Background: Work-ability is often assessed as part of the vocational rehabilitation process for injured workers. However, research highlights a concern among therapists who carry out vocational assessments that there is a lack of consistency with regard to quality and comprehensiveness using current methods of assessment. One of the reasons for this is that there are no standardized measures of work-ability available that are designed to be used for the purpose of facilitating rehabilitation. The Participation And Work-ability Support Scale (PAWSS) is a new measure, conceptualized and initially developed by Professors Lynne Turner-Stokes and Kathryn McPherson, that was designed to address this gap. Design and Methods: This research was designed to develop the PAWSS measure to the point where it had face validity, and was complete enough to be formally psychometrically tested. The design of the research involved three parts. Firstly, a comprehensive review of the literature was undertaken. This was done to identify all the aspects of work functioning that are considered to contribute to work-ability, and then consider currently available work-ability measures in relation to their suitability for assessing vocational support needs. Secondly, in phase one of the research, qualitative focus groups and interviews with stakeholders in the return-to-work process were undertaken. The purpose of this phase was to check the content of the measure against stakeholder experiences, and determine the most appropriate administration context and procedures. Interviews and focus groups were analysed using descriptive analysis, and findings were used to inform revisions to the measure. Finally, phase two of the research involved pilot testing the measure. This was carried out by contracting experienced occupational therapists to test the new measure with consenting workplace assessment clients. Feedback from assessors and injured workers, assessor testing notes and scoring were analysed to examine feasibility and acceptability of the PAWSS, and revisions to the measure were made in accordance with findings.Results: The qualitative interviews and focus groups (phase one) provided feedback and comments that informed adaptations to the measure to bring it more in line with stakeholders’ experiences of work-ability. Furthermore, this phase provided information about the context in which the measure should be administered, and this was adopted for the pilot testing. Pilot testing of the measure (phase two) showed that the measure was acceptable to both the assessors and the injured workers, and that it was feasible to administer as part of a workplace assessment. Revisions to the measure and training procedures at this stage were primarily made to enhance clarity of item descriptions and scoring decisions. Conclusions and implications for practice: Findings from the research confirmed the need for a standardized measure of work-ability that can be used to plan vocational supports and interventions. Furthermore, the PAWSS was shown to be feasible and acceptable as a comprehensive tool for assessment of the work-ability of injured workers. Further research is needed to test the reliability and validity of the PAWSS before it can be used in practice.

Diss. Västerås : Mälardalens högskola, 2007. / Härtill 5 uppsatser. S. 20-23: Bibliografi.

Thesis (M. Sc.)--University of Adelaide, Dept of Pure Mathematics,1984. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 69-72).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2004. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 108-111).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Riverside, 2009. / Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 202-204) and index. Issued in print and online. Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations.

Satellite images increasingly become a major data source for monitoring changes in the natural environment. A main task in the analysis of satellite images is concerned with the modelling of land use classes by reducing uncertainty during a classification process. In the approach presented in this paper uncertainty is perceived to be due to the vagueness of geographical categories caused by either the complexity of the category (like 'urban area') or by the use of the category in several application contexts. Two circumstances of use of an extended set theoretical concept (fuzzy sets) are discussed. First, two algorithms from the ISODATA class are used to determine the grades of membership to three a priori defined classes (woodland, suburban area, urban area) of a LANDSAT TM satellite image of Vienna, Austria. The results are visualized by a RGB image of the grades of membership to each category. Second, a measure of fuzziness is employed on the results. The measure relies on the concept of distance between a seUcategory and its complement. The so determined vagueness provide more information on the uncertainty of the different categories and may improve further information processing tasks. (authors' abstract) / Series: Discussion Papers of the Institute for Economic Geography and GIScience

Modern vehicles are very dependent on sensors and especially cameras to analyze different objects and conditions. Single camera systems are frequently used for lane detection and identifying objects in the distance. These systems depend on good conditions to work properly and are easily disrupted by environmental interferences. This project is targeted in developing an image processing algorithm that can detect disturbances applied upon the camera lens. Several focus measure operators are evaluated and compared by expected outcome while still maintaining a satisfying computational time, low resource usage and accuracy with an ERR between 0% - 1%.

A presente Tese de Doutorado é composta de quatro artigos científicos em duas áreas distintas. Em Horta, Guerre e Fernandes (2015), o qual constitui o Capítulo 2 desta Tese, é proposto um estimador suavizado no contexto de modelos de regressão quantílica linear (Koenker e Basset, 1978). Uma representação de Bahadur-Kiefer uniforme é obtida, a qual apresenta uma ordem assintótica que domina aquela correspondente ao estimador clássico. Em seguida, prova-se que o viés associado à suavização é negligenciável, no sentido de que o termo de viés é equivalente, em primeira ordem, ao verdadeiro parâmetro. A taxa precisa de convergência é dada, a qual pode ser controlada uniformemente pela escolha do parâmetro de suavização. Em seguida, são estudadas propriedades de segunda ordem do estimador proposto, em termos do seu erro quadrático médio assintótico, e mostra-se que o estimador suavizado apresenta uma melhoria em relação ao usual. Como corolário, tem-se que o estimador é assintoticamente normal e consistente à ordem p n. Em seguida, é proposto um estimador consistente para a matriz de covariância assintótica, o qual não depende de estimação de parâmetros auxiliares e a partir do qual pode-se obter diretamente intervalos de confiança assintóticos. A qualidade do método proposto é por fim ilustrada em um estudo de simulação. Os artigos Horta e Ziegelmann (2015a, 2015b, 2015c) se originam de um ímpeto inicial destinado a generalizar os resultados de Bathia et al. (2010). Em Horta e Ziegelmann (2015a), Capítulo 3 da presente Tese, é investigada a questão de existência de certos processos estocásticos, ditos processos conjugados, os quais são conduzidos por um segundo processo cujo espaço de estados tem como elementos medidas de probabilidade. Através dos conceitos de coerência e compatibilidade, obtémse uma resposta afirmativa à questão anterior. Baseado nas noções de medida aleatória (Kallenberg, 1973) e desintegração (Chang e Pollard, 1997; Pollard, 2002), é proposto um método geral para construção de processos conjugados. A teoria permite um rico conjunto de exemplos, e inclui uma classe de modelos de mudança de regime. Em Horta e Ziegelmann (2015b), Capítulo 4 desta Tese, é proposto – em relação com a construção obtida em Horta e Ziegelmann (2015a) – o conceito de processo fracamente conjugado: um processo estocástico real a tempo contínuo, conduzido por uma sequência de funções de distribuição aleatórias, ambos conectados por uma condição de compatibilidade a qual impõe que aspectos da distribuição do primeiro processo são divisíveis em uma quantidade enumerável de ciclos, dentro dos quais este tem como marginais, precisamente, o segundo processo. Em seguida, mostra-se que a metodologia de Bathia et al. (2010) pode ser aplicada para se estudar a estrutura de dependência de processos fracamente conjugados, e com isso obtém-se resultados de consistência à ordem p n para os estimadores que surgem naturalmente na teoria. Adicionalmente, a metodologia é ilustrada através de uma implementação a dados financeiros. Especificamente, o método proposto permite que características da dinâmica das distribuições de processos de retornos sejam traduzidas em termos de um processo escalar latente, a partir do qual podem ser obtidas previsões de quantidades associadas a essas distribuições. Em Horta e Ziegelmann (2015c), Capítulo 5 da presente Tese, são obtidos resultados de consistência à ordem p n em relação à estimação de representações espectrais de operadores de autocovariância de séries de tempo Hilbertianas estacionárias, em um contexto de medições imperfeitas. Os resultados são uma generalização do método desenvolvido em Bathia et al. (2010), e baseiam-se no importante fato de que elementos aleatórios em um espaço de Hilbert separável são quase certamente ortogonais ao núcleo de seu respectivo operador de covariância. É dada uma prova direta deste fato. / The present Thesis is composed of 4 research papers in two distinct areas. In Horta, Guerre, and Fernandes (2015), which constitutes Chapter 2 of this Thesis, we propose a smoothed estimator in the framework of the linear quantile regression model of Koenker and Bassett (1978). A uniform Bahadur-Kiefer representation is provided, with an asymptotic rate which dominates the standard quantile regression estimator. Next, we prove that the bias introduced by smoothing is negligible in the sense that the bias term is firstorder equivalent to the true parameter. A precise rate of convergence, which is controlled uniformly by choice of bandwidth, is provided. We then study second-order properties of the smoothed estimator, in terms of its asymptotic mean squared error, and show that it improves on the usual estimator when an optimal bandwidth is used. As corollaries to the above, one obtains that the proposed estimator is p n-consistent and asymptotically normal. Next, we provide a consistent estimator of the asymptotic covariance matrix which does not depend on ancillary estimation of nuisance parameters, and from which asymptotic confidence intervals are straightforwardly computable. The quality of the method is then illustrated through a simulation study. The research papers Horta and Ziegelmann (2015a;b;c) are all related in the sense that they stem from an initial impetus of generalizing the results in Bathia et al. (2010). In Horta and Ziegelmann (2015a), Chapter 3 of this Thesis, we address the question of existence of certain stochastic processes, which we call conjugate processes, driven by a second, measure-valued stochastic process. We investigate primitive conditions ensuring existence and, through the concepts of coherence and compatibility, obtain an affirmative answer to the former question. Relying on the notions of random measure (Kallenberg (1973)) and disintegration (Chang and Pollard (1997), Pollard (2002)), we provide a general approach for construction of conjugate processes. The theory allows for a rich set of examples, and includes a class of Regime Switching models. In Horta and Ziegelmann (2015b), Chapter 4 of the present Thesis, we introduce, in relation with the construction in Horta and Ziegelmann (2015a), the concept of a weakly conjugate process: a continuous time, real valued stochastic process driven by a sequence of random distribution functions, the connection between the two being given by a compatibility condition which says that distributional aspects of the former process are divisible into countably many cycles during which it has precisely the latter as marginal distributions. We then show that the methodology of Bathia et al. (2010) can be applied to study the dependence structure of weakly conjugate processes, and therewith provide p n-consistency results for the natural estimators appearing in the theory. Additionally, we illustrate the methodology through an implementation to financial data. Specifically, our method permits us to translate the dynamic character of the distribution of an asset returns process into the dynamics of a latent scalar process, which in turn allows us to generate forecasts of quantities associated to distributional aspects of the returns process. In Horta and Ziegelmann (2015c), Chapter 5 of this Thesis, we obtain p n-consistency results regarding estimation of the spectral representation of the zero-lag autocovariance operator of stationary Hilbertian time series, in a setting with imperfect measurements. This is a generalization of the method developed in Bathia et al. (2010). The generalization relies on the important property that centered random elements of strong second order in a separable Hilbert space lie almost surely in the closed linear span of the associated covariance operator. We provide a straightforward proof to this fact.

[pt] Uma rede de comutação de pacotes deve garantir um mesmo grau de serviço a todos os seus usuários. Como a rede é um serviço compartilhado no tempo, não existe um consenso sobre o que é um tratamento equânime dos usuários. Com o objetivo de estudar a eqüidade entre os usuários é feita uma análise dos métodos existentes. Após ser feita uma classificação destes métodos segundo o seu enfoque, duas novas técnicas são desenvolvidas. A primeira é conceitualmente mais precisa e se baseia na proporcionalidade entre a medida de penalidade e a de congestionamento por canal atravessado. A segunda é mais eficaz e se baseia apenas nas medidas de penalidade. Ambas as técnicas atuam na janela dos circuitos virtuais e consideram igualmente a vazão e o tempo de retardo. Além disso, elas permitem que o usuário pondere de maneira diferente estes parâmetros de desempenho, de acordo com as suas necessidades. Para avaliar o desempenho das técnicas, são apresentados exemplos de suas aplicações. / [en] Packet switching networks are an attractive way of transmitting bursty data traffic, due to the extensive resource sharing they allow. This sharing, however, has to be done in an orderly way, securing a fair access to the network resources by all users. In this work, a detailed analysis of all existing fairness definitions is first made and then two new techniques to evaluate fairness are proposed. One scheme is conceptually more rigorous and assumes that the ratio between a penalty measure and a congestion measure should be constant for all network users. The second method employs only the penalty measure but it requires much less computing time. Both techniques assume that the network operates with window flow control. One important feature of the two schemes proposed is that they allow the users to select which parameter, delay or throughput, is more important for them. Several examples illustrating the behavior of the two methods are also presented.

abstract: Mindfulness is a concept derived from the Buddhist discourses of the Satipattana. Interventions that draw on mindfulness have been shown to reduce psychologically distressing symptoms in clinical settings. It has become widely used as a therapeutic technique in counseling, so it is important to develop an instrument measuring mindfulness-related constructs. This study presents a new instrument measuring the importance of mindfulness-related constructs. Results from an exploratory factor analysis revealed a clear two-factor structure, with the factors named "Present Moment Awareness", and "Compassion and Ethical Behavior." These items were positively correlated with each other and, as expected, negatively correlated with depression. Finally, hours of meditation moderated this association such that the association was stronger among participants who reported higher levels of meditation practice. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Counselor Education 2014