A Longitudinal Examination of Bidirectional Associations between Subjective Sleep Characteristics and Psychosocial Functioning among University Students

A number of studies have found a significant link between sleep and psychosocial functioning among university students. A critical examination of this literature, however, indicates that one important gap within the literature is the need for longitudinal studies that specifically test for bidirectional associations between these two constructs. The main purpose of my dissertation was to address this gap by conducting three studies that examined bidirectional associations between sleep and psychosocial functioning among a sample of university students. Participants were 942 (71.5% female) undergraduate students enrolled at a Canadian university, who completed survey assessments annually for three consecutive years, beginning in their first year of university. In the first study, I assessed bidirectional associations between two sleep characteristics (sleep quality and sleep duration) and three psychosocial functioning variables (academics, friendship quality, and intrapersonal adjustment). Results based on cross-lagged models indicated a significant bidirectional association between sleep quality and intrapersonal adjustment, such that more sleep problems predicted more negative intrapersonal adjustment over time, and vice versa. Unidirectional associations indicated that both higher academic achievement and more positive friendship quality were significant predictors of less sleep problems over time. In the second study, in which I examined bidirectional associations between sleep and media use, results provided support only for unidirectional associations; such that more sleep problems predicted increases in both time spent watching television and time spent engaged in online social networking. In the third study of my dissertation, in which I examined social ties at university and sleep quality, results indicated a significant bidirectional association, such that more positive social ties predicted less sleep problems over time, and vice versa. Importantly, emotion regulation was a significant mediator of this association. Findings across the three studies, highlight the importance of determining the direction of effects between different sleep characteristics and various aspects of university students’ psychosocial functioning, as such findings have important implications for both methodology and practice. A better understanding of the nature of the associations between sleep and psychosocial functioning will equip students, parents and university administrators with the tools necessary to facilitate successful adjustment across the university years.

Bank of Canada Records, 1958-1989

The Bank of Canada first introduced Canada Savings Bonds during the First and Second World Wars. At the time, they were known as War Savings Certificates and Victory Bonds and were used to fund the war effort. In 1946, Canada Savings Bonds were used as part of Canada’s Postwar Financing Program. At that time, the government also introduced the sale of bonds through payroll deduction. Canada Savings Bonds proved to be very popular, providing investors with a convenient, flexible and safe investment. Over time the bonds failed to remain competitive with other low-risk investment options, and the high cost of administering the program called into question its relevance. An independent report commissioned by the government in 2004 recommended that the bonds be phased out, however, the government decided to keep the program and make some revisions. As of 2012, Canada Savings Bonds are available exclusively through the payroll savings program, while Canada Premium Bonds (introduced in 1998) are available through financial institutions, dealers and by phone.

Ontario Winter Games records, 1984-1985.

The Ontario Winter Games began in 1970. This four day sporting event features amateur athletes from across the province, with the majority of the athletes being between the ages of 14-18. The event is held every two years and averages 3,500 participants, including athletes, coaches and officials. It provides an opportunity for young athletes to showcase and develop their skills, often preparing them for sports competitions at the national and international level. The 1985 Ontario Winter Games were held in St. Catharines, Ontario, from March 14-17.

University Students' Perceptions of Myocardial Infarction Patients

This study examined: (1) whether individuals who were described as having a myocardial infarction (MI) were perceived differently compared to individuals who were described as having rheumatoid arthritis or individuals who had no health condition; and (2) whether individuals described as engaging in exercise following an MI were perceived more positively than those described as not engaging in exercise following an MI or for whom no mention of exercise was made. University students (n = 473) were randomly assigned 1 of 10 target conditions. They completed demographic information, read a target description, created an image of that target in their head, and then rated that target on physical and personality characteristics. The results showed that the MI targets were perceived more negatively than the arthritis targets and healthy controls, specifically on the physical characteristics. Further, engaging in exercise following an MI helped to reduce the negative perceptions associated with MIs.

The Effects of a Social-Evaluative Body Image Threat on Shame, Social Physique Anxiety, Body Dissatisfaction and Cortisol Responses in University Men

Men struggle with body image concerns particularly related to the desire to be muscular. In women, social-evaluative body image threats have been linked to increased shame and cortisol responses, consistent with social self-preservation theory (SSPT), but no research has investigated these responses in men. Men (n = 66) were randomly assigned to either a social-evaluative threat (SET) or non-social-evaluative threat (N-SET) condition. Participants provided saliva samples and completed body shame, body dissatisfaction and social physique anxiety measures prior to and following their condition, during which anthropometric and strength measures were assessed. Results indicated men in the SET condition had higher body shame, social physique anxiety, and body dissatisfaction and had higher levels of cortisol than men in the N-SET condition post-social-evaluative threat. These findings, consistent with SSPT, suggest that social-evaluative body image threats may lead to increased body shame and social physique anxiety, greater body dissatisfaction and higher cortisol levels.

Ribbed moraines and subglacial geomorphological signatures of interior-sector palaeo-ice sheet dynamics

Transverse, subglacial bedforms (ribbed moraines) occur frequently in southern Keewatin, Nunavut, Canada, where they record a complex glacial history, including shifting centers of ice dispersal and fluctuating basal thermal regimes. Comprehensive mapping and quantitative morphometric analysis of the subglacial bedform archive in this sector reveals that ribbed moraines are spatially clustered by size and assume a broad range of visually distinct forms. Results suggest that end-member morphologies are consistent with a dichotomous polygenetic origin, and that a continuum of forms emerged through subsequent reshaping processes of variable intensity and duration. Translocation of mobile, immobile and quasi-mobile beds throughout the last glacial cycle conditioned the development of a subglacial deforming bed mosaic, and is likely responsible for the patchy zonation of palimpsest and inherited landscape signatures within this former core region of the Laurentide Ice Sheet. Comparison against field evidence collected from central Norway suggests that bedforming processes can be locally mediated by pre-existing topography.

Coping with a Learning Disability: A Case Study

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to understand a child’s experience with a learning disability (LD) through the way that they cope with it, and how self-esteem, self-efficacy, attribution style, and social support contribute to this process. Qualitative interviews were conducted with one child, his parents, and his teacher, accompanied by a content analysis of the child’s psychosocial assessment report. It was found that the child copes well with having a learning disability, employing a problem-focused/approach coping style by seeking help and practicing for skills he struggles with, an emotion-focused coping style by implementing strategies to alleviate frustration, and compartmentalizing his disability. Further, self-esteem, self-efficacy, attribution style, social support and sports and leisure engagement were found to contribute positively to the coping process. These findings offer useful implications for parents, teachers, and practitioners to support other students with LD.

Brock Essay - The Chateau Cabinet

An essay submitted to Professor J.E. Anderson by Sean O'Sullivan, 10 November 1975. The essay entitled, The Chateau Cabinet: A Case Study in Intra-Party Conflict, studies how "internal discontent---be it based on philosophical or personality difference---leads to intra-party conflict---and the roots of such discontent are indeed strong within the Progressive Conservative Party."

Brock Essay - The Political Culture of Ontario

An essay submitted by Sean O'Sullivan to Professor W.A. Matheson, 25 April 1977. The focus of the essay is stable government, "As one of the chief, if not the predominant, force in giving Confederation its political shape, Ontario helped bring about a central government designed to promote, and dedicated to preserve, stability. In the governing of their own province, the people of Ontario have been faithful to that same goal of stability. Perhaps that steadfast attitude says more than anything else about the political culture of Ontario."

STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS, LAYER THICKNESS MEASUREMENTS AND MINERALOGICAL INVESTIGATION OF THE LARGE INTERIOR LAYERED DEPOSIT WITHIN GANGES CHASMA, VALLES MARINERIS, MARS

The interior layered deposit (ILD) in Ganges Chasma, Valles Marineris, is a 4.25 km high mound that extends approximately 110 km from west to east. The deposition, deformation, and erosion history of the Ganges ILD records aids in identifying the processes that formed and shaped the Chasma. To interpret structural and geomorphic processes acting on the ILD, multiple layer attitudes and layer thickness transects were conducted on the Ganges ILD. Mineralogical data was analyzed to determine correlations between materials and landforms. Layer thickness measurements indicate that the majority of layers are between 0.5 m and 4 m throughout the ILD. Three major benches dominate the Ganges ILD. Layer thicknesses increase at the ILD benches, suggesting that the benches are formed from the gradual thickening of layers. This indicates that the benches are depositional features draping over basement topography. Layer attitudes indicate overall shallow dips generally confined to a North-South direction that locally appear to follow bench topography. Layering is disrupted on a scale of 40 m to 150 m in 12 separate locations throughout the ILD. In all locations, underlying layering is disturbed by overlying folded layers in a trough-like geometry. These features are interpreted to have formed as submarine channels in a lacustrine setting, subsequently infilled by sediments. Subsequently, the channels were eroded to the present topography, resulting in the thin, curved layering observed. Data cannot conclusively support one ILD formation hypothesis, but does indicate that the Ganges ILD postdates Chasma formation. The presence of water altered minerals, consistently thin layering, and layer orientations provide strong evidence that the ILD formed in a lacustrine setting.

University Faculty Members’ Understanding of Their Role: Identity, Power, and Silence

This qualitative study was conducted to explore tenured faculty members’ understandings of their roles as professors. Tenure is an institutional means to enact academic freedom, which allows tenured faculty members to investigate topics of their choosing free from external influence. Academic freedom also enables faculty members to be public intellectuals who shape and critique social policies and make knowledge assertions. In effect, the faculty members are institutionally protected to speak truth to power. Purposeful sampling of 9 participants from 2 universities yielded 3 major themes: professorial identity (shaped by such factors as career stage, university culture, and faculty affiliation), professorial power (powers that participants experienced as well as the ways in which they exercised power), and professorial silencing (as a response to fiscal realities coupled with numerous governance issues). While participants were cognizant of the powers that affected their freedoms, they were less aware of the ways in which their position afforded them powers. Subtle but more potent forms of power were at play for tenured professors, but the participants saw themselves as having to work within institutional and financial constraints that limited their freedom to speak out on controversial issues. Faculty members were, thus, silenced and at times chose to self-silence. The context of the present-day university, governance models, and the financial issues affecting universities and departments worked in concert to silence this critical voice in society.

Meat Packers Council of Canada records, 1954-1961

The Meat Packers Council of Canada was originally founded in 1919 in an effort to encourage farmers to produce better quality livestock. Originally known as the Industrial and Development Council of Canadian Meat Packers, charter members included Harris Abattoir Co. Ltd.; William Davies Co. Ltd.; Swift Canadian Co. Ltd.; Gunns Ltd.; Canadian Packing Co. Ltd.; Puddy’s Ltd.; F.W. Fearman Co.; Ingersol Packing Co. Ltd.; Whyte Packing Co. Ltd.; Gallagher-Holman & Lafrance Co. Ltd.; Gordon – Fronside and Fares Packers Ltd.; Wilson Canadian Co. Ltd.; and Armour & Co. Most of these firms were based in Ontario, but the Council’s operations were soon expanded with the opening of a western and eastern field office. The Council was incorporated in 1961. In 1980, the name changed to the Canadian Meat Council.

Fleet Industries records, 1948, 1983-1989

The Fleet Aircraft of Canada Ltd. Company was founded in 1930 by Reuben Hollis Fleet in Fort Erie, Ontario. Within the first decade of operations, the company had gained an international reputation for excellence. With the outbreak of war in 1939, Fleet focused all of its efforts in the design and production of various training aircraft for the Royal Canadian Air Force and the refurbishment of British and Canadian fighter planes. Fleet ceased production of aircrafts in 1957 and was renamed Fleet Aerospace, a division of Magellan Aerospace. The manufacturing location in Fort Erie was known as Fleet Industries. Currently, the company is a Canadian Aerospace Sub-contractor that manufactures aerospace structures, component parts, and assemblies to approved design data. Fleet’s customers include Boeing, Bombardier, Viking Air and Erickson Air-Crane. In 2006, the Company became privately owned when 16 minority stakeholders took over operations. The Company was renamed Fleet Canada Inc.

Chamber's Historical Questions with Answers

The book is hardcover and inscribed with an illegible signature, dated 1880 and below that is the signature Margaret J. Woodruff. The preface of the book begins, "The present work is designed to fulfil an important purpose in Education - that of bringing clearly into view the leading facts which are supposed to be gained through a long course of instruction. Without proposing to supersede the elementary books usually employed, it offers a certain test of what is presumed to have been previously learned. With such a work in their hands, Schoolmasters, Tutors, Governesses, or Parents, may at once satisfy themselves as to the degree of knowledge on a variety of subjects attained by the young person under their charge, and for whose intellectual culture they feel a special interest." The full text is available in the Brock University Special Collections and Archives.

Tacitus' Germania and the Jesuit Relations: Intertextuality in the Transatlantic World of the Early Jesuits in New France.

The first Europeans who wrote about the Indigenous people of the newly discovered Americas, not only used medieval, but also classical literature as a tool of reference to describe 'otherness.' As true humanists, the French Jesuits who arrived in the New World were deeply influenced by their classical education and, as claimed by Grafton, reverted to ancient ethnographic texts, like Tacitus' Germania, to support their analyse of the Indigenous people they encountered. Books talk to books. Inspired by Germania, the early French Jesuits managed to convey to their readers a subtle critique of their own civilization, enhancing, like Tacitus, the virtuous aspect of the so-called barbarians they described while illustrating the corruption of their respective civilized worlds. This thesis suggests that the essence of Tacitus' work is definitively present in Pierre Biard's letters and his Relation. His testimonies illustrate the connection the early French Jesuits had with the humanist thought of their time.