Yes / Informal caregivers of people with dementia develop their own beliefs about the condition, referred to as Dementia Representations (DRs), as they try to make sense of the changes they are observing. The first aim of this study was to provide a profile of the types of DRs held by caregivers. The second aim was to examine the impact of caregivers’ DRs on their well-being, satisfaction with life (SwL) and caregiving stress. Methods: Participants were 1264 informal caregivers of people in the mild-to-moderate stages of dementia from time-point 1 of the IDEAL cohort study. Measures: DRs were measured using questionnaire items covering: Identity, Cause, Control, and Timeline. Results: Almost half (49.2%) of caregivers used a diagnostic term to describe the person’s condition, although 93.4% of caregivers stated they were aware of the diagnosis. Higher well-being, SwL, and lower caregiving stress were associated with the use of an identity term relating to specific symptoms of dementia, attributing the cause to ageing or not knowing the cause, and believing the condition would stay the same. Lower well-being, SwL, and higher caregiving stress were associated with believing there was little that could be done to control the effects of the condition. Conclusion: Healthcare professionals should assess and gain an understanding of caregivers’ DRs in order to provide more tailored information and support. / Economic and Social Research Council (UK) and the National Institute for Health Research (UK) grant ES/L001853/2

This dissertation collects four papers on common knowledge and one on introspection principles in epistemic game theory. The first two papers offer a sustained argument against the importance of common knowledge and belief in explaining social behavior. Chapters 3 and 4 study the role of common knowledge of tautologies in standard models in epistemic logic and game theory. The first considers the problem as it relates to Robert Aumann’s Agreement Theorem; the second (joint work with Peter Fritz) studies it in models of awareness. The fifth paper corrects a claimed Agreement Theorem of Geanakoplos (1989), and exploits the corrected theorem to provide epistemic conditions for correlated equilibrium and Nash equilibrium.

This thesis is focused on the theme of parity and disparity in settlements of common marital property. The main aim of this work is to analyze the topic of parity and disparity in settlements of common marital property, which is not summarized complexly in professional literature. The thesis is composed of seven chapters, which are divided into sections and subsections. Chapter One is an introductory chapter which provides the basic starting points and main purpose of this thesis. Chapter Two describes the historical development and conception of common marital property in our legal environment. Encompassing changes from Roman law through to modern Czech law. Chapter Three contains a short introduction to the topic, the basic characteristics of common marital property together with its creation, termination, regimes, modifications, settlement and methods of settlement are described in the beginning of the text. This chapter is used as a base for all other parts of the thesis. Chapter Four is the core of the thesis. It will deal with the conditions, reasons and consequences of using disparity in the case of settlement of community property. The topic is analyzed considering the basic normative starting points of parity and disparity. Current judicature is very important source of this thesis and is...

Approved for public release, distribution is unlimited / Configuration Management (CM) plays a vital role in the development of trusted computing systems. The Common Criteria (CC) provides a framework for performing Information Technology (IT) security evaluations of these systems and further emphasizes CM's role in the development and evaluation process by specifying a minimum set of CM qualities for each Evaluated Assurance Level (EAL). As an evaluation guide, the Common Methodology for Information Technology Security Evaluation, Part 2: Evaluation Methodology (CEM), recommends a set of minimum CM guidelines which can be used by evaluators in the performance of a CM evaluation at the lower Evaluated Assurance Levels. Evaluators and developers will quickly note the CEM's lack of recommended CM guidelines at the higher assurance levels. Thorough study of the listed references supports the hypothesis for this work: Configuration Management guidelines are useful in the evaluation of trusted computing systems. As an assurance mechanism, complete CM guidance helps users of high assurance products obtain a degree of confidence the system security requirements operate as intended and do not contain clandestine code. Complete CM guidance provides evaluators with a "completed assurance scale" and ensures only authorized changes were made to the TOE during development. Useful CM guidelines at the higher assurance levels (EAL5, 6, and 7) will help developers and evaluators ensure products meet the minimum requirements needed for high assurance systems. / Lieutenant, United States Navy

O controle judicial de constitucionalidade moderno nasceu nos Estados Unidos, a partir da decisão do caso Marbury v. Madison, em 1803. Desde então pode-se dizer que as atenções do meio acadêmico jurídico, especialmente no campo do direito contitucional, foram progressivamente voltando-se a essa prática, com vistas a melhor compreendê-la. A partir da segunda metade do século XX, o controle de constitucionalidade foi amplamente difundido e hoje está presente na grande maioria dos países democráticos. Mais recentemente, os debates sobre o tema convergiram para os excessos cometidos pelos órgãos incumbidos, em cada Estado, da tarefa de revisar a constitucionalidade da legislação. Foram colocados no centro das discussões não apenas o modo por meio do qual os órgãos de controle atuam, especialmente o Poder Judiciário, mas também a própria legitimidade do exercício dessa função, tendo em vista as tensões existentes entre o controle de constitucionalidade das leis por órgãos não representativos e os princípios democrático e do Estado de Direito. Dessa forma, a tese inicia-se buscando compreender as origens do judicial review na tradição do common law inglês; em seguida, procura desvendar como a tradição do direito inglês foi incorporada aos Estados Unidos e compatibilizada à sua constituição escrita; passa, então, a descrever as dificuldades que os autores modernos encontraram para justificar o exercício do controle judicial de constitucionalidade, tendo em vista a dificuldade contramajoritária que enfrenta; expõe, assim, algumas críticas ao que se convencionou chamar de supremacia judicial, tese que afirma competir ao Poder Judiciário proferir a última palavra sobre o significado da Constituição; e, por fim, reinserindo o debate no plano do constitucionalismo político, a tese explicita a noção de diálogo institucional e tenta imaginar os papéis institucionais que Cortes e Parlamentos exercem ou devem exercer nesse debate, com foco especialmente no Brasil e na relação entre o Supremo Tribunal Federal e o Congresso Nacional relativamente à interpretação da Constituição. / This thesis focuses on the problems of the contemporary constitutional review in Brazil. It is widely recognised that constitutional review was established in 1803 with the landmark case Marbury v Madison. By the second half of the 20th century some form of constitutional review had been adopted by most western democracies. More recently the excesses of such a form of control of the legislative function have shifted the experts attention to the phenomenon of judicial supremacy. Because it is most frequently performed by unelected officials, the procedures of judicial review have been put under scrutiny and its very legitimacy has been questioned. This tension between the majoritarian principle and the judicial function of constitutional review became known as the counter-majoritarian difficulty. Although our main focus is on the Brazilian constitutional review, we start by going back to the beginnings of the judicial review within the common law tradition in order to understand the primitive structure of this function. Then we move on to its transplantation into American legal practice, which uses a written constitution as a basis for the judicial review. Next, we examine some of the contemporary uses of constitutional review, as depicted by its critics. Finally, we analyse the relations between the Supreme Court and the National Congress of Brazil in performing judicial review. We argue that in order to overcome the counter-majoritarian difficulty, we must accept this constitutional function as a political one, which means moving beyond its judicial features and including other institutions, such as the Congress, in the process of judging whether or not statutes should be invalidated when they breach the constitution. We call this widening of the range of institutions capable of participating in the constitutional review institutional dialogue.

O principal objetivo deste trabalho é mostrar que uma convenção social está fortemente relacionada com o conceito de equilíbrio correlacionado. Através da interação de longo prazo e do aprendizado, os agentes podem chegar a um acordo, mesmo com suposições pouco restritivas e que possibilitem uma interpretação mais natural e realista do conceito de equilíbrio em Teoria dos Jogos. Inicialmente a suposição de conhecimento comum é apresentado de maneira formal e informal. O conceito de equilíbrio correlacionado é apresentado com exemplos. Finalmente, a relação entre o equilíbrio correlacionado e a convenção social é analisada. / The main purpose of this dissertation is to show that a convention can be related to a correlated equilibrium. Through the long run interaction and learning, the players can reach an agreement, even if we relax the traditional assumptions of Game Theory, and we can find a more natural and plausible interpretation of equilibrium. Initially the common knowledge assumption is presented in a formal and informal way. The correlated equilibrium is presented with examples. Finally, the relation between correlated equilibrium and convention is analyzed.

O controle judicial de constitucionalidade moderno nasceu nos Estados Unidos, a partir da decisão do caso Marbury v. Madison, em 1803. Desde então pode-se dizer que as atenções do meio acadêmico jurídico, especialmente no campo do direito contitucional, foram progressivamente voltando-se a essa prática, com vistas a melhor compreendê-la. A partir da segunda metade do século XX, o controle de constitucionalidade foi amplamente difundido e hoje está presente na grande maioria dos países democráticos. Mais recentemente, os debates sobre o tema convergiram para os excessos cometidos pelos órgãos incumbidos, em cada Estado, da tarefa de revisar a constitucionalidade da legislação. Foram colocados no centro das discussões não apenas o modo por meio do qual os órgãos de controle atuam, especialmente o Poder Judiciário, mas também a própria legitimidade do exercício dessa função, tendo em vista as tensões existentes entre o controle de constitucionalidade das leis por órgãos não representativos e os princípios democrático e do Estado de Direito. Dessa forma, a tese inicia-se buscando compreender as origens do judicial review na tradição do common law inglês; em seguida, procura desvendar como a tradição do direito inglês foi incorporada aos Estados Unidos e compatibilizada à sua constituição escrita; passa, então, a descrever as dificuldades que os autores modernos encontraram para justificar o exercício do controle judicial de constitucionalidade, tendo em vista a dificuldade contramajoritária que enfrenta; expõe, assim, algumas críticas ao que se convencionou chamar de supremacia judicial, tese que afirma competir ao Poder Judiciário proferir a última palavra sobre o significado da Constituição; e, por fim, reinserindo o debate no plano do constitucionalismo político, a tese explicita a noção de diálogo institucional e tenta imaginar os papéis institucionais que Cortes e Parlamentos exercem ou devem exercer nesse debate, com foco especialmente no Brasil e na relação entre o Supremo Tribunal Federal e o Congresso Nacional relativamente à interpretação da Constituição. / This thesis focuses on the problems of the contemporary constitutional review in Brazil. It is widely recognised that constitutional review was established in 1803 with the landmark case Marbury v Madison. By the second half of the 20th century some form of constitutional review had been adopted by most western democracies. More recently the excesses of such a form of control of the legislative function have shifted the experts attention to the phenomenon of judicial supremacy. Because it is most frequently performed by unelected officials, the procedures of judicial review have been put under scrutiny and its very legitimacy has been questioned. This tension between the majoritarian principle and the judicial function of constitutional review became known as the counter-majoritarian difficulty. Although our main focus is on the Brazilian constitutional review, we start by going back to the beginnings of the judicial review within the common law tradition in order to understand the primitive structure of this function. Then we move on to its transplantation into American legal practice, which uses a written constitution as a basis for the judicial review. Next, we examine some of the contemporary uses of constitutional review, as depicted by its critics. Finally, we analyse the relations between the Supreme Court and the National Congress of Brazil in performing judicial review. We argue that in order to overcome the counter-majoritarian difficulty, we must accept this constitutional function as a political one, which means moving beyond its judicial features and including other institutions, such as the Congress, in the process of judging whether or not statutes should be invalidated when they breach the constitution. We call this widening of the range of institutions capable of participating in the constitutional review institutional dialogue.

Abundance, distribution and habitat preferences of the lizard species present on Motunau Island, off the Canterbury coast of New Zealand, were investigated. The aim of the study was to investigate the extent to which recent vegetation change on Motunau Island has effected the lizard community and what implications this has for the future management of the Island. Three species of lizard occur on Motunau Island; the common gecko (Hoplodactylus maculatus), common skink (Oligosoma nigriplantare polychroma) and spotted skink (O. lineoocellatum). Rabbits (Oryctolagus cuniculus) were present on the island from 1862 until their eradication in 1962. Since then, vegetation on the island has changed from being tussock-dominated to being dominated by exotic weeds. Data from lizard pitfall trap surveys carried out in 1967-75 by Tony Whitaker of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) were compared with new pitfall trapping data to determine if changes in the lizard population had occurred in response to these vegetation changes. The abundance of O. n. polychroma and H. maculatus does not appear to change significantly. The distribution of these two species were significantly correlated but neither showed any preference for a particular type. The abundance of O. lineoocellatum was significantly greater in 1996/97 than in the earlier DSlR surveys. This could be a result of the vegetation becoming more open and more structurally complex since the early surveys. This would offer greater opportunities for O. lineoocellatum (which is strongly heliothermic) to thermoregulate and forage. O. lineoocellatum showed no consistent significant preference towards any habitat type, although they tended to be found more in 'margin' habitat. Research into pitfall trapping and the way lizard behaviour may influence pitfall trapping data needs to be undertaken as there is a possible trap bias in this study. Management of Motunau Island needs to ensure that a structurally complex environment is maintained to ensure high numbers of all three lizard species can continue to coexist.

There are growing industrial demands for low-voltage supply and low-power consumption circuits and systems. This is especially true for very high integration level and very large scale integrated (VLSI) mixed-signal chips and system-on-a-chip. It is mainly due to the limited power dissipation within a small area and the costs related to the packaging and thermal management. In this research work, two low-voltage, low-power integrated circuits used for data communication systems are introduced. The first one is a high performance continuous-time linear phase filter with automatic frequency tuning. The filter can be used in hard disk driver systems and wired communication systems such as 1000Base-T transceivers. A pseudo-differential operational transconductance amplifier (OTA) based on transistors operating in triode region is used to achieve a large linear signal swing with low-voltage supplies. A common-mode (CM) control circuit that combines common-mode feedback (CMFB), common-mode feedforward (CMFF), and adaptive-bias has been proposed. With a 2.3V single supply, the filter’s total harmonic distortion is less than –44dB for a 2VPP differential input, which is due to the well controlled CM behavior. The ratio of the root mean square value of the ac signal to the power supply voltage is around 31%, which is much better than previous realizations. The second integrated circuit includes two LVDS drivers used for high-speed point-to-point links. By removing the stacked switches used in the conventional structures, both LVDS drivers can operate with ultra low-voltage supplies. Although the Double Current Sources (DCS) LVDS driver draws twice minimum static current as required by the signal swing, it is quite simple and achieves very high speed operation. The Switchable Current Sources (SCS) LVDS driver, by dynamically switching the current sources, draws minimum static current and reduces the power consumption by 60% compared to the previously reported LVDS drivers. Both LVDS drivers are compliant to the standards and operate at data rates up to gigabits-per-second.

Dieses Forschungspapier fasst die zentralen Ergebnisse entsprechenden Diplomarbeit zur Steuerverwaltung in Polen zusammen. Die zentrale Fragestellung lautet, wie sich diese spezifische öffentliche Verwaltungsstruktur im Zuge der Transformation und des Beitritts zur Europäischen Union entwickelt hat und inwiefern sie heute europäischen Standards entspricht. Da es der EU in dem Bereich an Kompetenzen mangelt, besteht kein einheitliches europäisches Modell der Steuerverwaltung, an dem die polnische zu messen wäre. Die Autorin nutzt das im Rahmen der Europäisierungsforschung entwickelte Konzept des Europäischen Verwaltungsraums, um die aktuelle Gestalt der polnischen Steuerverwaltung unter Berücksichtigung verbindlicher Vorgaben der EU und deren Aktivitäten im Beitrittsprozess analysieren zu können. Ob es eine spezifisch europäische Steuerverwaltung gibt, wird anhand von Daten der OECD mit einer Clusteranalyse ausgelotet werden. Schließlich wird Polens Verortung in den differenzierten Steuerverwaltungswelten ermittelt. Desweiteren analysiert die Autorin die Verbreitung des Common Assessment Frameworks in den Steuerverwaltungen in den Staaten Mittelosteuropas thematisiert. Eine eigene Umfrage bei den polnischen Finanzämtern bringt mehr Klarheit über die Nutzung des CAF in der polnischen Steuerverwaltung. Schließlich ermittelt die Autorin mittels eines semantischen Differentials das Image der polnischen Steuerverwaltung in Deutschland und vergleicht dieses mit dem Selbstbild der deutschen Steuerverwaltung. In einer Schlussbetrachtung werden die Ergebnisse der verschiedenen Untersuchungen zusammengeführt. Die Antwort der Autorin auf die aufgeworfene Frage nach dem europäischen Charakter der polnischen Steuerverwaltung ist verhalten optimistisch. / This research paper is including the central findings of the diploma thesis diploma about the fiscal administration in Poland. The central question is, how this specific public administrative structure developed in the course of the transformation process and the entry to the European Union and to what extent it corresponds today to European standards. Since the European Union has only few competencies in this field, no uniform European model of the fiscal administration exist, at which the Polish fiscal administration would be measured. The author uses the concept of the European administrative space, in order to be able to analyze the current shape of the Polish fiscal administration with special consideration of obligatory defaults of the European Union and their activities during the entry process. Whether there is a specifically European fiscal administration will be find out, on the basis of data of the OECD with a cluster analysis. Finally, Poland’s place in the different fiscal administration worlds is determined. Further the author analyzes the spreading of the Common Assessment Frameworks in the fiscal administrations in Central Eastern European Countries. Its own inquiry with the Polish tax offices brings more clarity over the use of the CAF in the Polish fiscal administration. Finally the author determines the image of the Polish fiscal administration in Germany by means of a semantic differential and compares this with the self-image of the German fiscal administration. In a final consideration the results of the different findings are connected. The answer of the author to the raised question about the European character of the Polish fiscal administration is with restraint optimistic.