Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-11T13:40:53Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 fabiane.pdf: 615159 bytes, checksum: 953b6f14542aae4eb7fe0ee5edf86f0e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2006-12-05 / The relationship between nature and technology is effective from the participation of the man, who sees part of that relationship. In the Amazon, this process is effective with the conquest of geographical space, as part of the process of land occupation, the use of technology was linked to the interventionist policies of the state. Public policies in Brazil and the Amazon in particular are marked by discontinuities, which frustrate and interrupt processes and collective constructions. This study examines how information technologies are present in the Amazonian landscape and public policies for development and national integration. The regional context is seen through a prism that weaves together the interests of local, global and globalized. These interests are flow in school and in the process of computerization. Having the State School Waldir Garcia as a case study, seeks to show how teachers, students and other individuals involved perceive and at the same time, design changes and the ways that the National Programme for IT in Education - MEC-ProInfo assumes when articulated with global interests, but situated on local issues and characteristics of a complex and contradictory space as the school. Realize possibilities for use of information technology in school, where space is contradictory and complex plots new directions, directions and points to the teaching activities and the strengthening of school. / A relação natureza e tecnologia se efetiva a partir da participação do homem, que se percebe parte dessa relação. Na Amazônia, esse processo se efetiva com a conquista do espaço geográfico; como parte do processo de ocupação territorial, o uso das tecnologias esteve associado às políticas intervencionistas do Estado. As políticas públicas no Brasil e em especial na Amazônia são marcadas pelas descontinuidades, que frustram e interrompem processos e construções coletivas. O estudo em questão analisa como as tecnologias da informação estão presentes no cenário amazônico e nas políticas públicas para o seu desenvolvimento e integração nacional. O contexto regional é visto por um prisma que entrelaça os interesses locais, globais e mundializados. Esses interesses encontram vazão na escola e em seu processo de informatização. Tendo a Escola Estadual Waldir Garcia como estudo de caso, busca-se evidenciar como professores, alunos e demais sujeitos envolvidos percebem e, ao mesmo tempo, concebem as mudanças e os caminhos que o Programa Nacional de Informática na Educação ProInfo-MEC assume, quando articulado aos interesses globais, mas situado nas questões locais e características de um espaço contraditório e complexo como a escola. Perceber possibilidades de uso das tecnologias da informação na escola, cujo espaço é contraditório e complexo, traça novos rumos, pontos e direções para a ação docente e o fortalecimento da escola.

Ces travaux ont pour but d'explorer le traitement musical chez les personnes présentant un trouble du spectre autistique (TSA). Cette question a été abordée sous l'angle des traitements global et local dans le cadre des deux théories cognitives dominantes de l'autisme : i) la faiblesse de cohérence centrale et ii) la théorie du surfonctionnement perceptif. Ces deux théories postulent la présence d'un biais de traitement envers l'information locale dans l'autisme provenant, soit i) d'un déficit du traitement global, soit ii) d'une capacité perceptive supérieure. A travers une dizaine d'études, nous avons confronté ces deux théories manipulant les traitements global et local dans la musique. Nous avons aussi questionné la perception auditive chez ces personnes ainsi que son impact sur des traitements de plus haut niveau. Dans l'ensemble, nos travaux mettent en évidence une plus grande implication des processus perceptifs dans le traitement musical chez ces personnes, allant dans le sens de la théorie du surfonctionnement perceptif. Par ailleurs, certains de nos résultats pointent un mécanisme cognitif central chez les personnes autistes : le mécanisme de cartographie véridique. / This research aimed to explore musical processing in individuals with an autistic spectrum disorder. This question has been tackled by exploring global and local processing in the framework of the two main cognitive theories of autism: i) the weak central coherence theory and ii) the enhanced perceptual processing theory. These two theories postulate a bias toward local processing in autism which originates either from i) a global processing deficit or ii) enhanced perceptual capacities. Through ten studies, we confronted these two theories by manipulating global and local processing of music. We also explored auditory perception in autistic people and its impact on higher musical processing. Globally, our research highlights a greater implication of perceptual processes in musical processing, giving support to the enhanced perceptual processing theory. In addition, some of our results point to a central cognitive mechanism in autism: the mechanism of veridical mapping.

This study explores the contemporary working lives of prison managers. It attempts to understand the ways in which globalised changes in management practices have intersected with localised practices and occupational cultures. Through an ethnographic study of the lived experience of the practitioners of prison management, the research explores the ways in which the operation of managerialism in a prison environment creates a series of tensions, pressures and expectations on senior managers, and the ways in which these are experienced, understood and negotiated. This study is therefore concerned with the relationships between global and local, and between agency and structure that are characteristic of late modernity. The constraining and enabling features of contemporary prison management are considered in light of Giddens’s account of ‘the duality of structure’. Relevant work on transformation of working lives by Sennett and others are also considered in order to situate this discussion within the world of work more generally. The original research involved ethnographic field work in two medium security prisons in England over a twelve month period, with data generated from observations, interviews and documentary sources. Four aspects of prison management are used in order to address the central issues. The first is a consideration of performance monitoring mechanisms such as targets, audits and inspections; how these are understood, operated, and influenced by those using them and also how they reshape and direct the approach and thinking of managers. The second is a discussion of aspects of agency such as values, discretion, resistance and the use of power; in what ways these are idiosyncratic and individual and how far they are patterned across the organisation and shaped by wider factors. The third issue is a consideration of how people become prison managers and how they approach and understand key issues that face them in managing individual staff, teams and prisoners. The final area considers the ‘hidden injuries’ of contemporary management practice, including how this is experienced by women, members of minority ethnic groups and others who experience themselves as having been marginalised. The study concludes by describing the confluence of global and local, and agency and structure that shape what is described as ‘prison managerialism’. It also describes some of the effects of this and discusses alternatives.

Submitted by Neusa Fagundes (neusa.fagundes@unioeste.br) on 2017-09-25T18:57:03Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Regiane_Fagundes2017.pdf: 6331934 bytes, checksum: faab7007f3c7c2e91c6bf26bc30fea8e (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-09-25T18:57:03Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Regiane_Fagundes2017.pdf: 6331934 bytes, checksum: faab7007f3c7c2e91c6bf26bc30fea8e (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-01-17 / Fundação Araucária de Apoio ao Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico do Estado do Paraná (FA) / This study aimed at a discussing problems of multivariate statistical inference and linear spatial modeling when observations are from a continuous, symmetric population, with multivariate slash distribution. Firstly, a reparametrization of slash distribution was performed, assuming the existence of the finite second moment. Thus, some iterant properties were shown. Analytical expressions were tested for the score function and Fisher information matrix of reparameterized distribution. An approach to estimate some parameters by maximum likelihood was considered based at the EM (Expectation-Maximization) algorithm. Linear hypothesis tests have been described regarding the means vector and the covariance matrix using statistics such as C(α), likelihood ratio, Wald, and score. Studies of simulation were carried out to evaluate the efficiency of the statistical tests and EM algorithm. Data related to the agricultural area illustrated the methodology developed, and the hypothesis tests for equality of means, sphericity and equicorrelation were also applied. A slash linear spatial model, with and without the use of covariates, was proposed. Were Discussed the global and local influence diagnostic analysis in order to evaluate the influence of observations on the process of parameters’estimation. The curvatures required for the local influence procedure and based on the slash model were derived, in which the perturbation scheme has been chosen properly and related to the different perturbation schemes. Spatial variability maps of chemical attributes of soil and yield were generated by kriging with external drift. Finally results of simulations and applications indicated that the slash distribution is a robust alternative when the data present high kurtosis. / O objetivo deste trabalho foi discutir problemas de inferência estatística multivariada e de modelagem espacial quando as observações são provenientes de uma população contínua, simétrica, com distribuição slash multivariada. Inicialmente, foi realizada uma reparametrização da distribuição slash supondo existência do segundo momento finito, sendo apresentadas algumas propriedades recorrentes. Provaram-se expressões analíticas para a função escore e matriz de informação de Fisher da distribuição reparametrizada. Abordou-se um enfoque para a estimação dos parâmetros por máxima verossimilhança considerando um algoritmo do tipo EM (Esperança-Maximização). Descreveu-se a prova de hipóteses lineares sob o vetor de médias e matriz de covariância com o uso das estatísticas C(α), razão de verossimilhança, Wald e score. Estudos de simulação foram realizados para avaliar a eficiência dos testes estatísticos e do algoritmo EM. Dados relacionados à área agrícola ilustraram a metodologia desenvolvida, sendo aplicado sobre os mesmos os testes de igualdade de médias, esfericidade e equicorrelação. Como ilustração da aplicação da distribuição slash multivariada na área de modelagem estatística, o modelo espacial linear slash, com e sem o uso de covariáveis, foi discutido e proposto. Com o intuito de avaliar a influência das observações no processo de estimação dos parâmetros, discussões relacionadas à análise de diagnóstico, global e local, foram apresentadas. Derivaram-se as curvaturas requeridas no procedimento de influência local para o modelo slash, adequando o esquema de perturbação a distribuição e considerando diferentes esquemas de perturbação. Mapas de variabilidade espacial de atributos químicos do solo e produtividade foram gerados utilizando krigagem com drift externo. Os resultados das simulações e aplicações indicaram que a distribuição slash é uma alternativa robusta quando os dados apresentam alta curtose.

The purpose of the current study is to investigate how global and local thinking styles affect psychological well-being among undergraduate students. A total of 372 (213 females and 159 males) students at Middle East Technical University participated in this study. The qualitative data were gathered via self-report questionnaires including Scales of Psychological Well-Being, Thinking Styles Inventory and a demographic information form. To be able to determine the differences between psychological well-being due to global thinking and local thinking scores as well as gender, ANOVA was held. The results revealed a significant difference between high and low scorers of local thinking in terms of psychological well-being when the global thinking style was low. In addition, the findings indicated that for higher levels of psychological well-being individuals need to adopt one of the styles and report higher levels on that adopted style. On the other hand, the statistical analysis revealed no significant differences between high scorers of global thinking and low scorers of global thinking on psychological well-being. Additionally, no significant difference found between high scorers and low scorers of local thinking in terms of psychological well-being. Upon the examination of gender related findings, it was found that females reported higher levels of psychological well-being compared to males while males reported higher levels of global thinking than females did.

The argument that the world has been witnessing a transformation from national developmentalism towards a new form of developmentalism especially after the 1980s has increasingly become more widespread in the development literature. Moreover, the concerned literature has recently been dominated by the provocative claim that the notion of development itself is no longer operational and meaningful. However, it is still very ambiguous as to how this new form of development which is primarily implemented by the hands of the international corporations and institutions rather than the nation-states is being conceptualized with regard to the existing models of development and how to name it. This dissertation advances the claim that the national developmentalism has given way to what will be called as the &lsquo / global developmentalism&rsquo / in this context and it operates through the notions of the locality and particularity, which are conceptual elements intrinsic to the global capitalism. This dissertation will also attempt to reveal that the logic of global developmentalism no longer depends on the main conceptual categories of the notion of development / thus it can no longer be regarded as a form of developmentalism. The field research of this dissertation involves the analysis of several major and minor projects which are thought to be implemented within either national developmentalism or global developmentalism, or intermediate forms between these two. This dissertation will advance a discussion on the transformation from national developmentalism to global developmentalism and make a discourse analysis of these two forms of developmentalism by interpreting the data obtained from the deep interviews with experts that have worked in these projects, the local inhabitants in the project-affected areas, and from analysis of the observable consequences of these projects.

This study explores how young Maltese women give meaning to the music they listen to and how this music is incorporated in everyday discourses and identities within the differing local contexts of their lives. This area of research has not attracted the attention of researchers and this study starts to fill this gap. The research was carried out in Malta, a post-colonial island with a population of approximately 400,000 people. Through purposive sampling and snowballing, 20 in-depth interviews were carried out with young Maltese women aged 16-34, from different social backgrounds. By looking at young Maltese women’s identities through their engagements with music, this study shows how girls experience the tensions between the opposing forces of Maltese traditional music and more modern globalised musical forms. Music was found to be a means of conspicuous leisure as well as a means of maintaining social difference and distinction. Musical taste and the social practices associated with that particular music was found to be a primary indicator of social class for Maltese girls. The significance of this study lies in the exploration of a topic that has not yet been properly researched. It combines the Maltese context and the gendered nature of identity formation in Malta’s music scene. The framework of categorisation of respondents is also significant since rather than categorising respondents according to the music they listen to, it categorises respondents through the ways in which they engage with their music. By developing Willis’s (1978) analytical framework, participants were placed into four categories of Fully Committed, Committed, Active Drifters and Passive Drifters. For each category, the most prominent characteristics of participants’ music identities are analysed. These include their understandings of social and cultural capital, structure and agency, negotiations of social boundaries and identity formation. The idea of distinct music subcultures is questioned as, in their everyday lives, young women in Malta rarely conform with distinct cultural groups but form parts of multiple groups within the contexts of their lives. Moreover, processes of hybridization seem to have erased what might have been understood as a subculture’s distinguishing characteristics. These have often become adopted and eventually absorbed by mainstream culture making distinct subcultures problematic. The findings of the research imply tensions between traditional and modern lifestyles that are, in turn, associated with different strata of social class.

This thesis examines the applicability of pre-dominantly Western theories of inclusive school development in countries of the Global South. Firstly, the findings of a review of research literature are used to develop a typology to describe the common features of inclusive schools, incorporating ways in which they might be supported. This typology was then used to explore the ways in which schools in the Lao People's Democratic Republic and Thailand developed inclusive practices. Engagement with school systems in these countries over a period of six years between 2003 and 2009 provided opportunities to work at several different levels with schools that in some way defined themselves as being 'inclusive'. Using data generated through field work with schools in an Inclusive Education Project in Laos and one school in Thailand, tensions were identified between the theoretical framework and my initial research findings. A revision of the typology was undertaken, drawing on a wider literature to take account of additional factors such as local and national culture and the impact of the policy context in these countries. The researcher often had the role of consultant, creating tensions in the way he constructed his position and also in the schools’ response. Reflecting on these tensions became a productive process in terms of understanding the factors which effectively promoted the development of inclusion in these different contexts. In particular, the process highlighted the relatively neglected significance of local context and knowledge and the way in which these factors impact on inclusive school development. In order to explore these issues in greater detail, further research was then undertaken in one school in Laos, creating a case study developed over four years. This detailed engagement revealed more clearly the limits of typologies in general and of Western theories in particular. Whilst they may offer a lens for examining inclusive school development they do not 'adequately' account for variable factors rooted in the local context. In conclusion, policy initiatives designed to support the development of more inclusive schools must allow for the creation of space at local levels for meanings to be constructed which will support teachers in developing their own sense of agency and making changes in their practice of which they have ownership.

This thesis deals with the verification of global transformation key on densification points around Olomouc by selected GNSS methods. The work will be described in GNSS technology, its distribution, measurement methods and services. As part of this work is a description of networks of permanent reference stations. Next, become familiar with the creation of local transformation key to what is used and what is its significance. The measurement was carried out at points densification, described in a separate section. In this thesis is describes surveying methods and principles, the methods of measurement GNSS, equipment, as well as any specific regarding this issue. The result is a clear set of tables with measured values of GNSS equipment and coordinates ZhB, accuracy of the method used (standard deviations), graphical reporting, and comparing the results of the global and local transformation key.

Global brands are increasingly expanding their footprint to developing countries, due to the promising opportunities that these countries hold; and as such, consumers are faced with the decision between global and local brands. In South Africa too, there has been an influx of global brands, which has placed pressure on the local retail landscape. Therefore, the main objective of this study was to determine whether there is a difference in perception among millennial consumers in South Africa between a global and a local fashion retail brand. Millennials are considered to be individuals born between the early 1980s and late 1990s. To understand consumers’ decision making process between global and local brands, the signaling theory was applied. The signaling theory is typically used to describe behaviour when multiple parties have access to different information – in this case it relates to consumers having access to the different signals sent out by both global and local brands. In addition to the signaling theory, the brand-analysis model was employed to measure these perceptions relating to brand-specific associations (perceived quality and emotional value), general brand impression (brand awareness and brand image) and brand commitment (brand loyalty and purchase intention). Therefore, the objectives and hypotheses for this study were directly derived from each of the brand-analysis constructs mentioned above. It is understood that researchers have not used the signaling theory and brand analysis model together. This study also considers them independently, however the brand analysis constructs are used as signals between brands and consumers. Using the two retail brands, H&M (global) and Mr Price (local) as stimuli, the data were collected through an online questionnaire. A non-probability sampling technique was implemented, which achieved a total sample size of n=263. The target population consisted of millennial consumers in South Africa, due to the significant spending power of this cohort. The findings were three-fold. Firstly, the hypotheses tests indicated that there are differences in consumer perception relating to each of the brand-analysis constructs, with higher ratings towards the global brand for perceived quality, emotional value, brand image, brand loyalty, and purchase intention. Local brands, however, appear to enjoy higher levels of brand awareness. Secondly, in order to gain deeper insights into these perceptions, this study also compared the difference in perceptions among the demographic subgroups. In contrast to the overall preference for global brands, certain groups, such as those with lower income levels and lower levels of education, had higher ratings for the local brand in terms of perceived quality, emotional value, brand loyalty and purchase intention. Lastly, the strength of the relationships between constructs was measured; and this showed that, for both brands, positive relationships exist among all of the brand-analysis constructs – with varying strength levels. The academic contributions of this study are as follows: In general, brand management literature in developing countries has been neglected. Previous research has shown that there are differences in brand perception between consumers from developed and those from developing countries. This study therefore aimed to add to the literature, not only towards a typical developing country, but towards a hybrid country, namely South Africa. In addition, the brand-analysis model and the signaling theory used in this study, serve as a basis for future research aiming to evaluate consumer choice. Practical contributions include the following: The findings yielded significant insights into the aspects to be emphasised by global and local brands, in order to be successful in capturing and maintaining the desire of consumers to purchase and use their brands. Thus, the findings provide an understanding of the drivers of global and local brand purchases for marketing practitioners – to improve or adjust their marketing strategies. On the basis of these findings, local brands are advised to invest in expanding their presence in other countries, and to advertise this as a signal of quality. Another strategy for local brands is to emphasise their authenticity and pride in the local culture as a signal of a deep connectedness with the local market. Global brands on the other hand, are advised to advertise their worldwide availability and acceptance as a signal of quality and prestige, and to offer an opportunity for consumers to be part of the global-consumer culture.