This study explored the effects of lecture speech rate and duration on L1 Chinese listeners' listening comprehension of online L2 English lectures on free-recall and cued-recall questions. There are many factors that may affect a Chinese listener's listening comprehension of online English lectures. The current study focused specifically on the effects of speech rate and duration, and explored the possibility of identifying tools that listeners might use to control these factors during online lectures in order to achieve better learning experiences. Using an exploratory quasi-experimental approach, this study explored the research questions in three phases: 1) An initial quasi-experiment was conducted via Qualtrics and applied as a pilot study; 2) The quasi-experiment was revised, with a new link sent out to potential participants from both the United States and China; and 3) Quasi-experiment responses were collected and analyzed. Based on 28 participant responses, the findings from the current study suggest that the interaction between speech rate and duration impacted L1 Chinese listener's comprehension of online L2 English lectures. The findings also suggest that study participants' responses on various types of questions were affected differently by the speech rate and duration of the lectures. / Doctor of Philosophy / It is assumed that the slower and the shorter the listening material is, the better the foreign language learner's listening comprehension will be. Is this true? This study explored how a lecture's speech rate and duration may affect L1 Chinese listeners' listening comprehension of online L2 English lectures on free-recall and cued-recall questions. It discusses the possibility of identifying tools for listeners to control the speech rate and duration of online lectures in order to help listeners achieve better learning experiences. Using an exploratory quasi-experimental approach, this study explored the research questions in three phases: 1) An initial quasi-experiment was conducted via Qualtrics and applied as a pilot study; 2) The quasi-experiment was revised, with a new link sent out to potential participants from both the United States and China; and 3) Quasi-experiment responses were collected and analyzed. Based on 28 participant responses, the findings from the current study suggest that speech rate and duration worked together to impact L1 Chinese listeners' comprehension of online L2 English lectures. The findings also suggest that study participants' responses on various types of questions were affected differently by the speech rate and duration of the lectures.

Passwords are widely used as a primary method of authentication and access control, making them a critical component in safeguarding digital assets. However, individuals’ password-related behaviors, such as password selection, memorization, and management, significantly impact the security of their accounts. Cognitive abilities, one of which is memory capacity, have also been shown in past research to affect cybersecurity awareness and therefore password behavior, as an extension of this. This thesis aimed to explore how individuals’ short-term memory capacity influenced their password behavior and its implications for cybersecurity. The research methodology used a questionnaire as a quantitative approach towards this issue. The study examined participants’ password creation strategies and their ability to remember different aspects using cued recall. Furthermore, the relationship between password behavior and short-term memory capacity was also explored in terms of four different demographic subgroups, namely gender, age, level of education, and IT competence. The evaluation has been performed using statistical analysis on 315 complete questionnaire responses. The results of this thesis work corroborate most of the previous research on the aforementioned topics, such that females and older age were the strongest predictors of correlation between password behavior and short-term memory capacity. This thesis work can be used as guidance when conducting further research on the effects of various cognitive abilities on cybersecurity awareness.