn influenced students’ institutional and goal commitments. These results were taken to indicate the potential value of peer-based processes in aiding students’ institutional and goal commitment and subsequently reducing levels of student attrition. Given that significant differences were found between the 1996 and 1997 cohorts on a number of pre-test measures and other key indicators, investigations regarding significant predictors of students’ re-enrolment into second year and their first year grade point average were conducted separately for the two cohorts. The results of logistic regression analyses indicated that students’ first year grade point average was the only consistent and significant predictor of their re-enrolment into the second year of study across the two cohorts. Multiple regression analyses revealed that students’ tertiary entrance ranks and previous university attendance were consistently significant predictors of their first year grade point average across the two cohorts. Equipped with a better understanding of the factors that affect student attrition and academic performance, as well as the relationship between those factors, the second part of the thesis focused on the efficacy of two formal, group-based peer-mentoring relationships in assisting first year students make a successful transition to university. However, given that significant differences were found between the 1996 and 1997 cohorts on a number of pre-test measures and other key indicators, it was not possible to evaluate the efficacy of the 1997 peer-mentoring program relative to either the 1996 peer-mentoring program or control group. Nevertheless, the 1996 treatment and control condition groups were found to be equivalent on pre-test measures and indices, and thus were able to be compared. Overall, the results of a series of one-way ANOVAs revealed that the 1996 peer-mentoring program was found to have a positive effect on enhancing students’ re-enrolment into second year, persistence intentions, academic performance and self-reported adjustment, which was consistent with the direction of findings in previous studies. However, for a range of reasons, the effect of the 1996 peer-mentoring program on a number of these variables was not strong enough to reach statistical significance. Although there were trends towards significant differences between the 1996 treatment and control groups on a number of variables (i.e., students in the 1996 peer-mentoring program evidenced higher grades in PB11002: Introduction to Cognitive and Biological Psychology; and PB11008: Research Methods and Statistics; as well as higher scores on the Peer Group Interactions scale than students in the control group), the only significant positive difference of the 1996 peer-mentoring program was the improvement of students’ academic performance in one first year subject (i.e., PB11006, Introduction to Research in the Behavioural Sciences). Finally, exploratory factor analyses and reliability analysis of a mentoring functions scale revealed strong support for the presence of one, highly reliable, general mentoring function. Both the 1996 and 1997 program participants’ ratings of the performance of this general mentoring function were significantly and positively correlated with their self-reported academic and intellectual development. In addition, the 1997 program participants’ ratings of the performance of this general mentoring function were significantly and positively correlated to their self-reported peer group interactions, institutional commitments, goal commitments, and persistence intentions.

This thesis describes a program of research which aimed to identify the extent to which couple and stepfamily variables were associated with couple relationship adjustment and stability in stepfamily couples. Two studies were conducted. Study 1 consisted of 63 stepfamily couples who were in a committed relationship (married or cohabiting) and who had earlier taken part in an intervention program. It was hypothesised that positive couple relationship outcomes could be predicted by low couple aggression, high couple negativity, low couple withdrawal, high parenting disagreement, and high dysfunctional parenting over a 5-year period. The results did not support the hypotheses possibly due to low power in the design. In Study 2, 122 stepfamily couples who been living together (married or cohabiting) as a stepfamily were assessed on couple and stepfamily factors, and these were tested for their association with couple relationship adjustment and stability, using both self-report questionnaires and interview data. As predicted, stepfamily factors accounted for variance in couple stability above that accounted for by couple factors. Furthermore, stepfamily factors were associated with couple stability independent of couple adjustment. The influence of stepfamily couple relationship adjustment and stability seem distinctive from first-marriage couples. It was concluded that stepfamily relationship education programs for stepfamilies should address the unique needs of stepfamilies such as parenting education for inexperienced stepparents, the development of positive stepparent-stepchild relationships, and the building of stepfamily cohesion.

This interdisciplinary study critically revisits the Australian print media???s engagement with Helen Garner???s controversial work of ???non-fiction???, The First Stone (1995). Print news media engagement with the book, marked by intense discursive contestation over feminism, has been constituted both by feminists and other critics as a significant cultural signpost. However, the highly visible print media event following the book???s publication raised a plethora of critical questions and dilemmas that remain unsatisfactorily addressed. Building upon John Fiske???s work on media events as sites of maximum visibility and discursive turbulence (Fiske: 1996), this study re-theorises the public dialogue following The First Stone???s publication in terms of four constitutive elements: narrative, celebrity, audience, and history and conflict. Through an analysis of these four diverse yet interconnected aspects of the media event, I create a critical space not only for its limitations to emerge but also the frequently overlooked possibilities it offers in terms of the wider feminism and print media culture relationship. As part of its central aim to refigure The First Stone media event, this thesis argues against prior characterisations of the debate as constitutive of either a monologic articulation of conservative, antifeminist voices or an unmitigated attack on its author by a homogenous feminism. In particular, I use this media event as indicative of the sophistication and complexity of media engagement with contemporary feminism, despite both continued derision and overly simplistic celebration of this relationship. Texts subject to analysis here include: The First Stone, various ???mainstream??? media representations and self-representations of three ???celebrity feminists??? (Helen Garner, Anne Summers and Jenna Mead), letters to the editor of newspapers and magazines, ???popular??? feminist books by Kathy Bail and Virginia Trioli, and a number of media texts in which those claiming a feminist subject position and those sympathetic to feminism act as either news sources or columnists/commentators. Although Garner???s narrative is throughout identified to be deeply problematic, I argue that the media event it precipitated provides valuable insights into both the opportunities and the constraints of the print media-feminism nexus in 1990s Australia.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 168-172).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Delaware, 2007. / Principal faculty advisors: Wendy Bellion and Nina Athanassoglou-Kallmyer, Dept. of Art History. Includes bibliographical references.

Over many years, researchers in the field of flotation have developed an in-depth understanding of processes occurring in the pulp phase of flotation machines. Until recently, however, the froth phase has received little attention. The froth phase serves to separate bubble-particle aggregates from suspended slurry in a flotation cell. The mechanism of recovery by entrainment, its relationship to water recovery and particle size dependency is well understood. Froth recovery, (the fraction of particles entering the concentrate launder that entered the froth phase attached to air bubbles), is not well understood. Up until now, there has been doubt over whether this property is dependent on particle size and hydrophobicity. Difficulties in measuring froth recovery had previously prevented researchers from gaining a deeper understanding of the transport of attached particles across the froth phase. A novel device was designed and tested to measure froth recovery by isolating bubble-particle aggregates in the pulp-phase of flotation machines through the determination of the bubble loading in the pulp phase (mass of particles attached per unit volume of air bubbles). This technique can be used with other measurements to investigate froth selectivity by directly comparing these captured particles to those found in the froth phase. Evidence was collected at Red Dog Mine, Alaska and Newmont Golden Grove Operations, Western Australia which showed that the froth phase selectively transported more hydrophobic and smaller sized particles across the froth than less hydrophobic and larger particles. Particles collected in the device were compared to those found in the concentrate stream on a size by mineral by liberation class. Froth recovery was also calculated on a size by mineral by liberation class for two valuable sulphide minerals in a continuous 3m³ flotation cell. These results show that the froth phase is responsible for the upgrading of attached particles across the froth phase as well as for the separation of bubble-particle aggregates from suspended slurry. The pulp phase is responsible for creating bubble-particle aggregates through the attachment of hdyrophobic mineral particles to air bubbles. Many complex factors affect the extent to which this occurs including the size and hdyrophobicity of the particles, the size and number of air bubbles produced by the flotation machine, the rate of collisions between particles and bubbles and the overall chemistry of the system. This measurement of bubble loading presents an opportunity to measure the impact of all these factors on the successful creation of bubble-particle aggregates. Based on a literature review suggesting that there was a high probability of particles being detached at the pulp-froth interface due to the aggregates change in momentum, a three phase description of a flotation cell was proposed. The three phases were: pulp, pulp-froth interface and upper froth zones. A second froth recovery measurement technique (changing froth depth) was used in combination with the bubble load technique to determine the recovery across each of the two froth zones. It was found that the pulp-froth interface appears to be responsible for the selectivity observed across the froth phase as a whole. These findings will enable more in-depth research into the sub-process of the froth phase as well as assisting flotation cell design through a better understanding of the roles of the pulp-froth interface and the upper froth region.