This research considers the connections between appearance and identity apparent in the social experience of five gay male drag queens. Appearing at variance with gender norms that underwrite male appearance in mainstream society and among gay men prompted social consequences that impacted their identities and world views. One aim is to apprehend the experiences of difference that drag appearance manifest and expressed. Another aim is to gain a new perspective on the social construction of gendered appearances from marginalized persons who seem to look from the "outside" in toward mainstream social appearances and relations. Qualitative analysis relied on interview data and occurred using grounded theory methodology. However, analysis gained focus and intensified by engaging Stone's (1970) theorizing on "Appearance and the Self," Feminist articulations of "the gaze" and poststructural conceptions of the discursively constituted person as "the subject." This research especially emphasizes the points of connection between Stone's theorizing and more recent feminist theoretical advancements on the gaze as they each pertain to appearance, identity and social operations of seeing and being seen. Yet there is also consideration of the manners in which gendered appearance norms circulate in discourse and permeate the individual psyche. The research findings also locate social consequences of transgressing male appearance norms. These drag queens' interviews revealed that they used appearance to visibly portray gendered identities. Manners in which they related their drag appearances to the self were suggestive that gender identities are states of consciousness stemming from one's imagined connections to mass cultural conceptions of male and/or female. Where most people seem to commit themselves exclusively to male or female appearance repertoires and identity sets, these men indicated that they made both male and female identifications. These mixed identifications, which could have remained hidden, materialized when they did drag. In a sense, by doing drag, they performed their gender ambivalence. Their drag appearances were meta-performances that referred both to their own ambivalence with the gender binary, and to how appearance assists in constructing, maintaining and communicating (i.e., performing) status quo gendered identities. / Ph. D.

Published Article / A descriptive observational study was conducted among undergraduate medical students to determine whether the knowledge of Anatomy influenced their body image perceptions. The perception of some students regarding their body image and appearance was different after the course, and also their view of other peoples' bodies. The findings of the study support the literature that males are more concerned with muscularity and developing muscles, whereas females are more preoccupied with thinness. The study showed that a course in Anatomy might have an influence on students' perceptions of their own and other peoples' physical appearance.

Denna studie tar del i den stora hälsotrenden som pågår i dagens samhälle. Ingen kan ha undgått hur media påverkar och har ett stort inflytande när det kommer till kroppsfixering och självförtroende hos människor. Överallt får man intrycket av att man ska vara smal eller vältränad för att passa in och det är viktigt att vara som alla andra. Och är du inte det så uppfyller du inte omgivningens krav. Självklart borde detta spegla av sig på självförtroendet om man inte känner att man uppfyller kraven, eller är det verkligen så? Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka om manliga och kvinnliga universitetsstudenter har olika syn på sitt eget utseende och självförtroende, och även undersöka om det finns några könsskillnader i detta. Vi har valt att göra undersökningen med hjälp av enkäter via det webbaserade programmet Survey & Report. Sedan analysera resultatet i Survey & Report och statistikprogrammet SPSS. Vi valde att gå runt på Karlstads universitet med enkäten och låta slumpmässigt utvalda respondenter få svara på enkäten och det var 50 studenter som deltog i undersökningen. Resultatet visade att de kvinnliga studenterna hade generellt sämre självförtroende än vad de manliga studenterna hade. Både de kvinnliga och manliga studenterna var överlag ganska positiva till sitt eget utseende. De manliga studenterna visade sig vara mer säkra i olika sorters situationer än vad de kvinnliga studenterna var. Slutsatserna är att det var ett brett område att undersöka, kanske för brett för en b-uppsatts och för den lilla andelen respondenter vi hade. Det går inte heller dra någon generalisering av forskningen då det var för få respondenter. Men av det som vi valt att undersöka går det att dra en slutsats att de manliga respondenterna visade på ett bättre självförtroende och att de var säkrare i olika situationer. De kvinnliga respondenterna var mer jämnnöjda med sitt utseende än vad männen var, och de kvinnliga respondenterna svarade att de ville ändra mindre på sig själva utseendemässigt än vad männen svarade att de ville. / The paper takes part in the big health trend going on in today's society. No one can have failed to notice how the media influences and has a major influence when it comes to body fixation and self-confidence. Everywhere one gets the impression that one should be slim or fit to fit in and it is important to be like everyone else. And if you're not, you don’t meet the demands of your surroundings. Obviously, this should reflect on your self-confidence if you do not feel you meet the requirements, or is that the case? The purpose of this paper is to examine whether male and female university students have different views of their own appearance and self-confidence, and also investigate whether there are gender differences. We have chosen to do the survey using questionnaires via the web-based program Survey & Report. After analyzing the results of the Survey & Report and SPSS, we chose to walk around at Karlstad University with the survey and let the randomly selected respondents answer the questionnaire and there were 50 students who participated in the survey. The results showed that female students generally had lower self-confidence than the male students had. Both the female and male students were overall quite positive about their own appearance. Male students were found to be more secure in different kinds of situations than the female students were. The conclusions are that there was a wide area to explore, perhaps too wide for this kind of paper and for the small percentage of respondents we had. It is not possible to draw any generalization of the research when there were too few respondents. But from what we have chosen to investigate it is possible to draw a conclusion that male respondents showed a better self-confidence and were more reliable in different situations. The female respondents were more evenly satisfied with their appearance than men were, and female respondents answered that they wanted to change less of themselves in appearance than men responded that they would.

This thesis is concerned with the problem of place recognition for mobile robots. How can a robot determine its location from an image or sequence of images, without any prior knowledge of its position, even in a world where many places look identical? We outline a new probabilistic approach to the problem, which we call Fast Appearance Based Mapping or FAB-MAP. Our map of the environment consists of a set of discrete locations, each with an associated appearance model. For every observation collected by the robot, we compute a probability distribution over the map, and either create a new location or update our belief about the appearance of an existing location. The technique can be seen as a new type of SLAM algorithm, where the appearance of locations (rather than their position) is subject to estimation. Unlike existing SLAM systems, our appearance based technique does not rely on keeping track of the robot in any metric coordinate system. Thus it is applicable even when informative observations are available only intermittently. Solutions to the loop closure detection problem, the kidnapped robot problem and the multi-session mapping problem arise as special cases of our general approach. Abstract Our probabilistic model introduces several technical advances. The model incorporates correlations between visual features in a novel way, which is shown to improve system performance. Additionally, we explicitly compute an approximation to the partition function in our Bayesian formulation, which provides a natural probabilistic measure of when a new observation should be assigned to a location not already present in the map. The technique is applicable even in visually repetitive environments where many places look the same. Abstract Finally, we define two distinct approximate inference procedures for the model. The first of these is based on concentration inequalities and has general applicability beyond the problem considered in this thesis. The second approach, built on inverted index techniques, is tailored to our specific problem of place recognition, but achieves extreme efficiency, allowing us to apply FAB-MAP to navigation problems on the largest scale. The thesis concludes with a visual SLAM experiment on a trajectory 1,000 km long. The system successfully detects loop closures with close to 100% precision and requires average inference time of only 25 ms by the end of the trajectory.

Master of Science / Department of Psychological Sciences / Laura A. Brannon / In a two-study thesis, the current project compares the effectiveness of various messages aimed at reducing unsafe high-end tanning behaviors. Study 1 used messages focused on either the appearance or health consequences of tanning in an effort to reduce the intention of unsafe high-end tanning behaviors. The results indicated that participants did not differ in their high-end sun tanning frequencies as a result of the message condition, but that there was an interaction effect between message type and gender, such that appearance messages were most effective at reducing unsafe tanning behaviors for females. However, upon further examination of the appearance messages, it was noted that there were two primary aspects of appearance content that were present: aging and blemishes. Therefore, Study 2 examined whether the gender effect that was present in Study 1 was being driven by either the aging or blemish content of the messages. Surprisingly, it was found in Study 2 that aging messages were more effective on male participants than female participants at reducing intention of unsafe high-end tanning behaviors. Additionally, it was found in Study 2 that graphic images effectively decreased intention to perform unsafe high-end tanning behaviors. These findings along with their implications are discussed.

Magister Scientiae Dentium - MSc(Dent) / The aim of this study is to determine the perceptions of different occlusal appearance observed by schoolchildren aged 13 -16yrs in the Capricorn District of Limpopo Province in South Africa. The study determined schoolchildren’s perceptions of different occlusal appearances, by assessing the self-perception of schoolchildren toward their occlusal appearance using the Aesthetic Component (AC) of the Index of Orthodontic Need (IOTN). These were compared with the perceptions held by schoolchildren across age, gender and place of residence in Limpopo Province.

Informe de Seminario para optar al grado de Licenciado en Filosofía / El interés de esta investigación radica en dilucidar las posibilidades y límites de una teoría del conocimiento, en miras a la dificultad que presenta el concepto de pensamiento bajo la perspectiva de F. H. Bradley, principalmente en su texto Apariencia y Realidad. Resulta necesario preguntar no sólo por el cómo se conoce - asunto para el que abundan las respuestas en filosofía y en otros ámbitos - ,sino que más importante y prioritario es preguntar si efectivamente es posible un conocimiento del mundo. Lo que aquí defendemos es la posibilidad de un conocimiento mínimo respecto de lo que nuestra experiencia vislumbra como la Realidad o el Absoluto. Esta alternativa - que finalmente es la única y por tanto no es ya alternativa - aunque precaria, se presenta mucho más coherente que aquellas en donde el conocimiento parece ser más abarcante, pero que en último termino resultan insostenibles. En forma simultánea discutiremos acerca de la doctrina que con más justicia podría hacerse cargo de esta teoría del conocimiento, sin que aquella represente estrictamente el pensamiento del referido autor. Defendemos en la presente investigación que el idealismo filosófico, con ciertas restricciones recogidas del pensamiento de Bradley, podría constituir el camino más seguro hacia una comprensión del carácter general de la Realidad.

Background: Objectification theory considers how gender and culture intersect to position women at a greater risk of developing eating disorders, depression, and sexual dysfunction. Self-objectification is defined as the internalization of a third person perspective to view one’s own body, which then leads to mental health consequences of anxiety, body shame, insensitivity to internal drives, and decreased peak motivational states. Body surveillance, the habitual and constant monitoring of the body, denotes the behavioral manifestation of self-objectification. Altogether, the accumulation of objectifying experiences and mental health consequences heighten women’s risks of developing the aforementioned mental disorders. Rationale: Extant experimental and correlational research supports objectification theory, in particular regarding eating disorders and depression. Research into the effects of social media on mental health is a relatively new frontier, thus gaps exist in the current body of literature. This study endeavored to contribute to the existing research base by employing qualitative methods to impart women’s personal descriptions of the experience of self-objectification and its proposed consequences in relation to social media use. Purpose of the Study: The purpose of the study was to explore how women’s social media consumption contributes to self-objectification, body surveillance, appearance comparison, body shame, and appearance-based self-worth. Also, the study sought to understand if women perceived themselves differently when they were not using social media platforms. Methods: Fifteen women completed the Social Media Use and Activities Questionnaire and the in-depth, semi-structured interview. The questionnaire assessed women’s active social media accounts, frequency of social media use, and social media behaviors. The interview protocol contained questions designed to extract explanations of constructs from objectification theory such as self-objectification, body surveillance, and body shame. A multilevel thematic data analysis was performed. Results: All of the individuals interviewed were heavy social media users based on the frequency of use (66.7% visit platforms several times daily), as well as the number of accounts operated (minimum of 4). Indicative of self-objectification and body surveillance, women emphasized the importance of how their physical appearance and body attributes are portrayed on social media sites. Also consistent with the definition of self-objectification, women expressed concerns about perceptions, reactions, and disapproval from others on social media regarding their physical appearance. Three additional modalities of body surveillance surfaced including: (1) using filters to enhance or modify the appearance of skin in pictures; (2) posing to accentuate facial features, hairstyles, and body attributes; and (3) women’s personal criteria regarding uploading and “tagging” of appearance-based pictures shared on social media. Findings strongly suggest women compare their physical appearances, features, and bodies to other women. Beauty ideals are determined by evaluating the number of individuals associated with other women’s social media accounts, as well as the distribution of ‘likes’ and positive comments written by people on their appearance-focused content. Five women recollected comparing their appearances and bodies to others, engaging in body surveillance, and feeling as if their own body and appearance failed to comply with beauty ideals, which then led to the experience of feeling body shame. Low self-esteem, depression, disordered eating, compulsive exercise, or bulimia nervosa were cited as reasons for deletion, temporary deactivation, or taking breaks from social media. Refraining from using social media was associated with feeling less pressured, engaging in less comparisons overall, being more mindful of the present moment, and relaxing standards for personal appearances. Conclusions: This study generated contextually rich, in-depth descriptions which illustrated women’s experiences with self-objectification, body surveillance, appearance comparisons, body shame, and appearance-based self-worth in the virtual world of social media. Based on results from this study, objectification theory is clearly applicable to women’s social media use and there is definitive need for future research to address the effects of social media consumption on mental health, particularly among younger generations. Meanwhile, primary prevention initiatives should educate people about the process of self-objectification and its associated consequences, as well as teach resistance strategies. Learning how to deconstruct media content, critically analyze others' online portrayals, and build self-esteem and self-worth may impede self-objectification and its negative mental health effects. Furthermore, public health campaigns should build upon the momentum of the body positivity movement. Known to young women as “BoPo,” this movement encourages women to see themselves as more than their bodies, inspires self-acceptance, and empowers them to be unapologetic and celebrate their body in its current form without adhering to societal beauty norms. These messages are instrumental to dismantling beauty ideals, exhibiting inclusivity of all body types, and mitigating the effects of sexual objectification of the female body.

Durant els últims anys, hi ha hagut un interès creixent en les tècniques de reconeixement d'objectes basades en imatges, on cadascuna de les quals es correspon a una aparença particular de l'objecte. Aquestes tècniques que únicament utilitzen informació de les imatges són anomenades tècniques basades en l'aparença i l'interès sorgit per aquestes tècniques és degut al seu éxit a l'hora de reconèixer objectes. Els primers mètodes basats en l'aparença es recolzaven únicament en models globals. Tot i que els mètodes globals han estat utilitzats satisfactòriament en un conjunt molt ampli d'aplicacions basades en la visió per computador (per exemple, reconeixement de cares, posicionament de robots, etc), encara hi ha alguns problemes que no es poden tractar fàcilment. Les oclusions parcials, canvis excessius en la il·luminació, fons complexes, canvis en l'escala i diferents punts de vista i orientacions dels objectes encara són un gran problema si s'han de tractar des d'un punt de vista global. En aquest punt és quan els mètodes basats en l'aparença local van sorgir amb l'objectiu primordial de reduir l'efecte d'alguns d'aquests problemes i proporcionar una representació molt més rica per ser utilitzada en entorns encara més complexes.Usualment, els mètodes basats en l'aparença local utilitzen descriptors d'alta dimensionalitat a l'hora de descriure regions locals dels objectes. Llavors, el problema de la maledicció de la dimensionalitat (curse of dimensionality) pot sorgir i la classificació dels objectes pot empitjorar. En aquest sentit, un exemple típic per alleujar la maledicció de la dimensionalitat és la utilització de tècniques basades en la reducció de la dimensionalitat. D'entre les possibles tècniques per reduir la dimensionalitat, es poden utilitzar les transformacions lineals de dades. Bàsicament, ens podem beneficiar de les transformacions lineals de dades si la projecció millora o manté la mateixa informació de l'espai d'alta dimensió original i produeix classificadors fiables. Llavors, el principal objectiu és la modelització de patrons d'estructures presents als espais d'altes dimensions en espais de baixes dimensions.La primera part d'aquesta tesi utilitza primordialment histogrames color, un descriptor local que ens proveeix d'una bona font d'informació relacionada amb les variacions fotomètriques de les regions locals dels objectes. Llavors, aquests descriptors d'alta dimensionalitat es projecten en espais de baixes dimensions tot utilitzant diverses tècniques. L'anàlisi de components principals (PCA), la factorització de matrius amb valors no-negatius (NMF) i la versió ponderada del NMF són 3 transformacions lineals que s'han introduit en aquesta tesi per reduir la dimensionalitat de les dades i proporcionar espais de baixa dimensionalitat que siguin fiables i mantinguin les estructures de l'espai original. Una vegada s'han explicat, les 3 tècniques lineals són àmpliament comparades segons els nivells de classificació tot utilitzant una gran diversitat de bases de dades. També es presenta un primer intent per unir aquestes tècniques en un únic marc de treball i els resultats són molt interessants i prometedors. Un altre objectiu d'aquesta tesi és determinar quan i quina transformació lineal s'ha d'utilitzar tot tenint en compte les dades amb que estem treballant. Finalment, s'introdueix l'anàlisi de components independents (ICA) per modelitzar funcions de densitat de probabilitats tant a espais originals d'alta dimensionalitat com la seva extensió en subespais creats amb el PCA. L'anàlisi de components independents és una tècnica lineal d'extracció de característiques que busca minimitzar les dependències d'alt ordre. Quan les seves assumpcions es compleixen, es poden obtenir característiques estadísticament independents a partir de les mesures originals. En aquest sentit, el ICA s'adapta al problema de reconeixement estadístic de patrons de dades d'alta dimensionalitat. Això s'aconsegueix utilitzant representacions condicionals a la classe i un esquema de decisió de Bayes adaptat específicament. Degut a l'assumpció d'independència aquest esquema resulta en una modificació del classificador ingenu de Bayes.El principal inconvenient de les transformacions lineals de dades esmentades anteriorment és que no consideren cap tipus de relació espacial entre les característiques locals. Conseqüentment, es presenta un mètode per reconèixer objectes tridimensionals a partir d'imatges d'escenes complexes, tot utilitzant un únic model après d'una imatge de l'objecte. Aquest mètode es basa directament en les característiques visuals locals extretes de punts rellevants dels objectes i té en compte les relacions espacials entre elles. Aquest nou esquema redueix l'ambigüitat de les representacions anteriors. De fet, es presenta una nova metodologia general per obtenir estimacions fiables de distribucions conjuntes de vectors de característiques locals de múltiples punts rellevants dels objectes. Per fer-ho, definim el concepte de k-tuples per poder representar l'aparença local de l'objecte a k punts diferents i al mateix moment les dependències estadístiques entre ells. En aquest sentit, el nostre mètode s'adapta a entorns complexes i reals demostrant una gran habilitat per detectar objectes en aquests escenaris amb resultats molt prometedors. / During the last few years, there has been a growing interest in object recognition techniques directly based on images, each corresponding to a particular appearance of the object. These techniques which use only information of images are called appearance based models and the interest in such techniques is due to its success in recognizing objects. Earlier appearance-based approaches were focused on the use of holistic approaches. In spite of the fact that global representations have been successfully used in a broad set of computer vision applications (i.e. face recognition, robot positioning, etc), there are still some problems that can not be easily solved. Partial object occlusions, severe lighting changes, complex backgrounds, object scale changes and different viewpoints or orientations of objects are still a problem if they should be faced under a holistic perspective. Then, local appearance approaches emerged as they reduce the effect of some of these problems and provide a richer representation to be used in more complex environments.Usually, local appearance methods use high dimensional descriptors to describe local regions of objects. Then, the curse of dimensionality problem appears and object classification degrades. A typical example to alleviate the curse of dimensionality problem is to use techniques based on dimensionality reduction. Among possible reduction techniques, one could use linear data transformations. We can benefit from linear data transformations if the projection improves or mantains the same information of the high dimensional space and produces reliable classifiers. Then, the main goal is to model low dimensional pattern structures present in high dimensional data.The first part of this thesis is mainly focused on the use of color histograms, a local descriptor which provides a good source of information directly related to the photometric variations of local image regions. Then, these high dimensional descriptors are projected to low dimensional spaces using several techniques. Principal Component Analysis (PCA), Non-negative Matrix Factorization (NMF) and a weighted version of NMF, the Weighted Non-negative Matrix Factorization (WNMF) are 3 linear transformations of data which have been introduced in this thesis to reduce dimensionality and provide reliable low dimensional spaces. Once introduced, these three linear techniques are widely compared in terms of performances using several databases. Also, a first attempt to merge these techniques in an unified framework is shown and results seem to be very promising. Another goal of this thesis is to determine when and which linear transformation might be used depending on the data we are dealing with. To this end, we introduce Independent Component Analysis (ICA) to model probability density functions in the original high dimensional spaces as well as its extension to model subspaces obtained using PCA. ICA is a linear feature extraction technique that aims to minimize higher-order dependencies in the extracted features. When its assumptions are met, statistically independent features can be obtained from the original measurements. We adapt ICA to the particular problem of statistical pattern recognition of high dimensional data. This is done by means of class-conditional representations and a specifically adapted Bayesian decision scheme. Due to the independence assumption this scheme results in a modification of the naive Bayes classifier.The main disadvantage of the previous linear data transformations is that they do not take into account the relationship among local features. Consequently, we present a method of recognizing three-dimensional objects in intensity images of cluttered scenes, using a model learned from one single image of the object. This method is directly based on local visual features extracted from relevant keypoints of objects and takes into account the relationship between them. Then, this new scheme reduces the ambiguity of previous representations. In fact, we describe a general methodology for obtaining a reliable estimation of the joint distribution of local feature vectors at multiple salient points (keypoints). We define the concept of k-tuple in order to represent the local appearance of the object at k different points as well as the statistical dependencies among them. Our method is adapted to real, complex and cluttered environments and we present some results of object detection in these scenarios with promising results.

Appearance-related self worth occupies a central role in the self-structure of many individuals. While many social psychological theories may be employed to understand the role of appearance in individuals' self-structures, thus far developmental theories have not been widely used to understand how these structures come to be and how they change throughout development. The current project integrates social and developmental theories of self to understand the role that important domains may play in the development of self-structure. Participants between the ages of 9 and 21 completed a set of questionnaires assessing various self-concept and self-esteem related variables to address these questions, allowing a cross-sectional view of the development of self-structure. In addition, multiple regression analyses were used to address several research questions, and five clear patterns emerged. First, connections between domains of self increase developmentally, a finding which replicates and adds depth to previous self research. Second, discrepancies between how individuals see themselves and how they would ideally like to be are positively related to how connected that domain is within the self-structure. Third, malleability of self worth is negatively related to domain connectedness such that higher levels of connectedness are associated with decreased malleability of self feelings in response to challenges to self-esteem. Fourth, domain importance does not play a strong role in the development of self-structure. Connectedness of domains increases developmentally regardless of individual beliefs about domains. Finally, development of self-structure differs according to the universality of the self domain that is being considered. Universally important cultural areas, such as appearance, show markedly different developmental associations than do domains that are not as universally stressed. Implications of these findings for prevention programs aimed at decreasing centrality of appearance and future directions for research are discussed. / Dissertation