A cultura nacional influencia o processo de tomada de decisão? Quais são os pressupostos da tomada de decisão? Qual a relação entre a cultura nacional do tomador de decisão, seus constructos pessoais, a produção de sentido e a tomada de decisão? Este trabalho buscou desenvolver um raciocínio acerca desta temática, criando um modelo que integra conceitos de culturas nacionais, a teoria dos constructos pessoais e a teoria da produção de sentido. Este modelo de análise foi então aplicado a estudantes universitários de origem alemã, italiana e ibérica no Estado do Rio Grande do Sul. Foram aplicados dois questionários estruturados, um aberto e um fechado bem como um quase-experimento para chegar-se aos resultados. Aproximadamente 700 pessoas participaram da pesquisa em 6 cidades. Os dados foram então analisados através de análise de conteúdo (para as questões abertas), e técnicas estatísticas como regressão linear e análise fatorial para as questões fechadas. A relação entre cultura nacional, constructos pessoais, produção de sentido e tomada de decisão foi evidenciada parcialmente. Observou-se que os constructos pessoais variaram conforme a origem dos respondentes, porém a diferença entre as culturas italiana, alemã e ibérica não foi significativa para a decisão individual, não influenciando de forma diferente a tomada de decisão e a produção de sentido. Houve no entanto, uma diferença importante entre decisão individual e organizacional, verificando-se a influência da origem cultural (ascendência) no processo de tomada de decisão organizacional, no que tange a percepção da qualidade, sem no entanto alterar a ordem de importância dos atributos (constructos pessoais) de decisão. Estes resultados são importantes pois ajudam a entender o processo decisório, ressaltando a emergência de uma cultura regional (geral), mais forte do que as influências dos países de origem (ascendências). / Does national culture influence the decision-making process? What are the assumptions of decision-making? What is the relationship between the decision maker´s national culture, his personal constructs, his sensemaking and his actual decision? This study aimed to develop an argument about this issue, creating a model that integrates concepts of national culture, the personal constructs theory, and the sensemaking theory. This analysis model was then applied to Brazilian university students of German, Italian and Iberian origins (ancestry) in the state of Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil). Two structured questionnaires were applied as well as a quasi-experiment to get to the results. Approximately 700 people participated in the survey in 6 cities. The data were then analyzed using content analysis (for open questions), and statistical techniques such as correlation, regression and factor analysis for the closed questions. The relationship between national culture, personal constructs, sensemaking and decision-making was evidenced in part. It was observed that personal constructs varied according to the origin of the respondents, but the difference between Italian, German and Iberian cultures was not significant for the individual decision, not influencing in a different way the decision-making and the sensemaking. There was however, an important difference between individual and organizational decision, showing the influence of cultural origin (ancestry) in the organizational decision making process regarding the perception of quality, without changing the order of importance of the decision attributes (personal constructs). These results are useful to understand the decision-making process, highlighting the emergence of a (general) regional culture, stronger than the influence of countries of origin (ancestry).

Esta tese investiga heurísticas de criação de oportunidades empreendedoras em startups. Pesquisas sobre ação empreendedora com base em heurísticas são desenvolvidas tendo como premissa que o mercado oferece várias oportunidades, prontas para serem selecionadas. Tais pesquisas não investigam como se dá a ação empreendedora quando há a necessidade de criação de uma nova oportunidade. Pesquisas sobre ação empreendedora com base em heurísticas também não exploram conceitualmente e empiricamente a criação de oportunidades empreendedoras por startups. Para preencher essas lacunas, esta tese se propõe a analisar a aderência da tipologia proposta por Bingham e Eisenhardt (2011) na criação de oportunidades empreendedoras por startups. A proposição que se faz é a seguinte: a tipologia proposta por Bingham e Eisenhardt não prevê heurísticas de gestão para a criação de novas oportunidades, já que tem como premissa que o mercado dispõe de várias oportunidades prontas para serem capturadas. Com base nesta análise, a seguinte pergunta dirige esta tese: Quais as heurísticas presentes na criação de oportunidades empreendedoras? Para responder a esta pergunta, esta tese constrói um quadro conceitual a partir da literatura e emprega a abordagem de pesquisa empírica, através da análise de ações empreendedoras unindo percepções, decisões e ações através de estudos de múltiplos casos realizados em oito startups. A contribuição central desta tese é a proposição de uma tipologia de heurísticas relacionadas à criação de oportunidades empreendedoras, adaptando a tipologia proposta por Bingham e Eisenhardt. Enquanto a tipologia de Bingham e Eisenhardt determina que empresas aprendem heurísticas dos tipos seleção, processual, prioridade e temporal, esta tese determina que empresas também aprendem heurísticas do tipo \'criação\' e propõe uma nova tipologia de heurísticas para a criação de oportunidades empreendedoras: \'startups aprendem heurísticas dos tipos criação, processual, prioridade e temporal\', uma vez que necessitam criar uma oportunidade que o mercado ainda não dispõe. / This thesis investigates heuristics creating entrepreneurial opportunities for startups. Research on entrepreneurial action based on heuristics are developed with the premise that the market offers several opportunities, ready to be selected. Such surveys do not investigate how is the entrepreneurial action when there is a need to create a new opportunity. Research on entrepreneurial action based on heuristics did not explore conceptually and empirically creating entrepreneurial opportunities for startups. To fill these gaps, this thesis aims to analyze the adherence of the typology proposed by Bingham and Eisenhardt (2011) in creating opportunities for entrepreneurial startups. The proposition that does is the following: the typology proposed by Bingham and Eisenhardt does not provide management of heuristics to create new opportunities, as it is premised that the market offers many opportunities ready to be captured. Based on this analysis, the following question directs this thesis: What heuristics present at the creation of entrepreneurial opportunities? To answer this question, this thesis builds a conceptual framework from the literature and employs empirical research approach through the analysis of entrepreneurial activities linking perceptions, decisions and actions through multiple cases performed in eight startups studies. The main contribution of this thesis is to propose a typology of heuristics related to creating entrepreneurial opportunities, adapting the typology proposed by Bingham and Eisenhardt. While the typology of Bingham and Eisenhardt requires that companies learn heuristics types selection, procedure, priority and time, this thesis requires that companies also learn heuristics like \'creation\' and proposes a new typology of heuristics to create opportunities entrepreneurial: \'startups learn heuristics types creation, procedure, priority and time\', since they need to create an opportunity that the market does not yet have.

Especialmente em EN III, Aristóteles dedicou-se a apresentar os elementos que compõem uma teoria da ação. Tal teoria se encontra detalhada no quadro amplo do que se entende por responsabilidade moral e requer a investigação do raciocínio prático implicado nas ações humanas, que é efetivado na escolha deliberada. A ação é sempre aberta aos contrários sendo, portanto, indeterminada, e será voluntária se o princípio motor estiver no agente e as circunstâncias forem conhecidas. Entretanto, nem toda ação voluntária é deliberada, como nos casos em que se age por ímpeto, de modo passional, mas toda escolha deliberada é voluntária. Mas, onde se situa, propriamente, a responsabilidade moral? Basta a voluntariedade da ação ou é necessário que haja deliberação e escolha? Esta pesquisa busca entender tais questões e a relação que há entre a teoria da ação e a virtude, em uma tentativa de melhor compreender os elementos que balizam a tomada de decisão e, em específico, a tomada de decisão no âmbito da gestão empresarial. Para tanto, há que se investigar a importância do bem humano supremo, a felicidade, além da importância da educação correta dos desejos na construção do bom hábito e na verificação das condições de construção da virtude perfeita. O caminho percorrido inclui a análise da motivação das ações e as justificativas para cada etapa na evolução do agente em busca da sua formação na direção da virtude perfeita, que se manifestará nas ações voluntárias, deliberadamente escolhidas. Na busca dos objetivos traçados para esta dissertação, esteve presente um dos preceitos de grande importância em Aristóteles: a atenção à precisão e clareza cabíveis em cada investigação, de acordo com a natureza do objeto investigado. A responsabilidade moral, em Aristóteles, é possível de ser identificada na conjugação das ações praticadas com a disposição de caráter do agente, o que inclui não só a contingência e a circunstância, mas também algo mais complexo, que é justamente o resultado do desenvolvimento pessoal dos potenciais humanos, fruto da soma do que foi apreendido pelo mesmo durante uma vida de aprendizado. / Especially on EN III, Aristotle devoted himself to present the elements for a theory of action. Such a theory is detailed in the broad picture of what is meant by moral responsibility and requires an investigation of practical reasoning in human actions, which is effective at the deliberate choice. The action is always opened to the contraries and therefore undetermined, and will be voluntary if the principle is in the agent and the circumstances are known. However, not all voluntary action is deliberated, as in cases where the action is based on impulse or passion, but all deliberated choice is voluntary. Moreover, one question arises: where is it placed the moral responsibility itself? Would it be enough the willingness of the action or is it necessary deliberation and choice? This research seeks to understand these issues and the relation between the theory of action and virtue, in an attempt to better understand the elements that guide decision-making and, in particular, decision-making in the context of business management. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the importance of the supreme human good, happiness, and the relevance of proper education of desires on the way of building the good habit and the conditions for perfect virtue. The path taken in this research includes the analysis of the motivation for actions and the justifications for each step in the evolution of the agent in its searching for perfect virtue, which will manifest itself in voluntary and deliberated chosen actions. In pursuit of the goals set for this thesis, one of the very important principles in Aristotle is in place: the constant attention of the accuracy and appropriate clarity in each investigation, according to the nature of the investigated object. Moral responsibility in Aristotle, it is possible to be identified in the combination of the actions taken by the character disposition of the agent, which includes not only the contingency and circumstance, but also a more profound subject, which is, precisely, the result of personal development of personal potentials, as a result of a lifetime of learning summed up.

Although affirmative action is a beacon of hope for millions of South Africans, it is unfortunately also a source of potential unrest amongst the minority groups, since personal security and integrity in interpersonal relationships between races are being threatened. In light of this it seems as if the government of the day is challenging universal principles by means of their affirmative action policy which may lead to distrust and broken relationships. The aim of this study is to investigate the potential impact of affirmative action on characteristics of interpersonal relationships by means of a Personal and Professional Leadership perspective. In order to accomplish the aim and objective of this study, the following specific goals are set for this research essay: § to identify and describe characteristics of interpersonal relationships by means of a Personal and Professional Leadership perspective; § to identify and describe features of discrimination; § to identify and describe features of affirmative action; § to investigate possible implications of affirmative action for characteristics of interpersonal relationships. / Prof. D.P.J. Smith

Abstract This thesis presents a novel control architecture, Samba, for reactive task execution. Reactive task execution implies goal-oriented and reactive properties from a robot and the ability to execute several tasks at the same time, also in a dynamic environment. These requirements are fullfilled in Samba by the rrepresentation of goals, intermediate results, and robots actions. The key idea in Samba is to produce continously reactions for all the important objects in the environment. These reactions are represented as action maps, which are a novel representation for robot actions. An action map specifies for each possible action how preferable the action is from the perspective of the producer of the map. the preferences are shown by assigning a weight to each action. Tasks are executed by modifying and combining action maps. The tasks can be either reasoned by a higher layer or triggered by sensor data. Action maps, and the methods for modifying and combining them, enable executing tasks inparallel and considering the dynamics of the environment. further, as the action maps are produced continously from sensor data, the robot actions are based on the current state of the environment. Markers describe goals and intermediate results. They facilitate managing the complexity of the system. Markers describing intermediate results decompose the system vertically, into producers and consumers of data. Markers describing goals decompose the control system horizontally, into a Samba layer and a higher layer of reasoning tasks. Tasks flow via markers from the higher layer to the Samba layer. Markers are tested on a real robot equipment with stereo gaze platform. Further, the samba architecture is applied to playing soccer. Experiments were carried out in the 1997 and 1998 RoboCup competitions. These experiments show that the Samba architecture is a potential alternative for controlling a mobile robot in a dynamic environment.

Målet med denna uppsats är att undersöka vilka likheter och skillnader det finns i klippningen av actionsekvenser i filmer producerade i Hollywood och Hongkong. Analysen i uppsatsen bygger på Barry Salts analysmetod för att få fram en sekvens ASL (Average shot length). För att en scen ska få analyseras så måste den innehålla Dancygers fyra kriterier som behövs i en actionsekvens. Den statistik som samlas in jämförs sedan för att få fram vilka skillnader och likheter det finns i klippningen. Resultatet visar att klippningen av sekvenserna är relativt lika varandra men ger ändå olika upplevelser. Detta på grund utav att det är så pass många olika faktorer som spelar in i hur en actionsekvens skapas.

In the future, robots will become our companions and co-workers. They will gradually appear in our environment, to help elderly or disabled people or to perform repetitive or unsafe tasks. However, we are still far from a real autonomous robot, which would be able to act in a natural, efficient and secure manner with humans. To endow robots with the capacity to act naturally with human, it is important to study, first, how humans act together. Consequently, this manuscript starts with a state of the art on joint action in psychology and philosophy before presenting the implementation of the principles gained from this study to human-robot joint action. We will then describe the supervision module for human-robot interaction developed during the thesis. Part of the work presented in this manuscript concerns the management of what we call a shared plan. Here, a shared plan is a a partially ordered set of actions to be performed by humans and/or the robot for the purpose of achieving a given goal. First, we present how the robot estimates the beliefs of its humans partners concerning the shared plan (called mental states) and how it takes these mental states into account during shared plan execution. It allows it to be able to communicate in a clever way about the potential divergent beliefs between the robot and the humans knowledge. Second, we present the abstraction of the shared plans and the postponing of some decisions. Indeed, in previous works, the robot took all decisions at planning time (who should perform which action, which object to use…) which could be perceived as unnatural by the human during execution as it imposes a solution preferentially to any other. This work allows us to endow the robot with the capacity to identify which decisions can be postponed to execution time and to take the right decision according to the human behavior in order to get a fluent and natural robot behavior. The complete system of shared plans management has been evaluated in simulation and with real robots in the context of a user study. Thereafter, we present our work concerning the non-verbal communication needed for human-robot joint action. This work is here focused on how to manage the robot head, which allows to transmit information concerning what the robot's activity and what it understands of the human actions, as well as coordination signals. Finally, we present how to mix planning and learning in order to allow the robot to be more efficient during its decision process. The idea, inspired from neuroscience studies, is to limit the use of planning (which is adapted to the human-aware context but costly) by letting the learning module made the choices when the robot is in a "known" situation. The first obtained results demonstrate the potential interest of the proposed solution.

South Africa’s history as a nation is replete with examples of inequality and unfair discrimination. The working arena was no exception to the rule. In fact, it was one of the areas where inequality was most prevalent. Discriminatory legislation was promulgated under the Apartheid regime. These laws enforced differential treatment of employees along racial lines. After 1994, the newly democratic South Africa, through the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act 108 of 1996 (hereinafter referred to as the “Constitution”), regarded all people as equal before the law and entitled to equal benefit and protection under the law. National legislation was subsequently promulgated to give effect to this constitutional objective. The Employment Equity Act 55 of 1998 (hereinafter referred to as the “EEA”), specifically, gave effect to all employees’ constitutional right to equality in the workplace. Under the EEA, unfair discrimination was forbidden. The EEA also required employers to implement measures to eradicate the injustices of the past. Subsequent to the enactment of the EEA, the Courts reiterated two tests to determine whether unfair discrimination had taken place in the workplace. It also tested whether an affirmative action measure could justify such unfair discrimination. These two tests, referred to in Harksen v Lane NO and others (CCT9/97) [1997] ZACC 12 (11) BCLR 1489 (CC) (Hereinafter referred to as the “Harksen test”) and Minister of Finance v Van Heerden 2004 (11) BCLR 1125 (CC) (Hereinafter referred to as the “Van Heerden test”), were unfortunately applied by the Courts in an inconsistent manner. This created confusion about which test found application in specific circumstances. The Constitutional Court then clarified the confusion through the South African Police Service v Solidarity obo Barnard (2014) ZACC 23 (CC) (Hereinafter referred to as the “Barnard” decision”). It is important to note that this study does not seek to evaluate the correctness of the Barnard decision, nor does it consider the cases prior to the Barnard decision. Rather, this study considers the extent to which the Barnard decision informed later cases dealing with unfair discrimination and affirmative action. In the remaining chapters of this treatise the writer will attempt to answer this question as follows: In chapter two, the legislative framework applicable to issues of unfair discrimination and the application of affirmative action is discussed. Chapter three comprises of a detailed analysis of the Barnard decision. In chapters four and five the writer investigates how the Barnard decision informed four recent cases concerning affirmative action and unfair discrimination in the workplace. These discussions enabled the writer to, in the final chapter; conclude that all four cases were indeed informed by the Barnard decision. The Department of Correctional Services case, however, reiterated the Barnard decision to its fullest extent.

Abstract Stretch of the cardiac muscle activates several physiological processes leading to changes in the function of the muscle. These changes include increase of the contraction force accompanied by changes in the intracellular calcium concentration. This phenomenon is known as Frank-Starling relation of the heart. In addition to this, stretch also influences the membrane voltage of individual myocytes predisposing the cardiac muscle to arrhythmias. In atrial muscle stretch augments the secretion of the atrial natriuretic peptide (ANP). Although several cellular components are known to be sensitive to mechanical stimulus the precise mechanisms participating to these stretch-induced changes are not known in detail. Further it is not known if these changes are causally related or if they share a common causal factor. This research was aimed to study the stretch-induced changes in the rat atrium. The possible interactive mechanisms were studied by recording intracellular action potentials, changes in the intracellular calcium concentration, contraction force and ANP secretion during stretch. The plausible mechanosensitive cellular components were incorporated into a mathematical model that was used to further study the mechanisms. The role of intracellular acidosis as a possible modulator of the mechanotransduction was of special interest. In isolated rat left atrium moderate stretch produced by increasing the intra-atrial pressure increased the contraction force in a biphasic manner. The immediate increase of the force was caused by altered properties of the contractile element, but the following slow increase was accompanied by an increase of the Ca2+ transient. These changes were followed by lengthening of the late phase of action potentials and augmented secretion of the ANP. Intensive sustained stretch was also found to induce delayed afterdepolarizations (DADs). Gadolinium (Gd3+), blocker of stretch-activated ion channels reduced the stretch-dependent activation of the contraction and inhibited the stretch-induced DADs. The mathematical model simulated the experimental findings at best when stretch-activated channel (SA-channel) activation and increased troponin-C affinity were used to mimic the stretch. The modelling data suggested that the SA-channel current increases the sarcoplasmic reticulum calcium content in a time dependent manner leading to Ca2+ transient augmentation during systole. Bigger Ca2+ transients induce a depolarizing current during the late phase of the action potential (AP) repolarization via the Na+/Ca2+ exchanger causing the lengthening of the action potentials. A small reduction of the intracellular pH (0.18 units) with 20 mM propionate was found to modulate the stretch-induced changes in the rat atrium. Acidosis leads to an increase in the diastolic [Ca2+]i during stretch, inhibits the stretch-induced changes in action potentials and slows down the contraction development during stretch by inhibiting the fast component of the force increase. These changes in E-C-coupling (excitation-contraction-coupling) were accompanied by a simultaneous augmentation of the ANP secretion. Furthermore, it was shown that contraction force and diastolic [Ca2+]i of the stretched tissue are more sensitive to acidosis than in non-stretched tissue. In conclusion, the stretch-induced changes in rat atrial myocytes are mediated by at least two mechanisms; stretch-activated Ca2+ influx and change in the properties of the contractile element. The action potential changes can be largely explained by modulation of the membrane voltage by intracellular calcium via Na+/Ca2+-exchanger. The co-occurrence of the changes in the [Ca2+]i and ANP secretion suggests that the stretch-induced ANP secretion can be mediated by [Ca2+]i.

It has been claimed that action representations can be evoked by the image of a handled object (Tucker & Ellis, 1998). Contrary to this view, it may instead be the location of the object’s handle in visual space that generates a spatial code that in turn interacts with selection of response location. For example, an object with its handle extending into right visual space may bias attention to the right, resulting in a faster right- versus left-sided response (Cho & Proctor, 2010). In the current experiments I present evidence that under certain task conditions, images of objects evoke their corresponding action representations. When subjects engaged in laterality judgments to images of hands presented after or in conjunction with an image of a handled object, motor representations associated with that object were evoked. Although the location of the handle was irrelevant to the task, subjects were faster at responding when the depicted handle location and hand of response were aligned (i.e., right-handed key press to a right-handled frying pan) rather than misaligned. The effect of alignment remained constant across the response time distribution. When subjects made a crossed-hand response, the alignment effect was driven by a correspondence between the location of the object’s handle and the response hand, not the response location. These results contrast with what was found when observers responded to directional arrow cues in place of pictures of hands. With arrow cues, the observed alignment effect appeared to be driven by spatial correspondence between the location of the object’s body and the location of the response button. Moreover, in this case the alignment effect decreased across the response time distribution, in keeping with other cases of spatial compatibility effects (Proctor, Miles, & Baroni, 2011). I conclude that attention to an image of a hand can induce observers to activate motor affordances associated with pictured objects. / Graduate