Creativity is a nebulous concept, lacking both clear articulations and common understandings of meaning. Due to a lack of clear alternatives the concept of creativity is increasingly becoming infused with economically driven vocabulary, associations, interests and ideologies. There is an immediate need to provide alternatives to the „creative economy‟ view of creativity, because of its insidious effect on educational institutions and practices and because it promotes a generally impoverished view of the meaning of creativity and of human potential. Reductionist thought; the tendency to understand concepts as separate and distinct from one another prevents us from easily conceptualising an experience such as creativity which involves the simultaneous experience of seemingly paradoxical elements such as individuality and unity, intellect and intuition and freedom and discipline. Democracy is a metaphor which can help to articulate and understand the paradoxical experience of creativity. Democracy stands for the potential to make meaning from the integrated exploration of individuality and of unity, which I argue is a fundamental dynamic of the creative experience. I further suggest that the essence of the creative experience is a democratic attunement to existence, in which subject and object, self and environment, intellect and intuition and freedom and discipline are experienced as in a democratic relationship with one another. This way of understanding creativity provides an alternative to the creative economy view. It implies some significant changes to traditional educational emphases, including a movement away from primarily individualistically oriented curricula and toward curricula and educational values which situate the individual within an integrated eco-system.

No description available.

Recent research has suggested that boredom is a construct that can be distinguished from similar affective states including apathy, anhedonia, and depression, using self-reports. The current study investigated whether boredom and sadness (an analogue for depression) are distinct in terms of their physiological signatures. State boredom and sadness were induced in a group of healthy participants while their physiological parameters of heart rate (HR), skin conductance (SCL), and cortisol levels were monitored. Results indicated that the autonomic nervous system response for both states can be characterized by directional fractionation, with boredom resulting in increased HR but decreased SCL relative to sadness. Cortisol levels were higher after the boring induction than the sad induction, indicating increased hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activation for boredom. Overall, boredom appears to have a physiological signature that is distinguishable from a primary symptom of depression.

Beginning with a series of several self-report questionnaire studies I examine the potential for everyday attention lapses to create an inability to form connections to the external world, particularly through the experience of chronic boredom, and to subsequently lead to depression. In the first study I examine this process through the intermediate role of memory failures in the onset of boredom and depression, while in the second I examine the role of self-efficacy and in the third I add psychological stress as a further intermediate step between attention lapses and depression. For each study significant associations are found between self-report measures of attention lapses and attention-related cognitive errors, as presumed causes, and boredom proneness and depression as presumed outcomes. Structural equation modeling is then used to show these associations are well explained by an Attention-to-Affect model in which the attention lapses and attention-related errors predict the onset of boredom and depression, in part through their effects on memory failures (Chapter 1), perceived self-efficacy (Chapter 2), and psychological stress (Chapter 3). That these Attention-to-Affect models provide much better fit for the data runs contrary to the typical conception of attention and memory problems as consequences of emotional distress. Following from these models I examine in more specific terms the disconnect experienced as a result of attention lapses, through a laboratory study employing the Sustained Attention to Response Task. This study (Chapter 4) revealed a significant influence of attentional challenges on blinking behaviour, suggesting that whenever our attentional capacity is tested we have a tendency to momentarily direct our thoughts inwardly, perhaps to re-evaluate our attentional performance, and that the timeframe of this redirection is expanded following lapses of attention, and the commission of attention-related errors.

No description available.

Recent research has suggested that boredom is a construct that can be distinguished from similar affective states including apathy, anhedonia, and depression, using self-reports. The current study investigated whether boredom and sadness (an analogue for depression) are distinct in terms of their physiological signatures. State boredom and sadness were induced in a group of healthy participants while their physiological parameters of heart rate (HR), skin conductance (SCL), and cortisol levels were monitored. Results indicated that the autonomic nervous system response for both states can be characterized by directional fractionation, with boredom resulting in increased HR but decreased SCL relative to sadness. Cortisol levels were higher after the boring induction than the sad induction, indicating increased hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activation for boredom. Overall, boredom appears to have a physiological signature that is distinguishable from a primary symptom of depression.

Beginning with a series of several self-report questionnaire studies I examine the potential for everyday attention lapses to create an inability to form connections to the external world, particularly through the experience of chronic boredom, and to subsequently lead to depression. In the first study I examine this process through the intermediate role of memory failures in the onset of boredom and depression, while in the second I examine the role of self-efficacy and in the third I add psychological stress as a further intermediate step between attention lapses and depression. For each study significant associations are found between self-report measures of attention lapses and attention-related cognitive errors, as presumed causes, and boredom proneness and depression as presumed outcomes. Structural equation modeling is then used to show these associations are well explained by an Attention-to-Affect model in which the attention lapses and attention-related errors predict the onset of boredom and depression, in part through their effects on memory failures (Chapter 1), perceived self-efficacy (Chapter 2), and psychological stress (Chapter 3). That these Attention-to-Affect models provide much better fit for the data runs contrary to the typical conception of attention and memory problems as consequences of emotional distress. Following from these models I examine in more specific terms the disconnect experienced as a result of attention lapses, through a laboratory study employing the Sustained Attention to Response Task. This study (Chapter 4) revealed a significant influence of attentional challenges on blinking behaviour, suggesting that whenever our attentional capacity is tested we have a tendency to momentarily direct our thoughts inwardly, perhaps to re-evaluate our attentional performance, and that the timeframe of this redirection is expanded following lapses of attention, and the commission of attention-related errors.

Creativity is a nebulous concept, lacking both clear articulations and common understandings of meaning. Due to a lack of clear alternatives the concept of creativity is increasingly becoming infused with economically driven vocabulary, associations, interests and ideologies. There is an immediate need to provide alternatives to the „creative economy‟ view of creativity, because of its insidious effect on educational institutions and practices and because it promotes a generally impoverished view of the meaning of creativity and of human potential. Reductionist thought; the tendency to understand concepts as separate and distinct from one another prevents us from easily conceptualising an experience such as creativity which involves the simultaneous experience of seemingly paradoxical elements such as individuality and unity, intellect and intuition and freedom and discipline. Democracy is a metaphor which can help to articulate and understand the paradoxical experience of creativity. Democracy stands for the potential to make meaning from the integrated exploration of individuality and of unity, which I argue is a fundamental dynamic of the creative experience. I further suggest that the essence of the creative experience is a democratic attunement to existence, in which subject and object, self and environment, intellect and intuition and freedom and discipline are experienced as in a democratic relationship with one another. This way of understanding creativity provides an alternative to the creative economy view. It implies some significant changes to traditional educational emphases, including a movement away from primarily individualistically oriented curricula and toward curricula and educational values which situate the individual within an integrated eco-system.

This master's thesis addresses the problem of moods and attunements in Heidegger's famous conceptualization which falls into the 1st half of 20th century and which he introduced in his phenomenology, understood as fundamental ontology. This thesis follows "being attuned" in terms of its essential characteristics and with the emphasis on its full meaning, in terms of existential analytics of man as Dasein. The objective of this thesis is to show, in which sense is "being attuned" grasped as the essential way of being of the Dasein in the midst of beings as a whole, and how is this "being attuned", as this essential way of being, made manifest, or how it may manifest itself to us the possibilities and limits of the Dasein understood as "being here" (Da-sein). In terms of particular moods and attunements, the thesis follows mainly the motif of fear and anxiety and is seeking to create an understanding of profound boredom as the fundamental attunement of the Dasein and its connectedness with the temporal character of the essence of the Dasein. Key words: Dasein, attunement, anxiety, fear, boredom Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Homelessness has been a problem in the United States as early as the 1700s and kinship care networks provided emergency shelters and assistance to victims, neighbors, and family members. Previous studies on homelessness have focused primarily on the causes and effects of the phenomenon or on people who were not able to work due to mental or physical disabilities. The purpose of this transcendental phenomenological study was to explore and understand the lived experiences of 24-55 year old homeless individuals who are able to work but who used homeless shelters in Charlotte, North Carolina, thus helping fill a gap in the literature. The theoretical foundation of the study was functionalism. Snowball sampling was used to find five participants and data were collected using semi-structured interviews based on Rubin and Rubin's approach to interviewing. Data were analyzed using Sada's multiple stage process based on Husserl. All participants experienced worry, boredom, hopelessness, and fear of other residents. Participants also unanimously said shelters cannot be considered long-term homes. Knowledge of these experiences could enable shelter providers to develop programs and services aimed at helping residents feel safer and able to stay for longer periods of time when needed as well as ways to reduce worry, boredom, and hopelessness. This would help promote positive social change by giving residents the ability to take more advantage of counseling and job training programs for those who want to find ways to get out of the condition of homelessness.