This thesis explores the challenges posed to democratic legitimacy by current practices of EU counter-terrorism policing. It is concerned with the increasing amount of international cooperation between police and, to a lesser extent, intelligence actors in this field and analyses how far traditional mechanisms of accountability and oversight are keeping up with this development. For this purpose, the thesis develops a model of democratic legitimacy for the field of international counter-terrorism co-operation. The EU – like its Member States – understands itself to be based on principles of representative liberal democracy and the model follows roughly this idea by identifying parliamentary and judicial scrutiny as key instruments to ensure ‘democratic’ counter-terrorism actions and the protection of human rights. Drawing on the literature on security networks, it is proposed that current forms of counterterrorism policing under the EU’s umbrella should be understood as networks which are defined as sets of expert institutional nodes or individual agents from at least two countries that are interconnected in order to authorize and/or provide security with regard to counter-terrorism for the benefit of the network participants or external ‘clients’. The empirical focus of this thesis is on the European Police Office (Europol) which provides a key example in which to explore the emergence and current status quo of EU counter-terrorism policing. In addition, debates about the EUUS exchange of Passenger Name Record (PNR) data, the so-called Prüm arrangements concerning intensified counter-terrorism co-operation in the EU, the freezing of terrorist funds as well as European involvement in the CIA’s so-called extraordinary rendition campaign are interwoven into this discussion. The thesis concludes that the EU is an emerging counter-terrorism actor, but that – for the time being – its policies and actions are insufficiently subject to parliamentary and judicial scrutiny. Challenges arise, in particular, from the international nature of counter-terrorism networks, their loose structure, the variety of actors involved and the strengthened co-operation between police and intelligence authorities.

The release from proactive interference (PI) is a well-studied phenomenon, but its cause is elusive. When a release in PI is caused by changes in the content of to-be-remembered items, the more accurate retrieval is likely a result of changes in context (Watkins & Watkins, 1975). However, changes in context do not readily explain the cause of PI release resulting from a temporal delay. Instead, it could be that during the delay subjects disengage from intrusive information from previous trials. The ability to disengage from no-longer-relevant information is related to fluid intelligence (Gf). I predicted that this ability to disengage, as defined by fluid intelligence, is the driving factor of the time-based release from PI. In order to test this prediction, I administered a free recall task to individuals of high and low Gf. The time between the last two lists was lengthened to cause release. The time manipulation did not cause a release from PI; essentially, this result represents a failure to replicate. Limitations of the study and potential methodological issues are discussed.

Our study investigated the effect of preparatory selective attention on encoding two target items (T1 and T2), causing an attentional blink effect (AB), as observed in previous studies. We altered participants' readiness state on a trial-to-trial basis using informative or uninformative cues for selective attention. Additionally, we varied their overall state of readiness by randomly mixing cue types (mixed cue-context) or presenting them in separate blocks (blocked cue- context). Our findings demonstrated a clear advantage in performance when participants received informative cues compared to uninformative ones in the mixed cue-condition, regardless of the lag between T1 and T2. Notably, in the blocked cue-context condition, cueing benefits were limited to the shortest T1-T2 lag. This suggests that participants proactively prepared to focus on T1 when anticipating conflict, but the extent of this preparation varied between cue-contexts. A heightened state of preparation led to an overinvestment of resources to T1 encoding, which negatively affected T2 encoding. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

Dynamic provisioning of server boxes to applications entails an inherent performance-power trade-off for the service provider, a trade-off that has not been studied in detail. The optimal number of replicas to be dynamically provisioned to an application is ultimately the configuration that results in the highest revenue. The service provider should thus dynamically provision resources for an application only as long as the resulting reward from hosting more clients exceeds its operational costs for power and cooling. We introduce a novel cost-aware dynamic provisioning approach for the database tier of a dynamic content site. Our approach employs Support Vector Machine regression for learning a dynamically adaptive system model. We leverage this lightweight on-line learning approach for two cost-aware dynamic provisioning techniques. The first is a temperature-aware scheme which avoids temperature hot-spots within the set of provisioned machines, and hence reduces cooling costs. The second is a more general cost-aware provisioning technique using a utility function expressing monetary costs for both performance and power.

Dynamic provisioning of server boxes to applications entails an inherent performance-power trade-off for the service provider, a trade-off that has not been studied in detail. The optimal number of replicas to be dynamically provisioned to an application is ultimately the configuration that results in the highest revenue. The service provider should thus dynamically provision resources for an application only as long as the resulting reward from hosting more clients exceeds its operational costs for power and cooling. We introduce a novel cost-aware dynamic provisioning approach for the database tier of a dynamic content site. Our approach employs Support Vector Machine regression for learning a dynamically adaptive system model. We leverage this lightweight on-line learning approach for two cost-aware dynamic provisioning techniques. The first is a temperature-aware scheme which avoids temperature hot-spots within the set of provisioned machines, and hence reduces cooling costs. The second is a more general cost-aware provisioning technique using a utility function expressing monetary costs for both performance and power.

In the past, a large body of research has examined how individuals deal with past stressors. More recently a newer line of research has examined how individuals deal with upcoming stressors. However, to date only a limited number of studies has concerned itself with this question. The present three studies were intended to add to the current literature on future-oriented coping by investigating predictors, mediators, and psychological outcomes related to future-oriented coping styles. Study 1 used an internet-based, cross sectional design to gain insight into the relationship between internal (goal-orientation and maximizing) and external resources (social support) and competencies (proactive competencies and goal adjustment) and three future-oriented coping styles, future-oriented avoidance coping, preventive coping, and proactive coping. We predicted that the three future-oriented coping styles would be related differently to resources and competencies. The results only partially supported our hypotheses, and particularly the inverse relationship between proactive coping and social support was surprising. Furthermore, proactive and preventive coping were related to maximizing. Study 2 and Study 3 extended the findings of Study 1. These studies used a lab-based, prospective design. In Study 2, the relationship of several additional internal resources in addition to maximizing were examined (irrational beliefs, values, optimism, and the Big Five personality traits) to gain further insight into their / text

Adolescents and young adults face several developmental, social, and personal challenges as they grow towards adulthood. Common challenges such as: (a) conflicts within their families, (b) problems in their friendships and intimate relationships, (c) threats to their health, fitness, and body image, and (d) difficulties arising from their peer group social stratification, are generally addressed after damage or stress has already occurred. These challenges can introduce varying degrees of difficulty and stress into the lives of adolescents and young adults. While traditional reactive counselling methods are helpful in responding to challenges that emerge in the lives of young adolescents, it may be valuable to employ counselling methods proactively and non-therapeutically in order to equip students in junior high schools with the tools they will need to navigate common challenges before they occur. This study aimed to explore the thoughts and perceptions of teachers towards such a proactive approach to counselling with junior high school students. The findings indicated that there is a place for the proactive non-therapeutic use of traditional strategies in schools. While teachers may feel more comfortable with the content of “typical” adolescent challenges, they are less comfortable coaching students through the emotional and behavioural outcomes that occur as a result of these challenges. Educators may feel a need for more process related strategies to support students (e.g., managing unpleasant emotions, problem-solving, goal setting, etc.) in meeting goals and challenges however, one must also ensure that the context (e.g., peer relationships, family, health, etc.) is taken into consideration as well. In addition, proactive strategies and opportunities for social-emotional learning need to take place within a larger context rather than behind closed doors. In addition, the challenges experienced by today’s youth may be complicated by the technological world and the overall cultural climate of contemporary Western Canada (Ahn, 2011; Lai & Gwung, 2013; Subrahmanyam & Greenfield, 2008). Furthermore, with dual earner families being the majority in Canada, the home environment is impacted and the quantity and quality of time is diminished, which in turn affects the academic and social-emotional development and health of today’s youth (Wada et al., 2014; Dilworth, 2004). It may be that this phenomenon puts educators in a position where they are required to fill multiple roles and balance social-emotional education of children with their academic growth and development. / October 2015

Master of Science / Department of Psychological Sciences / Patrick A. Knight / For decades psychologists have studied ways in which organizations can redesign jobs to achieve improved performance and worker satisfaction. Recently there has been interest in job crafting, the process by which workers themselves change their jobs to achieve similar ends. This study examined the relationships between job crafting and (a) worker autonomy and (b) proactive personality. It was found that both autonomy and proactive personality were positively related to job crafting, with proactive personality being more strongly related to job crafting than was autonomy. Thus, the potential for both situational and individual characteristics to influence job crafting was found.

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Based on the unique clinical correlates of two subtypes of childhood aggression (reactive and proactive), this study examined possible differential treatment effects for children with varying degrees of reactive or proactive aggression receiving one of two types of psychosocial treatment aimed at addressing these unique characteristics. Forty-seven affectively dysregulated children with oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) participated in the study. Results suggest a main effect for type of treatment, modest support for the moderating role of proactive aggression, and no support for reactive aggression as a moderator of treatment outcome. Implications for assessment and treatment of aggression are discussed. / Master of Science