À travers le cas de la Coalition québécoise contre la réforme de l’assurance-emploi, nous cherchons à comprendre quels sont les facteurs qui influencent les dynamiques internes d’une coalition de mouvements sociaux. Pour ce faire, nous effectuons, tout d’abord, une revue de la littérature axée sur les théories des mouvements sociaux et les coalitions de mouvements sociaux. Celle-ci nous permet de formuler l’hypothèse selon laquelle les relations interpersonnelles entre les représentants des différents groupes sociaux membres d’une coalition vont influencer sa durabilité et l’accomplissement de ses objectifs. Nous testons ensuite cette hypothèse en passant les données recueillies au filtre des indicateurs élaborés au sein de notre cadre théorique. Il s’agit donc de voir en quoi la structure de prise de décisions (processus décisionnel participatif et égalitaire, construction du plan d’action conjoint et élaboration des critères d’adhésion) et la présence de liens interpersonnels, préexistants à la formation de la Coalition, entre les individus membres de celle-ci, ont une influence sur son fonctionnement et sa continuité dans le temps. Enfin, nous terminons en analysant les liens personnels entre ces individus à travers l’ambiance dans les rencontres, le plaisir d’y participer et les relations qui s’y sont développées. / By studying the case of the Québec Coalition against the reform of the employment insurance, we seek to determine how it is possible for a social movement coalition, considering the diversity of its members, to organize itself and act in unison in the public area. To answer this question, we first put together a literature review of social movements and social movement coalitions, while focussing on social ties. This review brings to light the hypothesis that social ties between members of a social movement coalition have an influence on the proper operation and the durability of this coalition. In order to test this hypothesis, we use data collected in the field through interviews and observation. The data is analysed using various indicators defined in our theoretical framework. The first element is based on how decisions are made within the Coalition (participation of each member, determination of the action plan and criteria for new adherents) and the possibility of existing social ties between members of the Coalition before its formation. The second element refers to the relationships between those members and their impact on the proper operation and continuity of the Coalition.

Esta pesquisa investiga uma categoria de pessoas portadoras, principalmente, de deficiências mentais, associadas também a deficiências físicas, popularmente denominadas de bobos, que, embora em processo de desaparecimento, ainda moram na comunidade da Cidade de Goiás, Estado de Goiás. Estes bobos emergem de uma extensa rede complementar de papéis, participando do cotidiano da cidade há mais de cem anos. Vivem no interior das famílias, nas praças públicas, ou na única instituição que os abriga, o Asilo São Vicente de Paulo. Em sua grande maioria procederam de regiões vizinhas ou da zona rural, ainda que muitos provenham de famílias do lugar. Foram absorvidos de maneira indiscriminada e naturalizada na convivência cotidiana. Com eles foi estabelecido um tipo de relação social sustentado por costumes muito arraigados. Foram adotados e criados pelas famílias, que se valeram de suas deficiências mentais para submetêlos. Em troca de casa e comida prestaram toda sorte de serviços domésticos. Eram treinados para a execução de trabalhos árduos e mecânicos que a topografia da cidade e as falhas estruturais dos serviços urbanos impuseram aos habitantes. A explicação e justificativa para sua existência e o tratamento que recebem se apoiam na formulação generalizada de que os bobos são fruto de relações consanguíneas, quando não incestuosas, que, neste trabalho, é denominada de consanguinidadecausa. Esta pesquisa converge elementos da psicologia social, psicanálise, antropologia, neurologia e genética para a análise desta explicação e justificativa. As vertentes destas disciplinas permitem a crítica das relações sociais no cotidiano, revelando suas origens, desvelando referenciais ideológicos, favorecendo a desmontagem de estereótipos e justificativas escamoteadoras das condutas de dominação e submissão que a comunidade pratica, de forma naturalizada, na relação com seus bobos. Este trabalho se alicerça, de um lado, em fontes documentais e bibliográficas e, de outro, em entrevistas realizadas no interior da comunidade, envolvendo os próprios bobos, as famílias que os abrigam, a instituição que os recolhe e figuras representativas da cidade. Caracterizandose como um Estudo de Caso, esta tese foi dividida em três partes temáticas, que se articulam, conferindolhe unidade analítica. A primeira intitulase Bobos de Goiás: reminiscências subjacentes; a segunda, Investigando os bobos da Cidade de Goiás, e a outra, O trabalho de campo na Cidade de Goiás / This research investigates a category of people with, mainly, mental disabilities, also associated to physical deficiencies, who are popularly known as bobos. Although they are becoming rarer, they can still be found in the community of Cidade de Goiás, in the State of Goiás. These bobos come from an extensive complementary network of roles, taking part in the everyday life of the town for over one hundred years. They live with host families, in the public squares, or in the only institution that gives them shelter, the São Vicente de Paulo Asylum. Most of them come from neighboring or from rural areas, but many come from families who live in town. They have been absorbed indiscriminately and incorporated into the community everyday life. A specific kind of social relationship supported by ingrained customs has been established with them. They were adopted and raised by families, who used their disabilities to assure their submission and the performance of all kinds of menial tasks, in exchange for room and board. They were trained to do the hard mechanical jobs that the topography of the town and the structural flaws in urban services imposed on its inhabitants. The explanation and justification for their existence and the kind of treatment they receive are based on a generalized concept that the bobos are the result of consanguineous relationships, when not incestuous, and in this work they are called consanguineouscause. This research combines elements of social psychology, psychoanalysis, anthropology, neurology and genetics to analyze the explanation and justification. The approach of these disciplines allows for a critique of everyday social relationships, revealing their origins, uncovering ideological references, favoring the deconstruction of stereotypes and the covering up of justifications for the conduct of domination and submission that is practiced in a naturalized way by the community in its relationship with its bobos. This work is based, on the one hand, on documents and bibliographical sources, and on the other, on interviews in the community with the bobos themselves, the families that took them in, the institution that shelters them, and with prominent members of the town. It may be characterized as a case study, and is divided in three thematic parts that articulate and confer an analytical unity. The first is entitled bobos from Goiás: underlying reminiscences; the second, investigating the bobos in Cidade de Goiás, and another, The field work at Cidade de Goiás.

This study posits that there is a connection between political action online and activism in the real life. In addition, social ties and networks as well as political knowledge and efficacy play an important role in this connection. Causes, an application on Facebook, was selected for analyzed. A mixed method study was conducted, consisting of two stages. In the first stage (quantitative), a survey was utilized to investigate the correlation between activities on Causes and conventional political engagement. A total of 45 responses were gathered using convenience sampling. It was found that there is a strong correlation between action on Causes and conventional political engagement. For example, information retrieval activities are correlated with conventional activism (r=.418, p<.05), and social networking activities are also correlated with conventional activism (r=.661, p<.05). In addition to the survey, intensive interviews (N = 5) were conducted in the second stage (qualitative) to elaborate and clarify the results from the survey as well as to explore new grounds on the significance of ties and networks. Some themes have emerged from the interviews, including motivations for the use of Causes, Causes as an information channel, potential and problems of Causes, online versus offline activism, affiliation and involvement, political knowledge and efficacy as well as ties and networks. Interview findings concluded that the high correlation between online and offline activism is further specified by the interviewees to be an extension of each form of activism, meaning they are complementary rather than identical.

The availability and scale of user generated data in online systems raises tremendous challenges and opportunities to analytic study of human activities. Effective modeling of online human activities is not only fundamental to the understanding of human behavior, but also important to the online industry. This thesis focuses on developing models and algorithms to predict human activities in online systems and to improve the algorithmic design of personalized/socialized systems (e.g., recommendation, advertising, Web search systems). We are particularly interested in three types of online user activities, i.e., decision making, social interactions and user-generated contents. Centered around these activities, the thesis focuses on three challenging topics: 1. Behavior prediction, i.e., predicting users' online decisions. We present Collaborative-Competitive Filtering, a novel game-theoretic framework for predicting users' online decision making behavior and leverage the knowledge to optimize the design of online systems (e.g., recommendation systems) in respect of certain strategic goals (e.g., sales revenue, consumption diversity). 2. Social contagion, i.e., modeling the interplay between social interactions and individual behavior of decision making. We establish the joint Friendship-Interest Propagation model and the Behavior-Relation Interplay model, a series of statistical approaches to characterize the behavior of individual user's decision making, the interactions among socially connected users, and the interplay between these two activities. These techniques are demonstrated by applications to social behavior targeting. 3. Content mining, i.e., understanding user generated contents. We propose the Topic-Adapted Latent Dirichlet Allocation model, a probabilistic model for identifying a user's hidden cognitive aspects (e.g., knowledgability) from the texts created by the user. The model is successfully applied to address the challenge of ``language gap" in medical information retrieval.

Cette recherche porte sur les mécanismes d’ajustement des différentes urbanités en présence à Casablanca, principale métropole du Maroc, par le biais de l’étude de l’appropriation d’espaces publics par des pratiques déviantes. La question des rapports mutuels entre les citadins déviants et l’ensemble des acteurs de la ville (citadins ordinaires et acteurs institutionnels de l’aménagement), incarnée dans le processus d’aménagement urbain du centre-ville à partir de 2002, permet de mettre en évidence l’importance de la visibilité de la transgression des normes sociales. Ces projets contraignant les citadins déviants à réadapter leurs lieux de vie à l’injonction à une urbanité policée sont analysés au regard des limites des compétences des citadins en situation de vulnérabilité et interrogent l’aménagement dans sa capacité à intégrer toutes les composantes sociales de la ville. Dans une démarche de type ethnographique, explorer l’articulation du lien social à la morphologie urbaine permet de comprendre les transformations des valeurs à l’oeuvre dans des situations de déviance, révélatrices de changements affectant les formes familiales et l’ensemble de la société marocaine, pour les hommes et les femmes en quête d’individuation. / This research is a study of the adjustment of different urbanities present in Casablanca, Morocco’s main metropolis, where public spaces are appropriated by city-dwellers for their deviant practices. The issue of mutual relations among the city-dwellers and all the city stakeholders (ordinary city-dwellers and institutional players involved in planning) embodied in the urban planning process of the city center since 2002 highlights the importance of visibility of the transgression of social norms. The development projects, which force deviant city-dwellers to readjust their living places to a constraining civilized urbanity, are analyzed in terms of the limitations of the competencies of these city-dwellers, who are in a vulnerable situation. The projects also call into question urban planning in its ability to incorporate all the social components of the city. Using an ethnographic approach to explore the relationship of social ties with urban morphology helps to understand the transformations of values at play in situations of deviance, which reveal changes in family structure and the entire Moroccan society for men and women in search of individuation.

Esta pesquisa investiga uma categoria de pessoas portadoras, principalmente, de deficiências mentais, associadas também a deficiências físicas, popularmente denominadas de bobos, que, embora em processo de desaparecimento, ainda moram na comunidade da Cidade de Goiás, Estado de Goiás. Estes bobos emergem de uma extensa rede complementar de papéis, participando do cotidiano da cidade há mais de cem anos. Vivem no interior das famílias, nas praças públicas, ou na única instituição que os abriga, o Asilo São Vicente de Paulo. Em sua grande maioria procederam de regiões vizinhas ou da zona rural, ainda que muitos provenham de famílias do lugar. Foram absorvidos de maneira indiscriminada e naturalizada na convivência cotidiana. Com eles foi estabelecido um tipo de relação social sustentado por costumes muito arraigados. Foram adotados e criados pelas famílias, que se valeram de suas deficiências mentais para submetêlos. Em troca de casa e comida prestaram toda sorte de serviços domésticos. Eram treinados para a execução de trabalhos árduos e mecânicos que a topografia da cidade e as falhas estruturais dos serviços urbanos impuseram aos habitantes. A explicação e justificativa para sua existência e o tratamento que recebem se apoiam na formulação generalizada de que os bobos são fruto de relações consanguíneas, quando não incestuosas, que, neste trabalho, é denominada de consanguinidadecausa. Esta pesquisa converge elementos da psicologia social, psicanálise, antropologia, neurologia e genética para a análise desta explicação e justificativa. As vertentes destas disciplinas permitem a crítica das relações sociais no cotidiano, revelando suas origens, desvelando referenciais ideológicos, favorecendo a desmontagem de estereótipos e justificativas escamoteadoras das condutas de dominação e submissão que a comunidade pratica, de forma naturalizada, na relação com seus bobos. Este trabalho se alicerça, de um lado, em fontes documentais e bibliográficas e, de outro, em entrevistas realizadas no interior da comunidade, envolvendo os próprios bobos, as famílias que os abrigam, a instituição que os recolhe e figuras representativas da cidade. Caracterizandose como um Estudo de Caso, esta tese foi dividida em três partes temáticas, que se articulam, conferindolhe unidade analítica. A primeira intitulase Bobos de Goiás: reminiscências subjacentes; a segunda, Investigando os bobos da Cidade de Goiás, e a outra, O trabalho de campo na Cidade de Goiás / This research investigates a category of people with, mainly, mental disabilities, also associated to physical deficiencies, who are popularly known as bobos. Although they are becoming rarer, they can still be found in the community of Cidade de Goiás, in the State of Goiás. These bobos come from an extensive complementary network of roles, taking part in the everyday life of the town for over one hundred years. They live with host families, in the public squares, or in the only institution that gives them shelter, the São Vicente de Paulo Asylum. Most of them come from neighboring or from rural areas, but many come from families who live in town. They have been absorbed indiscriminately and incorporated into the community everyday life. A specific kind of social relationship supported by ingrained customs has been established with them. They were adopted and raised by families, who used their disabilities to assure their submission and the performance of all kinds of menial tasks, in exchange for room and board. They were trained to do the hard mechanical jobs that the topography of the town and the structural flaws in urban services imposed on its inhabitants. The explanation and justification for their existence and the kind of treatment they receive are based on a generalized concept that the bobos are the result of consanguineous relationships, when not incestuous, and in this work they are called consanguineouscause. This research combines elements of social psychology, psychoanalysis, anthropology, neurology and genetics to analyze the explanation and justification. The approach of these disciplines allows for a critique of everyday social relationships, revealing their origins, uncovering ideological references, favoring the deconstruction of stereotypes and the covering up of justifications for the conduct of domination and submission that is practiced in a naturalized way by the community in its relationship with its bobos. This work is based, on the one hand, on documents and bibliographical sources, and on the other, on interviews in the community with the bobos themselves, the families that took them in, the institution that shelters them, and with prominent members of the town. It may be characterized as a case study, and is divided in three thematic parts that articulate and confer an analytical unity. The first is entitled bobos from Goiás: underlying reminiscences; the second, investigating the bobos in Cidade de Goiás, and another, The field work at Cidade de Goiás.

Le travail doctoral concerne l’étude des dynamiques de changement en faveur de pratiques éco-citoyennes et liées à la mobilité via la communication numérique engageante. La question de recherche qui en découle relève de la définition des conditions et des modalités portant sur la possibilité de transposer les travaux fondateurs antérieurs consacrés à la communication engageante dans le cadre élargi d’interactions médiatées et médiatisées sur l’internet, en milieu naturel.Pour tenter de répondre à cette question, nous avons situé notre propos dans un cadre théorique et méthodologique ouvert en montrant les relations entre la communication engageante et d’autres perspectives relevant du lien, du rite d’interaction ; nous abordons également la problématisation du changement individuel et collectif. Nos travaux apportent une contribution à la réflexion concernant la relation entre information et communication. Sur le plan empirique, nous avons mené une recherche-action dans une Université du Sud de la France. Il s’agissait, dans le contexte d’un partenariat avec cette institution, d’amener des étudiants à s’inscrire sur un dispositif Web de mise en relation de covoitureurs potentiels. Nous avons mené deux expériences mobilisant le paradigme de la communication numérique engageante.Notre approche, replacée dans les problématiques et la méthode de la recherche-action, n’est pas exempte de limites, notamment liées à une validité interne modérée par certains éléments hors de notre contrôle : facteurs historiques, mortalité expérimentale, variables parasites…Tous ces éléments sont présentés, discutés, mis en perspective. / This doctoral work relates to the study of change dynamics in favor of eco-friendly practices and tied to mobility through digital binding communication. The research question that ensues concerns the definition of the terms and conditions about the possibility of incorporating previous work on digital binding communication in the broader context of mediated and mediatized interactions on the internet, in a natural environment.In order to try answering this question, we set our discussion on an open theoretical and methodological framework by showing the relationships between binding communication and other perspectives concerning links, interaction rituals, we also broach upon the problematization of individual and collective change. Our work provides a contribution to the debate on the relationship between information and communication. From an empirical standpoint, we conducted an action research at a southern French university. Our goal was within the context of a partnership with this institution, to encourage students to register to a Web device putting potential carpoolers in touch. We conducted two experiments mobilizing the digital binding communication paradigm.Our approach, put in the context of the set of problems and the action research method is not without flaws, especially insofar as its internal validity is weakened by elements beyond our control: historical factors, experimental mortality, confounding variables…All these elements are presented, discussed, put into perspective.

The diploma thesis focuses on motivations for watching beauty videos on YouTube. The aim is to clarify why viewers watch amateur videos that communicate topics related to physical appearance. Assuming the audience as an active actor of media communication the thesis is based on uses and gratification theory. Viewers watch beauty videos consciously to meet their individual needs. Based on an analysis of eleven interviews with regular viewers of beauty videos this thesis reveals five categories of motivation. Beauty videos represent the source of information, the source of entertainment, the platform for communication with individuals with shared theme of interest and the tool for self-education. These motivations are not specific for this specific type of media and can motivate viewers to watch amateur beauty videos and professional beauty shows equally. The key motivation for watching beauty videos on YouTube is the interest of videobloggers. Authors of beauty videos disclose parts of their privacy, show their imperfections and interact with their audience. Using these practices videobloggers evoke the illusion of a close relationship between them and their viewers. Viewers have the opportunity the create strong social ties to videobloggers.

This study investigates the social networks impact on mental health. Further, it examines the role of digital tools in regard to loneliness among elderly people. Several studies have investigated similar questions before, but further knowledge can be added with this study on the Swedish population. The aim of the study is to enhance the knowledge on whether social networks have an impact on individual’s mental health. The theoretical framework consists of Granovetter’s strenght-of-weak-ties and Putnam’s definition of social capital. A quantitative approach is used, and secondary analysis is made on an existing data set. The data originates from a survey used to measure social networks in Sweden. To get further insight, an ordinal regression model was built in order to sort out the potential impact of the different variables. The result shows that elderly peoplewho use digital tools are less likely to feel lonely in comparison to those who are non-users. Also, both weak and strong social ties seem to have a positive effect on mental health. Finally, social capital is also proved to have an impact on mental health. The most important result show that trusting people was the strongest correlated variable with mental health in regard to the components of social capital. Further, those who feel trust for others are more likely to report a better mental wellbeing. For future research we recommend focusing on a specific age group, for example relevant to our findings, this could be the elder population. To gain enhanced knowledge, we recommend a mixed methods approach in order toget a deeper understanding.

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