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In counselling and psychotherapy, the issue of class is neglected both theoretically and in practice. This thesis aims to address this anomaly by focusing on the class dynamic in the therapeutic relationship. First, the study offers a theoretical exploration of the three major concepts of class. Second, the empirical research aims to highlight how the working class research participants perceive therapists and counselling, and how the counsellor participants perceive class and manage class difference. I argue that class is complex and multidimensional. Therefore, no one theory about class offers a complete account. With this in mind three theoretical concepts are explored demonstrating their potential usefulness to the provision and practice of therapy. The position taken is that two of these concepts, class as a relational phenomenon, and class maintained and reproduced through habitus, capital and dispositions of the therapist and the client provide a means by which the class dynamic can be analysed, with consequences for the therapeutic transference. The empirical inquiry constitutes a theory led, constructionist, thematic focus group analysis, cross referenced to individual counsellor interviews. The data was gathered from six focus groups situated in Sure Start Children Centres across the West Midlands. Each centre was located within the highest percentile of nationally delineated deprivation factors. The research findings suggest that all participants called on latent socio-cultural accounts of class in relationally defining themselves in opposition to others; that the power dynamic in the therapeutic relationship is constructed differently between the working class participants and the counsellors; that therapists symbolise a homogenous middle class to the working class participants; that the cultural capital of the therapist is resisted by the working class client; and that the focus group participants’ constructions of therapy, coupled with the counsellors’ terms of therapeutic engagement when working in Sure Start centres, signal implications for practice. Class, as addressed in this study, indicates it is an issue in primary processing, and confirms its centrality to the therapeutic relationship.

<p> Vibration Analysis (VA) is a key technique used for maintenance and fault detection of vibrating machinery. The purpose of maintenance is to analyze how well the machinery is operating within its target parameters, while fault detection is done to diagnose and locate a fault that might be developing on the machinery.</p> <p> If we consider s(n) to be the true signal from a rotating system and e(n) to be the additive noise corrupting the signal, then the observed signal is x(n) = s(n) + e(n). If s(n) is composed of a main driving frequency sm(n) and summed fault frequencies sf(n), then fault detection is the study of sf(n). In fault detection, we eliminate e(n) as much as possible so that sf(n) can be isolated and studied.</p> <p> This thesis presents a technique based on cross-correlation, utilizing a network of sensors, to eliminate e(n) from the measurements, preserving just the correlated frequency content. This is extended to provide a means of localizing the source of the frequency content, based on the relative strengths of the members of the complete set of cross-correlations between all sensors. This technique has been shown to be able to extract a signal buried by noise, in situations where the traditional FFT fails.</p> <p> To enable this, a new VA system has been developed. This introduces new wireless vibration sensors as well as a data capture unit capable of providing real-time VA data to technicians. The system can simultaneously capture data from eight sensors, so the data can be used not only for traditional VA techniques, but also in conjunction with the cross-correlation technique described above. This system is now commercially available and in use by dozens of technicians around the world. </p> / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

<p>Även om forskning i miljöområdet och forskning i psykologi har kommit långt saknas det forskningsansatser som förenar de två. Ambitionen med uppsatsen är att förena miljöområdet och psykologi genom att undersöka vilka faktorer som är bidragande orsak till miljöengagemang. Deltagarna var 91 studenter som svarade på en enkät där miljöengagemang studerades. Resultatet visade att det fanns ett signifikant samband mellan att tycka människor i världen var viktiga och ha ett miljöengagemang. Det fanns även ett positivt samband mellan om närstående var miljömedvetna och om deltagaren var det samt ett positivt samband mellan miljömedvetenhet i teorin och praktiken.</p>

Även om forskning i miljöområdet och forskning i psykologi har kommit långt saknas det forskningsansatser som förenar de två. Ambitionen med uppsatsen är att förena miljöområdet och psykologi genom att undersöka vilka faktorer som är bidragande orsak till miljöengagemang. Deltagarna var 91 studenter som svarade på en enkät där miljöengagemang studerades. Resultatet visade att det fanns ett signifikant samband mellan att tycka människor i världen var viktiga och ha ett miljöengagemang. Det fanns även ett positivt samband mellan om närstående var miljömedvetna och om deltagaren var det samt ett positivt samband mellan miljömedvetenhet i teorin och praktiken.

Current literature regarding quality health services frequently identifies interprofessional collaboration (IPC) as essential to patient-centred care, sustainable health systems, and a productive workforce. The IPC literature tends to focus on interprofessionalism and collaboration and pays little attention to the concept of practice, which is thought to be a represented world of objects and processes that have pre-given characteristics practitioners can know cognitively and apply or manage correctly. Many strategies intended to support IPC simplify and codify the complex, contested, and unpredictable day-to-day interactions among interdependent agents that I argue constitute the practices of a community. These strategies are based in systems thinking, which understand the system as distinct from experience and subject to rational, linear logic. In this thinking, a leader can step outside of the system to develop an ideal plan, which is then implemented to unfold the predetermined ideal future. However, changes in health services and healthcare practices are often difficult to enact and sustain.This thesis problematises the concept of ‘practice’, and claims practices as thoroughly social and emergent phenomenon constituted by interdependent and iterative processes of representation (policies and practice guidelines), signification (sense making through negotiation and reflective and reflexive practices), and improvisation (acting into the circumstances that present at the point and in the moments of care). I argue that local and population-wide patterns are negotiated and iteratively co-expressed through relations of power, values, and identity. Moreover, practice (including the practice of leadership or consulting) is inherently concerned with ethics, which I also formulate as both normative and social/relational in nature. I argue that theory and practice are not separate but paradoxical phenomena that remain in generative tension, which in healthcare is often felt as tension between what we should do (best practice) and what we actually do (best possible practice in the contingent circumstances we find ourselves in). I articulate the implications this has for how knowledge and knowing are understood, how organisations change, and how the role of an internal practice consultant is understood. An important implication is that practice-based evidence and evidence-based practice are iterative and coexpressed(not sequential), and while practice is primordial, it is not privileged over theory.I propose that a practice consultant could usefully become a temporary participant in the practices of a particular community. Through a position of ‘involved detachment’, a consultant can more easily notice and articulate the practices of a community that for participants are most often implicit and taken for granted. Reflective and reflexive consideration of what is taken for granted may change conversations and thus be transformative.

Magister Curationis - MCur / Background: Nursing as a profession is based on firm knowledge, values, clinical skills and attitudes. In the current dynamic healthcare systems, all nurses are challenged to be insightful and have robust clinical reasoning and psychomotor skills in order to integrate theory into practice. Therefore, they need to be accountable in ensuring that they perform optimally to meet the extensive demands of clinical settings. Theory-practice integration is a major element that sustains quality and drives best nursing practice. One of the barriers to theory-practice integration is the gap between theory and practice in nursing education. Therefore, if sound theory is the basis for understanding the reality of the clinical setting, then every effort should be made to reduce the gap between theory and practice. Aim: The aim of the study was to explore and describe the challenges experienced by second and third-year nursing students when integrating theory into practice in a selected clinical setting in the Western Cape. Method: A qualitative approach, using an explorative, descriptive and contextual design, was employed. The target population of the study was the second and third-year nursing students who were registered for the Bachelor of Nursing Degree in the academic year of 2016. The selected non probability sample comprised of 14 participants. Data were collected using semi-structured focus group interviews, with an interview guide and probing to gain detailed information during the process of data collection. Interviews were audio recorded to ensure that no information would be lost and the researcher could review it when necessary. The content analysis method was used to analyse the data. Permission to conduct the study using the nursing students was obtained from the registrar of the University of the Western Cape and the HOD of Son. The research ethics committee granted ethics approval related to the study. All participants were involved in the study on a voluntary basis. Informed consent and focus group confidentiality binding forms were completed by participants to ensure confidentiality. Results: Four themes emerged from the findings namely: Theory verses practice, lack of role models, inadequate support structures and communication. The study highlighted that nursing students still experience a challenge with integrating theory into practice in the clinical settings. In addition the study highlighted that clinical guidance from the preceptors a crucial role in the professional development of students. The results of the study also showed that a new structure of facilitating nursing students in clinical settings must be in place. This structure should include proper orientation and supervision of the nursing students. The preceptors who facilitate clinical guidance must be equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills to ensure that they are able to facilitate and monitor the competence of the nursing students. Conclusion: Clinical nursing education is vital and indispensable in nursing education. It is very complex consisting of many aspects and situations, which can be challenging and demanding for a nursing student. Due to its complexity, it is essential for nursing students to be exposed to a variety of real life situations within their training in order to better prepare them for quality practice. Nursing students therefore require sufficient support from the clinical preceptor and the nursing educators, to acquire the necessary skills, knowledge and attitude to perform nursing duties with competence, when placed in the clinical settings. This calls a lot of attention from the higher learning institutions and the clinical settings to have standardised goals and expectation for the students, providing quality clinical accompaniment that will socialise the nursing student optimally in the profession and attempt to bridge the gap between theory and practice.

Yes / The capability approach and sustainability can be connected in numerous ways. One could think of sustainability as a self-contained domain of human analysis – thus there could be theories of sustainability and there may be difficulties in this domain as elsewhere in moving from theory to policy or practice. Thus, capability approach could be considered as an additional lens that can facilitate the transition from sustainability theory to practice; alternatively one could think of the capability approach as offering an alternative paradigm and thus build on both theories and then find ways to move from theory to practice. In this chapter, both of these approaches are recognised and discussed. The capability approach is mainly about enhancing substantive freedoms- we examine the conjectures whether an approach of increasing freedoms is compatible with sustainability and whether freedoms are sufficient for sustainability. We use the case of Mongolia to explore some of these issues of application.

Yes / Since the 1980's, changes in nursing education have inadvertently led to diminishing anatomy and physiology content in curricula (Taylor et al., 2015). The need for nurses to have a thorough grounding in these subjects is undisputed; however, the pedagogical principles for anatomy and physiology education have been under scrutiny (Perkins, 2019). Anatomy and physiology are typically incorporated as part of bioscience, which also encompasses genetics, microbiology, pharmacology, and pathophysiology (Horiuchi-Hirose et al., 2023). Registered nurses and nursing students often express anxiety about studying bioscience and its perceived difficulty, largely due to difficulties in applying theory to practice (Craft et al., 2013, Craft et al., 2017, Meedya et al., 2019). Despite this, there remains a recognition that bioscience knowledge is important for effective nursing practice (Danielson and Berntsson, 2007, Horiuchi-Hirose et al., 2023). / The full-text of this article will be released for public view at the end of the publisher embargo on 15 Dec 2024.

The commercial field of sustainability communications encompasses ground previously demarcated between the fields of Corporate Social Responsibility on the one hand, and marketing, advertising and public relations on the other. This thesis examines the formation and development of this novel field of cultural production and its significance for sustainable consumption and corporate sustainability. The research is orientated by practice theory and draws on participant observation within a sustainability communications agency, interviews and documentary analysis. The heuristic value of practice theory for the study of sustainable consumption is now well established in the context of end-use consumption but is unexplored in the context of commercial sustainability communications. Equally, sustainability communications has been neglected by the field of cultural economy. The key concern is with cultural intermediaries and their capacity or otherwise to instantiate their own mores, understandings and practices in the social world. I address this in terms of sustainability and draw on the idea of performativity to approach commercial sustainability communications as a performative complex of practices. Furthermore, the research aims to problematise the place of 'the consumer' in discourses of sustainable consumption. I produce a genealogy of sustainability communications and an account of the development and contemporary constitution of the associated agency market. I suggest that a defining role that the market plays is the management of the 'strategic ambiguity' of sustainability. Drawing on fieldwork and interviews I identify elements that integrate practices into the complex of sustainability communications and examine its normative orientations. Cultural intermediation is shown to take place through, firstly, the diffusion of practices and practice elements. Secondly, it occurs through attempts to instantiate 'the sustainable consumer'. Models of the consumer at work in sustainability communications are analysed and different modes of instantiation of 'the sustainable consumer' identified. Thirdly, it takes place through articulating sustainability with brands. I explore three arenas in which sustainability communications articulates brand and sustainability: what I identify as the discourse of corporate-sponsored sustainable consumption; the cultural politics of work; and lastly, the public sphere.