Background The mindset of an individual is made up by perception and motivation. Motivation is in turn driven by personal experiences, values and goals. Many times, a personal experience can act as a ‘Gandhi-moment’ or a triggering event to take action towards achieving a specific outcome. For a social entrepreneur, this outcome is many times some type of positive social change. In order for the social entrepreneur to create this, he or she needs to be innovative and creative, and therefore stay open towards new opportunities and perspectives to not get stuck in a particular mindset. Purpose The purpose of the thesis is to investigate the role of personal experiences and a person’s mindset in the start-up of a social project. Furthermore, the study aims to explore how a change in one’s mindset can result in social projects or enterprises that are successfully able to create social change. Method The research approach of the thesis takes the form of a multiple case study; one main large case and four illustrative smaller ones. The data analysis is of abductive style, going back and forth between theory and empirical data. Conclusion It can be concluded that personal experiences can serve as a motivational platform for an individual starting a project or enterprise, aiming to create a social change. However, other elements of a person’s mindset will also influence this process, in terms motivation and perception. Furthermore, for changes in society to occur, changes first needs to be made from within. Therefore, in order for a social entrepreneur to create actual social change; he or she needs to go through a process of mindset-change.

Over the past ten years, there has been a consistent increase in opioid use, which has resulted in an increase in enrolment in methadone maintenance therapy [MMT]. With retention in MMT being a key factor, in order to understand the process of retention, it is important to gain an understanding of individual perceptions and experiences. No research in Ottawa, Ontario has addressed the perspective of MMT from people enrolled in MMT; therefore, nursing based research was undertaken. The objective was to understand the process and experiences associated with MMT from the perspective of persons who are enrolled in treatment. Twelve participants were engaged in semi-structured interviews. These participants described that, although MMT can positively affect the people who use such a treatment option, it continues to have a negative impact that repeatedly affects MMT initiation and delivery. The theoretical framework of Hardt and Negri’s “Triple Imperative of Empire” was used to analyze the research participants’ interviews within the current MMT program, to help develop a more inclusive healthcare service that addressed the current barriers hindering access and retention in treatment. The integration of this framework can help engage persons in treatment, tailor treatment to patient specific needs, and as a result increase access and retention in MMT programs.

Introduction: The public often believes that ‘mentally ill’ individuals are more prone to dangerous and criminal behavior and more inclined towards gun violence. These misperceptions have negative consequences on justice-involved individuals with a mental illness who are reintegrating into society post-incarceration. Media is often cited as a reason for the spread of misperceptions, but these results may not apply to rural communities. Rather, in rural areas, social support is essential to success due to lack of modern technology, no/lacking public transportation, limited mental health services, employment opportunities, and available housing, and may play a more significant role in perception development. Misperceptions held by rural residents can exacerbate existing environmental barriers. Aims: This thesis examines how rural residents’ beliefs and perceptions regarding the association between mental illness and gun violence may be differentially impacted by: (1) media consumption, (2) social relationships, and (3) personal experiences. Method: 32 rural residents were recruited to participate in an open-ended qualitative interview. The qualitative interview examined the extent to which social relationships, personal experiences, and media consumption impacted development of beliefs and misperceptions regarding the association between mental illness and gun violence and beliefs about gun control. Analytical Plan: Using methods from both directed and traditional qualitative content analysis, codes were developed to analyze influential social relationships, personal experiences and media consumption on belief and perception development regarding mental illness and gun violence, along with gun control. These codes were then used to organize and analyze relevant aspects of participant interviews in order to create insight into emergent themes. Results: The most prominent emergent theme was idiosyncrasy, suggesting rural residents are a heterogeneous population. For example, participants reported that interpersonal contact both increased and decreased misperceptions, depending on the participant. While idiosyncrasies is a major thematic emergence, much more emerged beyond this. Participants displayed widely varying definitions of what a mental illness is, conflating mental illness with things such as mental retardation and lupus; this lack of an understanding of what a mental illness is, is reflected in another result – that misperceptions surrounding mental illness are prevalent in this rural sample. Participants also displayed distrust in the media and the way they portray mental illness and gun violence in particular. Other minor sub-themes and thematic emergences manifested within the data. Implications: The results of this thesis contribute to a better understanding of the role of factors such as: misunderstandings of what mental illness is, the lack of a role of relationship closeness, and the importance of personal experience, and how these may promote or reduce misconceptions regarding gun violence and mental illness in rural communities. This expanded understanding allows for the development of effective, culturally competent psychoeducation targeted specifically towards rural residents, which will ideally be accomplished by incorporating the effects on (mis)perception development of the aforementioned influences. This is imperative, as findings in extant literature may be differentially relevant in rural communities.

This research focuses on pushing forward the understanding of mental disorders portrayals in games, more specifically social anxiety, which still lies as a marginalized topic in this medium. In order to understand honest manifestations of social anxiety in games, the first step is to conduct a close reading of games made by people who suffer from this mental disorder. A collection of five indie games, all of autobiographical nature and featuring social anxiety as an important part of their text, was put together for this analysis. This was done embracing the need to address the representational complexity, in order to tap into such a nuanced and elusive topic as social anxiety, not to identify rights or wrongs, but to engage in a discussion of how experiences are represented in games by people directly affected by this mental disorder. Individual experiences also contribute to expand interpretations and to identify additional keys of social anxiety representation. This is done by reaching informants, people living with a comorbid mental illnesses or disorders, that face or had faced social anxiety, and assess their perspectives through an experiential workshop. This work intends to further explore the practice of game design as mediator of experiences, contributing to both deepen the knowledge of game design and explore nuances of individual experiences present in autobiographical games and how this relates to perspectives of other people living with social anxiety. By combining the games and informants perspectives it is possible to structure a debate about game design patterns based on the findings of the game analysis and further elaborated with the nuanced perceptions gathered from informants. The knowledge acquired through this work is a step towards understanding of how games can represent, in an honest and non-stereotypical way, mental disorders, starting with social anxiety and, hopefully, contribute to spark other studies to broaden the spectrum of how the complexity of adverse mental conditions can be more respectfully addressed in games.

D.Phil. / This thesis can be regarded as an autoethnographic performance. It consists actually of two plays with ten acts. Most of them have changing scenes Play 1, titled Koringrosie en die kerk, consists of five acts, and tells the story of Koringrosie, the wife of the minister. Her experiences are described against the backdrop of her life in the parsonage. Play 2, Antoinette se doktorale reis with acts six to ten, represents the research story which tells the story behind the stage. True to ethnographic characteristics, these two stories are intermingled, and the reader/playgoer can decide for him- herself which one of the two plays he/she wants to experience first. The first story is an excerpt from the unpublished novel Koringrosie describing my life of twenty one years in a parsonage. With this study I revisit these parts. I started writing Koringrosie during August 1993 with the focus on the one hand to conserve the church culture from 1977-1998. On the other hand it was written to give me a therapeutic space in which I could escape when certain church traditions of an institution like the Church, tended to engulf me.

Bakgrund: Självskadebeteende ses som ett växande problem i dagens samhälle och är vanligast förekommande bland kvinnor. Självskadebeteende ses även bland den manliga befolkningen men i mindre skala vilket tros bero på att de har andra sätt att hantera situationer, tankar och känslor på. Genom att ha ett personcentrerat förhållningssätt där sjuksköterskan utgår från varje enskild person kan det ge en ökad förståelse för patienten vilket i sin tur kan leda till ett ökat välbefinnande. Syfte: Syftet med studien var att belysa personers erfarenheter av att leva med ett självskadebeteende. Metod: En allmän litteraturstudie genomfördes med induktiv ansats. Resultat: Resultatet baserades på tio vetenskapliga artiklar där fyra teman framkom: utlösande faktorer, omgivningens syn på självskadebeteendet, ett sätt att hantera känslorna och vägen mot återhämtning. Konklusion: Det framkom att personer som skadade sig använde självskadebeteendet som ett sätt att hantera tankar och känslor på, som de annars inte visste hur de skulle få utlopp för. Att söka hjälp var ett orosmoment då det fanns en rädsla inför andra människors fördomar om självskadebeteende vilket gjorde att de valde att dölja självskadebeteendet från sin omgivning. För att kunna återhämta sig krävs ett gott stöd samt en förståelse för varför självskadebeteendet uppkommit och en ökad självacceptans. / Background: Self-injurious behaviour is seen as a growing problem in today’s society and is most common among women. Self-injurious behaviour is also seen among the male population but on a smaller scale which is believed to be due to the fact that they have other ways of dealing with situations, thoughts and feelings. By having a person-centered approach where the nursing is based on each person, it can provide an increased understanding of the patient, which in turn can lead to a higher level of well-being. Aim: The aim of the study was to illustrate people’s experiences of living with a self-injurious behaviour. Method: The study was conducted as a general litterature study with an inductive approach. Result: The result was based on ten scientific articles where four themes emerged: triggering factors, society’s view of self-injurious behaviour, a way of coping with the emotions and the road to recovery. Conclusion: It appeared that people who injures themselves use self-injurious behaviour as a way of dealing with thoughts and feelings that they otherwise, did not know how to handle. Seeking help was a concern as there is a fear of other people's prejudice about self-injurious behaviour, which made them choose to hide their self-injurious behaviour from their surroundings. To be able to recover, it is important to have a good support and an understanding of why self-injurious behaviour has emerged together with an increased self-acceptance.

Background: Nowadays nostalgia has become a staple within the marketers’ toolkit on grounds of the plethora of positive effects it has on consumers. It is however solely focused on memories and the individual’s yearning for the past. A new concept, forestalgia, is the direct counterpart to nostalgia, and it focuses on the individual’s yearning for an idealised future. Due to the infancy and limited knowledge of this concept, little is known about the practicality and appeal of this concept for advertisers. This research paper aims to utilise video games as a case to expand upon existing knowledge regarding forestalgia, potentially providing insights that can benefit advertisers.  Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to examine forestalgic experiences of Gen Z using gaming and Counter-Strike 2 as a case to develop in-depth knowledge of this phenomenon, address gaps in the existing literature and develop avenues for future research to be conducted in this area.  Method: Exploratory research has been conducted on this topic with the use of semi-structured interviews, and further analysed using the IPA (Interpretative phenomenological analysis) method. The semi-structured interviews were conducted with Gen Z individuals who have an extent of familiarity with gaming, specifically the Counter-Strike series. The paper was written with interpretivism as the ontology, and interpretivism as the epistemology, and was written with an abductive approach.  Conclusion: The findings explored the experience of forestalgia amongst participants, identifying key themes extracted from the interviews conducted. In addition, the findings displayed potential links between nostalgia and forestalgia, whilst also contesting the claim that individuals under 30 don’t experience personal nostalgia. The findings also highlight potential avenues for further research on forestalgia.

This study sheds insight into the unique, daily struggles of individuals with Asperger Syndrome (AS) as they transition into adulthood. The majority of research available regarding individuals diagnosed with AS focuses on childhood experiences. What happens when these individuals age out of high school? What are their experiences with becoming independent, successful adults? This study elicited qualitative data concerned with individual experience from seven participants between the ages of eighteen and thirty years old. Data were collected through three face-to-face and four email interviews. Data were analyzed to identify specific challenges of adult life. All participants expressed challenges in social interaction, as well as successfully coping with stress in the areas of employment, education, and relationships. Results of this study offer a deeper understanding of the individual challenges individuals experience in young adult life.

In this study the emotional responses of the teacher’s experiences in integrating ICT in the curriculum were identified. Teachers’ experiences were explored regarding challenges and benefits of incorporating ICT in their teaching. The aim of this research was to attempt to contribute to the field by investigating the affective aspects according to Krathwohl’s taxonomy. The study employed a qualitative approach where data was analysed through narrative stories, interviews and observations. The design was used to capture the life stories of the five teachers who were integrating ICT relating to their experiences and emotional responses. Data was analysed by conceptual analysis after which, ten emotional response themes were identified. The ten emotional responses were then concatenated into four categories namely: hope, joy, anger and fear. This study found that teachers do experience complex emotions in response to the integration of ICT although there is a positive effect on instruction when information and communication’s technology is used optimally. / Dissertation (MEd (CIE))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Curriculum Studies / MEd / unrestricted

The purpose of this research was to explore HIV/AIDS stigma in the workplace, with a special focus on the stigmatised. The sample consisted of 10 HIV/AIDS positive employees. A qualitative interview schedule was designed. The interview guide was used to facilitate one-on-one interviews with each participant. An analysis of the data revealed that the majority of the participants were shunned by family, friends and partners. Others were too ashamed or afraid to reveal their positive status. The majority of the participants did not feel comfortable revealing their positive status to their line managers and to their co-workers. All participants felt that others viewed people living with HIV/AIDS as dirty and unclean and many had been exposed to stigmatising behaviours towards them due to their HIV/AIDS positive status. As a coping mechanism, most participants noted that they would walk away if stigmatised against. Recommendations were made to address HIV/AIDS stigma in the workplace. / Industrial & Organisational Psychology / M. A. (Industrial and Organisation Psychology)