2011 MU dissertations - Access restricted to MU
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Item The mechanics of Roman religion : the functionality and aspectualization of the gods(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2011) Shamey, Casey; Trout, Dennis E., 1953-[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] This dissertation examines the practical functioning of Roman religion and the nature of the Roman gods. Roman religion operated as a thaumaturgical polytheistic orthopraxy, a religion that worshipped many gods, emphasized the importance of performing ritual correctly, and was concerned exclusively with this-worldly benefits. As a result, the Romans attempted to maximize their chances of receiving a favorable divine response to any given request by assigning specific divine agency to individual functions and processes. Such a narrowly defined divine identification allowed a more precise targeting of ritual and function, thus increasing the chances of receiving the desired response. This specific narrowing of divine identity occurred in multiple ways. The most common method was aspectualization, the fragmentation of a larger divine identity into smaller aspects, which were often labeled with epithets, for example, Jupiter Optimus Maximus or Jupiter Tonans as aspects of Jupiter. Other methods of narrowing identity included the creation of new, often specific, deities, or the adaptation of existing deities or aspects to a new function. The ultimate result of this process was an extremely flexible religious system, responsive and easily able to adapt to the constantly shifting needs of its practitioners.Item Second grade students' interpretations of various representations depicting part-part-whole relationships(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2011) Buchheister, Kelley E.; Lannin, John K.[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] Through a cross-case analysis this study characterizes second-grade students' interpretations of mathematical representations (i.e., contextual situations, equations, part-part-whole diagrams, and open number lines) that depict part-part-whole relationships, and relates students' interpretations to their level of strategy development as indicated by a problem solving assessment. Data were collected from 10 students in a single second-grade classroom. Three main clusters of students' interpretations were identified: (a) viewing representations as final solutions (e.g., representations with missing values were unacceptable), (b) focusing interpretations of representations on location, sequence, or the meaning of operations (e.g., match the order of numbers or direct action of problem), and (c) interpreting representations using fact families or mathematical properties (e.g., applying commutativity or inverse relationships). For the 10 students in this study, a student's strategy development did not correspond to the students' cluster assignments. These data provide significant implications for all levels of teacher development, curriculum design, and assessment.Item Finding 'The answers inside me' : a model of empowerment through breastfeeding and weaning(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2011) Nelson, Teak, 1973-; Libbus, Martha K.[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] Breastfeeding confers numerous health benefits upon both nursing infants and their mothers, many of which increase as breastfeeding duration increases. These benefits have led to recommendations that mothers exclusively breastfeed their infants six months, continuing through at least the first year of life with the addition of complementary foods. Current breastfeeding rates fall short of these recommendations, and a growing disparity exists between women of different socioeconomic backgrounds. Although many factors contribute to breastfeeding cessation, little is understood about the ways in which women make weaning decisions. This study explored the process of weaning from the perspective of low-income women within the context of their own breastfeeding experiences. Low-income women who were in the process of weaning or who had recently weaned a breastfed child were theoretically sampled from rural communities in northeast Missouri. Individual interviews were conducted with 15 mothers who collectively had breastfed 30 children. Grounded theory method and constant comparative analysis were used to gather and analyze data. The resulting theory explains the psychosocial process through which women are empowered through breastfeeding and weaning. Throughout this process women actively build a base of support and information, make their own decisions, and discover much about themselves. Implications for nursing practice and research are discussed.Item Process management and scheduing [sic] in radiation therapy(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2011) Mutic, Sasa; Miller, William Hughes, 1941-; Wu, B. (Bin), 1957-[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] Management of complex, advanced technology, high cost, and high risk operations requires reliance on systems engineering principles. This approach has been common place in the management of nuclear power plants for decades. Despite the advances in modern health care and modern radiation therapy (RT) and increasing complexity and cost of these operations, management in this area is still largely based on legacy approaches. In 1995 the National Academy of Engineering and the Institute of Medicine published a report, Building a Better Delivery System, in which applications of systems engineering principles in healthcare design and management were outlined. This work explores the applicability and utility of systems thinking in the design and management of RT. The work consists of three projects: RT process mapping using IDEF0, performance data collection in RT, and modeling of RT scheduling systems. The projects are aimed at improving quality, safety, and efficiency of RT operations by enabling definition of processes, systematic process data collection, and analysis of operations. The presented work shows that IDEF0 is well suited for modeling of RT operations. The developed data collection processes demonstrate that the electronic work environment of modern RT operations is well suited for systematic data collection for the purposes of process management and improvement. Lastly, the analysis of scheduling models in RT demonstrated that the conventional scheduling models are inadequate and that the electronic work environment has the potential to improve the scheduling process in RT which is in turn expected to improve quality, safety, and efficiency of RT operations.Item Semiparametric transformation models for panel count data(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2011) Li, Ni; Sun, Jianguo, 1961-[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] Panel count data arise in event history studies. It may not be feasible to monitor subjects continuously and recurrent events can be observed only at discrete time points rather than continuously and thus only the numbers of the events that occur between the observation times, not their occurrence times, are observed. The resulting interval-censored recurrent event data are commonly referred to as panel count data. The first part of this dissertation discusses a class of semiparametric transformation models for regression analysis of panel count data when the observation times or process may differ from subject to subject and more importantly, may contain relevant information about the underlying recurrent event. The second part of this dissertation will consider semiparametric transformation models for regression analysis of multivariate panel count data. The last part of the dissertation considers the same problem studied in Chapter 2 and provides an approach that allows both observation and follow-up times to be correlated with the recurrent event process. In all three parts, extensive simulation studies were conducted and indicate that the proposed approaches work well for practical situations. Illustrative examples are provided.