The objective of this study was to respond to two primary questions: (1) What is the process of self transformation for the recovering alcoholic? and (2) What is surrender and what role does it play in that process of transformation? Eight subjects were interviewed who have maintained abstinence from alcohol for over ten years and who are active members of Alcoholics Anonymous. Subjects were chosen though two key informants who participated in a pilot study. Key informants were long-term recovering alcoholics and referred the researcher to individuals who could provide in-depth and process-oriented reflections about their experiences. Subjects were asked to tell their story of addiction and recovery in their own terms. An interview guide with focal and follow-up questions insured that each subject gave his/her own authentic and full account of the process of self transformation and experiences of surrender. Grounded Theory guided the collection and analysis of the data generated in the interviews. Analysis of data revealed common themes and patterns in regard to the recovery process and the experiences of surrender. A common pattern of recovery, illustrated as a gestalt process model, involved four components: action, awareness, connectedness, and choice. These components were found to be highly interactive, each contributing to or augmenting the other three. No common sequence was found; instead, any one of the components could serve as an entry into a cyclical, multileveled system of interaction of all four components, in ways that led to crucial experiences of surrender. Although surrender was found to be the necessary and critical core experience in all the sustained recoveries, differing forms of surrender were described, and various names for the experience were identified. All subjects described the process of recovery and the experiences of surrender as what led them to new "ways of being", forms of "knowing", and different modes of consciousness.

This dissertation examines the use of the dark areas of the occult in the lives of six adolescents who have been involved with black magic, satanic ritual, or other occult practices. All but one of the subjects were connected to the community helping system because of divorce, abuse and/or neglect, delinquency, and substance abuse. Data was collected by means of an interview concerned with the ethnic, economic and religious background of the subjects' family, the subjects' relationships with family, community and state agencies, and the duration of involvement with the occult. The interview and data analysis drew from two perspectives: The first five stages of Erik Erikson's "Eight Stages of Man" identity development model and the existential psychological examination of the "problems of youth" by Paul Goodman in Growing Up Absurd (1960). The study provides an examination of the historical and current use of the occult as a social-strain gauge and disturbing parallels of despairing behavior between the youth culture of Weimar Republic Germany and that of the United States. A strong connection is made between the involvement with dark areas of the occult and the loss of meaning, hope and faith. The subjects came from circumstances that hampered healthy negotiation of Erik Erikson's first five stages of identity development. The subjects grew up in circumstances that led to despairing beliefs and behaviors, as described by Goodman. The data suggests that the nature of the use of magic during early adolescence depends on the nurturent (physical, psychological and ideological) circumstances of infancy, and latency. If the child despairs because of insufficient family/community nurturence then the dark, deviant and depraved element of the occult is more likely to manifest itself. The subjects represent a larger despairing population (uninvolved with the occult or the helping system) that puts society at risk politically and economically. The current youth culture parallels with Weimar Republic youth culture suggest that this larger despairing population threatens society because they could be manipulated by historical circumstance and charismatic personalities to commit widespread depravity in the name of political change.

Despite the continuing trend to delay parenthood in contemporary society, research about late-timing parenthood has been extremely limited. The purpose of this study was to examine the process of maternal adjustment for a sample of late-timing primiparous mothers. This developmentally rooted short-term longitudinal study used both quantitative and qualitative methods. Twenty mothers, all of whom were twenty-nine years of age and older, were interviewed during the eighth month of pregnancy and again at two months postpartum. Measures of social support were administered in the prenatal period, and again in the postnatal period, along with measures of maternal self-esteem and infant temperament. Observations of mother-infant interaction and the home environment were done at two months. Qualitative data were used to develop "personal profiles". The data show that the late-timing mothers adjusted well to new parenthood. They had positive prenatal attitudes about motherhood and demonstrated average or higher levels of maternal self-esteem. They were satisfied with the support they received, and did not feel isolated. They found their infants adaptable and unpredictable, but not difficult or dull. They were sensitive and responsive to the needs of their infants. Results also show that maternal adjustment was influenced over time by prenatal attitudes about motherhood, infant temperament, maternal self-esteem, and the quality of the caregiving environment provided by the mother. The personal psychological resources of the mother and the temperament of the infant were most influential in determining the quality of maternal adjustment and the developing mother-infant relationship. Qualitative results show that maternal adjustment, for some, was also influenced by sources of support and stress. Late-timing motherhood was seen as a desirable life-course choice by most of the late-timing mothers.

Moffitt's (1993) taxonomy of adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent offenders suggests, among other things, that an early onset of antisocial behavior a) increases the likelihood of a life-course persistent offending trajectory and b) is the product of neuropsychological deficits and familial risk factors working in concert. Over two decades of research has yielded a substantial amount of support for Moffitt's claims. Nevertheless, research has yet to significantly expand the repertoire of biosocial processes that might influence the onset of antisocial behavior during childhood. For instance, only a handful of criminologists have considered the role that infant and early childhood nutrition might play in the development of antisocial behavior. Moreover, studies employing genetically sensitive methods to examine the link between nutrition and child antisocial behavior are virtually nonexistent. Scholars have also neglected to consider the socioemotional mediators of the nutrition-externalizing relationship, as well as whether infants and children are differentially sensitive to nutritional intake depending on their level of genetic risk, perinatal risk, and security of attachment. Finally, researchers have yet to explore the ways in which nutritional factors across infancy and early childhood work together to influence externalizing behavior. This dissertation seeks to address these gaps in the literature by employing a large, nationally representative sample of twin pairs. The findings suggest that, even after accounting for the influence of genes and the shared environment, nutritional factors during infancy and early childhood have both direct and indirect effects on externalizing behavior during kindergarten. Furthermore, some significant interactions between genetic and nutritional factors, as well as nutritional factors across life stages, were detected. The limitations of the study are noted and recommendations for policy, theory, and future research are discussed. / A Dissertation submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester, 2015. / May 22, 2015. / Antisocial, Attachment, Breastfeeding, Diet, Genetics / Includes bibliographical references. / Kevin M. Beaver, Professor Directing Dissertation; Amy M. Burdette, University Representative; William D. Bales, Committee Member; Brian J. Stults, Committee Member.

This study explored the relationships among separation-individuation, bulimia, social characteristics, and perceived parenting style in a sample of 192 non-bulimic and 39 bulimic college females. There was support for the hypothesis that bulimics are underseparated from their parents when compared to non-bulimic subjects. The bulimic women exhibited a distinctly different pattern of social qualities characterized by higher levels of depression, lower self-esteem, higher private and public self-consciousness, and higher social anxiety than the non-bulimic subjects. It was not possible to discriminate between bulimic and non-bulimic subjects based on the parental rearing styles they experienced. However, there were strong relationships between type of parenting style received and level of independence; the warm and flexible authoritative parenting style was most closely linked to a supportive relationship between parent and child that is free from undercurrents of anger and resentment. Suggestions for future research are discussed.

During the age of non-avian dinosaurs, ancestors of present-day mammals were likely small insectivores, relegated to nocturnal and subterranean niches. This nocturnal "bottle-neck" is postulated as a driving force of numerous physiological and sensory adaptations including those of the visual system. The consequences of structural mutations of opsins upon spectral sensitivity and environmental adaptation have been studied in great detail, but lacking is knowledge of the potential influence of alterations in gene regulatory networks upon the diversity of cone subtypes and the variation in the ratio of rods and cones observed in diurnal and nocturnal species. Exploiting photoreceptor patterning in cone-dominated zebrafish, we uncovered two independent mechanisms by which the sine oculis homeobox homolog 7 (six7) regulates photoreceptor development. In a genetic screen, we isolated the lots-of-rods-junior (ljrp23ahub) mutation that resulted in an increased number and uniform distribution of rods in otherwise normal appearing larvae. Sequence analysis, genome editing using TALENs and knockdown strategies confirm ljrp23ahub as a hypomorphic allele of six7, a teleost orthologue of six3, with known roles in forebrain patterning and expression of opsins. Based on the lack of protein-coding changes and an identified deletion of a conserved sequence about 40 kb upstream of six7 loci, a cis-regulatory mutation is proposed as the basis of the reduced expression in ljrp23ahub. Comparison of the hypomorphic and knock-out alleles provides evidence of two independent roles in photoreceptor development. EdU and PH3 labeling show that the increase in rod number and uniform distribution is associated with extended mitosis of photoreceptor progenitors, and TUNEL suggest that the lack of green cones is the result of cell death of the cone precursor. These data add six7 to the small but growing list of genes essential for specification and patterning of photoreceptors in non-mammalian vertebrates, and form the basis of a model that underscores the potential of alterations in transcriptional regulation as a mechanism underpinning photoreceptor variation across species. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Biological Science in partial fulfillment of the Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester 2016. / March 14, 2016. / development, evolution, photoreceptors, retina, TALENs, zebrafish / Includes bibliographical references. / James M. Fadool, Professor Directing Dissertation; Jamila I. Horabin, University Representative; Brian P. Chadwick, Committee Member; Hank W. Bass, Committee Member; Wu-Min Deng, Committee Member.

Success is often defined by the quality and effectiveness of an organization’s employees, and workplace design can be a primary driver in employee recruitment, satisfaction, and retention (Gensler, 2013). Since understanding employees is requisite in providing for employees’ needs and desires in the physical work environment, this study seeks to build upon the generational research by taking a more in depth look at employees through the lens of adulthood stage of life. The stages of life in adulthood are broadly defined as early middle and late adulthood (Levinson, 1978). With the demographics of the workforce shifting, this study focuses on employees in early adulthood as they make up the largest portion of the workforce population and have the most working years left (Fry, 2015). At a time with increasing pressures on the business bottom-line and a heightened awareness for employee well-being, many employers are turning to amenities to combat the digitalization of work, aid in attraction and retention, and improve employee satisfaction, health, and well-being (Smart Growth America, 2015). With a growing emphasis on workplace amenities and their role in supporting employee attraction and retention, this study explored the workplace amenity preferences of employees in early adulthood and how valued amenities can be provided in or near an existing high-rise office building. To identify the amenity preferences of early adult employees, this study’s methodology surveyed early adult employees currently working at a technology company located in metropolitan Washington, D.C. The survey addressed participants’ stage of life characteristics and their workplace amenity preferences. From this survey the researcher was able to identify the workplace amenities the sample population valued most. These findings informed programming and site location decisions to develop a design solution that illustrates how the most valued amenities can be provided to employees. With a shift towards a walkable, urban future and many companies relocating or opening new offices in urban locations, the design solution explored how the discovered amenity desires could be provided in an existing high-rise structure. With a better understanding of employees and their amenity desires, employers can make more informed decisions about office locations and amenity selections that support employees daily lifestyles and provide choice while also improving the fabric of our growing urban communities. To identify the amenity preferences of early adult employees, this study’s methodology employed a survey to employees currently working for a technology company in metropolitan Washington, D.C. The survey addressed participants’ stage of life characteristics and their workplace amenity preferences. From this survey the researcher was able to identify the workplace amenities the sample population valued most. These findings informed programming and site location decisions to form a design solution that illustrates how the most valued amenities can be provided to employees. With a shift towards a walkable, urban future and many companies relocating or opening new offices in urban location, the design solution explores how the discovered amenity desires can be provided in a existing high-rise structure. With a better understanding of employees and their amenity desires, employers can make more informed decisions about office locations and amenity selections that support employees daily lifestyles and provide choice while also improving the fabric of our growing urban communities. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Interior Architecture and Design in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Fine Arts. / Summer Semester 2016. / June 28, 2016. / Early Adulthood, Generations, physical work environment, Retention, Stage of Life, Workplace Amenities / Includes bibliographical references. / Steven Webber, Professor Directing Thesis; Marlo Ransdell, Committee Member; Amy Huber, Committee Member.

The present study investigated the meta-relations among common components of reading comprehension. The Simple View of Reading (SVR, Hoover & Gough, 1990) posits that reading comprehension is the sum or product of linguistic comprehension and decoding. The meta- analysis presented here investigated extending the SVR using a two-stage correlational meta- analytic structural equation modeling (SEM) approach with added additional components of working memory, background knowledge, and reasoning and inference. A comprehensive literature search using terms related to reading comprehension and the hypothesized predictors produced a total of k = 155 included studies. Results of an expanded SVR model run on the full sample (n = 1,205,581) showed that none of the hypothesized added predictors accounted for additional variance beyond that accounted for by the SVR components of decoding and linguistic comprehension. Age was then considered as a moderator in these analyses. The correlation matrices were dichotomized into a younger (age < 11 years) and older cohort (age >= 11 years). The SVR model fit the data well for both the younger cohort and the older cohort. Whereby both decoding and linguistic comprehension were important in earlier grades, once decoding was fluent, only linguistic comprehension was a significant predictor of reading comprehension for later grades. Neither working memory, background knowledge, nor reasoning and inference made significant contributions to reading comprehension in the older cohort. For the younger cohort, reasoning and inference was a statistically significant predictor of individual differences in reading comprehension but the additional variance accounted for was trivial. The models accounted for approximately 60% of the variance in reading comprehension. Results are presented in the context of the development of reading ability in the early elementary years and implications for policy and practice are discussed. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Summer Semester 2016. / June 2, 2016. / meta-analysis, reading comprehension, reading development / Includes bibliographical references. / Richard K. Wagner, Professor Directing Dissertation; Young-Suk Grace Kim, University Representative; Christopher Schatschneider, Committee Member; Sara A. Hart, Committee Member; Jeanette Taylor, Committee Member.

The follicular epithelium (FE) of the Drosophila egg chamber is an excellent model system to study cell-cycle regulation, cell differentiation and cell migration in development. During oogenesis, follicle cells sequentially undergo three distinct cell-cycle programs: the mitotic cycle (stage 1-6), endocycle (stage 7-10a), and gene amplification (stage 10b-13). Notch signaling plays a central role in regulating follicle-cell differentiation and cell-cycle switches; its activation and inactivation in follicle cells are essential for the mitotic cycle/endocycle (M/E) and the endocycle/gene amplification (E/A) switches, respectively. In my dissertation, I mainly focus on Notch signaling and its downstream target broad (br). In the first part of the dissertation, I introduce the background information of the egg chamber system, Notch signaling and other associated factors. In the second part, I describe a screen strategy to identify novel genes involved in Notch-mediated follicle cell differentiation and cell cycle switches. In the third part, I select a Notch target gene br from the above-mentioned screen and study its regulation and functions. I will show br, encoding a small group of zinc-finger transcription factors resulting from alternative splicing, is a transcriptional target of Notch nuclear effector Suppressor of Hairless (Su(H)). The early pattern of Br in the FE, uniformly expressed except in the polar cells, is established by Notch signaling around stage 6, through the binding of Su(H) to the br early enhancer (brE) region. My findings also suggest an important role of br in the timing of follicle cell development during the M/E switch. In the fourth part, I report the uniform pattern of Br in the follicular epithelium is gradually lost in the anterior follicle cells (stretched cells and border cells) from stage 9 to 10a during oogenesis. This downregulation of Br is functionally significant for proper stretched-cell stretching. I also find ecdysone and JAK/STAT signaling mediate the downregulation of Notch-maintained Br. Together, My research investigates the complex Notch signaling network, and reveal that Notch-directly-regulated Br interacts with the ecdysone and JAK/STAT pathways, serving as an important spatiotemporal cue for proper cell differentiation and morphogenetic movement during Drosophila oogenesis. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Biological Science in partial fulfillment of the Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester, 2015. / February 27, 2015. / broad, ecdysone, follicle cell, JAK/STAT, Notch, oogenesis / Includes bibliographical references. / Wu-Min Deng, Professor Directing Dissertation; Jamila I. Horabin, University Representative; Jonathan Hancock Dennis, Committee Member; Timothy Megraw, Committee Member; Steven John Lenhert, Committee Member.

Prematurity is associated with poor neurodevelopmental outcomes, and laws mandate the provision of early intervention services to those infants with disability. However, it is often difficult to identify early which infants would benefit most from these services. The Neurobiologic Risk Score (NBRS) and the Neurodevelopmental Risk Exam (NRE) are instruments used to assess infants at near-term corrected age. These instruments have been shown to correlate with later developmental outcomes. However, the environment of the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) has changed since the NBRS and NRE were first validated, and it is not known whether they are still able to accurately predict future developmental outcomes. The objective of this study was therefore to examine the ability of the NBRS and NRE, both alone and in combination with socio-economic variables, to predict future developmental outcomes in the contemporary NICU. The subjects were 219 neonates of less than 32 weeks' gestational age discharged from the NICU between November 2001 and December 2006 who had undergone both the NBRS and NRE. Infants were assessed at chronological age 6, 12 and 24 months, with developmental quotients being assigned at these ages. Parental socio-economic data were also collected and analysed. The hypothesis was that the NBRS and NRE would be less effective at predicting neurodevelopmental outcomes in the contemporary NICU. The best measure of future developmental outcome is likely to need to include both neurobiological and socio-economic risk factors.