In order to simulate virtual humans more realistically and enable them life-like behaviours, several exploration research on emotion calculation, synthetic perception, and decision making process have been discussed. A series of sub-modules have been designed and simulation results have been presented with discussion. A visual based synthetic perception system has been proposed in this thesis, which allows virtual humans to detect the surrounding virtual environment through a collision-based synthetic vision system. It enables autonomous virtual humans to change their emotion states according to stimuli in real time. The synthetic perception system also allows virtual humans to remember limited information within their own First-in-first-out short-term virtual memory. The new emotion generation method includes a novel hierarchical emotion structure and a group of emotion calculation equations, which enables virtual humans to perform emotionally in real-time according to their internal and external factors. Emotion calculation equations used in this research were derived from psychologic emotion measurements. Virtual humans can utilise the information in virtual memory and emotion calculation equations to generate their own numerical emotion states within the hierarchical emotion structure. Those emotion states are important internal references for virtual humans to adopt appropriate behaviours and also key cues for their decision making. The work introduces a dynamic emotional motion database structure for virtual human modelling. When developing realistic virtual human behaviours, lots of subjects were motion-captured whilst performing emotional motions with or without intent. The captured motions were endowed to virtual characters and implemented in different virtual scenarios to help evoke and verify design ideas, possible consequences of simulation (such as fire evacuation). This work also introduced simple heuristics theory into decision making process in order to make the virtual human’s decision making more like real human. Emotion values are proposed as a group of the key cues for decision making under the simple heuristic structures. A data interface which connects the emotion calculation and the decision making structure together has also been designed for the simulation system.

As decisões governamentais, que permitem a expansão da geração hidrelétrica no Brasil, com bases em interesses voltados apenas ao crescimento econômico, traduzido quase exclusivamente pelo aumento do Produto Interno Bruto (PIB), estão em conflito com o fato do potencial hidráulico brasileiro, disponível para aproveitamento hidrelétrico, estar situado em bacias hidrográficas estabelecidas em áreas de ampla biodiversidade, ocupadas em grande medida por populações ribeirinhas, tradicionais e indígenas. Nesse contexto, a presente tese tem como objetivo central demonstrar por meio de uma análise teórico-empírica, que parte das estratégias institucionais, governamentais e empresariais componentes do processo decisório que estabelece a expansão da geração hidrelétrica no Brasil tem, em sua estruturação, dificultado a contestação dos que se opõem, ao limitar os espaços democráticos de decisão, inseridos em tais estratégias. A análise teórica estruturou-se a partir de conceitos centrais como: espaços de poder, poder simbólico, decisões tecnológicas, conflitos socioambientais, justiça ambiental, democracia e participação, na busca por fundamentar as reflexões referentes às estratégias decisórias, sua estruturação e o modo como estas invisibilizam alguns grupos, ao limitar a participação, fragilizando, assim, a democratização do processo envolto em muitos e diversos interesses. Para melhor estabelecer a compreensão e demonstração de tais questões, buscou-se ainda, de modo empírico, relacionar as discussões teóricas com a vivência relativa ao processo de planejamento e licenciamento da UHE Belo Monte, construída no rio Xingu no estado do Pará. Por meio das análises e reflexões, tem-se a intenção de contribuir com indicativas que possam corroborar com as discussões, entre a academia, os movimentos sociais e as instituições ambientais e, incentivar a continuação das análises, na busca por indicar caminhos mais democráticos e menos excludentes para os processos decisórios futuros, advindos das relações entre as instituições governamentais e a indústria de energia elétrica. / The governmental decisions, which have allowed the expansion of the hydroelectric generation in Brazil on the basis of interests focused on economic growth, almost exclusively on the increase in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), are in conflict with the fact that the Brazilian Hydraulic Potential, available for hydroelectric, is located in basins established in areas of large biodiversity, occupied largely by riverside populations, traditional and indigenous communities. In this context, this thesis aims to demonstrate by means of an empirical-theoretical analysis, that some of the institutional strategies, governmental and business components of the decision-making process that establishes the expansion of electricity generation in Brazil, with a focus on hydroelectric power, have made tough the critical questioning of those who are opposed to them. Limiting, then, the democratic spaces of decision in such strategies. The analysis seated in a theoretical discussion that sought, from the relation of concepts such as: development, developmentalism, energy security, territory, spaces of power, symbolic power, technological decisions, environmental conflicts, democracy and participation. Understand how some decision-making strategies may make some groups invisible in its structuring , weakening the democratization of the process involved in many and diverse interests. In order to better establish the understanding of these issues, we sought to relate the theoretical discussions with the experience concerning the process of planning and licensing of Belo Monte hydroelectric power plant, built in the Xingu River in the state of Pará. Intending that our studies contribute with allocations that might motivate the continuation of discussions, aiming that more democratic and less exclusive measures can be part of these decision-making processes in the future.

As decisões governamentais, que permitem a expansão da geração hidrelétrica no Brasil, com bases em interesses voltados apenas ao crescimento econômico, traduzido quase exclusivamente pelo aumento do Produto Interno Bruto (PIB), estão em conflito com o fato do potencial hidráulico brasileiro, disponível para aproveitamento hidrelétrico, estar situado em bacias hidrográficas estabelecidas em áreas de ampla biodiversidade, ocupadas em grande medida por populações ribeirinhas, tradicionais e indígenas. Nesse contexto, a presente tese tem como objetivo central demonstrar por meio de uma análise teórico-empírica, que parte das estratégias institucionais, governamentais e empresariais componentes do processo decisório que estabelece a expansão da geração hidrelétrica no Brasil tem, em sua estruturação, dificultado a contestação dos que se opõem, ao limitar os espaços democráticos de decisão, inseridos em tais estratégias. A análise teórica estruturou-se a partir de conceitos centrais como: espaços de poder, poder simbólico, decisões tecnológicas, conflitos socioambientais, justiça ambiental, democracia e participação, na busca por fundamentar as reflexões referentes às estratégias decisórias, sua estruturação e o modo como estas invisibilizam alguns grupos, ao limitar a participação, fragilizando, assim, a democratização do processo envolto em muitos e diversos interesses. Para melhor estabelecer a compreensão e demonstração de tais questões, buscou-se ainda, de modo empírico, relacionar as discussões teóricas com a vivência relativa ao processo de planejamento e licenciamento da UHE Belo Monte, construída no rio Xingu no estado do Pará. Por meio das análises e reflexões, tem-se a intenção de contribuir com indicativas que possam corroborar com as discussões, entre a academia, os movimentos sociais e as instituições ambientais e, incentivar a continuação das análises, na busca por indicar caminhos mais democráticos e menos excludentes para os processos decisórios futuros, advindos das relações entre as instituições governamentais e a indústria de energia elétrica. / The governmental decisions, which have allowed the expansion of the hydroelectric generation in Brazil on the basis of interests focused on economic growth, almost exclusively on the increase in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), are in conflict with the fact that the Brazilian Hydraulic Potential, available for hydroelectric, is located in basins established in areas of large biodiversity, occupied largely by riverside populations, traditional and indigenous communities. In this context, this thesis aims to demonstrate by means of an empirical-theoretical analysis, that some of the institutional strategies, governmental and business components of the decision-making process that establishes the expansion of electricity generation in Brazil, with a focus on hydroelectric power, have made tough the critical questioning of those who are opposed to them. Limiting, then, the democratic spaces of decision in such strategies. The analysis seated in a theoretical discussion that sought, from the relation of concepts such as: development, developmentalism, energy security, territory, spaces of power, symbolic power, technological decisions, environmental conflicts, democracy and participation. Understand how some decision-making strategies may make some groups invisible in its structuring , weakening the democratization of the process involved in many and diverse interests. In order to better establish the understanding of these issues, we sought to relate the theoretical discussions with the experience concerning the process of planning and licensing of Belo Monte hydroelectric power plant, built in the Xingu River in the state of Pará. Intending that our studies contribute with allocations that might motivate the continuation of discussions, aiming that more democratic and less exclusive measures can be part of these decision-making processes in the future.

Decision making for fast-moving consumer goods involves a choice between numerous similar alternatives. Under such demanding circumstances, a decision is made for one product. The decision is dependent on the interaction between the environment and the mind of the consumer, both of which are filled with information that can influence the outcome. The aim of this dissertation is to explore how the mind and the environment guides attention towards considered and chosen products in consumer decision making at the point-of-purchase. Consumers are equipped with several effort reduction strategies to simplify complex decision making. The selection of strategies can be conscious or automatic and driven by information in the environment or the mind of the decision maker. The selected decision strategy reduces the set of options to one alternative in an iterative process of comparisons that are fast and rely on perceptual cues to quickly exclude irrelevant products. This thesis uses eye-tracking to explore this rapid processing that lacks conscious access or control. The purpose is to explore how product packaging and placement (as in-store factors), and recognition, preferences, and choice task (as out-of-store factors) influence the decision-making process through visual attention. The results of the 10 experiments in the five papers that comprise this thesis shed new light on the role of visual attention in the interaction between the environment and the mind, and its influence on the consumer. It is said that consumers choose with their eyes, which means that unseen is unsold. The results of this thesis show that it is just as important to be comprehended as it is to be seen. In split-second decision making, the ability to recognize and comprehend a product can significantly impact preferences. Comprehension stretches beyond perception as consumers infer value from memory structures that influence attention. Hence, the eye truly sees what the mind is prepared to comprehend.