<p>The purpose of this study is to gain understanding of how self employed entrepreneurs (hereafter referred to as “entrepreneurs”) develop their competence based on their perceived learning space. The main question is: How do these entrepreneurs develop their competence based on their perceived learning space? Other questions relevant for the study are: How important is the social environment for these entrepreneurs and how do they interact with their social environment in order to develop their competence. The study has a qualitative approach. Semi-structured interviews with six entrepreneurs were conducted, during March and April 2008. The main finding of this study is the process by which the entrepreneurs develop their competence based on their perceived learning space. This is done through interaction with the entrepreneurs’ social environment. With a specific work task in mind, the entrepreneur evaluates his/her own competence in order to solve the task at hand, and in parallell search for the needed competence in his/her social environment. The social environment is therefore found to be very important to the entrepreneurs in the study. The active and conscious interactions lead to learning and in turn to development of the individual competence. This approach is essential for the entrepreneur to keep up-to-date and to stay attractive on the work market. Another finding in the study is how the entrepreneurs are forced to be more selective in the development of their competence, compared to a traditional employee, i.e. the entrepreneur needs to be more aware of whether he or she will gain anything from engaging in the specific activity. The responsibility for development of the individual competence lies solely on the entrepreneur. The development of the competence is however not separated from the overall responsibility of the business, but can be seen as part of the daily work.</p>

The aim of this thesis is to make a contribution to the field of design oriented theory, regarding young children and their way to digital competence. My research question is: How can a preschool with a certain pedagogical ICT-design give the children affordances for media play and for developing a digital competence? The European Parliament points out digital literacy as one of the Key Competences for life long learning. A digital competence is built on basic ICT (Information and Communication technology) skills. Skills you can develop any time during life, weather you are young or old. Recent Swedish research on young children and digital competence points out the preschool teacher’s insecurity regarding the use of ICT in the preschool´s daily activities (Ljung- Djärf, Klerfelt).   There are an amount of new social and cultural gaps in our modern society regarding illiteracies and learning. Fear for the digital gap, or divide, is confirmed by researchers such as Buckingham and Kress. Briefly, if one doesn’t possess digital literacy, the risk of society divides is impending. This could be built on factors such as gender, ethnicity, class, generational and geographical divides, but also about dichotomies in the capacity of learning in a digitalized milieu.   Today’s children are the first generation to grow up in a society characterized by digital media. They are born into it. They are the Digital Natives and they take the new technology for granted. The rest of us are Digital Immigrants and we try to adapt to the new society. Prensky highlights the possibilities of changes in young persons’ brains, or at least in their thinking, as a result of their nursery in the digital world. Where does that leave the teachers of the pre-digital age? The true risk of a digital divide can perhaps be found in the daily melting pot between “the natives” and “the immigrants”.  The act of arranging meaningful communicative meetings could be one education’s most important responsibilities.   From the view of a design orientated perspective, built on a socio-cultural theoretical framework, key words like design, setting and affordance become important in my study. Didactic design is a theoretical perspective which elaborates understanding of learning from semiotic activities. Learning is to be seen as meaning making in social contexts. These contexts are in pedagogical milieus called institutional settings. The teacher and /or the child can be designers of and actors in the setting.   Through the design and settings, the children at the preschool in my study, achieved consistent possibilities for media play and for developing digital competence. They got the opportunity to develop different kinds of literacy. One of the important findings of my study was that the preschool teachers developed digital competence and confidence much in the same way as the children did. Collaborative learning processes, elaboration, curiosity and playfulness stood up as affordances for learning. There have to be milieus designed for flexibility and elaborations and there have to be preschool teachers deliberately setting these kind of designs.   The study confirms previous research at one hand in the area young children and digital competence and on the other hand in research connected to design oriented theories. This study has merged the two fields together.   Further research is to be seen in a wide spread field. An interesting continuation is to study the preschool teachers education. Questions of learning and intertextuality are other important issues.   Key words: Didactic design, digital competence, digital divides, literacy, media play, affordances, settings, tools, preschool, ICT, multimodality, social semiotics, meaningmaking. / Syftet med min uppsats är att bidra till förståelse för hur valet av design och iscensättning i förskolepedagogiska miljöer erbjuder medielek och möjliggör utvecklandet av en digital kompetens. Jag har utgått från frågan: Hur kan en specialdesignad förskolemiljö bidra till utvecklingen av barns medielek och digitala kompetens? En digital kompetens bygger på grundläggande IKT-färdigheter[1]. Det innebär bland annat att man kan hämta fram, bedöma, lagra, producera och kommunicera med och genom digitala medier. Tidigare forskning visar på förskollärares oro för den digitala tekniken. Förutom den rent konkreta osäkerheten vid användningen av de digitala verktygen ges också uttryck för en osäkerhet för hur man balanserar förskoleverksamheten med ny teknologin. Detta kan belysa vad som inom medieforskning beskrivs som digital divides, något som i sin tur kan förstärka klyftor i samhället. Frågan om bruk av IKT i förskolan diskuteras ofta ur ett framåtsyftande nyttoperspektiv. Man talar om inlärningsaspekten, arbetslivsaspekten och demokratiaspekten. Barnen på förskolan i min studie har genom den didaktiska designen möjligheter att få del av dessa tre aspekter.  Men man har dessutom skapat en miljö som erbjuder barnen – och de vuxna – möjligheter för medielek och därigenom utvecklandet av en digital kompetens. I studien blir det tydligt hur vuxna och barn svarar upp mot de förutsättningar som designats och erbjuds. Lärprocesserna sker i en institutionell inramning, där läraren (och barnen) är aktörer och iscensättare. Pedagogen, likväl som barnet, kan aktivt välja vilka teckensystem och vilken gestaltningsform som ska användas.   I den undersökta verksamheten finns även en underliggande kulturell affordance, meningserbjudande, en idé om att IKT är bra för barn, att vuxna kan både leka och lära samtidigt, samt att det är tillåtet att experimentera, för att finna något som man varken vet frågan eller svaret på. Det här skulle ur ett socialsemiotiskt perspektiv, vara tecken på lärande, eftersom en lärandeprocess utmärks av en ökad förmåga att använda skilda teckensystem, eller domäner. Barnen utvecklar sin litteracitet och sin medielitteracitet. De utökar också sin kognitiva, kommunikativa och kulturella och estetiska kompetens. Vi skulle här kunna tala om en multilitteracitet, eftersom de meningsskapande processer som barnen befinner sig i under arbetet med de digitala verktygen, inte bara inbegriper lingvistiska utan också visuella, auditiva och spatiala processer. Min studie visar att design och iscensättning på den undersökta förskolan är betydelsefulla för erbjudandet av medielek och utvecklandet av barnens och de vuxnas digitala kompetens. De vuxna är trygga i sina roller och där fanns en naturlig balansgång mellan de mer traditionella och de digitala verktygen. En avslutande reflektion är att det inte längre är frågan om att diskutera om IKT och medier ska användas i förskolan, det är mer frågan om hur. Det är inte heller längre tid att diskutera om barn och vuxna ska utveckla en digital kompetens i förskolan, snarare hur det ska ske. En fortsatt forskning på området kan handla om en fördjupning i sådant som berör lärande, kommunikativ kompetens, intertextualitet eller textrörlighet. Andra viktiga frågor kan röra sig om hur lärarutbildningen lever upp till kraven på en digital kompetens.

The purpose of this study is to gain understanding of how self employed entrepreneurs (hereafter referred to as “entrepreneurs”) develop their competence based on their perceived learning space. The main question is: How do these entrepreneurs develop their competence based on their perceived learning space? Other questions relevant for the study are: How important is the social environment for these entrepreneurs and how do they interact with their social environment in order to develop their competence. The study has a qualitative approach. Semi-structured interviews with six entrepreneurs were conducted, during March and April 2008. The main finding of this study is the process by which the entrepreneurs develop their competence based on their perceived learning space. This is done through interaction with the entrepreneurs’ social environment. With a specific work task in mind, the entrepreneur evaluates his/her own competence in order to solve the task at hand, and in parallell search for the needed competence in his/her social environment. The social environment is therefore found to be very important to the entrepreneurs in the study. The active and conscious interactions lead to learning and in turn to development of the individual competence. This approach is essential for the entrepreneur to keep up-to-date and to stay attractive on the work market. Another finding in the study is how the entrepreneurs are forced to be more selective in the development of their competence, compared to a traditional employee, i.e. the entrepreneur needs to be more aware of whether he or she will gain anything from engaging in the specific activity. The responsibility for development of the individual competence lies solely on the entrepreneur. The development of the competence is however not separated from the overall responsibility of the business, but can be seen as part of the daily work.

La musique et le mouvement sont inséparables. Les mouvements produits spontanément lors de l'écoute musicale seraient le reflet d'un lien étroit entre le système perceptif et moteur. Ce lien est l'objet d'étude de cette thèse. Une première approche concernait l'impact des mouvements induits par la musique sur la cognition musicale. Dans deux études, nous montrons que bouger en rythme sur la musique n'améliore ni la rétention de nouveaux morceaux de musique (Etude 1) ni la rétention d'informations contextuelles relatives à leur encodage (Etude 2). Les résultats des ces deux études suggèrent la superficialité du traitement inhérent à l'expression des affordances musicales nécessaire à la production de mouvements induits par la musique dans la tâche motrice ainsi qu'un traitement moteur automatique de la musique indépendamment de la tâche. L'importance du groove musical a également été mise en évidence. Une deuxième approche concernait l'influence de la perception de rythmes musicaux sur la production de mouvements rythmiques. Notre troisième étude testait l'hypothèse selon laquelle les membres du corps seraient influencés de manière différente en fonction du tempo musical. Les résultats montrent que la tâche de tapping était la plus influencée par la perception de rythmes musicaux. Ceci serait dû à la nature similaire de la pulsation musicale et des mécanismes de timing impliqués dans le tapping ainsi qu'à des phénomènes de résonance motrice. Nous avons également observé la mise en place de certaines stratégies face à la tâche. L'ensemble de ces résultats est discuté à la lumière du lien entre perception et action, de la cognition musicale incarnée et des affordances musicales. / Music and movement are inseparable. The movements that are spontaneously procuded when listening to music are thought to be related to the close relationship between the perceptual and motor system in listeners. This particular link is the main topic of this thesis. A first approach was focused on the impact of music-induced movements on music cognition. In two studies, we show that moving along to music neither enhances the retention of new musical pieces (Study 1) nor the retention of the contextual information related to their encoding (Study 2). These results suggest a shallow processing inherent to the expression of musical affordances required for the production of music-induced movements in the motor task. Moreover, they suggest that music is automatically processed in a motoric fashion independantly of the task. Our results also brought forward the importance of the musical groove. A second approach focused on the influence of the perception of musical rhythms on the production of rythmic movements. Our third study tested the hypothesis that different limbs would be differentially influenced depending on the musical tempo. Results show that the tapping taks was the most influenced by the perception of musical rhythms. We argued that this would come from the similar nature of the musical pulse and the timing mecanisms involved in the tapping task and motor resonance phenomena. We also observed different strategies put in place to cope with the task. All these results are discussed in light of the link between perception and action, embodied musical cognition and musical affordances.

Notre travail s’intéresse aux maîtres d’apprentissage de l’enseignement supérieur et à la façon dont ils débutent dans cette fonction. En France, ceux qui occupent la mission de tuteur sont peu formés et les formations qui leurs sont proposées sont souvent de courte durée (1 journée). De même les prescriptions institutionnelles restent relativement floues, mentionnant peu le tuteur. Il semble dès lors que cette fonction s’apprenne très largement sur le tas. Notre objectif est ainsi de comprendre les pratiques formatives des tuteurs débutants et notamment, la façon dont les interactions et les relations que ces derniers vont voiravec d’autres acteurs (du monde scolaire, professionnel ou autre) vont les aider à construire leur pratique.Ce travail est construit à partir d’une enquête de terrain d’une année et d’un corpus caractérisé par une multiplicité de modes de production de données (observations participantes, captations audio et vidéo, entretiens, collecte de documents, etc.). Il prend la forme de trois études de cas dont le but est de comprendre comment se met en place une configuration tutorale (d’après Elias, 1981) et la façon dont cette configuration crée des affordances (Billett 1995, 2011), c’est à dire des opportunités d’apprentissage pour le tuteur débutant, dont il peut se saisir afin de construire sa pratique.Une analyse des prescriptions institutionnelles sur le tutorat et le rôle du maître d’apprentissage nous conduit à montrer que celui-ci occupe une place secondaire dans les discours institutionnels plutôt focalisés sur l’apprenti et adressés à ces derniers ou aux employeurs. De plus, les prescriptions se font à plusieurs niveaux (de la loi à l’école) et cela constitue un millefeuille de prescriptions qui restent floues et hétérogènes. Enfin, c’est une configuration tutorale relativement figée, incluant seulement trois acteurs (apprenti / MAP ou employeur / tuteur-école ou école) qui est la plupart du temps présentée.L’analyse de nos cas est réalisée en croisant deux niveaux : le niveau local et le niveau global. Il s’agit d’une part d’appréhender les interactions récurrentes et les relations qui se mettent en place dans le temps long et d’autre part, la façon dont les acteurs interagissent et se coordonnent dans des interactions et situations locales. Cela nous permet de documenter la façon dont une configuration tutorale émerge et se met en place dans le temps long, mais aussi la façon dont elle est localement consolidée ou au contraire bouleversée. Ces analyses nous permettent de mettre en avant que là où l’on a l’habitude de penser un duo tuteur-apprenti, il y a en réalité un réseau d’acteurs aux profils, objectifs et caractéristiques variés qui se crée dans le but d’accompagner l’apprenti. Cette configuration tutorale est dynamique et varie selon les contextes. Elle peut être constituée, outre l’apprenti et son tuteur, par des acteurs de la place de travail (hiérarchie, collègues, etc.), des acteurs de l’école (tuteurs-école, enseignants) ou encore des acteurs de la sphère familiale, amicale, etc. Chaque acteur de cette configuration a ses enjeux propres qui contribuent à orienter sa mise en place et son évolution dans le temps. Nos analyses montrent que cette évolution peut se faire en faveur de l’appropriation par le tuteur de son rôle. La configuration est, en effet, génératriced’affordances pour le maître d’apprentissage débutant, dont ce dernier peut se saisir afin de développer sa pratique tutorale. Ces affordances peuvent prendre des formes diverses (aide directe, inclusion à un collectif tutoral, échanges sur la pratique tutorale, etc.). Elles ne sont actualisées comme ressources que parce que le tuteur débutant s’en saisit, les rendant ainsi pertinentes pour sa pratique.Ces analyses nous conduisent à formuler des préconisations en vue d’améliorer la formation et l’information des tuteurs, notamment dans le cadre du travail d’ingénierie de formation actuellement mené par le CFA Formasup ARL. / This research focuses on workplace tutors in dual vocational tertiary courses, and how they begin in this role. In France some tutor’s training are offered but they are short-term (1 day) and few tutors participate. Institutional requirements remain vague with little mention mention of the workplace tutors. Therefore, it seems that a large part of tutors are learning this activity « on the job ». Our purpose is to understand how workplace tutors are learning their role, and in particular, how interactions and relationships they have with other actors (from the shool, the company, etc.) help them to build their practice of tutoring.This research is based on a one-year fieldwork and a corpus characterized by a multiplicity of data production modes (participating observations, audio and video recordings, interviews, document collection, etc.). It takes the form of three case studies whose aim is to understand how a tutorial configuration is set up (according to Elias, 1981) and how this configuration creates affordances (Billett 1995, 2011), i.e. learning opportunities for the novice workplace tutor, which he can take advantage of to build his practice.An analysis of the institutional requirements on tutoring and the role of the workplace tutor, leads us to show that he occupies a secondary place in speeches that are rather focused on the apprentice and addressed to them or to employers. In addition, this requirements are made at several levels (from law to school) and this constitutes a myriad (millefeuille) of requirements that remain vague and heterogeneous. Finally, it is a relatively fixed tutorial configuration, including only three actors (apprentice / MAP or employer / school-tutor or school) that is most of the time presented.The analysis of our cases is carried out by crossing two levels: the local level and the global level. On the one hand, it is a question of understanding the recurrent interactions and relationships that are established over time and, on the other hand, the way in which actors interact and coordinate themselves in local interactions and situations. This allows us to document how a tutorial configuration emerges and is implemented over time, but also how it is locally consolidated or disrupted. These analyses allow us to highlight that where we are used to thinking of a tutor-apprentice duo, there is in reality a network of actors with various profiles, objectives and characteristics that is created in order to support the apprentice. This tutorial configuration is dynamic and changes according to the context. It can be made up, in addition to the apprentice and his tutor, by actors in the workplace (hierarchy, colleagues, etc.), actors in the school (school-tutors, teachers) or actors in the family, friends, etc. Each actor in this configuration has its own purposes that contribute to orienting its implementation and evolution over time. Our analyses show that this evolution can be in favour of the tutor's appropriation of his role. The configuration is, in fact, agenerator of affordances for the novice workplace tutor, which he can take advantage of in order to develop his tutoring practice. These affordances can take various forms (direct support, inclusion in a tutoring collective, exchanges on tutoring practice, etc.). They are only actualized as resources because the novice tutor takes them over, making them relevant to his or her practice.In addition to documenting the training practices of tutors, this research aims to support the apprentices training center (Formasup ARL) in the engineering work of the training courses they are currently conducting.

Mémoire en recherche-création / Considérant le peu d’espace fait aux artistes s/Sourd-es et handicapé-es dans les milieux culturels (Leduc et al. 2020b) et le potentiel d’autodétermination de l’autogestion, cette recherche-création propose comme création le centre DC - Art Indisciplinaire (dc-art-indisciplinaire.com), autogéré par des artistes de la diversité capacitaire, et ce mémoire théorique réflexif des enjeux qui l’ont (in)formée. De ma posture autiste mad queer de classe ouvrière, j’aborde les signifiances dominantes de la création formant une culture d’exceptionnalité artistique hiérarchisée. Je démontre comment l’agentivité épistémique des personnes de la diversité capacitaire est décrédibilisée par les institutions culturelles et d’enseignement. Je définis ma pratique comme une méthodologie indisciplinaire et neuroqueer, des affordances always-in-the-making (Dokumaci 2017) afin de répondre à la question : Comment diriger nos énergies dépensées à performer des normes institutionnelles inatteignables et épuisantes, dans la création de possibilités émancipatrices collectives crip? A partir d'une réappropriation d'un mécanisme de survie connu des personnes autistes et queer, ma pratique de création de situations me permet de répondre à ces discriminations en imitant les normes capacitaires, neuronormatives et hétéro/homonormatives afin d’hacker les milieux dans lesquels j’évolue. Je soulève le « pour et par » comme insuffisant à l’émancipation de nos communautés, elles aussi régies par des rapports de pouvoirs multiples. Enfin, ce projet a cherché longtemps à faire ce que Remi Yergeau pointe comme l’impératif de pirater de manière « criptastique », un hack qui « […] s’insurge contre la normalisation forcée, celle qui passe de l’ajustement corporel à quelque chose de collectif, d’activiste et de systémique » (Yergeau 2012, ma traduction). / Considering little room given to d/Deaf and disabled artists in cultural circles (Leduc et al. 2020b) and the potential for self-determination in self-governance, this research-creation enables the creation of the disabled led artist-run center DC - Indisciplinary Art (dc-art-indisciplinaire.com). Furthermore, the following written essay constitutes a theoretical thought about the issues that have (in)formed the center’s creation. From a working-class queer mad and autistic perspective, I study the major meanings associated with the notion of creation and the way they form a hierarchical artistic exceptionality culture. I demonstrate how the epistemic agency of people from the ability diversity is discredited by cultural and educational institutions. I define my practice as an undisciplined and neuroqueer methodology, always-in-the-making affordances (Dokumaci 2017) to answer the question: How to redirect the energy spent performing unattainable and exhausting institutional standards, by creating possibilities for a crip collective emancipation? With the reappropriation of a known autistic and queer survival mechanism, my creation of situations practice allows me to respond to these discriminations by imitating able, neuronormative and hetero/homonormative norms in order to hack the environments in which I evolve. I question the “for us and by us” as insufficient for our communities’ emancipation because they are also governed by multiple power relations. Finally, this project has long sought to do what Remi Yergeau points out as the imperative to hack in a "criptastic" way, a hack that "[…] protests against forced normalization, that which goes from bodily adjustment to something collective, activist and systemic" (Yergeau 2012).

This dissertation provides an analysis of, and critical commentary on, the practice of playfulness as persistent phenomenon in the arts, technology and theory. Its aim is to introduce political reflections on agency through the study of playful technological artefacts, which were largely ignored in the recent discussions on game and play. Following the critical analysis of historic discourses and actual studies of play under differing auspices, and in order to understand play as inherently political agency, this thesis’ research question addresses the immersive effects of playful agency in symbolic exchange systems and in the material consciousness of the player. This thesis conducts an analysis of material cultures, in order to categorise play as technique of an inherent critique of technological culture. It traces the development of contemporary technological objects and their materiality in relation to the application of the concept of affordance in design theory. The author consequently proposes a new category of ‘play affordances’ in order to describe these new requirements of play found in consumer technologies. The structure of the analysis in the distinct chapters is informed by a stringent historic, theoretical and arts analysis and an alternating arts practice. The convergence of these elements leads to insights on further uses, options and perspectives of the research problems discussed, in particular in relation to the requirements of playful interaction in contemporary technologies, which increasingly radicalises the importance of play. The thesis’ hypothesis states that playful practices in arts and technologies provide models for political agency, like the strategic use of Con-Dividualities (Jahrmann 2000). This term describes the concept of shared identities in society or social media consumer technologies, as discussed in historic case studies and the author’s own arts practice, related to the modification of technologies as methodology of arts research. In this way the arts practice and theory of playfulness informs the emergence of a new methodology of research, intervention and participation in society through the arts of play, which is coined as Ludics, as an original outcome of this thesis.

Master of Landscape Architecture / Department of Landscape Architecture/Regional + Community Planning / Mary Catherine (Katie) Kingery‐Page / The generation of diagnosed autistic children is aging, calling on needed research for what will happen to autistic adults. Cities are outfitted to non-autistic people, typically created for an idealized individual without disability or limitation. Urban environments add to sensory overload, have limited mass transit accessible to those with neurological disabilities, provide few affordable housing units, offer very little employment opportunity, and have no green spaces designed for those with autism or other differences. Typical urban design does not take into account the landscape and urban affordances needed by adults with autism. This project synthesizes a toolkit including the following needs for adults with autism: vocational training, life skills, mental and physical health support, employment, public transportation and affordable housing. Using the initial theoretical urban systems toolkit, I conducted an evaluation and synthesized proposal for Nashville, Tennessee, a large city that ranks within the nation among the lowest for cost-of-living (e.g. groceries, housing, and utilities). The outcome of the evaluation and synthesis is a diagrammatic infographic conveying existing and needed services within Nashville, as well as connectivity of needs for adults with autism. From the diagrammatic proposal, the initial theoretical urban systems toolkit is revised, reflecting upon the findings through the evaluation of Nashville, Tennessee. The final theoretical urban systems toolkit and diagrammatic proposal for Nashville, Tennessee provides exploratory research for city planners, architects, and landscape architects to design for cities inclusive of adults with autism, as well as other neurological disabilities or limitations. This additional layer of design not only contributes to the social and environmental well-being of individuals with autism, but also contributes to the entire urban community. Urban design as an approach to planning for adults with autism contributes a new disciplinary perspective to the discourse on planning for a maturing autistic population.

Explaining incidents as systems is a fast growing area of safety scientific research. The misleading conception of naturalistic human communication in terms of 'objective information' remains a pervasive influence on systemic explanation of incidents, despite over a decade of methodological developments in the area. Currently, interested stakeholders are offered with few alternatives for analysing how information systems emerge naturally, and contribute towards the structuring of incident situations. Extant methods are also yet to be widely adopted by the practitioner community, and a research-practice gap has formed. In this PhD research, a new method of systemic incident analysis is developed, to counterbalance against the extant methods being developed in the area. The new method draws on insights from both Distributed Cognition, and linguistics research, in order to present a distributed means of doing systemic incident analysis. The new method de-objectifies the notion of information, to support analysis of how information 'flow' is constitutive of the formation of distributed cognitive systems. In embedding an intersubjective component into the core method design, we aim to increase the likelihood of systematic learning from incident situations. The incident analyst is required to explicitly relate past explanations of incident situations, in detail, to data and hypotheses from new incident situations. To increase the potential for theorists in the area to better account for the demands of incident analysis as practiced, data, insights, and method are contributed towards the bridges been built between research and practice. We first develop additional understanding of the practice of incident analysts from the patient safety background. Next, we provide a second new method of analysis, to allow research scrutiny of the empirical phenomena of using systemic incident analysis methods. This second method considers the detailed relationship: from the theory of the systemic incident analysis method into its practice as part of real incident investigation. This provides a new research instrument, for systematically examining how systemic incident analysis methods may afford or constrain elements of their practice.

Submitted by Maicon Juliano Schmidt (maicons) on 2015-07-16T14:20:10Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Fabio Miguel Junges.pdf: 4097222 bytes, checksum: ff90676639837e81bd0d6aa5577547e4 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-07-16T14:20:10Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Fabio Miguel Junges.pdf: 4097222 bytes, checksum: ff90676639837e81bd0d6aa5577547e4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-03-12 / CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / CNPQ – Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico / A pesquisa se propõe a identificar e analisar como o contexto de mobilidade influencia o processo de tomada de decisão, em que três elementos podem ser destacados. Primeiro, trata-se de uma pesquisa em que a lente está no processo e não nos seus resultados, e o sujeito de análise é o indivíduo que atua como gestor intermediário. Segundo, o fenômeno que se pretende estudar é o da tomada de decisão, que caracteriza uma das principais atribuições dos gestores intermediários e que tem os seus efeitos refletidos no sucesso ou fracasso das iniciativas organizacionais. A tomada de decisão é um fenômeno multifacetado que pode ser compreendido por diferentes lentes teóricas, dentre as quais essa pesquisa utilizou a perspectiva que considera a intuição e a razão como partes do sistemas cognitivos que compõem o processo de escolha do indivíduo. O terceiro elemento a ser destacado é o contexto específico em que esse fenômeno é estudado, o da mobilidade empresarial, que evidencia a tomada de decisão em movimento e é observado nesta pesquisa pelas perspectivas das affordances e dos paradoxos da tecnologia móvel. Nesse contexto, os gestores podem tomar decisões distantes dos seus locais tradicionais e fixos de trabalho, em que as dimensões de tempo e espaço assumem uma perspectiva diferente e a linearidade dá lugar à paradoxalidade de ação. Foram utilizados multimétodos para a etapa empírica de coleta e de análise dos dados, o primeiro qualitativo, pela realização de um grupo focal e vinte entrevistas em profundidade, e o segundo experimental, em que foi possível observar a ação do indivíduo em uma situação de decisão por meio de um quase-experimento aplicado a um grupo de controle e um grupo experimental. Os resultados revelam que o processo de tomada de decisão em movimento possui características específicas que são evidenciadas pela influência do contexto de mobilidade e pelo uso das tecnologias móveis, em que restrições e contribuições ao processo de tomada de decisão foram identificadas. Observou-se a redução na percepção de qualidade da informação, maior superficialidade e menor foco na ação em primeiro plano, menos tempo para reflexão, a dificuldade na produção e consumo de informações e uma maior exposição ao erro. Por outro lado, observou-se que o contexto de mobilidade pode contribuir para aumentar a agilidade das atividades organizacionais e dos fluxos de decisão, especialmente nos casos em que as decisões são carregadas com um nível menor de complexidade. Não se observou, no entanto, que a decisão em movimento evidencia alguma diferença em relação ao grau de intuição ou de razão empregados. Na perspectiva acadêmica, a pesquisa preenche uma lacuna teórica na compreensão do fenômeno investigado e contribui metodologicamente pela elaboração e utilização de um protocolo experimental para um estudo que envolve mobilidade. Na perspectiva aplicada, essa pesquisa oferece contribuições para os gestores intermediários, para as organizações e para os desenvolvedores de tecnologias. Por fim, é oferecido um conjunto de recomendações para pesquisas futuras. / This research aims to identify and analyze how the enterprise mobility context and the use of mobile technologies can influence individual decision-making on the go, in which three elements can be highlighted. First, the focus is in the process rather than outcomes, and the analysis is on the individual who acts as a middle manager. Second, the phenomenon to be studied is the decision-making, which is one of the main responsibilities of middle managers and has its effects reflected in the success or failure of organizational initiatives. Decision-making is a multifaceted phenomenon that can be understood by different theoretical perspectives. This research has used the perspective based on two cognitive systems that shape the individual decision process: intuition and reason. The third element to be highlighted is the specific context in which this phenomenon is studied, called enterprise mobility, which highlights the decision-making on the go and can be observed as affordances and paradoxes of mobile technology. In this context, middle managers can make decisions away from their traditional and fixed workplaces, in which the dimensions of time and space take on different perspectives and linearity can be replaced by a paradoxical action. Two empirical stages with different participants in each one were used, a qualitative, by holding a focus group and twenty in-depth interviews, and an experimental, in which beyond the perceptions of the individuals was possible to observe the action of the individual in a decision situation by a quasi-experiment applied to a control group and an experimental group. The results show that the decision-making process on the go has specific characteristics that are evidenced by the influence of the enterprise mobility context and the use of mobile technology, where restrictions and contributions to decision-making process have been identified. On the one hand, there is a reduction in the perception of information quality, more superficial and less focus on the action in the foreground, less time for reflection, a difficulty in production and consumption of information and greater exposure to error. On the other hand, it was observed that the mobility helps to increase the agility of the organizational and decision flows, especially in cases in which decisions are loaded with a lower level of complexity. However, the decision making on the go has not evidenced difference in the level of intuition or reason that was used. From the academic perspective, research fills a gap in the theoretical comprehension of the phenomenon investigated and contributes methodologically by the validation and use of an experimental protocol. From the managerial perspective, this research offers contributions to middle managers, organizations in general and technology developers. Finally, this research offered a couple of future research recommendations.