Category: Oral Presentation

Restaurants Service and Customers Care

Presenter(s): Komron Rasulov

Faculty Mentor(s): Cybele Higgins & Casey Reid

Oral Session 3 MI

The culinary community — a community in which people learn and get cooking skills — has problems between restaurant service and customers. In sales, commerce, and economics, a customer, also known as client or purchaser, is a receiver of delicious food, good service, and products that sellers can offer. In the restaurant business, the customer is the most important. Unfortunately, not all customers are happy, patient or satisfied. The presenter researched three of the most common problems which restaurants encounter with customers and proposes solutions for those customers who create these problems for restaurants in order to create a better customer-led experience. This informative presentation will help inform customers to recognize and change their often unpleasant behaviours in public places. Also, the recommendations presented will help the audience to be “woke” in welcoming behaviours, which every customer should exhibit in public places.

Tropical land use change effect on soil microbial function

Presenter(s): Sky Ramirez-Doble

Faculty Mentor(s): Krista McGuire & Stephanie Ostresh

Oral Session 1 O

70% of remaining tropical forests, sites with high biodiversity, primary productivity, and CO2 exchange, are being converted into agricultural or logged areas. Tropical agricultural sites have been found with altered levels of soil carbon, nitrogen, and microbial composition; however, anthropogenic effects on soil and litter microbial functional potential are poorly understood. To help reveal the relationship between an altered soil and litter chemistry and microbial functionality, total soil and litter carbon and nitrogen concentrations were correlated with the presence of key decomposition macromolecules in litter and soil in the three most abundant tree species in El Yunque National Forest: Prestoea montana var. acuminate, Casearia arborea, and Dacryodes excelsa. Through a series of statistical tests, we were able to determine if (1) tree species and land use create distinct physical and chemical zones that alter microbial composition and functional potential, (2) differential carbon and nitrogen availability across land use reflects the dominant tree species present, and (3) high land use areas are correlated to earlier successional species such as Casearia arborea and low land use are correlated with late successional species such as Dacryodes excelsa. My research will provide insight into the anthropogenic effects of tropical agriculture.

Future Flood Risk in the Columbia River Basin Under Climate Change

Presenter(s): Laura Queen

Faculty Mentor(s): Hank Childs & Phil Mote

Oral Session 2 M

The Columbia River has long provided resources as a cultural, economic and ecological agent in the Pacific Northwest. People have congregated along the Columbia’s banks throughout history, from the earliest settlements to contemporary metropoles, but this close proximity poses a serious threat when extreme flooding occurs. Understanding how climate change will affect the future flood risk throughout the Columbia River Basin is imperative for risk mitigation and infrastructural planning. To address this question, we are using an ensemble data set which provides daily streamflow values (1950-2100) for 172 different future projections for 396 locations in the Columbia Basin. To run just one future projection, a modeler must make four choice decisions: the representative concentration pathway (RCP), global climate model (GCM), meteorological downscaling method (MDM), and the hydrological model setup. This ensemble dataset contains 172 projections created by a modeling decision chain containing 2 RCPS, 10 GCMs, 2 MDMs, and 4 setups. With an ensemble dataset produced by multiple hydrologic model parameterizations, we are able to diminish the influence of human-made modeling decisions and find a trend in flood risk change amongst the 172 projections. From the daily time-step streamflow data, we fit probability distributions to extreme events from each water year and estimate flood statistics for floods with 10, 20 and 30 year return periods. From this analysis, we find a substantive increase in flood risk for all outlets sites in the Columbia River Basin and are beginning to study the correlation between sub-basin snow-dominance and increased flood risk.

Knowledge Transfer and Performance in Differently Structured Teams

Presenter(s): Alexander Pulaski

Faculty Mentor(s): Ralph Heidl

Oral Session 3 C

In the business world, the mutual understanding and sharing of knowledge is a critical factor of success. There is a plethora of research that indicates the network of social relationships within organizations influences how valuable information is shared and diffused. Traditionally, business organizations have used hierarchical structures to maintain stability and impose pathways for communication. However, non-hierarchical modes (which are flatter and less rigid) of organizing have recently emerged with mixed results. To better understand the micro-processes that drive the costs and benefits of knowledge exchange in structured and unstructured networks, the proposed research seeks to compare and contrast the evolution of hierarchically and non- hierarchically organized collaborative work using surveys and Bluetooth enabled sensor devices. Using these devices, continuous data streams recording varying proximity states among study participants will be examined and analyzed to illustrate how communication is occurring and changing. This effort will shed new light on how hierarchical and non-hierarchical teams evolve in collaborative work settings.

“Swim the Warm Waters of Sins of the Flesh”: Deviant Gender and Sexuality in Frankenstein and The Rocky Horror Picture Show

Presenter(s): Alyssa Pete

Oral Session 3 O

A myriad of authors have examined gender roles and sexuality in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), directing their attention to the homosexual undertones in the relationship between Victor Frankenstein and his creature, the incestuous connection between Victor and Elizabeth, and Victor’s role as either male scientist or mother. While studies of similar themes and relationships in The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) are growing in number, they are still limited. Furthermore, there is little literature that directly compares the two works and when they are discussed simultaneously, the emphasis remains on thematic similarities and differences of The Rocky Horror Picture Show as a variant of the original 1818 text. This essay works to directly utilize the blatant representation of shifting gender roles and sexuality in The Rocky Horror Picture Show to illuminate or reevaluate our understanding of subliminal homosexual desires, negative coding of sexuality, and androgyny present in Frankenstein. By analyzing the characterization of and relationships between characters in both the novel and film, I will demonstrate the corresponding depictions of gender roles and sexuality in each text. This essay will also draw from the cultural context of the novel and film, the 19th century and the 1970s respectively, to understand the differences in the visibility and reception of shifting gender and sexuality norms in Frankenstein and The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Dishes

Presenter(s): Kaity Olsen

Faculty Mentor(s): Angela Bogart-Montieth

Oral Session 3 DL

Dishes is a short story that follows Anna as she navigates difficulties in her marriage and in her rocky relationship with her sister. Following a series of escalating fights, Anna goes to stay with her sister, where she is finally forced to confront the trouble between her and her sister and the infidelity she has ignored for years. When I first started writing Dishes, I was focusing primarily on the relationship between Paul and Anna, two people who had married at a young age and, through the years, struggled to maintain that love. As the piece grew, and in much of my work this year, I became more interested in exploring the complicated dynamics of women in families- between sisters and their mothers.

Systematic Review of Mental Illness Measures and Diagnosis in the United States

Presenter(s): Megan Olivera

Faculty Mentor(s): Lynette Danley

Oral Session 2 SW

The purpose of this study is to conduct a systematic review of current psychological assessments used primary in the United States intended to address mental illness symptomology or bring about a mental illness diagnosis for patients. Measures included in this study to assess mental illness symptomology or bring about a mental illness diagnosis by clinicians include the Mood Disorder Scale (MDQ), Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale (GAD-7), Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), Hamiliton Depression Rating Scale(HAM-D), Hamiliton Anxiety Scale( HAM-A), and the Bipolar Spectrum Diagnostic Scale(BSDA). This review will have specific attention paid to language used in addressing mental disorders or symptomatology, the structure of said assessments and research, and their design. Effectiveness levels, potential harms, and benefits of the most common mental illness assessments commonly used will be discussed and explored in regard to the language used on said assessments. Implications of these findings will provide evidence for where current assessments used by mental health experts may be lacking in. This information will be useful to not only professionals wanting to reinvent how we screen for mental illness, but also informative for individuals who likely will at some point come across one of these assessments.

Literary Racialization: The Function of Children in Southern Gothic Literature

Presenter(s): Anika Nykanen

Faculty Mentor(s): Mark Whalan

Oral Session 1 SW

Children, who occupy a unique position as creatures of innocence in the American psyche, have haunted the pages of American Gothic literature from its inception, vulnerable figures in whom cultural and psychological anxieties find fecund ground. As such, they have featured critically in racial discourses as well, from slavery and abolition to Jim Crow and the Civil Rights movement. Gothic literature’s exploration of the dark, antagonistic elements of the human mind enables Southern Gothic writers to examine the violent underbelly of the American dream—the removal of indigenous peoples, slavery, and white supremacy—with unique license. This project investigates how relatively underexamined Modern Southern Gothic works such as Eudora Welty’s “Delta Cousins” and Richard Wright’s “Big Boy Leaves Home” reimagine American Gothic’s traditional depiction of race in the South as “the specter of otherness”(Ellen Weinauer, Cambridge Companion to Gothic Literature) by portraying the racialization of children. From the foreclosure of black male childhood to the adopted innocence of white girlhood, Gothic children become a device by which the South’s history of racism, playing out in the lives of literary children, is critically explored. I will examine the work of these authors with a variety of lenses— gothic, historical, racial, and modernistic—looking at Teresa Goddu’s Gothic America: Narrative, History, and Nation, Fred Botting’s Gothic, Robin Bernstein’s Racial Innocence: Performing American Childhood from Slavery to Civil Rights, as well as the seminal Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination by Toni Morrison.

On Being Full

Presenter(s): Kaya Noteboom

Faculty Mentor(s): Mark Hennion

Oral Session 3 DL

The personal essay, as a mode of creative writing, allows total agency in the representation of stories coming from writers of under-represented backgrounds. As an artist who identifies as a trauma survivor, as queer, trans, and mixed-race, I prioritize telling true stories from my life because I feel an urgency to complicate the sparse existing narratives surrounding these identities. “On Being Full” is a personal essay that mediates on two opposing fears: the fear of unplanned pregnancy and the fear of infertility. Within it, I weave expository elements with scenes of unpleasant doctor’s visits, and flashbacks of pivotal moments in my family history. This essay is a meditation on fertility—for the purpose of procreation, and creating as an artist. “On Being Full” provides a queered perspective on pregnancy and motherhood, contributing to the visibility of stories and lives that are seldom given light in the literary community.

Auto-Fiction: Better Fiction Through Non-Fiction

Presenter(s): Kaya Noteboom

Faculty Mentor(s): Mark Hennion

Oral Session 2 DL

Auto-fiction is a literary form that situates autobiographical elements of the author in fiction. How much is made-up and how much is factual varies on a spectrum from almost all to almost nothing. This is a form interested in challenging monotonous expectations of fiction by utilizing components of non-fiction. My research explores how narrative voice and character interiority function differently in fiction compared to non-fiction, and how narrative voice and character interiority can be used to subvert expectations of fiction in works of auto-fiction. I analyze the writings of Ben Lerner, a prominent auto-fiction author, and contrast his work with personal essays. My research is guided by the critical analysis Amit Chaudhuri and Ben Marcus, who practice versions of auto-fiction themselves, and provide helpful opinions on the subgenre. By exploring the role of character interiority and narrative voice in blurring the line between fiction and non-fiction, we might gain insight on how to better innovate components of fiction that are tired and expected.