Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection
Barrett, The Honors College at Arizona State University proudly showcases the work of undergraduate honors students by sharing this collection exclusively with the ASU community.
Barrett accepts high performing, academically engaged undergraduate students and works with them in collaboration with all of the other academic units at Arizona State University. All Barrett students complete a thesis or creative project which is an opportunity to explore an intellectual interest and produce an original piece of scholarly research. The thesis or creative project is supervised and defended in front of a faculty committee. Students are able to engage with professors who are nationally recognized in their fields and committed to working with honors students. Completing a Barrett thesis or creative project is an opportunity for undergraduate honors students to contribute to the ASU academic community in a meaningful way.
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- Creators: Economics Program in CLAS
Description
This paper explores how marginalist economics defines and inevitably constrains Victorian sensation fiction's content and composition. I argue that economic intuition implies that sensationalist heroes and antagonists, writers and readers all pursued a fundamental, "rational" aim: the attainment of pleasure. So although "sensationalism" took on connotations of moral impropriety in the Victorian age, sensation fiction primarily involves experiences of pain on the page that excite the reader's pleasure. As such, sensationalism as a whole can be seen as a conformist product, one which mirrors the effects of all commodities on the market, rather than as a rebellious one. Indeed, contrary to modern and contemporary critics' assumptions, sensation fiction may not be as scandalous as it seems.
ContributorsFischer, Brett Andrew (Author) / Bivona, Daniel (Thesis director) / Looser, Devoney (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor) / Department of English (Contributor)
Created2014-12
Description
Through collection of survey data on the characteristics of college debaters, disparities in participation and success for women and racial and ethnic minorities are measured. This study then uses econometric tools to assess whether there is an in-group judging bias in college debate that systematically disadvantages female and minority participants. Debate is used as a testing ground for competing economic theories of taste-based and statistical discrimination, applied to a higher education context. The study finds persistent disparities in participation and success for female participants. Judges are more likely to vote for debaters who share their gender. There is also a significant disparity in the participation of racial and ethnic minority debaters and judges, as well as female judges.
ContributorsVered, Michelle Nicole (Author) / Silverman, Daniel (Thesis director) / Symonds, Adam (Committee member) / Dillon, Eleanor (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor)
Created2014-12
Description
Since the start of U.S. hostilities against Iraq in 2003, International Relations scholars have begun to characterize the U.S. as potentially an empire. This is because the traditional notion of sovereignty under the Westphalian nation-state system is held as a constant in the prominent theories that govern how it is thought how nation-states interact with each other. The blatant violation of international laws and norms with impunity by the U.S. have led to a re-questioning of the true dynamics underlying this system. Some scholars have characterized the recent research as a popular fad, but most of the research is aimed at just attempting to show how the U.S. could be an empire. What the current research is missing is how the U.S. became an empire, with that analysis anchored in an historical comparison. A complete chronological review of each system in its entirety is required, with all of its components, to more fully understand these phenomena. This has required researchers to devise a new methodological process of qualitatively and quantitatively analyzing macro structures. We believe the implications of the insights that can be obtained with this new method could be of use to many fields and can generate many new hypotheses to test in the future.
ContributorsRoche, Joshua Nathan (Author) / Crittenden, Jack (Thesis director) / Walker, Stephen (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning (Contributor) / School of Politics and Global Studies (Contributor)
Created2014-12
Description
The goal of the ANLGE Lab's AR assembly project is to create/save assemblies as well as to replicate assemblies later with real-time AR feedback. In this iteration of the project, the SURF algorithm was used to provide object detection for 5 featureful objects (a Lego girl piece, a Lego guy piece, a blue Lego car piece, a window piece, and a fence piece). Functionality was added to determine the location of these 5 featureful objects within a frame as well by using the SURF keypoints associated with detection. Finally, the feedback mechanism by which the system detects connections between objects was improved to consider the size of the blocks in determining connections rather than using static values. Additional user features such as adding a new object and using voice commands were also implemented to make the system more user friendly.
ContributorsSelvam, Nikil Panneer (Author) / Atkinson, Robert (Thesis director) / Runger, George (Committee member) / Computer Science and Engineering Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Information Measurement Theory (IMT) is a decision-making system developed by ASU's Dr. Dean Kashiwagi that emphasizes the inefficiencies caused by decision-making and personal bias. Zen Buddhism is an ancient philosophical system designed to reduce life's suffering. IMT introduces readers to common-sense notions which are spun into more complex topics that reveal flaws in our normal modes of thinking. This style is often employed by Buddhist teachers, and the rigidly logical structure of IMT already proves many points tangent to Buddhist philosophy. In my thesis, I have exploited the similarities of IMT and Zen Buddhism to create a website introducing curious Western readers to the beauty of Zen in a refreshingly frank manner. This project will demonstrate the power of information theory and dominant communication to break down barriers towards understanding. Ultimately, this should offer an exciting new path for prospective students of Zen and help to build understanding between ideologically disparate groups.
ContributorsNess, Stuart Conrad (Author) / Kashiwagi, Dean (Thesis director) / Kashiwagi, Jacob (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Chemical Engineering Program (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
The NFL is one of largest and most influential industries in the world. In America there are few companies that have a stronger hold on the American culture and create such a phenomena from year to year. In this project aimed to develop a strategy that helps an NFL team be as successful as possible by defining which positions are most important to a team's success. Data from fifteen years of NFL games was collected and information on every player in the league was analyzed. First there needed to be a benchmark which describes a team as being average and then every player in the NFL must be compared to that average. Based on properties of linear regression using ordinary least squares this project aims to define such a model that shows each position's importance. Finally, once such a model had been established then the focus turned to the NFL draft in which the goal was to find a strategy of where each position needs to be drafted so that it is most likely to give the best payoff based on the results of the regression in part one.
ContributorsBalzer, Kevin Ryan (Author) / Goegan, Brian (Thesis director) / Dassanayake, Maduranga (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Robotic rehabilitation for upper limb post-stroke recovery is a developing technology. However, there are major issues in the implementation of this type of rehabilitation, issues which decrease efficacy. Two of the major solutions currently being explored to the upper limb post-stroke rehabilitation problem are the use of socially assistive rehabilitative robots, robots which directly interact with patients, and the use of exoskeleton-based systems of rehabilitation. While there is great promise in both of these techniques, they currently lack sufficient efficacy to objectively justify their costs. The overall efficacy to both of these techniques is about the same as conventional therapy, yet each has higher overhead costs that conventional therapy does. However there are associated long-term cost savings in each case, meaning that the actual current viability of either of these techniques is somewhat nebulous. In both cases, the problems which decrease technique viability are largely related to joint action, the interaction between robot and human in completing specific tasks, and issues in robot adaptability that make joint action difficult. As such, the largest part of current research into rehabilitative robotics aims to make robots behave in more "human-like" manners or to bypass the joint action problem entirely.
ContributorsRamakrishna, Vijay Kambhampati (Author) / Helms Tillery, Stephen (Thesis director) / Buneo, Christopher (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
Deconvolution of noisy data is an ill-posed problem, and requires some form of regularization to stabilize its solution. Tikhonov regularization is the most common method used, but it depends on the choice of a regularization parameter λ which must generally be estimated using one of several common methods. These methods can be computationally intensive, so I consider their behavior when only a portion of the sampled data is used. I show that the results of these methods converge as the sampling resolution increases, and use this to suggest a method of downsampling to estimate λ. I then present numerical results showing that this method can be feasible, and propose future avenues of inquiry.
ContributorsHansen, Jakob Kristian (Author) / Renaut, Rosemary (Thesis director) / Cochran, Douglas (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Music (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
In order to discover if Company X's current system of local trucking is the most efficient and cost-effective way to move freight between sites in the Western U.S., we will compare the current system to varying alternatives to see if there are potential avenues for Company X to create or implement an improved cost saving freight movement system.
ContributorsPicone, David (Co-author) / Krueger, Brandon (Co-author) / Harrison, Sarah (Co-author) / Way, Noah (Co-author) / Simonson, Mark (Thesis director) / Hertzel, Michael (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Supply Chain Management (Contributor) / Department of Finance (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / School of Accountancy (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
The following study is an attempt to analyze the idea of the abject through the grotesque representation of the female body in contemporary visual art. The focus of the paper will remain within the scheme of the modern Western ideology of physical female beauty, social affirmations, and restraints. My hypothesis is that the grotesque imagery of the female body in modern art redefines beauty and liberates the female subject by turning the gaze upon itself. The proposition of this study emerges from Julia Kristeva’s theory of the abject as it applies to the viewer and the viewed. There is a distinct relationship between grotesque ideas and the female body as it is viewed in the late 20th and 21st centuries. Visual imagery has become increasingly bold in its presentation for good or for bad. I chose the selected artists because they present dark, often socially ‘ugly’ depictions of the female body in honest, straightforward ways. I question why the grotesque is not popularly recognized on the ‘beauty scale’, yet our society craves this kind of imagery. The purpose of this study is to identify and explain abjection within depictions of the grotesque. This exploration of the female figure and its portrayal through the eyes of modern sculptors, painters, and designers aims to highlight that 20th and 21st century aesthetics have moved towards themes of grotesqueness in beauty, amidst cultural objectification and materialization. These themes perhaps present Western culture’s underlying physical insecurities and self-loathing.
ContributorsWillson, Ariane Lolita (Author) / Dove-Viebahn, Aviva (Thesis director) / Miller, April (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / Department of English (Contributor)
Created2015-05