The Baltic Sea is a brackish body of water in the heart of Europe, and within it lives a small whale: the Baltic Sea harbor porpoise. However, this animal is becoming increasingly more endangered. Due to various man-made threats, less than 500 animals remain in the sea. This thesis aims to provide a comprehensive overview of this issue with a political approach through discussing how the state of this animal reflects on the European Union. Furthermore, it investigates the European Commission's role and takes a closer look at EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030 to detect potential greenwashing. Through the case study of the harbor porpoise, the central conflict between the European Union and the conservationists aiming to save the animal gets illuminated from different perspectives. The analysis makes use of European integration theory as well as a deconstructive approach, through which the study is able to detect that the issue largely stems from the respective member states. Moreover, it finds that the approaches of the European Commission and the conservationist align at the core principles. With the help of an interview conducted with a field expert, these points can be emphasized. Reflecting on the findings it can be concluded that essential regulations are finally being put into place, but there is still a long way to go to save the Baltic Sea harbor porpoise.

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In this study, we contrasted socioemotional selectivity theory (SST; Carstensen, 2006) with dynamic integration theory (DIT; Labouvie-Vief, 2003) using trajectories of quantitative and qualitative social support in later life. SST is a lifespan theory of motivational development (Carstensen, Isaacowitz, & Charles, 1999). There is a normative decline in social support networks in later life. In other words, individuals who perceive the limitation on time left for their future are likely to decrease the quantitative social support and compensate for this decrease by improving qualitative social support with emotionally meaningful social partners. The theory also postulates that age is the primary proxy for perceived limitation of individuals' lives (Carstensen, Fung, & Charles, 2003). Further, self-reported health and functional status are factors that affect older adults' perception of limitation of time left in their lives (Carstensen, 2006). In contrast, DIT is a neo-Piagetian theory that emphasizes the presence of individual differences in quantitative and qualitative social support in later life depending on individuals' levels of cognitive resources that are associated with educational levels (Labouvie-Vief & Diehl, 2000). Despite these different arguments on the trajectories of quantitative and qualitative social support in later life, SST and DIT have not been tested within a same study. The current study examined the trajectories of frequency of social contact (quantitative social support) and reliance on family members and close friends (qualitative social support) in later life. Participants were drawn from the Normative Aging Study (NAS; N = 1,067, M[subscript age] = 60.83, SD = 8.08) who completed social support surveys three times from 1985 to 1991. Using unconditional and unconditional analyses (Raudenbush & Bryk, 1986), growth models of frequency of social contact with and reliance on family members and close friends were tested. Within subject analyses found that the trajectory of frequency of social contact was a U-shaped curve with the age of 54 years at a peak, while the trajectory of reliance on family and friends were stable and linear. Random effects of age for the intercept and slope were significant in both models of frequency of contact and reliance on family and friends, although the random effect for the latter were small in both models. Between subjects analyses were conducted to examine whether cognitive resources, marital status, health status, and functional status predicted variance in the intercept and slope of both types of support. As SST hypothesized, having better self-reported physical health predicted higher levels of frequency of contact over age. Being married was associated with higher quantity of social support. However, contrary to our hypothesis based on SST, having poorer functional status predicted more frequent social contact over age. The random effect of intercept was still significant after controlling for these psychosocial predictors. The evidence to test the DIT hypotheses was examined in the model of the qualitative social support. Having memory problems predicted decreasing reliance on social partners. However, marital status and education did not significantly predict change in qualitative social relationships. Contrary to the hypothesis based on SST that posited poor self-reported health was associated with higher qualitative social support, it was better self-reported health that predicted higher qualitative social support. The random effects for the intercept and slope were still significant after controlling for these psychosocial factors. Taken together, the findings of the current study suggest that SST and DIT can be used as theoretical frameworks that are complementary rather than contradictory in their predictions of socioemotional development in later life. SST is useful to illustrate the overall trajectory of quantitative social support in a normative development in late life. DIT's stance better explains the individual differences in qualitative social support in non-normative contexts. The findings also suggest that having memory problems and poor self-reported health as non-normative developmental outcomes may be risk factors of older adults' ability to seek for social support. / Graduation date: 2012

<p>Children with autism typically present with sensory processing difficulties that affect their ability to relate to people. This qualitative study focused on exploring the sensory processing of children with autism and their mothers, using a frame of reference of sensory integration theory. The purpose of the study was to help mothers gain knowledge and understanding into their own sensory processing so that they could develop a better understanding of their child&rsquo / s sensory processing in order to facilitate better mother-child relationships. An evaluation tool, the Sensory Profiles by Dunn (1999) and the Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile by Brown &amp / Dunn (2002) was used as the instrument for gathering information on sensory processing. The population consisted of ten sets of mothers and their children with autism who attend Vera School for Learners with Autism. The Sensory&nbsp / rofiles was completed to investigate the phenomenological issues regarding the sensory modulation aspects of the parent-child relationship. Each mother received individual feedback on their own and their child&rsquo / s sensory processing. Two focus groups were then conducted with the mothers to determine the value of the information gained from the&nbsp / rofiles. Data consisted of two audio taped feedback from the focus group. Data was analysed for emerging themes. The three major themes that emerged were, (a) You realize&nbsp / ow similar you are to your child, (b) I also have needs (c) They walk away and leave you with this wreck of a child. The findings of the study suggest that an understanding of&nbsp / ensory processing can influence the mother-child relationship positively.</p>

¡§Individual¡¨is the basic analytic unit in a pluralistic society. Especially, phenomenon of public affairs is essence of the problem and is based on individual cognition, hidden in group behavior. The individual cognition forms group judgment and interpersonal influence in the group. This interpersonal influence process may simplify as the power relations between group members, the communication network and the interaction form in the group, and the opinion relations within the group (French, 1956). The conflict is the essential situation of interpersonal influence and also is one kind of relational form and phenomenon for group judgment. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the interpersonal influence and conduct interpersonal mutual cooperation in the public affairs area. The group decision-making (or judgment) can be explored based on observable individual preference and group decision-making. That can infer unobservable interpersonal influence. This interpersonal influence process transforms the individual judgment into the group decision-making. There are two stages in interpersonal influence process, including opinion formation for individual members, and compromise among group members. Namely, the individual might revise his or her preference voluntarily. The group integrates the revised members¡¦ judgments into group decision-making. That is, the group process resembles the process which individual integrates multi-cues like information integration theory (IIT) (Friedkin, 2005; Sniezek et al., 1989). The average cognitive algebra pattern in IIT may measure the interpersonal influence effectively. The theories of group decision-making are still insufficient. For example, social power theory and social comparison theory explain the concept of choice shift, but not positivism. Social decision scheme (SDS) employs decision scheme to predict the group decision-making, but it is insufficient for explaining the group decision-making process. Although social dilemma explores both individual level and group level, it cannot provide the weighting method. Cognitive conflict paradigm (CCP) discusses judgment policy shift, but preference shift is still not mentioned. Although CCP focuses on interpersonal learning, it does not propose how to weight interpersonal influence. The functional measurement theory in IIT may supplement insufficiencies in these theories.. The research utilizes the concept and the method of IIT, which prodivides experimental validity for explaining the complex interpersonal influence process by using social weight. This research uses budget allocation as discussion cases. Interpersonal conflicts are divided by the cognitive conflict and the interest conflict. By using social judgment theory (SJT), this research can analyze cognitive difference in the case of cognitive conflict. Besides, using quasi-experimental procedure in IIT, the findings of this research include: 1. In the group process, group members¡¦ judgments are integrated to group decision-making based on unequal-weight rule mostly. Members¡¦ social weights are different and depend on the level of members¡¦ preferences. 2. The members in different groups have the same preferences initially. Although social weights of these members are not significant difference in statistic, these members still appear the differences between individuals. 3. In cognitive conflict case, the group consensus is not consistently accompanied by cognitive consensus. 4. The group influence results from normative social influence, rather than from informational social influence. 5. It shows that there is negative correlation between social weight and normative effect. Besides, social weight and comprise degree also show negative.correlation 6. The cognitive feedback and the outcome feedback don¡¦t affect decision-making result. 7. The relationship between social weight and the degree of satisfaction is not supported. The social weight and the fairness of decision-making process show significant correlation 8. The subjects¡¦ decision-making performances in the study don¡¦t show significant difference

In the current pluralistic societies, public policy-makings had to take into account various stakeholders as well as the social values. The research, based on the integrated public affairs management¡]PAM¡^ framework (Wang et al., 2004a) and place marketing strategy (Kotler, 1999), defined the applicable operational variables which includes three major factors of economical, social and political, and government, and nine derivative attributes, two situations of direct three-links between Taiwan and Mainland China, and status quo are used as the scenario. Altogether they will influence the stakeholders as decision-makers while deciding if they should invest, live, or work in Kaohsiung. For research design, we employed three major multiple-attribute theories or methods for individual stakeholders¡¦information processing and integration, Information Integration Theory¡]IIT¡^, Analytical Hierarchy Process¡]AHP¡^, Simple Multi-Attribute Rating Technique¡]SMART¡^, and Rating. In particular, the way the information is integrated cognitively is empirically examined instead of assumed with the averaging model of the IIT (Anderson, 1991a), and the scale values (equivalent to the utility component in MAUT or AHP) and the weights are concurrently separated and measured as results of the examination. Such separation rendered measurement of the psychological weights with theoretical validity possible, and could be used as the standard so that weights measured with the other three methods are evaluated and compared. Findings of the research are as follow, in the aspect of multiple-attribute weight measurement methods applied in the place marketing of Kaohsiung¡G 1. Among the three major factors, the most important is ¡§economic development¡¨, the second is ¡§government function¡¨, and then the third is ¡§social and political development¡¨. 2. For economic development, under the situation of maintain status quo, the most crucial derivative attribute is¡§ the level of economic globalization of Kaohsiung¡¨. The second one is ¡§the industrial structure of Kaohsiung city¡¨. The last one is ¡§the competitiveness of Kaohsiung Port and Airport project¡¨¡FUnder the situation of opening for three direct-links, the most crucial derivative attribute is still ¡§the level of economic globalization of Kaohsiung¡¨. The second one is ¡§the competitiveness of Kaohsiung Port and Airport project¡¨. The last one is ¡§the industrial structure of Kaohsiung city¡¨. 3. For the factor of social and political development, the most important attribute is ¡§the level of citizen participation in public affairs and the extent they influence public policies¡¨, the second is ¡§the public values and culture¡¨, the last is ¡§the operational mechanism of politics and election¡¨. 4. As for government function, the most essential attribute is ¡§the provision of public infrastructures¡¨. The second is ¡§the elected officials¡¦ perception of place marketing and capabilities of policy planning¡¨. The third is¡§the career officials¡¦ identifications for the elected officials¡¦ ambitions and abilities to carry out the place marketing policies¡¨. 5. The second group examinees think that direct-links has positive effects on the developments of Kaohsiung and most of them approve of the policy of three direct-links¡Fthe first group examinees have diverse opinions on it. 6. Based on PAM framework, we will sum up the problems of place marketing of Kaohsiung and brings out policy suggestions for Kaohsiung city. In the aspect of Multiple-attribute weight measurement methods theory¡G 1. Take the weight parameters derived from IIT¡¦s averaging model as the standard, weights from rating¡BAHP and SMART are all theoretically valid. The theoretical validity of rating outperforms that of AHP, AHP outperforms that of SMART. Among the convergence validity or consistence of four methods, between rating and AHP with IIT¡¦s averaging model fit better in convergence validity, between SMART and IIT¡¦s averaging model don¡¦t. 2. All three models had fairly high predictability and notable for subjects¡¦ holistic judgments. The predictability of IIT is the a little bit higher than SMART, the third one is AHP, and the last one is rating. 3. For convergence, measured with accumulative weights derived from subjects selected 15-20 examinees randomly, IIT was better than SMART, and SMART was better than AHP. 4. In terms of perceived performance, degree of operational easiness and fondness, the three models are not significantly different. As for the degree of confidence, IIT outperformed AHP, and AHP outperformed SMART.

<p>Children with autism typically present with sensory processing difficulties that affect their ability to relate to people. This qualitative study focused on exploring the sensory processing of children with autism and their mothers, using a frame of reference of sensory integration theory. The purpose of the study was to help mothers gain knowledge and understanding into their own sensory processing so that they could develop a better understanding of their child&rsquo / s sensory processing in order to facilitate better mother-child relationships. An evaluation tool, the Sensory Profiles by Dunn (1999) and the Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile by Brown &amp / Dunn (2002) was used as the instrument for gathering information on sensory processing. The population consisted of ten sets of mothers and their children with autism who attend Vera School for Learners with Autism. The Sensory&nbsp / rofiles was completed to investigate the phenomenological issues regarding the sensory modulation aspects of the parent-child relationship. Each mother received individual feedback on their own and their child&rsquo / s sensory processing. Two focus groups were then conducted with the mothers to determine the value of the information gained from the&nbsp / rofiles. Data consisted of two audio taped feedback from the focus group. Data was analysed for emerging themes. The three major themes that emerged were, (a) You realize&nbsp / ow similar you are to your child, (b) I also have needs (c) They walk away and leave you with this wreck of a child. The findings of the study suggest that an understanding of&nbsp / ensory processing can influence the mother-child relationship positively.</p>

Made available in DSpace on 2018-06-27T19:13:11Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 Thiago Freire Sangoi.pdf: 12425983 bytes, checksum: ce220af41739cae819f7a796ad5c53ce (MD5) Thiago Freire Sangoi.pdf.jpg: 4082 bytes, checksum: 9304a756fd0d6a5fe599c850d8d6c0ce (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-08-10 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / O presente trabalho consiste na proposta de inserção da Integração Teoria/ Experimento como prática de aprendizagem nas escolas de Ensino Médio através da elaboração e aplicação de um módulo didático que irá englobar a parte experimental e a teórico-científica. Para atender a esse propósito, foi elaborado e aplicado um módulo didático que se adapta aos currículos escolares e às orientações sugeridas pelos PCN s (Parâmetros Curriculares Nacionais), e também, ao mesmo tempo, abordam tópicos de propriedades da Termofísica. O módulo didático faz a abordagem dos conteúdos referentes à termofísica, tratando desde os conhecimentos teóricos, envolvendo energia cinética, temperatura, calor e equilíbrio térmico, para que, com esse embasamento, seja possível abordar mais consistentemente os tópicos da dilatação e das trocas de energia sob a forma de calor. Este módulo didático foi elaborado para atender um público de 21 (vinte e um) alunos do segundo ano do Ensino Médio do Colégio Dom Alberto, da cidade de Santa Cruz do Sul, no Rio Grande do Sul. O material tem sua estrutura organizada em forma sequencial para que abranja, da melhor maneira, os tópicos envolvidos. Assim, tanto o professor, que irá aplicar o módulo concomitantemente com o experimento, quanto o aluno, que irá seguir a sequência aplicada pelo professor, terão uma assimilação significativa do assunto abordado. Tanto o desenvolvimento quanto a aplicação do módulo didático estão ancorados na aprendizagem com significado de David Ausubel, em que a informação deve interagir e ancorar-se nos conceitos relevantes já pré-existentes na estrutura cognitiva do aluno. A elaboração do material teve como estrutura básica uma problematização inicial, organização do conhecimento e aplicação do conhecimento, propostos nos três momentos pedagógicos de Delizoicov e Angotti. A avaliação dos novos conceitos adquiridos em relação aos já preexistentes foram analisado através de questionários aplicados antes e após a aplicação do experimento, etapas que denominamos pré e pós experimento. Dessa forma, foi com base nesses questionários aplicados e analisados que se tornou possível verificar vestígios satisfatórios no ensino e na aprendizagem significativa por parte dos alunos envolvidos. Durante a primeira fase da discussão, denominada pré experimento, observou-se, por meio do material impresso devolvido ao professor, que a maioria dos alunos, cerca de 60%, demonstraram conhecimentos superficiais. Desse montante, uma minoria de alunos, cerca de 10%, demonstrou conhecimentos mais amplos sobre o tema, e o mesmo foi obtido por meio de livros didáticos de séries anteriores, jornais, documentários e nos programas de televisão em geral. Na segunda fase, chamada de pós experimento, também por meio do mesmo material impresso aplicado, foi observado que, do montante de 60% dos que tinham conhecimentos superficiais, houve uma suba para 80%, uma vez que o montante daqueles alunos com os conhecimentos mais amplos também se elevou para 55%. Entretanto, uma minoria dos alunos, pode-se dizer que se enquadram naqueles que apresentaram respostas medíocres, e assim demonstram visivelmente que preferem outras áreas do conhecimento que não se vinculam as veias exatas, e para este trabalho podem ser desconsideradas, uma vez que o enfoque principal era de um levantamento e não motivacional.

Magister Scientiae (Occupational Therapy) - MSc(OT) / Children with autism typically present with sensory processing difficulties that affect their ability to relate to people. This qualitative study focused on exploring the sensory processing of children with autism and their mothers, using a frame of reference of sensory integration theory. The purpose of the study was to help mothers gain knowledge and understanding into their own sensory processing so that they could develop a better understanding of their child's sensory processing in order to facilitate better mother-child relationships. An evaluation tool, the Sensory Profiles by Dunn (1999) and the Adolescent/Adult Sensory Profile by Brown & Dunn (2002) was used as the instrument for gathering information on sensory processing. The population consisted of ten sets of mothers and their children with autism who attend Vera School for Learners with Autism. The Sensory Profiles was completed to investigate the phenomenological issues regarding the sensory modulation aspects of the parent-child relationship. Each mother received individual feedback on their own and their child's sensory processing. Two focus groups were then conducted with the mothers to determine the value of the information gained from the profiles. Data consisted of two audio taped feedback from the focus group. Data was analysed for emerging themes. The three major themes that emerged were, (a) You realize how similar you are to your child, (b) I also have needs (c) They walk away and leave you with this wreck of a child. The findings of the study suggest that an understanding of sensory processing can influence the mother-child relationship positively. / South Africa

This study is to investigate how acquiring firms within the Swedish construction industry work towards successful post-acquisition integration during the early stages of post-acquisition and which factors they consider when doing so. When researching the five cases, the study adopted a qualitative approach, using semi-structured interviews with five managers from acquiring firms to gather in-depth, first-hand data for thematic analysis. The empirical findings highlight the significance of corporate culture, organizational structure, and leadership structure in the integration process. Acquiring firms prioritize cultural compatibility, recognizing that differences can hinder successful integration. They also emphasize the positive impact of similar business models and the creation of new leadership groups combining resources and capabilities. Supportive leadership plays a crucial role in smoothening the integration process. To achieve a successful post-acquisition integration, firms in the Swedish construction industry focus on assessing corporate culture compatibility, restructuring leadership, and effective integration planning. They aim to integrate cultures, develop thorough integration plans, and ensure employee satisfaction and financial success. The studied cases challenges theories that emphasize organizational structure as the main obstacle in acquisitions, suggesting that cultural factors are more critical. Similarly, it contradicts theories highlighting directive leadership, emphasizing the importance of supportive leadership instead. The study contributes to the understanding of integrating human resources, cultural factors, and clear integration plans as essential elements for acquisition success.