Innovative passenger vehicle technologies are required to make significant contributions to climate change mitigation. A number of challenges exist as barriers to their adoption. One key opportunity is the potential for social influence to have a positive impact on adoption rates. Social influence is how an individual's decisions can be influenced by other people – what their peers and others say and do and how this, in turn, affects the diffusion of new behaviours. The mixed method research detailed in this thesis contributes to an emerging interest in social influence in transport studies addressing a key research gap, the spatial aspects of this influence. Spatial analysis of private Toyota Prius vehicle ownership, was undertaken at the Output Area level for London for the period 2000 to 2011. Exploratory Spatial Data Analysis (ESDA), an important first step in spatial analysis, indicated the presence of spatial autocorrelation and Toyota Prius spatial clusters ('hotspots'). These 'hotspots' enlarged over time which can be indicative of social influence. This informed the need for in-depth quantitative analysis on the role of co-variables through the use of a Zero Inflated Negative Binomial model and the choice of case study areas for qualitative interviews. In the model, 'what your neighbours do' is a key co-variable represented by the average number of Priuses from neighbouring Output Areas (OA). This measure of social influence had a positive impact on the number of Toyota Priuses in a neighbourhood. The likelihood of Prius ownership in an OA increases by over 50% when the average number of Priuses in neighbouring OA increases by one. The case study OAs were examined in detail setting the scene for the qualitative interviews. Nine face-to-face semi-structured interviews were undertaken with current and potential future Toyota Prius owners. All referenced at least one form of social influence. The influences included direct observation of the vehicles, the opportunity to trial vehicles and changes in the symbolism of the vehicle through its adoption by others. Broader findings were consistent with the literature, for example with regard to the role of congestion charge exemptions and the socio-economic background of the participants. The confirmation of social influence indicated by these findings could assist in the geographic positioning of demonstration schemes or in the allocation of grants, with the economic assessment benefits of grant programmes, because of the 'knock-on' effects of social influence, potentially being wider than conventionally assumed.

abstract: The Internet is a major source of online news content. Online news is a form of large-scale narrative text with rich, complex contents that embed deep meanings (facts, strategic communication frames, and biases) for shaping and transitioning standards, values, attitudes, and beliefs of the masses. Currently, this body of narrative text remains untapped due—in large part—to human limitations. The human ability to comprehend rich text and extract hidden meanings is far superior to known computational algorithms but remains unscalable. In this research, computational treatment is given to online news framing for exposing a deeper level of expressivity coined “double subjectivity” as characterized by its cumulative amplification effects. A visual language is offered for extracting spatial and temporal dynamics of double subjectivity that may give insight into social influence about critical issues, such as environmental, economic, or political discourse. This research offers benefits of 1) scalability for processing hidden meanings in big data and 2) visibility of the entire network dynamics over time and space to give users insight into the current status and future trends of mass communication. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Computer Science 2017

This thesis examines the effects of cooperation within multilateral counter-terrorist fora on the process of preference formation of a selected group of Western countries: the United States, the United Kingdom and Italy. The analysis focuses on the global counter-terrorist regime, a set of complex and multifaceted institutional arrangements, which were developed in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, attacks in order to harmonise state counter-terrorist responses worldwide. The study looks at three sets of formal international institutions within the regime: the United Nations, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and the European Union. It also selects a sample of three issue areas in multilateral counter-terrorist cooperation: counter-radicalisation policies, the inclusion of human rights safeguards within the main counter-terrorist sanctions provisions, and counter-terrorist financing standards. The thesis identifies as the visible symptom of institutional effects the progressive convergence of policy outputs at member state level, and proceeds with an exploration of the processes of regime creation, evolution, reform, and participation on the part of the three country case studies. The analysis reveals that the instances of pro-institution behaviour displayed by state actors are occasioned by image-related group-pressures, triggered by considerations of the maximisation of status markers and social praise, and the related avoidance of shame and social devaluation. The thesis labels this process social influence. The study further outlines the specific conditions under which interaction within a group can activate the social influence phenomenon and identifies the main triggers of state actors’ particular sensitivity to image and shame.

Master of Science / Department of Journalism and Mass Communications / Steven J. Smethers / This study describes and maps the process journalists employ when deciding issues of coverage, content, and treatment of news at community newspapers within the context of community standards. Much scholarship has been devoted to how journalists should make ethical decisions of news judgment in accordance with moral, ethical, and social responsibility theory. But little has been done in the way of describing and mapping how journalists – specifically, community journalists – actually make these on-deadline news decisions and how the concept of community standards plays into those decisions. Through the use of naturalistic inquiry methodology, in this case, a triangulation of qualitative depth interview methods – informant and ethnographic – within the context of society, this research describes the factors considered by community journalists when faced with decisions of news judgment, how that process takes place, and how and where community standards fit into that process. Data indicate that values and value-based moral and ethical reasoning are tempered by at least three considerations in the decision-making process: (1) how coverage and treatment will affect the journalist, (2) how coverage and treatment will affect others, and (3) the public instructional value, before being filtered through a screen of community standards prior to the final rendering of a news judgment decision. Furthermore, findings offer a base on which to construct a model of community journalism decision making, useful for study and discussions of ethical decision making among community journalism scholars, instructors, and students, and for its applications in practical situations by future or novice community journalists.

Organizations, once established, tend not to change, typically going obsolete as society continues to evolve. This makes adaptability an important issue. Organizational members must make sense to each other, or coordination suffers. They must also make sense to environmental actors, or the organization will not achieve the support it needs to survive. This sense-making is a process of institutionalization, of constructing a shared understanding of the organization's enterprise, business and environment. When environmental actors adopt new priorities, ideas and modes of thinking, organizations must develop a new understanding of reality or go obsolete. To stay adaptable, organizations needs to contain competing perspectives. But the pressures to conform and to coordinate make it difficult for established organizations to adapt, trapped by the very benefits of increased efficiency. Using an agent-based model of organizational institutionalization, I show that an organization's adaptability is highly dependent on structural elements that affect the member interaction frequencies, and that organizations that leverage the strength of weak ties between member groups can maintain adaptability. The effects of changes to any of these elements are decidedly non-linear, however, which helps explain why it is difficult to design effective organizations. Organizational structure is one part of a tri-partite framework of institutional development in organizations and of organizational adaptability, where the other two parts are the individual characteristics of the members and the content of the organizational culture.

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La recherche s’est très peu intéressée aux groupes de soutien (Moisio et Beruchashvili, 2010), et notamment aux communautés en ligne dédiées à la santé et à leur impact sur le comportement des consommateurs (Ma, Chen et Xiao, 2010). Ce travail doctoral a pour but d’étudier les effets positifs et négatifs de la participation à une communauté en ligne de soutien à la perte de poids (degré de participation et soutien social) sur les comportements alimentaires (restriction, diversification et auto-efficacité alimentaires). Ce lien est testé au travers d’une double médiation : l’identification aux membres de la communauté et la sensibilité à l’influence de la communauté (ou sensibilité à l’influence sociale). En effet, l’influence sociale a été étudiée dans le contexte de l’alimentation mais principalement dans le cadre de la prise d’un repas en compagnie d’autres personnes (De Castro et De Castro, 1989 ; McFerran et al., 2010 ; Vartanian, Herman et Wansink, 2008). Cette recherche vient également compléter les travaux sur l’influence sociale négative qui sont peu nombreux et concernent les réseaux sociaux tels que Facebook (Wilcox et Stephen, 2013). Ainsi, deux phases qualitatives exploratoires ont été menées auprès de 23 experts en nutrition, puis auprès de 25 utilisateurs de ce type de communautés. Ces entretiens ont permis de mieux comprendre les mécanismes de la sensibilité à l’influence de la communauté ainsi que son lien avec la comparaison sociale, l’homophilie (combinaison de la similitude et de la proximité perçues), les normes de la communauté et l’estime de soi. Par ailleurs, la restriction alimentaire est apparue comme une conséquence négative de l’influence de la communauté. Une phase quantitative a ensuite été conduite auprès de 335 utilisateurs de communautés en ligne de soutien à la perte de poids. Les résultats montrent que la participation active et le soutien social ont un effet positif sur la restriction et la diversification alimentaires, par l’intermédiaire de l’identification à la communauté et de certaines variables liées à la sensibilité à l’influence de la communauté. Ces relations n’avaient pas été mises en lumière dans la littérature. Cette recherche doctorale est également la première à montrer que la sensibilité à l’influence informationnelle a un effet positif sur la diversification alimentaire, alors que la sensibilité à l’influence normative a une influence positive sur la restriction. De plus, la comparaison sociale a un effet sur certaines variables liées à l’influence sociale dans la lignée des travaux de Polivy et Pliner (2015) qui n’avaient pas établi ce lien empiriquement. De nouveaux standards et critères de comparaison ont aussi été mis en évidence. L’homophilie liée à la perte de poids, les normes de la communauté et l’estime de soi ont également un lien avec la sensibilité à l’influence de la communauté. La thèse permet de conclure qu’il est nécessaire de sensibiliser les individus souffrant de surpoids ou d’obésité sur les dangers de la restriction et sur l’importance de la diversification de différentes manières : par les professionnels de santé, par les pouvoirs publics et par les modérateurs de communautés. / Research has shown little interest in support groups (Moisio & Beruchashvili, 2010), and especially in online health support communities and their impact on consumers’ behavior (Ma, Chen & Xiao, 2010). This doctoral research aims at studying the positive and negative effects of participating in an online dieting support community (participation level and social support) on eating behaviors (restrained eating, food variety and eating self-efficacy). A double mediation is assumed to occur: identification to community’s members and susceptibility to community influence (or susceptibility to social influence). Indeed, the effect of social influence on eating behavior was only studied when sharing a meal with other people (De Castro & De Castro, 1989; McFerran et al., 2010; Vartanian, Herman & Wansink, 2008), but not in an online context. In addition, this study extends the very few works on negative social influence which are related to online social networks like Facebook (Wilcox & Stephen, 2013). To address this issue, two exploratory qualitative studies were carried out by interviewing 23 nutrition experts, and then 25 communities’ users. Interviews enable to better understand the mechanisms of susceptibility to community influence and its link with social comparison, homophily (to feel both similar and close with others), community norms and self-esteem. A quantitative study was then conducted by questioning 335 online dieting support communities’ users. Results show that active participation and social support has a positive effect on restrained eating, food variety and eating self-efficacy, through community identification and some aspects of susceptibility to community influence. These relations were not highlighted in existing literature. So, this doctoral research is the first work to point out that susceptibility to informational influence has a positive effect on food variety whereas susceptibility to normative influence has a positive influence on restrained eating. Social comparison appears to be linked with some aspects of social influence, in line with Polivy and Pliner (2015) that dit not precisely addressed this link. New comparison standards and criteria are extracted. Homophily related to weight loss, community norms and self-esteem are also related to susceptibility to community influence. The conclusion of this work is that awareness of overweight and obese people have to be raised by health professionals, public authorities and communities’ moderators in order to avoid restraint behaviors and to promote food variety.

There has been considerable zeal regarding the democratizing promises of information and communication technologies (ICTs). This belief has resulted in the proliferation of ICT development initiatives in education through public private partnerships. However, there are critical scholars who caution against an overly celebratory perspective of ICTs and expose the ways in which they may be contributing to the exacerbation of existing inequalities. This thesis was inspired by Dan Schiller’s book, Digital Capitalism (1999) with the purpose of examining how digital capitalism is evident today. 'Digital capitalism' refers to the relationship between politics, economics, and technology that explains the shift in the use of the Internet from aiding government agencies to serving private commercial interests. Through a political economy of communication approach, this thesis examines a new model of public schools in which IT companies are partnering with various cities and districts to equip students with the 21st century skills needed to participate in the labor market. These partnerships are designed to benefit marginalized youth that do not have access to ICTs so the study looks at one of these schools encompassing this new innovative model in order to examine the benefits and limitations of these partnerships The purpose of this thesis is to examine the way digital capitalism is playing out in education today in order to shed light on the political and economic forces driving these initiatives while examining who the decision makers are as well as who benefits and why. It has a dual objective of contributing to current digital inequality scholarship and informing policy-making. This thesis ultimately argues that there is a need for more targeted and individualized policies that serve each district’s unique needs, which works to fulfill the policy objective. It challenges the notion that technology is a neutral artifact that is separate from broader political, social, and economic processes.

Colder, harsher parenting attitudes and behaviours negatively impact children's behaviour and development, and have been linked to heightened levels of violence towards children. Parenting interventions can improve outcomes by reducing violent and increasing non-violent parenting behaviours. I investigated how changes associated with a low-cost positive parenting intervention spread through a rural, low-income, South African community. Specifically, I assessed whether exposure to a community-wide social activation process and Parenting for Lifelong Health (PLH) programmes (focused on violence prevention in low-resource settings) significantly predict: (1) improved parenting, and (2) change in the communication networks of female caregivers in the whole community, while controlling for variables such as psychiatric symptoms, parenting stress, and alcohol misuse. Additionally, I investigated whether ties to parenting programme attendees in the communication network predicted improved parenting. Afrikaans-speaking female caregivers (n = 235; mean age 35.92 years), with children aged between 1½ and 18 years old, participated in the intervention; three waves of data were collected (January 2016, June 2017, and February 2019). The social network was measured based on a peer nomination procedure (of study participants whom “you talk to about parenting”). To analyse the role of interpersonal ties as pathways for spreading intervention effects, I make use of Social Network Analysis (SNA), in the form of nominations of people with whom respondents discuss parenting, together with self-report measures of parenting-related outcomes (from caregivers and their children). I then trace the extent to which both the social activation process and the parenting programmes are effective, in part, via their diffusion throughout the community. SNA was used to disentangle whether network changes improved parenting practices (i.e., selection effects) or whether reported improvements in parenting practices improved caregiver information networks (i.e., socialisation effects). Analysis of data from waves 1 and 2 indicated that community-wide improvements in parenting behaviour were evidenced. The significant predictors of improvement were social activation “dose” received, change in network centrality and the influence of indirect exposure to the parenting programmes via attendees. Furthermore, attending at least one session of a parenting programme offered in the intervention significantly predicted change in the caregivers' communication networks, indicating the spread of social influence through their network. The small subset of caregivers (n = 51; 21.7%) attending one or more sessions of a parenting programme evidenced greater activity (i.e., covariate ego effect) and potential influence (i.e., covariate alter effect) within the communication network compared to caregivers who did not attend any programme sessions. This subset of attending caregivers were more likely to reach out to other caregivers to speak about parenting after being exposed to the intervention, and both sought and received social support from other caregivers. Follow-up assessment using a third wave of data showed that while attendees remained socially influential within the caregiver network the overall community improvement was not sustained. These results illustrate the value of social network analysis for ascertaining the pathways through which the intervention achieved its impact and tracking the evolution of social norms within a community. The results indicate an association between spill-over effects from attendees to non-attendees and community-wide changes through targeted interventions.

La presente investigación busca determinar la incidencia de los factores a partir del Modelo Unificado de Adopción y Uso de Tecnología (UTAUT 2) en la intención de compra a través del comercio electrónico B2C de los vacacionistas nacionales que pertenecen a la Generación X entre 35 a 50 años de Lima Metropolitana en la industria turística durante el 2020. Se presentarán como parte de la investigación la definición del comercio electrónico, la industria del turismo en el Perú y la definición de vacacionista nacional. Asimismo, se desarrollarán las características de las personas que pertenecen a la Generación X de Lima Metropolitana, así como la evolución de las teorías de modelos de adopción de tecnologías. Se empleó una investigación cuantitativa, de alcance explicativo, diseño transversal no experimental. A través de encuestas realizadas a 384 personas pertenecientes al público objetivo de la investigación; donde se recolectó la data y mediante el uso de la herramienta estadística informática SPSS; se comprobó que los factores del modelo UTAUT 2 si influyen en el comercio electrónico en la industria del turismo del Perú para los vacacionistas nacionales pertenecientes a la Generación X. También se encontró el nivel de relación de los factores del UTAUT 2 con la intención de compra, siendo el factor Precio el más significativo. / The present investigation seeks to identify the incidence of the factors from The Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT 2) in the intention of purchase through the B2C e-commerce of the domestic tourist who belong to the Generation X between 35 to 50 years of Metropolitan Lima in the tourist industry during the 2020. The definition of e-commerce, the tourism industry in Peru, and the definition of domestic tourist will be presented as part of the research. Likewise, the characteristics of the people who belong to Generation X of Metropolitan Lima will be developed, as well as the evolution of the theories and models of adoption of technologies. A quantified research was used, with an explanatory scope, non-experimental transversal design. Through surveys carried out on 384 people belonging to the target public of the investigation; where the data was collected and through the use of the computer statistical tool SPSS; it was verified that the factors do influence the electronic commerce in the tourism industry for the national vacationers belonging to Generation X. We also found the level of relationship of the UTAUT 2 factors with the intention to purchase, being the price factor the most significant one. / Tesis