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- Creators: Arizona State University
- Status: Published
Description
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, declared in March of 2020, there have been many lifestyle changes which have likely influenced tobacco smoking behavior. Such lifestyle changes include lockdowns, stay at home orders, reduction in social cues related to smoking, increased stress, and boredom among other things. This study utilized a cross-sectional survey which looked into these behaviors, primarily perceived risk to COVID-19, and determined if there is an association between perceived risk and education level/race. Education level is a proxy for income and material resources, therefore making it more likely that people with lower levels of education have fewer resources and higher perceived risk to negative effects of COVID-19. Additionally, people of color are often marginalized in the medical community along with being the target of heavy advertising by tobacco companies which have likely impacted risk to COVID-19 as well.
ContributorsLodha, Pratishtha (Author) / Leischow, J. Scott (Thesis director) / Pearson, Jennifer (Committee member) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / School of Human Evolution & Social Change (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2021-05
Description
Traditional public health strategies for assessing human behavior, exposure, and activity are considered resource-exhaustive, time-consuming, and expensive, warranting a need for alternative methods to enhance data acquisition and subsequent interventions. This dissertation critically evaluated the use of wastewater-based epidemiology (WBE) as an inclusive and non-invasive tool for conducting near real-time population health assessments. A rigorous literature review was performed to gauge the current landscape of WBE to monitor for biomarkers indicative of diet, as well as exposure to estrogen-mimicking endocrine disrupting (EED) chemicals via route of ingestion. Wastewater-derived measurements of phytoestrogens from August 2017 through July 2019 (n = 156 samples) in a small sewer catchment revealed seasonal patterns, with highest average per capita consumption rates in January through March of each year (2018: 7.0 ± 2.0 mg d-1; 2019: 8.2 ± 2.3 mg d-1) and statistically significant differences (p = 0.01) between fall and winter (3.4 ± 1.2 vs. 6.1 ± 2.9 mg d-1; p ≤ 0.01) and spring and summer (5.6 ± 2.1 vs. 3.4 ± 1.5 mg d-1; p ≤ 0.01). Additional investigations, including a human gut microbial composition analysis of community wastewater, were performed to support a methodological framework for future implementation of WBE to assess population-level dietary behavior. In response to the COVID-19 global pandemic, a high-frequency, high-resolution sample collection approach with public data sharing was implemented throughout the City of Tempe, Arizona, and analyzed for SARS-CoV-2 (E gene) from April 2020 through March 2021 (n = 1,556 samples). Results indicate early warning capability during the first wave (June 2020) compared to newly reported clinical cases (8.5 ± 2.1 days), later transitioning to a slight lagging indicator in December/January 2020-21 (-2.0 ± 1.4 days). A viral hotspot from within a larger catchment area was detected, prompting targeted interventions to successfully mitigate community spread; reinforcing the importance of sample collection within the sewer infrastructure. I conclude that by working in tandem with traditional approaches, WBE can enlighten a comprehensive understanding of population health, with methods and strategies implemented in this work recommended for future expansion to produce timely, actionable data in support of public health.
ContributorsBowes, Devin Ashley (Author) / Halden, Rolf U (Thesis advisor) / Krajmalnik-Brown, Rosa (Thesis advisor) / Conroy-Ben, Otakuye (Committee member) / Varsani, Arvind (Committee member) / Whisner, Corrie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description城市商业银行是我国银行业体系中的重要组成部分，在新冠疫情的背景下，本文从对我国商业银行不良贷款的成因进行分析，从新冠疫情前后城商行不良贷款、盈利能力、资本充足性等角度进行比较，总结新冠疫情之后城商行不良贷款规模上升、区域分化、不良处置加大等特征变化。然后，从企业、个人和银行本身等路径全面系统地分析新冠疫情对城商行不良贷款的直接影响，并从“宽信用”、“宽监管”和“宽货币”等政策层面对城商行不良贷款的间接影响机制进行分析。在实证分析上选取2018年一季度至2020年四季度的9个经济指标作为控制变量，分成宏观、行业和银行等三个层次，考虑到数据的可得性，选取20家上市城商行的不良贷款率作为被解释变量，通过建立连续型双重差分模型对新冠疫情对我国城市商业银行不良贷款率的影响进行实证分析，并进行稳定性和影响机制检验，得出了受疫情冲击越严重的地区，经济受影响越明显，因而城商行的不良贷款率增加得越多的结论，而且疫情对城商行不良贷款率且具有连续且时滞性的影响。相比高拨备覆盖率的城市商业银行，疫情更能提高低拨备覆盖率、抵御风险较低的城商行的不良贷款率。选取银行资本充足率作为被解释变量进行了稳健性检验。选取工业增加值和居民人均收入作为渠道变量，进行影响机制检验，结果说明工业增加值和居民人均收入对城商行不良贷款有负向的影响。最后，在理论和实证结果的基础上，对城商行不良贷款处置和有效预防疫情带来不良风险的措施提出相关建议。
ContributorsZhong, Rujian (Author) / Zhang, John (Thesis advisor) / Zhu, Ning (Thesis advisor) / Hu, Jie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description
ABSTRACT
COVID-19 has affected every aspect of society, including the performing arts. This study creates a historic record of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Navy Band Southwest (NBSW), located in San Diego, CA. It is an account of Navy Band Southwest’s journey under my direction as the Bandmaster and the transformation from live music performances to performances in the virtual environment from March 2020 until September 2021. The paper details safety protocols developed by the NBSW leadership team that were implemented following Center for Disease Control and Department of Defense overarching guidance. It also examines the process of development of recording techniques, both audio and video, as well as hardware used to create virtual band performances. Chapters cover NBSW operations pre-COVID, development of the virtual music-making process, and the creation of specific projects, including an original commission for wind band that was conceived, composed, rehearsed, and recorded entirely in a virtual environment. This paper aims to capture the perseverance and professionalism of U. S. Navy Sailors and how these musicians adapted to continue making music during forced isolation and quarantine. An archive of selected performances is included with this document.
ContributorsMansfield, Bruce John (Author) / Caslor, Jason (Thesis advisor) / Edwards, Bradley (Committee member) / Holbrook, Amy (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
Description
This work explores the dynamics in emergence, deployment, and execution of modern technoscientific initiatives in the U.S. government. I focus on the federal initiative that developed vaccine and other responses to the Covid-19 crisis. This included federal policy mechanisms used during crisis, political and financial risk in federal technoscientific solutions, and conditions for technoscientific solutions success. The focus on these dynamics during crisis response is an approach to understanding overarching governance of technoscientific initiatives in non-crisis times. The process of exploration includes a series of interviews with senior officials engaged in technoscientific initiative development. Two studies governed by the tenets of the Delphi approach were completed, one in 2020 with senior government officials engaged in Operation Warp Speed, and another in 2021 with former senior government officials involved in government-funded technoscientific initiatives including the National Nanotechnology Initiative, the National Manufacturing Initiative, and the Precision Medicine Initiative. These results were coded and then the data were triangulated and corroborated through the use of public media, follow up interviews, and fact-checking in the local Washington, D.C. policy network. This work reveals a series of theoretical, policy, and practical results. The theoretical contributions include that high profile technoscientific initiatives are undertheorized in Innovation Policy and Science and Technology Studies. This work also establishes an early typology of U.S. government technoscientific initiatives. In addition, this work suggests policy and practical contributions regarding federal responses to emerging crises, as well as lessons from crisis-intervention policies that might be useful without crises.
ContributorsArnold, Amanda J (Author) / Ross, Heather (Thesis advisor) / Cook-Deegan, Robert (Thesis advisor) / Underiner, Tamara (Committee member) / Hurlbut, J. Ben (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2023
Description
The unprecedented amount and sources of information during the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in an indiscriminate level of misinformation that was confusing and compromised healthcare access and delivery. The World Health Organization (WHO) called this an ‘infodemic’, and conspiracy theories and fake news about COVID-19, plagued public health efforts to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. National and international public health priorities expanded to counter misinformation. As a multi-disciplinary study encompassing expertise from public health, informatics, and communication, this research focused on eliciting strategies to better understand and combat misinformation on COVID-19. The study hypotheses is that 1) factors influencing vaccine-acceptance like socio-demographic factors, COVID-19 knowledge, trust in institutions, and media related factors could be leveraged for public health education and intervention; and 2) individuals with a high level of knowledge regarding COVID-19 prevention and control have unique behaviors and practices, like nuanced media literacy and validation skills that could be promoted to improve vaccine acceptance and preventative health behaviors. In this biphasic study an initial survey of 1,498 individuals sampled from Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) assessed socio-demographic factors, an 18-item test of COVID-19 knowledge, trust in healthcare stakeholders, and measures of media literacy and consumption. Subsequently, using the Positive Deviance Framework, a diverse subset of 25 individuals with high COVID-19 knowledge scores were interviewed to identify these deviants’ information and media practices that helped avoid COVID-19 misinformation. Access to primary care, higher educational attainment and living in urban communities were positive socio-demographic predictors of COVID-19 vaccine acceptance emphasizing the need to invest in education and rural health. High COVID-19 knowledge and trust in government and health providers were also critical factors and associated with a higher level of trust in science and credible information sources like the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and health experts. Positive deviants practiced media literacy skills that emphasized checking sources for scientific basis as well as hidden bias; cross-checking information across multiple sources and verifying health information with scientific experts. These identified information validation and confirmation practices may be useful in educating the public and designing strategies to better protect communities against harmful health misinformation.
ContributorsSivanandam, Shalini (Author) / Doebbeling, Bradley (Thesis advisor) / Koskan, Alexis (Committee member) / Roschke, Kristy (Committee member) / Chung, Yunro (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2023
Description
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, countries took serious measures to control its spread and reduce its effect on health, social, and economic aspects. The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has taken unprecedented preventive measures against the spread of COVID-19, including complete lockdowns and the closing of some businesses. Therefore, 27% of companies expected to lose their businesses within a month, while 43% of companies expected to go out of business within six months. This was not only due to the countrywide lockdown, or the impacts caused by the pandemic, but also due to the bad leadership of some leaders during this crisis. There are little of studies and data that discuss the consequences of these decisions on businesses, and it will be helpful to measure the consequences over three years. This study answers the following question: How much did myopic staffing and compensation decisions in the context of COVID-19 affect companies’ performance? To answer this question, I use agent-based modeling (ABM) supported by secondary data to create a simulation to study the consequences of myopic decisions made on employees’ performance in the private sector in the United Arab Emirates starting from the 2020 year and through an anticipated period of 3 years . The study found that under the assumptions that pay deductions, layoffs, and unpaid leaves, are myopic decisions and in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the companies’ performance, there is a huge affect on companies’ performance over the study period which is 3 years.
Keywords: bad leadership, myopic decisions, companies, businesses, COVID-19, agent-based model.
ContributorsAlsaleh, Mohammad (Author) / Trinh, Mai P. (Thesis advisor) / Castillo, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Wallace, L. Marie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description
As the construction industry in Saudi Arabia was on its way to thriving again. Their growth was due to the unprecedented volume of planned projects such as large-scale and unique projects. Suddenly, the world was faced with one of the most disrupting events in the last century which had a devastating impact on the construction industry specifically. This paper explores mainly the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on construction projects in Saudi Arabia. Particularly, this paper explores how the pandemic and its related events contributed to the projects' schedule disturbances. This is because most of the projects rely on manpower and supply chains which were heavily disrupted due to the protective measures. For that, a study was conducted to evaluate the impact on the construction projects in Saudi Arabia, to what extent the schedule projects were affected, and what were the main reasons for the schedule delays. The research relied on a field survey and schedule analysis for 12 projects which resulted in identifying several causes of delays and the delayed durations that the projects in Saudi Arabia were facing. This research allows those in construction fields to identify the main causes of delays in order to avoid or minimize the impact of these issues on future projects.
ContributorsObeid, Muhammad Hasan Hani (Author) / Ariaratnam, Samuel (Thesis advisor) / El Asmar, Mounir (Committee member) / Chong, Oswald (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021
Description
The COVID-19 pandemic arguably affected the travel industry more than any other global industry. In what felt like overnight, both domestic and international travel was halted due to the spread of the virus. Travel organizations, such as The Travel Corporation, had to learn to adapt and create policies and procedures to help mitigate the consequences of the pandemic. This qualitative research examines the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the travel industry to provide an understanding of future travel implications and restrictions for travelers and guided travel companies, utilizing The Travel Corporation as an example. A total of 36 employees of The Travel Corporation were surveyed regarding their views on how the company handled the pandemic. The research shows that the travel industry needs to have policies in place that ensure resilience against any future catastrophes.
ContributorsBurg, Amber Dawn (Author) / Akpan-Obong, Patience (Thesis advisor) / Veach, Paula (Thesis advisor) / Todd, Megan (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2023
Description
Contact tracing has been shown to be effective in limiting the rate of spread of infectious diseases like COVID-19. Several solutions based on the exchange of random, anonymous tokens between users’ mobile devices via Bluetooth, or using users’ location traces have been proposed and deployed. These solutions require the user device to download the tokens (or traces) of infected users from the server. The user tokens are matched with infected users’ tokens to determine an exposure event. These solutions are vulnerable to a range of security and privacy issues, and require large downloads, thus warranting the need for an efficient protocol with strong privacy guarantees. Moreover, these solutions are based solely on proximity between user devices, while COVID-19 can spread from common surfaces as well. Knowledge of areas with a large number of visits by infected users (hotspots) can help inform users to avoid those areas and thereby reduce surface transmission. This thesis proposes a strong secure system for contact tracing and hotspots histogram computation. The contact tracing protocol uses a combination of Bluetooth Low Energy and Global Positioning System (GPS) location data. A novel and deployment-friendly Delegated Private Set Intersection Cardinality protocol is proposed for efficient and secure server aided matching of tokens. Secure aggregation techniques are used to allow the server to learn areas of high risk from location traces of diagnosed users, without revealing any individual user’s location history.
ContributorsSurana, Chetan (Author) / Trieu, Ni (Thesis advisor) / Sankar, Lalitha (Committee member) / Berisha, Visar (Committee member) / Zhao, Ming (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021