A critical overreliance on the technical dimension of information security has recently shifted toward more robust, organizationally focused information security methods to countermand $54 billion lost from computer security incidents. Developing a more balanced approach is required since protecting information is not an all or nothing proposition. Inaccurate tradeoffs resulting from misidentified risk severity based on organizational group perceptions related to information risk form information security gaps. This dissertation applies dialogical action research to study the information security gap created by incongruent perceptions of organizational members related to information risk among different stakeholder communities. A new model, the Information Security Improvement model, based on Technological Frames of Reference (TFR), is proposed and tested to improve information security through reduced member incongruity. The model proved useful in realigning incongruent perceptions related to information risk within the studied organization. A process for identifying disparate information characteristics and potential influencing factors is also presented. The research suggested that the model is flexible and extensible, within the organizational context, and may be used to study incongruent individual perceptions (micro) or larger groups such as departments or divisions.

Head position signal is crucial for preparing reaching movements because it contributes to specifying the position of body and target in space and relative to each other. However, it is unclear whether sensory information pertaining head position is used to control the movement after movement onset. In this study, nineteen participants performed discrete reaches towards a virtual target while neck vibration was randomly applied before and/or during the movement or not at all. The main dependent variable was the directional bias of the reaching finger. Neck vibration induced early leftward or late rightward trajectory biases. It appears that participants interpreted the sensed head shift as a target or an eye-in-head motion, which can be explained by individual differences in the use of reference frames. Nevertheless, body-centered and head-centered frames of reference appear to be important for the early and late stages of a goal-directed movement, respectively.

Head position signal is crucial for preparing reaching movements because it contributes to specifying the position of body and target in space and relative to each other. However, it is unclear whether sensory information pertaining head position is used to control the movement after movement onset. In this study, nineteen participants performed discrete reaches towards a virtual target while neck vibration was randomly applied before and/or during the movement or not at all. The main dependent variable was the directional bias of the reaching finger. Neck vibration induced early leftward or late rightward trajectory biases. It appears that participants interpreted the sensed head shift as a target or an eye-in-head motion, which can be explained by individual differences in the use of reference frames. Nevertheless, body-centered and head-centered frames of reference appear to be important for the early and late stages of a goal-directed movement, respectively.

The literature emphasizes the important role played by stakeholder perceptions in explaining success and failure of IT-enabled change efforts. However, our knowledge of how stakeholder perceptions evolve and interact with outcomes during change processes is still limited. Consequently, this study adapts technological frames of reference (TFR) to explore the dynamics of stakeholder perceptions based on action research into an IT-enabled sales process innovation project at VoiceTech. The study attempts to answer the following research questions: How can TFR be adapted and applied to support action research into IT-enabled change efforts? What was the role of stakeholder perceptions during IT-enabled sales process innovation at VoiceTech? How do stakeholder perceptions evolve and interact with outcomes during IT-enabled change efforts? The study develops TFR as a theory for investigating stakeholder perceptions during IT-enabled change and it offers a process model of how frame interactions, incongruencies, and inconsistencies contribute to frame shifts and change outcomes over time. In addition, the study provides detailed insights into how the IT-enabled sales process innovation at VoiceTech shaped and was shaped by shifts in stakeholder perceptions over time.

The literature emphasizes the important role played by stakeholder perceptions in explaining success and failure of IT-enabled change efforts. However, our knowledge of how stakeholder perceptions evolve and interact with outcomes during change processes is still limited. Consequently, this study adapts technological frames of reference (TFR) to explore the dynamics of stakeholder perceptions based on action research into an IT-enabled sales process innovation project at VoiceTech. The study attempts to answer the following research questions: How can TFR be adapted and applied to support action research into IT-enabled change efforts? What was the role of stakeholder perceptions during IT-enabled sales process innovation at VoiceTech? How do stakeholder perceptions evolve and interact with outcomes during IT-enabled change efforts? The study develops TFR as a theory for investigating stakeholder perceptions during IT-enabled change and it offers a process model of how frame interactions, incongruencies, and inconsistencies contribute to frame shifts and change outcomes over time. In addition, the study provides detailed insights into how the IT-enabled sales process innovation at VoiceTech shaped and was shaped by shifts in stakeholder perceptions over time.

RésuméLa thèse porte sur les représentations spatiales et en particulier sur les cadres de référence spatiale. Ils permettent la localisation d’objets par rapport à d’autres dans un espace proche, comme dans l’exemple : « le sel est à gauche du poivre ». Il existe différents types de références : centré sur soi, centré sur l’objet et centré sur l’environnement. Celles qui sont préférentiellement utilisées par un individu dépendent de sa langue et de sa culture.Dans un premier temps, le développement des cadres de référence est analysé chez des sujets de culture française de 3 à 21 ans, grâce aux tâches du paradigme de rotation à 180° (Levinson, 2003). Dans un second temps, les relations entre les confusions gauche/droite et l’utilisation de cadres de référence sont examinées chez des adultes français, en s’appuyant sur un questionnaire d’auto-évaluation et sur une tâche du paradigme de rotation. Les résultats permettent de dessiner un chemin développemental concernant les cadres de référence en France, selon le modèle de la Redescription Représentationnelle de Karmiloff-Smith (1992). Ils montrent également le lien entre les confusions gauche/droite et les types de références spatiales utilisées chez certains adultes. / The thesis is about spatial representations, especially spatial frames of reference, which are used to locate an object with respect to another in a small-scale space, for example: « the salt is to the left of the pepper ». Different references exist: self-centred, object-centred and environment-centred. The references preferentially employed by a subject depend on his language and culture.First of all, the development of frames of reference is analysed with French subjects from 3 to 21 years of age, thanks to 180° rotation paradigm tasks (Levinson, 2003). Secondly, the relations between left/right confusions and the use of frames of reference are examined with French adults, with a self-judgment questionnaire and a rotation paradigm task.Results show that the development of frames of reference in France follows the predictions of the Representational Redescription model of Karmiloff-Smith (1992). They also highlight a link between left/right confusions and spatial references used by some adults.

Vortex detection has been a long-standing and challenging topic in fluid analysis. Recent state-of-the-art extraction and visualization of vortices in unsteady fluid flow employ objective vortex criteria, which makes feature extraction independent of reference frames or observers. However, even objectivity can only guarantee that different observers reach the same conclusions, but not necessarily guarantee that these conclusions are the only physically meaningful or relevant ones. Moreover, a significant challenge is that a single observer is often not sufficient to accurately observe multiple vortices that follow different motions. This thesis presents a novel mathematical framework that represents physically realizable observers as the Lie algebra of the Killing fields on the underlying manifold, together with a software system that enables the exploration and use of an interactively chosen set of observers, resulting in relative velocity fields and objective vortex structures in real-time. Based on our mathematical framework, our system facilitates the objective detection and visualization of vortices relative to well-adapted reference frame motions, while at the same time guaranteeing that these observers are physically realizable. We show how our framework speeds up the exploration of objective vortices in unsteady 2D flow, on planar as well as on spherical domains.

Spatial collaboration refers to collaboration activities involving physical space. It occurs every day as people work together to solve spatial problems, such as rearranging furniture or communicating about an environmental issue. In this work, we investigate how to support spatial collaboration when the collaborators are not colocated. We propose using shared, interactive representations of the space to support distributed, spatial collaboration. Our study examines viewpoint constraint techniques, which determine how the collaborators individually view the representation, and awareness techniques, which enable the collaborators to maintain an understanding of each other's work efforts. Our work consists of four phases, in which we explore a design space for interactive representations and examine the effects of different viewpoint constraint and awareness techniques. We consider situations where the collaborators use the same viewpoints, different viewpoints, and have a choice in viewpoint constraint techniques. In phase 1, we examine current technological support for spatial collaboration and designed two early prototypes. Phase 2 compares various two-dimensional map techniques, with the collaborators using identical techniques. Phase 3 focuses on three-dimensional virtual environment techniques, comparing similar and different frames of reference. The final phase reuses the favorable techniques from the previous studies and presents a novel prototype that combines both two-dimensional and three-dimensional representations. Each phase of this research is limited to synchronous communication activities and non-professional users working together on everyday tasks. Our findings highlight the advantages and disadvantages of the different techniques for spatial collaboration solutions. Also, having conducted multiple evaluations of spatial collaboration prototypes, we offer a common set of lessons with respect to distributed, spatial collaboration activities. This research also highlights the need for continued study to improve on the techniques evaluated and to consider additional spatial collaboration activities. / Ph. D.

The thesis provides an in-depth analysis of motion event descriptions of two Australian indigenous languages. Jaminjung is a highly endangered non Pama-Nyungan language with approximately 50 remaining speakers. Kriol, an English-lexified Creole, is spoken by about 20.000 people in different varieties across northern Australia. While the languages are typologically very different, occupancy of the same linguistic and cultural area provides an intriguing opportunity to examine the effects of culture and language contact on conceptual components and distribution patterns in discourse. This investigation also applies and tests a number of existing frameworks and typologies regarding the linguistic encoding of motion and space in general. The thesis first provides an overview of the encoding of motion event descriptions in Jaminjung and Kriol. It becomes clear that, concerning overt marking of case, ground-encodings follow a systematic semantic pattern with no or rare case-marking for deictic terms, optional marking for toponyms and mandatory marking for all other types of landmarks. Furthermore, the structure and semantics of the motion verb phrase is investigated. Particularly noteworthy here is a study of asymmetrical serial verb constructions in Kriol which revealed a number of previously undescribed types. Following this, various proposals for a typology of Frames of Reference are applied. The notion of ‘anchor’ is at the centre of the analysis. The investigation shows that contextual restrictions for the use of Jaminjung’s absolute terms can be accounted for by a restriction on egocentric anchoring and ‘Orientation’ settings only. Furthermore, absolute Frame of Reference is realised differently in Roper and Westside Kriol respectively, suggesting an ongoing influence of the traditional languages spoken by the respective communities rather than the lexifier English. Jaminjung and Kriol, additionally, prefer the use of absolute over relative Frame of Reference. The following chapter investigates how lexicalisation patterns influence the distribution of path and manner encodings in discourse. After concluding that Jaminjung might best be described as following an equipollently-framed pattern and Kriol as satellite-framed, path and manner salience is investigated in different types of discourse using a dataset of motion event encodings in a Frog Story collection and a general corpus of various discourse environments. It is concluded that while the two languages behave very differently with regards to frequency patterns of ground- and other path-encodings, they show remarkable similarities in distributing path and manner over larger chunks of discourse. These findings suggest that cultural influences may sometimes override structural typological constraints. Finally, motion event encodings in specific types of discourse are analysed. Regarding route descriptions, speakers show a clear preference for dynamic over static modes of presentation. This includes encoding ‘fictive motion’ events for which a figure- and ground-based distinction is introduced. Additionally, concerning the use of deictics in a comparative analysis of different types of corpora for both languages, it was shown that the distribution of absolute terms remains stable across discourse environments while deictic usage differs drastically. Lastly, the concept of ‘motion’ is abstracted and described as a kind of structuring device in narratives. It is shown that the ‘journey’ within the story world is used by speakers of both languages to bridge episodes sometimes even overriding a temporal in favour of a spatial order of events.

<p>Abstract</p><p>Planned change and change-related communication are perceived very differently by the members of an organization. Strongly varying perceptions of new tasks, work processes and goals make joint action difficult and cause the failure of many change initiatives. The purpose of this study is to investigate how internal communication and sensemaking processes contribute to the perception of strategic change among the members of a public service organization. The following questions are answered: How does the management plan and perform internal communication during a strategic change of the Swedish public service television company Sveriges Television (SVT)? How do the members of the organization make sense of a strategic change and the internal communication related to the changes that are planned and carried out?</p><p>A social constructivist perspective combined with theories of sensemaking, communication, social identities, roles, groups, power and status constitutes the analytical framework. The investigation is designed as two case studies of the SVT production facilities in Malmö and Örebro. The empirical material consists mainly of personal interviews. Written documents and observations have also been used. The case studies took place between 2002 and 2004. Some main conclusions are as follows:</p><p>1) Internal communication is central for how members of an organization make sense of, and participate in, major change. Yet, not even in ideal communication situations do the employees experience that the information has been sufficient and that they have been included in the change process. There are thus reasons for more balanced expectations of what is possible to achieve with internal communication during strategic change. 2) The most influential factor determining how people make sense of change-related communication is the practical everyday reality that constitutes their frames of reference. The reluctance to consider, and act upon, how other individuals conceive of a situation leads to misdirected internal communication and gaps of understanding. 3) Organizational identities, group membership, roles and status function as frames of reference when employees make sense of changes. But irrespective of whether the changes take place on an organizational, departmental or group level, personal identities are the most influential frames of reference for interpreting organizational change. The investigation thus establishes an order of precedence for frames of reference that has important implications for internal communication during strategic change.</p><p>The thesis contributes to sensemaking theories by demonstrating their extensive ability to explain mutually related phenomena, such as attention, resistance and self-fulfilling prophecies. The apparent ability to explain basically all sensemaking-related issues in organizations, and thus leading to reductionism, is also concluded to be one of the weaknesses of the theories. By connecting sensemaking theories with roles, social identities and power, the study contributes to clarifying the frame concept.</p><p>Key words: internal communication, sensemaking, strategic change, public service, Sveriges Television, frames of reference, organizational identity, roles, status.</p><p>Kontakt: saradalfelt@yahoo.se</p>