This thesis addresses creativity in design as a property of systems rather than an attribute of isolated individuals. It focuses on the dynamics between generative and evaluative or ascriptive processes. This is in distinction to conventional approaches to the study of creativity which tend to concentrate on the isolated characteristics of person, process and product. Whilst previous research has advanced insights on potentially creative behaviour and on the general dynamics of innovation in groups, little is known about their interaction. A systems view of creativity in design is adopted in our work to broaden the focus of inquiry to incorporate the link between individual and collective change. The work presented in this thesis investigates the relation between creativity and innovation in computational models of design as a social construct. The aim is to define and implement in computer simulations the different actors and components of a system and the rules that may determine their behaviour and interaction. This allows the systematic study of their likely characteristics and effects when the system is run over simulated time. By manipulating the experimental variables of the system at initial time the experimenter is able to extract patterns from the observed results over time and build an understanding of the different types of determinants of creative design. The experiments and findings presented in this thesis relate to artificial societies composed by software agents and the social structures that emerge from their interaction. Inasmuch as these systems aim to capture some aspects of design activity, understanding them is likely to contribute to the understanding of the target system. The first part of this thesis formulates a series of initial computational explorations on cellular automata of social influence and change agency. This simple modelling framework illustrates a number of factors that facilitate change. The potential for a designer to trigger cycles of collective change is demonstrated to depend on the combination of individual and external or situational characteristics. A more comprehensive simulation framework is then introduced to explore the link between designers and their societies based on a systems model of creativity that includes social and epistemological components. In this framework a number of independent variables are set for experimentation including characteristics of individuals, fields, and domains. The effects of these individual and situational parameters are observed in experimental settings. Aspects of relevance in the definition of creativity included in these studies comprise the role of opinion leaders as gatekeepers of the domain, the effects of social organisation, the consequences of public and private access to domain knowledge by designers, and the relation between imitative behaviour and innovation. A number of factors in a social system are identified that contribute to the emergence of phenomena that are normally associated to creativity and innovation in design. At the individual level the role of differences of abilities, persistence, opportunities, imitative behaviour, peer influence, and design strategies are discussed. At the field level determinants under inspection include group structure, social mobility and organisation, emergence of opinion leaders, established rules and norms, and distribution of adoption and quality assessments. Lastly, domain aspects that influence the interaction between designers and their social groups include the generation and access to knowledge, activities of gatekeeping, domain size and distribution, and artefact structure and representation. These insights are discussed in view of current findings and relevant modelling approaches in the literature. Whilst a number of assumptions and results are validated, others contribute to ongoing debates and suggest specific mechanisms and parameters for future experimentation. The thesis concludes by characterising this approach to the study of creativity in design as an alternative �in silico� method of inquiry that enables simulation with phenomena not amenable to direct manipulation. Lines of development for future work are advanced which promise to contribute to the experimental study of the social dimensions of design.

Social scientists agree that public confidence in social institutions is a crucial element in building democratic society. This is especially true for transitional societies including post-communist countries, because the lack of public confidence in newly emerged democratic institutions can interfere with democratic development. Although different theories explaining public confidence in social institutions were developed, these theories ignored the role that mass media play in building public confidence. The goal of this study is to examine the connection between mass media coverage of social institutions and public confidence in these institutions by conducting content analysis of Belarusian newspapers, reviewing the results of the public opinion polls from Belarus, and exploring the links between coverage of social institutions and trust in them. Four institutions were chosen for this examination: two institutions with high level of confidence representing the state (the President, the military) and two institutions with low level of confidence representing civil society (independent labor unions, opposition political parties). Results showed that there is a noticeable connection between media coverage and public confidence in social institutions. Content analysis demonstrated that the state-run newspapers publish a great number of articles about Belarus President Lukashenko, covering him within the scope of explicitly positive themes. As results of public opinion polls demonstrate, the President enjoys an high level of confidence amongst people who trust state-run Media. On the other hand, independent newspapers present President Lukashenko in a negative different light: he is being depicted as a dictator and an ineffective leader. According to public opinion polls, people who trust the independent media are less confident in the President: more than 42% do have confidence in him. Given that state-run newspapers present the President almost exclusively within positive themes and independent newspapers seldom speak of the President’s achievements, concentrating mostly on his failures and shortcomings, we can see a strong connection between media coverage of the President and levels of public confidence in him. Examining media coverage and public opinion about other social institutions provided similar results, confirming the connection between media coverage and public confidence in this study.

<p>The first objective of this study is to show if diffusion of contraception in areas of traditional high fertility has gone through profound changes. Indeed, we would like to know if contraceptive behaviours have evolved because of new fertility perceptions and also because partners now have greater freedom to make choices in a relationship. The second objective of this study is not only to highlight the levels and trends of contraception and the factors influencing their use (government policies, role of family planning, etc.) in developing countries, but also to consider the population of unmet-needs of contraception. Indeed, the level of contraceptive use depends obviously on users, but also on non-users with no needs and non-users with unsatisfied needs. The understanding of this last category of females is essential to a more accurate estimation of contraception levels, and, therefore for the estimation of fertility levels. This study analyses the contraceptive use in several developing countries in Africa and highlights the unsatisfied needs of contraception, to understand why such needs exist. To do so, we shall analyse available demographic data for thirty-five African countries by using the available Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), from the 1980&rsquo / s to 2000&rsquo / s considering the DHS I, DHS II, DHS III and DHS IV. This great variety of surveys, seventy-nine in total, permits one to compare levels of contraception and &ldquo / unmet-needs&rdquo / from country to country. The surveys also, make it possible to compare the evolution over time of specific countries or specific regions, and to subsequently comprehend the determining factors of contraceptive use or non-use.</p>

With increasing merging of the Internet in our daily lives, online shopping becomes a new consumption model. The study subject was female customers who did shopping online. By means of performance expectancy, effort expectancy and social influence in terms of Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) as well as involvement degree, the study explored if those variations had influenced female customers¡¦ intentions and behaviors on online shopping. We issued 240 questionnaires by purposive sampling and analyzed by quantitative statistics. The result shows that performance expectancy, effort expectancy and social influence originating from UTAUT significantly influenced female customers¡¦ intentions. Moreover, their intentions also significantly influenced their behavior online.

Scholars have advocated that public relations executives need to seek a seat at the table among the most senior officers in the organization, referred to as the dominant coalition. However, this study found that public relations practitioners also need to seek a seat among the division leadership team and executive-level committees to fulfill a valuable internal boundary spanning role, a role that has been neglected in public relations theory. Consistent with social capital theory, the contacts that public relations practitioners developed allowed them to gather intelligence across the company and then they used that information to help their companies make better strategic decisions and avoid costly mistakes. Through in-depth interviews with 30 senior executives from a variety of disciplines, three other services were identified that enhanced public relations’ power and influence: online reputation management, external boundary spanning and advocacy, and stakeholder analysis. Factors that enhanced or hindered public relations practitioners’ ability to perform these services were also identified. Favorable conditions included the use of integrated decision teams, Theory Y management, perceptions of public relations as a strategic business partner, commitment to transparency in communication, internal relationship building, and the integration of public relations’ activities with core business objectives and operations. The study also examined why informal coalitions are formed and found they existed in both companies with strong adherence to hierarchy and those with decentralized management, a finding that contradicts previous theory. / text

<p>The first objective of this study is to show if diffusion of contraception in areas of traditional high fertility has gone through profound changes. Indeed, we would like to know if contraceptive behaviours have evolved because of new fertility perceptions and also because partners now have greater freedom to make choices in a relationship. The second objective of this study is not only to highlight the levels and trends of contraception and the factors influencing their use (government policies, role of family planning, etc.) in developing countries, but also to consider the population of unmet-needs of contraception. Indeed, the level of contraceptive use depends obviously on users, but also on non-users with no needs and non-users with unsatisfied needs. The understanding of this last category of females is essential to a more accurate estimation of contraception levels, and, therefore for the estimation of fertility levels. This study analyses the contraceptive use in several developing countries in Africa and highlights the unsatisfied needs of contraception, to understand why such needs exist. To do so, we shall analyse available demographic data for thirty-five African countries by using the available Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS), from the 1980&rsquo / s to 2000&rsquo / s considering the DHS I, DHS II, DHS III and DHS IV. This great variety of surveys, seventy-nine in total, permits one to compare levels of contraception and &ldquo / unmet-needs&rdquo / from country to country. The surveys also, make it possible to compare the evolution over time of specific countries or specific regions, and to subsequently comprehend the determining factors of contraceptive use or non-use.</p>

This thesis reports the results of a study designed to investigate the influence of exposure to televised medical dramas on perceptions of medical miracles. Four hundred and eighty-one college students participated in a survey in which they responded to different questions about their medical drama viewership and their different beliefs with regard to medical miracles. Results found that heavy medical drama viewers perceived belief in medical miracles to be less normal than non-viewers. Similarly, heavy viewers perceived medical miracles to occur less often than non-viewers. Interestingly, heavy viewers perceived medical dramas to be less credible than non-viewers. In addition, this study found that personal experience with medical miracles affected responses across all three measured viewership levels. The study concludes that, when compared to no exposure to medical dramas, heavy exposure has the potential for creating a more realistic view of medical miracles. Future research should continue to study genre-specific cultivation effects with regard to health perceptions.

Framing tactics are used to structure a situation in an attempt to establish a “favorable climate” for influence. Framing can be used to influence the military or society to make decisions that are in your best interest (i.e. Jackie Robinson’s allowance into major league baseball and the desegregation of the Armed Services) by structuring the issues at hand. The military may be faced with several options; however, introducing social influence tactics will alter his/her idea of what they believe to be their set course of action. Successful framing tactics are evident in how the military desegregated itself breaking from its long tradition of racial separation of decades past. Framing will present the military an optional course of action. This course of action is not desirable for some, but most will benefit from it, due to the fact that homosexuals will not be subjugated, scrutinized, or discharged for their sexual orientation. The idea behind this framing tactic is to have the military choose option A on their own accord. This thesis will explore the relevance of the Jackie Robinson situation and how it relates to the current military actions towards “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” and to determine how social influence tactics were employed to achieve the desired result. There are several examples ranging from desegregation of African-Americans into the military to the current acceptance of gays into the military.

A social navigation system collects data from its users--its community--about what they are doing, their opinions, and their decisions, aggregates this data, and provides the aggregated data--community data--back to individuals so that they can use it to guide behavior and decisions. In this thesis, I document my investigation of the user experience for social navigation systems that employ activity data. I make three contributions in this thesis. First, I synthesize social navigation systems research with research in social influence, advice-taking, and informational cascades to construct hypotheses about the social navigation user experience. These hypotheses posit that community data from a social navigation system exerts informational influence on users, that users egocentrically discount community data, that herding in social navigation systems can be characterized as informational cascades, and that the size and unanimity of the community data correspond to the strength of the community data's influence. The second contribution of this thesis is an experiment that evaluates the hypotheses about the social navigation user experience; this experiment investigated how a social navigation system can support online charitable giving decisions. The experiment's results support the majority of the hypotheses about the social navigation user experience and provide mixed evidence for the other hypotheses. The implications that arise from the experiment's findings compromise the final contribution of this thesis. These implications concern improving the design of social navigation systems and developing a general framework for evaluating the social influence of social navigation systems.

This thesis addresses creativity in design as a property of systems rather than an attribute of isolated individuals. It focuses on the dynamics between generative and evaluative or ascriptive processes. This is in distinction to conventional approaches to the study of creativity which tend to concentrate on the isolated characteristics of person, process and product. Whilst previous research has advanced insights on potentially creative behaviour and on the general dynamics of innovation in groups, little is known about their interaction. A systems view of creativity in design is adopted in our work to broaden the focus of inquiry to incorporate the link between individual and collective change. The work presented in this thesis investigates the relation between creativity and innovation in computational models of design as a social construct. The aim is to define and implement in computer simulations the different actors and components of a system and the rules that may determine their behaviour and interaction. This allows the systematic study of their likely characteristics and effects when the system is run over simulated time. By manipulating the experimental variables of the system at initial time the experimenter is able to extract patterns from the observed results over time and build an understanding of the different types of determinants of creative design. The experiments and findings presented in this thesis relate to artificial societies composed by software agents and the social structures that emerge from their interaction. Inasmuch as these systems aim to capture some aspects of design activity, understanding them is likely to contribute to the understanding of the target system. The first part of this thesis formulates a series of initial computational explorations on cellular automata of social influence and change agency. This simple modelling framework illustrates a number of factors that facilitate change. The potential for a designer to trigger cycles of collective change is demonstrated to depend on the combination of individual and external or situational characteristics. A more comprehensive simulation framework is then introduced to explore the link between designers and their societies based on a systems model of creativity that includes social and epistemological components. In this framework a number of independent variables are set for experimentation including characteristics of individuals, fields, and domains. The effects of these individual and situational parameters are observed in experimental settings. Aspects of relevance in the definition of creativity included in these studies comprise the role of opinion leaders as gatekeepers of the domain, the effects of social organisation, the consequences of public and private access to domain knowledge by designers, and the relation between imitative behaviour and innovation. A number of factors in a social system are identified that contribute to the emergence of phenomena that are normally associated to creativity and innovation in design. At the individual level the role of differences of abilities, persistence, opportunities, imitative behaviour, peer influence, and design strategies are discussed. At the field level determinants under inspection include group structure, social mobility and organisation, emergence of opinion leaders, established rules and norms, and distribution of adoption and quality assessments. Lastly, domain aspects that influence the interaction between designers and their social groups include the generation and access to knowledge, activities of gatekeeping, domain size and distribution, and artefact structure and representation. These insights are discussed in view of current findings and relevant modelling approaches in the literature. Whilst a number of assumptions and results are validated, others contribute to ongoing debates and suggest specific mechanisms and parameters for future experimentation. The thesis concludes by characterising this approach to the study of creativity in design as an alternative �in silico� method of inquiry that enables simulation with phenomena not amenable to direct manipulation. Lines of development for future work are advanced which promise to contribute to the experimental study of the social dimensions of design.