Thesis (M.S.W.)--Smith College School for Social Work, Northampton, Mass., 2008. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 131-142).

Zugl.: Lausanne, Univ., Diss., 2007

Zugl.: Bielefeld, Univ., Diss., 2008

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Dept. of Psychology, August 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 211-220). Also available on the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Dept. of Economics, Jun. 2003. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 101-104). Also available on the Internet.

Zugl.: Bielefeld, Univ., Diss., 2000

Conscientiousness-related personality traits are relevant predictors of many outcomes in achievement domains outside sport. They have also been associated with several outcomes in sport, however, their relative role on athletes’ deliberate practice (DP) and other criteria of expertise development has not been investigated. The overall aim of this dissertation was to examine the role of conscientiousness-related traits on sport expertise development. It had six specific purposes: (a) to examine the structural validity of conscientiousness-related measures; (b) to understand whether athletes’ DP amounts, skill level, and other criteria of expertise development could be predicted by these measures; (c) to identify the best personality predictor and combination of predictors that explained the maximal variance in different criteria of expertise development; (d) to examine whether grit facets predicted athletes’ practice engagement across a demanding sport season; (e) to explore coaches’ perspectives on the behavioural indicators of conscientious, gritty, and self-controlled athletes in training; and (f) to explore coaches’ views about how these personality traits may impact athletes’ quantity and quality of practice and development toward higher skill levels. The dissertation used a sequential explanatory mixed-methods design, wherein Phase 1 (Articles 1, 2, and 3) quantitatively pursued purposes (a) to (c), Phase 2 (Article 4) addressed (d), and Phase 3 (Article 5) qualitatively addressed (e) and (f). Article 1 tested the factor structure of the Brief Self-Control Scale in sport and showed distinct associations between self-control variables and (a) sport-specific practice amounts, (b) engagement in various practice contexts, and (c) threats to commitment to one’s sport, in a diverse sport sample. Article 2 conducted factor analyses of the Grit Scale in sport and examined a full latent variable model showing associations between grit variables and several criteria of expertise development. In particular, perseverance of effort associated with athletes’ weekly amounts of DP, engagement in different practice contexts, and skill level, while consistency of interests associated with athletes’ commitment to their sport. Article 3 comprised two studies. In Study 1, path analyses were used to assess the role of conscientiousness on criteria of expertise development. At the broad level, conscientiousness predicted athletes’ engagement in practice contexts and commitment to their sport; at the facet-level, achievement-striving was the best predictor of athletes’ weekly DP and engagement in practice contexts. The systematic test of the role of self-control (Article 1), grit (Article 2), and conscientiousness (Article 3, Study1) for key criteria of expertise development culminated with Study 2 of Article 3, which reported comparative analyses of the predictive ability of self-control, grit, and conscientiousness facets—which had shown to be significant predictors when assessed separately—for the criterion measures of sport expertise. Study 2 showed that (a) perseverance of effort was the best predictor of athletes’ weekly DP, engagement in mandatory practice, and the only predictor of higher skill level, (b) achievement-striving best predicted athletes’ engagement in optional practice, and (c) consistency of interests best predicted athletes’ commitment to their sport. Article 4 tested whether athletes’ self-reported levels of grit (broad and facets) were longitudinally associated with their coach-reported practice engagement throughout one sport season. Perseverance of effort was the grit variable most related to indicators of practice engagement, the only variable related to overall practice engagement across three time points, and the only variable marginally associated with athletes’ stability of practice engagement over time. Article 5 explored coaches’ views about the behavioural indicators of athletes’ conscientiousness, grit, and self-control in the daily training environment and how these traits impacted athletes’ training and development. Coaches described (a) conscientious athletes as systematic and detail-oriented, highly considerate of others, and highly engaged in self-regulation; (b) gritty athletes as those who persevere despite adversity and work hard in practice; and (c) self-controlled athletes as those who control impulses, resist temptations, and delay gratification. Coaches believe grit, conscientiousness, and self-control play important roles on athletes’ development toward higher skill levels, but results generally highlighted the preponderance of perseverance of effort. Potential mechanisms (e.g., conscientiousness—self-regulation—practice quality and conscientiousness—self-regulation—skill level) were highlighted to help explain the personality-expertise link found in Phases 1 and 2. This dissertation contributed to the literature on sport expertise by parsimoniously identifying conscientiousness-related personality traits that were associated with measures of athletes’ practice quantity, quality, and stability, commitment to sport, and higher skill level. Although several facets (i.e., perseverance of effort, consistency of interests, achievement-striving, self-discipline, and dutifulness) showed associations with practice and performance-related outcomes, this dissertation generally highlighted the role of grit facets. In particular, while perseverance of effort was the best predictor of athletes’ amounts of DP, the only grit variable associated with quality practice engagement over time, and the only predictor of higher skill level, consistency of interests was the best predictor of commitment variables. Furthermore, results based on coaches’ descriptions (a) provided behavioural indicators of conscientiousness-related traits that serve as reference points for practitioners aiming to help athletes develop desirable traits, (b) suggested that gritty athletes ‘work hard’ and conscientious athletes ‘work smart’, and (c) proposed mechanisms to explain the personality-expertise link found in the quantitative studies. Taken together, the results of this dissertation suggest that the tendency to persevere despite adversity and mindfully use self-regulated processes seems to be a powerful predisposition for athletes’ development toward expert levels of performance.

This thesis explored two main research questions, firstly investigating whether musical expertise offers a performance advantage in working memory for sequences of tones that vary in pitch, and secondly whether any advantage of musical expertise may be present in older as well as younger individuals. Previous research on working memory for tone sequences has reported that articulatory suppression interferes with temporary storage of verbal but not with tone sequences (Koelsch et al, 2009), suggesting a “tonal loop” within a musician’s working memory (Schulze, Zysset, Mueller, Friederici, & Koelsch, 2011) that complements the phonological loop for verbal material in musicians and non-musicians alike (e.g., Baddeley, 1986; 1992). The five experiments reported here explored detection of a pitch change between pairs of tone sequences with or without concurrent articulatory suppression or singing suppression. In Experiment 1, with pairs of auditory tonal (in a musical key) sequences to be compared, singing suppression impaired non-musicians significantly more than musicians, although both groups showed an impairment, whereas only non-musicians were affected by verbal articulatory suppression. In Experiment 2, conducted only with musicians who could read music, the first sequence of each pair was presented visually and the second sequence for comparison was presented aurally. Musicians were again impaired by singing suppression but not by articulatory suppression. For Experiment 3, for auditory atonal (no musical key) pairs of sequences, non-musicians performed at floor, and musicians were again significantly more impaired by singing suppression than by articulatory suppression. In contrast, for Experiment 4, only with musicians who could read music, for visually presented atonal sequences each followed by an auditory atonal sequence for comparison, musicians were significantly more impaired by articulatory suppression than singing suppression. These results suggest that for tonal sequences, musicians use their musical training and experience, coupled with subvocalised singing, but for atonal sequences, additional strategies involving phonological rehearsal may be used. Non-musicians may also rely on musical experience and subvocal singing for tonal sequences but seem to be unable to do so for atonal sequences. Results are consistent with the use by both musicians and non-musicians of a tonal loop for the rehearsal of tone sequences, which develops with musical training and may be used in addition to subvocal rehearsal. Previous research has suggested musical expertise may offer some protection against cognitive ageing (Hanna-Pladdy & MacKay, 2011; Amer, Kalender, Hasher, Trehub, & Wong, 2013). Experiment 5 in this thesis explored whether a lifetime of musical training and experience may offer the same advantages in old age for retaining tone sequences that had been found in Experiments 1 and 3 for younger musicians. This experiment also considered whether any advantage for older musicians on this task could be explained by the proposed “bilingual advantage” (e.g., Bialystok, Craik, Klein & Viswanathan, 2004), and what other aspects of cognition might be associated with tone sequence memory performance. A test battery was utilised with 74 older adults (60-80 years of age) to assess the influence of musical and language expertise, and cognitive abilities (attention, working memory capacity, self-reported prospective and retrospective memory) on the music-related pitch sequence comparison task from Experiments 1 and 3. Working memory capacity was found to predict individual differences in the ability to detect pitch changes between pairs of tone sequences, regardless of musical experience. Older musicians performed more poorly on the pitch change detection task overall than the younger musicians in the earlier experiments, but their performance on the task was significantly better than for age-matched non-musically trained peers who were close to floor for both tonal and atonal sequences, suggesting some benefit from a lifetime of musical experience.

abstract: Corporations in biomedicine hold significant power and influence, in both political and personal spheres. The decisions these companies make about ethics are critically important, as they help determine what products are developed, how they are developed, how they are promoted, and potentially even how they are regulated. In the last fifteen years, for-profit private companies have been assembling bioethics committees to help resolve dilemmas that require informed deliberation about ethical, legal, scientific, and economic considerations. Private sector bioethics committees represent an important innovation in the governance of emerging technologies, with corporations taking a lead role in deciding what is ethically appropriate or problematic. And yet, we know very little about these committees, including their structures, memberships, mandates, authority, and impact. Drawing on an extensive literature review and qualitative analysis of semi-structured interviews with executives, scientists and board members, this dissertation provides an in-depth analysis of the Ethics and Public Policy Board at SmithKline Beecham, the Ethics Advisory Board at Advanced Cell Technology, and the Bioethics Committee at Eli Lilly and offers insights about how ideas of bioethics and governance are currently imagined and enacted within corporations. The SmithKline Beecham board was the first private sector bioethics committee; its mandate was to explore, in a comprehensive and balanced analysis, the ethics of macro trends in science and technology. The Advanced Cell Technology board was created to be like a watchdog for the company, to prevent them from making major errors. The Eli Lilly board is different than the others in that it is made up mostly of internal employees and does research ethics consultations within the company. These private sector bioethics committees evaluate and construct new boundaries between their private interests and the public values they claim to promote. Findings from this dissertation show that criticisms of private sector bioethics that focus narrowly on financial conflicts of interest and a lack of transparency obscure analysis of the ideas about governance (about expertise, credibility and authority) that emerge from these structures and hamper serious debate about the possible impacts of moving ethical deliberation from the public to the private sector. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Biology 2012

This research, situated at the intersection of sociology, science and technology studies and police studies, provides the first sociological account of Crime Scene Investigator (CSI) training in England and Wales. Focusing on the acquisition and everyday enactment of CSI expertise, this qualitative, ethnographic investigation asks (1) what are the roles, practices and expertise of the CSI and (2) how is the CSI’s expertise developed in training and enacted in everyday work. These questions are explored through participant observation at the main training centre for UK CSIs, observation at crime scenes, interviews with trainees during and after their training and visual methods. By unpicking the visible and invisible components of CSI work, I analyse how CSIs are trained to document crime scenes and explore the practices of transforming a potentially relevant object from these locations into artefacts that meet the requirements of courtroom scrutiny. I demonstrate how CSIs engage actively and reflexively with the requirements of different conceptions of objectivity and the changing demands placed on them. They continually and performatively negotiate and delimit multiple boundaries, from the very literal in demarcating a crime scene to claiming their position within the investigative hierarchy in each interaction. Unlike other discussions of boundary work, for the CSI this is iterative, requires constant effort and is embedded in their routine practice. Within police environments, the CSI has scope for such boundary work. In the courtroom, however, crime scene investigation is narrowly defined. This thesis develops our understanding of the CSI and crime scene investigation as a practice. It stresses the significance of taking this actor seriously in any account of forensic science and investigative practices. By viewing the CSI as simply an evidence collector, or not considering her work at all, the expertise and pivotal role of this actor in the meaningful and efficient use of science in policing is blackboxed. My detailed qualitative analysis of the CSI’s role, work and specialist expertise contributes a necessary account of a key actor in the police and criminal justice system.