Current Search: Facilitator (x)
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- Title
- THE ROLE OF OTHER:AN EXPLORATION OF A FACILITATOR'S ROLE IN PLAYBUILDING WITH ECONOMICALLY DISADVANTAGED ADOLESCENT WOMEN.
- Creator
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Melnik, Laurie, Listengarten, Julia, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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During the Fall 2007 semester, I facilitated the devising of a new play with students from a school located in St. Louis, Missouri. As an employee of a mid-America prominent regional theatre company, the organization partnering with the school on this project, I was hired as the teaching artist who oversaw the students' playwriting. Both the school and the regional theatre company hoped my being there would assist the girls in writing a play that connected to their Top 20 Teens curriculum...
Show moreDuring the Fall 2007 semester, I facilitated the devising of a new play with students from a school located in St. Louis, Missouri. As an employee of a mid-America prominent regional theatre company, the organization partnering with the school on this project, I was hired as the teaching artist who oversaw the students' playwriting. Both the school and the regional theatre company hoped my being there would assist the girls in writing a play that connected to their Top 20 Teens curriculum as well as demonstrate the high standards that are expected of them by their school's administration. This is the second year that the school and the regional theatre company partnered on this project, and they discovered last year that the play's use of language and character development suffered due to hands off directing. Neither organization wanted this to happen again and decided that a facilitator needed to work with the girls throughout the entire playwriting process rather than allow the students free reign in hopes that they were challenged to make different decisions from last year's play. The school's student population stems from communities deemed economically disadvantaged, and my role in this project proved challenging due to the fact that I am not from the same population as the students. As a white, middle class female working in an inner city environment, I seem to be endowed with a modicum of perceived power, whether or not I agree with it or want it. In my experience, I have noticed a dynamic permeated by uneasiness due to past, and current, tensions between whites and other races. As a Caucasian entering an inner city environment, I felt like the obvious minority. Resulting from these situations, I assume the role of "other" when entering populations that differ from my own. In the case of the school, I felt my role as "other" increased due to working in an all-female environment with participants drawn from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. My role as "other" sparked the following questions for me: How do I facilitate this project as an "other," and how does this crucial, racial and socio-economic role affect the construction of my sessions with the participants? I was interested in documenting how I perceived this role relative to my participants and the partnering organization during my facilitation and in my conclusions after the project was completed. During my facilitation, I kept a journal that served as a self-action study during all of my sessions with the girls. The "in the moment" writings allowed me to capture those times when my role as "other" directly affected my approach to the facilitating of the playbuilding and the choices I made during the project. Afterward, I developed a conclusion section that was written a few months after the project had ended. I wanted to determine how my perception of "other" shifted, if at all, while I facilitated the project and after I had the time to reflect on the project. I discovered that my perception of "other" did change as I went through this project. During the study, I found myself aware of this shift, but noticed my awareness of power and privilege increased when I had time to reflect on the project months after it had ended. I discovered that I can be "other" in some instances while this role may not be apparent to my participants. My thesis documents how being "other" guided my choices as a facilitator, as well as when it did not seem to be the basis of my decision-making. From this study, I concluded that my being different racially and socio-economically led me to place an unnecessary filter over my work with the playbuilding project which caused me to have many challenges as a white teaching artist working in an inner city setting.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2008
- Identifier
- CFE0002119, ucf:47549
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002119
- Title
- Understanding Human Performance and Social Presence: An Analysis of Vigilance and Social Facilitation.
- Creator
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Claypoole, Victoria, Szalma, James, Mouloua, Mustapha, Sims, Valerie, Hancock, Peter, Joseph, Dana, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Social facilitation is characterized by improved performance on simple, or well-known, tasks and impaired performance on complex, or unfamiliar, tasks. Previous research has demonstrated that the use of social presence may improve performance on cognitive-based tasks that are relevant to many organizational contexts, such as vigilance. However, to date, there has not been consolidation of the research regarding the different implementations of social facilitation, or any analysis indicating...
Show moreSocial facilitation is characterized by improved performance on simple, or well-known, tasks and impaired performance on complex, or unfamiliar, tasks. Previous research has demonstrated that the use of social presence may improve performance on cognitive-based tasks that are relevant to many organizational contexts, such as vigilance. However, to date, there has not been consolidation of the research regarding the different implementations of social facilitation, or any analysis indicating which types of social presence are best under varying conditions. The present dissertation describes three experiments that seek to contribute to a taxonomic framework of social facilitation. Experiment One statistically established a difference in task difficulty between twoversions of a cognitive-based vigilance task by utilizing increasing increments of event rate in order to examine the first factor of the taxonomy (i.e., level of difficulty). Experiment Two explored the effects of two novel manipulations of social presence, electronic performance monitoring (i.e., EPM) and co-acting, in order to demonstrate that both novel forms of social presence could improve performance, and were worth examining further. Finally, ExperimentThree replicated and extended the results of Experiments One and Two by examining the interaction effects of levels of task difficulty and social presence through the use of ten conditions. Overall the results indicates that multiple forms of social presence can improve cognitive performance, however, this effect was not moderated by the level of task difficulty, as suggestedby the predominant theories of social facilitation. This suggests that future work should seek to replicate and extend this finding in order to determine if the level of task difficult is indeed a moderating variable of social facilitation. Additionally, the results demonstrated that social presence could be used in organizational settings in order to improve employee performance, while also sometimes reducing the perceived workload associated with the task.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2018
- Identifier
- CFE0006989, ucf:51631
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006989
- Title
- An Exploration of the Relationships Between Supervisees' Perceptions of Facilitative Conditions in Supervision, Clients' Perceptions of Facilitative Conditions in Counseling, and Client Outcomes.
- Creator
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Bell, Chastity, Robinson, Edward, Hagedorn, William, Hundley, Gulnora, Hayes, Burnice, Brumfield, Kristy, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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The counseling relationship has long been considered an essential part of the foundation of positive client outcomes in counseling. While many factors play a role in the therapeutic relationship, the facilitative conditions of empathy, unconditional positive regard, and genuineness have been the most-researched components of the Person-Centered construct of the therapeutic relationship. The supervisory relationship parallels the therapeutic relationship in many ways, and as the therapeutic...
Show moreThe counseling relationship has long been considered an essential part of the foundation of positive client outcomes in counseling. While many factors play a role in the therapeutic relationship, the facilitative conditions of empathy, unconditional positive regard, and genuineness have been the most-researched components of the Person-Centered construct of the therapeutic relationship. The supervisory relationship parallels the therapeutic relationship in many ways, and as the therapeutic relationship is critical to counseling, the supervisory relationship is foundational to effective supervision. While the facilitative conditions are empirically proven to contribute to positive client outcomes within the therapeutic relationship, the role of the counselor's supervisory relationship has been largely unexplored in its association to client outcomes. The purpose of this study was to determine if there is a relationship between the facilitative conditions perceived by the client during counseling, and the facilitative conditions perceived by the counselor-in-training during supervision. Additionally, these variables were tested for their ability to predict client outcomes.The sample of this study consisted of 88 clients and 55 counselors-in-training at a large university in the southeastern United States. Both clients and counselors-in-training completed two instruments to ascertain the quality of their counseling and supervision relationships. The Outcomes Questionnaire-45 was utilized to collect client outcomes data. Results validate a correlation between the client's perception of the therapeutic relationship and client outcomes, however there appears to be no relationship between the supervisory relationship and client outcomes. Further results of the study and limitations were discussed.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- Identifier
- CFE0004812, ucf:49741
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0004812
- Title
- Effects of biotic interactions on coastal wetland communities with applications for restoration.
- Creator
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Donnelly, Melinda, Walters, Linda, Quintana-Ascencio, Pedro, Weishampel, John, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Coastal wetland plants serve as ecological engineers in a physiologically stressful environment and the loss of coastal wetlands can cause negative effects throughout the estuarine system. Due to increased degradation of coastal habitats worldwide, interest in restoration has increased around the world. An understanding of the biotic processes affecting species distribution and diversity is critical for future conservation, management, and restoration of coastal wetlands. The purpose of my...
Show moreCoastal wetland plants serve as ecological engineers in a physiologically stressful environment and the loss of coastal wetlands can cause negative effects throughout the estuarine system. Due to increased degradation of coastal habitats worldwide, interest in restoration has increased around the world. An understanding of the biotic processes affecting species distribution and diversity is critical for future conservation, management, and restoration of coastal wetlands. The purpose of my study was to test the effects of biotic interactions on native coastal wetland plants and determine how these interactions may be incorporated into current and future restoration projects. I had three primary goals for my dissertation. First, I evaluated the effectiveness of natural regeneration of coastal wetland communities following hydrological restoration. Second, I examined effects of biotic interactions between mangroves and other wetland species by experimentally testing: 1) trapping capabilities of early successional plant species on Rhizophora mangle propagules, 2) effects of pre-dispersal propagule damage on native mangrove species, 3) facilitative and competitive interactions between the plants Rhizophora mangle, Batis maritima, Sarcocornia perennis, and the fiddler crab, Uca pugilator using mesocosms. Third, I evaluated the combined effects of biotic and abiotic interactions on survival and growth of R. mangle propagules during their first year of establishment using a manipulative field experiment. Results from my study increase our knowledge of the importance of biotic interactions in coastal wetland communities, their role in early successional stages, and have direct applications to coastal wetland restoration and management.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- Identifier
- CFE0005483, ucf:50344
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005483
- Title
- Creating Art That Truly Reflects the Community: An Exploration Into Facilitation of Devised, Community-Engaged Performance.
- Creator
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Grile, Courtney, Weaver, Earl, Brown, James, McDonald, Holly, Kovac, Kim, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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One purpose of community-engaged work is to build and reflect the community; to allow their voice to be heard. This research explores the relationship between the professional artist facilitator and participants in a community-engaged setting while applying devised theatre practices. The facilitating artist brings to the group their expertise in playmaking and storytelling. The research centers on how a facilitating artist might approach devising a community-engaged performance project with...
Show moreOne purpose of community-engaged work is to build and reflect the community; to allow their voice to be heard. This research explores the relationship between the professional artist facilitator and participants in a community-engaged setting while applying devised theatre practices. The facilitating artist brings to the group their expertise in playmaking and storytelling. The research centers on how a facilitating artist might approach devising a community-engaged performance project with awareness of his/her ability to influence the group. How can the facilitator channel their influence to provide productive guidance for the collective creativity in order to honor the community's intent and minimize the distortion created by the facilitator's perspective? Are there guidelines that can be established in order to ensure that the community's voice is undiluted? I begin by engaging in dialogue with established current practitioners in the field and examining literature published on the subject with this goal in mind. From this research a roadmap of perils and pitfalls, signs to look for that indicate tension or discomfort within the group, and techniques and tips for productively refocusing the group's work have been created. The objective of the research is to formulate a philosophy on facilitation that aligns with my artistic mission and values, ensuring the work truly builds and reflects the communities from which it is produced.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- Identifier
- CFE0005095, ucf:50737
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005095
- Title
- BARRIERS AND FACILITATORS TO ACCESSING AND UTILIZING MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES FOR HOMELESS YOUTH: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW.
- Creator
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Lapinski, Abbygail P, Dever, Kimberly, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Homelessness in the youth population is associated with elevated rates of mental illness, substance abuse, and suicidality compared to the housed population in the United States (Berdahl, Hoyt, and Whitbeck, 2005; Hodgson, Shelton, Van den Bree, 2014; Hughes et al., 2010). With a survival-focused perspective, exacerbating issues, stigmatization, and transience housing; homeless youth require special consideration to meet their diverse health needs. When barriers impede homeless youth's access...
Show moreHomelessness in the youth population is associated with elevated rates of mental illness, substance abuse, and suicidality compared to the housed population in the United States (Berdahl, Hoyt, and Whitbeck, 2005; Hodgson, Shelton, Van den Bree, 2014; Hughes et al., 2010). With a survival-focused perspective, exacerbating issues, stigmatization, and transience housing; homeless youth require special consideration to meet their diverse health needs. When barriers impede homeless youth's access to necessary health resources, their health concerns are left untreated and impound until emergency services are required. This review of literature is focused on identifying and synthesizing barriers and facilitators for homeless youth to access and utilize mental health care services. When untreated mental illness reaches a crisis point, it becomes more expensive to treat (Taylor, Stuttaford, and Vostanis, 2006). For youth experiencing homelessness, various factors influence their decisions to wait until a crisis to reach out to emergency services. Within the literature, barriers and facilitators were bracketed into personal, social, and structural factors. These factors ranged from financial concerns, communication with health care providers and between health care service locations, stigmatization, lack of awareness, and administrative requirements. While further research is required, evidence from the literature shows promise in developing and altering interventions and communication to meet homeless youth's mental health and substance abuse needs.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2019
- Identifier
- CFH2000468, ucf:45860
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH2000468
- Title
- UNDERSTANDING PLANT COMMUNITY COMPOSITION IN AGRICULTURAL WETLANDS: CONTEXT DEPENDENT EFFECTS AND PLANT INTERACTIONS.
- Creator
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Boughton, Elizabeth, Quintana-Ascencio, Pedro, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Community composition results from an integrated combination of random processes, regional habitat spatial structure, local environmental conditions, and species interactions. For example, the outcome of plant interactions can change depending on local environmental conditions such as nutrient availability, land management, or herbivory intensity. In particular, plant interactions may vary between facilitation and competition depending on ecological context, with facilitation expected to be...
Show moreCommunity composition results from an integrated combination of random processes, regional habitat spatial structure, local environmental conditions, and species interactions. For example, the outcome of plant interactions can change depending on local environmental conditions such as nutrient availability, land management, or herbivory intensity. In particular, plant interactions may vary between facilitation and competition depending on ecological context, with facilitation expected to be prevalent under stressful conditions. I present the results of four studies that address different aspects of the community assemblage and dynamics emphasizing the synergistic effect of different processes. In the first, I investigated the importance of habitat isolation in determining species richness of wetlands with contrasting land use. The second describes an experiment to test the hypothesis that plant interactions with an unpalatable plant (Juncus effusus) would range from competition in ungrazed areas to facilitation in grazed areas and predicted that facilitative effects of Juncus would differ among functional groups of beneficiary species and be strongest when grazing was intense. In the third, I examine the community composition impacts of Juncus and predicted that Juncus would preserve functional diversity in grazed wetlands but that the effects of Juncus would vary along a grazing gradient. The fourth study investigated the relative importance of competition and nutrients in determining wetland invasion in two different land use types. Broadly, I demonstrate that the importance of different processes (habitat isolation, nutrient availability, competition/facilitation) to community composition is dependent on ecological conditions. This integrated view of community dynamics is interesting from a purely ecological perspective but also can be applied to understanding ecological problems such as exotic invasions and restoration of disturbed habitats.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- Identifier
- CFE0002678, ucf:48234
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002678
- Title
- Modeling and analysis of a three-species food web with facilitated and intraguild predation.
- Creator
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Castro, Joshua, Weishampel, John, Quintana-Ascencio, Pedro, Nevai, A, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Biotic interactions are known to shape natural community assemblages and biodiversity. Positive interactions such as facilitation have recently received attention in ecological food webs. Mechanistic models have improved our understanding of these complex food web interactions. Here, focus is given to a three-species food web system with a beach dune natural community in mind. In the last decade, there has been a series of studies investigating intraguild predation between two major...
Show moreBiotic interactions are known to shape natural community assemblages and biodiversity. Positive interactions such as facilitation have recently received attention in ecological food webs. Mechanistic models have improved our understanding of these complex food web interactions. Here, focus is given to a three-species food web system with a beach dune natural community in mind. In the last decade, there has been a series of studies investigating intraguild predation between two major loggerhead sea turtle nest predators, North American raccoons and Atlantic ghost crabs. Studies have also highlighted that ghost crab predation assists raccoons in finding nests (i.e., facilitated predation). However, the combined effects of these two intraguild interactions and their consequences on nests have not been examined explicitly. The aims of this study were to (i) develop a three-species, ordinary differential equation model (ii) implement a sensitivity analysis to understand the influence of facilitation and other factors in driving species richness and abundance and (iii) characterize the dynamic interactions between intraguild predators and their effects on a shared resource. Interactions between ghost crabs and sea turtle eggs and facilitation can yield a wide variety of species abundance responses and were influential factors in the model. I found that high secondary sea turtle egg depredation and low facilitated predation by raccoons led to three species co-existence regions in the model. Controlling for nest predators at higher abundance levels showed that ghost crabs had a larger negative effect on sea turtle egg abundance responses when compared to raccoons. This suggests that interactions between sea turtle eggs and ghost crabs appear to be important and potential sea turtle nest management implications are discussed such as the use of ghost crab exclusion devices.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2015
- Identifier
- CFE0005771, ucf:50074
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005771
- Title
- Do programs designed to train working memory, other executive functions, and attention benefit children with ADHD? A meta-analytic review of cognitive, academic, and behavioral outcomes.
- Creator
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Orban, Sarah, Rapport, Mark, Beidel, Deborah, Cassisi, Jeffrey, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Children with ADHD are characterized frequently as possessing underdeveloped executive functions and sustained attentional abilities, and recent commercial claims suggest that computer-based cognitive training can remediate these impairments and provide significant and lasting improvement in their attention, impulse control, social functioning, academic performance, and complex reasoning skills. The present review critically evaluates these claims through meta-analysis of 25 studies of...
Show moreChildren with ADHD are characterized frequently as possessing underdeveloped executive functions and sustained attentional abilities, and recent commercial claims suggest that computer-based cognitive training can remediate these impairments and provide significant and lasting improvement in their attention, impulse control, social functioning, academic performance, and complex reasoning skills. The present review critically evaluates these claims through meta-analysis of 25 studies of facilitative intervention training (i.e., cognitive training) for children with ADHD. Random effects models corrected for publication bias and sampling error revealed that studies training short-term memory alone resulted in moderate magnitude improvements in short-term memory (d= 0.63), whereas training attention did not significantly improve attention and training mixed executive functions did not significantly improve the targeted executive functions (both nonsignificant: 95% confidence intervals include 0.0). Far transfer effects of cognitive training on academic functioning, blinded ratings of behavior (both nonsignificant), and cognitive tests (d= 0.14) were nonsignificant or negligible. Unblinded raters (d= 0.48) reported significantly larger benefits relative to blinded raters and objective tests (both p (<) .05), indicating the likelihood of Hawthorne effects. Critical examination of training targets revealed incongruence with empirical evidence regarding the specific executive functions that are (a) most impaired in ADHD, and (b) functionally related to the behavioral and academic outcomes these training programs are intended to ameliorate. Collectively, meta-analytic results indicate that claims regarding the academic, behavioral, and cognitive benefits associated with extant cognitive training programs are unsupported in ADHD. The methodological limitations of the current evidence base, however, leaves open the possibility that cognitive training techniques designed to improve empirically documented executive function deficits may benefit children with ADHD.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2013
- Identifier
- CFE0005040, ucf:49962
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005040
- Title
- Role Ambiguity: Defining the Elusive Role of the Special Education Teacher Who Works in Inclusive Settings.
- Creator
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Slanda, Dena, Little, Mary, Martin, Suzanne, Pearl, Cynthia, Boote, David, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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This phenomenological study examined the lived experiences of special education teachers who worked in inclusive settings. Given the increasing number of students with disabilities receiving special education services in the general education classroom (U.S. Department of Education, 2016), there is a critical need to understand the dynamic role of a special education teacher who works in inclusive settings. Federal mandates have required special education teachers working in inclusive...
Show moreThis phenomenological study examined the lived experiences of special education teachers who worked in inclusive settings. Given the increasing number of students with disabilities receiving special education services in the general education classroom (U.S. Department of Education, 2016), there is a critical need to understand the dynamic role of a special education teacher who works in inclusive settings. Federal mandates have required special education teachers working in inclusive settings to rethink their roles (McLeskey, Landers, Hoppey, (&) Williamson, 2011) and restructure their approach to providing specially-designed services. Further, these roles are dependent on those who interpret and implement policy and access to finite resources. This study used a phenomenological research method to examine the roles and responsibilities of special education teachers. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with seven participants (N = 7). A thematic analysis resulted in five overarching themes. The five themes included: (a) supporting students with disabilities within a support facilitation model; (b) role ambiguity of the special education teacher; (c) the lack of roles and responsibilities of the special education teacher within the MTSS framework; (d) the changing role of collaboration and communication; and (e) the challenges impacting the inclusion of students with disabilities in the general education setting. This study exposed the multiple facets of school and district policies that directly affected special educators' roles and responsibilities, as well as the emergence of a new role as a support facilitator.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2017
- Identifier
- CFE0006796, ucf:51821
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0006796