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Description
RecyclePlus is an iOS mobile application that allows users to be knowledgeable in the realms of sustainability. It gives encourages users to be environmental responsible by providing them access to recycling information. In particular, it allows users to search up certain materials and learn about its recyclability and how to properly dispose of the material. Some searches will show locations of facilities near users that collect certain materials and dispose of the materials properly. This is a full stack software project that explores open source software and APIs, UI/UX design, and iOS development.
ContributorsTran, Nikki (Author) / Ganesh, Tirupalavanam (Thesis director) / Meuth, Ryan (Committee member) / Watts College of Public Service & Community Solut (Contributor) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / Computer Science and Engineering Program (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
In the past ten years, the United States’ sound recording industries have experienced significant decreases in employment opportunities for aspiring audio engineers from economic imbalances in the music industry’s digital streaming era and reductions in government funding for career and technical education (CTE). The Recording Industry Association of America reports promises of music industry sustainability based on increasing annual revenues in paid streaming services and artists’ high creative demand. The rate of new audio engineer entries in the sound recording subsection of the music industry is not viable to support streaming artists’ high demand to engineer new music recordings. Offering CTE programs in secondary education is rare for aspiring engineers with insufficient accessibility to pursue a post-secondary or vocational education because of financial and academic limitations. These aspiring engineers seek alternatives for receiving an informal education in audio engineering on the Internet using video sharing services like YouTube to search for tutorials and improve their engineering skills. The shortage of accessible educational materials on the Internet restricts engineers from advancing their own audio engineering education, reducing opportunities to enter a desperate job market in need of independent, home studio-based engineers. Content creators on YouTube take advantage of this situation and commercialize their own video tutorial series for free and selling paid subscriptions to exclusive content. This is misleading for newer engineers because these tutorials omit important understandings of fundamental engineering concepts. Instead, content creators teach inflexible engineering methodologies that are mostly beneficial to their own way of thinking. Content creators do not often assess the incompatibility of teaching their own methodologies to potential entrants in a profession that demands critical thinking skills requiring applied fundamental audio engineering concepts and techniques. This project analyzes potential solutions to resolve the deficiencies in online audio engineering education and experiments with structuring simple, deliverable, accessible educational content and materials to new entries in audio engineering. Designing clear, easy to follow material to these new entries in audio engineering is essential for developing a strong understanding for the application of fundamental concepts in future engineers’ careers. Approaches to creating and designing educational content requires translating complex engineering concepts through simplified mediums that reduce limitations in learning for future audio engineers.
ContributorsBurns, Triston Connor (Author) / Tobias, Evan (Thesis director) / Libman, Jeff (Committee member) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2020-05
Description
In this project, the use of deep neural networks for the process of selecting actions to execute within an environment to achieve a goal is explored. Scenarios like this are common in crafting based games such as Terraria or Minecraft. Goals in these environments have recursive sub-goal dependencies which form a dependency tree. An agent operating within these environments have access to low amounts of data about the environment before interacting with it, so it is crucial that this agent is able to effectively utilize a tree of dependencies and its environmental surroundings to make judgements about which sub-goals are most efficient to pursue at any point in time. A successful agent aims to minimizes cost when completing a given goal. A deep neural network in combination with Q-learning techniques was employed to act as the agent in this environment. This agent consistently performed better than agents using alternate models (models that used dependency tree heuristics or human-like approaches to make sub-goal oriented choices), with an average performance advantage of 33.86% (with a standard deviation of 14.69%) over the best alternate agent. This shows that machine learning techniques can be consistently employed to make goal-oriented choices within an environment with recursive sub-goal dependencies and low amounts of pre-known information.
ContributorsKoleber, Derek (Author) / Acuna, Ruben (Thesis director) / Bansal, Ajay (Committee member) / W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Software Engineering (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
In recent years, companies have been expanding their business efforts on a global scale. This project explores this expansion of American-based multinational corporations (MNCs) in Ireland, and the comparison of how their culture motivation in the workplace. We did a cultural study using Hofstede and Trompenaars' cultural dimensions of the two countries then used McClelland's Needs Theory, Equity Theory, and Herzberg's Motivation-Hygiene Theory in order to create three research questions. (1) How does the manager define success for the firm as a whole and for their employees, (2) How is the definition of success reflected in the company's corporate culture (i.e. values, norms and practices), along with how cultural values, norms and practices affect the company, and (3) How do external forces (i.e. governmental factors, workplace technology, etc.) affect the workplace environment and motivation for employees? With these we hypothesized that for research question 1, we hypothesized that from our study of Hofstede's and Trompenaars' cultural frameworks, Irish employees will show a greater tendency to favor affiliation, nAff, as opposed to a need for achievement, nAch, in American employees, according to McClelland's Needs Theory. For research question 2, we predicted that motivation would be administered through style of feedback to employees and office norms, such as autonomy, flexible hours, and work-life balance. For research question 3, we hypothesized that Ireland would have an impact from external factors such as government and technology, whereas the U.S. employees would face no clear impact. We conducted eight, qualitative interviews using a questionnaire, either in person or via video conference. The interviewees were all managers in some facet and have all had some international experience. Through the analysis of the interviews, we found that the Irish employees focused on how employees are able to help or contribute to a group (nAff), instead of looking at how the contribution of a group can be used to meet individual goals (nAch). The American companies reflected Trompenaars' definition of individualism in which employees focus on collaborating in teams, as long as individual goals are met, and benchmarked collaboration as a performance measure, tying in the need for achievement, for research question one. For the second research question, we found that employees in Ireland had a focus on teamwork in the workplace and much higher respect for work-life balance. American firms, in contrast, had a greater focus on making sure employees were contributing, meeting their goals, and getting their work done. While American firms did acknowledge work-life balance and its importance, there was a priority for coming in early and/or staying late to make sure a job got done. Findings for our third question showed that government factors did impact Ireland more, due to labor laws such as required vacation days in Ireland, and that technology had less of an impact than expected, for both countries. More importantly was our finding that the companies in Ireland were greatly impacted by the decisions made by the business executives in the United States.
ContributorsSong, Jenny Jungwon (Co-author) / Brown, William (Co-author) / Arrfelt, Mathias (Thesis director) / Moore, James (Committee member) / Department of Marketing (Contributor) / Department of Management and Entrepreneurship (Contributor) / W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
This paper looks at the growth of influencer marketing in application and how it has shifted the relationship between brands and consumers. Barriers to enter the space and methods of practice are discussed and analyzed to project the accessibility of obtaining influencer status. Best practices for brands and influencers are outlined based on research, and key findings are analyzed from interviewed participants that play an active role in the field. Another component of the paper includes the discussion of the significance of platform dependence regarding influencers and brands using social media channels to reach consumers. The dynamic of the relationship that exists between consumers, brands and platforms is demonstrated through a model to demonstrate the interdependence of the relationship. The final component of the paper involves the exploration of the field as an active participant through an experiment that was conducted by the researcher on behalf of the question: can anyone be an influencer? The answer to this question is explored through personal accounts on the journey during an eight month process of testing content creation and promotion to build awareness and increase engagement. The barriers to enter the space as an influencer and to collaborate with brands is addressed through the process of testing tactics and strategies on social channels, along with travel expeditions across Arizona to contribute to content creation purposed into blog articles. The findings throughout the paper are conclusive that the value of influencer marketing is increasing as more brands validate and utilize this method in their marketing efforts.
ContributorsDavis, Natalie Marie (Author) / Giles, Bret (Thesis director) / Schlacter, John (Committee member) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / Department of Marketing (Contributor) / Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
As the prevalence and awareness of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) increases, so does the variety of treatment options for primary symptoms (social interaction, communication, behavior) and secondary symptoms (anxiety, hyperactivity, GI problems, and insomnia). Various treatments, from Adderall to Citalopram to Flax Seed Oil promise relief for these symptoms. However, very little research has actually been done on some of these treatments. Additionally, the research that has been done fails to compare these treatments against one another in terms of symptom relief. The Autism Treatment Effectiveness Survey, written by Dr. James Adams, director of the Autism/Asperger's Research Program at ASU, and graduate student/program coordinator Devon Coleman, aims to fill this gap. The survey numerically rates medications based on benefit and adverse effects, in addition to naming specific symptoms that are impacted by the treatments. However, the survey itself was retrospective in nature and requires further evidence to support its claims. Therefore, the purpose of this research paper is to evaluate evidence related to the results of the survey. After the performing an extensive literature review of over 70 different treatments, it appears that the findings of the Autism Treatment Effectiveness Survey are generally well supported. There were a few minor discrepancies regarding the primary benefitted symptom, but there was not enough of a conflict to discount the information from the survey. As research is still ongoing, conclusions cannot yet be drawn for Nutritional Supplements, although the current data looks promising.
ContributorsAnderson, Amy Lynn (Author) / Adams, James (Thesis director) / Coleman, Devon (Committee member) / School of Nutrition and Health Promotion (Contributor) / W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
The academic study of eSports, or professional competition through the medium of video games, has tended to focus on players' motivations to play and watch eSports as well as marketing concerns of huge eSports corporations. Instead of utilizing marketing or psychology to analyze this phenomenon, I investigate three areas of focus in accordance with available literature: the fans and their characteristics, the design of the game itself, and the relationship between fans and the game's developer. This investigation was conducted by first examining existing literature surrounding eSports fans, then collecting public domain data such as Reddit posts, forum posts, and YouTube videos, and last by studying interviews with developers and players. With this thesis, I apply a fan studies approach to eSports by creating a series of indicators based in each of the three focus areas which can be utilized as a systematic method of evaluating an eSport's popularity and growth.
ContributorsHilliker, Noah Henry (Author) / Ingram-Waters, Mary (Thesis director) / Schmidt, Peter (Committee member) / Anderson, Sky (Committee member) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
Pandora is a play exploring our relationship with gendered technology through the lens of artificial intelligence. Can women be subjective under patriarchy? Do robots who look like women have subjectivity? Hoping to create a better version of ourselves, The Engineer must navigate the loss of her creation, and Pandora must navigate their new world. The original premiere run was March 27-28, 2018, original cast: Caitlin Andelora, Rikki Tremblay, and Michael Tristano Jr.
ContributorsToye, Abigail Elizabeth (Author) / Linde, Jennifer (Thesis director) / Abele, Kelsey (Committee member) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / Economics Program in CLAS (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
As climate change and air pollution continue to plague the world today, committed citizens are doing their part to minimize their environmental impact. However, financial limitations have hindered a majority of individuals from adopting clean, renewable energy such as rooftop photovoltaic solar systems. England Sustainability Consulting plans to reverse this limitation and increase affordability for residents across Northern California to install solar panel systems for their energy needs. The purpose of this proposal is to showcase a new approach to procuring solar panel system components while offering the same products needed by each customer. We will examine market data to further prove the feasibility of this business approach while remaining profitable and spread our company's vision across all of Northern California.
ContributorsEngland, Kaysey (Author) / Dooley, Kevin (Thesis director) / Keahey, Jennifer (Committee member) / Department of Supply Chain Management (Contributor) / School of Social and Behavioral Sciences (Contributor) / W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
The main goal of this project is to study approximations of functions on circular and spherical domains using the cubed sphere discretization. On each subdomain, the function is approximated by windowed Fourier expansions. Of particular interest is the dependence of accuracy on the different choices of windows and the size of the overlapping regions. We use Matlab to manipulate each of the variables involved in these computations as well as the overall error, thus enabling us to decide which specific values produce the most accurate results. This work is motivated by problems arising in atmospheric research.
ContributorsSopa, Megan Grace (Author) / Platte, Rodrigo (Thesis director) / Kostelich, Eric (Committee member) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05