The topics of motivation and job satisfaction have been of interest to researchers over the past decades. Many researchers and practitioners have studied the driving factors to motivate staff in the workplace, but no specific findings have shown correlation between motivation and job satisfaction. Problems of motivation and job satisfaction have continued to plague many developing countries like Malaysia. This study is an attempt to improve the understanding of the human contribution to variability in manufacturing industries and the focus areas are work motivation, satisfaction and performance as well as relationships with learning behaviours of employees in the workplace. The research work can be categorized into three parts. The first part consists of pilot study which was conducted to determine the practicality and validity of method/instruments used in the research. The pilot study also helped to correct the flaws/weaknesses of the method before employing it in the full-scale research study. Secondly, an experimental study was carried out to identify the motivation, satisfaction, performance and learning behaviour of unskilled and skilled employees doing simple or complex tasks individually or in group. The final part was an industrial study conducted with 356 employees from various positions and backgrounds in selected manufacturing industries in Malaysia. Based on the findings, it has been shown that unskilled employees preferred doing complex tasks in a group rather than doing simple tasks and skilled employees preferred doing complex tasks individually rather than in a group. It increased their work motivation, satisfaction and performance. It was found that task identity (simple tasks) and learning behaviours (individual learning of unskilled employees) can be the reason for employees to leave in the future. The task identity (task complexity) can be an important factor in job design in organisations and it is significant in the learning process of unskilled and skilled employees in manufacturing industries, particularly in Malaysia. It was also found that learning in a team (group) appears to be a very significant factor in workplace learning for both unskilled and skilled employees. The study has shown that there are relationships between motivational and learning behaviours of skilled and unskilled employees and this knowledge is expected to be useful for employers and policy makers in organisations especially in manufacturing industries in Malaysia.

This thesis explores the teaching and learning of English for Medical Purposes (EMP) in a Syrian Arab university (Tishreen University). It investigates the inherent contradictions in the position of EMP in an Arab-medium university by drawing on the socio-political and economic factors shaping English language education policy in Syria. It also critiques “mainstream” ESP through examining the “purpose” in English for Medical Purposes. Rather than viewing learning as an end product, this study suggests that learning English is part of a dynamic process of learning to become a doctor in Syria and as part of constructing the 21st Century Syrian “doctor” identity. I draw on aspects of poststructuralism and complexity theory to take the analysis of English for Specific Purposes beyond issues of needs analysis, content, and materials development. ESP, from its outset, has been proposed for decades as a commodity that meets students’ linguistic and communicative needs. However important these concerns are for the development of the discipline, as I argue in this thesis, ESP seems to adopt a “mechanistic” approach by predetermining “needs” and “purposes” which fails to account for the complexity of human beings’ behaviours and responses in educational contexts. The deterministic conceptualisation of ESP places rigid boundaries between ESP and the reality of the medicine profession, therefore, fails to meet students’ needs which transcend boundaries of classroom in aspiration for recognition by the medical community worldwide. English for Medical Purposes, in this study, goes beyond “specific purposes” to account for the role of English as a foreign language in constructing doctor identity and in the process of becoming a doctor. Data in this qualitative research were collected through focus groups with students of medicine in Tishreen University, semi-structured interviews with medical tutors and management officials in the Faculty of Medicine and the Higher Institute of Languages, as well as ESP teachers. Policy documents were analysed, and field notes were taken in classroom and hospital observations. Based on the analysis of these sources, a deeper understanding of EMP at Tishreen University is reached through the lens of poststructuralism and complexity theory. Finally, this thesis ends by drawing an ESP/Applied Linguistics relationship among the implications the findings have for policy makers, teachers and medical students, alongside recommendations for future ESP research directions.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-25T20:20:44Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese EDISON MERCURI.pdf: 19505970 bytes, checksum: ba7ff766b5bd60162ec3055bdcfe770c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2005-11-07 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / The present is focused on two different publications which were accomplished in Curitiba: art magazine Joaquim and Cultural newspaper Nicolau. The former, magazine for valiant youth, homage to all brazilian joaquins , has 21 numbers which were brought to public from April 1946 to December 1948; the latter was a monthly tabloid organized by the Government of State of Paraná, (60 numbers) from July 1987 to May 1997, both were published in two crucial moments of 20th Century s History, distant one another approximately 50 years. As epistemological cuts which contains two times, both are adopted as capable references of analyzing two different cities: late 1940´s Curitiba and that of the 1980/90 s one. Joaquim and Nicolau reflect urbanity images in which old and new are molded, carving out past and future, inventing memories and imagination borders, for feelings and thoughts from a parcel of Curitiba s society are kept within Joaquim and Nicolau s contents. It is an effort, under an anthropological sight, to navigate through literature s opened fields, in order to search conceptual articulations and to overcome scientific concepts which are apprehended by traditional visions thought tanked concerning human and social sciences, social psychology, history, semiotics, psychoanalysis, linguistic and arts. Reflexions and debates, under dialogical perspective, pointed by complexity theories, are the present s moto, by dissolving borders and edges, reuniting and constructing through texts esthetic and scientific aspects Science & Art. / A tese desenvolve-se a partir da leitura de duas publicações realizadas em Curitiba: a revista de arte Joaquim e o jornal cultural Nicolau. Veiculados em períodos distintos dois momentos cruciais da segunda metade do século XX, distantes, aproximadamente, 50 anos um do outro , a primeira, revista para moços, em homenagem a todos os joaquins do Brasil , com 21 números que circularam entre abril de 1946 e dezembro de 1948; o segundo, tablóide mensal da Secretaria de Estado da Cultura do Paraná, com 60 números editados entre julho de 1987 e maio de 1997. Configurados como cortes epistemológicos que delimitam dois tempos, os dois conjuntos são adotados como referenciais para a análise dos aspectos culturais determinantes em duas cidades a Curitiba do fim da década de 1940 e a de meados das décadas de 1980/1990. Ao guardar vestígios de sentimentos e de pensamentos de parcelas da sociedade curitibana, Joaquim e Nicolau refletem imagens das urbanidades em que o velho e o novo se mesclam fundindo passado e futuro para inventar memórias e delinear imaginários. Constitui-se num percurso transdisciplinar de caráter antropológico que, trafegando nos campos abertos pela literatura, busca promover articulações conceituais e transpor as limitações disciplinares das categorias compreendidas na visão tradicional compartimentada das ciências sociais, psicologia social, história, semiótica, psicanálise, lingüística e artes. Dissolvendo bordas e fronteiras, rejuntando e construindo intertextualmente os campos estético e científico Ciência e Arte , pretende alimentar reflexões e debates na perspectiva dialógica apontada pelas teorias da complexidade.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-26T14:53:40Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Tese EDISON MERCURI.pdf: 19505970 bytes, checksum: ba7ff766b5bd60162ec3055bdcfe770c (MD5) Previous issue date: 2005-11-07 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / The present is focused on two different publications which were accomplished in Curitiba: art magazine Joaquim and Cultural newspaper Nicolau. The former, magazine for valiant youth, homage to all brazilian joaquins , has 21 numbers which were brought to public from April 1946 to December 1948; the latter was a monthly tabloid organized by the Government of State of Paraná, (60 numbers) from July 1987 to May 1997, both were published in two crucial moments of 20th Century s History, distant one another approximately 50 years. As epistemological cuts which contains two times, both are adopted as capable references of analyzing two different cities: late 1940´s Curitiba and that of the 1980/90 s one. Joaquim and Nicolau reflect urbanity images in which old and new are molded, carving out past and future, inventing memories and imagination borders, for feelings and thoughts from a parcel of Curitiba s society are kept within Joaquim and Nicolau s contents. It is an effort, under an anthropological sight, to navigate through literature s opened fields, in order to search conceptual articulations and to overcome scientific concepts which are apprehended by traditional visions thought tanked concerning human and social sciences, social psychology, history, semiotics, psychoanalysis, linguistic and arts. Reflexions and debates, under dialogical perspective, pointed by complexity theories, are the present s moto, by dissolving borders and edges, reuniting and constructing through texts esthetic and scientific aspects Science & Art. / A tese desenvolve-se a partir da leitura de duas publicações realizadas em Curitiba: a revista de arte Joaquim e o jornal cultural Nicolau. Veiculados em períodos distintos dois momentos cruciais da segunda metade do século XX, distantes, aproximadamente, 50 anos um do outro , a primeira, revista para moços, em homenagem a todos os joaquins do Brasil , com 21 números que circularam entre abril de 1946 e dezembro de 1948; o segundo, tablóide mensal da Secretaria de Estado da Cultura do Paraná, com 60 números editados entre julho de 1987 e maio de 1997. Configurados como cortes epistemológicos que delimitam dois tempos, os dois conjuntos são adotados como referenciais para a análise dos aspectos culturais determinantes em duas cidades a Curitiba do fim da década de 1940 e a de meados das décadas de 1980/1990. Ao guardar vestígios de sentimentos e de pensamentos de parcelas da sociedade curitibana, Joaquim e Nicolau refletem imagens das urbanidades em que o velho e o novo se mesclam fundindo passado e futuro para inventar memórias e delinear imaginários. Constitui-se num percurso transdisciplinar de caráter antropológico que, trafegando nos campos abertos pela literatura, busca promover articulações conceituais e transpor as limitações disciplinares das categorias compreendidas na visão tradicional compartimentada das ciências sociais, psicologia social, história, semiótica, psicanálise, lingüística e artes. Dissolvendo bordas e fronteiras, rejuntando e construindo intertextualmente os campos estético e científico Ciência e Arte , pretende alimentar reflexões e debates na perspectiva dialógica apontada pelas teorias da complexidade.