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This study argues for the need of a testable general symbolic interactionist theory of criminal behavior. I look to affect control theory, a structural symbolic interactionist theory of behavior focused on the cybernetic maintenance of affective meanings shared within a linguistic group and extrapolate from its statements and equations using a large hypothetical event simulation. Employing a novel story-telling interview method to uncover the process of definition of the situation, I interview twenty-five paroled offenders and describe a typical view of criminal actions in both violent and property crime events. I examine this view for criminogenic potential. Next, I investigate the popular view that identity controls behavior in interaction by asking parolees about themselves, and comparing their self perspectives to those of undergraduate students. No support for this view is found. Implications of different culturally-based meaning systems are then examined by measuring affective meanings of criminal events as they are perceived by three different aggregate groups: paroled offenders, probationary offenders, and undergraduate student non-offenders. Affect control predictions about the likelihood of criminal events given these perspectives are found to be in accordance with the relative surmised likelihood of criminal behavior for these groups, as extrapolated from their past behavior. This supports arguments of a culturally based explanation of criminal behavior. I argue that affect control theory presents criminology with the novel potential for a generative theory of crime that integrates micrological and macrological levels of analysis. Finally I outline a proposed affect control theory of crime for further testing.

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This project examines attitude change between 1981 and 2001 for a population of young, well educated Canadians, employing evaluation, potency and activity (EPA) semantic differential ratings of approximately 800 social identities. This comprises my larger data set. I also employ a smaller subset of 102 social identities drawn from the larger data set to explore changes across three points in time (1981, 1995, and 2001) for 102 social identities, supplementing my analysis across two points in time (1981 and 2001) for 800 social identities. The objectives for this dissertation are: (1) to assess stability of attitudes for social identities over time; (2) to identify and describe patterns of change in identity attitudes and to connect observed changes in identity attitudes to historical events, and to social and cultural change in Canadian society; (3) to explore the extent to which identities that cluster together in EPA space define social institutions; and (4) to explore how changes in identity attitudes affect role expectations over time. Despite significant shifts in attitudes for a number of identities, approximately 80% of identity attitudes remained stable over time, confirming findings from past research that cultural sentiments are slow to change. Observed changes could be connected to social and cultural structure. Specifically, dramatic changes occurred for religious and sexual preference/orientation identities. Numerous religious identities decreased on evaluation for male respondents between 1981 and 1995 and then were restored to earlier levels by 2001. Female respondents were not as forgiving and 1995 decreases in evaluation were sustained. These changes are connected to increased secularization and earlier sexual scandals in religious institutions. Sexual preference/orientation identities increased significantly on evaluation for both males and females. However, increases for females were more dramatic and occurred across all three points in time while changes in attitudes for males occurred between 1981 and 1995 and then changed little between 1995 and 2001. These changes can be connected to numerous factors, including the increased visibility of gay/lesbian culture in mainstream media and the absence of a strong anti-gay counter movement. Although social identities clustered in interesting ways, cluster analysis was not very successful in defining social institutions. Computer simulations revealed how role and behaviour expectations change with changes in identity attitudes. For example, there is obvious increase in evaluation between 1981 and 2001 for the behavior of a police officer toward a homosexual. This dissertation concludes by addressing methodological issues such as sample size and generalizability. It is suggested that the corpus of identities should be continually updated to include identities that are emerging from pop culture. Finally, four areas of future research are suggested: (1) a continual monitoring of cultural sentiments; (2) a more detailed focus on individual social institutions; (3) a confirmation of computer predictions with qualitative interview data; and (4) identifying the implications of this research for trend analysis. Practical implications of this dissertation research include the use of computer simulations of identity-role processes in the areas of education and policy research.

Many applications in robotics require faithfully following a prescribed path. Tracking controllers may not be appropriate for such a task, as there is no guarantee that the robot will stay on the path. The objective of this thesis is to develop a control design method which makes the “output” of a robot get to, and move along the prescribed path without leaving the path. We consider the class of mechanical systems, which encompasses robotics. Various techniques exist for designing pah following controllers. We base our approach on a technique called “transverse feedback linearization”. Using this technique, if feasible, we decompose the dynamics of a mechanical system into a transversal subsystem and a tangential subsystem using a coordinate and feedback transformation. The transversal subsystem is linear, time-invariant and decoupled from the tangential subsystem. Stabilizing the origin of the transversal subsystem is equivalent to stabilizing a set corresponding to the output of the mechanical system being on the desired path, thereby partly achieving the control objective. Given a mechanical system and a path, we provide conditions under which this is possible. The tangential subsystem describes all of the motions of the mechanical system, when the output is on the path. Some tangential dynamics may move the output along the path, and thereby meet the design objective. In order to move the output of the mechanical system along the path, we further decompose the tangential subsystem into a subsystem which moves the output along the path, and a subsystem which does not, if feasible, using partial feedback linearization. The subsystem which governs output motions along the path is linear, time-invariant and decoupled. The remaining tangential dynamics have no special structure. We provide conditions under which such a decomposition of the tangential dynamics is possible. We show that a five-bar robotic manipulator has dynamics which may be transversely feedback linearized, and the tangential dynamics may be partially linearized. Given a circular path, we experimentally implement our path following design, and observe that our control objective is indeed met. Inherent advantages of path following over trajectory tracking are illustrated. Standard feedback linearization of a five-bar robotic manipulator with a flexible link has been shown to fail. We show that this system is transversely feedback linearizable, and its tangential dynamics may be partially linearized, under mild restrictions. Simulations illustrate path following applied to this complex system.

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