Behavior problems are quite common in preschool.  Without effective intervention, children with behavior problems are at risk for rejection by teachers, peers and academic failure. But many children in preschool are not diagnosed and are not getting the support they need. At the age of two, children can show both prosocial and aggressive behavior with peers. Researchers stress the importance of positive peer relationships in childhood, because early childhood is the time children learn how to interact with each other. Through peer interactions children develop social, cognitive and language skills. The aim of this systematic literature review is to identify, and critically analyze, special support in preschool which promote peer interaction of children with behavior problems (age of 2-5 years). Five studies, with different interventions have been found through the search procedure. The results show that all the implemented interventions had positive effect on peer interactions and did reduce behavior problems in the classrooms. The results show that the studies focused on different behavior problems, but aggression was found in all the articles.  The studies were focused on different participants in order to influence behavior problems and peer interactions. Four major groups of special support orientations were found: Teacher oriented support, Team-based oriented support, Peer oriented support and Support oriented toward target children. This review presents a good overview on available special support in preschool settings, however more research still needs to be done.

Overcoming social skill deficits in children with autism is a challenge faced by educators and caregivers. Video modeling is a method of training that can promote generalization. This study extends the literature by investigating effects of video modeling on repetitive motor and vocal responses and skill generalization to other settings for children with low-functioning autism/ developmental disabilities. A multiple baseline across 3 play sequences was implemented with 3 males. Results indicate that 2 acquired vocal and motor responses and 1 acquired imitative noises and motor responses using video modeling alone. Generalization occurred with 2 participants. These findings have important implications for the field showing that video modeling can enable educators and caregivers to help children with autism overcome social skill deficits.

Redan i mitten av 60-talet studerade Edwin A. Locke konsten av att sätta rätt mål. I slutet av 60-talet publicerade han artikeln ”Toward a Theory of Task Motivation and Incentives” vilken ligger till grund för en stor del av forskningen kring att sätta mål. Relativa mål är något som kan användas av organisationer för att motivera medarbetare med mål som håller sig relevanta oavsett externa förhållanden. Att motivera medarbetare för att öka prestationer är något som organisationer strävar efter. Forskningen visar att mål ska vara utmanande och nåbara, men det finns begränsat med forskning som belyser fördelar respektive nackdelar med vad det innebär att använda sig av relativa mål ur ett bredare perspektiv. Syftet med den här studien var att utveckla kunskaper om för- och nackdelar med relativa mål med avseende på hur fördelar maximeras och nackdelar minimeras. I denna studie har ett kvalitativt tillvägagångsätt använts för att skapa en djupare förståelse för problematiken. Semistrukturerade intervjuer har utförts med sju olika respondenter som alla har arbetat eller arbetar med relativa mål. Den forskning som har studerats inför denna studie pekar på att relativa mål har en positiv prestationseffekt på medarbetare och leder även till finansiellt positiva effekter. Det finns även nackdelar med relativa mål, exempelvis att sabotera för sina kollegor eller att manipulera data. Studiens empiri indikerar på att en majoritet av respondenterna finner relativa mål som motiverande och utmanande. Uppföljning och feedback är även något som empirin tar upp som viktiga faktorer för att medarbetare ska bibehålla en prestation även efter det utförda tävlingsmomentet. Respondenterna finner även relativa mål som tydliga i det avseende att de vet vad arbetsuppgiften går ut på, likväl finns det en osäkerhet kring hur mycket som krävs i prestation av dem för att uppnå målet. För att kunna maximera fördelarna och minimera nackdelar med att använda sig av relativa mål tyder forskningen på att mål ska vara utmanande och nåbara, arbetsledning ska ge tydliga instruktioner, coacha och följa upp prestationer. I studiens slutsatser framgår det att relativa mål är utmanande och nåbara under förutsättningen att de är korrekt utformande. Det ökar produktiviteten hos medarbetare och ökad prestation under tävlingsperioden. Det kan även leda till att medarbetare kommer fram till nya mer innovativa sätt att utföra arbetsuppgifter, vilket leder till en högre prestation även efter tävlingsmomentet. För att maximera fördelar och minimera nackdelar krävs det att både målet och arbetsuppgiften är tydliga. / Already in the mid-60s Edwin A. Locke studied the art of setting the correct goals. In the late 1960s, he published the article "Toward a Theory of Task Motivation and Incentives", which forms the basis on research towards setting goals. Relative goals are something that can be used by organizations to motivate employees with goals that remain relevant regardless of external circumstances. Motivating employees to increase performance is something that organizations strive towards. Research show that goals should be challenging and attainable, but there is a limited research that highlights the advantages and disadvantages of what it means to use relative goals in a broader perspective. Thus, the purpose of the study was to develop knowledge of the benefits and disadvantages of relative goals regarding how benefits are maximized, and disadvantages are minimized. In this study, a qualitative approach has been used to create a deeper understanding of the problem. Semi-structured interviews have been conducted with seven different respondents, all of whom have worked or work with relative goals. The research that has been studied prior to this study indicates that relative goals have a positive effect on employees performance and also lead to financially positive effects. There are also drawbacks to relative goals, such as sabotaging for their colleagues or manipulating data. The study's empirical data indicates that a majority of respondents find relative goals as motivating and challenging. Follow-up and feedback is also something that empirical data considers to be important factors for employees to maintain a performance even after the competition has been performed. Respondents also find relative goals to be clear in that sense that they know what the job is all about, however there is some uncertainty as to how much is required in performance of them to achieve the goal. To be able to maximize the benefits and minimize the disadvantages of using relative goals, research suggests that goals should be challenging and attainable, give clear instructions and follow-up on performance. The study's conclusions show that relative goals administered as a competition are challenging and achievable provided that they are properly designed. This increases the productivity of employees and increased performance during the competition period. It can also lead to employees detect new, more innovative ways of performing tasks, which leads to higher performance even after the competition. To maximize benefits and minimize disadvantages, it is necessary that both the goal and the task are clear.

Magister Commercii (Industrial Psychology) - MCom(IPS) / The financial industry revolves around organisations that provide financial services to people in the community. The largest contributor is the banking sector followed by the insurance sector. Financial services organisations face an ever-changing working environment that is constantly increasing in its complexity. New market entrants such as banks provide insurance products, customer preferences change, technology changes quickly, and ever-changing legislation governs the way in which insurance organisations conduct business with customers. Having to continuously contend with the losses, regulatory changes, and risk management, while having to increase the shareholders’ value, all impact on the global financial services industry. They in turn increase the job demands on employees.

Job satisfaction of early childhood teachers in military programs and satisfaction changes as teachers deal with challenging behaviors in the workplace was the focus of this study. The goal of The National Association for the Education of Young Children is to ensure quality programming that promotes positive child development experiences. Child development experiences are impacted by teaching staff, partnerships, administration, and the children's' environment. This case study examined the specific environment and behaviors that military childcare providers experience at a small military installation and explored how working with children with challenging behaviors impacts the job satisfaction of early childhood teachers. Herzberg's 2-factor theory provided the conceptual framework on how satisfaction and dissatisfaction can exist in the same environment. Data were collected through face-to-face interviews and observations of the work environment with 11 participants ranging from 23 to 56 years of age at the military installation. The participants were selected for being part of the military community and early childhood teachers at the study site. Data were open coded and thematically analyzed. Findings indicated that the teachers at this site have a dual perception of satisfaction and dissatisfaction in the workplace that stems from experiences with coworker relationships, dealing with policy and procedure changes, and adjusting to the varying behaviors of children. The implications for social change include providing research findings on early childhood teacher satisfaction to the study site so that administrators can develop a plan to improve military early childhood care provider job satisfaction, which may improve the quality of the environment of the military child.

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Syftet med denna studie var att utveckla kunskapen om skickliga lärares ledarskap i förhållande till elevers utmanande beteende. Studien genomfördes med sju lärare som arbetade i sju olika skolor. Frågorna som undersöktes var hur skickliga lärare agerar för att utveckla lärandet hos elever med utmanande beteende och hur skickliga lärare beskrev sitt stöd till elever med utmanande beteende. Dessa frågor undersöktes genom strukturerad observation och efterföljande intervju. I den strukturerade observationen användes ett observationsprotokoll inspirerat av CLASS. CLASS bygger på begreppsapparaten Teaching Through Interactions (TTI), en teori om hur lärare interagerar med elever och hur det främjar lärande. TTI består av de tre domänerna Emotionellt stöd, Klassrumsorganisering och Lärandestöd. TTI användes även tillsammans med KASAM (Känsla av samhörighet) som teori i analysen av resultatet. Studien visade att stödet för lärandet till eleverna löpte genom alla tre domäner inom TTI med betoning på Emotionellt stöd och Klassrumsorganisering. Det innebar att lärarna arbetade för att det skulle vara lugnt i klassrummet innan eleverna kunde lära sig men att de därmed inte nådde fram till den nivå av metakognition och högre tänkande som Lärandestöd till stor del står för. Framtida studier kan inriktas på att studera hur arbetet med att utveckla utmanande elevers lärande kan ske genom det didaktiska ledarskapet och Lärande stöd i stället för att börja med Emotionellt stöd och Klassrumsorganisering. / The aim of this study was to develop the knowledge of skilled teachers' leadership in relation to students' challenging behavior. The study was conducted with seven teachers who worked in seven different schools. The questions investigated were how skilled teachers act to develop the learning of students with challenging behavior and how skilled teachers described their support for students with challenging behavior. These questions were investigated through structured observation and subsequent interview. In the structured observation, an observation protocol inspired by CLASS was used. CLASS is based on the concept Teaching Through Interactions (TTI), a theory about how teachers interact with students and how it promotes learning. The TTI consists of the three domains Emotional Support, Classroom Organization and Learning Support. TTI was also used together with KASAM (Sense of belonging) as a theory in the analysis of the results. The study showed that support for students learning was evident in all three domains within TTI with an emphasis on Emotional Support and Classroom Organization. This meant that the teachers worked to make the classroom quiet before the students could learn, but that they did not reach the level of meta-cognition and higher thinking that Learning Support largely stands for.Future studies can be focused on studying how the work of developing challenging students' learning can be done through didactic leadership and Learning support instead of starting with Emotional support and Classroom Organization.

Students with disabilities, some with emotional and behavior disorders, are included in almost all elementary music classes. Students with emotional behavior disorders are one of the greatest challenges for teachers. To be effective, teachers must develop strategies and inclusive practices specifically geared towards intervention. With the quantity of students served and only limited class time with students, the music teacher is often unaware of the unique needs of specific special learners. Music teacher preparation has been inadequate in training teachers for inclusion. Elementary music educators rarely have outside support to deal with classroom challenges as they serve students with disabilities and at-risk students. Music teacher training is focused on content, not behavior management. This study examined the perceptions of randomly selected elementary music educators who were members of MENC: The National Association for Music Education regarding their preparedness to effectively manage five areas of severe behavior often exhibited by students with emotional behavior disorders: withdrawal, impulsivity, argumentative behavior, aggression towards peers, and aggression towards the teacher. The researcher devised a 39 item online survey instrument based on supporting literature. The survey was given to randomly selected participants. Two hundred sixty-nine elementary music educators from across the United States completed the survey providing information on incidence frequency, preparedness, training in behavior management, and the amount of behavior support available. Elementary music teachers felt prepared to handle impulsivity (58.2%), and argumentative behavior (55.7%). They were not prepared for withdrawal (50.8%), aggression towards peers (50.9%), and least prepared to handle aggression towards the teacher (58.1%).Over 94% of the music teachers had adult assistance less than 25% of the time and 45.9% never had adult assistance with included classes. More than 74% of the teachers indicated that they have adult assistance with self-contained special education classes less than 25% of the time and 35.7% never having adult assistance with those classes. Forty-six point two percent of the music teachers had no behavior specialist available or were unaware if one was available. Only 3.7% of the respondents felt they had all the support they needed. Thirty-six point one percent of the music teachers had no crisis plan in case of an eruption of severe behavior in their classes.

No / This paper considers the situation of people with dementia who are living in long-term care from two rarely-applied theoretical perspectives. The first, Agamben’s theory of biopolitical life versus bare life, demonstrates that the situation of people with dementia living in care homes or hospitals approximates to that of prisoners, internees and refugees, deprived of full citizenship or biopolitical life. In popular imagery people with dementia are frequently referred to, first in terms of numbers, as a ‘rising tide’, in a way that has historically been used to justify discrimination and social exclusion. In many, care environments it is, moreover, still the case that people with dementia are reduced to a condition of ‘bare life’ only: given little choice, having few rights, lacking freedom of movement, and subjected to almost constant surveillance. In other contexts, such treatment is known to cause or exacerbate many of the problems which – following a biomedical model – are constructed as ‘symptoms of dementia’, such as disorientation in time and space, sleep disturbance, hallucinations and repetitive movement. The second body of theory is Bakhtin’s work on cultural resistance. This demonstrates that many of the so-called ‘challenging behaviours’ manifested by people with dementia, can better be understood as coping, sense-making and self-determining strategies adopted in order to survive within prevailing organisational cultures. Based on a series of studies carried out in intermediate and long-term care since 2009, the paper draws on a range of narrative and film-based examples to demonstrate the ‘courage, humour, fortitude and cunning’ with which, as Walter Benjamin noted, the oppressed have always met the conditions of their oppression. In the process, ‘challenging behaviour’ is given political and ideological meaning, as protest, perpetrated by people who are struggling against extreme odds to be reinstated as full citizens. / Conference website: http://www.aginggraz2017.com/conference-schedule