Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of St Andrews, June 2009. / Restricted until 22nd June 2011.

Thesis (M.Phil.) - University of St Andrews, May 2010.

Thesis (M.A. in human development)--Washington State University, May 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 41-50).

Despite an increasing recognition of the need for an integrative approach to sustainable development, there remains a tendency for this to be anthropocentric. Attempts to govern sustainability are invariably focused on the pre-eminence of the human perspective and social systems in the pursuit of human goals. This often means either excluding or attempting to control the external environment rather than understanding and responding to it. This thesis explores more holistic approaches to governance that are based upon the need for an improved understanding about the interconnections between social, economic and ecological systems. It examines current literature on governance for sustainable development and systems thinking as applied to it, with specific reference to Socio-Technical Systems (STS), social learning about systems’ interrelations and the nature of public goods. On the basis of this analysis, a systemic conception of governance for sustainability is developed and translated into a provisional framework that can aid participatory social learning relating to sustainable development. Three initial Socio-Technical Systems (STS) case studies are drawn upon to populate the empty framework (the European Critical Electricity Infrastructure (ECEI), the Finnish security system and the transition of energy systems towards a post carbon society); these are then analysed thematically to derive common governance for sustainability criteria. The final modified framework is then applied to an in depth, and on-going, case study of food systems’ security and sustainability and a final discussion considers how this governance framework (GAME) might contribute to future holistic decision making for more sustainable Socio-Technical Systems. The multi-method GAME supports the generation of future scenarios and core sustainability criteria by multiple stakeholders; reflecting needs, capabilities and limits that can maintain systems’ equilibrium. It also implies a more normative governance for sustainability and a commitment to improved evidence-based decision-making that reflects systems’ complexity and contributes to bridging the gaps between science, policy and society. The GAME is currently being extended to incorporate the user-friendly geospatial representations of impacts.

Magister Psychologiae - MPsych / Tobacco smoking remains the largest preventable behavioural cause of chronic disease and premature death. Many people continue to engage in this behaviour, despite the well-known negative health consequences. The most common form of smoking is cigarette smoking, which is a type of risk-taking behaviour that is becoming increasingly prevalent among adolescents. Cigarette consumption rates are increasing among adolescents in various parts of the world; each year nearly a million adolescents start to smoke. This behaviour, if continued into adulthood, may lead to a range of debilitating diseases of lifestyle. In an effort to contribute to the success of adolescent smoking cessation programmes in South Africa, this study looks at the factors that motivate and support adolescents‘ decision to start and continue with their cigarette smoking behaviour. Utilising a qualitative framework, individual interviews were carried out with six boys and six girls from an English-medium high school within Cape Town. The participants‘ ages ranged from 16-18 years. Through the use of thematic analysis, the results show that adolescents smoking are not determined by knowledge, beliefs and attitudes alone, but by social and environmental influences as well. Risk and protective factors for adolescent smoking was identified on a psychological, physical, social/environmental level cross-cuttingly on the different stages of the smoking cycle. Of importance was the adolescents‘ common misinterpretation of 'smoking out of habit‘ for 'addiction‘. Essentially, this study focused on the importance of adolescent health and how it is affected by factors associated with tobacco use in South Africa. Therefore, a key recommendation of this study would be for these underlying risk and protective factors needs to be integrated to strengthen current smoking cessation programmes.

Considering the ecological crisis and the increased disconnection between human beings and nature, this study attempts to find the social and aesthetic educational response needed for developing ecological citizenship for the 21st century. In this transdisciplinary study I articulate what at first seems a clumsy attempt to enable the capacities of the embodied ecological citizen, and which later emerges as an alchemical ‘social sculpture’ approach to learning that expands the range of capacities available to the citizen and the citizen’s immediate community. This learning bridges the gap between purely biocentric and technocentric forms of education, and addresses the ambiguity of concepts and forms of action such as ‘sustainability’. My primary focus is enabling both communal and personal forms of agency: new ways of 'doing’ and 'being' in the world as it changes radically. I argue that this demands constantly reflecting on and engaging without understanding, place and perception of the problems we see. Attending to a call for the importance of complex learning processes, that deepens our understanding of sustainability, and the need for methodological and pedagogical approaches to accessible forms of learning socially in the era of climate change and environmental degradation, this study offers a particular insight into the education of an ecological citizen. In particular I examine a form of learning that enables individuals to explore relationships between themselves and their ecologies (both physical and social), and that encourages personal forms of knowing so that each person’s values can be cultivated within the experience and intuitive expression from both inner and outer realities. Central to my research focus is addressing the difficulties inherent in ‘ecological apartheid’, which is defined as a growing separation of relationships that include the human being’s relationship with the natural world, as well as disconnections experienced within one’s own inner and outer capacities. Subsequently I investigate forms of learning that encourage agency that most appropriately enable citizens to respond personally to both inner and outer forms of disconnection. ‘Personal’ and ‘relational agency’ are defined and investigated through an initial twelve-month collaborative participatory contextual profiling exploratory research period in South Africa (phase A), where I explore various forms of multiple-genre creative social learning practice that develop an accessible set of methodologies and pedagogies for the ecological citizen. Through this exploratory research, I place significance in the relatively unknown field of social sculpture, which I investigate through a self-made apprenticeship with Shelley Sacks, an expert in the field. This is documented through a rigorous ethnographic inquiry over a period of 18 months. Following this I undertake another two-year collaborative, practice-based research study across South Africa (phase B: 17 towns, with a total of 350 citizens) and eventually abroad (United Kingdom, Germany, USA and Belgium).The focus of this study was the implementation of a collaboratively developed citizen learning practice entitled Earth Forum developed by Shelley Sacks as a progression from her work “Exchange Values: voices of insivible lives” and my collaboative exploration into Earth Forum and its further development draws heavily from social sculpture methods obtained during the apprenticeship, and applied in 36 different incidences. I further explore the efficacy of this practice in enabling and expanding the capacities of participants, particularly those that encourage the development of personal and relational agency. This was achieved through a pedagogical development and expansion period (phase C). A primary finding through the iterative phase (phase D) was the value of imaginal contemplation, attentive listening, and empathy as capacities that enable an ecological citizen’s overall capability. I ascribed this to Nussbaum and Sen’s (1993) capability theory and the need to enable the articulation and implementation of a citizen’s valued ‘beings and doings’. Through this iterative phase, specific attention is given to listening and intuitive capacities in enabling personal and relational agency, and specifically I observed the fundamental role of imagination in this form of learning. Particularly valuable for the educational contribution of this study is the pedagogical development of the Earth Forum practice that enables an accessible, socially constructed form of learning. This contributes specifically to exploring ‘how’ social learning is undertaken, and I argue that an aesthetic approach to learning is vital for the education of the ecological citizen. I carefully describe how one can conduct collaborative practice-based research that utilises creative connective practice in agency development. This collaborative approach, with regard to learning socially and capacity development for ecological citizenship (that focuses its attention on addressing ecological apartheid and separateness), is articulated through a multiple-genred text. I found that empathetic capacity in ecological citizen education is relatively unexplored, and within listening and as well in empathy theory, that the role of imagination in listening and empathy development, requires greater attention. I attempt to reveal how connective practice considers aesthetic form and shape in expanding capacities of human beings, and introduce novel expanded forms of developing pedagogies that encourage personal and relational agency in the context of ecological apartheid from the artsbased field of social sculpture. Finally, I aim in this study to share the potential value found in social sculpture theory and practice into the field of environmental education and social learning through a reflection on the current context of education and social learning, and its potential enrichment via social sculpture processes.

The complex human process of sport coaching is a dynamic and evolving practice that develops over a long period of time. Coaches learn from a number of different situations and their past experiences influence what they choose to pay attention to and learn from (Werthner & Trudel, 2009). This dissertation explores the lifelong learning process through a collective case study involving four coaches for athletes with a physical disability. The theoretical framework that guides this study is Jarvis’ (2006, 2007, 2009) comprehensive view on human learning, including his concept of lifelong learning, and key concepts such as biography, experience and disjuncture, and types of learning. Jarvis' psychosocial perspective on human learning is a useful lens for a closer examination of how coaches develop over a lifetime and how they change and continue the process of becoming through new experiences, which they gain, more often than not, within a social context. The work of Moon (1999, 2004) and her metaphor of a network view of learning is a complementary framework for examining learning through reflective practice. Moon's generic view of learning (1999) illustrates how a network of knowledge, feelings and emotions make up one’s "cognitive structure" and suggests that this structure plays an important role in the learning process as it guides what we choose to pay attention to and what we choose to learn. A thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006) was used to extract themes and examples from three in-depth interviews with each coach, observation of the coach in their coaching contexts, as well as interviews with key collaborators in their coaching practice. The transcripts were member checked to increase trustworthiness. Three articles comprise the results section and the main points in this dissertation are as follows: (a) a case study of one exemplary parasport coach and how he learned through a wide variety of life experiences, such as pragmatic problem solving, education, and building relationships; (b) the four coaches who engaged in social learning through meaningful interactions with a variety of key collaborators who contributed to their learning and coaching practice; and (c) the four coaches who used reflection to learn and to build their coaching practices within the unique context of the parasport world. These findings contribute to the emerging body of literature on coaches for athletes with disabilities by adding to our understanding of how coaches’ life experiences and biographies determine what kinds of learning opportunities they each found meaningful; the importance of the social context in learning to coach athletes with disabilities; and the role and importance of reflection in understanding the interconnections of learning from life experiences, particularly in the unique and developing parasport setting. The study will also aid coach educators in understanding the role and importance of past learning experiences and the social context in coach learning.

The purpose of this doctoral dissertation was twofold: (a) to explore how communities of practice (CoPs) can be designed, implemented, assessed, and sustained in sport settings, and (b) to examine the value that is created by participating in a community of practice using Wenger, Trayner, and De Laat’s (2011) value creation framework. Two studies were conducted. In Study One, a sport coach CoP was collaboratively designed, implemented, and assessed in a youth soccer organisation. Data generation included two individual interviews with each co-researcher, observations from CoP gatherings, and communications via an online discussion platform. Findings indicated that the co-researchers created value within each of the five cycles of value creation outlined in Wenger and colleagues’ framework. The co-researchers created value that was personally relevant to their coaching needs, which led to an increase in perceived coaching abilities. The co-researchers also gained new perspectives, such as the importance of social learning, and a broader view of athlete development. Study Two examined the value that was created in five CoPs nested in the university sport setting and how they were sustained. One interview was conducted with each participant (10 coaches and two administrators). The findings revealed that the coaches created value in each of the five cycles of the value creation framework. They learned a variety of strategies, some of which they implemented in their coaching practice. As a result, the coaches noticed an improvement in their coaching abilities and their athletes’ outcomes. The coaches also gained new perspectives, and reframed their views concerning their personal development and that of their athletes. For example, the coaches realised the importance of focusing on their own well-being. They also realised the importance of learning through social interactions, and developed a broader view of athlete development. The findings from both Study One and Study Two illustrate that CoPs in sport settings are practical and pragmatic, and that they have a positive impact on coaches’ development and on their coaching practices.

This thesis is focused on the educational theories, forms of training, development and types of e - learning. Then there are mentioned new online educational technologies, pros and cons of on-line learning and its trends (gamification, social learning, MOOCs, etc.). This theoretical knowledge is necessary for understanding the principles of the on-line education and importance of massive open online courses. One part of the practical section concentrates on the results of a questionnaire regarding the presence of on- line technologies in a student learning. Another part reflects the aim of the thesis and generally analyses the possibilities of the university involvement in MOOC. Specifically, it states the conditions and process of college involvement in the German educational platform iversity.

This study investigates the relationship between social learning and perceived realism in the context of an entertainment media text, the 2015 movie San Andreas. As a fictional natural disaster movie, this film depicts several safety and survival techniques that could potentially be observed and adopted by audience members should they face a similar situation (i.e. major earthquake). While the majority of these techniques align with professionally recommended behaviors, a few are misleading. This study investigates the perceptions, attitudes, beliefs, and behavioral intentions different groups of audience members hold concerning the behaviors they observed in the film. Participants were grouped by geologically-based knowledge levels and levels of perceived realism. While the findings of this study reveal minimal differences based on knowledge and perceived realism, results clearly show that the film triggered high levels of curiosity and thinking about earthquakes and earthquake safety across the board. Furthermore, all audience members appeared to be persuaded on both a conscious and even more so on a subconscious level to behave as the characters in the film did, assuming the consequences of those actions were positive. These findings suggest that entertainment media texts can be a powerful educational and persuasive tool.