Video games have been criticized for the amount of violence present in them and how this violence could affect aggression and anti-social behavior. Much of the literature on video games effects has focused primarily on the content of video games, but recent studies show that competition in video games could be a major influence on aggression. While competing against other players has been shown to increase aggression, there is less research on whether the mere presence of a competitive environment can influence aggression. The existing research has also primarily been performed using surveys and lab experiments. While these two approaches are very useful, they lack the ecological validity of methods like field experiments. This study examined how competitiveness, teamwork, and co-operation affect anti-social behavior in video games. A 2 (competition: high vs low) x 2 (cooperation: vs no cooperation) x 2 (team: teammates vs opponents) online field experiment on hostile speech was performed. In this study, it was found that players experience more hostile language from their teammates than they do opponents. However, neither the level of competition nor cooperation had an effect on hostile language. There was a significant interaction between player team and cooperation, with teammates being less hostile in the cooperation condition and enemies being more hostile in the cooperation condition. Implications for hostility in online video games and group dynamics within online games are discussed. / Master of Arts

This thesis addresses the question of whether or not online interactional practices are systematically different from interaction in other contexts, particularly spoken interaction. I will establish how the organization of online interaction demonstrates participants orientations to the technological affordances of the online medium. The dataset for the study comprises one-to-one interaction between friends, conducted using the chat application of the social networking site, Facebook. Chat logs and screen capture data were used to analyze how participants engaged in, and managed, their unfolding interaction. The data were analyzed using conversation analysis (CA). CA was developed originally for the analysis of spoken talk, but in this dissertation it provides an empirical basis for comparing Facebook chat and spoken interaction. The thesis demonstrates how CA can be used for analyzing online interaction. The first analytic chapter provides an overview of how participants organize the generic orders of interaction. The findings suggest that participants draw on their knowledge of both spoken and written interaction when managing the particular interactional constraints and affordances of Facebook chat. The second analytic chapter focuses on chat openings, comparing them to openings in spoken interaction. The findings reveal some similarities, but also systematic differences which orient to the design of the chat software. The third analytic chapter examines topic management, including topic-initiation, topic change and the management of simultaneous topics. The findings suggest that the CA categorization of topic-initiating turns could potentially be extended by also analyzing action-orientation and also the epistemic stance displayed. The analysis also reveals remarkable similarities between topic change in spoken interaction and in Facebook chat. Finally in this chapter I show how organizational components of spoken interaction, such as adjacency pairs and tying techniques, are used to manage simultaneous topics. The final analytic chapter focuses on self-repair in Facebook chat. The analysis reveals that self-repairs completed during message construction orient to the same interactional contingencies as self-repairs in spoken interaction. However, the affordances of Facebook chat enable these repairs to be hidden from the recipient. Visible repairs tend to be corrections, with the affordances impacting the sequential placement of such repairs. Finally, I show how participants self-repair in response to the actions of their co-participant. Overall, the findings reveal a number of similarities between the organization of Facebook chat and spoken interaction. The analysis also reveals that participants attend to the technological affordances of Facebook in a variety of ways. Finally, this thesis demonstrates that, while there are differences between the interactional practices of spoken and online written interaction, CA can be used to analyze, and subsequently explain, such differences.

Objectives. Social Networking Sites (SNSs) have exploded in popularity around the world and are composed of hundreds of millions of users. SNSs give the ability to communicate, share photos, send files, and update personal information instantaneously and continuously. Research is now being done on these sites to determine their usefulness and study whether or not its existence can enhance learning and the lives of people. The purpose of this study is to examine whether or not Facebook use has an effect on life satisfaction through Facebook identity salience and Facebook role enactment. Methods. Using data acquired at the University of Texas at Austin, this research uses a path model to identity relationships between Facebook use and life satisfaction. Results. My research finds that identity theory can be applied to learning the effect Facebook use has on life satisfaction. Overall, greater Facebook identity salience and more Facebook friends are associated with greater life satisfaction. We also find that for females, the more time spent on Facebook, the lower the reported life satisfaction. Conclusion. My research has demonstrated that identity theory can be used to examine roles that are voluntary and not highly central to one's overall life functioning. The model designed can be used as a blueprint to examine other roles relating to social media. My hope is that future research looks at the importance of the social media roles for younger generations and how they compare to older generations with more salient roles. / Master of Science

В работе предпринята попытка предложить методы и практики для оптимизации онлайн-обучения. Сначало разобрана история развития дистанционного образования, проанализированы его определение и особенности. Затем в практической части было организовано обследование ситуации онлайн-обучения студентов, и по результатам опроса проводилась педагогическая деятельность. Наконец, предоставляются методы обучения и схем оптимизации онлайн-класса. / The paper attempts to propose methods and practices for optimizing online learning. First, the history of the development of distance education is analyzed, its definition and features are analyzed. Then, in the practical part, a survey of the situation of online learning of students was organized, and based on the results of the survey, pedagogical activities were carried out. Finally, teaching methods and online class optimization schemes are provided.

<p>The main purpose of this thesis is to explore and investigate how an online company can utilize social media. Another purpose is to, though an extensive literature review, explain why a web-based company should exploit social communication channels. Another purpose is to analyze and explain the impact of implementing a channel extension strategy using social communication channels through an empirical study.</p>

This study investigated the online interactions of parents using the constructs of Wenger’s (1998) community of practice theory. Parents were surveyed and blogs and comments selections were examined to determine whether a communities of practice perspective would be appropriate as a construct to examine parents’ online interactions, and whether parents could gain similar benefits to those found from face-to-face parent support groups. This study provides evidence to support the utility of parents’ online interactions and the relevance of a community of practice perspective as analyzed with the components of Wenger’s (1998) Communities of Practice Theory. / text

The main purpose of this thesis is to explore and investigate how an online company can utilize social media. Another purpose is to, though an extensive literature review, explain why a web-based company should exploit social communication channels. Another purpose is to analyze and explain the impact of implementing a channel extension strategy using social communication channels through an empirical study.

CoordenaÃÃo de AperfeÃoamento de Pessoal de NÃvel Superior / Os processos de ensino e aprendizagem de lÃnguas estrangeiras por meio da educaÃÃo a distÃncia vÃm conquistando cada vez mais espaÃo tanto nas ofertas de cursos nessa modalidade, quanto nas agendas de pesquisa em linguÃstica aplicada movidas pelo interesse em compreender como o contÃnuo avanÃo tecnolÃgico e cientÃfico impactam as metodologias e as prÃticas de ensino e aprendizagem de lÃnguas (PAIVA, 1999, 2010, 2011). Inserido nesse universo, o contexto desta pesquisa foi um curso de letras-inglÃs na modalidade a distÃncia ofertado para pÃlos do interior do estado do CearÃ. Devido Ãs vÃrias restriÃÃes tecnolÃgicas e ambientais presentes nesse cenÃrio, prevalecia a forma de interaÃÃo interpessoal online no modo escrito dentro do ambiente virtual de aprendizagem pesquisado. A comunicaÃÃo mediada pelo computador (CMC) escrita apresenta vÃrias restriÃÃes aos interagentes devido ao modo visual reduzido. Por outro lado, a CMC escrita apresenta recursos diferenciados que ajudam a sustentar a interaÃÃo e que podem favorecer a aprendizagem de lÃnguas (WARSCHAUER, 1998; CHAPELLE, 2001, 2003; FELIX, 2003; WHITE, 2003; LEVY & STOCKWELL, 2006; LAMY & HAMPEL, 2007). Nesse Ãmbito, o objetivo principal desta pesquisa, caracterizada como qualitativa complexa (SILVERMAN, 2000), foi descrever os mecanismos de engajamento com affordances que ajudam a sustentar a interaÃÃo interpessoal escrita em um ambiente virtual de aprendizagem de inglÃs como lÃngua estrangeira, especificamente nos fÃruns de discussÃo e nos chats. A noÃÃo de affordance, oriunda da psicologia ecolÃgica (GIBSON, 1986), foi discutida neste trabalho em trÃs dimensÃes: (i) a ambiental, (ii) a tecnolÃgica, estas duas a partir das contribuiÃÃes de Lamy & Hampel (2007) e Rama et al. (2012), principalmente, e (iii) a linguÃstica, associando a esta Ãltima uma teoria pragmÃtica sobre pistas de contextualizaÃÃo (GUMPERZ, 1982; GREENO, 1994). Buscando preservar a noÃÃo de affordance como uma ressonÃncia do indivÃduo com o que percebe como Ãtil para agir no ambiente, que rompe com a dicotomia objetivo-subjetivo, a teoria da complexidade forneceu subsÃdios teÃrico-metodolÃgicos para investigar as interaÃÃes interpessoais escritas nos fÃruns e nos chats como sistemas adaptativos complexos em que fatores interagiam e eram percebidos como affordances ou como restriÃÃes para o engajamento durante as trajetÃrias das interaÃÃes (LARSEN-FREEMAN & CAMERON, 2008). Para estudar a percepÃÃo, foram tambÃm realizadas entrevistas motivadas pelos dados das interaÃÃes analisadas como forma de reconstruÃÃo de contexto. As descobertas mostraram lados antagÃnicos dos affordances: o que era percebido por alguns como um favorecimento, para outros era uma restriÃÃo, como foi o caso da cronÃmica nos chats e nos fÃruns. Affordances tecnolÃgicos e linguÃsticos contribuÃram para a construÃÃo da presenÃa no ambiente, da projeÃÃo das identidades individuais e de grupo, de uma comunidade de aprendizagem (LAVE & WENGER, 1991; WHITE, 2003), que, por sua vez, foi um affordance ambiental para o sentimento de confianÃa e seguranÃa no engajamento nas interaÃÃes. Evidenciou-se, por fim, que os affordances podem ser mediados pelo professor. / The processes of foreign language learning and teaching in distance education have conquered increasing space in both course offerings in this educational mode and in applied linguistics research agendas driven by the interest in understanding how the continuous technological and scientific progress impact methodologies and practices of teaching and learning languages (PAIVA, 1999, 2010 2011). Inserted in this universe, the context of this research was one course of English teacher education (Letras), through distance education, offered for municipalities located in the countryside of the state of Ceara, Brazil. Due to various technological and environmental constraints present in this scenario, the online interpersonal interaction in the virtual learning environment was realized predominantly in the written mode. Text-based Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC) presents several constraints on interactants because of its visually-reduced mode. On the other hand, text-based CMC presents different features, which help to sustain the interaction and can promote language learning (WARSCHAUER, 1998; CHAPELLE, 2001, 2003; FELIX, 2003; WHITE, 2003; LEVY & STOCKWELL, 2006; LAMY & HAMPEL, 2007). In this context, the main objective of this research, characterized as qualitative-complex research (SILVERMAN, 2000), was to describe the mechanisms of engagement with the affordances that helped to sustain the text-based interpersonal interactions in a virtual learning environment where English was learned as a foreign language, specifically in discussion forums and chats. The notion of affordance, which came from ecological psychology (GIBSON, 1986), was discussed in this work according to three dimensions: (i) the environmental dimension, (ii) the technological dimension, both of them with contributions by Lamy & Hampel (2007) and Rama et al. (2012), mainly, and (iii) the linguistic dimension, associating a linguistics pragmatics theory about contextualization cues to the latter (GUMPERZ, 1982; GREENO, 1994). The complexity theory offered subsidies to study text-based interpersonal interactions in forums and chats as complex systems in which factors interacted and were perceived as affordances or as constraints to the engagement during the interactional trajectories (LARSEN-FREEMAN & CAMERON, 2008), as well as helped to preserve the notion of affordance as a resonance between an individual and what they can perceive as useful for engagement in the environment, which avoids the objective-subjetive dichotomy. In order to study perception, data-stimulated interviews were conducted with participants as a form of context reconstruction. The findings showed antagonistic sides of affordances: what was perceived as affordances by some of the participants, others could perceive as constraint, such as the chronemics in the chats and forums analyzed. Technological and linguistic affordances contributed to the construction of presence in the environment, helping participants to project both individual and group identities, and the learning community identity (LAVE & WENGER, 1991; WHITE, 2003), which, in turn, was an environmental affordance to build a sense of confidence and trust to engage in the interactions. Finally, it was possible to verify that affordances could be mediated by the teachers.

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Stagnant student achievement in science education in the United States has placed an increased emphasis on teacher professional development. Since many elementary educators could benefit from improved science content knowledge—and given the challenge of providing this at a level scalable and sustainable through face-to-face delivery alone—this study sought to understand what types of online self-directed content-interaction strategies are of greatest learner satisfaction and provide the highest learning impact for teachers in grades three–six. Employing Anderson's Equivalency of Interaction Theorem, and looking at age, years teaching experience, and learning preferences via Kolb and Kolb's Learning Style Inventory 3.1 (2005), this descriptive study non-randomly sampled 85 educators who passed a series of self-paced interactive web modules to rate their preferences for five different types of content-interactive strategies: (a) simulations, (b) interactive reference, (c) hands-on, (d) personal feedback, and (e) pedagogical implications. Using an online survey and a pre- and postassessment instrument it was found that (a) as age and years teaching experience increase, teachers' preferences for personal feedback, interactive reference, and simulations increased, (b) teachers' content knowledge increased significantly after completing the web modules, (c) teachers' learning style moderately aligned with their preferences for content-interaction strategies, and (d) teachers least preferred the pedagogical implications component. Instructional designers and education administrators selecting professional development for teachers may find this informative. Data from this research support Anderson's theory that if the content interaction is rich, human interaction may be provided in diminished capacities. / Ph. D.