Nowadays, an intelligence is a widely applied concept. The authors' opinions on its possible unification with or strict separation from the specific cognitive functions vary throughout different fields of psychology. Simultaneously, schizophrenia is a mental disorder, which is often connected to a cognitive deficit. Its assessment is usually realized on an estimation of the intelligence level. The aim was to explore how the estimation of intelligence corresponds with a cognitive profile of a patient with schizophrenia. This purpose is firstly being attained by a description of various views and theoretical objects, for instance core characteristics of a schizophrenia, a description of intelligence and selected cognitive functions. The empirical part is focused on an exploration of the relationship between a cognitive profile and the estimation of actual and premorbid intelligence of a patient with schizophrenia. A total of 120 persons with a diagnose F20 were included in this study. A cognitive profile was assessed with the usage of MATRICS battery and the intelligence levels were evaluated by selected WASI tests and Czech reading test (CRT). Results indicates that despite the level of premorbid and actual intelligence level was identified within the normal range, respondents evinced a cognitive...

Consensus and commercial terms: theoretical and comparative analysis This final thesis deals with the topic of the battle of the forms using the theoretical apparatus of rules governing the formation of contract. The problem is modeled (and therefore limited) for the case of formation of contract for the sale of goods concluded between merchants when each of them uses his/her own commercial (standard) terms. Another limitation of the thesis is connected with the use of classical contractual paradigm which is based on the continuity of offer and acceptance in the process of contracting. The key element of contract is found in consensus, therefore it is consensus which is analyzed in connection with extensiveness of terms, about which the minds have to meet in order to form the contract, and also in connection with the content of already formed contract. The final thesis has two objectives. First, it is to verify on theoretical level that no matter what principle in the process of formation of contract is used (whether mirror-image rule or not) both law professionals and legal theory are forced to find solutions which are in accordance with the principle of economic analysis of contract. Second, it is to analyze solutions on the formation and content of contract which were adopted by Czech...

(in English): Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is a very effective treatment procedure for patients with severe and treatment resistant psychiatric disorders. This Thesis deals with the impact of electroconvulsive therapy on cognitive function, specified as a measurement of cognitive function after electroconvulsive therapy, focusing on the monitoring of cognitive function, eventually their deficits with the passage of time after ECT. At several time points (T1 week after ECT completion; T2: 6-8 weeks after ECT completion) from ECT completion the progression of cognitive performance of patients was repeatedly measured. Respondents were divided according to their diagnosis (mood disorders groop and schizophrenia group). The groups were compared with each other. The aim of the Thesis is the observance of the cognitive changes in patients over time after electroconvulsive therapy. In the final stage 18 subjects were submissed into the study (10 women and 8 men). In terms of diagnosis 39% were diagnosed with the disease in the ICD category F20-F29; 33% were diagnosed with mood disorders (category ICD: F30-F39) and 28% were diagnosed with F06.3 organic affective disorder. The MCCB (MATRICS Consensus Cognitive Battery) was chosen as a method for data scan, it has very good psychometric properties also...

This dissertation aims at solving the consensus control problem of multi-agent systems with Lipschitz nonlinearity. This depends on the design of the controller that enables each agent or subsystem in multi-agent systems with Lipschitz nonlinearity to reach consensus; using the understanding of the agents' connection network from the knowledge of graph theory as well as the control system design strategy. The objective is achieved by designing a type of distributed control, namely the consensus control, which manipulates the relative information of each agent in a multi-agent systems in order to arrive at a single solution. In addition, containment control is also developed to solve containment problem. It is an extension of consensus control via leader-follower configuration, aimed at having each agent contained by multiple leaders in a multi-agent systems with Lipschitz nonlinearity. Four types of controllers are proposed - state-feedback consensus controller, observer-based consensus controller, state-feedback containment controller and observer-based containment controller; each provides the stability conditions based on Lyapunov stability analysis in time domain which enabled each agent or subsystem to reach consensus. The observer-based controllers are designed based on the consensus observer that is related to Luenberger observer. Linear Matrix Inequality (LMI) and Algebraic Riccati Equation (ARE) are utilized to obtain the solutions for the stability conditions. The simulation results of the proposed controllers and observers have been carried out to prove their theoretical validity. Several practical examples of flexible robot arm simulations are included to further validate the theoretical aspects of the thesis.

Ph.D. / This study is largely comprised of elements stemming from two important approaches to the study of politics ie political leadership studies and political culture studies. The following two assumptions were implicit to this study: 1) The political process largely revolves around the practice of leadership in society, as leaders being part of the elite are directly involved in politics and have to make important decisions. ii) Comprehension of leaders' political beliefs contribute to our knowledge of politics ...

Magister Legum - LLM / This research examines the effectiveness of these dispute resolution mechanisms in environmental disputes and what improvements should be made in order to make those mechanisms suitable for these types of disputes. / South Africa

Governing agencies increasingly employ collaborative forms of decision-making in fisheries management to improve decision quality and legitimacy. However, crafting fair and effective collaborative processes which will achieve these benefits is often difficult. In an effort to identify keys and obstacles to success, this research evaluated the Commercial Groundfish Initiative, a collaborative planning process tasked with reforming the management of Canada's Pacific groundfish fisheries. Using semi-structured interviews, I gathered the perspectives of participants from the two committees within the process: a consensus-based committee of commercial representatives and a committee broadly representative of other interest groups for which consensus was encouraged but not mandated. Control over the design of a proposal for management reform was asymmetrically divided between the two committees, giving the commercial committee the primary role. Participants from the commercial committee expressed high levels of support for their consensus process. Keys to this committee’s success in reaching a high quality agreement were (i) a strong incentive to cooperate, (ii) consensus decision-making, and (iii) independent process facilitation. The latter two functioned as security measures against the potential for process manipulation by participants or governing agencies. Results from an examination of the broader committee indicate non-commercial respondents were largely accepting of an “oversight” role provided that the scope for their input remained sufficient, which it did not. Early involvement in tasks such as designing the process and defining objectives were particularly critical to non-commercial respondents’ perceptions of procedural fairness and their ability to participate effectively. Several participants also raised concerns that the process was not appropriately representative of groups with an interest in groundfish management. The poor performance of the process in these respects overshadowed positive aspects of broadening participation beyond commercial users. Consensus approaches have gained currency among commercial participants as a result of their positive experience and made some of them more willing to consider meaningful collaboration with a broader range of interest groups. The ineffectiveness of the broader committee suggests there is still work to do in designing processes that will actually achieve this meaningful, broad collaboration. / Forestry, Faculty of / Graduate

Cooperative control of multi-agent systems (MASs) has been intensively investigated in the past decade. The task is always complicated for an individual agent, but can be achieved by collectively operating a group of agents in a reliable, economic and efficient way. Although a lot of efforts are being spent on improving MAS performances, much progress has yet to be developed on different aspects. This thesis aims to solve problems in the consensus control of multiple quadrotors and/or mobile robots considering irregular sampling controls, heterogeneous agent dynamics and the presence of model uncertainties and disturbances. The thesis proceeds with Chapter 1 by providing the literature review of the state-of-the-art development in the consensus control of MASs. Chapter 2 introduces experimental setups of the laboratory involving two-wheeled mobile robots (2WMRs), quadrotors, positioning systems and inter-vehicle communications. All of the developed theoretical results in Chapters 3-6 are experimentally verified on the platform. Then it is followed by two main parts: Irregular sampling consensus control methods (Chapter 3 and 4) and cooperative control of heterogeneous MASs (Chapter 5 and 6). Chapter 3 focuses on the non-uniform sampling consensus control for a group of 2WMRs, and Chapter 4 studies the event-based rendezvous control for a group of asynchronous robots with time-varying communication delays. Chapter 5 concentrates on cooperative control methods for a heterogeneous MAS consisting of quadrotors and 2WMRs. Chapter 6 focuses on the design of a quadrotor flight controller which is robust to various adverse factors such as model uncertainties and external disturbances. The developed controller is further applied to the consensus control of the heterogeneous MAS. Specifically, Chapter 3 studies synchronized and non-periodical sampling consensus control methods for a group of 2WMRs. The directed and switching communication topologies among the network are considered in the controller design. The 2WMR is an underactuated system, which implies that it can not generate independent x and y accelerations in the two-dimensional plane. The rendezvous control methods are proposed for 2WMRs. The algebraic graph theory and stochastic matrix analysis are employed to conduct the convergence analysis. Although the samplings in the work of Chapter 3 are aperiodic, one feature is that local clocks of agents are required to be synchronized. Challenges arise in the practical control of distributed MASs, especially in the scenario that the global clock is lacking. Moreover, frequent samplings can result in redundant information transmissions when the communication bandwidth is limited. To address these problems, Chapter 4 investigates an event-based rendezvous control method for a group of asynchronous MAS with time-varying communication delays. Integral-type triggering conditions for each robot are adopted to be checked periodically. If the triggering condition is satisfied at one checking instant, the agent samples and broadcasts the state to the neighbors with a bounded communication delay. Then an algorithm is provided for driving 2WMRs to asymptotically reach rendezvous. The convergence analysis is conducted through Lyapunov approaches. Most of the theoretical works on cooperative control are focused on controlling agents with identical dynamics. However, in certain realistic scenarios, some complex missions require the cooperation of different types of agent dynamics such as surveillance, search and rescue, etc. Tasks can be carried out with higher efficiency by employing both the autonomous ground vehicles and unmanned aerial vehicles. To achieve better performance for MASs, in Chapter 5, distributed cooperative control methods for a heterogeneous MAS consisting of quadrotors and 2WMRs are developed. Consensus conditions are provided, and the theoretical results are experimentally verified. Many existing quadrotor control methods need exact model parameters of the quadrotor. In reality, when a quadrotor is conducting some tasks with extra payloads or with unexpected damages to the model structure, errors in parameters could result in the failure of the flight. External disturbances also inevitably affect the flight performance. To move a step further towards practical applications, in Chapter 6, a robust quadrotor flight controller using Integral Sliding Mode Control (ISMC) technique is investigated. In experiments, an extra payload with the position and mass unknown, is attached to destroy the accuracy of the model and to add disturbances. The designed controller significantly rejects negative effects caused by the payload during the flight. This controller is also successfully applied to an MAS consisting of a quadrotor and 2WMRs. / Graduate

The diploma thesis deals with the export credit insurance as one of the possible instruments for covering business risks in international trade. Furthermore, it indicates its basic forms and also focuses on the international rules, which regulate the providing of export credit insurance. The main stress is laid on the development of export credit insurance with state support in a time of global financial and economic crisis. The thesis offers a view of the specific anti-crisis measures of some selected export credit agencies and their impact on the international trade development.

In this study, I undertake a discourse analysis of struggles over representation as they were manifested in the Charlottetown referendum campaign. I utilize transcripts taken during the campaign derived from the CBC news programs The National, The Journal, and Sunday Report as well as from The CTV News. The issue of (im-)partiality provides the analytical focus for this study. Who can legitimately speak on behalf of whom, or, to what extent do individuals have a particular voice which places limitations on whom they can represent? On the one hand, underlying what I call the ‘universalistic’ discourse is the premise that human beings can act in an impartial manner so that all individuals have the capacity to speak or act in the interests of all other individuals regardless of the group(s) to which they belong. On the other hand, a competing discourse based on group-difference’ maintains that all representatives express partial voices depending on their group-based characteristics. I argue that the universalistic discourse was hegemonic in the transcripts but, at the same time, the group-difference discourse was successful at articulating powerful counter-hegemonic resistance. Ironically, the universalistic discourse was hegemonic despite widespread assumptions of partiality on the basis of province, region, language, and Aboriginality. This was possible because the universalistic discourse subsumed territorial notions of partiality within itself. In contrast, I argue that assumptions of Aboriginal partiality will likely diffuse themselves to other categories, beginning with gender, in the future. I also describe the strategies used by the competing discourses to undermine one another. The universalistic discourse successfully portrayed the group-difference discourse as an inversion to a dangerous apartheid-style society where individuals were forced to exist within group-based categories. The group-difference discourse used the strategy of anomaly to demonstrate that individuals were inevitably categorized in the universalistic discourse; impartiality was a facade for a highly-partial ruling class. In examining these strategies, I demonstrate that the group-difference discourse justified its own position by making assumptions about the operation of power and dominance in society. Thus, impartiality was impossible not for the post-modern reason that inherent differences make representation highly problematic, but because power relations hinder the ability of representatives to act in a truly impartial manner. / Arts, Faculty of / Political Science, Department of / Graduate