Thesis (Ph. D.)--West Virginia University, 2007. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains viii, 86 p. : ill. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 45-59).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, August, 2006. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (MSc)--University of Stellenbosch, 2005. / Bibliography. Also available via the Internet.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--West Virginia University, 2007. / Title from document title page. Document formatted into pages; contains viii, 73 p. : ill. Vita. Includes abstract. Includes bibliographical references (p. 41-45).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2006. / Title from first page of PDF file. Includes bibliographical references (p. 203-231).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Akron, Dept. of Sociology, 2009. / "May, 2009." Title from electronic thesis title page (viewed 11/18/2009) Advisor, Rebecca J. Erickson; Faculty Reader, Clare L. Stacey; Department Chair, John F. Zipp; Dean of the College, Chand Midha; Dean of the Graduate School, George R. Newkome. Includes bibliographical references.

Η κινητή τηλεφωνία και το διαδίκτυο έχουν φέρει επανάσταση στην επικοινωνία και τον τρόπο ζωής των ανθρώπων. Ένας ολοένα αυξανόμενος αριθμός κινητών τηλεφώνων και άλλων κινητών συσκευών επιτρέπουν στους ανθρώπους να έχουν πρόσβαση στο διαδίκτυο οπουδήποτε βρίσκονται και όποτε θέλουν. Οι υπηρεσίες αυτές εστιάζουν στην αξιοποίηση της γεωγραφικής θέσης που παρέχει το σύστημα GPS παρέχοντας επιπλέον στον χρήστη πληροφορίες για τις υπηρεσίες που αφορούν την γεωγραφική θέση του και την περιοχή γύρω του. Στην εργασία αυτή οι βασισμένες στη θέση υπηρεσίες συνδυάζονται με τεχνικές παροχής συστάσεων και υλοποιείται μια πρότυπη εφαρμογή παροχής συστάσεων για χρήστες κινητών τηλεφώνων σχετικά με φωτογραφίες περιοχών του ενδιαφέροντος τους. Ο χρήστης θεωρείται μέλος ενός κοινωνικού δικτύου και οι συστάσεις που του παρέχονται βασίζονται στην ομοιότητα του χρήστη με τα μέλη του δικτύου του. Οι συστάσεις προκύπτουν από τον υπολογισμό της ομοιότητας του χρήστη με κάθε φίλο του, βάσει ενός συνόλου φωτογραφιών που έχουν βαθμολογήσει και οι δύο. Ο βαθμός ομοιότητας του χρήστη υπολογίζεται με το συντελεστή συσχέτισης του Pearson. Τα άτομα που ικανοποιούν μια καθορισμένη τιμή ομοιότητας αποτελούν τους συμβούλους του χρήστη. Οι φωτογραφίες που παρουσιάζει η εφαρμογή στους χρήστες καθορίζονται από τις βαθμολογίες των συμβούλων για τις φωτογραφίες που δεν έχει βαθμολογήσει ο χρήστης. Στο πλαίσιο της εργασίας περιγράφεται η αρχιτεκτονική που εξυπηρετεί εφαρμογές αυτού του είδους. Επίσης υλοποιείται μια πρότυπη εφαρμογή με την οποία συστήνονται στο χρήστη φωτογραφίες που έχουν βαθμολογήσει οι φίλοι του. / Telecommunications and network technologies have made a revolution in communication and the way people live. The growing number of mobile phones and other mobile devices allows people have access to internet whenever and wherever they are. These services are concentrated in the utilization of geographic position provided by GPS system giving also information about services related with user’s position and the area around him. In this work location based services are combined with recommendation techniques to implement a standard application which provides recommendations to mobile devices users related to photographs from areas which may users are interested in. User is considered as a member of a social network and recommendations provided to him are based on the similarity the user has with other members of his network. Recommendations derive from user to user similarity calculation, on basis of photographs that both users have rate. User’s degree of similarity is calculated with Pearson’s correlation coefficient. Users that satisfy a certain value of similarity constitute the consultants of a user. The photographs presented to users by the application are specified by consultants’ ratings for the photographs that user has not rated. In the context of this work the architecture that serves such applications is described. It is also implemented a standard application which recommends users with photographs that his fellows have rated.

Η ύλη της διπλωµατικής οργανώνεται σε πέντε κεφάλαια, παρακάτω δίνεται µια σύνοψη των κεφαλαίων: • Στο κεφάλαιο 1, γίνεται µια συνοπτική παρουσίαση των υπαρχόντων κοινωνικών δικτύων που αφορούν το διαβήτη. Πιο συγκεκριµένα, για κάθε κοινωνικό δίκτυο αναφέρονται ο σκοπός που εξυπηρετεί, οι παροχές του προς το χρήστη καθώς και οι αδυναµίες του. Τέλος, γίνεται µια σύγκριση των δικτύων αυτών µε βάση κάποια προκαθορισµένα κριτήρια. • Στο κεφάλαιο 2, δίνεται µια αναλυτική περιγραφή της λειτουργικότητας που παρέχει το σύστηµα που υλοποιήθηκε. 6 • Στο κεφάλαιο 3, δίνεται µια συνοπτική περιγραφή της αρχιτεκτονικής του συστήµατος και πιο συγκεκριµένα των επιπέδων από τα οποία αποτελείται και του ρόλου τους. Πιο συγκεκριµένα, περιγράφεται το επίπεδο δεδοµένων (µοντέλο) και οι οντότητες οι οποίες χρησιµοποιούνται, το επίπεδο λειτουργιών δηλαδή οι αλγόριθµοι στους οποίους στηρίζονται οι βασικές λειτουργίες του συστήµατος και το επίπεδο παρουσίασης δηλαδή το περιβάλλον διεπαφής. • Στο κεφάλαιο 4, παρουσιάζονται συνοπτικά οι τεχνολογίες και τα εργαλεία που παρέχονται για την υλοποίηση κοινωνικών δικτύων καθώς και µια σύντοµη αξιολόγησή τους . • Στο κεφάλαιο 5, παρουσιάζεται συνοπτικά το joomla, το εργαλείο το οποίο επιλέχθηκε για την υλοποίηση του κοινωνικού δικτύου. • Στο κεφάλαιο 6, γίνεται µια σύντοµη αξιολόγηση του συστήµατος και παρουσιάζονται µελλοντικές βελτιώσεις. / Design and implementation of a social network for people who suffer from diabetes.

abstract: This thesis deals with the analysis of interpersonal communication dynamics in online social networks and social media. Our central hypothesis is that communication dynamics between individuals manifest themselves via three key aspects: the information that is the content of communication, the social engagement i.e. the sociological framework emergent of the communication process, and the channel i.e. the media via which communication takes place. Communication dynamics have been of interest to researchers from multi-faceted domains over the past several decades. However, today we are faced with several modern capabilities encompassing a host of social media websites. These sites feature variegated interactional affordances, ranging from blogging, micro-blogging, sharing media elements as well as a rich set of social actions such as tagging, voting, commenting and so on. Consequently, these communication tools have begun to redefine the ways in which we exchange information, our modes of social engagement, and mechanisms of how the media characteristics impact our interactional behavior. The outcomes of this research are manifold. We present our contributions in three parts, corresponding to the three key organizing ideas. First, we have observed that user context is key to characterizing communication between a pair of individuals. However interestingly, the probability of future communication seems to be more sensitive to the context compared to the delay, which appears to be rather habitual. Further, we observe that diffusion of social actions in a network can be indicative of future information cascades; that might be attributed to social influence or homophily depending on the nature of the social action. Second, we have observed that different modes of social engagement lead to evolution of groups that have considerable predictive capability in characterizing external-world temporal occurrences, such as stock market dynamics as well as collective political sentiments. Finally, characterization of communication on rich media sites have shown that conversations that are deemed "interesting" appear to have consequential impact on the properties of the social network they are associated with: in terms of degree of participation of the individuals in future conversations, thematic diffusion as well as emergent cohesiveness in activity among the concerned participants in the network. Based on all these outcomes, we believe that this research can make significant contribution into a better understanding of how we communicate online and how it is redefining our collective sociological behavior. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Computer Science 2011

abstract: This dissertation explores the interrelationships between periods of rapid social change and regional-scale social identities. Using archaeological data from the Cibola region of the U.S. Southwest, I examine changes in the nature and scale of social identification across a period of demographic and social upheaval (A.D. 1150-1325) marked by a shift from dispersed hamlets, to clustered villages, and eventually, to a small number of large nucleated towns. This transformation in settlement organization entailed a fundamental reconfiguration of the relationships among households and communities across an area of over 45,000 km2. This study draws on contemporary social theory focused on political mobilization and social movements to investigate how changes in the process of social identification can influence the potential for such widespread and rapid transformations. This framework suggests that social identification can be divided into two primary modes; relational identification based on networks of interaction among individuals, and categorical identification based on active expressions of affiliation with social roles or groups to which one can belong. Importantly, trajectories of social transformations are closely tied to the interrelationships between these two modes of identification. This study has three components: Social transformation, indicated by rapid demographic and settlement transitions, is documented through settlement studies drawing on a massive, regional database including over 1,500 sites. Relational identities, indicated by networks of interaction, are documented through ceramic compositional analyses of over 2,100 potsherds, technological characterizations of over 2,000 utilitarian ceramic vessels, and the distributions of different types of domestic architectural features across the region. Categorical identities are documented through stylistic comparisons of a large sample of polychrome ceramic vessels and characterizations of public architectural spaces. Contrary to assumptions underlying traditional approaches to social identity in archaeology, this study demonstrates that relational and categorical identities are not necessarily coterminous. Importantly, however, the strongest patterns of relational connections prior to the period of social transformation in the Cibola region largely predict the scale and structure of changes associated with that transformation. This suggests that the social transformation in the Cibola region, despite occurring in a non-state setting, was governed by similar dynamics to well-documented contemporary examples. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Anthropology 2011