Brainstorming is a critical part of the engineering design process and can have a significant impact on the outcomes of the overall project. While research has studied the outcomes of brainstorming and the ideas that teams generate, the role that language and conversation play in these activities is still relatively underexplored. Observing the different ways people use specific types of discourse can reveal how conversations can affect brainstorming itself. To that end, this research aims to answer the following questions: 1) What are the different kinds of discursive moves that students make during engineering brainstorming activities? 2) What patterns or themes emerge among these discursive moves? We collected data by recording conversations that took place during team brainstorming activities with engineering students. These conversations were transcribed, and we used discourse analysis to code our data according to the speaker's intent. We combined quantitative and qualitative analysis to identify and explore correlation patterns within these conversations. Three prominent themes emerged from our analyses: Active Engagement, Group Rapport, and Exploring the Problem. These themes highlight the range of different conversational elements that work together to support effective brainstorming discussions. Engineers and engineering educators can be mindful of the way that they frame their brainstorming activities so that the team’s discourse encourages more active engagement, stronger group rapport, and deeper exploration of the problem at hand.

The way in which environmental designers design neighborhood spaces has a role to play in the quality of outdoor spaces that shapes and directs daily outdoor social activities as well as creates a bridge between individuals and the local community. The high quality design of outdoor spaces is fundamental in fostering social cohesion among users/residents in order to produce a healthy social atmosphere, whereas a decline in the quality of outdoor spaces can contribute to antisocial behavior. Today, In Jeddah City, Saudi Arabia, in many cases of new neighborhoods, the outdoor space has become abandoned, and empty, or is avoided. Within this setting, these spaces do not provide opportunities for families with their children to gather and play, to sit and socialize with neighbors, to gather in outdoor activities, to walk to the mosque or school, or to do their daily grocery shopping without being threatened by dangerous car traffic. Moreover, even if users and residents experience problems in their neighborhood, and have their own needs and visions to solve the problem, they do not have the experience to mentally visualize and resolve these problems. Through this qualitative research, the researcher proposes a new approach in incorporating users' imagination in the ideation process of design in order to examine to extend the current normative theory through the development of a more "collaborative ideation process."In this new collaborative process, the representation of ideas becomes more iterative and knowledge exchange between researcher and users becomes more seamless. Through incorporating the researcher's sketching skills as a process of "collaborative-sketching," possible ideas and solutions are explored that are responsive to the needs and desires of users. Using a number of photographs of an outdoor residential space as an example, the objective of this study is to examine the use of collaborative sketching as a way of taping into users' imagination as a rich source of their needs and desires to empower the design process. The findings showed that applying a collaborative sketching process in the early ideation stage of design can result in a rich exchange between designers and user, enabling the designer to have a better and more realistic understanding of needs and desires from the perspective of the user. Through this collaborative-sketching process, the users were continuously, iteratively, and instantly stimulated to not only to narrate their needs and desires, but to visually provide realistic and specific details about the social activities and physical elements including their affordance, rationale of using, value of use, and how social interactions might occur within the different settings. / Ph. D.

Background: In Taiwan, there were 7,038 reports of attempted suicide among people aged 24 or younger in 2018. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the U.S., affecting 40 million adults in the United States age 18 and older. Purpose: In this study, we compared United States (US) and Taiwanese college students’ spiritual well-being, psychological well-being, and suicidal ideation. Methods: A total of 661 college students (481 from the US and 180 from Taiwan) were recruited to complete the survey study. This was a cross-sectional comparative research design. SPSS 28.0 was used to do the data analysis. Chi-square tests, independent t-tests, Pearson Correlations, and Stepwise Multiple Regressions were used to examine the research questions. Results: Compared with Taiwanese college students, US college students had higher scores in spiritual well-being and psychological well-being. US and Taiwanese college students’ spiritual well-being had significant relationships with psychological well-being and suicidal ideation. The significant predictors for the US college students’ psychological well-being were Life Satisfaction/ self-actualization and Life/self-responsibility, while Taiwanese college students had total scores of Spiritual Well-being and Life Satisfaction/ self-actualization. Life Satisfaction/ self-actualization had a significantly negative association with Taiwanese college students’ suicidal ideation. Total scores of Spiritual Well-being and Faith/belief were predictors for US college students’ suicidal ideation and they had significant negative relationships. Conclusions/Implications for Practice: College students’ psychological well-being and suicidal ideation are often cited as important areas. Understanding factors that influence positive psychological well-being is important in order to institute protective factors and provide emotional support.

Rationale: The severity of insomnia symptoms, including difficulty falling asleep and returning to sleep when awakened in the night, are major risk factors for more severe suicidality including suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and death by suicide. As a modifiable risk factor, insomnia is a potential target for suicide prevention. There are several commonly observed gaps in the literature studying the association between insomnia and suicidality including little exploration of potential mediators, limited assessments of insomnia and suicidality, and a lack of sample diversity and representativeness. As such, the models that explain the association between insomnia and suicidality remain unclear and understudied. The purpose of this study is to investigate potential mediators that are associated with both insomnia severity and suicidality severity including emotion dysregulation, thwarted belongingness, and perceived burdensomeness with the use of validated measures in a nationally representative sample. Background: Evidence suggests that insomnia severity is related to suicidality severity, even when accounting for common risk factors of suicidality such as depression. Several models have been developed to explain the association between insomnia and suicidality severity. Neurocognitive models propose that insomnia prevents natural recuperative functions of sleep, thereby contributing to daytime impairment such as emotion dysregulation. Joiner’s suicide risk model may also outline potential psychosocial components that facilitate the association between insomnia and suicidality severity including thwarted belongingness and perceived burdensomeness. Emotion dysregulation, thwarted belongingness, and perceived burdensomeness have been individually associated with both insomnia and suicidality severity. Methods: We collected data on demographics, insomnia severity, depression, anxiety, suicidality severity, emotional regulation, thwarted belongingness, and perceived burdensomeness from 428 participants through an online survey. Our first aim was to replicate previous findings of the insomnia-suicidality severity association through regression analyses between self-reported insomnia and suicidality severity whilst controlling demographic variables, self-reported depression severity, and self-reported anxiety severity. Our second aim is to understand the role emotion dysregulation, thwarted belongingness, and perceived burdensomeness play in the insomnia and suicidal severity association, even when accounting for depression, through testing our proposed mediation models using structural equation modeling. Results: Insomnia severity was related to greater suicidality, but not when accounting for depression severity. Emotion dysregulation and perceived burdensomeness partially mediated the association between insomnia severity and suicidality severity. When accounting for depression severity, emotion dysregulation and perceived burdensomeness fully mediated the association between insomnia severity and suicidality severity. Conclusions: Depression, perceived burdensomeness, and emotion dysregulation may explain the association between insomnia and suicidality severity. These difficulties may serve as potent markers for suicide risk and potential targets for treatment and suicide prevention.

Each year, about 800,000 individuals die by suicide globally, affecting millions more. Mitigating suicide risks by targeting modifiable factors such as the sleep disturbances of insomnia and nightmares, which are prevalent and linked to suicidality is important. This study investigated the structural and functional brain differences related to sleep disturbances and suicidality, with the anterior cingulate (caudal and rostral), insula, middle frontal gyrus, posterior cingulate, thalamus, amygdala, and orbitofrontal cortex as seed regions. Participants had no history of suicidal ideation (NSI; n=43) or suicidal ideation within the past two weeks (SI; n=25). Measures for analyses included the Insomnia Severity Index (ISI), Disturbing Dream and Nightmare Severity Index (DDNSI), and Frequency of Suicidal Ideation Inventory (FSII). The relationships between group (control vs suicidal ideation), structural measurements (cortical surface area, cortical thickness, gray matter volume), insomnia and nightmares across the eight regions in each hemisphere were examined. Functional connectivity-change differences were measured across wake and sleep with the eight regions as seeds. The SI group had smaller cortical surface area and gray matter volumes in the left insula (t= 2.58, p = 0.012; t = 2.44, p = 0.017); however, not after adjusting for multiple comparisons. ISI and FSII total scores correlated with each other and the surface area and gray matter volume of the left insula. In a mediation model, ISI total score was significantly related to insula surface area and FSII total score (p = 0.023; p =0.027), but the insula surface area was not significantly associated with FSII total score (p = 0.075). The indirect effect of ISI on FSII through the left insula surface area was not significant (p =0.161). The SI group had smaller changes from wake to sleep than the NSI group in the functional connectivity of the right thalamus to the left and right superior/middle temporal regions. Other neurological mechanisms could be at play as only the cortical surface area and gray matter volume in the left insula had implied differences between groups and the structural differences did not mediate the relationship between insomnia and suicidality. Smaller functional connectivity-changes differences across wake and sleep for SI compared to NSI, potentially indicate deficits in auditory inhibition.

Suicide is a major public health issue in the United States. Some studies show decreased suicide rates in religious populations, but it is unclear how religiosity might be linked to suicidal behavior of adolescents emerging into adulthood. To this point few studies have examined the relationship between adolescent suicidal ideation and several risk factors at once and the role of religiosity in these relationships. Drawing from Waves I-III of the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health data from 1994 to 2002, I sought to explore the relationship between religiosity (i.e. religious affiliation, service attendance, prayer, perceived importance of religion) and suicidal ideation of adolescents over time. Additionally, associations between risk factors (i.e. poor parental relationship, low self-esteem, depressive symptoms, suicidal behavior of friends and family, drug use, alcohol use, aggressive behavior) and risk of suicidal ideation were assessed by simple logistic regression analyses. Multivariate analyses were then used to examine the relationships among the risk factors and suicidal ideation. In a second step of the multivariate analyses, religiosity was added to the model to test if there would be a change in the odds ratios. Results of the simple logistic regression indicated adolescents’ religiosity was negatively correlated with suicidal ideation, while the selected risk factors were positively correlated with suicidal ideation among adolescent participants. However, as participants became young adults, one religiosity measure (i.e. prayer) and one aggressive behavior measure (i.e. access to weapons) were no longer significantly related to their suicidal ideation. Also, females and Whites were more likely to report suicidal ideation than males or African Americans, respectively. In the multivariate models all the selected suicide risk factors were positively correlated with suicidal ideation. When religiosity was added to the model, it had a positive impact on aggressive behavior among older adolescents in Wave II (35% reduced risk) and drug use among younger adolescents in Wave I (14% reduced risk). Religiosity had marginal impact on the rest of the risk factors: 0.1% – 2.4% reduced risk in some and 0.2% – 1.6% increased risk in others in all 3 waves.

Suicidal behavior, including suicide attempt, may result from maladaptive explanatory patterns for past negative life events, in which a person attributes the causes of stressors to internal, stable and global factors. Conversely, an optimistic explanatory style involves perceiving negative life events as external, transient and specific, and may be related to reduced suicide risk. We examined the association between attributional style and lifetime suicide attempts in 135 college students, covarying age, race and ethnicity. Participants provided informed consent and completed an online survey. An optimistic explanatory style was associated with reduced risk of suicide attempt; this effect persisted in a model controlling for hopelessness and depressive symptoms. The manner in which an individual interprets negative life events may buffer against suicidal behavior. Therapeutic strategies to promote an optimistic explanatory style may be successful in the prevention of suicide.

Background: Insomnia is a robust correlate of suicidal ideation and behavior. Preliminary research has identified thwarted belongingness (c.f. social disconnection) as an explanatory link between insomnia and suicidal ideation. Objectives: This study replicates and extends previous findings using both cross-sectional and longitudinal designs in four demographically diverse samples. Additionally, the specificity of thwarted belongingness was evaluated by testing anxiety as a rival mediator. Method: Self-report measures of insomnia symptoms, thwarted belongingness, suicidal ideation and behavior, and anxiety were administered in four adult samples: 469 undergraduate students, 352 psychiatric outpatients, 858 firefighters, and 217 primary care patients. Results: More severe insomnia was associated with more severe thwarted belongingness and suicidality. Thwarted belongingness significantly accounted for the association between insomnia and suicidality, cross-sectionally and longitudinally, beyond anxiety. Notably, findings supported the specificity of thwarted belongingness: anxiety did not significantly mediate the association between insomnia and suicidality, and insomnia did not mediate the relation between thwarted belongingness and suicidality. Limitations: This study relied solely on self-report measures. Future studies incorporating objective sleep measurements are needed. Conclusion: Findings underscore the utility of assessing and addressing sleep disturbances and social disconnection to reduce suicide risk.

Associations between the satisfaction of basic psychological needs of autonomy, competence, and relatedness with current suicidal ideation and risk for suicidal behavior were examined. Two logistic regressions were conducted with a cross-sectional database of 440 university students to examine the association of need satisfaction with suicidal ideation and risk for suicidal behavior, while controlling for demographics and depressive symptoms. Suicidal ideation was reported by 15% of participants and 18% were found to be at risk for suicidal behavior. A one standard deviation increase in need satisfaction reduced the odds of suicidal ideation by 53%, OR (95% CI) = 0.47 (0.33–0.67), and the odds of being at risk for suicidal behavior by 50%, OR (95% CI) = 0.50 (0.37–0.69). Young adults whose basic psychological needs are met may be less likely to consider suicide and engage in suicidal behavior. Prospective research is needed to confirm these associations.

The objective of this study was to examine the combined moderating effects of life stress and loneliness on the association between social problem solving ability (SPS) and suicidal behaviors. We assessed SPS, suicidal behavior, loneliness, and stressful life events in a sample of 385 ethnically diverse college students. Overall, only loneliness moderated the association between SPS and suicidal behaviors. Across ethnic groups, loneliness moderated the association between SPS and suicidal behavior for Blacks, Whites, and Asians; life stress was a moderator for Hispanics. For most individuals, loneliness increases the strength of the association between poor problem-solving and suicidal behaviors. For Hispanics, life stress exacerbates this relationship. Ethnically-specific prevention strategies targeting loneliness and life stress may promote effective problem-solving, reducing suicide risk.