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The International Technology Education Association published Standards for Technological Literacy (STL) to assist technology educators in establishing curriculum to reflect technological literacy. Presently, the extent to which STL and the individual Standards are being used is not known. The problem of this study was to determine the extent to which Virginia secondary technology education teachers are implementing STL. A questionnaire was sent to 285 randomly selected Virginia secondary technology education teachers seeking information concerning their use of STL, their use of the individual Standards within STL, and their perceptions with regard to Rogers' five attributes of innovation. Frequencies and percentages were calculated to describe the population and the respondents' perception of implementation of the individual Standards with regard to Rogers' attributes of and innovation. A two way contingency table was used to evaluate the relationship between Rogers' attributes of innovation and the implementation of individual Standards. Twenty percent of the respondents use STL with varying percentages for each individual Standard. These identified relationships may be used to assist change agents in understanding respondents' perceptions and assisting them in further implementing STL in Virginia. / Ph. D.

Federal law requires hearing protection device (HPD) manufacturers to provide attenuation ratings for use in estimating workers’ protection levels. These ratings, which are laboratory obtained, typically overestimate the actual protection levels achieved in the workplace. This research investigated laboratory protocols for yielding improved estimates of HPD in-field performance. Two experiments were conducted. The first was a pilot study developed by an American National Standards Institute (ANSI) working group. In this experiment, two types of earplugs were tested, a user-molded, malleable foam plug and a pre-molded, multi-sized rubber plug. Attenuation data (obtained using a psychoacoustical real-ear-attenuation-at-threshold measurement procedure) were collected across 10 subjects who entered the study as novice HPD users but were considered experienced HPD users in the latter half of the study. Four testing protocols involving two levels of HPDs, two levels of instruction-insertion techniques, and two levels of user experience were investigated. The same 10 subjects participated in all treatment conditions of the experiment. The second experiment involved similar protocols as the first; however, only one plug type was tested (the pre-molded, multi-sized rubber plug). Four testing protocols involving two levels of instruction-insertion techniques, two levels of user experience, and two levels of auditory feedback [fitting noise] were investigated. Forty subjects participated; each subject was tested in two treatment conditions. The attenuation results of each experiment were analyzed by statistical techniques. Statistical comparisons of results were made between the two experiments as well as between the experiments and selected field data. The major finding of the research was that fitting noise did not help subjects achieve higher attenuation [better protection] when consciously used for that purpose. Other findings indicated that novice subjects using only HPD manufacturer's instructions achieved attenuation that more closely represented the field attenuation than subjects tested under other conditions. However, the results were plug specific, in that no laboratory protocols yielded attenuation similar to the field data for the foam plug. / Master of Science

Certain U. S. and international consensus standards governing hearing protection device (HPD) attenuation testing specify the use of a diffuse sound field to ensure the sound field remains uniform and random-incidence in an envelope about the subject’s head (ANSI, 1974; ANSI, 1984; British BSI 5108:1983; Canadian CSA Z94.2-M1984; ISO 4869- 1:1990; Swedish SS 882151). However, there are very few experimental data to support these restrictive requirements. The research presented herein investigated this issue by applying three different environments in tests of the attenuation of four different hearing protectors (three earmuffs and one earplug) at each of nine 1/3 octave band frequencies centered at 125, 250, 500, 1000, 2000, 3150, 4000, 6300, and 8000 Hz. One testing environment comprised a reverberant room with three loudspeakers, one firing in each room plane, that met all the specifications for testing under ANSI S3.19-1974 (ANSI, 1974). The other two environments progressively degraded the diffusivity of the sound field through the use of a single loudspeaker and room surface treatment with absorptive panels. A psychophysical real-ear-attenuation-at-threshold procedure was used to obtain attenuation data. The results showed small, but statistically significant, differences in attenuation among the three environments for specific test frequencies. Due to their statistical significance, these differences preclude direct comparison of attenuation data obtained in these different environments, especially when the data are used for purposes such as technical design research, product comparison and/or labeling, and testing standards development. However, being of small magnitude, these differences are not great enough to prevent obtaining an estimation of the attenuation that an individual is achieving with a particular device under these alternative environments. With this in mind, the use of an industrial audiometric test booth may be beneficial for determining an individual worker’s protection levels actually achieved on the job. In sum, the interpretation of the results differs depending upon the intended purpose of the testing. / Master of Science

This research study was designed to investigate the relationship between participation in a nursing education program and the factors of stress, physical illness, anxiety, and self-concept experienced by the participants. Also, the study examined the relationship between age of participants and these same factors. The purposes of this study were (1) to determine if beginning and ending nursing students differ in stress, physical illness, anxiety, and self-concept, (2) to examine the relationship between age of nursing students and stress, physical illness, anxiety, and self-concept, (3) to provide information that may help develop a theoretical base concerning stressful life events and illness in nursing students, and (4) to provide information that may be beneficial with regard to future research involving stress, physical illness, anxiety, self-concept, and age in nursing students.

Forty Sprague Dawley rats were randomly placed in five groups with eight rats per group. Each group varied in dietary composition for fiber type and carbohydrate source. Groups one and two received oat fiber and either sucrose or corn starch as the carbohydrate source. Groups three and four received corn bran as the fiber source and either sucrose or corn starch as the carbohydrate source. Group five (considered the control group), received Purina standard rat chow. Analysis of variance showed only significant differences for food intake, and the control group had a significantly higher food intake. Weight gain, serum cholesterol and triglyceride levels showed no significant differences.

The levels of total nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) and nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADP), and their redox states were determined as the function of growth in S. cerevisiae. Cells growing in a medium containing 0.8% glucose exhibit two phases of exponential growth, utilizing glucose and ethanol, respectively. The NAD pool is 50% reduced during both stages of growth while the NADP pool is 67% reduced in glucose growth and 48% reduced in ethanol growth. The NAD/NADP ratio is constant during growth on glucose and a two-fold increase in the NAD/NADP ratio occurs upon exhaustion of glucose. The increased ratio is maintained during growth on ethanol. This alteration in the regulation of the relative levels of NAD and NADP may be due to a change in the regulation of NAD kinase and/or NADP phosphatase activities. These changes may be related to the redox state of the NADP pool.

Includes bibliographical references (p. B1-B24)

Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1993. / Includes bibliographical references.

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