Thesis (M.S. in Operations Research)--Naval Postgraduate School, September 1987. / Thesis Advisor(s): Boger, Dan C. Second Reader: Andrus, Alvin F. "September 1987." Description based on title screen as viewed on April 23, 2010. DTIC Descriptor(s): Army Budgets, Decision Making, Goal Programming, Antimissile Defense Systems, Army Operations, Coefficients, Computer Programs, Hierarchies, Linearity, Management, Military Strategy, Mathematical Models, Operations Research, Personnel, Sensitivity, Theses, Army Research. DTIC Identifier(s): Army strategic defense command, Analytic hierarchy process. Author(s) subject terms: Goal Programming " Analytic Hierarchy Process, R&D Project Funding Models. Includes bibliographical references (p. 165-167). Also available in print.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Texas at El Paso, 2009. / Title from title screen. Vita. CD-ROM. Includes bibliographical references. Also available online.

In this paper, we introduce a novel set of features for robust object recognition, which exhibits outstanding performances on a variety ofobject categories while being capable of learning from only a fewtraining examples. Each element of this set is a complex featureobtained by combining position- and scale-tolerant edge-detectors overneighboring positions and multiple orientations.Our system - motivated by a quantitative model of visual cortex -outperforms state-of-the-art systems on a variety of object imagedatasets from different groups. We also show that our system is ableto learn from very few examples with no prior category knowledge. Thesuccess of the approach is also a suggestive plausibility proof for aclass of feed-forward models of object recognition in cortex. Finally,we conjecture the existence of a universal overcompletedictionary of features that could handle the recognition of all objectcategories.

Synchrony, or rhythmic bodily unison activities such as drumming or cadence marching, has attracted growing scholarly interest. Among laboratory subjects, synchrony elicits prosocial responses, including altruism and empathy. In light of such findings, researchers in social psychology and the bio-cultural study of religion have suggested that synchrony played a role in humanity’s evolutionary history by engendering collectivistic commitments and social cohesion. These models propose that synchrony enhances cohesion by making people feel united. However, such models overlook the importance of differentiated social relations, such as hierarchies. This dissertation builds on this insight by drawing on neuroscience, coordination dynamics, social psychology, anthropology, and ritual studies to generate a complex model of synchrony, ritual, and social hierarchy, which is then tested in an experimental study. In the hypothesized model, shared motor unison suppresses the brain’s ability to distinguish cognitively between self-caused and exogenous motor acts, resulting in subjective self-other overlap. During synchrony each participant is dynamically entrained to a group mean rhythm; this “immanent authority” prevents any one participant from unilaterally dictating the rhythm, flattening relative hierarchy. As a ritualized behavior, synchrony therefore paradigmatically evokes shared ideals of equality and unity. However, when lab participants were assigned to either a synchrony or asynchrony manipulation and given a collaborative task requiring complex coordination, synchrony predicted a marginally lower degree of collaboration and significantly lower interpersonal satisfaction. These findings imply that unity and equality can undercut group cohesion if the collective agenda is a shared goal that requires interpersonal coordination. My results emphasize that, despite the inevitable tensions associated with social hierarchy, complementary roles and hierarchy are vital for certain aspects of social cohesion. Ritual and convention institute social boundaries that can be adroitly negotiated, even as egalitarian effervescence such as communitas (in the sense of Victor Turner) facilitates social unity and inspires affective commitments. These findings corroborate theories in ritual studies and sociology that caution both against excessive emphasis on inner emotive states (such as empathy) and against excessively rigid conventions or roles. An organic balance between unity and functional differentiation is vital for genuinely robust, long-term social cohesion. / 2018-06-21T00:00:00Z

Human flexible behaviour is often seen in everyday life tasks. These tasks (e.g., making coffee) are composed of actions (e.g., pouring sugar) that are typically nested within a large task structures made of superordinate components and nested subcomponents. Task switching has been adopted widely as an effective tool to explore the mechanisms of flexible behaviour and can be easily adapted to real-life situations. The core hypothesis explored in this thesis was that there might be another level of control that is responsible for coordinating and scheduling actions in task switching, which I label "meta-control". My first project aimed to establish robust behavioural evidence of meta-control. To test this hypothesis, switching efficiency was treated as a measure of meta-control influence. In a novel design, participants' beliefs about switch probability were manipulated through explicit instruction, allowing manipulation of meta-level control independent of the specific sequence of tasks required. The first three behavioural experiments demonstrated behaviorally that instructions influenced the efficiency of switching even when low-level (bottom-up) experience was matched, and that this effect was motivation-dependent. In follow-up studies, this meta-control influence was found to bias voluntary task selection. Two EEG studies aimed to characterize the level at which instruction affected processing. Motor and task levels were examined with lateralized motor potentials and oscillatory alpha power, respectively. Effects of instruction only existed on alpha power. Overall, the results suggest that expectancy prompts the adoption of distinct control modes across sequences of trials. The second project explored meta-control in a task switching paradigm with a hierarchical task structure in very short (2-4 trial) sequences that were preceded by instructions about switch frequency or switch position. The experiments focused on the benefits and costs of sequence structure, based on the hypothesis that trial sequences are treated as coherent units. Three behavioural studies were conducted for testing this hypothesis. The first utilized instructions about switch frequency to test for sequence transition effects and their influence on switching performance at the trial level. In two subsequent experiments, instructions made explicit the position of a task switch. The results confirmed that instructions about switch position helped participants to build useful sequence representations, and that alternating between sequences influenced trial-level switch processes. Generally, sequence representations have a persisting influence across trials and a pronounced impact at the first trial position of sequences. The experiments in this thesis provide evidence of meta-control in task switching. The first conclusion is that meta-control can be studied with the novel experimental design introduced in this thesis and was found to be reward dependent. The second conclusion is that meta-control acts as a set of parameters that can modulate the mode of control in a sustained way across trials.

In Malawi the future of a child in terms of academic achievement is known before a child completes a higher secondary education. This is determined by the type of secondary school a child has been selected to. The secondary schools in Malawi are classified into three types namely the grant aided, secondary schools, the district conventional secondary schools and the community day secondary schools. When a pupil has been selected to a grant aided secondary school the general public expectation is that such a student would achieve a high academic standard, similarly when a pupil has been selected to the community day secondary school the public expectation is that such a pupil would not achieve a high academic standard. On the other hand those who are selected to attend the district conventional secondary schools will have an academic achievement which is between the other two types of secondary schools. This research was carried out to find out the impact of the ADMISSIONS POLICY OF STUDENTS INTO MALAWI SECONDARY SCHOOLS by examining the factors which contribute to disparities in academic achievements from the three types of secondary schools. The study was carried out in Dowa District in the Central Region of Malawi. Specifically it was conducted in the Central East Education Division which is comprised of five education districts namely: Dowa, Ntchisi, Nkhotakota, Salima and Kasungu. The research was conducted using a number of methods namely: survey questionnaires, convenient sampling, interviews and snowballing. Through the research it was established that the grant aided secondary schools offer excellence of education where many students excel in academics and is seconded by the district conventional secondary schools, while the community day secondary schools offer poor education which attributes to poor academic achievement. The research has explained what has been responsible for the differences in academic achievement. / Public Administration and Management / MPA

TAHIM, Makarius Oliveira. Aspectos clássicos de gravitação topológica e dimensões extras. 2008. 115 f. Tese (Doutorado em Física) - Programa de Pós-Graduação em Física, Departamento de Física, Centro de Ciências, Universidade Federal do Ceará, Fortaleza, 2008. / Submitted by Edvander Pires (edvanderpires@gmail.com) on 2015-05-22T20:22:11Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2008_tese_motahim.pdf: 525141 bytes, checksum: f66f89fe8740ec135888fd7be2a867ef (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Edvander Pires(edvanderpires@gmail.com) on 2015-05-22T20:24:36Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2008_tese_motahim.pdf: 525141 bytes, checksum: f66f89fe8740ec135888fd7be2a867ef (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-22T20:24:36Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2008_tese_motahim.pdf: 525141 bytes, checksum: f66f89fe8740ec135888fd7be2a867ef (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008 / Nesta tese abordamos alguns aspectos relacionados com teorias de Gravidade. Essencialmente existem duas partes principais neste trabalho: 1) mecanismos de localização de campos em membranas e 2) nova interpretação para a teoria de gravitação. No que concerne aos mecanismos de localização de campos em membranas dois assuntos são colocados: a construção de modelos de gravidade topológica no contexto de teorias contendo membranas e localização de campos de gauge tensoriais em membranas finas (o denominado campo de Kalb-Ramond). No primeiro destes assuntos, a questão importante é a tentativa de se obter resultados semelhantes aqueles provindos do modelo de Randall-Sundrum, isto é, a solução do problema de hierarquia e localização do campo gravitacional na membrana. No entanto, o caminho escolhido está associado com modelos de gravitação topológica, modelos estes onde a métrica do espaço-tempo não é a quantidade fundamental da teoria. Existe na literatura uma corrente de pensamento baseada em um formalismo de quantização de gravidade que necessita do ponto de vista onde a mesma pode ser tratada por meio de uma teoria topológica de campos vinculada. Portanto, perguntar da validade dos resultados de Randall-Sundrum no contexto de gravidade topológica pode servir de teste para se construir resultados estritamente quânticos. Neste sentido, fazemos uma análise primeiramente clássica de modelos possíveis, discutindo diversos aspectos (quebras de simetrias, simetrias de gauge, etc.). Primeiramente mostramos que se pode obter de fato, no contexto acima citado, equações semelhantes àquelas obtidas nos modelos de Randall-Sundrum para explicar a existência da hierarquia entre as massas dos bósons de Higgs. No entanto, não se faz uma análise detalhada de como deve ser descrita gravidade em D=5. Nesta linha de raciocínio, construímos vários modelos com forma matemática semelhante a modelos de gravidade topológica (modelos equivalentes), tentando fazer a "localização" sobre as membranas de modo a linkar estes resultados ao primeiro citado logo acima. Por último, construímos efetivamente gravidade topológica em membranas nos moldes de modelos de gravidade topológica, fazendo a análise dos vínculos no espaço-tempo ortogonal à membrana. No segundo assunto, estudamos modelos de campos escalares que suportam defeitos tipo kink embutidos em espaço-tempo D=5. Tais modelos podem ser utilizados para se simular membranas finas. Neste caso analisamos a localização de campos de gauge tensoriais, principalmente o campo de Kalb-Ramond, no background de várias geometrias que não apresentam singularidades, como no caso do modelo de Randall-Sundrum. O resultado é que o modo-zero do campo de Kalb-Ramond pode ser localizado somente em background gravitacional onde o dilaton tem papel importante. A segunda parte da tese é um pouco mais especulativa. Trata de uma nova abordagem de interpretação da gravitação. A idéia, em suma, é comparar o próprio espaço-tempo a um sólido deformável. Neste sentido, busca-se identificar quem são os componentes microscópicos do sólido do espaço-tempo, em analogia com os sólidos cristalinos reais, os quais são compostos por uma rede contendo uma miríade de átomos e moléculas. Para tal empresa, a equação de Landau-Raychaudhuri tem papel importante. No total, discutem-se três sinais apontando para esta idéia: a) as deformações do volume do espaço-tempo, b) a origem elástica da ação de Einstein-Hilbert e c) a relação entre a Lei de Hooke da Elasticidade e a equação de Einstein da gravitação. A idéia principal é que as equações de Einstein parecem "emergir", sendo bastante naturais neste contexto.

A troca e o comércio estão associados na sua origem ao próprio conceito de cidade, a partir de uma relação mútua, de atividades que definem e são definidas pelos locais onde acontecem. A troca, a compra e venda de produtos, assim como o fluxo de pessoas, entre diferentes centros urbanos, tende a influenciar o crescimento das cidades. A cidade então não pode ser entendida como isolada do seu entorno, e o seu estudo passa, portanto, pelo entendimento das suas relações regionais. A presente pesquisa propõe o desenvolvimento de uma metodologia para identificação e avaliação da hierarquia regional a partir das relações entre as cidades. Para tanto, se utiliza de um indicador espacial descrito com o uso de modelos configuracionais. A partir de pesquisa bibliográfica se considera que a interação espacial entre as cidades acontece como consequência das relações de distância, ofertas de serviços e demandas das populações. A hipótese central da pesquisa é de que a abordagem configuracional do espaço dispõe de medidas que são capazes de descrever a hierarquia em um sistema de cidades. Utilizando o estado do Rio Grande do Sul como caso empírico, se constrói a sua representação espacial a partir da teoria dos grafos, carregando o sistema gerado com dados socioeconômicos dos municípios a fim de reproduzir o fluxo entre as cidades. A partir da análise e da comparação destes resultados com o volume médio de tráfego nas praças de pedágio do estado, se utiliza o Método dos Mínimos Quadrados como técnica de ajuste e ponderação dos dados socioeconômicos. O trabalho é finalizado comparando o indicador de hierarquia regional desenvolvido com a hierarquia de cidades apresentada no Estudo de Regiões de Influências do IBGE. Verificou-se que a metodologia proposta obteve uma descrição adequada da hierarquia regional, fazendo uso de menos dados em uma aplicação mais rápida do que as abordagens mais conhecidas. / Exchange and commerce are associated in their origin with the very concept of a city, based on a mutual relation, of activities that define and are defined by the places where they happen. The exchange, buying and selling of products as well as the flow of people, between different urban centers, tends to influence the growth of cities. The city cannot then be understood as isolated from its surroundings, and its study therefore depends on the understanding of its regional relations. The present research proposes the development of a methodology for identification and evaluation of the regional hierarchy based on the relations between cities. To do so, we use a spatial indicator described with the use of configurational models. From a bibliographical research it is considered that the spatial interaction between cities happens as a consequence of distance relations, service offerings and demands of the populations. The central hypothesis of the research is that the configurational approach of space has measures that are able to describe the hierarchy in a system of cities. Using the state of Rio Grande do Sul as an empirical case, its spatial representation is constructed from the theory of graphs, loading the system generated with socioeconomic data from the cities in order to reproduce the flow between them. From the analysis and comparison of these results with the average volume of traffic in the toll points of the state, the Least Squares Method is used as adjustment technique and weighting of socioeconomic data. The work is completed by comparing the regional hierarchy indicator developed with the city hierarchy presented in Influence Regions Study from IBGE. It was found that the proposed methodology obtained an adequate description of the regional hierarchy, making use of less data in a faster application than the most known approaches.

A troca e o comércio estão associados na sua origem ao próprio conceito de cidade, a partir de uma relação mútua, de atividades que definem e são definidas pelos locais onde acontecem. A troca, a compra e venda de produtos, assim como o fluxo de pessoas, entre diferentes centros urbanos, tende a influenciar o crescimento das cidades. A cidade então não pode ser entendida como isolada do seu entorno, e o seu estudo passa, portanto, pelo entendimento das suas relações regionais. A presente pesquisa propõe o desenvolvimento de uma metodologia para identificação e avaliação da hierarquia regional a partir das relações entre as cidades. Para tanto, se utiliza de um indicador espacial descrito com o uso de modelos configuracionais. A partir de pesquisa bibliográfica se considera que a interação espacial entre as cidades acontece como consequência das relações de distância, ofertas de serviços e demandas das populações. A hipótese central da pesquisa é de que a abordagem configuracional do espaço dispõe de medidas que são capazes de descrever a hierarquia em um sistema de cidades. Utilizando o estado do Rio Grande do Sul como caso empírico, se constrói a sua representação espacial a partir da teoria dos grafos, carregando o sistema gerado com dados socioeconômicos dos municípios a fim de reproduzir o fluxo entre as cidades. A partir da análise e da comparação destes resultados com o volume médio de tráfego nas praças de pedágio do estado, se utiliza o Método dos Mínimos Quadrados como técnica de ajuste e ponderação dos dados socioeconômicos. O trabalho é finalizado comparando o indicador de hierarquia regional desenvolvido com a hierarquia de cidades apresentada no Estudo de Regiões de Influências do IBGE. Verificou-se que a metodologia proposta obteve uma descrição adequada da hierarquia regional, fazendo uso de menos dados em uma aplicação mais rápida do que as abordagens mais conhecidas. / Exchange and commerce are associated in their origin with the very concept of a city, based on a mutual relation, of activities that define and are defined by the places where they happen. The exchange, buying and selling of products as well as the flow of people, between different urban centers, tends to influence the growth of cities. The city cannot then be understood as isolated from its surroundings, and its study therefore depends on the understanding of its regional relations. The present research proposes the development of a methodology for identification and evaluation of the regional hierarchy based on the relations between cities. To do so, we use a spatial indicator described with the use of configurational models. From a bibliographical research it is considered that the spatial interaction between cities happens as a consequence of distance relations, service offerings and demands of the populations. The central hypothesis of the research is that the configurational approach of space has measures that are able to describe the hierarchy in a system of cities. Using the state of Rio Grande do Sul as an empirical case, its spatial representation is constructed from the theory of graphs, loading the system generated with socioeconomic data from the cities in order to reproduce the flow between them. From the analysis and comparison of these results with the average volume of traffic in the toll points of the state, the Least Squares Method is used as adjustment technique and weighting of socioeconomic data. The work is completed by comparing the regional hierarchy indicator developed with the city hierarchy presented in Influence Regions Study from IBGE. It was found that the proposed methodology obtained an adequate description of the regional hierarchy, making use of less data in a faster application than the most known approaches.

abstract: Branding and brand management have been top management priorities in the hotel industry. Some researchers have concluded that strong branding would be an efficient way for hotels and hotel chains to differentiate themselves from each other. Recent studies have focused on the establishment of a brand equity model and the relevant causal relationships of the model. Most of these studies have used types of desirability scales examining the importance of individual factors in measuring brand equity. However, they ignore the trade-offs that affect and characterize choice. Particularly, the personal decision process implied by the hierarchical brand equity model is absent. This study proposed two alternative measures of brand equity, analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and conjoint analysis (CA), to address these limitations. The AHP and the CA were compared using several validity measures to aid in selecting efficient methods. This study examined the validity of AHP and CA under two data collection methods applied to hotel branding: paper-based survey and online survey. Result showed that the AHP data collection methods were easier, as well as with respect to saving time and costs. Results also indicated that the AHP is equivalent to the CA with respect to predictive accuracy. Practical differences for hotel branding in attribute preferences were clearly observed between the AHP and the CA. The AHP results were consistent with previous studies by awarding high importance to perceived quality and brand loyalty and lower importance to brand awareness and brand image. Managerial implications were provided for results. In terms of practicality in data collection, the study results revealed that the data gathered online leads to a slightly lower internal and predictive validity. A limitation of this study was that the two methods were not perfectly comparable. Nevertheless, the validity of both AHP and CA seems satisfactory for both methods. The study results also offer useful perspectives to consider when choosing between the two methods, as well as between AHP and CA. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Community Resources and Development 2014