The aim of this thesis is to shed light on the handbook as a multimodal resource from a reader perspective, with the material consisting of 32 Swedish handbooks on gardening from 1643 to 2005. The study draws theoretically on social semiotics and multimodal discourse analysis, as well as dialogism. There is an emphasis on the addressivity of the text, which is taken as a starting point for tracing signs of the intended text use in the design of the texts. The analysis is meaning-based, with the focus placed on functional features in the design of the texts. The first part of the study considers the reading goals afforded by the thematizations conveyed in titles, headings and text type patterns. The core function of these texts turns out to be action orientation, although the more recent books often include sections oriented towards other goals, like shaping individual aesthetic taste. The second part illustrates how the multimodal cohesive patterns in the books afford non-linear reading paths and make the texts searchable, which is enhanced by the presence of devices such as indices and tables of contents. Concentrating on six of the books, the third part of the study maps out the role of the reader that is naturalized by the design of the text, drawing on appraisal theory, and shows the strong, authoritative role taken by the authorial voice. The evaluative patterns naturalize a fact-seeking reading. However, the most recent book, from 1996, emphasizes emotions to a greater extent, naturalizing a parallel reading that invokes sensory experience. The conclusion drawn is that the core characteristics of the handbooks are action orientation, searchability and factuality. As different parallel functions in recent books are discerned, a tendency towards diversity and multifunctionality is described. The range of semiotic resources has also expanded, it is noted, and there is growing support for the view of a tendency towards the visualisation of written texts.

Många av de skador som inträffar inom ridsport är ofta orsakat av ett trauma (Havlik, 2010) vilket för det mesta resulterar i allvarliga skador. De psykologiska reaktionerna som uppkommer hos skadade ryttare är mångfacetterade och rehabiliteringsprocessen och resultatet är ofta en följd av ryttarens kognitiva värdering av sin skada (Wiese-Bjornstal, Smith, Shaffer & Morrey, 1998). Syftet med studien var att ur ett holistiskt perspektiv (1) skapa en förståelse över vilka psykologiska reaktioner ryttare upplever efter att ha råkat ut för en allvarlig idrottsskada, (2) förstå hur deras upplevelse av rehabiliteringsprocessen påverkade deras kognitiva värdering samt (3) förstå vilka faktorer som underlättade eller försvårade vägen tillbaka till aktiv ridsport igen. En kvalitativ metod i form av narrativa intervjuer användes och analysmetoden var holistiskt-innehåll (II), holistiskt-form (III) och kritisk narrativ analys (VI). Antalet deltagare var två ryttare som har tagit sig tillbaka till ridsporten efter en allvarlig skada. Resultatet av holistiskt-innehålls analysen redovisas enligt studiens frågeställning. Resultatet av holistiskt-form analysen visade 4 vändpunkter i ryttare A´s berättelse och 5 vändpunkter i ryttare B´s berättelse. Den kritisk narrativa analysen visade att ryttare A och B berättade om sig själva i relation till 3 olika teman. Resultaten diskuteras i relation till teoretiska referensramen samt tidigare forskning. / Many of the injuries occurring in equestrian sports are often caused by some form of trauma (Havlik, 2010) and they often results in a serious injury. The psychological reactions that equestrian riders may experience are multifaceted and the rehabilitation process and the result is often a result of the rider's cognitive appraisal of the injury (Wiese-Bjorn Stal, Smith, Shaffer & Morrey, 1998). The purpose of this study was from a holistic perspective (1) create an understanding of the psychological reaction a equestrian rider may feel after having suffered a serious sport-related injury, (2) understand how their experience of the rehabilitation process affected their cognitive appraisal, and (3) understand the factors that helped/did not help them get back to equestrian-sport. A qualitative approach through narrative interviews were used and the analysis was holistic-content (II), holistic-form (III) and critical narrative analysis (VI). Two equestrian riders who made a comeback to equestrian-sport after a serious injury participated. The result of the holistic-content analysis was reported according to the study questions. The result of the holistic-form analysis indicate 4 turning points in the rider A's story and the 5 turning points in the rider B's story. The critical narrative analysis illustrates that rider A and B described themselves in relation to 3 different themes. The results are discussed in relation to the theoretical framework and previous research.

For many companies, especially the ones that are knowledge-intensive such as consulting companies or service delivery firms, it has been increasingly popular to organize the employees in so called self-managing teams. These teams have proven to increase efficiency as they reduce overhead costs by not having the need of being supervised by a manager. These teams should handle the daily work tasks by themselves as well as make decisions, handle the teams’ development in line with company desires, and work towards greater performance. Furthermore, the teams need to structure the performance management and be able to handle all the activities that are included within that process. Performance management is a process that is designed to improve the overall performance at the company. Activities within the process include goal setting, performance feedback and performance appraisals. All these activities should help the company with structuring a way of getting the right input for giving the suitable rewards to their employees. The team will always be influenced by different factors that will affect the team: both from within the team and from the organization as a whole. Therefor, the purpose of this thesis was to investigate how external factors (within the organization but outside the team) and internal factors have an impact on the self-managing teams within knowledge-intensive companies, and how well they can perform the performance management activities. To be able to answer the purpose, a case study was made at the IT-consulting company Findwise AB. A year ago (Spring 2011), the three development teams at the Stockholm office got organized in more permanent teams. They saw a need of structuring their daily work and therefor they implemented the agile working method Scrum at the office, a working method focusing on iterative and incremental development.  They started to operate more self-managed and a lot of the responsibilities that had been managed outside the team were now integrated towards the team. This fall (2012), the Team Leaders in each team will begin to take over the responsibility for parts of the performance appraisal process, a performance management activity that previously was done by an external manager outside the team.  Furthermore, the team should to a greater extent than before, handle other performance management activities, such as setting goals and giving performance feedback. The case study showed that the following external factors have an impact on the executing of performance management activities within the self-managing teams: external leaders and the information systems. Furthermore, the group beliefs and meeting organizational objectives, roles and responsibilities, and team composition were internal factors that had an impact. During the analysis, it became clear that things that were found in the empirical data collection also affected how effective the performance management activities were executed within the teams. The external factors were the internal processes at the company, which refers to the fact that the team members also have responsibilities outside the team, and the external Project Leaders, which refers to that the teams sometimes uses Project Leaders for the customer projects that are not held permanent within the team. A new internal factor that was found was the various working methods that were used between the development teams. The recommendations given to the case company included the need of setting clear goals that are tangible, as well as having attainable goals connected to a carrier plan. Furthermore, the study showed a need of implementing performance feedback sessions were input from all relevant stakeholders, inside and outside the company, could be gathered. / För många företag, speciellt de som är kunskapsintensiva så som företag inom konsultsektorn eller tjänstesektorn, har det blivit allt mer populärt att organisera de anställda i självorganiserande team. Dessa team har visat sig öka produktiviteten då de minskar overheadkostnader genom att de inte har ett stort behov av att kontrolleras av en ledare eller chef. Dessa team ska kunna hantera dagliga aktiviteter själva och ta de beslut som krävs inom gruppen, men även se till att teamet utvecklas i linje med organisationens önskemål, samt att de arbetar för att ständigt öka prestationen inom gruppen. Dessutom måste teamen arbeta med målstyrningsprocessen och se till att de kan hantera alla de aktiviteter som finns inom denna process. Målstyrning, eller verksamhetsstyrning, är ett samlingsnamn för en process som underlättar möjligheten för ökad prestation inom ett företag. Aktiviteter som ingår inkluderas av målsättning, prestationsfeedback och utvärdering. Dessa aktiviteter kan tillsammans underlätta för organisationen att skapa en struktur som kan ge input för att kunna ge rätt belöning till företagets anställda. Teamen som ska arbeta med dessa aktiviteter kommer alltid influeras av olika faktorer som påverkar hur väl de kan arbeta som ett självgående team och ha möjlighet att arbeta effektivt med tidigare nämnda målstyrningsaktiviteter. Dessa faktorer kan innefatta påverkan internt inom teamet, men även påverkan utanför teamet men inom organisationen. Detta examensarbete hade därför som syfte att studera hur externa faktorer (inom organisationen men utanför teamet) och interna faktorer har en inverkan på självorganiserande team i kunskapsintensiva företag, samt hur detta i sin tur påverkar hur väl de kan utföra målstyrningsaktiviteterna.  För att kunna besvara syftet gjordes en fallstudie på IT-konsultföretaget Findwise AB. Under våren 2011 började de tre utvecklingsteamen på företagets kontor i Stockholm organisera sig i mer permanenta team. De såg ett behov av att få en bättre struktur på det dagliga arbetet och implementerade därför den agila arbetsmetoden Scrum på företaget som går ut på att arbeta inkrementellt där utvecklingslösningarna utförs iterativt. Detta ledde till att teamen började arbeta allt mer självständigt och många av de ansvarsområden som tidigare legat utanför teamen integrerades nu mot teamen. Hösten 2012 kommer teamledarna för varje team börja ta över ansvaret för delar av utvärderingsprocessen, en målstyrningsaktivitet som tidigare har utförts av olika externa ledare utanför teamet. Tanken är även att teamen ska utföra flertalet av de övriga målstyrningsaktiviteterna inom teamet, så som målsättning och ge feedback. Fallstudien visade att de externa ledarna i organisationen samt företagets informationssystem var externa faktorer som hade en inverkan på utförandet av målstyrningsaktiviteterna inom självorganiserande team. Studien visade även att delade värderingar inom gruppen och möjligheten att nå organisationens mål, roller och ansvarsområden samt gruppsammansättning var interna faktorer som hade en påverkan. Under arbetets analysfas upptäcktes även att faktorer som hittades i det empiriska materialet även det hade en påverkan på hur effektivt målstyrningsaktiviteterna kunde utföras inom teamet. Nya externa faktorer som påträffades var så kallande interna processer, vilket syftar till att de anställda i många fall har ansvarsområden utanför teamet, samt att teamen ibland använde sig av externa projektledare under utförandet av kundprojekt. En ny intern faktor som påträffades var att teamen påverkades av att de redan nu hade börjat utveckla olika arbetsmetoder inom gruppen. Studien avslutades med att ge rekommendationer till fallföretaget med information om att de behövde sätta klara och konkreta mål som på ett tydligt sätt gick att koppla till en karriärs- eller utvecklingsplan för individen. Dessutom visade studien på ett behov av att implementera feedbackmöten på team och individnivå där input kunde hämtas från samtliga intressenter inom företaget samt från de externa kunderna.

<p>Marketers seek to create and consumers seek to cultivate a variety of positive emotional experiences. Despite their importance to consumer behavior, researchers have lacked a clear understanding of the distinct behavioral consequences of specific positive emotions. My dissertation examines how different positive emotions (e.g., hope, love, and pride) can differentially affect consumers' decisions and behaviors. I find that positive emotions can not only be differentiated but also that specific positive emotions lead to distinctly different patterns of consumption behavior, such as considering more options, donating in different ways, engaging in more effortful actions, or performing more socially conscious consumption behaviors benefiting distant others. I find important differences both with momentary emotional experiences and downstream consequences of chronic emotional experiences. </p><p>Positive emotions differ reliably in the degree to which they create a lens of problem-solving, social connection, and perceived control. For example, I find that positive emotions characterized by a social connection lens (e.g., love and gratitude) lead to increases in socially conscious behaviors benefiting distant others. The tendency to perceive one's environment through a problem-solving lens (which characterizes hope and interest but not love and gratitude) leads to larger consideration sets and engagement in more effortful environmental actions. I also examine how positive emotions characterized by different lenses, such as perceived control (e.g., pride) and social connection (e.g., love), produce distinct behaviors within the same consumption context (e.g., giving in different ways in response to a fundraising appeal). Five studies demonstrate that positive emotions can be characterized in ways that allow prediction of distinct forms of broadening and specific consumption behaviors.</p> / Dissertation

Emotional design addresses peoples needs and desires which is at the center of product or technology development. Currently, there is no established process of emotional design in the field of industrial design to address research and design issues. A five step emotional design process is proposed in this thesis. Research theories and methods on emotional design were reviewed. Existing pantry storage products were evaluated. User research was targeted on women between age 45 and 60. Research data were collected through interviews and surveys. Research findings were produced by analyzing the data using a proposed data analysis method called Product Emotion Baseline. Product function design, product interface design and user experience study on smart pantry were presented. All five steps of emotional design process were applied to smart pantry design to illustrate in detail how the proposed process works.

This research examined the critical thinking (CT) skills and conceptions of prospective teachers studying at Foreign Language Education Department at Middle East Technical University. In this way, the study intended to contribute to the field of curriculum and instruction by pointing to the currents status while constituting a basis for further actions in teacher education in terms CT. In this research, data analysis was carried out through both quantitative and qualitative analysis. A survey, including Student Information Form, and Watson and Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal- Form YM Turkish version were utilized for data gathering. Data were collected from 103 prospective teachers in the junior and senior level during the Spring Semester of 2007- 2008 Academic Year. Results demonstrated that the critical thinking (CT) levels of prospective teachers assessed by WGCTA are in medium level. In addition, WGCTA-YM cannot be predicted from reported regular reading activity, CGPA, and gender. Besides, results showed that, prospective teachers make rudiment or vague statements about critical thinking activities and do not point to a common instructional activity. In terms of critical thinking definitions, prospective teachers mostly perceive CT as a cognitive skill. Furthermore, there is a common sense view of CT rather than an understanding based on literature. The results revealed that prospective teachers are short of the essential CT skills and the CT comprehension to be able to raise individuals with CT ability. Therefore, curriculum renovation movements, projects, and research studies to improve critical thinking skills in teacher education should be developed and implemented.

The main aim of the present study was to better understand the influence of nationality/religious affiliation and degree of religious devoutness on OCD symptoms, more specifically scrupulosity symptoms and beliefs by comparing the Turkish Muslim students with the Canadian Christians who show different degrees of religiosity. To clarify the effect of religiosity on OCD symptomatology, Bible school and Divinity school students were included in the present study as an extreme religious group. Furthermore, the present study was aimed to examine the cross-cultural differences in the prevalence, content, appraisal and control of intrusions, using a structured interview methodology. Religiosity, guilt and scrupulosity scales and interview schedule were adapted into Turkish. The analyses revealed that the psychometric properties of the adapted measurements were satisfactory. Then, the effect of religiosity and religious affiliation on the experience of OCD symptoms, scrupulosity, and OCD relevant beliefs were examined via univariate and multivariate analyses. Results revealed that the effect of religiosity and nationality were significant for general distress. Results also revealed that regardless of nationality, high religious individuals reported higher degree of OCD and scrupulosity symptoms, and dysfunctional obsessive beliefs than low religious ones. The effect of religiosity on OCD and scrupulosity symptoms differed by religious affiliation. High religious Muslim students reported higher degree of compulsions, and fear of God symptoms than high religious Christians. Furthermore, religiosity and nationality affected obsessive beliefs differently. Turkish students reported higher level of perfectionism and intolerance for uncertainty in comparison with Canadian students. These results were supported by subsequent regression analyses. Furthermore, interview data showed that except for the frequency of the intrusions, the content of the intrusions was almost universal, and frequency and distress as a response to intrusions is very low in the normal population. Nationality and degree of religiosity revealed some minor differences in primary and secondary appraisals, and control strategies. These factors were specifically significant for religious and sexual intrusions. Results suggested that the religious affiliation and degree of religiosity may provide content for intrusions, rather being a causal factor. Keywords: Intrusive thoughts, Obsessive-Compulsive Symptoms, Faulty belief domains and appraisal, Religiosity and Religious Affiliation

The purpose of the study was to examine the role of test anxiety, academic self-efficacy, and cognitive appraisal processes in predicting eighth grade students&rsquo / emotion regulation strategies during test taking. In addition, gender was included as a predictor in the study. The sample of the study consisted of 778 eighth grade students (398 females and 380 males) in 17 schools of &Ccedil / ankaya and Yenimahalle districts in Ankara. Emotion Regulation during Test Taking Scale (ERT) (Schutz, Distefano, Benson, &amp / Davis, 2004), Anxiety subscale of Academic Emotions Questionnaire (AEQ) (Pekrun, Goetz, Titz, &amp / Perry, 2002), and Academic Self-Efficacy Scale (ASE) (Jerusalem &amp / Schwarzer, 1981) were used to collect the data. Confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) were performed for the ERT, anxiety subscale of AEQ, and ASE scale. All of the scales were working as intended. Cronbach alpha coefficients were .85 for test anxiety, .76 for ASE, and ranged from .58 to .75 for ERT scale. Four separate hierarchical regression analyses were conducted to examine the role of gender, cognitive appraisal processes (goal congruence, agency, and testing problem efficacy), academic self-efficacy, and test anxiety in predicting four emotion regulation strategies: task focusing, tension reduction, wishful thinking, and self blame strategies. For all strategies, almost all of the predictors were found statistically significant. Test anxiety was found to be the most powerful predictor for all the dependent variables. Girls tend to use more emotional regulation strategies than boys.

Since last year 2008, the economy has started going down and the unemployment rate has risen uncontrollably. Our government promised to take the citizens out of this bad condition. To improve the citizen satisfaction, the government should lead the whole government team to progress. And before doing so, understanding the attitude of civil servants is very important, because the higher satisfaction the civil servants have, the harder they will work. However, the issue about employment satisfaction is widely researched by many scholars. As a result, this research will focus on the six HRM practice practices , which are selecting , training and development, performance appraisal, organization structure and process , communication and rewards. In this study, the main research intends to understand the difference between the perception of the civil servants on the current stage and their perception of the ideal condition. And the personal characteristics impact on the employment satisfaction. This study concluded the main results as follows: 1. There appears significant difference in HRM practices between civil servant¡¦s actual and ideal perception. 2. Person characteristics will affect the satisfaction of civil servants in different HRM practice dimensions.

<p>Vid regeringsskiftet 2006 kom det att bli förändringar inom skolpolitiken och det blev startskottet för denna undersökning. Skolverket fick i uppdrag att utforma nya kunskapsmål att uppnå i ämnena matematik, svenska samt svenska som andra språk. Detta föregick införandet av nationella prov i årskurs tre. Syftet med undersökningen är att ta reda på grundskolelärares inställning till hur proven kan komma att påverka det pedagogiska uppdraget.</p><p>Insamlandet av material har skett genom en enkät bestående av fasta svarsalternativ och det har getts möjligheten för skriftliga kommentarer.</p><p>Resultatet visar att lärare anser att de nya problemformuleringarna är en vinst för elevernas kunskapsutveckling och inte proven i sig. De nationella proven ses som redskap att synliggöra elevernas kunskaper och till viss del kan de komma att ligga till grund för bedömningar av elevernas kunskapsutveckling.</p> / <p>After the Swedish government shifted in 2006 changes were made to school politics, which gave me the cause to start this survey. The National Agency for Education was given the task to design new levels of knowledge in the field of mathematics, Swedish, and Swedish as a second language. This precedes an introduction of national tests in the third grade. The purpose of the survey was to find out the teachers’ attitudes how the tests may influence their educational work.</p><p>The report was based on a questionnaire with questions with the advantage of the questionnaire being able to comment freely.</p><p>The result shows that it is the way the goal wording is written which one sees as a merit of the new reform and not the tests in it self. The national tests should be seen as a tool to be used to see how the pupils development progresses and which can then be used to set the pupils level of development.</p>