Acute stretching increases postural stability in nonbalance trained individuals. J Strength Cond Res 26(11): 3095-3100, 2012-Studies into the relationship between acute stretching and maintenance of postural balance have been inconclusive. It was hypothesized that familiarization with the task and subsequent learning might be involved in the conflicting results. Therefore, this study was to designed determine if a regimen of static stretching exercises after a familiarization period would improve a person's ability to maintain a stabilometer in a neutral position and whether stretching had the same effect on individuals with extensive involvement with balancing tasks. Forty-Two college students (21 male, 21 female) and 10 surfers (all male) performed tests on a stabilometer on 2 separate days after 3 days of familiarization. Testing followed either 30 minutes of quiet sitting (nonstretched) or 30 minutes of stretching activities (stretched). Stretching exercises consisted of various assisted and unassisted static stretches of the muscles around the hip, knee, and ankle joints. Improved flexibility after the stretching exercises was demonstrated by significant (p , 0.05) 6.5 6 2.7 cm (mean 6 SD) increase in the sit and reach. Balance time for the students improved significantly by 11.4% (2.0-second increase), but the surfers had no significant change. Thus, stretching improved maintenance of balance perhaps by helping the subjects to eliminate the gross muscle contractions that caused large stabilometer displacements and to replace them with fine muscle contractions that caused little or no stabilometer displacements. However, it appears that experience doing balance tasks supplants any stretching benefit.

A wrinkling approach was used to study the mechanics of hybrid nanotube/nanocrystal coatings adhering to soft polymer (PDMS) substrates. We focused on three thicknesses: 10 nm, 30 nm, and 40 nm. The approach we used is the Strain-Induced Elastic Buckling Instability for Mechanical Measurements (SIEBIFMM) technique, which allows measurement of the SWCNT film mechanics by the buckling wavelength and the film thickness by inducing a compressive stress in the films at different strains; 2%, 4%, 6%, 8%, 10%, and 12%. In this thesis, dip-coating method with colloidal nanocrystals was used to enhance the rigidity of the carbon nanotube films by filling the pores of the nanotube network. Our results show an almost two-fold enhancement in the Young modulus of a thin SWCNT film related to the presence of a thin interpenetrating over-layer of the semiconductor nanocrystal.

Experts have argued that hoarding disorder occurs in part because hoarding behaviors help individuals avoid distress and feel positive emotions in the moment. For example, when people who hoard choose to save something rather than discard it, they may avoid feelings of anxiety, and when people who hoard acquire something new, they may feel excited. However, no previous studies have examined whether or not these changes actually occur in the moment. These processes could also potentially be altered by how individuals respond to their emotions in the moment. For example, individuals who hoard may have stronger emotional reactions, distinguish less between different emotions, tend to avoid their emotions more, or tend to be inattentive of their experience, which could change how their emotions in the moment affect their behavior. Therefore, this study examined whether or not the anticipated effects of hoarding behaviors on mood occurred, and whether or not there were differences between those with higher and lower hoarding scores on how they respond to their emotions, in a sample of 61 college students. Participants completed two online surveys one week apart, and responded to questions on their mobile phone throughout the week. As expected, the students with higher hoarding scores had stronger emotional reactions to stress, avoided their emotions more often, and were less attentive to their ongoing experience. Both those with higher hoarding scores and lower hoarding scores vi reported that they acquired new items primarily to feel good. However, acquiring, discarding, working with items, and looking for items did not change either group’s mood in the moment. Overall, these findings suggest that people who hoard do have differences in how they respond to their emotions, which could mean that treatments that target these responses may be useful for these people. They also show the importance of understanding why working to put yourself in a good mood through acquiring is problematic for some people and not others, and suggest that there may be a difference between how these behaviors are intended to perform and their actual results.

The development of software and communication technologies in education has led the majority of universities worldwide to integrate the functions of Learning Management Systems (LMSs) into their learning environments. LMSs offers several features that encourage their use by universities and other educational institutions, such as unlimited access to course content, easy tracking of learners’ progress and performance, and reduced costs in terms of both money and time. Most existing LMS studies have been focused on experienced LMS users who are familiar with its functions, with little consideration given to new users. Furthermore, although previous researchers have identified various means of enhancing the effectiveness of LMS use, no consensus has yet been reached on which of these features most successfully improve the learning outcomes of new learners enrolled in programming courses. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to examine the usability of particular LMS features and their impact on learning outcomes for freshman students enrolled in programming courses. Through the Virtual Programming Lab (VPL) and discussion forums, particular LMS features have been considered. For this study, a quantitative quasi-experimental design was employed, including experimental and control groups of new students enrolled in an introductory programming course that involved different LMS features. These features have been considered in the place of treatment in this experiment, in which the level of difference between participants in the two groups was compared. This study involved two main dependent variables: LMS features’ usability and learning achievement. For the first dependent variable, LMS usability, the participants completed a survey, based on the components of Shackel’s usability model (1991), to evaluate the effectiveness of the LMS features’ usability. Four constructs underpin this model: effectiveness, learnability, flexibility, a¬¬nd attitude. For the second dependent variable, learning achievement, the final grade was used to measure the impact of these two LMS features on learning achievement between the two groups. The results revealed significance differences related to LMS features’ usability and learning achievement between the experimental group and the control group. Participants in the experimental group reported greater LMS usability than did those in the control group, and overall course scores indicated improved learning performance in members of the experimental group who applied the VPL and discussion forms features of programming courses.

The Covid-19 pandemic broadly affected the world together with the phenomena of digitalization, which quickly accelerated during the pandemic. This led to people working more from home (also called WFH or telework) or in a hybrid mix, which has workers reporting different opinions on the preferences for working at home or the office (Alexander et al., 2020). This change meant that managers and companies needed to rethink the structure of the organization and the effect of WFH or hybrid work form, to fit the preferences of the personnel and its productivity. Previous research shows that household characteristics have a significant impact on workplace preference. As Hill et al. (2003) reported that there were blurred lines between work and home life when working from home. The main purpose of this study was to find the factors that lead employees to prefer working from home or the office. This was done through the research question ”What are the factors which lead people to prefer working from home or at the office,  and how do these factors differ between Generation X and millennials?”. This study was done with a deductive approach for the qualitative research and consists of a cross-sectional design with a restrictive time frame. Interviews were conducted with ten participants, including five participants from the generation of millennials born between 1981-1996 and the other five from Generation X born between 1965-1980 (Kagan, 2021). These interviews were semi-structured, followed by a thematic analysis method to analyze the collected qualitative primary data The coded data were analyzed relating to the research question. However, this study was conducted with participants from Svealand, Sweden and it can be disputed whether this sample is large enough and whether this region can represent the whole of Sweden.   Further, the results of this study found that the main factors behind workplace preference, common to both generations, were the organizational factor and job characteristics which includes the support from the organizations in form of equipment, training, digital tools together with the nature of the tasks and the possibility to do them at home. This is significant since earlier research predominately discusses household characteristics and accommodating working-home life balance, which was a weak factor in this study.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Many advanced cancer patients receive intensive treatment near the end of life (EOL). Intensive treatment near the EOL is often associated with worse outcomes, such as worse quality of life (QOL), greater distress in patients and caregivers, and higher health care costs. For cancers typically unresponsive to chemotherapy such as lung and gastro-intestinal (GI), the side effects of intensive treatment are endured without increasing survival time. To date, research on EOL care in advanced cancer patients has focused on patient prognostic understanding, physician communication, and patient distress. These factors do not fully explain why many patients receive intensive treatment near the EOL when there is no hope for cure. Hence, there is a need to better understand the factors that influence EOL treatment in order to improve patient and caregiver outcomes. Self-Regulation Theory (SRT) provides a framework that may help explain motivations and care decisions in this population. This study had two aims: 1) to examine the associations between EOL clinical encounters (i.e., EOL conversations with a physician) and treatment intensity in advanced cancer patients near the EOL; and 2) to examine the associations between important SRT constructs (i.e., goal flexibility, hope, and optimism) and treatment intensity in advanced cancer patients near the EOL. A sample of 76 advanced lung and GI cancer patients was recruited from Indiana University Simon Cancer Center. Hope predicted receiving chemotherapy closer to death (β = -.41, t (66) = -2.31, p = .025), indicating more intensive treatment near EOL. Other predictor variables were not significantly associated with intensive treatment. Implications and methodological limitations are discussed.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / Workers who request a flexible schedule to accommodate their biologically-determined sleep-wake cycle (chronotype) may face prejudice if supervisors perceive them, particularly “night owls”, as lazy or unconscientious. Such bias may be exacerbated in organizational cultures characterized by stability and control. Thus, chronotype bias was examined in a 2 (rigid vs. flexible organizational norms) X 3 (morningness chronotype, eveningness chronotype, educational pursuit/control as reason for a flexible schedule request) online scenario study. Participants were recruited through Amazon Mechanical Turk (N=398) and were instructed to act as managers to decide whether to approve a fictitious employee’s request for a flexible schedule. Organizational culture and reason for schedule request were orthogonally manipulated in the scenarios. Ps completed measures of schedule approval (including an open-ended justification item), beliefs about the employee’s performance (job-specific task performance, contextual performance, personal discipline, and conscientiousness), and manipulation checks, as well as measures of their own chronotype. Ps were less likely to approve a flexible schedule request for employees with chronotype-based requests (both morningness and eveningness) compared to control (educational pursuit/control request). Task performance beliefs mediated the effect. Organizational norms had both a direct and moderating effect on schedule approval, such that approval was higher and chronotype bias was weakened in the flexible norm condition compared to the rigid norm condition. Ps’ own chronotype had no direct or moderating effect on schedule approval. Qualitative content analysis of Ps’ justification for the schedule approval decision revealed that Ps justified their decision on the impact of schedule approval on the organization.

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La tesis Doctoral está dividida en dos grandes bloques: el primero relacionado con el estudio estructural y de flexibilidad de distintos "Zeolític imidazolate fremewroks (ZIFs) utilizando distintas técnicas de caracterización de alta resolución y, además, simulación molecular; así como el efecto en la adsorción de distintas moléculas en fase gas. El segundo bloque hace referencia al estudio de MOFs en aplicaciones biomédicas, en específico en el estudio de adsorción y liberación en fase líquida de fármacos para el tratamiento del glaucoma.