This project involved the adaptive reuse of Maw Garage at 112 King Street. The building was transformed into an interpretive centre for Winnipeg’s Exchange District. As museums are faced with challenges of being relevant in today’s context, museum planners have started to shift their attention toward new approaches for the design of these environments. The purpose of this project was to investigate the evolving nature of the museum, and to determine how its role in society could be modified to better accommodate its audience’s needs. Society’s understanding of heritage in regard to the way we interpret, relate to, and connect with objects, each other, and environments has changed. A thorough review of literature resulted in a broad understanding of post-museum, constructivist learning, and public space theories. Combined with knowledge gained from the analysis of three precedents and programming, these theories enabled the development of a contemporary museum that challenges stereotypical ideas of the museum. This design proposal illustrates one possible way in which post-museum, constructivist learning, and public space theories could be used to design a new museum. Although the solution presented here is specific to Winnipeg’s Exchange District and the Heritage Winnipeg client, conceivably, the same theories could be used to design interpretive centres elsewhere in North America.

This project involved the adaptive reuse of Maw Garage at 112 King Street. The building was transformed into an interpretive centre for Winnipeg’s Exchange District. As museums are faced with challenges of being relevant in today’s context, museum planners have started to shift their attention toward new approaches for the design of these environments. The purpose of this project was to investigate the evolving nature of the museum, and to determine how its role in society could be modified to better accommodate its audience’s needs. Society’s understanding of heritage in regard to the way we interpret, relate to, and connect with objects, each other, and environments has changed. A thorough review of literature resulted in a broad understanding of post-museum, constructivist learning, and public space theories. Combined with knowledge gained from the analysis of three precedents and programming, these theories enabled the development of a contemporary museum that challenges stereotypical ideas of the museum. This design proposal illustrates one possible way in which post-museum, constructivist learning, and public space theories could be used to design a new museum. Although the solution presented here is specific to Winnipeg’s Exchange District and the Heritage Winnipeg client, conceivably, the same theories could be used to design interpretive centres elsewhere in North America.

INTRODUCTION AND AIM: The current shortage of nurses is a concern shared by the healthcare industry globally. Whilst the reasons for these shortages are varied and complex, a key factor among them seem to involve an unhealthy work environment. The demanding nature of the critical care environment presents a challenge to many nursing professionals and it carries the risk of a high turn over rate due to the stress and intensity of the critical care environment. The critical care nurse is responsible for caring for the most ill patients in hospitals and the acute shortage of critical care nurses contributes to the intensity and pressures of this environment. Little evidence exists of research conducted to explore and describe the practice environment of the critical care nurse in South Africa. The main aim of this research study was to construct a theory for positive practice environments in critical care units in South Africa, grounded in the views and perceptions of critical care nurses working in the private hospital context. In recognition of the fact that a positive practice environment is considered to be the foundation for the successful recruitment and retention of nurses, it was clear that issues related to staff shortages will not be resolved unless the unhealthy work environment of nurses is adequately addressed. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHOD: A constructivist grounded theory design was selected to address the inquiry at hand. The study was divided into two phases and pragmatic plurality allowed the use of both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods to explore, describe and contextualise the data in order to achieve the overall aim of the study. In phase one, a checklist developed by the researcher was used to describe the demographic profile of the critical care units (n=31) that participated in the study. The perceptions of critical care nurses (n=298) regarding their current practice environment was explored and decribed by using a valid and reliable instrument, the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index (PES-NWI). In phase two, the elements of a positive practice environment were explored and described by means of intensive interviews with critical care nurses (n=6) working in the critical care environment. Concepts related to the phenomenon under investigation were identified by means of an inductive analysis of the data through a coding process and memo-writing. One core conceptual category and six related categories emerged out of the data. In the final phase of the theoretical sampling of the literature, a set of conclusions relevant to the phenomenon under study was constructed. The conclusions deduced from the empirical findings in both phases of the research process were integrated with those derived from the literature review to provide the foundation from which the theory was constructed. FINDINGS: The findings from the first phase of the research process provided information about the context in which the participants operate and assisted in discovering concepts considered relevant to the phenomenon under investigation. A grounded theory depicting the core conceptual category of "being in controi" and its relation to the other six categories was constructed from the data in order to explain a positive practice environment for critical care units in the private healthcare sector in South Africa. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Nursing))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2010.

Evidence indicates that regular physical activity (e.g., aerobic physical activity for 30 minutes most days of the week) reduces recurrent cardiac events and death rates in women with coronary heart disease (CHD). However, study findings consistently report higher rates of physical inactivity among rural versus urban women. In addition, rural women experience significant geographic disparities, health inequities, and limited access to health care services and providers, creating further self-care challenges such as engaging in recommended physical activity behaviors post-MI. To understand how rural Nova Scotia (NS) women engage in physical activity behaviors post MI, and factors that affect their physical activity in the post-MI period, constructivist grounded theory (CGT) and photovoice methodologies and methods were used in this research. Eighteen NS women from rural settings participated in two interviews and in the taking of personal photographs using provided disposable cameras. Findings from the narrative and visual data culminated in a substantive theory, “Seeking-Self Worth: A Theory of How Rural Women Engage in Physical Activity Behavior Post-MI.” What was most problematic for study participants was questioning self-worth as a rural woman post-MI. To manage this problem, study participants engaged in the process of seeking self-worth as a rural woman post-MI. The theory of seeking self-worth also involved the processes of assessing MI damage and physical activity, testing physical activity limits, and choosing physical activity priorities. All of these processes played out within a rural context where gender and contextual factors encouraged or hindered study participants’ seeking of self-worth post-MI and, subsequently, their engagement in physical activity behavior post-MI. This substantive theory has implications for nursing, particularly rural public health nurses and nurse practitioners, in the areas of practice, education, research, and policy development.

INTRODUCTION AND AIM: The current shortage of nurses is a concern shared by the healthcare industry globally. Whilst the reasons for these shortages are varied and complex, a key factor among them seem to involve an unhealthy work environment. The demanding nature of the critical care environment presents a challenge to many nursing professionals and it carries the risk of a high turn over rate due to the stress and intensity of the critical care environment. The critical care nurse is responsible for caring for the most ill patients in hospitals and the acute shortage of critical care nurses contributes to the intensity and pressures of this environment. Little evidence exists of research conducted to explore and describe the practice environment of the critical care nurse in South Africa. The main aim of this research study was to construct a theory for positive practice environments in critical care units in South Africa, grounded in the views and perceptions of critical care nurses working in the private hospital context. In recognition of the fact that a positive practice environment is considered to be the foundation for the successful recruitment and retention of nurses, it was clear that issues related to staff shortages will not be resolved unless the unhealthy work environment of nurses is adequately addressed. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHOD: A constructivist grounded theory design was selected to address the inquiry at hand. The study was divided into two phases and pragmatic plurality allowed the use of both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods to explore, describe and contextualise the data in order to achieve the overall aim of the study. In phase one, a checklist developed by the researcher was used to describe the demographic profile of the critical care units (n=31) that participated in the study. The perceptions of critical care nurses (n=298) regarding their current practice environment was explored and decribed by using a valid and reliable instrument, the Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index (PES-NWI). In phase two, the elements of a positive practice environment were explored and described by means of intensive interviews with critical care nurses (n=6) working in the critical care environment. Concepts related to the phenomenon under investigation were identified by means of an inductive analysis of the data through a coding process and memo-writing. One core conceptual category and six related categories emerged out of the data. In the final phase of the theoretical sampling of the literature, a set of conclusions relevant to the phenomenon under study was constructed. The conclusions deduced from the empirical findings in both phases of the research process were integrated with those derived from the literature review to provide the foundation from which the theory was constructed. FINDINGS: The findings from the first phase of the research process provided information about the context in which the participants operate and assisted in discovering concepts considered relevant to the phenomenon under investigation. A grounded theory depicting the core conceptual category of "being in controi" and its relation to the other six categories was constructed from the data in order to explain a positive practice environment for critical care units in the private healthcare sector in South Africa. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Nursing))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2010.

This project explores the 'maternal migration effect'. Following migration to a high-income country with a low maternal mortality rate, we assume that some immigrant women’s reliance upon maternal practices that respond to a low-income, high-mortality context can adversely affect care-seeking and utilization of treatment facilities. At highest risk in the United Kingdom and Sweden are those from Africa's Horn, particularly Somali women who have experienced diasporic migration. By applying constructivist qualitative methods as proxies for medical anthropology, we propose a framework for identifying socio-cultural factors, and then we explore how these can influence the western facility-based maternity care encounter. Study 1 proposes a conceptual framework to understand why sub-Saharan African immigrants might experience adverse childbirth outcomes in western settings. Analysis was guided by 'naturalistic inquiry method' to explore delay-causing socio-cultural factors to optimal maternity treatment. Delays can result from (a) broken trust underlying women’s late-booking or refusal of treatment interventions, and care provider frustration; (b) over-reliance on poorly-functioning interpreter services that deny women’s access to medical expertise; and (c) mutual broken trust and miscommunication, and limited development of guidelines for treatment avoidance. Limited coherence exists in the perspectives between women and providers about caesarean section and other interventions, refusal of treatment, and coping strategies following adverse birth outcomes. Care providers' held misconceptions about women’s preferences for gender- and ethnic-congruence. Women preferred competent care. Congruent language was identified as the key ingredient for optimal culture-sensitive care. Study 2 applied 'grounded dimensional analysis' and 'functional narrative analysis' to explore pre-migration socio-cultural factors that influence Somali parents' childbearing in Sweden. Women’s delayed care-seeking continues, despite that childbearing is still perceived as life-threatening. Decision-making is shared between the couple. Men more than women trust care providers to fill gaps in their knowledge. The postpartum period showed that fathers play an important role. "Aftercare" concerns include unarticulated sexual aversion combined with loss of traditional kin support. Women's autonomy is enhanced but greater necessity exists for intimate partner communication and reliance upon professional care services. Medical anthropology can provide a complementary instrument for developing qualitative evidence-based strategies that target prevention of adverse childbirth outcomes in European countries.

Integration of work-placements into undergraduate degrees is now established on awards linked to professional registration in healthcare. Pre-registration training forms the basis for development of capability and entry onto a professional register. This enquiry explores how key stakeholders on a programme leading to registration as a Biomedical Scientist (BMS) position themselves in their role and the subsequent impact of this upon the development of the capable BMS. It draws upon current knowledge of work-based pedagogy and utilises a constructivist grounded theory (CGT) approach to explore the perceptions and experiences of individuals and groups to develop an interpretative portrayal and deeper understanding of the implementation of pre-registration training in one region of England. Data gathering and analysis was divided into two stages. The first employed analysis of professional documents to provide an insight into current discourses around BMS training. This provided initial developing categories and directed the creation of a questionnaire. Questionnaire responses confirmed the relevance of the developing categories and a summary of responses provided an ‘ice-breaker’ to guide stage two of data gathering. This stage employed focus groups and interviews to enable a greater understanding of how individuals make sense of their experiences. Initial, focused and theoretical coding allowed synthesis and conceptualisation of the data gathered and presented direction for the enquiry. The findings expose the challenges of integrating professional registration training into an academic programme of study. Three theoretical categories were identified: Role conflict, Expectations and Ownership. Conceptualising the interactions and intersections of these categories enabled the recognition of ‘Doing the portfolio’ as a way of describing and conceptualising the stakeholders positioning within the current programme. The registration portfolio has become an objective reductionist measure of learning, reflecting the positivist typology of practice in this profession. This provides a theoretical explanation as to how the programme is delivered and why there is a need to rethink conceptualisation of the role of the programme in supporting pre-registration training and the development of the capable BMS. To ensure that BMS students are supported to develop not only technical skills but also professional capability there is a need for a paradigm shift from a positivist episteme to one that embraces both the positivist and socio-cultural paradigms, viewing them as complementary and parallel. The novel research approach used in this enquiry has generated rich insights into how stakeholders interact with the pressures of internal and external influences and the impact this has upon behaviours and strategies adopted. The theoretical understanding proposed, which recognises the tensions emerging from a positivist typology of practice, has a range of implications for practice and for the development of practitioner capability through pre-registration training and beyond.

The aim of this research was to investigate how I engaged in constructivist teaching (CT) when helping a group of low-performing Grade 7 students to develop new meanings of notation as they started to learn formal algebra. Data was collected over a period of one scholastic year, in which I explored the teacher-student dynamics during my mathematics lessons, where students learnt new representations and interpretations of notation with the help of the computer software Grid Algebra. Analysing video recordings of my lessons, I observed myself continuously changing my teaching purpose as I negotiated between the mathematics I intended to teach and the mathematics being constructed by my students. These shifts of focus and purpose were used to develop a conceptual framework called Mathematics-Negotiation-Learner (M-N-L). Besides serving as a CT model, the M-N-L framework was found useful to determine the extent to which I managed to engage in CT during the lessons and also to identify moments where I lost my sensitivity to students constructions of knowledge. The effectiveness of my CT was investigated by focusing on students learning, for which reason I developed the analytical framework called CAPS (Concept-Action-Picture-Symbol). The CAPS framework helped me to analyse how students developed notions about properties of operational notation, the structure and order of operations in numerical and algebraic expressions, and the relational property of the equals sign. Grid Algebra was found to be a useful tool in helping students to enrich their repertoire of representations and to develop new interpretations of notation through what I defined as informal- and formal-algebraic activities. All students managed to transfer these representations and interpretations of notation to pen-and-paper problems, where they successfully worked out traditionally set substitution-and-evaluation tasks.

This study aims at analyzing the content of high school textbooks in social sciences, more specifically the field of law and order, and comparing this with the current research situation in the field. Another purpose is to investigate whether the new type of serious gang crime, which in particular has grown in various immigrant suburbs, adjacent to our largest cities, as reported in the media in recent years, has also looked into the textbooks. The essay uses a constructivist theory formation. The constructivist theory considers that different actors, based on their ideological positions, create different descriptions of current social phenomena, descriptions aimed at influencing the recipient to incorporate specific perceptions of reality and values. In this context, the teaching materials become a political product that is not so much about describing a social phenomenon as complex and objective as possible a complex, but, above all, it will be understood as the attempt of the various parties to convey their specific interpretations and interests of the phenomenon. The survey shows that all analyzing textbooks directly or indirectly highlight the men and adolescents group, and to some extent also people in an exposed psychosocial position that overrepresented in a criminal context. In cases where textbooks address statements about people committing crimes, socio-economic and psychosocial vulnerabilities are mentioned, as well as explanations of the social plane in terms of control and casualty structures. In this regard, textbooks fail to report a broad and current research on the mechanisms of crime. None of the textbooks deal with the new crime that has emerged in different socially vulnerable areas to our metropolitan areas, believing that this has gained a lot of space in the media and that the syllabuses in social sciences emphasize that the subject will highlight current social phenomena. All books consistently choose to not treat people it with a foreign background's overrepresentation in a criminal context. Nor should it be noted that some people have a biological vulnerability in committing crimes, for example, that individuals with ADHD diagnosis are heavily overrepresented in crime statistics. / <p>Godkännane datum: 2018-05-31</p>

This exploratory study examined links between health communication and other constructs affecting health promotion and disease prevention among Haitian mother-daughter dyads living in West Central Florida, and the risk or protective factors for HIV. Risky sexual behaviors can be reduced with accurate and effective information provided through parent-adolescent communication (Coetzee et al, 2014; Ogle, Glasier & Riley, 2008; Hadley et al., 2009). In Haiti, a country that bears a disproportionate burden of HIV/AIDS, women are the most vulnerable (UNAIDS, 2016a); In the United States (U.S.), foreign-born Haitian women in the state of Florida experience health disparities in many areas and bear a disproportionate burden of HIV/AIDS relative to their non-Haitian peers but little is known about (Florida Department of Health [FLDOH], 2017; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion [ODPHP], 2017). Indeed, the state of Florida recently reported that newly diagnosed cases of HIV increased for foreign-born Haitian women and in 2016, the latter represented 3.64% of all cases (Florida Department of Health, Bureau of Communicable Diseases, HIV/AIDS Section, 2017a). Recognizing that Haitian mothers traditionally bear the primary responsibility for transmitting traditional norms, values, health beliefs and practices, a concept referred to as poto mitan, this qualitative study examined risks and protective factors for HIV that may emerge in health and sexual health communication among Haitian mothers and daughters. This study comprised a two-phase process in which purposive sampling was first used to recruit and interview a focus group of seven health care providers and Haitian-descendant community leaders who engage Haitian-descendant clients in West Central Florida, after which findings from the focus group were used to strengthen a semi-structured interview guide that would be used to interview 10 Haitian mother/daughter dyads in the area. This study addressed a gap in the scientific literature related to health and sexual health promotion and disease prevention communication among Haitian immigrant women in the U.S., particularly surrounding HIV risk. Specifically, it sought to discover what constitutes specific methods that Haitian mothers use to communicate health and sexual health and the contents of such conversations, as well as the intention of daughters to transmit information that they received from their mothers, even here in the U.S. This study applied a constructivist grounded theory approach, in which Symbolic Interactionism (SI) and the Information-Motivation-Behavioral Skills Model (IMB) were triangulated as a framework. ATLAS.ti® 7.0, a software that supports analysis of textual data, was used to analyze transcripts from the focus group and from the interviews. Findings indicate that (a) Haitian mothers intentionally transmit specific and valued traditional knowledge about health and sexual health to their daughters, specifically in the areas of vaginal health, post-partum rituals, and abstinence as the acceptable mode of HIV prevention; (b) Haitian mothers in the study sample lack adequate and accurate knowledge about HIV/AIDS as well as the time to learn more that they can share with daughters; (c) Haitian mothers in the study sample do engage in direct communication about HIV prevention, taking advantage of teachable moments, using popular music and television programs; (d) there is a strong reliance on religious leaders and school systems to address health and sexual health instruction; (e) Haitian mothers in the sample reported and daughters confirmed that there is extremely limited conversation between the mothers and daughters surrounding sex, HIV risk reduction methods outside of abstinence. (f) Symbolic Interactionism is a useful framework for understanding the process of communication between Haitian mothers and daughters in this study; (g) IMB is useful to understand that the information being provided by Haitian mothers in this sample is at times insufficient and inaccurate, thereby limiting the ability of daughters to effectively and intentionally engage in conduct that protects their sexual health and reduces HIV risk. This study has several implications for social work education, research, practice, and policy. First, social work students must be taught to conduct comprehensive assessments of Haitian women in the context of valued Haitian family dynamics, and to engage in life-long learning regarding protective as well as risk factors for Haitian mothers and daughters. Second, Haitian and non-Haitian health providers who serve Haitian clientele could be surveyed regarding knowledge of health beliefs and practices and its potential impact on the health of their constituents. their Haitian patients. Third, researchers may use this study’s findings as a foundation for developing interventions that enhance strategies aimed at establishing rapport with Haitian clients and for assessing potential interactions between hidden health practices and prescribed medications. Fourth, findings suggest the need to develop interventions that empower trusted religious leaders to gain accurate HIV knowledge and to deliver empowering information effectively to their congregants. Fifth, findings suggest a need to develop outreach programs aimed at heightening HIV awareness and increasing HIV testing for Haitian women who are similar to this study’s sample. Sixth, social workers engaging Haitian female clients can make intentional efforts to include Haitian mothers in treatment. Seventh, this study’s findings underscore a need for social workers to advocate on behalf of Haitian immigrants’ efforts to be properly counted in the census, and to be counted as a culturally distinct group in other surveillance data. Social workers can benefit from understanding the strengths of relationships between Haitian mothers and daughters and to enhance their awareness of the heterogeneity among Haitians in general when working with Haitian clients. To work effectively with Haitian immigrant females overall requires cultural humility to mitigate the likelihood of bias towards them based on known or hidden traditional health beliefs and practices and gender roles.