This thesis examines the response of Taiwanese hotels to climate change. Climate change is increasingly recognised by industry, governments and researchers as one of the most substantial challenges to the sustainability of tourism at both a destination and business level in both the short and long-term. Hall (2008) observed that tourism was explicitly recognised by the IPCC as one of the most important industries in Asia, yet the lack of research on tourism and climate change in an Asian context was identified, with especially little explicit research on the climate change response of the hospitality and accommodation sector. This is also despite the accommodation sector being the most significant tourism sector contributor to emissions after aviation (United Nations World Tourism Organisation [UNWTO] and United Nations Environment Programme [UNEP] 2008; World Economic Forum [WEF] 2009; Scott et al. 2012). Therefore this research seeks to explicitly respond to this knowledge gap by examining the response of the Taiwanese hotel sector to climate change. It is also the first known study that explores the extent to which the hotel sector meets the specific recommendations of the UNWTO-UNEP (2008) with respect to accommodation sector measures in relation to climate change. In order to provide a firm basis of methodological comparison with the previous international literature on environmental studies of the accommodation sector, this thesis conducted a baseline survey to investigate the response of Taiwanese hotels towards environment and climate change with respect to four main dimensions, including perception, attitudes, actions, and influencing factors for environmental and climate change practices. Overall, 270 hotel participants answered the email-based questionnaire survey of the total population of Taiwanese hotels, reflecting a response rate of approximately 10%. Taiwanese hotel respondents acknowledged the existence of climate change, but rarely related this phenomenon to their daily business operations. Their attitude towards their own hotel’s contribution to climate change was especially reserved. In addition to waste management, energy-saving practice, and the offer of local-produced cuisine, the level of implementation of environmental practices in Taiwanese hotels was relatively limited. There were also low compliance rates with existing environmental policy, although they were aware of environmental schemes. The factors of size and extreme weather event experience were identified as the more significant variables to differentiate Taiwanese hotel response to environment and climate change. The significance of hotel size, standard, and experience of weather extreme variables were also examined. Finally, this research discussed the prospective contributions and issues of the results of this study, and argues for their application in the fields of climate change research, benchmarking development, education and and training, government regulation and policy, and hotel management.

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Where about 2 million people perform Hajj and visit the Holy places in Makkah and al-Madina. Pilgrimage is considered one of the largest event in the world. The increase in the pilgrims' number does not follow with an increase in the accommodation and built environment needs. As a result, pilgrims find themselves in a built environment which is not designed according to their satisfaction level. The specific core proposition of this study is to analyse the results of pilgrims' satisfaction with all aspect of their existing accommodation as a micro built environment, as well as with their neighbourhood and the city of al-Madina as a macro level of the built environment.

Accommodation and vergence are two interacting ocular motor systems that function to maintain clear and single vision across a wide range of distances. Sustained fixation results in the adaptation of these ocular motor systems and has been widely investigated in adults but not in children. Moreover, limited reports have measured adaptation to disparities induced by ophthalmic lenses. This thesis used near addition lenses as a means to investigate binocular adaptation in children. The specific aims of this thesis were three-fold. First, the thesis aimed to gain insight into the mechanism of changes to accommodation and vergence during binocular adaptation in children. The second objective was to determine the role of vergence-bias category (eso/exo/normals) on adaptation. Lastly, this thesis evaluated the influence of myopia on binocular adaptation. Thirty- eight myopic and 38 emmetropic children between 7-14 years of age were examined for the purpose of this thesis. A series of studies were performed to evaluate adaptation using varying demands for accommodation and vergence, stimulated by binocular fixation at near (33 cm), through the addition of +2D and -2D over corrective lenses (closed loop accommodation) and using 10 base-out prisms (open-loop accommodation at 4M). In each closed-loop condition, measures of binocular and monocular accommodation (PowerRefractor, Multichannel systems) and near phoria (modified Thorington technique) were recorded at frequent intervals when children binocularly fixated a high contrast near target (33 cm) for 20 min. For the open-loop condition (obtained using 0.5 mm pinhole pupils), binocular accommodation and tonic vergence (distance heterophoria through pinhole pupils) were determined at frequent intervals when binocular fixation was sustained at 4M for 20 min. For all conditions, tonic accommodation was measured before and after the near task to measure accommodative adaptation. The results of this thesis make three major contributions to the literature. First, it outlines that the addition of +2D and -2D lenses alters both accommodation and near phoria during sustained binocular fixation, which can be explained based on the models of accommodation and vergence. Second, it shows that the direction of phoria influences the pattern of binocular vs. monocular accommodation in closed-loop conditions and alters the degree of vergence adaptation in both closed and open-loop accommodation. These changes have been primarily attributed to the varying demands on fusional vergence. Lastly, this thesis demonstrates that myopic children show reduced vergence adaptation when fusional convergence was initiated through plus adds or base-out prisms but not when fusional divergence was initiated through minus addition lenses. Further, myopic children also showed variations in other ocular motor parameters such as higher accommodative lags, greater variability of accommodative response, larger accommodative after-effects, and higher AV/A ratios compared to emmetropes. Consistent with the models of accommodation and vergence, the thesis highlights that it is necessary to measure changes to both accommodation and vergence when evaluating the response of the ocular motor system. The direction of phoria and type of refractive error play a significant role in determining binocular adaptation in children. Future studies should differentiate these parameters when evaluating adaptation of the ocular motor system.

A major challenge facing communities across the Province of Ontario is the provision of educational facilities for students while balancing community-planning objectives. In recent years, it has become clear that Provincial and local policies coupled with demographic and financial pressures are leading to more closures and the loss of the public resources that are local schools. In the last three years, 172 schools have been slated for closure. In addition, public outcry has grown in volume as the Accommodation Review process is cited as an unsatisfying exercise for all those involved. From a planning perspective, schools are an irreplaceable resource in a community, yet current policy structures have left planners with no power to protect public assets while school boards are limited in the ability to find creative alternative solutions to closure. Therefore, to gain a broader understanding of the policies and processes governing Accommodation Reviews, this research was guided by these key questions: • What roles do school board and provincial policies play in school closure process? • How do these policies affect the pedagogical landscape? • What is the impact of school closures on their respective communities? • How do these educational governance methods compare to community planning policies? • Can school board objectives be reconciled with community planning objectives? These questions were addressed through qualitative surveys and interviews with School Board and Municipal officials and staff. The survey was completed with 39 responses across four communities in Southwest Ontario. The survey and interviews discovered a major gap in the knowledge of local officials pertaining to the comprehensive impact of school closures. In addition, responses spurred further investigation into the policies governing school boards including funding formula and public consultation guidelines. When asked, key respondents pointed to the lack of flexibility and the poor structure of the Province’s Education funding formula as the main challenge for providing educational facilities. In addition, the lack of collaboration between local municipalities and school boards in conjunction with the lack of cohesiveness in Provincial policy mandates from the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs were found to ultimately compound the problems and the frustrations associated with the Accommodation Review process. Of the School Board officials surveyed and interviewed, very few saw the need for comprehensive collaboration with municipalities and local residents. However, nearly every planner surveyed or interviewed criticized this mindset as shortsighted and myopic. This paper found that for the provision of public goods, such as education policies, there is a need to provide flexibility for the local context. Municipalities must have a role to play in the process and must collaborate with local School Boards. In addition, the Accommodation Review process is limited by outdated funding policies from the Province and lacks the public empowerment that leads to creative decision-making with involvement of the electorate.

This research investigated underlying issues that were critical to the success of the bifocal trial and comprised of three studies. The first study evaluated if Chinese-Canadian children were suitable subjects for the bifocal trial. The high prevalence of myopia in Chinese children suggests that genetic input plays a role in myopia development, but the rapid increase in prevalence over the last few decades indicates environmental factors are also important. Since this bifocal trial was conducted in Canada, this work aimed to determine whether Chinese children who had migrated to Canada would still have high myopia prevalence and a high rate of myopia progression. The second study determined the optimal bifocal lens power for myopia treatment and the effect of incorporating base-in prism into the bifocal. In the majority of published myopia control studies, the power of the prescribed near addition was usually predetermined in the belief that the near addition would always help to improve the near focus. In fact, the effect of near addition on the accommodative error might be quite different even for individuals in which the same magnitude of accommodation lag had been measured. Therefore, this work was necessary to guide the selection of bifocal and prism powers most suitable for the subsequent bifocal trial. The third study, the ultimate goal of this research, was to conduct a longitudinal clinical trial to determine if bifocals and prismatic bifocals could control myopia progression in children.

The purpose of this study is to investigate which perceptions pedagogues have about the importance of play in children´s development and how they work in kindergartens to stimulate the children to play more. The essay for this study is based on preschool´s curriculum and preschool activities. Preschool´s curriculum has placed great importance on children´s lifelong learning and therefore it is important that activities in preschool must be fun, safe and instructive. Therefore, I have chosen to do a qualitative study which is a based on a phenomenology hermeneutics method. I will collect my empirical material by interviewing six educators in five preschools which is located in three different municipalities. My purpose of this choice was to interview six educators who work in different environments. At the end of my study I will describe what answers I received on my purpose and what perceptions do the pedagogues have about the significance of the play.

Doctor Legum - LLD / Decentralisation of political, financial, and administrative powers to sub-national units has been, and remains to be, a major trend in both developing and developed states. Very often decentralisation is not optional for a state. However, a state has the option to choose what to achieve through its decentralisation programme. After choosing what it intends to achieve through its decentralisation programme, a state may design it in such a way that it may attain the intended purpose. Many countries design their decentralisation programmes with the purpose of ‘deepening’ democracy and empowering their citizens. Other states decentralise power with the purpose of achieving development. They do so based on the postulate that development is preferable when it is achieved through the participation of those who benefit from it and that decentralisation enhances the extent and quality of citizen’s direct and indirect participation. States also decentralise powers based on the assumption that decentralisation brings efficiency in planning and implementing development projects. Several states also use their decentralisation programme to respond to the ethnic, religious, or other diversities of their people. They use territorial and non-territorial arrangement to accommodate the diversity of their people. Therefore, in some cases they create ethnically structured regional and local units and transfer to such unit political powers including the power to decide on cultural matters. Like in so many countries, the wind of decentralisation has blown over Ethiopia. The country has been implementing a decentralisation programme starting from 1991. Ethiopia has selected to achieve two principal purposes through its decentralisation programme namely, to achieve development and to respond to the ethnic diversity of its people. It is axiomatic that the success of a decentralisation programme, whether for achieving development or accommodating ethnic diversity, is greatly impacted on by its institutional design. This thesis, therefore, examines whether Ethiopia’s decentralisation programme incorporates the institutional features that are likely to impact the success of the decentralisation programme for achieving its intended purposes.

M.Phil. (Optometry) / The accommodative-convergence accommodation (AC/A) ratio is a commonly used relationship in the practice of optometry. Many practitioners make use of the AC/A ratio as an aid to diagnostic and prognostic decisions. It is not perfectly clear what effects positive and negative lenses have on the AC/A ratio. A number of questions remain relating to linearity, symptomatology and equality of lens effects on the AC/A ratio. This experiment was designed and conducted in an attempt to answer some of these unanswered questions and forms the foundation of this thesis. A literature review of available knowledge related to this study is detailed. An instrument is described which was constructed to measure the necessary accommodation and vergence changes induced by various stimuli. A sample of first year students at the Rand Afrikaans University department of Optometry was selected according to various acceptance criteria. A total of 109 students were screened , of which a group of 26 students was subjected to the experimental investigation. The data were then subjected to a statistical analysis in an attempt to reveal correlations, linearity and group formations.

Evolution of adaptation requires both generation of novel phenotypic variation and retention of a locally beneficial subset of this variation. Such retention can be facilitated by genetic assimilation, the accumulation of genetic and molecular mechanisms that stabilize induced phenotypes and assume progressively greater control over their reliable production. A particularly strong inference into genetic assimilation as an evolutionary process requires a system where it is possible to directly evaluate the extent to which an induced phenotype is progressively incorporated into preexisting developmental pathways. Evolution of diet-dependent pigmentation in birds-where external carotenoids are coopted into internal metabolism to a variable degree before being integrated with a feather's developmental processes-provides such an opportunity. Here we combine a metabolic network view of carotenoid evolution with detailed empirical study of feather modifications to show that the effect of physical properties of carotenoids on feather structure depends on their metabolic modification, their environmental recurrence, and biochemical redundancy, as predicted by the genetic assimilation hypothesis. Metabolized carotenoids caused less stochastic variation in feather structure and were more closely integrated with feather growth than were dietary carotenoids of the same molecular weight. These patterns were driven by the recurrence of organism-carotenoid associations: commonly used dietary carotenoids and biochemically redundant derived carotenoids caused less stochastic variation in feather structure than did rarely used or biochemically unique compounds. We discuss implications of genetic assimilation processes for the evolutionary diversification of diet-dependent animal coloration.