Having grown up abroad, the topic of architectural mediation has often made me pause. The world abounds with differences, and with today's globalization, many of us are being faced with cultural, social, and a multitude of physical differences/conditions. This thesis seeks to explore the role of architecture as a mediator and seeks designs that transition successfully between differing entities. The project is an orphanage in Nairobi, Kenya. The program is comprised of young orphans and the project explores how the structure that they occupy can effectively accommodate their specific needs. Challenges which need to be mediated include consideration of two scales, one for the child under the age of 6, and the other for the caretaker who has adult proportions. The building also will need to reconcile cultural stigmatization and attitudes towards orphans while also providing a safe environment. And lastly, the specific social needs of the orphan need to be tended to. The design and experience within the spaces will need to convey feelings of security, affections, and hope. / Master of Architecture

The transition from Apartheid urban space to – something else – draws our attention from the fixing moments of historically divided cities to the experience of mobility, interaction and the dynamism of space. (Robinson 1999: 163) This dissertation will approach the modern, post-colonial and post-apartheid African city as experimental ground for exploring, understanding and expressing spatial dynamics through the visual language of cinema. The proposal intends to mediate between the complex historical context which is manifested in the built fabric of the city and the new dynamic and often unstable urban conditions of Johannesburg, by specifically focusing on the contrasting conditions of the Johannesburg Art Gallery and the Noord Street Taxi Rank. The role of cinema as a philosophical device in this dissertation is to produce a point of inception, an assemblage, or a terrain of encounter through which the project will be further investigated and articulated. The principal aim of the dissertation is to effectively react to contrasting aspects of both heritage and transience, whilst simulating the Cinematic Gaze, by creating a public platform that serves as an aperture for viewing as well as an urban stage with the potential to be viewed. The hypothesis states that, if successfully applied, cinematic space can accentuate the unique and vibrant conditions of the inner city. This will ultimately lead the city dweller to a better sense of association with his/her immediate surroundings and a better comprehension of his/her role in place-and-time in the urban environment / Dissertation (MArch(Prof))--University of Pretoria, 2014. / Architecture / MArch(Prof) / Unrestricted

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effectiveness of the superordinate and subordinate words as mediators in mediate association learning across three different age groups in the A-B, B-C, A-C mediation x paradigm. The effects of sex difference, high and low levels of associational fluency, as well as a type of pre-training which was done by requiring subjects to create associations to the mediating B terms, were considered. The subjects used were, 50 fourth graders (22 boys and 28 girls), 54 seventh graders (26 boys and 28 girls), and 51 tenth graders (22 boys and 29 girls), for a total of 155 students. Each group of subjects was divided into high and low associational fluency groups using the cutting point. The high and low associational fluency groups were divided further into two groups each using the odd-even method on the ranks on the associational fluency scores. Prior to the mediate association learning task, one group received the pre-training procedure while the other received the no-pre-training procedure where each subject was simply required to write a short story. The learning materials consisted of superordinate and subordinate words, and high association value nonsense syllables. Two sets of A-B, B-C, A-C, mediate association learning task were constructed using superordinate words as B terms in one set and subordinate words as B terms in the other, while the same nonsense syllables were used as the A and C terms in both sets. Each set of the learning task consisted of two 12 paired-associate lists, half of which was used as the experimental pairs with the other half as the control pairs. Each list of paired-associates was presented one pair at a time for five seconds for seven trials. Each subject received both sets of the learning task and served as his own control. The multiple-choice method was used to measure the amount of mediation. The results of the experiments were as follows: Mediation was obtained with both the superordinate and subordinate words as mediators when subjects in the fourth, seventh and tenth grades were each treated as a single group, with the exception of the fourth grade group when the superordinate words were used as mediators. In general, when subjects were treated on the subgroup basis, mediation was obtained increasingly with age. The pre-training method was not superior to the no-pre-training (control) method in producing mediation. In fact, on the seventh grade level with superordinate words as mediators, the pre-training group was inferior to the control group in producing mediation. Superordinate words were not more effective mediators than subordinate words. There was a trend which indicated that subordinate words were more effective mediators than the superordinate words with the increasing age of subjects, especially among female subjects. There was no clear-cut evidence that the high associational fluency level enhanced the occurrence of mediation more than the low associational fluency level when the superordinate words and subordinate words were used as mediators. It was found that age had a definite effect on mediation. The amount of mediation produced occurred increasing with age, at least for the three grade levels compared. There was no sex difference on mediation produced superordinate words as mediators. But with the subordinate words as mediators there were sex difference effects on the amount of mediation produced in favor of female groups on the fourth and tenth grade levels. In conclusion, the results of the study were in agreement with the majority of the findings reported in the literature on mediate association experiments that mediation could be experimentally produced. The superordinate words and subordinate words proved to be about equally effective as mediators and their effectiveness increased with the increasing age of the subjects.

<p>Background One of the main demands on Swedish and global health care in general is to meet the patient’s need for safety. By general health care law this also comprises district nurses’ field of responsibility. Although there are numerous studies describing the concept of safety and its different shapes, no research could be found exploring how safety is, or supposed to be, mediated by district nurses’ in a Swedish context. Research about this is therefore needed. Aim The aim of this qualitative study was to explore how district nurses’ mediate safety to their patients. Method Qualitative data were collected from seven district nurses’ by means of semi structured interviews. Thereafter, a concept analysis was carried out. Results Responses revealed that district nurses’ consider themselves mediate safety through a variety of ways. Five major categories emerged: (1) complaisance’s; (2) competence; (3) patient participation; (4) same caregiver; (5) personal characteristics. Conclusion District nurses’ mediate safety through a combination of general attitudes and concrete acts. Preconditions are bound to each district nurse’s individual ability to give a good complaisance, his/her competence and ability to involve patients in treatment and care. Other, less pronounced, are bound to the district nurse’s ability to create continuity in contact with patients’ and his/her personal characteristics.</p>

Background One of the main demands on Swedish and global health care in general is to meet the patient’s need for safety. By general health care law this also comprises district nurses’ field of responsibility. Although there are numerous studies describing the concept of safety and its different shapes, no research could be found exploring how safety is, or supposed to be, mediated by district nurses’ in a Swedish context. Research about this is therefore needed. Aim The aim of this qualitative study was to explore how district nurses’ mediate safety to their patients. Method Qualitative data were collected from seven district nurses’ by means of semi structured interviews. Thereafter, a concept analysis was carried out. Results Responses revealed that district nurses’ consider themselves mediate safety through a variety of ways. Five major categories emerged: (1) complaisance’s; (2) competence; (3) patient participation; (4) same caregiver; (5) personal characteristics. Conclusion District nurses’ mediate safety through a combination of general attitudes and concrete acts. Preconditions are bound to each district nurse’s individual ability to give a good complaisance, his/her competence and ability to involve patients in treatment and care. Other, less pronounced, are bound to the district nurse’s ability to create continuity in contact with patients’ and his/her personal characteristics.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether affect influences mediate association. A second purpose of this experiment was to test whether there could be found an interaction between affect and meaningfulness in the verbal mediation scores. The subjects were all of the students registered for an Educational Psychology class at Utah State University, Spring Quarter, 1969. These students were randomly assigned to one of two groups, designated Phase I or Phase II. Phase I was designed to study the influence of affect upon mediation and the subjects in this group learned two lists of seven paired associates. Phase II was designed to examine the possible interaction of affect and meaningfulness in mediation and the subjects in this group learned two lists of eight paired associates. Phase III was added to the study to determine if there would be a correlation between mediation and association ability of all of the subjects. Affect level was determined by the magnitude of the Galvanic Skin Response readings on Stoelting Psychogalvanoscope in reaction to the mediating words of the B list. Meaningfulness level of the non-mediators was defined as the association value of Consonant-Vowel-Consonant trigrams used in the A-C lists. Mediation was defined as the number of correctly paired A-C trigrams in the multiple-choice mediation test. To test whether affect influences mediation, a comparison was made between mediation scores produced by high affect mediators and mediation scores produced by low affect mediators. The test of the interaction was made by a factorial design with two levels (high, low) of affect and four combinations of levels (high-high, high-low, low-high, and low-low) of meaningfulness. The procedure first assessed the affect level of the mediators. Then either Phase I, which tested Hypothesis 1, or Phase II, which tested Hypothesis 2, was administered to each subject. Each phase followed the chaining model (A-B, B-C, A-C) of mediation. There was no learning of the A-C list, but mediation was tested by pairing the A-C items in a multiple-choice test. Also, a test of association ability was made after presenting twelve paired associates using a similar multiple-choice test to that used to test mediation. Statistical analyses were applied to these test scores to determine the empirical support of the following hypotheses: Hypothesis 1 proposed that there would be a significant difference between the amount of recall scores mediated by high and low affect words when the meaningfulness of the non-mediators is held constant at a medium level. This hypothesis was supported by the data obtained. Hypothesis 2 predicted that there would be an interaction between levels of affect and combinations of levels of meaningfulness. This hypothesis was strongly supported by the data of this study. An additional finding was that a low, but significant correlation was obtained between mediation scores and association scores. The findings of this study showed that affect level of the mediator affects the amount of mediation produced in a chaining paradigm. There appears to be strong evidence for an affect and meaningfulness interaction in mediation data. Within this interaction, there was an indication that affect is prepotent over meaningfulness. Also, analysis of this interaction shows that the meaningfulness of the stimulus term rather than the response term seems to be critical in producing superior mediation. Finally, a low correlation seems to exist between simple or paired association and mediate association, because simple (paired) association and mediate association do not seem to be identical processes.

Over the years so many academic literatures has revealed that increased number of firms have seen internationalization as a means to gain and sustain competitive advantage and even increase economic of scale, and this has led many western companies to emerging markets. In this paper we discovered that among the pool of Swedish firms, only the MNEs have seen Nigerian market attractive to internationalize to, but just a few of the Swedish SMEs has expanded to the Nigerian market. This research was conducted by doing a qualitative study with the use of phenomenological research approach, during our investigation on the functions of intermediaries in Swedish SMEs internationalization to Nigeria market.Furthermore, we were able to understand the importance and functions of the different marketing intermediaries’ in Swedish SMEs internationalization to Nigeria market. These intermediaries equip the Swedish firms with the required objective knowledge of the Nigerian market, updating them with recent development of the opportunities and threats involved in the Nigerian marketing environment, and linking these Swedish firms to the required government departments, distributors, agent/broker, customers, middle men etc, thereby impacting them with the experiential knowledge. Moreover, it is important for firms to have objective or pre-market knowledge of a particular market before entering that market, but this knowledge is regarded as non-helpful knowledge to firms. But the experiential knowledge is acquired over time in the market, which is regarded as the helpful knowledge. It is evident that the intermediaries equip these firms with both objective and experiential knowledge.Although the opportunities in some emerging markets are very attractive, but the threats in these markets are other factors firms also put into consideration before internationalizing to these markets. This is why thorough market research has to be done so that firms can create effective marketing strategies when they want to expand their marketing activities to emerging markets. Despite the risk and uncertainties involved in doing business in foreign countries, still yet companies selling global products do not have any choice than to internationalize their marketing operations.

Värderingar och organisationskultur är två begrepp som blir allt vanligare och mer använda i dagens företag och organisationer Värderingars innebörd kan variera från högt till lågt och ibland känns det mer som ett begrepp organisationer slänger sig med för att låta bra istället för att leva som de lär. Vår undersökning syftar till att undersöka hur värderingar och därmed också organisationskultur uppkommer och förmedlas till anställda på telekombolaget Symsoft. Vi tittar även på skillnaden på de värderingar som kommer från företagets ledning jämfört med hur de anställda uppfattar värderingarna. Vi har i studien använt oss av en kvalitativ ansats och genomfört tio semistrukturerade intervjuer med anställda och chefer på Symsoft. Vi har även genomfört deltagande observationer under studiens gång då vi tillbringat mycket tid på Symsofts huvudkontor i Kista. Vi analyserade materialet med hjälp av etnografiska metoder och de teorier vi utgått från. Resultatet av studien speglar en organisation där vissa värderingar finns men inte förmedlas till de anställda. Detta har resulterat i att de anställda på Symsoft har svårt att implementera värderingarna i sitt dagliga arbete. Vår slutsats är att Symsoft behöver börja med ett aktivt värderingsarbete där de både formulerar om sina värderingar och inför rutiner för att förmedla dem till sina anställda. / Values and organizational culture are two concepts that become more common and used in today’s companies and organizations. The meaning of values can vary from high to low and sometimes it can seem like a concept an organization use just to sound good instead of live like they learn. The intentions with our study are to analyze how values and organizational culture rise and are mediated to the employees at the telecom company Symsoft. We will also look into the difference between the values of the management and the employees. We have also done participant observation during our time at Symsoft. The study is made using a qualitative approach, where ten semi-structured interviews were conducted with employees and managers at Symsoft. The analysis of the interviews was done with an ethnographic method, where the material was coded based on the theoretical stand. The result of the study shows that there are values at Symsoft but they are not mediated to the employees. As a result the employees at Symsoft have a hard time trying to implement the values into their daily work. Our conclusion is that Symsoft needs to reformulate and actively work with their values to mediate them to the employees at the company.

In this thesis we explore a different kind of computer-mediated collaboration (CMC) in which two people collaborate to perform a single task in a time-sensitive asymmetric situation wherein one person is more invested in the outcome than the other is. Our conjecture is that interactive computing can quickly communicate intent, which may help mediate time-sensitive asymmetric tasks between two people. We explore this idea specifically in the context of asking a stranger to take one's picture at a tourist site. Consider a tourist handing a cell phone to a complete stranger and asking the stranger to take the tourist's picture in front of a landmark. This collaboration often leaves the tourist unhappy with the final image. The tourist cannot quickly communicate the intended framing to the stranger who is, quite likely, in a hurry and, frankly, not interested in the final picture's quality. We explore mediation of this interaction with a mobile app, titled extit{Cake Cam}. Cake Cam is a computing tool used to communicate intent in time-sensitive asymmetric tasks wherein one collaborator is more interested in the outcome's quality than the other. To use the app, a tourist takes a photo of the scene, carefully framed to his or her desires. The tourist then hands the phone to a stranger, asks the stranger to take the tourist's picture, and moves into the frame. Augmented reality alignment markers guide the stranger into taking the photo the tourist initially framed, producing the intended photo. We found that Cake Cam was more effective and efficient in guiding users into replicating a photo than verbal descriptions were. On average it took almost 3 more tries for the participant to take the correct photo without Cake Cam, than with it. Additionally, with Cake Cam, the final photo was closer to the intended framing by an average 9 cm. Participants that used Cake Cam found the process to be less difficult and were more confident they had captured the intended photo than the participants that used the normal camera app.

This research project explores and describes how names and embedded meanings might be utilized as a therapeutic technique in order to mediate social adjustment and interpersonal efficiency. The subjective feeling of success that a person experiences in different areas of life is closely related to the quality of interpersonal relationships that underlie satisfactory interaction with other people. It is the researcher’s opinion that a person’s name almost equals a personal life prophecy and that any name could be a means to mould the client’s life script onto more favourable pathways, because the embedded meaning of a name might contribute to the client’s level of self-knowledge which is necessary for healthy, meaningful relations with others. With the rationale of this research study in mind, the research problem was formulated as follows: How can names and embedded meanings be utilized as a therapeutic technique to mediate social adjustment and interpersonal efficiency? Critical questions that emerged were: What are the underlying psychological constructs that guide the use of names and embedded meanings as a therapeutic technique? How can embedded meanings of names contribute to the different components inherent to sound social adjustment and interpersonal efficiency? Can names and embedded meanings be successfully utilized as a therapeutic technique to enhance social adjustment and interpersonal efficiency? A mixed method approach of qualitative as well as quantitative research was used for the purpose of this study, and interpretivism was the preferred epistemology. A non-experimental mode of inquiry was implemented at the hand of a single case study. Multiple data gathering methods were employed, which included: a well observed intake interview, a pre- and post-test at hand of the Interpersonal Relations Questionnaire, research participant-reflection during a structured interview with a number of stimulus-questions and informal observations and conversations. As enhanced social adjustment, interpersonal efficiency and growth in certain areas were obtained by means of using names and their embedded meanings as a therapeutic technique, the hypothesis of this study could be accepted and supported. / Dissertation (MEd (Educational Psychology))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Educational Psychology / MEd / unrestricted