Recent work in anthropology has speculated on how developments in molecular biology and medicine might bring about new bodies, selves, and forms of sociality. This thesis explores how herbal and pharmaceutical antidepressants differently affect experiences of one's neurochemistry. It does so in two ways. First, it outlines the historical 'social life' of pharmaceutical antidepressants, including their co-production with depression, and the neurochemical body in a particular style of reasoning in biological psychiatry. Second, it presents and analyzes claims made for the efficacy of antidepressants made in vernacular North American books, advertisements, and pamphlets. Although the claims for both herbal and pharmaceutical antidepressants allude to the same realms of value---those of science, nature/history, and personal experience---their different social lives enable different access to the neurochemical body.

Typescript. / Bibliography: leaves 259-280. / Photocopy. / xiv, 280 leaves, bound ill., map 29 cm

Typescript. / Bibliography: leaves 316-327. / xii, 327 leaves ill

Mass culture in Thailand creates idealizations about female beauty which cause many women to engage in destructive behavior such as starvation dieting and forced vomiting. In this dissertation I describe efforts to develop awareness among a group of predominately female students at a rural Thai university about the ideological purposes of these idealizations. Using a CD-based multimedia research template, the students reported the “common sense” beliefs which help create the beauty ideal and the effects of these beliefs on their own lives and the lives of other women. The major finding of their research was that mass culture creates beauty ideologies to maintain social stratification, in that those women who are made to feel “ugly” because they do not resemble the white-skinned underweight ideal tend not to be members of the elite social class which has the resources and time to achieve these ideals. The significance of this dissertation lies in the emancipatory effects that it produced; although a Critical Discourse Analysis showed that the students continued to assimilate some of the values and interests which they had identified as “oppressive”, they also demonstrated to varying degrees that they had ceased to think and behave in ways which had caused them mental and physical damage in the past.

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Despite the exponential growth in internet usage for personal communication over the last 10 years (Madden & Zickuhr, 2011) little is known of the online interpersonal persuasion process. Whilst some psychological research has been undertaken in this area, the findings are somewhat contradictory (e.g. Di Blasio & Milani, 2008; Murphy, Long, Holleran, & Esterly, 2003). These studies also fail to give consideration to cues used in online persuasive interactions due to the absence of paralinguistic cues. Further, the extant research in this domain has not explicitly examined the persuasion process in terms of a theoretical model. This thesis aims to address these issues and provide a foundation from which future research can be based. This thesis comprises two studies. The first study examined participants’ reactions to anonymous persuasive requests. These requests were presented using three situational contexts, each of which elicited different self-interest motivations (i.e. social, learning, and political). It also compared participants’ reactions to these contexts across three different communication modes both online and offline (i.e. instant messaging, email, and face to face). Language cues (i.e. language power and emotion) contained in the messages presented were also manipulated. The findings from this study show that in anonymous interactions communication mode does not affect compliance decisions. Instead, individuals are sensitive to situational context in online interactions and they process information in accordance with their self-interest motivations. Further, it was also found that, despite the anonymity, individuals are able to engage in impression formation by using the available cues and utilise these impressions when making compliance decisions. In response to these findings, Study 2 examined the effect of prior information in online interpersonal persuasive interactions and found that this information influences message evaluations over and above those in anonymous interactions. This study also examined the persuasion process in terms of a theoretical model finding that individuals engage in hypothesis-testing utilising all the information they perceive to be relevant to a compliance decision. Thus, it was concluded that Kruglanski and Thompson’s (1999) unimodel of persuasion provides the best explanation for online interpersonal persuasion processes. The findings from this thesis provide a broad foundation from which to base future research. They demonstrate that context is important in online communication and affects compliance decisions. They also show that cues are attended to in online interactions and are used in the evaluation process as they provide relevant evidence from which to base a compliance decision. From the findings of this thesis a model of the interpersonal persuasion process is proposed.

The work which is submitted for the degree of PhD by publication comprises eleven papers published in peer-reviewed journals: six sole-authored papers and five jointauthored. The publications span the years 1995 to the present, and the qualitative research projects from which the data and publications are derived were undertaken over a period of approximately ten years, commencing in 1994/95. The publications are included in full and are examined, both individually and within a more general context, in an overview. The overarching focus of the research coheres around the construction and maintenance of occupational and leisure identities, and more specifically in the case of the latter, on sporting identities. All the research projects from which the publications derive were qualitative in nature, apart from the earliest work on doctoral students in the social sciences, which was based predominantly on documentary analysis of the relevant literature. Whilst the unifying theme of the research and the PhD submission might be termed 'identity work', three principal strands can be delineated and these are described in some detail in the overview: 1) Occupational identities: contract researchers in the social sciences; 2) Occupational identities: doctoral research students; 3) Sporting identities: distance runners.

This thesis is concerned with the latest education reform, called 4+4+4 (4+), and overall educational changes in the basic education system (K12) since 2002 by the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP). The study investigates the role that education plays in state formation processes as well as looking at how dominant groups’ ideologies influence education policies. The research problem is the extent to which the state uses education policies to create a new public ideology. There are three key research questions that this thesis addresses. The data for this research was obtained from fifteen semi-structured interviews conducted with teacher trade unions, journalists and policy makers, focusing on their experiences and views not only about the 4+4+4 education system but also about the policymaking process in Turkey. The interviews present the pressing issues within the education system and indicate how education works a state apparatus for the government to gain and secure society’s consent. Located in a critical tradition, the research draws its theoretical framework from the Italian theorist Antonio Gramsci, especially focusing on his concepts of hegemony, civil society and consent. Using a Gramscian theoretical framework allows this study to place the 4+ reform in a bigger picture. The thesis analyses the reform not only from a local perspective but also from an international education policy perspective, focusing on the relationship between power, ideology and schooling. The findings suggest that the state and its private associations (i.e. media, and political parties) are actively encouraging Islamisation along with neoliberalism in order to consolidate their hegemonic dominance.

M.A. (Sociology) / An increase in the number of people living alone has been observed in various modern industrialised societies, paricularly over the last four decades. Despite this, very little is known about living alone, since until now very little comprehensive research has been undertaken into the lifestyle of those living alone. There has rather been a tendency among social scientists particularly those working within the framework of social integration theory - to base their researches on the assumption that people living .alone necessarily expose themselves to social isolation, to their own detriment. Other researchers, however, stress the probability that those living alone compensate for their relative isolation by maintaining more contacts outside the household and are thus not necessarily exposed to social isolation. The aim of this study was to use qualitative research in an exploratory way to collect in-depth information on the nature of the social integration of women living alone and other related aspects of their lives. Although the findings are therefore limited by the type of research, a number of tendencies regarding the lifestyles and social integration of those living alone can be identified .. Probably one of the most significant conclusions is that, as far as their social integration is concerned, people living alone cannot be treated as a homogeneous category: when, for instance, the regularity and quality of respondents' contact with the central figures in their lives is examined, it appears that their integration into these centrality networks ranges from very high to very low...

Ph.D. (Engineering Management) / This thesis explores the association between language, culture, and technological innovation. This is accomplished by examining primary data, and literature that is based on empirical research on the interplay between language, culture, and technological innovation. Multi, intra, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary perspectives are accordingly studied. The intent is to identify, assess and explicate language and cultural factors that support or act as barriers to technological innovativeness. The nature of the role played by these factors is also explored and explained. The methodology employed incorporates both the indigenous and foreign experiences through literature, case studies and primary data. The aim of this study is to understand better how to assist those nations that aspire to be technologically innovative. This research considers the characteristics of the innovation process, and the views and/or characteristics of the innovator. In other words, despite that a historically innovative person or nation and a user or a process of innovation, may all not know precisely why there is an innovation, they can still contribute to the inquiry. Relevant literature, case studies and interviews are used to identify the distinctive patterns and behaviours that characterize innovative people and processes. The thesis creates a theoretical framework that is useful for identifying the intrinsic nature and the rate of influence at various stages during the role played by language and cultural factors in technological innovation. The main contribution and conclusion of this thesis is that, language and/or cultural backgrounds do in fact positively contribute to technological innovation. However, when it comes to promoting and marketing the innovation, the business language plays a more significant role. It is further demonstrated that one’s national or primary culture, in response to needs, exposure, challenges, attitudes, beliefs, and values does play a critical role during the idea generation phase of the technological innovation process.