The main purpose of this study was to determine whether playing soccer at high intensity training for a long period causes degeneration of the lumbar spine or not. This degeneration may occur without any symptoms or low back pain. Results of the present study were discussed in the framework of lumbar disc degeneration, trunk strength, lumbar and hip bone mineral density, trunk flexibility, activity MET scores for active and veteran soccer groups. There have been four subject groups in this study (15 active soccer players, 15 sedentary participants, 14 veteran soccer players, 13 sedentary participants). The BMD was measured in anterior-posterior view with a second-generation dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA) device. Isokinetic trunk strength data were recorded with the Biodex System Dynamometer (Biobex Medical Inc, Shirly, NY) at the 60&ordm / /sec and 120&ordm / /sec. Plain lateral radiographs were taken. The presence of degenerative changes of each lumbar vertebra was determined by using the Kellgren and Lowrence Score. A modified Schober test was used to measure lumbar flexion. Findings of the study demonstrated that veteran soccer players displayed greater lumbar disc degeneration than other groups. Moreover, v active soccer group had more BMD than other groups, but the veteran group&amp / #8217 / s BMD results were not different while comparing the control participants. Isokinetic test findings of the current study, trunk extension strength at 60/sec was significantly higher in active 1st group players than 2nd group participants, but there were no significant differences between the 1st group and 2nd group in terms of trunk flexion strength and agonist/antagonist ratio at 60/sec. In conclusion, Findings of the study support the main hypothesis that playing soccer at high intensity training at a long period of time may cause lumbar spine degeneration. Degeneration may occur without low back symptoms. Moreover, results supported the idea that Soccer can be accepted an impact loading sport that are to keep or accelerate bone mineral density. At last, having abnormal trunk extension strength while playing actively may cause lumbar disc degeneration on the spine at later years. A similar study should be carried out with a larger number of subjects, and longitudinal studies should be designed to examine the factors that effect the degeneration on the lumbar spine.

This thesis uses two frameworks for effective gamification and makes a realization of part of them, with the aim of proposing a stage before gamification itself: the enterprise anticipation of gamification, which can be either of optimism or apathy. It can reveal to an enterprise willing to foster people’s motivation which gamification elements are more likely to succeed due to the uncertainties that the concept still carries. A survey was used as an instrument to measure people’s expectations towards game elements to increase the psychological satisfaction according to the Self Determination Theory, and shaped by an instrument to measure maturity in lean. The result of the survey in a company showed that there is an overall interest in gamification elements to increase autonomy and competence, but not relatedness, and also that even if people are aware of a gamification project their expectations are not significantly different from those who are not. Future studies should compare if the anticipation towards game elements are correspondent with the actual feelings when using a gamified solution.

本研究欲比較網球技術與心理素質與網球比賽勝率之關聯性，以及不同天分之男網選手的差異，並檢驗重大勝利能否影響選手之生涯。實證結果顯示，大多數的網球技術都和比賽勝率顯著地正相關，而有天分的選手於大多數網球技術之表現優於天分較差的選手。另外也發現選手得到ATP之賽事冠軍後，可以提升網球技術與心理素質；但在得到大滿貫(Grand Slam)賽事冠軍之後卻會退步。本研究結果亦顯示雖然攻擊、防守與心理素質對選手的比賽結果都有很大影響，但在贏得ATP級冠軍之前攻擊技術是影響比賽勝率最大的因素；而贏得大滿貫賽事冠軍之後防守技術則成為最重要的勝率影響因素。研究結果顯示獲得重大勝利之後確實會增加職業男網選手之信心。 / This study tries to examine the tennis skills and mental toughness associated with winning percentages, compare the performance difference between talent players and less talent players, and find out how a major win can affect players career. The empirical results suggest that most of the tennis skills and mental toughness are positively and significantly associated with winning percentage. Talent players have better performance than those less talent players in most of tennis skills. The study also finds that players can improve offensive and defensive skills and mental toughness through winning an ATP title, but get worse after winning a Grand Slam title. The research findings suggest that before winning an ATP title offensive skill is as important as defensive skill for a player to gain more winning percentage, however, after winning a Grand Slam title defensive skill is the most important skill to win more winning percentage, although defensive skill and mental toughness are still play an important role for winning more percentage. The research concludes that a major win does enhance a player’s confidence.

No description available.

Non-Player Character (NPC) behaviors in todays computer games are mostly generated from manually written scripts. The high cost of manually creating complex behaviors for each NPC to exhibit intelligence in response to every situation in the game results in NPCs with repetitive and artificial looking behaviors. The goal of this research is to enable NPCs in computer games to exhibit natural and human-like behaviors in non-combat situations. The quality of these behaviors affects the game experience especially in story-based games, which rely heavily on player-NPC interactions. Reinforcement Learning has been used in this research for BioWare Corp.s Neverwinter Nights to learn natural-looking behaviors for companion NPCs. The proposed method enables NPCs to rapidly learn reasonable behaviors and adapt to the changes in the game environment. This research also provides a learning architecture to divide the NPC behavior into sub-behaviors and sub-tasks called decision domains.

Interactive branched video allows users to make viewing decisions while watching, that affect the playback path of the video and potentially the outcome of the story. This type of video introduces new challenges in terms of design, for example displaying the playback progress, the structure of the branched video as well as the choices that the viewers can make. In this thesis we test three implementations of working video players with different types of playback bars: one fully viewed with no moving parts, one that zooms into the currently watched section of the video, and one that leverages a fisheye distortion. A number of usability tests are carried out using surveys complemented with observations made during the tests. Based on these user tests we concluded that the implementation with a zoomed in playback bar was the easiest to understand and that fisheye effect received mixed results, ranging from distracting and annoying to interesting and clear. With this feedback a new set of implementations was created and solutions for each component of the video player were identified. These new implementations support more general solutions for the shape of the branch segments and the position and location of the choices for upcoming branches. The new implementations have not gone through any testing, but we expect that future work can further explore this subject with the help of our code and suggestions.

Abstract Modern urban space, technological infrastructure, and sociability combine into a hybrid space that is the arena for urban pervasive games. Over the past two decades the changes in this game arena have been stealthy although substantial. Technological developments have helped to achieve true mobility of gaming devices, increased precision in localization, improved connectivity, and reduced orchestration required per player. Current pervasive location-based games can be played anytime anywhere. Subsequently, doors have been opened for a growing number of commercial games. These changes demand a new conceptualization of the urban game arena. This thesis focuses on playful appropriations of hybrid space. Hybrid space is urban space that entails ubiquitous technologies. Therefore, playful appropriations of hybrid space are always, to some extent, digital as well as urban. Prior research has identified two metaphors for urban pervasive games —true mobility and true sociability. This thesis proposes an additional metaphor, called synchronicity, for binding together different realities in pervasive games. They can be anything from mirror world like realistic virtual environments, such as 3D virtual representations of a city, to abstract realities, such as the backstory of the game, or the space identity of a certain location. While location awareness is an important binding factor between the virtual and physical worlds in pervasive gameplay, synchronizable elements can be anything from encouraged collocated gameplay to semantic similarities between the combined realities. This thesis is based on five game constructs that have been specifically designed and implemented as pervasive research games. Research data has been collected and analyzed with a mixed methods approach from field trials conducted in the wild. Constructive research is complemented with a literature review that maps the characteristics of current location-based mobile games and the game space. The main contribution of this thesis is the identification of the digital, abstract, and physical layers of reality in digital urban pervasive games. The second contribution is the identification and categorization of the synchronizable elements that bind these realities together. This thesis offers initial insights into translating this knowledge into the design of future pervasive games. / Tiivistelmä Urbaanitila on jatkuvassa muutoksessa, sillä se muotoutuu ja järjestyy uudelleen siellä kulkevien kaupunkilaisten kautta. Ubiikin teknologian, ihmisten kanssakäymisen ja modernin tilakäsityksen yhteisvaikutuksesta syntyy niin sanottu hybriditila, joka muodostaa peliareenan monille pervasiivisille peleille. Viime vuosikymmeninä tällä peliareenalla on tapahtunut vaivihkaisia mutta perustavaa laatua olevia muutoksia. Pelilaitteista on tullut aidosti mobiileja, ja ne kulkevat kaikkialla pelaajien mukana. Pelijärjestely vaatii vähemmän vaivaa pelaajaa kohden, paikannuksen tarkkuus on parantunut ja muutosten kautta myös kaupallisia pelejä on enemmän saatavilla. Nykyisiä pervasiivisia sijaintipohjaisia pelejä voi pelata milloin vain ja missä vain. Edellä mainittu kehitys edellyttää pervasiivisten pelien ja pelitilan uudelleen konseptualisointia. Väitöstyön aihe ei ole pelillisyys sellaisenaan, vaan “pelillisyys ja sen hyödyntäminen hybriditilassa”. Hybriditila on aina urbaani ja sisältää ubiikkia teknologiaa, minkä vuoksi pelit tässä tilassa ovat lähes poikkeuksetta myös digitaalisia. Aiempi tutkimus esittää, että saavutetut kehitysaskeleet voi niputtaa kahden metaforan alle. Nämä metaforat ovat: aito mobiilius sekä aito sosiaalisuus. Tämä väitöskirja esittää kolmannen, vielä määrittelemättömän tai saavuttamattoman metaforan näiden jatkoksi: synkronisuus. Synkronisoitavat piirteet tai elementit sitovat todellisuuksia yhteen pervasiivisessa pelitilassa. Tilassa olevat todellisuudet voivat olla realistisia pelimaailman kaltaisia virtuaalitiloja tai abstrakteja todellisuuksia, kuten pelitarinan muodostama todellisuus tai jonkin tietyn paikan tilaidentiteetti. Vaikka sijaintipohjaisuus on tärkeä todellisuuksia yhdistävä piirre, synkronisoitavat elementit voivat olla muutakin kuin sijaintikoordinaatteja. Pervasiiviset pelit nivoutuvat pelaajiensa päivittäiseen elämään, mikä tekee pelin kontekstista erottamattoman osan peliä. Tämä ominaisuus oikeuttaa ”in the wild” -menetelmien käytön tutkimuksessa, mikä tarkoittaa, että pelaamista ja pelejä tarkkaillaan luonnossa todellisessa ympäristössään. Tässä väitöstyössä käytetään konstruktioina varta vasten tätä tutkimusta ajatellen suunniteltuja ja toteutettuja pervasiivisia tutkimuspelejeä. Konstruktiivista tutkimusta tukee lisäksi teoreettinen tutkimusosio, joka koostuu kirjallisuuskatsaukseen pohjautuvasta nykyisten sijaintipohjaisten pelien ja pelitilan kategorisoinnista. Pervasiiviset pelit nivoutuvat pelaajiensa päivittäiseen elämään, mikä tekee pelin kontekstista erottamattoman osan peliä. Tämä ominaisuus oikeuttaa ”in the wild” -menetelmien käytön tutkimuksessa, mikä tarkoittaa, että pelaamista ja pelejä tarkkaillaan luonnossa todellisessa ympäristössään. Tässä väitöstyössä käytetään konstruktioina varta vasten tätä tutkimusta ajatellen suunniteltuja ja toteutettuja pervasiivisia tutkimuspelejeä. Konstruktiivista tutkimusta tukee lisäksi teoreettinen tutkimusosio, joka koostuu kirjallisuuskatsaukseen pohjautuvasta nykyisten sijaintipohjaisten pelien ja pelitilan kategorisoinnista.

This study examines correlations between player choice and identification in a multiple protagonist video game, seeking to determine whether a player’s identification with one or more player characters affects the way they make choices while playing. It discusses various definitions and types of identification as well as ways to create a successful narrative with multiple protagonists. The artefact created for the study is a text-based game with a branching narrative, where the player is required to make choices for three different characters, and a qualitative research method based on interviews with a small group of participants. The results show that players seek to identify with the player character even when there are more than one, and often use this as a basis for the choices they make, either by imagining themselves in the situation of the main character or by imagining that they are the main character. They do not usually base their choices while playing as a character on their identification or lack thereof with another, and regardless of how they made choices, most players made more or less the same ones. However, it did show that lack of identification made making choices more difficult for that character, which lessened their enjoyment of that storyline. / <p>Artefakten som användes i arbetet utvecklades i samarbete med Amanda Thim</p>

Fundação Carlos Chagas Filho de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro / A proposta deste estudo foi construir uma cartografia dos modos de fazer psicologia em centros de treinamento (CTs) de categorias de base, bem como das relações da psicologia do esporte com outros saberes/poderes e de seus possíveis efeitos na formação do jogador de futebol, tendo por campo empírico o cotidiano de alguns clubes de Belo Horizonte e do Rio de Janeiro. Em aliança com os pensamentos de Félix Guattari e Gilles Deleuze, apropriamo-nos dos escritos destes e de outros pesquisadores da Análise Institucional como interlocutores nesta cartografia; igualmente, das contribuições de Michel Foucault sobre sociedade disciplinar e biopoder. Estudos antropológicos e sócio-históricos também nos ajudaram a compreender como se constrói a noção/prática de formação no futebol brasileiro contemporâneo. Colaboraram ainda nessa composição os debates metodológico-epistemológicos sobre História Oral, procedimento que funcionou como um dispositivo ético-político durante todo o processo de investigação. Neste sentido, mediante entrevistas de história oral temática, buscou-se conhecer o trabalho de quatro psicólogos do esporte atuantes em categorias de base na atualidade. Complementarmente, observações em centros de treinamento foram realizadas. Nesse percurso, apreendemos nuances da instrumentalização do corpo-atleta que remetem ao processo histórico de construção dos atuais modos de formação do jogador de futebol no Brasil. Pistas sobre os primeiros trabalhos de Psicologia do Esporte de que se tem notícia integram tal processo, e apontam a uma psicologia que também se instrumentalizava, tendo os testes psicométricos como principal recurso. Em uma trajetória na qual forças mais, e menos flexíveis produzem efeitos políticos, vê-se o aspirante a jogador de futebol transformar-se em um atleta que funciona como jogador-peça, jogador-produto, ou mesmo jogador-empresa, a fim de realizar o almejado e muitas vezes inquestionável sonho de ser mundialmente conhecido e aclamado. No espaço dos CTs, disciplina e biopoder se articulam em dispositivos em prol da manutenção de uma produção em moldes capitalísticos. Das modulações das práticas neoliberais surge ainda a figura do empresário para gerenciar a vida dos jogadores e garantir que sejam produtos valorizados no mercado global de boleiros. Embora ainda hoje os testes e os perfis psicológicos sejam instrumentos hegemônicos na psicologia esportiva, as práticas desta última são tão diversas quanto os modos de subjetivação existentes e implicam efeitos às vezes mais, às vezes menos adaptados à promoção do rendimento esportivo e à constituição do atleta empreendedor-de-si mesmo. / The purpose of this study was to construct a cartography about the ways of doing psychology in youth soccer training centers (TCs), and also about relationships between sport psychology and other knowledges/powers and their possible effects on the formation of soccer players, having as an empirical field the daily life of some clubs of Belo Horizonte and Rio de Janeiro. In accordance with the thought of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, we take the writings of these and other researchers of Institutional Analysis as interlocutors in this cartography; we did the same with the contribution of Michel Foucault about disciplinary society and biopower. Anthropological and social-historic studies also helped us in understanding how the idea / practical of formation is being built in contemporary Brazilian soccer. Oral History methodological and epistemological debates also cooperated in that composition, and this was a procedure that worked as an ethical-political device throughout the research process. In this sense, with thematic oral history interviews, the aim was to get to know the work of four sport psychologists who are active in youth soccer. In addition, observatins were conducted in training centers. Along the way, nuances about the instrumentalization of the body-athlete which refer to the historical process of the construction of current modes of training soccer players in Brazil have been apprehend. Clues about the first works in Sport Psychology which are known to us integrate this process and point to a psychology that had been also instrumentalized, having the psychometric tests as its main resource. In a trajectory in which forces - sometimes more, sometimes less flexible produce political effects, the aspiring soccer player becomes an athlete who works as a piece- player, a product-player, or even an enterprise-player in order to realize the desired, and often unquestioned, dream of being a world-renowned and acclaimed soccer player. At TCs spaces, discipline and biopower are articulated as devices for the maintenance of production in the capitalistic framework. From the modulations of neoliberal practices the entrepreneur also appears, to manage players? lives and ensure that they become high-valued products in the global marketplace of footballers. Although the tests and psychological profiling tools are still hegemonic in the practice of sport psychology, those practices are as diverse as the existing modes of subjectivation and imply effects - sometimes more, sometimes less adapted to the promotion of sport performance and to the establishment of the athlete entrepreneur-of-itself.

Procedural content generation is a technique used to produce a wide range of computer-generated content in many industries today, the video game industry in particular. This study focuses on how procedural content generation can be applied to create emotionally interesting non-player characters and through this, generate narrative snippets that can immerse and interest a reader. The main points examined are how to achieve this using a modular approach to personality and behaviour, how well readers can distinguish whether motivations and interactions are generated by a computer or written by a human, and to what degree a reader can be immersed in a computer-generated narrative. Procedural narrative could help to reduce workload on large projects or lower costs, and is an area in which there is much room for further research. To answer these problems, a literature review of existing techniques for the creation of emotionally interesting non-player characters was conducted and used to design and construct a prototype implementation for generating procedural narrative. The output of this narrative was dressed up to match the style of a human text and A/B testing was conducted utilising a survey in order to evaluate and compare responses to the two texts. Ultimately, the results showed very little difference between the perception of the human-written text and the computer-written text, with the only aspects found lacking in the computer-written text being clarity of emotion and foreshadowing.