This paper examines the use of symbolism when companies communicate through advertisement. This is done by using a symbolic interactionist and dramaturgical approach to the use of symbols in advertisements. The field of previous research has also been studied and taken into consideration when analyzing the advertisements. The setup of this study is a unique combination between the field of social psychology and marketing. The base perspective of Blumers symbolic interactionism and Goffmans dramaturgy is used when examining how symbolism are used by companies in advertisements. This is where the study’s uniqueness comes from. Although previous research has touched the topic, none have looked at symbolism in marketing this way. The aim of this study is to contribute with research that brings knowledge to the field of both social psychology and marketing. The analysis of the advertisements shows that all the companies use symbolism in different ways to communicate their intended message. A consistent way that symbolism is used through the different advertisements is by connecting the symbolism of everyday situations to the company or their products. Through symbolic messaging the advertisements proved to also attempt to imbue the products with a symbolic meaning. Additional ways that symbolism is used in advertising are discussed thoroughly in the paper.

Demand for new methods of beef production is rising due to concern over potential impacts on human health, animal welfare, and the environment. Researchers at Utah State University have developed a method of beef production from cattle finished on tannin-containing legume forages in the Rocky Mountain Region in order to address those concerns. To ensure success of this product, the demand and marketability needed to be assessed. Food values addressed through new production standards and certifications are communicated through labeling by culinary professionals in the kitchen and behind service counters. This research study utilized qualitative methods to understand how culinary leaders construct meaning regarding non-conventional beef. A discursive analysis of labels, menus, and websites revealed that storytelling and branding are more important than third-party certifications. Thematic analysis of interviews with culinary professionals discovered participants are open to new products but environmental concern was tempered by concern for pleasing customers and hindered by planning a menu around consistency and quality. This research found that the success of beef from cattle finished on tannin-containing legume forages is dependent on the benefits being communicated in a way that emphasizes authenticity, tradition, and standards of quality necessary for culinary professionals.

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Humans engage with a variety of symbols in daily life. Perhaps the most common symbol form is language where we represent myriad concepts, ideas, and notions through strings of sounds and letters. Human communication is also facilitated through other non-verbal symbol modalities ranging from body language/gestures (e.g., crossed arms, thumbs up) to objects (clothing as an indication of social status), and signs (red octagon means stop). Child language research has explored symbolic cognition and its emergence in development, but fundamental questions remain regarding symbolic thinking in adulthood and the impact a symbolic deficit can have on communication. A novel, neurologically-constrained model of symbolic representation is proposed and investigated which aims to addresses open challenges in exploring symbolic cognition. In Chapter 1, SymCog, a novel toolkit to evaluate symbolic representation is developed and normed in a series of three studies. This toolkit and its task, the Symbol Identification Task, are premised upon matching animated video depictions of abstract concepts to their corresponding verbal and non-verbal symbols. Results showed individuals can consistently match different symbol modalities (words, images) to shared concept animations. Chapter 2 assesses performance in the Symbol Identification Task in neurotypical adults receiving inhibitory brain stimulation [i.e., transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) of the temporoparietal junction]. Chapter 3 evaluates two cases of persons with aphasia (PWA) in the same task. The goal of these studies was to isolate the neurological-constraints of the model and identify how symbol processing can be impaired. Findings showed reduced performance in the inhibitory stimulation group; highlighting the role of the temporoparietal junction in symbol processing. Results from PWA revealed one case had poor performance across both word and image symbol modalities. Chapter 4 further investigates neurological constraints of the model in an EEG/ERP study. This study assessed N400 deflections during a modified Symbol Identification Task, where frontal-central electrodes were most active. Taken together, these chapter findings suggested two cortical regions potentially support symbolic cognition, including the temporoparietal junction and left central frontal cortex. The results also suggest that impairments in one symbol modality (e.g., words in aphasia) might also present in other modalities for shared concepts. These studies offer insights regarding the cognitive mechanisms involved in symbolic cognition and how they can be impaired. With the use of contemporary tools, such as the SymCog toolkit, future research can better recognize the human capacity to understand and use symbols. / Communication Sciences

This dissertation draws on semi-structured interviews with 20 former youth in care to examine their experiences in Ontario’s child welfare system and the long-term impacts of those experiences. Using a symbolic interactionist approach, the study analyzes the biographical disruption that experiences in the care system represented for participants and how this affected their life trajectories. The findings are organized and discussed around three themes: a) participants’ involvement with the system – how they experienced entering, being in, and exiting the system; b) the stigma participants experienced while in care, and their efforts to neutralize or manage the stigma; and c) the impact that their care experiences had on participants as adults. The data reveal a range of challenges that participants encountered while they were in care, including loneliness, isolation, neglect, general mistreatment and in some cases, abuse. Particularly damaging were the stigma and assaults on “self” that participants experienced as a result of their care status. The data also reveal that in one way or another, these early experiences followed participants into their adult lives, leaving them with a myriad of issues and concerns. The dissertation ends with a discussion of the substantive and theoretical contributions of the findings, as well as a section that addresses the policy implications of the research. / Dissertation / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / This dissertation draws on semi-structured interviews with 20 former youth in care to examine their experiences in the care system and the long-term impacts of those experiences. Participants described their time in care, including the stereotyping, stigma, abuse, and general mistreatment they encountered, as well as the loneliness and isolation they experienced. Leaving the care system also came with a distinct set of challenges that often persisted into their adult lives. The analysis focuses on impacts relating to identity, self-perception, and material circumstances for those who pass through Ontario’s child welfare system.

Using a qualitative semiotic analysis and a quantitative netnographic approach, this mixed method study seeks to examine the use of nostalgic marketing within the field of luxury fashion advertising. The focal point of the study focused on material from online video content posted by four European luxury fashion brands between the years 2020 and 2022, as well as commentary feedback from their followers on social media platforms Instagram and Youtube. Basing our research on previous literature regarding both nostalgia and luxury fashion marketing individually, along with a theoretical framework including theory of semiotics, theory of representation, mythology and luxury branding, the aim was to establish whether or not the selected brands were successful in inducing nostalgic emotions in their viewers. This study offers insights into marketing perspectives, branding strategies and how to build brand equity through attachment and loyalty towards luxury fashion brands through the use of nostalgia. By analysing four luxury brands, three of which can be considered as heritage brands and the forth being newly-established on the market, and juxtaposing them against each other to compare their cultural, symbolic and nostalgic elements included in their advertising video campaigns and study their individual effectiveness. Throughout our research, it was indicated that the symbolic value within imagery must be enhanced, specifically in regards to luxury fashion brands, for consumers to have positive impressions of the brand and be willing to purchase from the brand. Therefore, luxury fashion brands continuously try to deliver dream-like scenarios in order to fulfil consumers’ desires and luxury experiences.

The ingrained economic, political, and cultural structures in society create difficulties for people to change consumption habits because they have existed in society for a long time where individuals’ social networks affect consumption. The purpose of this research has been to highlight and analyze the effect of the connection between social network and consumption and to reflect on how one's social network affects consumption habits. A quantitative survey using the 2018 Living Costs and Food Survey dataset with 5000 respondents was conducted for this reason. Social cost was used as a measure to highlight the effect it has on consumption. The result highlighted that material products acted as symbolic capital that the respondents consumed to strengthen their social ties that existed within their social networks.

Program testing is an important aspect of software development. Symbolic execution can be used as a tool to automatically verify the correctness of programs for all feasible paths of execution. Moreover, for embedded systems symbolic execution can be used to generate test cases to estimate run times to help determine the worst-case execution time (WCET) and schedulability of systems. This thesis explores an architecture for symbolic execution for use in embedded Rust. Accompanied with the architecture are implementation details of a prototype Symex that can handle small programs. Symex evaluates all feasible paths of execution looking for errors and assertions, and reports which concrete inputs lead to errors. Included with the prototype is a command-line tool to automatically build and analyze Rust projects. The tool allows for easy analysis of projects, and an included library provides functions to manipulate symbolic variables to aid the analysis. The method of evaluating all feasible paths work well with the purpose of evaluating embedded systems, where the aim is typically to keep the code complexity low. The low code complexity lends the software to be resilient towards path explosion. For the cases where this cannot be helped the functions to manipulate the symbolic variables in the analysis can be used to further constrain the variables and lower the number of feasible paths. The evaluation shows the architecture is feasible for the intended use case in embedded systems. Furthermore, evaluation of the prototype shows how the system can be used to show the absence of errors, verify functions, and check for functional equivalence. Inherent to the symbolic execution approach the system cannot handle programs with a large branching factor.

This exploratory study utilized qualitative methods to approach regional language abilities of local respondents and how it affects their regional identity. The theoretical framework of this study explored some of the tenets of symbolic interaction emphasizing on identity theory and how the flexible aspect of face-to-face interaction can define the self and someone's regional identity as it relates to their regional language use. Data for this study were collected in a small Occitan village in Southern France. In particular, the study explored the link between an individual residential setting, his/her age and his/her ability to speak the regional language. The results indicate that the ability to speak the specific regional or even sub regional language does not greatly affect an individual's regional identity, thus potentially contributing to the continuing decline of that language in the region. Furthermore, that future studies are merited to explore whether these results are specific or if they can more broadly be applied to other Occitan regions or elsewhere where regional languages are spoken.

This research explored psychological, social, and relational aspects of caregiving. It examined documented resolution of ethical dilemmas precipitated by veterans' medical crises and involved formal caregivers, informal caregivers, and veteran patients. The unit of analysis was caregiving relationships. The main research question asked, how does case documentation and documented processes of resolving ethical dilemmas in institutional healthcare for veterans reflect relational ethics? Relational ethics was defined as fairness of interpersonal give and take and included efforts to elicit, understand, and honor veteran's values and care preferences. The caregiving context was a Veterans Affairs Medical Center (VAMC). The research population was 25 male veterans whose cases required intervention by the VAMC ethics committee. The research was conducted in three phases using grounded theory methodology. The research purpose, guided by symbolic interaction theory, was to develop substantive theory in relational ethics. Study analyses used Atlas.ti qualitative software. Main study one, Veteran-Formal Caregiver Relations, focused on relational processes internal to the VAMC. It explored how members of professional healthcare disciplines documented ethical caregiving concerns amongst themselves and in interactions with veteran patients. Agency emerged as the core category. Agency meant that veteran patients could make choices and act on those choices in ways that impacted their care. When veterans' agency was compromised, formal caregivers' roles became more salient. The substantive theory was the dynamic process of clarifying agency. Main study two, Formal-Informal Caregiver Relations, focused on interactions between VAMC staff and veterans' significant others. It explored medical center staff communications with informal caregivers regarding veterans' health problems. Documented interactions confirmed the impact of relational ethics. Agendas and advocacy emerged as key categories that determined and respected veterans' relational autonomy. Relational autonomy validated other ethical concerns and resource demands, considered social context, and included obligations as well as entitlements. The substantive theory was the agenda to advocate for relational autonomy. Substantive theories from the two main studies were integrated. Categorical dimensions were combined into substantive theory; that doing the right thing in institutional caregiving for veterans was the dynamic process of clarifying agency with the agenda to advocate for relational autonomy. / Ph. D.