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The purpose of this study is to explore what teacher candidates (n=156) believe will be their primary assessment purposes, summative assessment practices, and assessment formats in their classrooms, their values and beliefs surrounding assessment, and what contextual factors influence teacher candidates’ assessment beliefs and practices. The results are placed in the context of previous research into the assessment practice of teachers and compared to the recommended assessment practices identified in research and what the Ministry of Education of Ontario expects its teachers to do through its assessment document, Growing Success (O.M.E., 2010). The survey instrument used in the study was composed of questions original to this research in combination with a revised version of the instrument used by McMillan (2001) and Duncan and Noonan (2007). Teacher candidates were divided into different groups based on their grade level, academic level, subject area, and B. Ed program (concurrent, or consecutive). Descriptive statistics were generated for each question by group and overall. A Principal Components Analysis was used to reduce the 35 items in the summative assessment practices section into 5 scales for ease of interpretation. Inferential statistics (paired samples t-tests, Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) were used to determine if there were statistically significant differences between groups. The results of my research indicate that the teacher candidates report having values and beliefs supportive of the orientation towards assessments reported in the research literature and Growing Success (O.M.E., 2010). Teacher candidates’ responses regarding purpose and format were also in alignment with practices supported in the research literature and Growing Success (O.M.E., 2010). In contrast, teacher candidates’ uses of non-academic criteria in making assessment decisions were not in line with recommendations found in the research literature and Growing Success (O.M.E., 2010). Only two statistically significant differences were noted between groups: Grades 7 and 8 teacher candidates reported using constructed response items more frequently than Grades 11 and 12 teacher candidates in their summative assessment practices; and concurrent education program teacher candidates reported their coursework as being less of an influence on their future practice than their consecutive education program peers. / Thesis (Master, Education) -- Queen's University, 2013-10-01 11:48:19.26

The study was prompted by the lack of existing research with regard to what people locally think and believe about dreams. The study aimed to uncover, explore, and describe current, local dream related beliefs, discourses, and practices (in the Vaal-Triangle area of South-Africa), using a postmodern, social constructivist, as well as a generally sociological approach. In support of this aim, a literature review of various religious, cultural, and psychological dream related discourses was executed. Semi-structured, qualitative interviews were conducted with twenty respondents who were purposively selected from the administrative database of a Vaal-Triangle University on the basis of culture and gender. The interviews were recorded and the edited transcriptions thus derived served as basis for a thematic qualitative analysis of the respondents' dream related beliefs and practices. The findings were also examined with regard to cultural and gender related patterns, as well as in relation to existing dream discourses. Findings included that dreams were accorded differing degrees of importance by the respondents, that dreams were believed to originate both from internal factors such as an individual's mental and emotional state and neurological processes, as well as from external factors such as daily events and experiences, deceased relatives, and God. Furthermore, dreams were believed to serve several different functions such as mental processing, releasing pent-up emotions, expressing fears or desires, predicting the future, or providing warnings and solutions to problems. Dreams also often served as basis for decisions and actions, most often in order to avoid a negative outcome, or actualize a positive scenario shown by a dream. Several types of unusual dream experiences were reported, including precognitive dreams, dreams that provided contact with a deceased relative or ancestor, spiritual experiences in dreams, as well as sleep paralysis. The most significant sociological findings included that dreams often influence the nature and content of social interaction between individuals, frequently serving as a source of humour and entertainment; that the mother often serves as the "keeper" of knowledge about dreams, and that local dream discourses and practices might in part be transmitted matrilineally. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Sociology))--North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2005

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore counselor educators’ perceptions of working with students unwilling to set aside their personal religious beliefs while counseling clients. Purposeful sampling was used in a snowball fashion to select participants with a minimum of one year experience as a counselor educator and who are currently working in the field of counselor education. The participants of this study reported and described perceptions of their lived experiences as counselor educators. The primary research question for my study was what are the perceptions of counselor educators as they relate to working with students who are unwilling to set aside their religious beliefs while counseling clients? The foundation for my study was provided by a review of counselor education literature which focused on areas such as gate-keeping, values conflicts, remediation, referrals, due process, and student dismissal. In this study, the Ward v. Wilbanks et al. and Keeton v. Anderson-Wiley et al. legal cases provided the context within which the question of how counselor educators handle working with students who are unwilling to set aside their religious beliefs was explored. Semi-structured phenomenological interviews including the use of open-ended questions were used to collect data. Taped interviews were transcribed, read and analyzed for key words and descriptive terms. The data was coded into categories, categories were clustered into themes and themes were cross-analyzed to create super-ordinate themes. Super-ordinate themes were then used to address the primary and secondary research questions. Based on the results of my study the one over-arching theme that appeared was gate-keeping. Under the realm of gate-keeping fell three super-ordinate themes: ethical issues, student interventions, and legal issues. Implications for counselor educators are presented along with recommendations for further research. Personal reflections of the researcher were presented.

Magister Public Health - MPH / Cleft lip and/or palate deformity is the most common facial birth defect with an incidence of 1 in 600 for every live birth worldwide. Despite the availability of specialised cleft care in Nigeria, many cleft patients are not aware that CL±Ps can be repaired and, thus, present late for treatment. As a result, there is a high incidence of unoperated CL±P in the country which has a grim negative health impact on the population. Furthermore, it was noted that the family caregivers including parents and other members of the extended family are crucial in getting early care for these children with CL±P. Therefore, understanding the perception of CL±P, attitude and experience with cleft services would go a long way in reducing the problem of late presentation and under-utilisation of these services. Therefore, the aim of the study was to explore the care givers’ perception and experience in accessing cleft services at Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital, Sokoto, Nigeria. In this study, we employed an exploratory qualitative methodology that gave deep insights and provided clear understanding of the perceptions by caregivers of children with CL±P on the aetiology of cleft, family reactions and their experience in accessing cleft services at our hospital. Data analysis was done following verbatim transcription using thematic analysis. Ethics statement: Before commencement of the study, ethical approval was obtained from the Institutional Review Boards of the University of Western Cape and the Usmanu Danfodiyo University Teaching Hospital Health Research and Ethics Committee. Informed consent was sought from each prospective participant and the signed form appropriately documented.

Thesis advisor: Mary E. Walsh / Comprehensive and collaborative intervention practices with individuals diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) recognize the essential role of the family in effective, long-term treatment of ASDs (e.g., National Research Council, 2001). While some research has focused on the experiences of families of individuals diagnosed with an ASD, there exists a need to better understand what factors detract from or facilitate the family's ability to adapt to their circumstances. Guided by the FAAR model (e.g., Patterson, 1989, 2005) and the Family Systems-Illness Model (e.g., Rolland, 1994, 2003), this current study examined the relationship between two demands or risk factors (i.e., the perceived severity of a child's ASD and the uncertainty related to a child's ASD), three capabilities or protective factors (i.e., optimism, mastery beliefs, and control beliefs), and the family's adaptation to their family member's ASD (i.e., family quality of life). Parents (N=207) of children diagnosed with Autism, PDD-NOS, or Asperger's Syndrome completed a self-report questionnaire assessing perceived ASD severity, the uncertainty regarding their child's ASD, the participant's optimism, mastery, and control beliefs, and the family's quality of life. Results demonstrated that the perceived severity of the child's ASD, the uncertainty related to the child's ASD, dispositional optimism, sense of coherence, and professional-related health locus of control are factors that significantly influence the family's overall quality of life. In addition, dispositional optimism and sense of coherence were found to mediate the relationship between the identified demand factors and the family's quality of life. Results suggest that perceived severity and uncertainty regarding a family member's ASD are demands that have important implications for the family. Additionally, results suggest that optimism and mastery beliefs can play a positive, complex role in the family's adaptation to a family member's ASD. Finally, the results of this study suggest that control beliefs may act in complex and different ways than expected. Theoretical considerations and implications for practice and future research are discussed. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2009. / Submitted to: Boston College. Lynch School of Education. / Discipline: Counseling, Developmental, and Educational Psychology.

[pt] Pesquisas recentes apontam para a L1 como facilitadora no processo de aprendizagem de L2 (Upton e Thompson, 2001; Jarvis, 2001; Silva, 2003; Zuchelli, 2003), especificamente no processo de escritura em L2 (Salies, 1995; Victori, 1999; Wen e Wang, 2002; Glopper, Stevenson e van Gelderen, 2003). Este trabalho tem como objetivo investigar o papel de L1 no desenvolvimento da escrita em L2, por meio de uma investigação exploratória das percepções e ações observadas no discurso em sala de aula e no processo particular de escritura dos aprendizes. Trata-se de um estudo de caso de um grupo de doutorandos em áreas exatas, aprendendo inglês para escrita acadêmica. Os dados serão triangulados para validação de possíveis conclusões em relação ao papel de L1, a partir das várias ferramentas de investigação: observação participante e transcrição do discurso de sala de aula, entrevistas, protocolos verbais retrospectivos e questionários semi-estruturados. Discuti-se o lugar da L1 na instrução formal para escrita em L2, com possíveis aplicações pedagógicas. / [en] Recent studies propose a facilitative role for L1 in the process of L2 learning (Upton e Thompson, 2001; Jarvis, 2001; Silva, 2003; Zuchelli, 2003), specifically in the process of L2 writing (Salies, 1995; Victori, 1999; Wen e Wang, 2002; Glopper, Stevenson e van Gelderen, 2003). The purpose of this work is to investigate the role of L1 in the development of L2 writing, by means of an exploratory research of the perceptions and actions observed in class and in the learners` private writing processes. This research is a case study of a group of doctorate students from technological areas, learning English for academic writing. The data are obtained from four methodological tools: participant observation with transcriptions, interviews, retrospective protocols and questionnaires with open-ended and closed questions. They are triangulated to validate possible conclusions in relation to the role of L1. The possible pedagogic applications of L1 in the formal instruction of L2 writing are discussed.

The unifying theme of all three chapters of this dissertation is incomplete information games. Each chapter investigates two essential components, namely beliefs and knowledge, of incomplete information games. In particular, the first two chapter studies an alternative equilibrium notion of Sakovics (2001)- mirage equilibrium- and the final chapter introduces a new notion of metric to measure the distance between partitions. All relevant notations and definitions are defined for each chapter so that any of them can be read independently. In the first chapter, I restudy the Purification theorem of Harsanyi (1973) by relaxing the common knowledge assumption on priors for 2 x 2 games. I show that the limit of the (Mirage) equilibrium points in perturbed games generically converge to a pure strategy of the original complete information. This result, unlike the original one in which the limit is a mixed equilibrium point, is reminiscent of risk dominance criterion of Carlsson and van Damme (1993). I also study the conditions for different hierarchy levels that yields risk dominant outcome for coordination games. That is, I give conditions (first order stochastic dominance and monotone likelihood ratio order) that yield the risk dominant outcome of a coordination game as the limit of perturbed game ´a la Harsanyi (1973). In the second chapter, I attempt to provide a generalization of mirage equilibrium for dynamic games in the context of Cournot duopoly in which costs are private information. The task of extending the definition of mirage equilibrium is a nontrivial issue since it is not clear on which level of finite hierarchies of beliefs the update takes place. I take a short-cut to tackle this problem and instead of working on beliefs (probability distributions) directly, I work on the support of them. Broadly speaking, players update their beliefs by eliminating the support of ”types” that do not explain the opponents’ behavior. I show that the limit of this update process converges to a Nash equilibrium of the corresponding complete information game. I also show that the rate of convergence is linear. In the third chapter, I define a new metric to measure the distance between the partitions of a given finite set. I compare the proposed metric with the ones in the literature through examples.

<p>Chronic pain is a costly health problem that affects more than 100 million people in the United States. Race differences exist in the way that pain is experienced and in how it is treated. Many biopsychosocial factors contribute to race differences in pain tolerance. Beliefs about race differences in pain sensitivity may be one of these factors. Previous research has identified that individuals’ explicit beliefs about their gender group influence their own pain tolerance on a cold pressor task. Explicit beliefs about race and pain sensitivity have also been identified but have yet to be linked to actual pain tolerance. Implicit beliefs about race are well documented; however, little is known about the extent to which individuals hold implicit beliefs about race differences in pain sensitivity or whether these beliefs contribute to actual race differences in pain. My thesis examined explicit and implicit beliefs about race and pain and explored whether these beliefs moderated race differences in pain tolerance. I found that White participants had a higher pain tolerance than Black participants on the cold pressor task, <i>U</i>=1165.50, <i>p</i><.01. Participants held the explicit, <i>t</i>(131)=-6.83, <i>p</i><.01, and implicit, <i>t</i>(131)=6.35, <i>p</i><.01, belief that White people are more pain sensitive than Black people. Both explicit, <i>b</i>=-0.37, <i>p</i>=.71, and implicit, <i>b</i>=-21.87, <i>p</i>=.65, beliefs failed to moderate the relationship between race and pain tolerance. Further exploration indicated that participants’ comparisons of their own pain sensitivity to that of their race group moderated the relationship between race and pain tolerance, ⍵=4.40, <i>p</i>=.04. These results provide further insight into race differences in pain tolerance. Researchers may consider examining explicit and implicit beliefs about race differences in pain in health care providers to better understand disparities in pain related recommendations.</p>

Class of 2007 Abstract / Objectives: To conduct a survey instrument on a pharmacists’ knowledge of and attitudes toward dispensing narcotic medications for the management of chronic pain. Methods: A focus group of 39 pharmacy managers for a local chain drug store reviewed 6 knowledge questions and 10 attitude statements for content validity, clarity and readability. The results of their responses to the survey and other comments were tabulated and analyzed. Results: The focus group sample was small and results were not statistically significant. Pharmacists were highly confident about their training, yet most did not score well on the test, especially those questions designed to distinguish between addiction, pseudo-addiction and tolerance. This limited knowledge may have been related to age since many of the wrong answers selected were based on older definitions. Several questions and statements were identified as ambiguous, plus having unclear directions or incorrect information. Focus group discussions confirmed the limited knowledge found in the survey and clarified pharmacist's responses to the attitude statements. Conclusions: What is clear from the literature and our study is that pharmacists' knowledge about chronic pain and the uses of opioids strongly influences their attitdues. Therefore, the survey questions and statements need to be reworded and restructured to specifically evaluate the relationship between pharmacists' knowledge and their attitudes.