En gran parte del mundo, las organizaciones han llegado a convertirse en un aspecto fundamental de la vida en sociedad. Intentando dar respuestas a las posibilidades y requerimientos de su entorno relevante, las organizaciones especializan su accionar en torno a múltiples actividades que representan una manera particular de llevar adelante el trabajo. Así, las actividades organizacionales consideran una peculiar forma de establecer tareas y de disponer de recursos humanos y tecnológicos. En este contexto, el problema de la dirección de las actividades organizacionales adquiere un papel de gran relevancia para el desarrollo de las organizaciones y, finalmente, para su viabilidad. La posibilidad de dirigir resulta determinante para asegurar la calidad del trabajo que las organizaciones despliegan en su entorno. En este sentido, la dirección de las actividades organizacionales contribuye a caracterizar la pertinencia que las tareas establecidas y los recursos empleados guardan para con los requerimientos de ese entorno. Con la finalidad de ganar una mejor comprensión acerca de los alcances de la dirección en las organizaciones modernas, esta investigación centró su interés en la práctica directiva de los ingenieros en una compañía siderúrgica chilena. Los ingenieros en esta compañía dirigían actividades donde concurrían equipos de trabajadores, tecnologías y lugares de trabajo especializados. La investigación puso el énfasis en una aproximación etnográfica a la práctica cotidiana de ingenieros y operarios en medio de un programa rutinario de mejoras a la calidad. El trabajo de terreno se extendió por seis meses en tiempo completo. La realización de registros, que permitieran el posterior análisis del trabajo de ingenieros y operarios en un medio constituido por instalaciones particulares, contempló la utilización del formato audio video. La investigación sugiere que la acción directiva de los ingenieros está fuertemente relacionada con la posibilidad de ir concibiendo una actividad organizacional que resulte inteligible para cada trabajador desde las particularidades de un lugar de trabajo, desde donde se acometen las tareas encargadas y donde concurren trabajadores y tecnologías. Esta manera de concebir la actividad contempla una forma precisa de entender el lugar de trabajo así como la propia participación en ese lugar. Al respecto, la acción de los ingenieros adquiere un carácter distintivo a la hora de presentar en el lugar de trabajo los alcances de la actividad donde cada trabajador participa. Igualmente, la acción de los ingenieros parece adquirir un carácter distintivo a la hora de representar en cada lugar de trabajo las explicaciones necesarias para entender los alcances de la participación de cada cual en la actividad colectiva.

The human visual system is adept at detecting and encoding statistical regularities in its spatio-temporal environment. Here we report an unexpected failure of this ability in the context of perceiving inconsistencies in illumination distributions across a scene. Contrary to predictions from previous studies [Enns and Rensink, 1990; Sun and Perona, 1996a, 1996b, 1997], we find that the visual system displays a remarkable lack of sensitivity to illumination inconsistencies, both in experimental stimuli and in images of real scenes. Our results allow us to draw inferences regarding how the visual system encodes illumination distributions across scenes. Specifically, they suggest that the visual system does not verify the global consistency of locally derived estimates of illumination direction.

Different theoretical models have tried to investigate the feasibility of recurrent neural mechanisms for achieving direction selectivity in the visual cortex. The mathematical analysis of such models has been restricted so far to the case of purely linear networks. We present an exact analytical solution of the nonlinear dynamics of a class of direction selective recurrent neural models with threshold nonlinearity. Our mathematical analysis shows that such networks have form-stable stimulus-locked traveling pulse solutions that are appropriate for modeling the responses of direction selective cortical neurons. Our analysis shows also that the stability of such solutions can break down giving raise to a different class of solutions ("lurching activity waves") that are characterized by a specific spatio-temporal periodicity. These solutions cannot arise in models for direction selectivity with purely linear spatio-temporal filtering.

The capability of estimating the walking direction of people would be useful in many applications such as those involving autonomous cars and robots. We introduce an approach for estimating the walking direction of people from images, based on learning the correct classification of a still image by using SVMs. We find that the performance of the system can be improved by classifying each image of a walking sequence and combining the outputs of the classifier. Experiments were performed to evaluate our system and estimate the trade-off between number of images in walking sequences and performance.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2006. / Title from first page of PDF file. Includes bibliographical references (p. 96-98).

Menée en milieu minoritaire francophone, cette recherche porte sur la prise de décision complexe liée à la supervision pédagogique chez les directions d’école élémentaire de l’Ontario. Sachant que les élèves de certaines écoles francophones réussissent moins bien que ceux des écoles anglophones, l’objectif est de décrire et de comprendre comment les directions d’école prennent des décisions pédagogiques complexes. Pour y parvenir, cette recherche se fonde sur un cadre de référence hybride traitant de la prise de décision complexe et du leadership éducationnel en milieux linguistiques minoritaires. Précisons que notre recherche ne tente pas de comparer les milieux linguistiques mais bien de relever les particularités du milieu francophone minoritaire quant à la prise de décision complexe liée à la supervision pédagogique chez les directions d’école. Épousant le paradigme interprétatif, cette recherche utilise l’étude multicas pour la collecte des données réalisée à l’aide d’entrevues semi-structurées individuelles auprès d’acteurs scolaires tels que les directions d’école, les directions de l’éducation et les enseignants. Les données ont été organisées selon quatre sections : le profil des répondants du cas, la fonction de la direction d’école, le processus de la prise de décision complexe et les éléments qui l'influencent. L'analyse des données a été réalisée à l'aide du logiciel NVivo et elle nous a permis de dresser le profil des répondants de chacun des quatre cas et de faire ressortir, par une analyse comparative, les convergences et les divergences entre ceux-ci.Les résultats de l'analyse mettent en évidence le fait que les directions d'école ne suivent pas nécessairement les mêmes étapes quant à la prise de décision pédagogique complexe. Si la majorité d'entre elles prend des décisions complexes selon la méthode rationnelle, les autres évoquent le recours à un processus décisionnel cyclique et itérative. Toutefois, ells croient toutes que l'expérience de vie personnelle et professionnnelle exerce la principale influence sur leur prise de décision complexe. L'analyse comparative des données a permis de proposer un modèle de prise de décision reflétant le milieu scolaire minoritaire francophone de l'Ontario où la consultation est considérée comme une valeur ajoutée dans le processus décisionnel. Finalement, s'insérant dans les rapports à l'identité et à la gestion scolaire, cette recherche pose un jalon pour l'étude de la prise de décision pédoagogique complexe et propose des pistes de recherches futures afin de poursuivre la réflexion.

Understanding human spatial cognition and behaviour is not something easily studied. Many factors are involved that contribute in different ways for different individuals. Navigation and wayfinding have been used as an approach, or starting point, for such studies. Spatial abilities tests have long been used as reference points to generalize to overt navigational behaviour. Care needs to be taken in generalizing from paper to behaviour to make certain that it is a valid relationship exists.<p>The purpose of this study was to examine the extent to which certain psychometric spatial abilities tests are indicators of actual navigational decision making. The study was conducted in two phases. The navigational decision tasks were made up of four paths with two variables: length and number of turns. The participants were required to make a decision on which direction to go after being lead part of the way around a hallway. The choices were to either go back the way they were led or take a novel route along a previously un-travelled path (shortcut). Spatial abilities tests (MRT, PFT, and OLMT), a self-rating of SOD, and learning preference for novel environments were administered in phase two. <p>While efficient navigation was not explicitly required in the navigation tasks those participants making the most efficient decisions shared similar characteristics. Efficient navigators have a higher aptitude for mental manipulation (as measured by the MRT), express a preference for a more exploratory environmental learning style, are disproportionately male, and have a slightly higher self-rating of SOD. In addition to the collective set of four navigation decisions (one for each experimental path), path 2 demonstrated the efficient vs. non-efficient distinction quite well: in order to make the most efficient decision the individual must maintain the correct metric distance from the origin point and not be deterred by the passage of only half of the turns in the rectangular experimental environment.

The sole purpose of every form of visual representation is to make something look believable. Even among abstract or conceptual representation, the purpose is to create something that within the defined visual language the audience will consider believable and accepted. In the field of computer generated representation there are numerous visual languages that have been developed throughout the years, attempting to solve different visualization or artistic problems. This thesis presents an alternative light transfer model for participating media focused on the intuitive control of the illumination data and the artistic value of the resulting image. The purpose is not focused on accurately modeling lights physical behavior and its interaction with the surfaces and elements. My thesis describes an artistic approach which aims to offer an organic and intuitive control of the glow and temperature of the effects of participating media and direct the value and hues through the surfaces. The system described in the thesis approximates light transfer through a given volume by calculating light contribution in the volume with discreet sampling and subsequently gathering these values to determine the diffuse scattering contribution for the volume. I will also discuss the assumptions made to allow such approximations, as well as how the intuitive control offered by the approach and these approximations allow new forms or representation and artistic direction.

Understanding human spatial cognition and behaviour is not something easily studied. Many factors are involved that contribute in different ways for different individuals. Navigation and wayfinding have been used as an approach, or starting point, for such studies. Spatial abilities tests have long been used as reference points to generalize to overt navigational behaviour. Care needs to be taken in generalizing from paper to behaviour to make certain that it is a valid relationship exists.<p>The purpose of this study was to examine the extent to which certain psychometric spatial abilities tests are indicators of actual navigational decision making. The study was conducted in two phases. The navigational decision tasks were made up of four paths with two variables: length and number of turns. The participants were required to make a decision on which direction to go after being lead part of the way around a hallway. The choices were to either go back the way they were led or take a novel route along a previously un-travelled path (shortcut). Spatial abilities tests (MRT, PFT, and OLMT), a self-rating of SOD, and learning preference for novel environments were administered in phase two. <p>While efficient navigation was not explicitly required in the navigation tasks those participants making the most efficient decisions shared similar characteristics. Efficient navigators have a higher aptitude for mental manipulation (as measured by the MRT), express a preference for a more exploratory environmental learning style, are disproportionately male, and have a slightly higher self-rating of SOD. In addition to the collective set of four navigation decisions (one for each experimental path), path 2 demonstrated the efficient vs. non-efficient distinction quite well: in order to make the most efficient decision the individual must maintain the correct metric distance from the origin point and not be deterred by the passage of only half of the turns in the rectangular experimental environment.

No description available.