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Although researchers have begun to investigate the potential mediators and moderators that impact the treatment responses of children diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), limited information has been published regarding the role of parental expectancy effects. Previous research has indicated that the desired effects parents hold at baseline about their children's treatment do not likely contribute to variation in actual outcome ratings. The present study prospectively assessed the role of baseline parent expectations of treatment benefit in actual, post-treatment ratings of 1) symptom severity and 2) global improvement in a sample of 85 children and adolescents who participated in an intensive summer treatment program. Results revealed that parent expectations predicted post-treatment scores on both narrowband and broadband measures, but not on a measure of global improvement, after controlling for baseline scores. These findings suggest that clinicians and researchers may consider parent expectations of treatment benefit when developing future research and treatment protocols.

As systems become increasingly complex and costly, potential failure mechanisms and indicators are numerous and difficult to identify, while the cost of loss is very expensive - human lives, replacement units, and impacts to national security. In order to ensure the safety and long-term reliability of vehicles, structures, and devices attention must be directed toward the assessment and management of system health. System health is the key component that links data, information, and knowledge to action. Integrated Systems Health Management (ISHM) doctrine calls for comprehensive real-time health assessment and management of systems where the distillation of raw data into information takes place within sensors and actuators. This thesis develops novel field programmable health assessment capability for sensors and actuators in ISHM. Health assessment and feature extraction algorithms are implemented on a sensor or actuator through the Embedded Routine Manager (ERM) API. Algorithms are described using Health Electronic Datasheets (HEDS) to provide more flexible run-time operation. Interfacing is accomplished through IEEE Standard 1451 for Smart Sensors and Actuators, connecting ISHM with the instrumentation network of the future. These key elements are validated using exemplar algorithms to detect noise, spike, and flat-line events onboard the ISHM enabled Methane Thruster Testbed Project (MTTP) at NASA Stennis Space Center in Mississippi.

It is commonly asserted that the New Deal order eroded in American politics between 1964 and 1972, laying the groundwork for the rise of American conservatism. On the contrary, liberal reforms proliferated during these years. This project argues that the principles of the New Deal regime were rearticulated and redirected towards new issue agendas and constituencies during this critical era. This period should be understood as an era when the New Deal regime was reconstructed upon a redirection and reinterpretation of the regime’s traditional principles, resulting in new public policy priorities and a rearrangement of the regime’s coalition partners. Through an examination of the civil rights movement, the New Left, George Wallace’s 1968 presidential campaign and the Johnson Administration’s Great Society programs, this account suggests that the New Deal regime was reshaped, not eroded, by the political disruption of this critical era in American politics. The reconstructed regime integrated commitments to civil rights and post-materialist policy agendas alongside traditional economic and social welfare commitments that traced their origins back to the New Deal of the 1930’s.