Determining bumpiness and inclination of surfaces is very important in many different areas, such as airports and at constructions sites. In this study, a surveying trolley and a remote controlled (RC) car were used to determine the bumpiness of two different surfaces. The aim with this study was to test the accuracy of a surveying trolley and an RC car to see how the accuracy can be increased with different observation methods. Total station, GPS and laser scanner surveying equipments were used, and all observations obtained by them were analysed. The laser scanner data was found to have the best precision. For that reason, it was accepted as the “true” data and it was used for comparing and evaluating other methods. It was found that the trolley and the RC car provided good height information with total stations and they were corresponding to the laser scanner data. When they were used with GPS, the accuracy was much lower. It was concluded that using two total stations is not increasing the accuracy, the RC car and the trolley are good measuring methods but not capable to inspect 1,2 mm tolerance for the floors, and finally, 2-3 cm positioning accuracy is obtainable when using GPS.

The evaluation of infinite series plays an important part in numerical calculation. In hand calculation whenever a transcendental function is involved, one usually consults a table. Not only do the construction of the tables require the evaluation of transcendental functions, but with the advent of the electronic computer it is usually more convenient to have such evaluation carried out by the computer than to try to store a table of the necessary values to carry out the intended calculation. / Advisor: H. C. Griffith, Professor Directing Study. / Typescript. / "August 1960." / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science." / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 37).

In college programs utilizing the quarter system there arise problems in the development of encounter groups due to a limited amount of time available. A short training program in evaluating group processes might be one way to facilitate group development. In order to test one such program two hypotheses were generated. Hypotheses I was tested for a significant difference between a Treatment Group, receiving training, and a Control Group, receiving no training, in expressed member satisfaction. Hypothesis II was tested for a significant difference in the therapeutic value of rated interaction between the Treatment and Control Group. Expressed member satisfaction was measured by a Group Rating Scale . Therapeutic value of interaction was measured by the Hill Interaction Matrix. Two groups of eight subjects were used. Each group had the same leader and met for eight, two and one-half hour sessions, and a three hour training period. The Treatment Group and the Control Group were exposed to three hours of training with the experimenter. The Treatment Group received three hours of training on the Hill Interaction Matrix. The Control Group received three hours of "placebo'' training consisting of an explanation of the purpose of feedback. The dependent variables then were "feedback" for the Control Group and HIM training for the Treatment Group. The results of the study were favorable to the Treatment Group. Significant differences were revealed on five of the 16 items of the Group Rating Scale. Similarly the Treatment Group received a significantly higher rating in therapeutic value in Quadrant III of the Hill Interaction Matrix after receiving training. However, due to several confounding variables it cannot be definitely stated the results were due to the effects of treatment.

The purpose of this study was to examine and compare some of the personality characteristics of junior high school students as they related to the students' later vocational choices. More specifically selected personality characteristics observed in girls who later made typical or atypical vocational selection were compared. Both typical and atypical girls were also compared to boys on these selected personality characteristics. Te s t s used in this study to measure cognitive need and flexibility "ere Anderson Self-Reporting Need Achievement Questionnaire, Berlak School Work Habit Questionnaire and Resnick Self- Reporting Need Cognition Questionnaire. Tests used to measure social attitudes and ideology were "Have"--"Have not" Questionnaire, Submissiveness Test, F-Scale, and Humanitarian Concern. Comprehensive Personality Inventories used in this study were Guilford-Zimmerman Temperament Survey and Cattell's High School Personality Questionnaire. Scores from the Differential Aptitude Test were also used. Using the above measures, it was found that the girls defined by this study as atypical have some personality characteristics similar to those of boys and dissimilar to those of girls defined by this study as typical. The atypical girls of this study also have some personality characteristics different from both boys and typical girl s . But as a whole and contrary to the stereo typed career - oriented girl , the atypical girls of this study have more personality characteristics in common with other girls than with boys.

I slutet av 2010 avskaffades revisionsplikten för små aktiebolag, vilket innebar att de inte längre var bundna att enligt lag anlita revisor. Motivet till avskaffandet grundade sig i regeringens antagande om att de aktiebolag som avskaffade revisor skulle minska sina administrativa kostnader och på så sätt bli mer konkurrenskraftig. Detta skulle i sin tur bidra till ökad tillväxt och lönsamhet för de omfattade bolagen. Reformen har i senare tid resulterat i ett flertal debatter och studier kring ifall regeringens intentioner uppfylls eller inte, där flera olika, ibland motsatta resultat presenterats. Syftet med den här studien är således att undersöka huruvida regeringens intentioner med reformen har realiserats eller inte. Studien är baserad på kvantitativ grund, där en difference-in-difference regression modell tillämpats för att analysera reformseffekten. Vidare har det härletts två hypoteser från teorier och tidigare forskning på ämnet. Hypoteserna är att företag som anlitar revisor präglas av högre tillväxt, både vad gäller nettoomsättning och antalet anställda. Dessa antaganden görs med grund i teorierna “revision som komfort”, “revision som förbättring” och utifrån begreppet informationsassymmetri. Empirin i studien grundar sig på primärdata från 328 små aktiebolags offentliga årsredovisningar, där hälften anlitat revisor under undersökningsperioden, medan den andra hälften inte gjort det.   Resultatet i analyserna tyder på att det förelåg en klar skillnad mellan grupperna, där de som anlitat revisor präglades av högre tillväxt, både i termer av nettoomsättning och antal anställda. Dessa resultat är i direkt motsägelse till regeringens förutsägelser. Vidare står resultaten i kontrast till en studie från 2021, där slutsatsen som drogs var att revision är en tillväxtbarriär för små aktiebolag. Däremot bekräftas det resultat som presenterats av riksrevisionen 2017, att revisionen antas bidra till högre tillväxt. Slutsatsen som dras utifrån studiens resultat är att revision är en konkurrensfördel för små aktiebolag, som antas bidra till ökad tillväxt. Studiens resultat bidrar således med ökad förståelse för små aktiebolagsägare kring innebörden av att avskaffa revisorn.

In this thesis, we make use of numerical schemes in order to solve Fisher’s and FitzHugh-Nagumo equations with specified initial conditions. The thesis is made up of six chapters. Chapter 1 gives some literatures on partial differential equations and chapter 2 provides some concepts on finite difference methods, nonstandard finite difference methods and their proper-ties, reaction-diffusion equations and singularly perturbed equations. In chapter 3, we obtain the numerical solution of Fisher’s equation when the coefficient of diffu-sion term is much smaller than the coefficient of reaction (Li et al., 1998). Li et al. (1998) used the Moving Mesh Partial Differential Equation (MMPDE) method to solve a scaled Fisher’s equation with coefficient of reaction being 104 and coefficient of diffusion equal to one and the initial condition consisted of an exponential function. The problem considered is quite challeng-ing and the results obtained by Li et al. (1998) are not accurate due to the fact that MMPDE is based on familiar arc-length or curvature monitor function. Qiu and Sloan (1998) constructed a suitable monitor function called modified monitor function and used it with the Moving Mesh Differential Algebraic Equation (MMDAE) method in order to solve the same problem as Li et al. (1998) and better result were obtained. However, each problem has its own choice of monitor function which makes the choice of the monitor function an open question. We use the Forward in Time Central Space (FTCS) scheme and the Nonstandard Finite Difference (NSFD) to solve the scaled Fisher’s equation and we find that the temporal step size must be very small in order to obtain accurate results and comparable to Qiu and Sloan (1998). This causes the computational time to be long if the domain is large. We use two techniques to modify these two schemes either by introducing artificial viscosity or using the approach of Ruxun et al. (1999). These techniques are efficient and give accurate results with a larger temporal step size. We prove that these four methods are consistent with the partial differential equation and we also obtain the region of stability. Chapter 4 is an improvement and extension of the work from Namjoo and Zibaei (2018) whereby the standard FitzHugh-Nagumo equation with specified initial and boundary conditions is solved. Namjoo and Zibaei (2018) constructed two versions of nonstandard finite difference (NSFD1, NSFD2) and also derived two schemes (one explicit and the other implicit) constructed from the exact solution. However, they presented results using the nonstandard finite difference schemes only. We showed that one of the nonstandard finite difference schemes (NSFD1) has convergence issues and we obtain an improvement for NSFD1 which we call NSFD3. We per-form a stability analysis of the schemes constructed from the exact solution and found that the explicit scheme is not stable for this problem. We study some properties of the five methods (NSFD1, NSFD2, NSFD3, two schemes obtained using the exact solution) such as stability, positivity and boundedness. The performance of the five methods is compared by computing L1, L∞ errors and the rate of convergence for two values of the threshold of Affect effect, γ namely; 0.001 and 0.5 for small and large spatial domains at time, T = 1.0. Tests on rate of convergence are important here as we are dealing with nonlinear partial differential equations and therefore the Lax-Equivalence theorem cannot be used. In chapter 5, we consider FitzHugh-Nagumo equation with the parameter β referred to as in-trinsic growth rate. We chose a numerical experiment which is quite challenging for simulation due to shock-like profiles. We construct four versions of nonstandard finite difference schemes and compared the performance by computing L1, L∞ errors, rate of convergence with respect to time and CPU time at given time, T = 0.5 using three values of the intrinsic growth rate, β namely; β = 0.5, 1.0, 2.0. Chapter 6 highlights the salient features of this work. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2020. / South African DST/NRF SARChI / Mathematics and Applied Mathematics / PhD / Unrestricted

No description available.

“The LGBTQIA+ community”, like all social groupings, is moulded by dialectical forces: inclusivity/exclusivity, belonging/non-belonging, sameness/difference. Literature on it is riddled with dichotomous conflicts over (dis)identification and (anti)relationality in theory, lived experiences, and political mobilisation. Dominant discourses tend to overlook intersectional complexities therein, focus on labels over interactions, and reiterate a framing of the LGBTQIA+ as inherently vulnerable. The gaps point to a need for a more open and reparative investigation that creates space for exploring and (re)negotiating the assumed coalition. This study investigated what diverse groups of queer-identified individuals experienced when sharing their lived accounts of “sameness and difference” with others. Twenty-one people each participated in one of four focus groups and in a follow-up interview were invited to reflect on their experience. Decolonial Intersectional Narrative Analysis (Boonzaier, 2019) and a Bakhtinian-dialogical analysis (Grossen & Salazar Orvig, 2011) were used to inspect the “what” and the “how” of the group dialogues, respectively. Participants recounted significant experiences of sameness and difference that both foregrounded and transcended their particular intersectional identities. Moments/relationships of being treated as more an object than a full subject, due to divergence from certain monoglossic gendered/sexed/sexual norms (both intra- and extra-communally), were conarrated as keys to ongoing queer abjection. Participants expressed that dialoguing in this particular setting was an experience of coming-out-of-isolation, intersubjective learning, and strengthening senses of self and community. Future research and activism are encouraged to invest in accessible open dialogue as a site itself for LGBTQIA+ community-building in South Africa and beyond.

No description available.

The employment effect of hosting the FIFA world cup has been researched multiple times with city, municipality, or state data using a variety of methods. Arguably, the Difference-In-Difference (DID) method, first used by Hotchkiss et al. (2003) then refined by countless others, is the most common method for measuring both short-term and long-term employment effects of mega sporting events (Hagn & Maennig, 2008). This event study applies a static and a dynamic two-way fixed effects difference-in-difference model (TWFEDD) to national employment data for 24 nations throughout 42 years between 1979 and 2021. The World Cup hosts included in the study are Mexico 1986, Italy 1990, USA 1994, France 1998, Korea & Japan 2002, Germany 2006, and Russia 2018. The two TWFEDD models fail to reject the hypothesis that there is no causal employment effect when hosting a World Cup.