The role of trust in traditional face-to-face mentoring has already been investigated in several research studies. However, to our knowledge, very few studies have examined how trust is established in electronic-mentoring relationships. The purpose of the current study is to examine by means of the Mayer et al. (1995) model how e-mentees perceive a prospective e-mentor's trustworthiness and how these perceptions influence the decision to be mentored by a particular e-mentor. A sample comprised of 253 undergraduate and graduate students from the Telfer School of Management at the University of Ottawa participated as potential mentees by completing a survey after having reviewed the selected e-mentor’s profile. The survey employed quantitative and qualitative measurements to assess the mentee's perception of the prospective e-mentor’s level of trustworthiness. In the quantitative section, both the Behavioural Trust Inventory (Gillespie, 2003) and the Factors of Perceived Trustworthiness (Mayer et al., 1999) were measured. The Behavioural Trust Inventory was designed to measure the extent to which a mentee is willing to be vulnerable in e-mentoring relationships. The Factors of Perceived Trustworthiness (ability, benevolence and integrity) were designed to measure these three attributes’ contributions to the extent to which the mentees perceived the e-mentor as being trustworthy. The factorial structure (confirmatory factor analysis) and internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha) of the constructs were examined. Structural equation modeling was conducted to test the fit of the models (Behavioural Trust Inventory and Mayer et al.) to an e-mentoring context. In the qualitative section, the indicators of trustworthiness were collected by means of an open-ended question and were analyzed by means of content analysis. The results of the quantitative analysis revealed that the models (the Behavioural Trust Inventory and the Factors of Perceived Trustworthiness) have an adequate fit with the e-mentoring model after accounting for some correlated error terms. The results of the qualitative analysis identified some other attributes (apart from ability, benevolence and integrity groups) have an influence on the extent to which the mentees perceived the e-mentor as being trustworthy. The main finding is that the Mayer et al. (1995) model appears to be a suitable device for the measurement of trust in e-mentoring relationships at the initiation phase.

This thesis presents a cost allocation method for deriving lower bounds on costs of feasible policies for a class of production/inventory problems. Consider the joint replenishment problem where a group of items is replenished together or individually. A sequence of reorders for any particular item will incur holding, backorder and set-up costs specific to the item, in addition whenever any item is replenished a joint cost is incurred. What is required of the total problem is the minimization of a cost function of the replenishment sequence or policy. The cost allocation method consists of decomposing the total problem into sub-problems, one for each item, by allocating the joint cost amongst the items in such a way that every item in the group receives a positive allocation or none. The result is that, for an arbitrary feasible cost allocation, the sum of the minimum costs for the subproblems is a lower bound on the cost of any feasible policy to the total problem. The results for the joint replenishment problem follows: For the constant and continuous demand case we reproduce the lower bound of Jackson, Maxwell and Muckstadt more easily than they did. For the multi-item dynamic lot-size problem, we generalize Silver-Meal and part-period balancing heuristics, and derive a cost allocation bound with little extra work. For the 'can-order' system, we use periodic policies derived from the cost allocation method and show that they are superior to the more complex (s,c,S) policies. The cost allocation method is easily generalized to pure distribution problems where joint replenishment decisions are taken at several facilities. For example, for the one-warehouse multi-retailer problem, we reproduce Roundy's bound more easily than he did. For the multi-facility joint replenishment problem (a pure distribution system with an arbitrary number of warehouses), we give a lower bound algorithm whose complexity is dr log r where d is the maximum number of facilities which replenish a particular item and r is the number of items. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

A distinction between ruminative and reflective forms of dispositional self-focus is introduced and the theoretical utility of this distinction is evaluated in a program of eight studies. Study 1 examined for the presence of this distinction among natural language trait descriptors. Study 2 evaluated whether this distinction provided a sufficient summary of relations between the Fenigstein, Scheier and Buss (1975) Self-Consciousness scales and the Five Factor Model of personality (FFM). In Study 3, two brief questionnaire measures of ruminative and reflective tendencies were developed, and their convergent and discriminant validity evaluated with respect to the FFM, and the Fenigstein et al. (1975) Public Self- Consciousness (PUSC) and Private Self-Consciousness (PRSC) scales. Study 4 investigated the extent to which rumination and reflection separately account for PRSC associations with measures of psychological distress (e.g., Beck Depression scale) and intellective dispositions (e.g., Need for Cognition scale), respectively. Study 5 evaluated, using a sample of dormitory roommates, the extent to which self-estimates of ruminativeness and reflectiveness correspond with the judgments of a knowledgeable observer. Studies 6, 7, and 8 evaluated the extent to which the traits of rumination and reflection separately account for previously reported PRSC associations with three theoretically relevant criteria of private self-consciousness: state indices of self-focused attention (Study 6), the asymmetry effect in self-other similarity judgments (Study 7), and research volunteerism (Study 8). Findings suggest that the PRSC scale confounds two relatively independent, and motivationally distinct dispositions, rumination and reflection, and that latent ruminative and reflective components of PRSC scores separately and fully account for PRSC correlates and effects. These findings provide a straight forward explanation of the "self-absorption" paradox implicit in the PRSC research literature, i.e., the consistent but apparently contradictory finding of more accurate and extensive self-knowledge, yet higher levels of subjective psychological distress, among persons high in private self-consciousness. It is likely that the PRSC's associations with psychological distress are uniquely due to its neurotic component (rumination), and that the PRSC's self-knowledge effects are uniquely due its intellective component (reflection). It is argued that rumination and reflection represent statistically and functionally independent self-focusing tendencies. Their strong and unique associations with the FFM dimensions of neuroticism and openness, respectively, imply a basic dichotomy of self-attentive motives: anxiety/fear and curiosity/exploration: rumination represents a useful summary conception of self-attentiveness motivated by perceived threats, losses, or injustices to the self; reflection represents a useful summary conception of self-attentiveness motivated by intrinsic curiosity, or epistemic interest in the self. It is concluded that the spatial metaphor of "direction" may not be an appropriate basis for a useful scientific conception of dispositional self-consciousness. The concept of a purely cognitive tendency to have attention chronically directed toward the self versus away from the self, construed independently of the emotional and motivational determinants of such a tendency, is probably untenable. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

Experimenter self-disclosure and verbal reinforcement of subject disclosure during an interview were both predicted to result in increased subject disclosure in a subsequent testing situation, as compared with direct instructions to the subjects to be more open.. The results indicated that for male subjects, verbal reinforcement had the predicted effect, but experimenter self-disclosure did not. Female subjects were found to be more disclosive than male subjects in general, but were relatively uninfluenced by the experimenter treatment conditions. Experimenter self-disclosure was shown to result in an increase in social evaluative anxiety and in more favourable perceptions of the self and of the experimenter in the subjects concerned. Both of these factors are discussed as having counteracted any modeling effect of experimenter self-disclosure. An interpretation of the results in terms of an interaction between subject sex, experimenter sex and experimental conditions is proposed and the implications this has for the related literature, which in general has ignored such variables as subject and experimenter sex, are discussed. / Arts, Faculty of / Psychology, Department of / Graduate

M.Ed. (Educational Management) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

As in the stock of trading business is allocated a large part of the capital resources, it is necessary to determine the manner of their control. For this purpose a number of models were developed. Before application to the specific case, these models must be properly adjusted to ensure conformity with reality. The aim of this thesis is to optimize the inventory management of electronic commerce. The stochastic model with loss from unfulfilled orders was chosen as default. First, the necessary adjustments were made to the model and defined input parameters. After filling model with real data, the optimum values of the monitored variables were obtained. The last part deals with the influence of changes in input parameters on the optimal value of variables. Use of the model is not limited to this particular case. Without major modifications, the model is also applicable to other similar problems.

The objective of the present study was to investigate the validity of a new teacher rating inventory, the Iowa Early Learning Inventory (IELI). It is intended to assess the young students' cognitive behaviors, behaviors related to or supportive of the learning process. It is intended to be useful for early identification of students who are likely to encounter learning difficulties later in their academic careers. The intended users are kindergarten and 1st grade teachers. The construct theory of the IELI was empirically derived using qualitative analysis of behavior statements obtained from relevant sources. Six areas of cognitive behaviors emerged from the qualitative analysis. The IELI was constructed to measure these areas using representative behaviors for item content. All six areas of cognitive behaviors had medium or strong correlations with each other and all had correlations of medium strength with ITBS achievement measures. Investigation of the relationship of individual cognitive behavior areas with selected measures of achievement supported that the IELI captures variance related to other measures of related constructs. Confirmatory factor analyses of the structure of the IELI investigated five models consisting of the six areas. None of the models was evaluated as adequately fitting the data. The most promising model consisted of six correlated areas or factors, each defined by the items intended to measure the respective cognitive area. Investigation of sex DIF identified a small number of potential problems in three of the six areas, but investigation of ethnic DIF was inconclusive but called for further investigation. Overall, the results indicated that the IELI provides useful and valid information about the cognitive relationships of early learners.

The diploma thesis focuses on internal logistics and manipulation in the manufacturing company. First part provides theoretical background. Second part offers an insight into the current state and last part contains a solution for optimization of internal logistics.

The diploma thesis deals with the study of the supply process in the chosen company, which mainly deals with the purchase and sale of cleaning machines and equipment. The thesis presents a proposal to improve the Supply Chain, with an emphasis on streamlining traffic, while at the same time making it possible to streamline customer service by designing a website. The work is divided into three main parts. The first part includes all the theoretical starting points, from which the analytical part starts. This part is mainly consists of analyzing the state of the company by using appropriate methods. On the basis of the shortcomings identified, the third part discusses suggestions for improving the processes that will contribute to their improvement, increasing the competitiveness of the company and increasing the value for the customer.

The diploma thesis focuses on the analysis of the current management of the purchasing process and inventory management for the production process in the company ZDAS, a.s. Based on the performed analyzes, this thesis proposes specific solutions for improving the actual partial processes.