La qualité est devenue aujourd’hui un véritable outil stratégique, pour faire face aux nouveaux enjeux économiques et sociaux de l’entreprise, grâce à son impact sur la maîtrise conjointe de la qualité du produit et des processus supports à sa production. Cette maîtrise est directement liée à l’organisation cohérente d’un ensemble d’activités qualité qui se positionnent sur les différents niveaux structurels de l’entreprise. Un des challenges majeurs est donc de faire du processus qualité un processus au sens système, c'est-à-dire un processus intégrant, de façon efficace, les différentes activités qualité sur les différents niveaux et avec les autres processus de l’entreprise. Relativement à ce challenge, plusieurs méthodologies et méthodes qualité supportent tout ou partie de la modélisation du processus qualité, mais leur manque de formalisation nuit à l’efficacité et à l’efficience de leur application. En réponse à ce double constat d’intégration et de manque de formalisation, notre contribution porte sur la proposition d’une approche qualité générique permettant de formaliser un processus qualité au niveau tactique en lien avec les autres niveaux de l’entreprise. Cette approche se positionne en cohérence avec le TQM dans l’objectif de maîtriser et d’améliorer conjointement la qualité du produit/processus de production. Elle se veut utilisable, par son automatisation avec l’outil MEGA, de la conception à l’exploitation du processus de maîtrise de la qualité. L’originalité de ces travaux réside dans une première unification, sous la forme de méta-modèles, des concepts qualité sur la base de l’approche processus définit dans la norme ISO9000:2000, de la fonction «management de qualité» telle que prônée par la norme IEC/ISO62264, des méthodes qualité, et finalement de la modélisation d’indicateurs pertinents. La faisabilité de cette approche est montrée sur un cas d’application de type processus manufacturier. / In today’s world of globalization, quality becomes a strategic tool to face the new economic and social stakes of the enterprise by its impact on jointly controlling the quality of the product and the processes supporting its production as well. This control is directly related to the coherent organization of the quality activities which are structured on the different enterprise levels. One of the major challenges is to set up the quality process as a process according to the “system” definition; i.e. a process which effectively integrates the quality activities on the different enterprise levels as well as with other processes belonging to the enterprise. Coping to this challenge, several methodologies and methods were proposed to support the whole or a part of modelling the process quality. However, the lack of formalization harms the effectiveness and the efficiency of their application. Regarding this double report on integration and lack of formalization, our contribution consists in developing a generic quality approach for formalising a process quality at the tactical level linked to the other enterprise levels. This approach is in accordance with the TQM to control and improve jointly the quality of the product and the production process. Since we propose and automated approach, it can be deployed from the design phase to the exploitation phase of the process quality control. The originality of this work consists on the unification, in the form of meta-models, of the quality concepts on the basis of: the process approach defined in the standard ISO9000:2000, the function "quality management" as defined by the standard IEC/ISO62264, the quality methods, and finally on the modelling of relevant indicators. The feasibility of this approach is shown by an application case of a manufacturing process.

It has generally been assumed that production frequency on a feature listing task measures the strength of some relationship between features and concepts. The nature of this relationship, however, has not yet been determined. This study examines the relationship between feature list production frequency and feature relevance, or informativeness. Also tested was the hypothesis, inherent in current concept theories, that different feature types bear different relationships to a given concept, and vary widely in their informativeness. An overall relationship between production frequency and relevance was found, but is attributable to significant correlations present for only a subset of the feature types under consideration. The findings contradict the predictions of two earlier studies; namely, that parts should be the most informative feature type, and that feature type informativeness should depend on the object category. These results are discussed with respect to both feature list studies, and general theories of concepts.

No description available.

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Teachers College, Columbia University. / Typescript; issued also on microfilm. Sponsor: Jeremy Kilpatrick. Dissertation Committee: Elizabeth Hagen. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1962. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 75-79).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1965. / Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Queensland, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1974. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliography.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1960. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

This study was conducted to investigate how teachers present concepts and use examples in the natural setting of the classroom. A conceptual framework which afforded bases for the generation of questions as well as general rationale was found within the concept acquisition research literature (Bourne & Guy, 1968; Carnine, 1980; Houtz, Moore & Davis, 1973; Hovland & Weiss, 1953; Klausmeier & Feldman, 1975; Tennyson & Park, 1980; Tennyson & Rothen, 1977; Tennyson, Steve, & Boutwell, 1975; Williams & Carnine, 1981). Within the developing research tradition, diverse instructional strategies had evolved within a context of highly specific, carefully controlled experimental laboratory investigations. Prescriptions based on the results of these research initiatives were being directed toward classroom practitioners (Engelmann & Carnine, 1982). The extent to which instructional design strategies emerging from the empirical activity could be transplanted from the artificial context of the laboratory to the unpredictable and complex environment of the classroom was a question which guided this inquiry. The focus of this descriptive study became an exploration of the verbal behavior of teachers in the classroom during the act of teaching, examining how concepts and supporting examples were being presented. A naturalistic, descriptive mode of inquiry was adopted during the study. The observational technique was utilized, and a "sign system" was constructed to isolate and quantify the behaviors of interest. Based on the literature, as well as trends discerned during two pilot studies, a number of questions relating to concept teaching in the natural setting were generated and explored in data from sixty different teaching lessons (N=8). These lessons reflected varying subject matters and students of varying chronological ages. The questions were formulated in reference to teachers' use of concept definitions, positive and negative examples, concrete as opposed to abstract examples, as well as the extent to which teachers asked students to generalize to new, different positive and negative examples. Frequencies associated with these verbal behaviors were reported. As well, the role which students were playing during concept teaching was examined. The results of this exploratory investigation suggest that areas of complementarity exist between the respective perspectives assumed by researchers and teachers, particularly in relation to use of definitions and positive examples during concept presentations. At the same time, the naturally occurring behaviors of the teachers in this sample were devoid of certain strategies judged essential by instructional designers, in particular use of negative examples during concept teaching sequences. Across the teachers, subject matters, and grade levels represented in this study, approximately one-half of the examples presented in relation to concepts were conceptualized and contributed by students. This pattern emerged during an instructional routine which Duffy (1983) terms the "turn taking model", where classroom interaction is characterized by the teacher asking a question, the student responding, and the teacher reinforcing or correcting. Because instructional designers' prescriptions for example presentation during concept teaching rely heavily on strict control over content and sequence issues, the question is raised whether instructional design models for concept teaching are feasible within the natural setting in general, given the constraints that may be imposed by adoption of turn taking procedures. / Education, Faculty of / Educational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS), Department of / Graduate