Dissociative processes in children and adolescents entail alterations in memory, identity, and perception that reflect and/or precipitate disconnects across biological, emotional, cognitive, and behavioral systems. Children of maltreatment survivors are at heightened risk for va…
The United States has become severely polarized over the last five years with some commentators even comparing this time of entrenched division to the Civil War era. However, the impulse to unify or to make one out of many (e pluribus unum) has existed in the country from the na…
This dissertation builds on research in digital rhetoric, multimodal composition, media studies and digital culture, feminist ethics, and fandom studies to better understand the role of the metatextual discussions across fandom that surround the community’s consumption and remix…
Parental history of substance abuse (PHA) is linked to increased risk for alcohol use problems; however, the cognitive and neurobiological mechanisms of this relationship are not well understood. Emerging research suggests PHA is associated with poorer executive functioning (EF)…
Purpose: Postnatal depression (PND) has significant negative outcomes for both mother and baby. The literature indicates that cognitive behavioural interventions can be effective and efficacious treatments, less is known about what mechanisms underpin change in such intervention…
Study One: Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunals (SENDIST) provide independent adjudication of parental appeals against Local Authority (LA) decisions. The Parent Partnership Service (PPS) and Disagreement Resolution Services (DRS) are both arranged to reduce disagr…
Like many countries around the world, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) encounters severe congestion in its court system. In a system with three tiers of trial, a lawsuit might stay in the court for years before reaching final judgment. As a result, the legislature in the UAE barre…
Based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork among Esperanto speakers and Esperantists - mostly, but not only, in Paris - this thesis asks: how can the Esperanto community and movement come into being in practice if Esperanto speakers are scattered all over the world and may, at ti…
This thesis tests the assumption that spatial methodologies may reveal deep underlying similarities in modernity across opposed political systems. In the USSR, the unexpected 'mis-use' of stadium spaces enabled fans to recast stadium space in ways meaningful to personal manifest…
This thesis examines the processes of the peace negotiations in Cambodia (1987-1993) and El Salvador (1989-1993) in order to address the following question: What does the interplay between the national factions and the external interveners in peace negotiations tell us about the…
This submission for PhD by Publication includes two studies I conducted during 8 years of dedicated field research examining the US role in mediating the Arab-Israeli conflict. These studies developed from my collection of in-depth oral testimonies and were buttressed by my reco…
This study explores and critically examines the role of indigenous mechanisms (the Inter-Tribal Reconciliation Conferences-ITRCs) in resolving tribal conflicts in South Darfur State of Western Sudan. The fundamental question raised by this study is: have these reconciliation con…
MySpace is a social network site (SNS) that forms an essential part of modern online communication. The creation of a personal profile in MySpace allows a user to connect with a global network of friends and communicate in a number of different ways. This thesis sets out to expl…
Whenever two or three are gathered together, the possibility of conflict is present. Conflict is inevitable, but how it is handled determines whether it leads to healthy relationships or destructive affiliations. This dissertation addresses whether preaching and teaching equip t…
Pornography has increasingly become a hot topic of discussion in the United States, likely due to its increasing rate of consumption. Recent scholarship has indicated the need to account for factors such as masturbation and sexual desire discrepancy when conducting pornography r…
This dissertation provides a theoretical framework for a multi-disciplinary approach to communication in conflict and problem-solving. It sheds light on best practices of communication, with a focus on dialogue in multi-party decision-making, conflict intervention, policy-making…
Islamic terrorism has become a global problem which has resulted in human, social, political, and economic costs. Many Islamic terrorist organizations have focused their attacks on the West and its interests. They justify these acts by making reference to policies of the West, w…
This dissertation investigates the social world of contemporary filmmakers in the Middle East and the way they use visual media to re-imagine existent forms of identity, envision new modes of social agency, and transform public culture in the face of dramatic instability. In the…
What kinds of power-resources do third party interveners employ to influence adversarial parties' behavior in the course of mediation? What factors and circumstances shape the effective use of such resources? This study attempts to answer these and allied questions by examining …