Šiuolaikinis švietimas remiasi kryptinga veikla, skirta mokinio įgūdžių, gebėjimų ir vertybinių nuostatų formavimui, mokinio žinių ir kompetencijos plėtotei. Vienas iš pagrindinių šiuolaikinių švietimo sistemos tikslų – išugdyti žmogų, gebantį ir norintį nuolat mokytis. Mokinių mokymasis traktuojamas kaip aktyvi ir tikslinga žmogaus veikla, o mokymosi motyvacijos klausimai sprendžiami veiklos, veiksmų, elgesio motyvacijos tyrimų kontekste. Mokymasis tampa vis sudėtingesnė, įvairių gebėjimų reikalaujančia mokinio veikla, kuri sąlygoja pilnavertę jo asmenybės raidą. priskiria mokymo priemonių stoką, per platų mokymo(si) turinį ir mokymosi aplinką. Vokiečių pedagogai nurodo drausmės klasėje stoką, netinkamai parinktus mokymo(si) metodus ir mokymosi aplinką. Esminiai žodžiai: mokymosi motyvacija, mokymosi motyvai, mokymosi sunkumai, motyvacija, motyvai, nesėkmės baimė, paauglystė, poreikis, šeima, veiksnys. / Contemporary education is based on purposeful activity to form pupils‘skills, abilities and their virtues and to develop their knowledge and competence. One of the main goals of contemporary education is to educate a person willing and able to study continually. Pupils learning is regarded as an active and purposeful human activity, and the questions of motivation are solved in the context of performance, actions and motivation of behaviour. Learning becomes a more complex activity requiring various pupils’ abilities, which determines a balanced development of a personality.

Personality, motives, and self-efficacy have all been recognized as factors contributing to relapse, and the interaction among these factors has been outlined in Witkiewitz and Marlatt’s contemporary relapse model. However, there is limited empirical research examining the mechanisms involved in this theory. This study aimed to better understand the relationship between personality risk, drinking motives, and confidence to resist drinking during high-risk situations among adults who have changed their drinking. Results indicate that prior to participants’ change in drinking, introversion/hopelessness was associated with coping motives and confidence in situations involving unpleasant emotions, anxiety sensitivity was associated with coping motives, and impulsivity was associated with conformity motives. Following participants’ change, two specific motives (i.e., coping and conformity) were found to moderate the association between two of the personality profiles (i.e., introversion/hopelessness and anxiety sensitivity) and confidence to resist drinking during specific high-risk situations (i.e., negative emotional and social pressure to use).

Abstract Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to elaborate decision-making in corporate volunteering by investigating the motives for implementing corporate volunteering programs (CVPs), the design and scope of the initiatives and the processes companies use to conduct corporate volunteering. Additionally, we would like to find out if the motives for implementing CVPs differ from the ones of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in general as reasons must exist why companies rely on this often costly tool. Research design: In our qualitative study we deploy semi-structured interviews to collect data from nine different medium- and large-sized international companies. We prepared a list of themes used to conduct and guide the interviews. The content analysis is utilized to interpret and categorize the data obtained. Findings: Firms introduce CVP for translating their CSR vision into action and for creating a win-win situation. They aim at improving the sustainability performance and the staff’s performance e.g. their skills, motivation and commitment to advance the retention of employees. Furthermore, personal reasons of decision-makers to conduct corporate volunteering initiatives exist. By investigating the motives of applying CVPs, we found out that they can differ from the ones of introducing CSR activity in general as they are more of a proactive nature and more related to employees and the society in general than to all stakeholders. Originality: We contribute to the existing literature about CSR and corporate volunteering by investigating decision-making in CVPs and by the development of a process model. Furthermore, we examine the reasons of applying CVPs to detect the value companies attribute to it. Lastly, we come up with a classification of CVPs which has not been done by other researchers yet.

This creative project entailed the creation and display of ten drawings. These drawings were to be the result of research into the lives and artistic styles of a number of visual artists who explored political and social themes. The goals of the artist of the creative project were to develop and extend her ability to produce a personal visual language, to communicate by way of her drawings certain feminist and social concerns, and to relate her treatment of the drawn figure to the treatment other artists have traditionally given these concerns.Within the context of the ten drawings submitted for this creative project, it became clear that the artist had begun to develop a personalized visual language. The human figures were indicated by outlines which suggested the three dimensional form in a manner that was distinctive to the artist while fitting into the realm of contemporary feminist and political art. Furthermore, these drawings described the humanist/feminist concerns of the artist. / Department of Art

The creative project was the end result of a year of focused exploration and development in the areas of painting and drawing. The artist created a group of five oil paintings and four mixed media drawings which culminated her year of work. The pieces were exhibited on Ball State University campus as well as being documented and evaluated in a thesis paper.A strong belief in the importance of the ability to pursue an idea or concept to its furthest point led the artist to set the goals of the project. While working on the project, the artist honed her technical skills, and strengthened her personal aesthetic by her discovery and research of painters who based their work in similar beliefs.The accomplishment of the goals she had set forth was the first step on the artist's journey to becoming a professional, exhibiting artist. / Department of Art

Portrait painting is an art form that has been used by artists for years. I am using the portrait to convey a story. The story follows a boy's process of becoming a man. The discovery of old family photographs initially inspired the project. The rite of passage theme stems from this inquiry into the process of growing up. Several artists inspired my work in the formal and conceptual aspects of my portraits. Those artists include Paula Rego, Chuck Close, and Robert Henri. "Rites of passage" is a phrase that carries with it many meanings and issues. This creative project is both a consideration of the rites of passage theme and an investigation of the painted portrait. / Department of Art

Tyrėjai vis dažniau skiria dvi save žalojančių paauglių grupes: mėginančius nusižudyti ir nesuicidiškai save žalojančius, kurie nesiekia mirties. Tačiau iki šiol buvo atlikta mažai populiacinių tyrimų, mėginančių šias dvi grupes tiesiogiai palyginti, todėl informacija apie šių grupių psichologinių ypatumų ir save žalojančio elgesio vidinių veiksnių skirtumus yra gana prieštaringa. Tyrime buvo naudojamas „Gyvenimo būdo ir prisitaikymo klausimynas“ (orig. Lifestyle and Coping Skills Questionnaire), kurį Lietuvoje adaptavo ir paauglių save žalojančio elgesio tyrimui pritaikė A. Laskytė ir N. Žemaitienė. Dalis jų surinktų duomenų analizuojama šiame darbe. Tikslas: ištirti bendros populiacijos paauglių suicidinio ir nesuicidinio save žalojančio elgesio vidinius veiksnius: motyvus, savižudiškus ketinimus, žalojančio elgesio ypatumus ir su šiais faktoriais galimai susijusius asmens psichologinius ypatumus. Taip pat atskleisti būdingus šių veiksnių skirtumus merginoms ir vaikinams. Tiriamieji: 15-17 metų amžiaus Lietuvos moksleiviai, kurie pildydami „Gyvenimo būdo ir prisitaikymo klausimyną“, atsakė, kad bent kartą gyvenime sąmoningai save žalojo. Klausimyno pildymo metu paaiškindami save žalojančio elgesio priežastis, prie teiginio „Aš norėjau numirti“ paaugliai galėjo atsakyti „Taip“ arba „Ne“. Pagal šį atsakymą jie buvo suskirstyti į dvi grupes: suicidiškai save žalojančių – norėjusiųjų numirti (n=163), ir nesuicidiškai save žalojančių – nenorėjusiųjų numirti (n=118). Rezultatai:... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Researches often differentiate two groups of self-harming adolescents: those who attempters a suicide, and those who are harming themselves in a non-suicidal way, and they don‘t seek the death. However just a few community-based research, which would directly compare these groups, were done so far, and therefore information about the differences of the psychological peculiarity and self-harming behavior‘s internal factors between the groups is ambivalent. Lifestyle and Coping Skills Questionnaire (Hawton, 2006), adapted and adjusted for the research of adolescents self-harming behavior by A. Laskytė and N. Žemaitienė in 2006, was used in this work. A part of their collected data is also used in this work. The aim: to examine the intrapersonal factors of suicidal and non-suicidal self-harm in a community sample population: the motives, suicidal intentions, the peculiarities of harming self-harm and person‘s psychological traits that could be possibly related to those factors. It also aimed to reveal the typical differences of these factors between the genders. The sample: 15-17 year old Lithuanian pupils who, while answering into Lifestyle and Coping Skills Questionnaire, responded that they were harming themselves at least once in a life time. In the questionnaire while explaining the reasons of self-harming behavior, into the proposition “I wanted to die” they could write “Yes” or “No”- in this way they were separated into two groups: suicidal self-harmers – who wanted to... [to full text]

Surrealism is examined through its history and phenomenology. The frame of reference is shifted from the history of art to the history of religions; the premises of modern art historiography examined; and Surrealism placed within an interdisciplinary context. The conjunction between the Surreal and the sacred is developed through the phenomenological clues of the uncanny, the weird, and the irrational--popular perceptions of the Surreal. The Surreal is seen as the transition between the ordinary and the extra-ordinary: as the threshold of the sacred. The origins of the Surrealist impulse to "transform life" are traced to occultism, alchemy, and hermetic philosophy, that attempt to create "the union of opposites". Historically, Surrealism stems from this heterodox tradition of archaic, occult, and daemonic elements in European cultures, yet it radically opposes them to the accepted religion and conventional mentality. In so doing, Surrealism creates a new orientation based upon the power of contradiction and ambivalence.

Consumer-to-consumer (C2C) online auctions represent an important new marketplace from which consumers can access the goods they require, an alternative marketplace to bricks-and-mortar and online retail stores. Sellers are often ordinary consumers and the items on sale are often second-hand household items, although, modern C2C auction sites also accommodate small businesses selling unused products. Consumer behaviour in online C2C auctions is unlike consumer behaviour in bricks-and-mortar or online retail stores. While considerable research has been conducted into the dynamics of bidding in online C2C auctions little research has addressed the motives for consumers’ ongoing participation in this marketplace. The concept of consumer involvement may explain the amount of time and money consumers are spending in online C2C auctions and the frequency of their visits to auction sites. In the context of this thesis, involvement is defined as the long-term and enduring relevance, connection and relatedness of online auctions to a consumer’s life. The aim of this research is to explore the ways in which the consumer involvement construct offers an explanation for variation in buyers’ ongoing use of online auctions. The thesis also seeks to discover which consumer motives contribute to buyers’ enduring involvement with online auctions. TradeMe is New Zealand’s most popular online C2C auction site. In a country of just four million people, the TradeMe auction site has more than 2 million members and accounts for more than 50 per cent of Internet traffic originating from New Zealand websites. This study of buyers who use the TradeMe auction site, offers the opportunity to study online auction consumers in this unique context. Based on an extensive literature review, eighteen propositions were developed regarding buyer motives for enduring involvement with online C2C auctions. In-depth, semi-structured interviews were conducted with twenty TradeMe users, to test these propositions and to identify any further motives for enduring involvement with auctions that had not been revealed in the literature review. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed in full. NVivo8 qualitative data analysis software was used to code the interview transcripts. Thematic analysis reveals six themes representing buyer motives for enduring involvement with online auctions. The significant contribution of this thesis is to identify involvement as a useful construct for explaining consumer behaviour in online auctions. In addition to utilitarian and hedonic motives for involvement with online auctions, the interviews reveal that the buyers have a number of social and personal motives for involvement with online auctions. Analysis of the qualitative dataset also reveals a set of marketer activities which encourage ongoing use of the auction site, and a number of factors (anti-motives) which discourage use of the auction site. The research reveals the existence of an off-line community of auction users who value the social contact they experience with one another outside the auction site. Ongoing buyer-seller relationships are also shown to develop outside the auction site, prompted by an initial auction transaction. TradeMe users often express loyalty to the TradeMe website because they are proud of its New Zealand origins, feel secure in using a local auction website, believe they are supporting small New Zealand businesses by buying from TradeMe, and believe they are practicing sustainable consumption behaviour by purchasing second-hand goods. Future research should develop a multi-item, quantitative measure of buyers’ enduring involvement with online auctions and test the validity of this measure with further empirical data.

Despite empirical evidence for the health-related benefits of physical activity, a large proportion of older adults are insufficiently active. In New Zealand, the Green Prescription is the nationwide physical activity scripting programme. The Green Prescription has been found to be effective in increasing physical activity in previously low-active and sedentary adults. However, more information is required about the efficacy of Green Prescription use with older adults. The present research examined participants' views and experiences of physical activity counseling via the conventional Green Prescription and a modified pedometer-based Green Prescription. Both versions of the Green Prescription were effective in increasing and maintaining physical activity over a 12-month period. Demographic factors were found to significantly influence perceived barriers and motives for physical activity regardless of type of Green Prescription administered.