As part of organizational politics, influence allows employees to impact the attitudes and behaviors of peers, supervisors, and subordinates. Even though there are a variety of influence tactics, this thesis examines the few tactics used individually and in combination in an upward direction. This thesis adds to upward influence literature by discussing not only effective upward tactics, but also strategies found in unsuccessful attempts, providing insights for employees. The individual influence tactics discussed to be most successful are rational persuasion, consultation, and ingratiation, while exchange tactics are likely to lead to a failed influence attempt. The combined influence tactics found to lead to a greater chance of success are soft and rational tactics, while combinations of hard as well as hard and soft tactics were shown to be less successful in upward influence attempts. Additionally, limitations and future research on upward influence are identified in the thesis.

Previous research has shown there to be a relationship between criminal peers and an individual's antisocial behavior and attitudes. Social literature lacks however empirical support for social identity theory, which suggests social identity serves as a mediator in the development of attitudes. Rather than a direct relationship where criminal peers influences the presence of criminal attitudes, this research suggests that criminal peers actually influences a mediator (i.e. an individual's social identity), which in turn influences their criminal attitudes. Thus, this mediation serves to clarify the nature of the seemingly apparent relationship between peers and attitudes. The current study, then, attempts to test the relationship between an individual's criminal associations and their criminal attitudes by introducing the individual's social identity as a mediator among individuals currently on probation or parole participating in a reentry program. This is done through the application of a survey constructed of three previously validated measures, and analyzed in two steps: firstly at the measurement level through confirmatory factor analysis; and secondly at the structural level through structural equation modeling.

Research indicates a connection between student discipline rates and school climate. In a large, urban K-12 public school district, student discipline concerns were increasing while school climate ratings were decreasing during the last few years. Guided by Bandura's social learning theory, the purpose of this ex post facto, causal-comparative study was to identify differences in teachers' perceptions of school climate, as measured by the New Teacher Project (TNTP) Insight Survey, between schools with high student discipline referral rates and schools with low student discipline referral rates in this school district. The study sample included 6,994 new and veteran certified teachers from N = 72 K-12 schools (n = 36 high discipline referral rate schools; n = 36 low discipline referral rate schools). Teachers' TNTP ratings for Spring 2014-2016 on the overall school climate index, learning environment, and school leadership scales were the dependent variables for the analyses. Independent samples t test results indicated significant differences in overall school climate index, as well as the learning environment and school leadership scales for schools with high compared to low discipline referral rates. Findings showed that schools with high student discipline referral rates had more negative climate ratings than schools with low student discipline referral rates across the three TNTP scales for these teachers. These outcomes suggest that school leaders may create positive social change by identifying and implementing effective strategies aimed at improving student behavior and responses to student discipline as one possible means for fostering a more positive school climate which benefits students, teachers, and staff alike.

Teachers in a southwestern elementary school were struggling to support students who were not meeting proficiency standards in reading. The purpose of this study was to explore teachers' perceptions and experiences of how administrator behaviors and efforts influenced instructional practices and strategies in the classroom. Marzano's leadership evaluation model served as the conceptual framework that guided this study. The research questions focused on teachers' perceptions of how building administrators offered guidance about teaching and instructional activities and how building administrators influenced teaching and instructional activities to improve student performance. A basic qualitative design was used to capture the insights of 7 teachers who taught on the selected campus during the 2015-2016 school year and any number of school years before, after, or both before and after the 2015-2016 school year through semi structured interviews; a purposeful sampling process was used to select the participants. Emergent themes were identified through open coding, and the findings were developed and checked for trustworthiness through member checking and rich descriptions. The findings revealed that teachers believe that instructional guidance, administrator support, and data tracking positively influence student performance. A professional development project was created to provide administrators with strategies and approaches to support and guide classroom teachers more effectively. This study has implications for positive social change, in that the findings may be applied in creating a structure to provide administrators with strategies to improve school leadership behaviors.

Thesis (M.A. (African Languages)) -- University of Limpopo, 2012 / Chapter 1: This deals with the introduction, background to the problem, aim of the study, the significance of the study, definition of terms, methodology, scope of the research and literature review. Chapter 2: Outlines the changes that occurred in the Tsonga traditional family focusing on the building of the dwellings, courtyard, kraals, fowlrun, due to the influence of Christianity among the Vatsonga people.Chapter 3: Outlines the resources that were used in the Mutsonga family and looking again on how the family lived before being affected by the impact of Christianity amongst them. Chapter 4: Outlines the changes that occurred in the Mutsonga family with the focus on how it was run, how traditional leadership was portrayed, the Vatsonga dresscode, their traditional beliefs, education and health, the division of labour as well as the traditional food that the Vatsonga people took pride in, due to the impact of Christianity on them. Chapter 5: Deals with conclusion wherein the findings and recommendations have been outlined.

We demonstrate social contagion in attitudes and show it is more pervasive than believed. While prior research has demonstrated that individuals are influenced by others when explicitly exposed to others' attitudes, we demonstrate they are influenced even for issues where they were never explicitly exposed to group attitudes. In first two studies we show that individuals have a remarkable ability to predict the attitudes of others in a social group from very scant information--a phenomenon that we term `Social Clairvoyance.' Across three other studies, we delineate the psychological mechanisms that permit the performance of this feat - specifically, empathic responding directed at group members in an effort to understand their underlying motivations. Further, the empathetic simulation of others attitudes results in reaction in oneself towards the attitude object resulting in a shift in one's own attitudes. In three other studies, we show that the accurate prediction of others' attitudes results in a shifting of an individual's own attitude--a phenomenon we term `Attitudinal Contagion.' From this perspective, many marketing phenomena such as word-of-mouth, diffusion of new products, neighborhood effects may have been insufficiently understood since it does not require explicit exposure to the attitudes of another.

Health consciousness drives people to drink skim milk. Yet, improving the blue-white appearance and watery texture of skim milk is necessary to make consumers happy with skim milk. In this study, the influence of limited proteolysis with soluble or immobilized proteases, heat treatment, and pH on the whiteness of skim milk were examined to meet this goal. Limited proteolysis with milk-clotting enzymes increased the whiteness of skim milk. the proteases porcine pepsin and chymosin were immobilized onto nonporous ceramic, glass, and controlled pore glass (CPG) beads. The enzymes were coupled to beads either directly or via crosslinker proteins. Pepsin, immobilized onto CPG beads via crosslinker proteins, exhibited the best properties with respect to enzymatic activity, stability, and whitening efficiency. The L value (whiteness) of this immobilized enzyme-treated skim milk was 79.5, which approached the whiteness of 1% fat milk. Immobilized proteases whitened skim milk more effectively than did soluble proteases. The whiteness of skim milk was determined at various temperatures from 4 to 90°C. The L value increased with increasing temperature throughout the range tested. For samples not heated above 50°C, the increases in L values were completely reversible on cooling. Partial reversibility was observed with samples heated at 70°C and above. Milk whiteness was also determined at different pH values ranging from 5.0 to 8.2 at temperatures of 4, 20, and 30°C. The L value increased with decreasing pH and increasing temperature. A maximum L value of 80.0 was obtained at pH 5.0 and 30°C, which is higher than the L value of skim milk at its natural pH at room temperature. The temperature-dependent dissociation of major caseins was investigated by size exclusion chromatography at temperatures from 10 to 40°C. Free soluble β-casein and κ-casein were found only at 10°C.

Riparian cottonwoods (populus spp.) are keystone pioneer species that contribute to critical streamside and in-stream habitats, water quality, and aesthetic and recreational value. Land use and river regulation have caused a widespread reduction in the extent and regeneration of this genus. The majority of research on Populus species' reproduction has examined seedling recruitment that dominates in wide alluvial valleys. In contrast, I evaluated reproductive strategies of Populus angustifoliain mountain valleys. Research was conducted in northern Utah on the Little Bear River, a gravel-bedded stream that flows north out of the Bear River Range onto deposits of Ancient Lake Bonneville. I used allozyme electrophoretic data and vegetation mapping to investigate recruitment mechanisms of cottonwoods at two steep, confined mountain valley sites and two wide, alluvial valley sites. Allozyme electrophoretic analysis on samples from sites one through four revealed 60%, 69%, 86%, and 84% clonal recruitment, respectively. The size of cottonwood clones may be on the order of 200-300 m in this system. Vegetation mapping supported allozyme data and suggested that clonal recruitment dominates the system. I also collected data at four sites containing no cottonwoods to compare hydrogeomorphic influences at non-cottonwood (NC) sites and cottonwood recruitment (CR) sites. CR sites possess a distinctive geomorphic template relative to NC sites and this template may facilitate root disturbance resulting in clonal recruitment. A high frequency of woody debris and mid-channel islands characterizes CR sites. Channels at CR sites are less entrenched, more sinuous, and exhibit larger bankfull channel width and width to depth ratios, and finer grain sizes than channels at NC sites. At CR sites, estimates of bankfull average boundary shear stress and unit stream power are less compared to those at NC sites. Cottonwood recruitment models that typically describe seedling reproduction in alluvial valley environments do not apply in narrow, steep-gradient environments. I found clonal recruitment of cottonwoods to correlate spatially and temporally with channel and root disturbance associated with rain on snow events on the order of the 25-30-yr flood event.

The retention of water in soils is a very interesting subject. Soil-water research presents a great challenge to research workers. The challenge is broad in scope and extends from the field problems of large irrigation projects to the atomic scale of the solid-liquid interface. If scientists are going to describe scientifically soil-water relations, they must ultimately utilize the instruments of science and the language of mathematics. To the end of the latter the mathematics of thermodynamics has been applied in these studies of water retention in soils.

The complete requirements for early embryo development in vitro of the ovine and other domestic species remain unknown. Many studies have concentrated on new media, supplementation, and gas atmosphere formulations. A newer approach is to coculture early embryos with different cell types to provide the physico-chemical requirements for their development. In this study, oviduct epithelial (OEC) and dissociated embryo cell (DEC) growth were tested in minimum essential media (MEM) and RPMI. Media were supplemented with fetal calf serum (FCS) and equine derived serum (EDS). Fetal calf serum supported maximum cell confluence in OEC collected on day 3 and day 13 post-estrus. Although at a slower growth rate, DEC developed faster in FCS-supplemented media. Cell growth was slower for EDSsupplemented media in all treatments. As a result, FCS-supplemented media were used to evaluate early embryo growth in various coculture systems. In MEM + OEC, 67% of 1- to 1 0- cell embryos developed to the hatched blastocyst stage (following 8 days of culture). In MEM+DEC, 66% hatched after the same time period. In control treatments (no exogenous cell layers), all embryos degenerated. When early embryo development was compared between St.Croix and Targhee-type breeds in MEM+OEC and RPMI+OEC, no significant differences were observed. The improved results obtained with coculture systems may provide an important method for assessing the viability of embryos following micromanipulation techniques (such as splitting, gene transfer, or following long periods of freezing). The nature of the beneficial action of these coculture systems remains unknown.