Specialist in Education (Ed.S.), University of Dayton, 2022, School Psychology

Executive functioning (EF) skills are a vital part of human development, emotional regulation, and knowledge acquisition and retention. Executive functioning skills help to reduce externalizing behaviors, predict academic achievement, and maintain social relationships. Successful executive functioning skills help to make the classroom a more peaceful and structured environment for the teacher and student. The current research explored Ohio Kindergarten through fifth grade elementary school teachers' knowledge, awareness, and beliefs of executive functioning skills. Through quantitative analysis using a survey instrument which was adapted from a previous study examining middle school teacher's knowledge, beliefs, and awareness of EF skills (Biecheler, 2019). The study supported teachers have knowledge about the topic and believe they are important for academic success and behavior. Executive functioning skills are expected of students, but never explicitly taught. Teachers indicated their teacher training programs did not provide them with the proper training to address EF skills in the classroom, although they have the confidence in their ability to do so. Additionally, general and special education teachers' responses were compared to determine the difference in groups.

Committee: Susan Davies (Advisor); Shauna Adams (Committee Member); Layla Kurt (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Educational Psychology; Psychology; Quantitative Psychology; Teacher Education

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Toledo, 2020, Curriculum and Instruction: Special Education

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to describe how pre-service general and special education teachers self-reported knowledge of twice exceptionality (2e) as well as how they made referral decision after reading a vignette about a student presenting twice exceptional characteristics. Survey and interview data analysis indicate a lack of knowledge in respect to four topics: IDEA, IEP, Identification and Referral, and Characteristics. With a low response rate of 5.93%, generalization of data is not appropriate. Despite the low response rate, it is noteworthy that study participants did report lack of 2e knowledge in all four topic areas, reported little to no content about 2e within their undergraduate programs, and also reported little to no experiences with 2e learners.

Committee: Robert Schultz (Committee Chair); Richard Welsch (Committee Member); Edward Cancio (Committee Member); Edward Amend (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Teacher Education

Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, 2017, Psychology

Claims are more likely to be judged true when accompanied by information that, though related to the subject of the claim, is actually nonprobative. This finding, coined the truthiness effect, is thought to occur because the embellished claims are processed more fluently, and therefore seem more accurate, than the unembellished claims. Five experiments are reported that explore the explanations for this effect. After an initial replication using nonprobative images, two experiments diminish truthiness via manipulations designed to mitigate the use of fluency as a cue for determining truth value of the claims: first by slowing presentation rate of the stimuli and then by warning participants of the nonprobative nature of the accompanying images. The concluding two experiments test alternative accounts of the truthiness effect. In Experiment 4, truthiness was not observed when claims were presented in a forced-choice format, supporting the hypothesis that a shift in response criteria underlies the effect in the standard true-false format. Experiment 5 was conducted to determine if truthiness is better conceptualized as increased positive responding to embellished claims or diminished positive responding to unembellished claims. A full design was used in which presence of nonprobative information was manipulated between subjects for some participants and within subjects for others. Though results were equivocal, available evidence best aligns with an inhibition account of truthiness, in which participants adopt a more conservative criterion for statements without nonprobative information when other statements have such information.

Committee: Robert Greene PhD (Committee Chair); Elizabeth Short PhD (Committee Member); Brooke Macnamara PhD (Committee Member); Fey Parrill PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Cognitive Psychology; Experimental Psychology; Psychology