A needs assessment was conducted at a learning center at one completely online institution to understand administrator, faculty, and student perceptions of the center's services and resources to uncover gaps between the current state and intended outcomes (personalized support, clarity of services, and shared accountability for student success).…

Gender norms and learned practices of student teachers can influence their performance in practice, either fixing or challenging, gendered social norms and expectations. This paper shares the findings of a multi-year mixed-methods research project that explored the understandings of gender norms and experiences of students and staff within a large…

A qualitative case study approach was used to examine Latino male students and First-Year Experience (FYE) programs aimed at promoting student transfer. Two FYE programs at two community colleges in California were studied: Bridgetown Community College and Portlake Community College (pseudonyms). Study participants included four groups: Latino…

Objective: Although much research on community colleges focuses on institutional challenges or student deficits, emerging evidence suggests that student-instructor relationships have the potential to impact student success. The current study examined factors that could influence community college students' development of relationships with…

Background: Domestic violence against women is well researched in the general population, but much less so in relation to women with learning disabilities. This qualitative research study interviewed 15 women with learning disabilities who had experienced domestic violence about their experiences, the impact of the violence on them and their…

Sexual assault is a prevalent, yet underreported and stigmatizing crime that disproportionately affects college-age students. The literature of Library & Information Studies does not currently address the ways in which survivors may seek information after an assault. Blending findings from Psychology and LIS, this study proposes the…

The psychotherapy experiences of a sample of Iraqi refugee men, in later stages of exile, were explored with the aim of shedding some light on how this client group can experience therapy. Ten adult male Iraqi refugees--who had lived in Sweden for at least five years and had been psychotherapy clients at some point during that time--were recruited…

There has been an increase in utilization of the Emergency Department (ED) in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) which may reflect a deficit of services (Green et al., "Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry" 40(3):325-332, 2001; Gurney et al., "Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent…

Qualitative researchers often have to decide whether to collect data using focus groups or individual interviews. We systematically compare these two methods on their ability to generate two types of information: unique items in a brainstorming task and personally sensitive disclosures. Our study sample consisted of 350 African-American men living…

Background: Although school climate is linked with youth educational, socioemotional, behavioral, and health outcomes, there has been limited research on the association between school climate and mental health education efforts. This study explored whether school climate was associated with students' depression literacy and mental health stigma…

Coteaching requires engagement by both student teachers and clinical educators during all aspects of student teaching and is an alternative to the practice of the gradual release of teaching responsibility to the candidate. Though there is an increased use of coteaching as a model for student teaching, little is known about how the model affords…

In recent years, there has been increasing interest in automatically assessing help seeking, the process of referring to resources outside of oneself to accomplish a task or solve a problem. Research in the United States has shown that specific help-seeking behaviors led to better learning within intelligent tutoring systems. However, intelligent…

This dissertation provides initial empirical evidence for Expectancy Value Theory for Help Sources and generates design recommendations for online courses based on the newfound understanding between theory and student behavior. (Abstract shortened by UMI.). [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest…

This study compared levels of state affect, dysphoric mood, and parenting sense of competence in Australian parents of children with or without autism. The effects of personality and location on the parents' experience were also examined, while controlling for current affect. Possible relationships among personality, location factors and…

The experiences of seven parents, whose preschoolers engaged in persistent challenging behaviors, were investigated. Individual interviews with each parent, member checking, and follow-up discussions to seek clarity on participants' comments were conducted. Four major categories of responses emerged from the data as parents shared their journeys…