Thesis (M.App.Psy.)--University of Waikato, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 44-51) Also available via the World Wide Web.

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a significant public health issue due to the incidence, complexity, and cost associated with treatment – emphasizing the need for effective rehabilitation programs. One mode of rehabilitation that has been demonstrated to improve health and reduce healthcare costs is health promotion programs (HPPs) that incorporate physical activity (PA). However, PA is not currently incorporated into the standard of care post-TBI. The purpose of this study was to conduct group interviews among individuals with a TBI undergoing outpatient rehabilitation to determine PA knowledge, attitudes, intentions, and barriers. Results will be used to develop a HPP that focuses on facilitating PA participation as part of the rehabilitation process. Seventeen participants completed a series of group interviews (2-3 people/group) regarding their PA needs. A qualitative research design was adopted and trustworthiness was established through triangulation of data (i.e., theoretical underpinning; multiple researchers and data-coders). A cross-case analysis was completed to identify themes and conceptual patterns. The main themes identified were (1) an inability to differentiate between PA and physical therapy, (2) a limited knowledge of PA health benefits and the relationship to rehabilitation, and (3) an interest in participating in a PA HPP as part of their rehabilitation. HPPs for outpatients with a TBI should educate individuals about PA, the associated health benefits, and the role PA plays in the rehabilitation process. A well designed HPP may increase the likelihood that individuals adopt and maintain PA as part of the rehabilitation process, thus reducing the risk of morbidity and mortality.

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This study examines the social worlds of mature students. Data was collected through participant observation in campus settings and in-depth interviews with mature students. The focus is on their experiences as they navigated the passage to student status. A variety of constraints to the progress of the passage are documented, as well as mature students' negotiation strategies used to overcome these constraints. Attention is then paid to how mature students adjust to the new realities that university life poses. Dealing with university administration, learning new skills, and renegotiation processes are analysed. The status passage to mature student is viewed as problematic for the individual, as a new set of meanings must be negotiated with significant others for the passage to be successful. This study suggests that the case of mature students offers explanation into the nature of status passage in later life, and contributes new knowledge to the nature of generic social processes. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

Yes / Qualitative dementia research emphasises the importance of recognising the voice of the person with dementia. However, research imbued with a politics of selfhood, whereby individuals are called upon to give coherence to experience and emotion, jars with representations of dementia as a gradual decline in capacity. Moreover, it reinforces an assumption that there is an essential experience that can be accessed through different methods. Drawing on Atkinson and Silverman, we view the interview not as confessional but rather as an outcome of social interaction. This paper draws on qualitative interviews from the Improving the Experince of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life (IDEAL) study, to focus specifically on the forms of accounting and storytelling of people living with dementia and how these are produced through the course of the interview encounter. Extracts from our interviews highlight key aspects of this interactional process: (a) social conventions and temporality, (b) self presentation and identity work, (c) accounts and wider cultural meanings. To conclude, we suggest that qualitative research with people with dementia requires a reframing of both the interview encounter and interpretive practices. / The IDEAL study’ was funded jointly by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) through grant ES/L001853/2 ‘Improving the experience of dementia and enhancing active life: living well with dementia’

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Master of Regional and Community Planning / Architecture / John W. Keller / Similar to their urban counterparts, rural communities consider preservation of a site based on their most vital economic features. With the growing minority and non-white cultures becoming more predominant in American society, so too has the culture and significance of historic events changed. More emphasis is now on the surrounding environment of those landmarks historically preserved rather than just the landmarks themselves. And in turn with the environment, more grants and awards are passed down to those sites and locations that provide more options to limiting excess space and energy while utilizing them to the fullest potential. Some conflicts still occur in relation to preserving historical integrity with development, but the total consensus is that historic preservation provides economic benefit more than loss.

This dissertation deals with relations between parents and child institutions such as childcare, school and child health centers in terms of an institutionalization of childhood and expressions of parental identities in life stories. The empirical study consists of thematic life story interviews with parents focusing on their experiences of meeting and relating to these child institutions. A perspective on life stories as socially situated action and identity performance is adopted that views the life stories as co-constructed in between the interviewee and the interviewer. The aim of the dissertation is to contribute to an understanding of relations between parents and child institutions in Sweden that takes as its point of departure the expressions of parental identities. Methodologically, the dissertation also aims to further develop a way of working with life stories that makes the interviewer visible as co-constructor of life stories and expressions of identity. The analyses is focused on expressions of parental identities through the storytelling and in the stories told. Parental identities took shape and form as performances and constructions of, for example, social subordination in relation to preschool staff and other parents, helpful intervention in school helping an inexperienced teacher, worries about children being different from other children and not fitting in at preschool and of gratefulness for help and support from childcare staff when being short of time and money. The identity expressions were then analyzed in relation to recurrent discourses in research on relations between parents and childinstitutions. The results show that dominant discourses of relations between parents and child institutions tend to construct parents as a homogenous group, thereby concealing how gender, social class, ethnicity and age, and the subsequent different constructions of children and childhood, structure and influence the relations between parents and child institutions and thereby also the institutionalization of childhood. / Förskola och skola i samverkan. Ett reformerat utbildningssystem.

The purpose of this essay is to investigate thoughts of pupils in third grade about language, language acquisition, multilingualism and mother tongue. The group is highly multicultural and multilingual which has resulted in many opinions regarding the following issues of conduct: How do the pupils describe their use of their language skills and what do they do to develop them? What thoughts do they have about multilingualism? To what and when do the pupils make use of their mother tongue? A mixed method has been used which makes the study equally quantitative and qualitative. The results show that language is a means of communication encountering people in your daily life, in example at home, school and in your free time. The children show great skills in language usage when they cross the different social arenas during a normal day and also an awareness regarding learning strategies. The pupils’ mother tongues are being used mostly with family though and although multilingualism is considered positive the children do not use all their language capacity when learning a second language.

The purpose of this study is to examine the cultural and social integration process among Syrian refugees in the United States, and to what extent the direct and indirect challenges have played a role in the process of their social and cultural integration. The challenges include, but are not limited to, cultural conflicts, religious values, stereotypes, and English language proficiency. In order to investigate my research questions, interviews as a research methodology were used as a theoretical framework for this project to collect and analyze data. I conducted semi-structured interviews with ten Syrian refugees who currently live in the United States. These interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed in full in both Arabic and English by me. My data analysis investigated what the interviewees indicated about their processes of social and cultural integration in the United States’ society as refugees. Specific extracts were chosen because they served as rich materials to analyze and provide answers to questions in this paper. Findings indicated that Syrian refugees needed to overcome significant personal, social, linguistic, and psychological barriers and challenges in order to integrate socially and culturally in the United States’ society. Results showed that participants in this study adopted various “acculturation strategies”. Only three out of ten were socially and culturally integrated. However, acculturation strategies adopted by participants are dynamic and changeable overtime, so further longitudinal study is needed to examine their integration processes over a longer time.