This thesis proposes a theoretical framework explaining cognitive processes of meaning construction through conceptual interactions. It was noted that while the nine models or theories (Fuzzy Sets, Selective Modification model, Amalgam theory, Concept Specialization model, Composite Prototype Model, Dual-Process model, Constraint model, CARIN model, and Coherence Theory) in literature on conceptual combination offered insights on the problem of how people understand conceptual combinations, most of them assumed a schematic representation of our knowledge of concepts. However, it is possible that our minds represent knowledge in less structured ways and that schematic structure may not necessarily play a role in making sense of conceptual combinations. In this thesis, I attempted to make fewer assumptions about how knowledge is represented to explain the cognitive processes of conceptual combinations. I assume that concepts are related to other concepts, and knowledge can be represented by associations among concepts. Based on this assumption, the meaning of a conceptual combination is constructed through interactions between these associated concepts. It is proposed that the cognitive processes involved in meaning construction start from a distinction between different roles each component concept plays (head or modifier), and then a system of associations are activated contingently, prototypically, and efficiently with the goal of forming a cognitive field (analytically represented as a closed cycle) to connect head and modifier in a balanced way. The balanced system of concepts is strengthened further by reconciling remaining tensions in the field. Experimental results confirmed that component concepts in a combination activate associations contingently, and prototypicality and balance are major factors influencing whether an association will be activated by the combination to construct the meaning. Head / Modifier and Novelty were also studied as moderating variables. The experimental results indicated that head is a stronger moderator for association activation than modifier, and novelty was not found to be a significant moderator in association activation. Implications of these findings are discussed and future research is identified.

This thesis proposes a theoretical framework explaining cognitive processes of meaning construction through conceptual interactions. It was noted that while the nine models or theories (Fuzzy Sets, Selective Modification model, Amalgam theory, Concept Specialization model, Composite Prototype Model, Dual-Process model, Constraint model, CARIN model, and Coherence Theory) in literature on conceptual combination offered insights on the problem of how people understand conceptual combinations, most of them assumed a schematic representation of our knowledge of concepts. However, it is possible that our minds represent knowledge in less structured ways and that schematic structure may not necessarily play a role in making sense of conceptual combinations. In this thesis, I attempted to make fewer assumptions about how knowledge is represented to explain the cognitive processes of conceptual combinations. I assume that concepts are related to other concepts, and knowledge can be represented by associations among concepts. Based on this assumption, the meaning of a conceptual combination is constructed through interactions between these associated concepts. It is proposed that the cognitive processes involved in meaning construction start from a distinction between different roles each component concept plays (head or modifier), and then a system of associations are activated contingently, prototypically, and efficiently with the goal of forming a cognitive field (analytically represented as a closed cycle) to connect head and modifier in a balanced way. The balanced system of concepts is strengthened further by reconciling remaining tensions in the field. Experimental results confirmed that component concepts in a combination activate associations contingently, and prototypicality and balance are major factors influencing whether an association will be activated by the combination to construct the meaning. Head / Modifier and Novelty were also studied as moderating variables. The experimental results indicated that head is a stronger moderator for association activation than modifier, and novelty was not found to be a significant moderator in association activation. Implications of these findings are discussed and future research is identified.

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Thesis advisor: Michael G. Pratt / In spite of an undeniably vast and multidisciplinary body of research on mergers and acquisitions (M&As) spanning more than 50 years, extant scholarship provides little insight into how two organizations that have struggled to integrate rebound from failure in their relationship. This dissertation examines two organizations—AMC Hospital and Community Hospital—that achieved this outcome nearly 16 years after they legally merged. To understand this phenomenon, I conducted an inductive, longitudinal qualitative study of these two organizations and their members using interviews, archival data, and observations as my data sources and grounded theory techniques to analyze the data and build theory. Extending prior research on M&As, multiple organizational identity management, and identities as resources in organizations, I advance the notion of multiple identity resourcing by examining how the negotiation of multiple organizational identities fostered greater resource sharing and generation during post-merger integration. Additionally, I elaborate prior research on meaning construction during strategic change by examining how managers’ interpretations of the power and intimacy dynamics in the merger relationship influenced their strategizing, which affected organizational-level episodes of success and failure during the integration process. More broadly, I demonstrate how practices at both the level of the merger relationship and the level of strategy implementation enable successful performance during post-merger integration. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2015. / Submitted to: Boston College. Carroll School of Management. / Discipline: Management and Organization.

O presente trabalho estuda os impactos na constituição subjetiva de seis auxiliares de educação infantis (ADIs) que trabalhavam em Centros de Educação Infantil da rede municipal de ensino de São Paulo e que passaram por formação docente em Curso Normal, em nível médio, que foi denominado Programa ADI-Magistério, promovido pela Secretaria Municipal de Educação de São Paulo e que atendeu cerca de 3700 profissionais em exercício. Ele apoiou-se em estudos protagonizados por Vigotsky, e retomados por Bruner, Leme, Grandesso, dentre outros, e utilizou a perpectiva teórico-metodológica da Rede de Significações (Rossetti-Ferreira et allii.) para a análise dos dados. Através do exame das narrativas produzidas em entrevistas abertas, a análise buscou identificar os contextos formativos da subjetividade de cada ADI, o que incluiu os acontecimentos históricos, os princípios e métodos de ensino do Programa ADI-Magistério, as relações sociais e as experiências relatadas, e a apreciação de cada uma sobre o novo papel social que assumiram em decorrência da formação - ser professor, avaliando as circunstâncias favorecedoras ou não de mudanças. A partir da configuração dessa rede, verificou como o discurso de cada entrevistada apontava mudanças no olhar para si mesma, ampliação na visão do próprio mundo e dos acontecimentos, alterações na prática profissional, e modificações na concepção de educação infantil. Por último, analisou as conseqüências das experiências provocadas pelo Programa ADI-Magistério para o processo de constituição subjetiva de cada ADI-aluna. Este trabalho poderá contribuir para o planejamento de outros processos formativos, como suporte e estruturação curricular de novos cursos, além de realçar a função social dos processos de formação. / The current study analyses the impact of the subjective development of six Assistant of Child Development, who underwent a teacher preparation programme, named Programa ADI-Magistério, promoted by the Municipal Secretary of Education of the City of Sao Paulo, which enrolled around 3700 professionals working in the Child Education Centers of its educational system. Starting from a hypothesis that the teacher´s way of being and thinking plays an active role in the teaching-learning interface, the objective of this study is to analyze the subjective developmental changes that appear in the subjects\' narratives and to evaluate the favorable and unfavorable circumstances for these changes, based on Vygotsky, Bruner, Leme, Grandesso, and the theoretical-methodological perspective elaborated by Rossetti-Ferreira and allii. and called Network of Meanings. In their interwiews, the subjects were stimulated to reflect about some contexts of their development as their life history, their social relationships and experiences, the principles and methods of the Teaching Preparation Program, and their appreciation of the new social role which they were formally assuming: to be a teacher. From the configuration of this network, the narratives elaborated by the interviewed persons have pointed out changes in their self-image, enlargement in their world vision, changes in their professional practice, and the modification in their concept of early childhood education. A final analysis discussed the mediation of the Teaching Preparation Program in the process of subjective development of each ADI student. In future, this study can contribute for planning other formation processes, and can be used as a support in the formulation of new formative curricula, besides enhancing the social vision of the graduation courses.

A critical aspect of the non-native students' academic adjustment in English-speaking countries is their English language ability, including their reading fluency and comprehension. Even when these students are considered proficient readers of English at an advanced level, they display different reading processes when dealing with the complex input of a second language (L2) text, as compared with their native English reading classmates. Despite the importance of comprehending highly sophisticated academic reading in international education, there is a lack of research in the field as to how advanced L2 readers cope with the texts with which the highly educated native speakers engage. This study, therefore, examined meaning construction processes of highly proficient L2 readers during reading the texts that vary in degree of cohesion. To describe readers' approaches to text cohesion and also recognize readers' perceptions of their own process, the study used a close observation of reading processes of nine highly proficient graduate students at a U.S. university with the use of qualitative research methods. The students participated in two interviews - pre-reading interview and post-reading cognitive interview - and two think-aloud verbal protocol sessions. Participants read one high-cohesive and one low-cohesive text during the think-aloud sessions, and then shared the meaning they constructed from the texts and also their thinking about the texts. The data from the instruments were analyzed qualitatively using a grounded theory approach. The results of the study reveal that the readers' meaning representation processes emerging as the result of reader and text interaction display differences at the local and global levels of processing of the high- and low-cohesive text. The processing differences between the readers are most apparent in texts with low text cohesion. The low cohesive text allowed the readers, especially, the creators of meaning, to conduct more elaborative processing compared to their performance with the high-cohesive one, in which all readers attempted to create a catalogue of facts trusting the explicitly provided text cohesion features. These results have implications for theories of text processing as well as the design of materials and instruction used for advanced L2 readers and lower level L2 readers.

Adequate assessment of the needs of HIV-positive individuals in the South African context is essential, as it may provide insight concerning limitations in healthcare. This study focuses on the subjective experience of nine HIV-positive individuals, in order (a) to investigate their needs; (b) to gain knowledge and understanding of the strengths available to them; (c) to investigate their coping strategies; and (d) to generate a set of guidelines for the development of a secondary prevention programme to improve their psychological well-being and immune functioning. This article employs a qualitative research method, utilising hermeneutic thematic analysis to gain a greater understanding of the subjective psychological functioning of HIV-positive individuals in the South African multicultural context. To a great extent, this research focuses on the salutogenic/fortigenic perspective, where the focus is on strengths, capacities and emotional/psychological well-being. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine asymptomatic HIV-positive individuals. The needs identified during this study involved the psychological, economical, informational and social categories. The strengths available to HIV-positive individuals in order to make sense or construct meaning in their lives, consisted of four themes, namely internal, social, self-regulative and spiritual strengths. The study further indicates that the psychological strengths utilised by HIV-positive individuals are closely related to the concept of meaningfulness, the mechanisms of coping and psychological resilience. A broad range of coping strategies was identified that participants employed in the management of the disease and in dealing with the negative emotions associated with an HIV-positive diagnosis. These strategies could be conceptually grouped into five categories based on the functions these strategies served, namely self-management coping strategies, cognitive coping strategies, social support coping strategies, religious coping strategies, and avoidance coping strategies. The implications of this study are that the various identified concepts related to needs, strengths and coping strategies, may contribute to the development of a secondary prevention programme, in order to improve HIV-positive individuals' psychological well-being and immune functioning. The concept of "Sense of Coherence" which consists of three elements, namely Comprehensibility, Manageability and Meaningfulness, could be successfully incorporated into an intervention programme in order to achieve a positive redefinition of participants' subjective feeling that life is meaningful, as well as to improve their comprehensibility and manageability of their illness. / Thesis (M.Sc.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2004.

Adequate assessment of the needs of HIV-positive individuals in the South African context is essential, as it may provide insight concerning limitations in healthcare. This study focuses on the subjective experience of nine HIV-positive individuals, in order (a) to investigate their needs; (b) to gain knowledge and understanding of the strengths available to them; (c) to investigate their coping strategies; and (d) to generate a set of guidelines for the development of a secondary prevention programme to improve their psychological well-being and immune functioning. This article employs a qualitative research method, utilising hermeneutic thematic analysis to gain a greater understanding of the subjective psychological functioning of HIV-positive individuals in the South African multicultural context. To a great extent, this research focuses on the salutogenic/fortigenic perspective, where the focus is on strengths, capacities and emotional/psychological well-being. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine asymptomatic HIV-positive individuals. The needs identified during this study involved the psychological, economical, informational and social categories. The strengths available to HIV-positive individuals in order to make sense or construct meaning in their lives, consisted of four themes, namely internal, social, self-regulative and spiritual strengths. The study further indicates that the psychological strengths utilised by HIV-positive individuals are closely related to the concept of meaningfulness, the mechanisms of coping and psychological resilience. A broad range of coping strategies was identified that participants employed in the management of the disease and in dealing with the negative emotions associated with an HIV-positive diagnosis. These strategies could be conceptually grouped into five categories based on the functions these strategies served, namely self-management coping strategies, cognitive coping strategies, social support coping strategies, religious coping strategies, and avoidance coping strategies. The implications of this study are that the various identified concepts related to needs, strengths and coping strategies, may contribute to the development of a secondary prevention programme, in order to improve HIV-positive individuals' psychological well-being and immune functioning. The concept of "Sense of Coherence" which consists of three elements, namely Comprehensibility, Manageability and Meaningfulness, could be successfully incorporated into an intervention programme in order to achieve a positive redefinition of participants' subjective feeling that life is meaningful, as well as to improve their comprehensibility and manageability of their illness. / Thesis (M.Sc.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2004.

O presente trabalho estuda os impactos na constituição subjetiva de seis auxiliares de educação infantis (ADIs) que trabalhavam em Centros de Educação Infantil da rede municipal de ensino de São Paulo e que passaram por formação docente em Curso Normal, em nível médio, que foi denominado Programa ADI-Magistério, promovido pela Secretaria Municipal de Educação de São Paulo e que atendeu cerca de 3700 profissionais em exercício. Ele apoiou-se em estudos protagonizados por Vigotsky, e retomados por Bruner, Leme, Grandesso, dentre outros, e utilizou a perpectiva teórico-metodológica da Rede de Significações (Rossetti-Ferreira et allii.) para a análise dos dados. Através do exame das narrativas produzidas em entrevistas abertas, a análise buscou identificar os contextos formativos da subjetividade de cada ADI, o que incluiu os acontecimentos históricos, os princípios e métodos de ensino do Programa ADI-Magistério, as relações sociais e as experiências relatadas, e a apreciação de cada uma sobre o novo papel social que assumiram em decorrência da formação - ser professor, avaliando as circunstâncias favorecedoras ou não de mudanças. A partir da configuração dessa rede, verificou como o discurso de cada entrevistada apontava mudanças no olhar para si mesma, ampliação na visão do próprio mundo e dos acontecimentos, alterações na prática profissional, e modificações na concepção de educação infantil. Por último, analisou as conseqüências das experiências provocadas pelo Programa ADI-Magistério para o processo de constituição subjetiva de cada ADI-aluna. Este trabalho poderá contribuir para o planejamento de outros processos formativos, como suporte e estruturação curricular de novos cursos, além de realçar a função social dos processos de formação. / The current study analyses the impact of the subjective development of six Assistant of Child Development, who underwent a teacher preparation programme, named Programa ADI-Magistério, promoted by the Municipal Secretary of Education of the City of Sao Paulo, which enrolled around 3700 professionals working in the Child Education Centers of its educational system. Starting from a hypothesis that the teacher´s way of being and thinking plays an active role in the teaching-learning interface, the objective of this study is to analyze the subjective developmental changes that appear in the subjects\' narratives and to evaluate the favorable and unfavorable circumstances for these changes, based on Vygotsky, Bruner, Leme, Grandesso, and the theoretical-methodological perspective elaborated by Rossetti-Ferreira and allii. and called Network of Meanings. In their interwiews, the subjects were stimulated to reflect about some contexts of their development as their life history, their social relationships and experiences, the principles and methods of the Teaching Preparation Program, and their appreciation of the new social role which they were formally assuming: to be a teacher. From the configuration of this network, the narratives elaborated by the interviewed persons have pointed out changes in their self-image, enlargement in their world vision, changes in their professional practice, and the modification in their concept of early childhood education. A final analysis discussed the mediation of the Teaching Preparation Program in the process of subjective development of each ADI student. In future, this study can contribute for planning other formation processes, and can be used as a support in the formulation of new formative curricula, besides enhancing the social vision of the graduation courses.

[pt] Este trabalho propõe contribuir para a compreensão da cena política brasileira contemporânea e, para tanto, articula Análise da Narrativa de viés sócio-interacional com discurso político visando oferecer uma visão do lingüista sobre o fenômeno da popularidade do presidente Lula. O corpus da análise são narrativas pessoais encaixadas em seis discursos pronunciados pelo presidente entre abril de 2006 e março de 2007. Baseada de modo flexível no modelo de narrativa laboviano e na noção de história de vida de Linde, e recorrendo ainda às noções de enquadre, conforme Bateson e Goffman, e de alinhamento, de Goffman, a análise dos dados identifica as várias identidades que o presidente Lula constrói naquelas narrativas: de migrante nordestino, de operário, de líder sindical, de pai, de presidente. Ao mostrar como essas identidades são narrativamente construídas, a análise ressalta as qualidades de caráter e nuances de sentido projetadas e indica, em relação aos variados públicos dos discursos do presidente, como esses sentidos e identidades podem promover a obtenção de alinhamentos e funcionar como pré-condição para o atingimento do objetivo básico de persuasão que define o discurso político. / [en] This work is intended as a contribution to the understanding of the contemporary Brazilian political scene: it integrates Socio-interactional Narrative Analysis with political discourse aiming to offer a linguist`s perspective on president Lula`s continued popularity. Personal stories embedded in six speeches delivered by the president between April 2006 and March 2007 form the corpus of this analysis. Freely based on Labov`s narrative model and on Linde´s notion of life story, and also resorting to the notion of frame as per Bateson and Goffman, and to Goffman`s footing, the analysis identifies several self- presentations constructed and displayed by president Lula through those personal stories: Northeastern migrant, blue collar worker, union leader, father and president. By showing how these identities are narratively constructed, the analysis emphasizes projected character traits and singularities of meaning and indicates, in relation to the different audiences of the president´s speeches, how these meanings and identities can obtain alignments and function as a pre-condition for achieving persuasion, the basic objective of political discourse in general.