The present article is about the constitutional interpretation theories. In the introduction, the author gives us a general vision of the present debate aroused around them. “Is the interpretation that conditions Constitution or is the Constitution that conditions interpretation?” comes to be the central question proposed by the article. To reach a possible answer, the author guides us through the world of constitutional interpretation theories, analyzing each one exhaustively and concluding with a new proposition about a general theory of constitutional interpretation, using the most important elements of each one of the theories previously exposed. / El presente artículo versa sobre las distintas teorías sobre la interpretación del texto constitucional. En la introducción, el autor nos da una visión general de la actualidad del debate suscitado alrededor de estas. “¿Es la interpretación la que condiciona a la Constitución o es la Constitución la que condiciona a la interpretación?” viene a ser la pregunta central propuesta en el artículo. Para llegar a una posible respuesta, el autor nos guía a través del mundo de las teorías interpretativas constitucionales, analizando a cada una de manera exhaustiva y finalizando con una propuesta propia de teoría general de interpretación de la Constitución, haciendo suyos los elementos más importantes de cada una de las teorías previamente expuestas.

Since Web-based interventions have a significantly high rate of attrition ranging from 99.5% to 77.5%, the researcher employed an instrumental case study approach to understand compliance in a Web-portal. The specific issue for this study was attrition rates and how SCT constructs affected eating competence. Qualitative data provided ground zero insight to a complex issue that was further understood. To better understand the phenomenon, participants that registered for the 30-day study and the software developer were interviewed. All interviews (n=6) were transcribed and data from the transcriptions were transformed from dialogues, into categories, then themes, and finally into concepts. Five guidelines to keep attrition rates low was the outcome of the data analysis. Having a nation interested in the Internet and at the same time faced with an obesity epidemic seemed to be a good fit for researching a method to promote eating competence with interactive technology. Eating competence intertwines four components: (1) attitudes about eating and the enjoyment of food (2) accepting new food to add variety to your diet (3) being able to eat the right amount of food and (4) being able to manage food through proper planning, storing, preparing, and offering. With the above information extracted from the literature, it was determined, a serious enough problem existed to justify spending time, money and other resources to develop and implement an intervention. The theoretical framework supporting the development of the web portal is the social cognitive theory (SCT). In health promotion, the purpose of the SCT is to help people stay healthy through good self-management of health habits. This dissertation focused on four constructs: self-efficacy, behavioral capabilities, observational learning, and reinforcement to better understand how eating competence skills were enhanced and attrition rates lowered.

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the effects of a Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) based physical activity intervention designed to evaluate the effectiveness of the twelve-week intervention with regard to psychosocial behaviour using SCT and physical activity behaviour among adults with intellectual disability in non-working time. Design: The study involved pre-post randomized control trial and employed a MANCOVA analysis for this study. Between-Subjects Design was used to assess the effect of independent variable (twelve-week intervention programme) on two groups (intervention group and control group). Follow-up (separate ANVOAs) were calculated on the four dependent variables (self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, barrier to exercise, and moderate physical activity). Participants: Eighty participants from St. James settlements aged over 18 years participated in the present study. After data screening, 59 (30 males, 29 females; n for intervention=29, n for control=30) cases with completed data were analyzed. The final data set contained participants with age ranged from 21 to 67 years (M=35.83, SD=10.28) and BMI ranged from 13 to 64 (M=27, SD=7.33). Intervention group received a SCT-based intervention programme for twelve one-hour lectures. Outcome measures:The Primary outcomes included Self-efficacy, Outcome expectation and Barrier to exercise Questionnaire (SOBQ) on psychosocial behaviour (self-efficacy, outcome expectancy and perceived barrier) and Physical Activity Recall (PAR) on physical activity behaviour (moderate physical activity) among adults with intellectual disabilities. Secondary outcome include objective check list to evaluate the designed treatment being delivered to participants adequately. Measures were taken at baseline and posttest and additionally, intervention group were recruited for follow-up at 4-month. Results: After controlling the pretest scores, the MANCOVA results showed a statistically significant difference between two groups (intervention group and control group) F(4,48)=32.8, P<0.001; Wilk’s Lambda=0.27, partial eta squared =0.73. Result of follow-up measure on MANCOVA, showed that 12-wk intervention between-subjects are significant for all 4 dependents variables: self-efficacy: F(1,116)=47.12, p<0.0125, ηρ²=0.48; outcome expectation: F(1,134)=22.27, p<0.0125, ηρ²=0.30; barrier to exercise: F(1,100)=10.50, p<0.0125, ηρ²=0.17; moderate physical activity F(1,114)=96.79, p<0.0125, ηρ²=0.65 with a Bonferroni adjusted alpha level of 0.0125. The MANOVA results showed that the outcome of the 12-week intervention programme significantly influence time (pretest and posttest) of self-efficacy, outcome expectation, barrier to exercise, moderate physical activity. All scores are significantly higher for posttest in self-efficacy (p<0.01), outcome expectation (p<0.01), moderate physical activity (p<0.01), and lower in barrier to exercise (p<0.01). Lastly, the four months follow-up test showed that the intervention group had significantly lower mean scores compared with posttest in self-efficacy, outcome expectancy, and barrier to exercise. There was no significant difference in moderate physical activity between follow-up and posttest in the intervention group. Conclusions: The twelve-week SCT-based educational treatment shows significant effects in posttest and also intervention group on the targeted constructs: self-efficacy, outcome expectation, and barrier to exercise as well as increasing the moderate physical activity among working adults with intellectual disabilities.

abstract: Possible selves researchers have uncovered many issues associated with the current possible selves measures. For instance, one of the most famous possible selves measures, Oyserman (2004)'s open-ended possible selves, has proven to be difficult to score reliably and also involves laborious scoring procedures. Therefore, this study was initiated to develop a close-ended measure, called the Persistent Academic Possible Selves Scale for Adolescents (PAPSS), that meets these challenges. The PAPSS integrates possible selves theories (personal and social identities) and educational psychology (self-regulation in social cognitive theory). Four hundred and ninety five junior high and high school students participated in the validation study of the PAPSS. I conducted confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) to compare fit for a baseline model to the hypothesized models using Mplus version 7 (Muthén & Muthén, 2012). A weighted least square means and a variance adjusted (WLSMV) estimation method was used for handling multivariate nonnormality of ordered categorical data. The final PAPSS has validity evidence based on the internal structure. The factor structure is composed of three goal-driven factors, one self-regulated factor that focuses on peers, and four self-regulated factors that emphasize the self. Oyserman (2004)'s open-ended questionnaire was used for exploring the evidence of convergent validity. Many issues regarding Oyserman (2003)'s instructions were found during the coding process of academic plausibility. It was complicated to detect hidden academic possible selves and strategies from non-academic possible selves and strategies. Also, interpersonal related strategies were over weighted in the scoring process compared to interpersonal related academic possible selves. The study results uncovered that all of the academic goal-related factors in the PAPSS are significantly related to academic plausibility in a positive direction. However, self-regulated factors in the PAPSS are not. The correlation results between the self-regulated factors and academic plausibility do not provide the evidence of convergent validity. Theoretical and methodological explanations for the test results are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Educational Psychology 2013

Companies spend considerable amounts of money on implementation of enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. The implementation of an ERP system is risky since it involves the core administrative processes used to give a good customer service, plan and monitor production, handle suppliers and monitor the financial effectiveness of the company. It is quite clear that a wrongly managed ERP implementation can cause lower customer satisfaction and weakening trust from the market. These are effects that companies can’t afford in most markets were competition is very strong and customer service is the key to future improved business. One very important part to minimize the risk in such projects is to focus on change management and knowledge transfer to the end users. The end users need to be equipped with the right knowledge in the new ERP system from day one, otherwise the risks grow considerable. Missing knowledge can cost missed deliveries, customer complaints, financial claims and most importantly lower compatibility on the market. This thesis builds a framework with main points to consider when building a positive learning environment and how to break the information wall so that the trainer can get through with the message.

The purposes of the study are to identify factors of creativity which have been revealed in the fields of personality and cognitive theory, art education, and science, and to formulate a base for a theory of creativity.

Theory of Mind (ToM) refers to the ability to attribute mental states to oneself and other people. In this thesis, I present a new paradigm, the Self/Other Differentiation task, which was designed to assess ToM abilities – specifically, the ability to attribute belief states to the ‘Self' and ‘Other' – in typically developed, healthy adults. By focussing on fully developed ToM abilities, we aimed to increase understanding of how the ToM mechanism is structured and functions in everyday life, and how individual ToM components may differentially relate to executive functioning (EF) abilities. The Self/Other Differentiation task is a computerized false-belief task utilizing a matched- design to allow direct comparison of self-oriented versus other-oriented belief- attribution processes. Using behavioural (response times/error rates) and electrophysiological (EEG) methods, the work presented in this thesis provides evidence of a clear and distinct differentiation in the processing of ‘Self' versus ‘Other' perspectives in healthy ToM. We established a key role of perspective-shifting in ToM, which we hypothesize plays a crucial role in day-to-day communications; shifting from the Self-to-Other perspective was significantly harder (longer and more error prone) than shifting from the Other-to-Self perspective, suggesting that the ‘Self' forms the stem of understanding the ‘Other'. EEG analysis revealed these effects were present across fronto-lateral and occipital-lateral areas of the brain, particularly across the right hemisphere in parietal regions. We provide evidence of these features as universal, core components of the ToM mechanism, with data collected from both Chinese and Western cultures illustrating similar patterns of results. Results regarding the relationship between ToM and EF were mixed, with one study finding that affective EF positively correlates with ToM task performance, whilst non-affective EF does not, and a further two studies finding no such differential relationship. The Self/Other Differentiation task provides the opportunity to establish the features of ‘typical' ToM processes in healthy adults, to further our understanding of how the mature ToM mechanism functions.

The tagets of this thesis were to test with a chosen organization's staff how much self-efficacy depending of particular tasks affected the quality of fulfilling those tasks, to recommend suitable methods of increasing self-efficacy and to suggest a method of task formulation corresponding to social cognitive theory of man in organization. The research was done at a particular section of fiscal administration. The requisite information was obtained by questionnaire method, the received dates were compiled by the suitable statistical methods. The consequent results allowed to say there was no positive relation betwen self-efficacy during fulfilling particular tasks and the efficiency of the particular section's offices. One of the most important results was that self-efficacy itself did not affect the efficiency of the particular offices. The differences in the efficiency resulted from the managers'work. The thesis includes recommendations resulted from its targets.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / The study investigated the impact of a dialogical argumentation instructional model (DAIM) as an intervention teaching strategy to assist pre-service science teachers to implement integrated science-indigenous knowledge (IK) lessons during their seven week block teaching practice at schools in the Western Cape. This imperative is found in Specific Aim 3 of the Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement (CAPS) of the South African School Curriculum (Department of Basics Education, 2011). The study focussed on the pre-post conceptions of pre-service science teachers’ conceptions of the nature of science and the nature of indigenous knowledge. In addition the study examined pre-service teachers’ sense of self-efficacy in deploying a dialogical argumentation instructional model to implement an integrated science-IK lesson. The sample consisted of a cohort of thirty (30) Post-graduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) students training to teach at the Further Education and Training (FET) phase of school. They were a combined class enrolled for method in Natural Sciences, Life Sciences and Physical Sciences. A mixed methods approach was used to generate quantitative and qualitative data using a series of questionnaires, reflective diaries, journals and focus group interviews. Transcripts provided a rich bank of data of which only exemplars were used to highlight trends and to illustrate how theoretical constructs were used as analytical tools. The theoretical constructs used were Toulmin’s (1958/2003) Argumentation Pattern (TAP), Ogunniyi’s (1997) Contiguity Argumentation Theory (CAT) and Banduras’ Social Cognitive Theory (1986). The findings showed that the pre-service teachers appeared to overestimate their sense of self-efficacy (i.e. the ease and comfort) in using DAIM to implement a science- IK curriculum at the pre-test than at the post-test. The study also identified important implications for policy, teacher training programmes, teaching practice, pre-service science teachers, learners and further research. Furthermore, the pre-service reflective experiences indicated their increased awareness of the challenges and successes related to using dialogical argumentation to integrate a science-IK lesson. The most important contribution of this study to an argumentation paradigm was the emergence of a visual model called the Pyramid Argumentation Model that succinctly connected the apparent disparate module units in a holistic way (To be discussed in follow-up reports). The findings revealed numerous complexities as the participants navigated their own cosmologies of a scientific worldview and that of their indigenous knowledge worldview. Finally, the findings have not only corroborated the findings in earlier studies with respect to the merits and demerits of argumentation instruction but also identified various challenges that prospective and even practicing teachers might encounter in an attempt to make school science relevant to the sociocultural environment of learners especially those living in indigenous or traditional societies like the participants in this study.

The purpose of this study was to better understand the study behaviors and habits of university undergraduate students. It was designed to determine whether undergraduate students could be grouped based on their self-reported study behaviors and if any grouping system could be determined, whether group membership was related to students’ academic achievement. A total of 152 undergraduate students voluntarily participated in the current study by completing the Study Behavior Inventory instrument. All participants were enrolled in fall semester of 2010 at Florida International University. The Q factor analysis technique using principal components extraction and a varimax rotation was used in order to examine the participants in relation to each other and to detect a pattern of intercorrelations among participants based on their self-reported study behaviors. The Q factor analysis yielded a two factor structure representing two distinct student types among participants regarding their study behaviors. The first student type (i.e., Factor 1) describes proactive learners who organize both their study materials and study time well. Type 1 students are labeled “Proactive Learners with Well-Organized Study Behaviors”. The second type (i.e., Factor 2) represents students who are poorly organized as well as being very likely to procrastinate. Type 2 students are labeled “Disorganized Procrastinators”. Hierarchical linear regression was employed to examine the relationship between student type and academic achievement as measured by current grade point averages (GPAs). The results showed significant differences in GPAs between Type 1 and Type 2 students at the .05 significance level. Furthermore, student type was found to be a significant predictor of academic achievement beyond and above students’ attribute variables including sex, age, major, and enrollment status. The study has several implications for educational researchers, practitioners, and policy makers in terms of improving college students' learning behaviors and outcomes.