The thesis is an attempt to find whether there is any perceived or actual correlation between people (personal characteristics, or characteristics of subgroups) and the environments they choose--in particular, their houses; that is, to correlate identifiable physical aspects of environment with various identifiable personal or social characteristics, and to attempt to explain why such correlations occur; thence to postulate theories which will enable environments to be designed to be acceptable to particular groups of people. "The thesis", part 1 of the thesis, is a theoretical statement comprising, in Chapter I, an explicit statement of the theoretical framework in the form of five premises derived from philosophy and theories of psychology, art and architecture, and sociology. And, in Chapter II, a statement of the two hypotheses (that dwelling environments are perceived as "meaning" the people who live in them and that people choose dwelling environments, other things being equal, according to their concept of the kind of people they are) and the assumptions necessary to test them. In Part 2: "The Research Method" Chapter III covers the development of the measure of closure in dwelling environments. Closure was chosen in Chapter II as the environmental variable to be used for the purposes of this study. The final measure comprises five sets of four bird’s eye view perspective line drawings depicting five situations in a typical house in which closure is varied in four steps from very open to very closed. Chapter IV describes the development of the measure of household identity. The measure of household identity was developed especially to be of relevance to the choice of degrees of closure in dwelling environments. The measure is derived from actual verbal responses of the respondents to open ended questions asked in pilot studies. In Chapter V, the last chapter in Part 2, the research design of the survey study is described: the research model used, the design of the questionnaire, and the sampling method. The first chapter of Part 3: "The Results and Discussion of the Results", Chapter VI, presents the sample size (610) and shows that the sample is representative of the population of the Auckland greater urban area. In Chapter VII, the results relating to hypothesis I are presented and discussed. The results weakly support the hypothesis but the correlations are not of sufficient strength to be used predictively. In Chapter VIII the results of hypothesis 2 are presented and discussed. These results also support the hypothesis but even less strongly so than for hypothesis 1. Chapter VIII also covers sub-hypothesis 1, that people choose dwelling environments according to their "objective” household identity, In Chapter IX the results of the hypotheses are compared and summarized. And in Chapter X the implications of the results are outlined: an attempt is made to relative the results to the theoretical framework and from this implications for a possible theory of aesthetics are drawn. The implications of the results for the theory and practice of architecture are delineated and finally suggestions for future research are outlined.

This thesis explores the contention that planning is a moral activity concerned with the way in which people live in relation to nature or the environment. It suggests that planning is the moral framework by which communities and individuals confront their relationship with nature or the environment. It argues that certain disciplines such as town planning, resource management, environmental ethics, aspects of theology and of art are but isolated and narrowed aspects of a wider activity of planning. The rationale for embarking on such a discussion of planning relies in part on the observation that when modern planners take a more contemplative approach to their craft, they have often been perplexed about their frequent failure to deliver the good they assumed that planning set out to achieve. It is suggested that this intent to achieve good is inherent to planning and that it is a moral concern. Planning, under this analysis, is part of the wider realm of moral philosophy and decision-making - that is undertaken by all people. Planning extends beyond mere moral discourse to encompass a number of mechanisms that bind individuals and communities to the moral norms they have adopted. These mechanisms, one of which is the key institution of property rights, are also affected by ideas that change over time; they exist in a dynamic interrelationship with both planning discourse (debates about moral structures and norms) and planning codes (norms adopted by individuals and communities as standards for action). This thesis takes this broad interpretation of planning and considers it in relation to four periods in planning history. In doing so, a number of themes are identified in relation to the role of planners, the decision-making structures of planning and the nature of planning discourse. These themes are considered in relation to the way Maori planning systems have developed in New Zealand since European settlement. They are also considered in terms of whether it is possible to identify certain universal moral rules within planning and whether there are certain tasks that all planners must address. / Whole document restricted, but available by request, use the feedback form to request access.

There are two possible approaches to the problem of a network of service facilities, where an individual customer passes through the network, queueing for service at some or all of these facilities. Either we produce methods by which the network may be decomposed into small manageable parts, or we must attempt to solve simultaneously for all the properties of the network, at a particular time. At present, the class of networks for which comprehensive solutions are known is so restricted that it is usually essential to consider the first approach, at least in the first instance. First we consider the problem of decomposition points, the points at which a stream of customers is broken up into several substreams, heading for different destinations. Conditions are established for a class of decomposition switches, which ensure that if the input stream to the switch is a Markov renewal process, then so are each of the substreams. We then investigate the behaviour of one of these substreams at a subsequent service facility. When the service times are exponentially distributed, an analysis of this, the SM/M/1 queue, based on the properties of the busy cycle, considerably simplifies and extends the results known for it. Some attempt is made to relax the condition on the service time distribution. Since there is always the possibility that a Poisson process approximation to the arrival stream may be acceptable, the dual of this queue, where the sequence of service times forms a Markov renewal process, is considered. This seems a particularly appropriate generalisation, since it allows for different classes of service requirements, perhaps reflecting the origin of customers from various parts of the network. In addition, some results are presented for a queue in which both the arrival times and service requirements depend on the sequence of customer types. Since the output from a queue in a network will form part or all of the input to a subsequent queue, we consider, finally, the departure processes from queues of the types that have been mentioned. Although, in general, it is not possible to describe the departure stream from queues of these types in terms of a particular stochastic process, we can find the distributions of some of the parameters of a very general departure process, in particular, the number of departures from the last queue mentioned above.

The review of property-related literature pertaining to valuer behaviour, valuation bias and smoothing all indicate that there are many behavioural issues that may affect valuation outcomes. Evidence suggests that heuristics may be one explanation for such phenomena, but a growing literature suggests that the role of the client within the valuation should also be considered. The main aim of this study therefore is to construct a framework of client influence in order to achieve an in-depth understanding of the commercial valuation process and the role played by the client within this process. Previous research in the area of behavioural property research has been undertaken utilising a quantitative research approach, however by introducing a qualitative approach a richer and more in-depth understanding of the topic was achieved. The research question addressed in this study was established as "How do clients influence valuation outcomes?". Constructionism identified the underlying assumption about reality governing the research; based on the premise that different people construct meaning in different ways in relation to the same phenomena. The theoretical perspective was determined to be interpretivism which was guided by the study's goal of assessing the nature of reality for both valuers and clients regarding the valuation process. The research process consisted of four stages, the first being the literature review and the construction of a preliminary framework of client influence. The second stage incorporated one-to-one interviews with valuers and the compilation of an updated framework. Stage 3 consisted of one-to-one interviews with clients and the compilation of a revised framework; and Stage 4 collected feedback from a number of experienced valuers and sophisticated clients in order to enhance the trustworthiness of the findings. The framework of client influence highlights eight main factors with the potential to affect the type and amount of client influence and power over the valuation process. These are described as the type of client; external pressures; valuer traits; the type of client valuer relationship; the characteristics of the valuation firm; the valuation process; the purpose of the valuation and finally technical valuation. In addition to the formulation of a framework of client influence the results provide a comprehensive understanding of the valuation process and specifically the incentives, power and opportunities clients have to influence valuations. The results of the study suggest that there are a number of specific influences not previously documented in the property literature that appear to have the potential to affect valuation outcomes and the valuations that are ultimately reported to stakeholders. In particular the strong influence the client has over the whole valuation process was uncovered. The main findings of the research suggest that clients possess not only the incentives and the ability to influence valuation outcomes, but the valuation process itself is largely governed by the client and provides opportunities for them to exert their power over the valuer. This influence does not only exist within the formal valuation process, but informally before the valuation has been commissioned. The study concludes by identifying scholarly contributions and contributions to the property profession. These suggest that the knowledge gained from the research can assist the property profession in understanding the role of both client and valuer in the valuation process and the tension that may exist between valuer independence and customer satisfaction. This knowledge can be used to effectively educate both valuers and clients of their roles in the valuation process together with areas where a valuer may be potentially vulnerable to undue influence.

The thesis is a retrospective reporting and a critical examination of HyperSteel. This is a hypermedia application for architectural education intended to function as a learning bridge between structural knowledge-acquisition and intuitive use. It is one of many parallel developments in software design that have occurred around the world in the last decade (Mitchell 1995). Hypermedia is a set of procedures applied to computer aided learning that is based upon interactive software, typically Apple Computer's Hypercard©, and its successors. How can this medium with its strongly cinematographic characteristics best be used in the imaginative and intuitive processes of an architectural education? The term cinema - whether it means the discipline and industry of film making or whether it is the architecture of a place of entertainment - evokes diverse concepts and images. These include illusions of time and space, the sense of seeing more than one reality at the same time; and of existing at the intersection of art and technology. This thesis argues that these related concepts and images can be distilled from cinema and other established disciplines, and adapted into a common aesthetic for hypermedia. The thesis posits a chronotopic theory with respect to the computer-human interface, whose integral imaginative mechanism is the click-jump of the user interface device. Mikhail Bakhtin's chronotopic event is borrowed from literary theory to describe the progression and development of time and space as they intersect (Bakhtin 1937). It is argued that this moment of the man-machine coordinated action is the act which puts imaginative control of the learning process into the hands of the learner and thus becomes the central vehicle of knowledge delivery. The theoretical underpinning for this argument refers to depictions of architecture as a space-time experience used by historian Sigfried Giedion (1941). The perception of the intuition as tacit knowledge is developed from Michael Polanyi (1969), and the conclusions of cognitive psychologist Allan Paivio and others provide an educational principle of dual processing as a model for learning by hypermedia (Paivio 1986).The writings of Paul Ricoeur (1988) on the nature of a meaning for narrative which encompasses both time and space along one horizon in which the traveller - in this case the student architect - arrives at perceptive understanding in their learning The thesis is a retrospective reporting and a critical examination of HyperSteel. This is a hypermedia application for architectural education intended to function as a learning bridge between structural knowledge-acquisition and intuitive use. It is one of many parallel developments in software design that have occurred around the world in the last decade (Mitchell 1991). Hypermedia is a set of procedures applied to computer aided learning that is based upon interactive software, typically Apple Computer's Hypercard©, and its successors. How can this medium with its strongly cinematographic characteristics best be used in the imaginative and intuitive processes of an architectural education? The term cinema - whether it means the discipline and industry of film making or whether it is the architecture of a place of entertainment - evokes diverse concepts and images. These include illusions of time and space, the sense of seeing more than one reality at the same time; and of existing at the intersection of art and technology. This thesis argues that these related concepts and images can be distilled from cinema and other established disciplines, and adapted into a common aesthetic for hypermedia. The thesis posits a chronotopic theory with respect to the computer-human interface, whose integral imaginative mechanism is the click-jump of the user interface device. Mikhail Bakhtin's chronotopic event is borrowed from literary theory to describe the progression and development of time and space as they intersect (Bakhtin 1937). It is argued that this moment of the man-machine coordinated action is the act which puts imaginative control of the learning process into the hands of the learner and thus becomes the central vehicle of knowledge delivery. The theoretical underpinning for this argument refers to depictions of architecture as a space-time experience used by historian Sigfried Giedion (1941). The perception of the intuition as tacit knowledge is developed from Michael Polanyi (1969), and the conclusions of cognitive psychologist Allan Paivio and others provide an educational principle of dual processing as a model for learning by hypermedia (Paivio 1986).The writings of Paul Ricoeur (1988) on the nature of a meaning for narrative which encompasses both time and space along one horizon in which the traveller - in this case the student architect - arrives at perceptive understanding in their learning process, will also inform this theoretical perspective. The intention of the thesis is- to identify, and theorise digital chronotopicity as it functions in architecture education. My conclusion is that there is a role for the media practitioner and theorist in making interactive software tools effective in the context of computer technologies and architecture education.

The thesis is an attempt to find whether there is any perceived or actual correlation between people (personal characteristics, or characteristics of subgroups) and the environments they choose--in particular, their houses; that is, to correlate identifiable physical aspects of environment with various identifiable personal or social characteristics, and to attempt to explain why such correlations occur; thence to postulate theories which will enable environments to be designed to be acceptable to particular groups of people. "The thesis", part 1 of the thesis, is a theoretical statement comprising, in Chapter I, an explicit statement of the theoretical framework in the form of five premises derived from philosophy and theories of psychology, art and architecture, and sociology. And, in Chapter II, a statement of the two hypotheses (that dwelling environments are perceived as "meaning" the people who live in them and that people choose dwelling environments, other things being equal, according to their concept of the kind of people they are) and the assumptions necessary to test them. In Part 2: "The Research Method" Chapter III covers the development of the measure of closure in dwelling environments. Closure was chosen in Chapter II as the environmental variable to be used for the purposes of this study. The final measure comprises five sets of four bird’s eye view perspective line drawings depicting five situations in a typical house in which closure is varied in four steps from very open to very closed. Chapter IV describes the development of the measure of household identity. The measure of household identity was developed especially to be of relevance to the choice of degrees of closure in dwelling environments. The measure is derived from actual verbal responses of the respondents to open ended questions asked in pilot studies. In Chapter V, the last chapter in Part 2, the research design of the survey study is described: the research model used, the design of the questionnaire, and the sampling method. The first chapter of Part 3: "The Results and Discussion of the Results", Chapter VI, presents the sample size (610) and shows that the sample is representative of the population of the Auckland greater urban area. In Chapter VII, the results relating to hypothesis I are presented and discussed. The results weakly support the hypothesis but the correlations are not of sufficient strength to be used predictively. In Chapter VIII the results of hypothesis 2 are presented and discussed. These results also support the hypothesis but even less strongly so than for hypothesis 1. Chapter VIII also covers sub-hypothesis 1, that people choose dwelling environments according to their "objective” household identity, In Chapter IX the results of the hypotheses are compared and summarized. And in Chapter X the implications of the results are outlined: an attempt is made to relative the results to the theoretical framework and from this implications for a possible theory of aesthetics are drawn. The implications of the results for the theory and practice of architecture are delineated and finally suggestions for future research are outlined.

This thesis explores the contention that planning is a moral activity concerned with the way in which people live in relation to nature or the environment. It suggests that planning is the moral framework by which communities and individuals confront their relationship with nature or the environment. It argues that certain disciplines such as town planning, resource management, environmental ethics, aspects of theology and of art are but isolated and narrowed aspects of a wider activity of planning. The rationale for embarking on such a discussion of planning relies in part on the observation that when modern planners take a more contemplative approach to their craft, they have often been perplexed about their frequent failure to deliver the good they assumed that planning set out to achieve. It is suggested that this intent to achieve good is inherent to planning and that it is a moral concern. Planning, under this analysis, is part of the wider realm of moral philosophy and decision-making - that is undertaken by all people. Planning extends beyond mere moral discourse to encompass a number of mechanisms that bind individuals and communities to the moral norms they have adopted. These mechanisms, one of which is the key institution of property rights, are also affected by ideas that change over time; they exist in a dynamic interrelationship with both planning discourse (debates about moral structures and norms) and planning codes (norms adopted by individuals and communities as standards for action). This thesis takes this broad interpretation of planning and considers it in relation to four periods in planning history. In doing so, a number of themes are identified in relation to the role of planners, the decision-making structures of planning and the nature of planning discourse. These themes are considered in relation to the way Maori planning systems have developed in New Zealand since European settlement. They are also considered in terms of whether it is possible to identify certain universal moral rules within planning and whether there are certain tasks that all planners must address. / Whole document restricted, but available by request, use the feedback form to request access.

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