The purpose of this thesis was to test the theory of wage incentives, as presented in the literature, to determine if the theory is sound when applied to work situations. Data were collected by means of a survey of manufacturing plants within the state of Virginia. Questionnaires were sent to a randomly selected sample of 294 plants from among the 20 manufacturing industry classifications. It was determined that in those manufacturing plants in which wage incentive plans are applicable, they result in increased earnings for hourly workers, increased productivity of these workers, and decreased unit labor costs. It was further determined that unionism has no apparent effect on the use of these plans. / M.S.

During June 1990 - November 1993 I measured the responses of black bears (Ursus americanus) in Shenandoah National Park (SNP), Virginia to gypsy moth (Lymantria dispar) induced oak (Quercus spp.) mortality. Oak species composed >50% of the forest canopy of SNP, and oak mortality rates ranged from 1- ≥48%. I compared black bear population dynamics, food habits, movements and habitat use to preinfestation data collected in SNP from 1982 - 1985. Scat analysis indicated that the current diet of SNP’s black bear population includes proportionally more soft mast in the fall and more soft mast and ants (Formicidae spp., P<0.0001) in the summer than did the preinfestation diet. Fewer acorns (Quercus spp. mast, P=0.03) and squawroot (Conopholis americana, P=0.01) were consumed in the fall and summer respectively. No decline in the physical condition of adult females (P=0.91), subadult males (P=0.34) or subadult females (P=0.94) was evident. Adult male physical condition declined (P=0.03) for unknown reasons. The mean age of neither female (P=0.99) nor male bears (P=0.54) was different from preinfestation data. Mean litter size - 2.25 cubs - did not differ (P=0.49) froma preinfestation mean of 2.0 cubs. Survival of radio-collared female bears was 100%, indicating that the female survival rate has not declined from a high preinfestation survival rate. Minimum cub survival rate to 1 year was 64.7%. Fall and annual home ranges of female bears were smaller (P=0.001 and P=0.002, respectively) than during preinfestation years. Use of forest cover types differed from availability during the summer (P<0.01), early fall (P<0.0001) and late fall (P<0.001) and when compared to preinfestation data. Use of stands with different levels of oak mortality was not different from availability during the summer (P=0.1) but was different during the early fall (P<0.005) and late fall (P<0.001). / Master of Science

Benefits from a flood control project that accrue to a landowner are defined as the amount the landowner is willing to pay for the reduction in flood risk. The primary method utilized by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to estimate a residential landowner's benefits is the property damages avoided method. Only under a set of restrictive assumptions will this method accurately estimate landowner willingness to pay. Therefore, several alternative techniques, such as the hedonic price method, are approved for use by the Corps but it is not known how they compare. The purpose of this study is to examine the benefit measures from the property damages avoided and hedonic price methods and two new measures, restricted willingness to pay (RWTP) and restricted willingness to accept (RWTA). The measures RWTP and RWTA are biased estimates of willingness to pay (WTP) and willingness to accept (WTA) where the direction of the bias is known. In addition, the methods that calculate these measures, the RWTP and RWTA methods, do not require data on income or an aggregator for the prices of all goods not in the analysis. Benefit estimates from the hedonic price and RWTP methods provide upper and lower bounds on WTP for non-marginal reductions in flood risk and converge for marginal reductions. / Master of Science

The red-legged grasshopper, Melanoplus femurrubrum femurrubrum (De Geer), was found to be developmentally polymorphic. Local field populations in Virginia had five, six, seven, and eight instars, determined by antennal segment counts. Adults with five instars were uncommon, and six and seven-instar adults were the most abundant morphs. Laboratory studies showed that decreasing temperature decreased both the number of instars, and developmental rate. Grasshoppers with fewer instars had the differential number of instars deleted from between the third and penultimate instars, thus, temperature must affect instar number early in the life cycle, i.e., before the third instar. The laboratory study produced no five-instar grasshoppers. Most individuals had six or· seven instars, depending on temperatures. Few eight-instar individuals were produced in the laboratory. Grasshoppers with more instars had longer developmental times and larger body sizes. Females were larger than males and tended to go through more instars, however, males and females which developed with the same number of instars did not differ in developmental time. In field populations, instar number was positively correlated with accumulated heat units the month of hatch, but body size was negatively correlated. Mean population in Melanoplus spp. grasshoppers is positively correlated with mean species body size. In the laboratory, ovariole number in M. femurrubrum was related to the size of the egg from which the female hatched, and in field populations mean population ovariole number in was determined by mean length of the growing season, and rainfall in the maternal generation. In field populations number of pods laid was less than two, and was related to rainfall in September, while pod size was related to body size and rainfall in October. Numbers of pods laid and total eggs were negatively correlated with the tegmen/femur ratio. / Ph. D.

Middle school programs in agricultural education are unique educational experiences that provide middle school aged children in Virginia with a basic understanding of agriculture and its applied sciences. Curriculum innovations such as the one for Virginia middle schools provide guidance for teachers in the field and offer a base from which programs can operate. However, the benefits of educational innovations are never fully realized until the teacher in the classroom adopts and implements the changes. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between teacher characteristics and the adoption of agriscience curriculum in Virginia middle school agricultural education programs. The population for this study consisted of the 57 middle school teachers of agricultural education in Virginia. All of the teachers were surveyed with an 81% response rate obtained. Selected conclusions drawn from the findings were: 1. There are two distinct groups of middle school agricultural education teachers in Virginia, those who are teaching a large part of the approved curriculum and those who are teaching only a small portion of the curriculum. 2. Teacher attitude toward agriscience is a significant predictor of the amount of agriscience curriculum taught. 3. Teacher knowledge of agriscience is a significant predictor of the amount of agriscience curriculum taught. 4. Teacher expectations of agriscience curriculum is a meaningful predictor of the amount of agriscience curriculum taught. Selected recommendations drawn from the findings and conclusions are: 1. Given the existence of the significant contribution of the teachers’ positive attitude toward the amount of agriscience curriculum taught by middle school teachers of agricultural education in Virginia, more effort by teacher education, the Virginia Department of Education, and agricultural interests in Virginia should be devoted to building positive attitudes toward agriscience. 2. Given the significant contribution of the teachers’ knowledge toward the amount of agriscience curriculum taught by middle school teachers of agricultural education in Virginia, more effort is needed by teacher education to prepare prospective teachers in agriscience content and methodology as part of their teacher preparation. The Virginia Department of Education and agricultural interests in Virginia should also commit to teacher training through inservice and other activities involving agriscience education. / Ph. D.

In response to an epidemic of rabies in the mid-Atlantic region, the Virginia Department of Health and the Consolidated Laboratory Services in 1982, redesigned their submission forms for animals being tested for rabies in an effort to elicit detailed information about the epidemiology of rabies in Virginia. The information collected from those submission forms was used in a mathematical model analysis of the epidemiology of raccoon rabies in Virginia for the years 1984 through 1987. Eleven explanatory variables and one response variable (positivity for rabies) were examined. The objective of this study was to develop a model, through logistic regression, that would explain the epidemiology of rabies in raccoons in Virginia, and determine the risk factors for prediction for positivity for rabies in raccoons in Virginia. This information would aid further surveillance efforts, preventive education programs, and in formulating future oral vaccination programs in raccoons. Multiway contingency tables were constructed (involving 2,3,4,5,and 6 way interactions), and log-linear models were fitted using an iterative fitting process to generate maximum likelihood estimates. The goodness of fit of each model was judged using the likelihood-ratio-chi-square p value (0.01). The backward stepwise model selection process was performed on logit models to find the best fitting model (0.01). The final model consisted of a combination of 17 four variable term models. Eight of the eleven explanatory variables remained important risk factors in the prediction of positivity for rabies in raccoons. To validate the model, it was applied to data collected in the years 1988 through July 1989. The model fit at the 0.01 level. Parameter estimates were calculated for each term in the model. All eight variables had main order effects (direct) on the response variable (positivity for rabies). Three second order effects were evident: age and season, behavior and season, and year and season. Future studies will involve applications of this model to other species to further explore the epidemiology of rabies, and to refine the model for practical applications. / Ph. D.

The purpose of this study was to model the demand for higher education enrollments and to determine whether or not enrollments were price elastic among Virginia's public four-year institutions. The underlying intent was to check the feasibility of a human capital theory based methodology for examining the demand dependency of higher education institutions in Virginia. Price elasticity and other determinants of enrollments were observed across different institutional groupings to observe the differential effects of these factors given institutional type or individual institution characteristics. The analyses were based upon the investment approach to human capital theory as adapted to the study of educational demand. Accordingly, it was assumed that individuals will display a willingness to invest in themselves by enrolling in a college or university because they believe that such an investment will accrue both financial and psychological benefits. Multiple linear regression was used to model five sets of determinants across three levels of analysis: statewide, institutional type (major universities, prior normal schools, and urban institutions), and individual institutions. The direct cost of attendance, the size of the eligible population of prospective students, the educational attainment of the students' locale, and the rural nature of the students' environment generally were found to have significant effects on enrollment. Price, or the direct cost of attendance, was primarily negative and statistically significant for all types of institutions except the major universities and the one special purpose, military institute in the state. Several factors indicated that the location of the institution was important. In other words, students tended to enroll in nearby as opposed to distant institutions, while a geographically concentrated pool of institutions restricted the dependency of these same institutions on local student populations. A cross-sectional design was used in this study, therefore the resultant demand models were descriptive only of the time period covered in these analyses. Nevertheless, such research should be useful in assessing the impact on enrollments of selected demand factors and in determining the efficacy of the investment approach applied in this and similar research efforts. / Ph. D.

This study was designed to allow accurate description of the influence of the State Chamber of Commerce on policies and curriculum publications of the Virginia Department of Education related to economics education. The methodology allowed collection of data from the complex environment that shapes the influence process. Using strategies from historiography and ethnography, data were collected through interviews with a number of persons associated with State Chamber activities and educational governance at the state level. Document search served to guide interviews, to verify data, and to provide additional details. Beginning in 1959, the business community showed a marked interest in economics education. Subsequently, the State Board of Education adopted a policy statement prescribing a plan for systematic improvement in instruction in this area. Interest in this program became a priority with the Education Committee of the State Chamber of Commerce. Through close interaction with the Superintendent of Public Instruction and effective institutionalization of Chamber members on the State Board of Education and on committees appointed to review economics programs, the organization was able to directly influence economics programs and publications emanating from the Department of Education in the period 1959-1974. Since 1974, the State Chamber of Commerce has remained an influential voice in programs designed by the Department, and staff members from the educational bureaucracy have given assistance to Chamber efforts in this area. However, in this latter period, assessment of influence on economics education is more difficult. Neither the Chamber nor the Department of Education have delineated consistent new goals for economics education, and findings are further confounded by the fact that new agents such as the General Assembly and the Virginia Council for Economics Education have demonstrated strong interest in the topic. In summary, the Chamber did influence the timing and the substance of economics publications and policies during the period 1959-1974. More recent influence appears to be indicated, but cannot be clearly identified. / Ed. D.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the seven-period day schedule implemented at Abingdon High School and to judge the feasibility of implementing a comparable schedule in all Washington County high schools on a permanent basis. In order to facilitate the evaluation, several areas of inquiry were identified. Questions of interest included: Did the students take advantage of the additional opportunities to take courses? If so, what courses were selected? Did an extended day create problems for students and/or faculty? If so, what kind of problems/concerns were encountered? Was students' performance affected? Did students' behavior change? Did the lengthened school day increase stress or otherwise affect teachers' performance? What about cost? Finally, administrators in the region were asked to comment on the possible impact (advantages and disadvantages) of a seven-period schedule as an addendum to the data collected at the school. Data pertinent to the evaluation of the seven-period day were obtained from various offices at Abingdon High School and the Washington County School Board. Data regarding perceptions of faculty and students were obtained from two 13-question surveys, one given to 76 faculty members with 58 responses and the other given to all students with 977 responses. There were subjective qualities involved in the study such as newness of the seven-period day or change itself. These qualities cannot be measured quantitatively and may have affected the results of the study. Aside from these considerations, no evidence was revealed by the research that would indicate the seven-period day was less effective than the six-period day. The results of the study indicate that students would take additional courses if given the opportunity with no apparent negative effects. The cost of the seven-period day was less on a per course basis than for the six-period day. / Ed. D. / incomplete_metadata

This project analyzes the role of religion, both institutional and private, in Virginia's dealings with witchcraft during the seventeenth century. The witch trials of New England and Europe during the 1600s have tended to overshadow those that simultaneously took place in Virginia, leaving historians to prematurely regard Virginia as an anomaly of rationality in an otherwise superstitious period of witches and demons. Virginia's failure to prosecute those accused of witchcraft was not due to a lack of allegations, my thesis will argue, but can instead be partly attributed to the nature of the colony's religious experience and the theology and practices of Virginia's Anglican Church. While Virginia's seventeenth-century inhabitants migrated to the New World with firmly entrenched English religious values, their relationship with God and their response to the supernatural world were profoundly influenced by New World experiences and peoples. To protect the social fragility of their colony, Virginia's political and religious leaders consciously chose to prosecute offenses that they felt threatened the social cohesion of the colony, such as fornication, gossip, and slander, and dismissed those, such as witchcraft, that threatened to tear it apart. / Master of Arts