This thesis is on the basis of searching EWOM actively and attempt to treat the motivation of using discussion board, and how these motivations explain the influence of discussion board. Reviewing literatures, the thesis generalize the motivations of searching WOM actively and use product involvement to be situational variable in order to explore that the motivation and the consequence of using different discussion board. The thesis adopted bulletin board systems to be the research field, and distributed questionnaires. The research found that though consumers had different motivations of using discussion boards while facing products with diverse level of involvement, in fact, they normally take ¡§information searching¡¨ and ¡§recognition seeking¡¨ as the main motivations. Further, the explanatory power of these motivation factors on the consumers¡¦ behaviors changed by the discussion boards will differ with the product involvement.

Thesis (M.A.) -- University of Texas at Arlington, 2008.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2002. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Available also from UMI Company.

This four-month-long qualitative case study looks closely at how one kindergarten teacher tried to help young children have more mathematical discussions. To discover and more deeply understand a kindergarten teacher’s ways of thinking about and facilitating mathematical discussion as part of everyday mathematical instruction, data was collected through classroom observations, semi-structured interviews, and various forms of documentation. Through data analysis in the constant-comparative method, this study found that intensive-discussion mathematics lessons could be accomplished through two pedagogical roles of the teacher. The first was creating a respectful learning environment to motivate children’s participation in mathematical discussion. The second was scaffolding student discussions to construct their own knowledge in the path of their mathematics learning. The analysis detailed here also revealed that successes and failures of discussion-intensive mathematics lessons depend on the teacher’s ability to overcome challenges she encounters while integrating mathematical discussion into her everyday lessons. The presented examples and descriptions in this study offer significant implications for early childhood teachers. This is particularly true for those who care about their young students’ mathematical development, yet either struggle to develop trusting classroom communities or do not know how to facilitate mathematical discussion. This study also provides insights into how teacher educators can help preservice teachers develop a profound understanding of mathematics teaching and learning. This highly influences their moment-by-moment decision-making to appropriately scaffold young children’s talk and learning. It offers implications for administrators about how to support early childhood teachers’ growth, learning, and their practices in teaching mathematics. / text

No description available.

Il existe peu de littérature sur le détournement de médicaments chez les adolescents et les jeunes adultes et sur la façon dont cette pratique se manifeste sur les forums en ligne notamment d'un point de vue interactionnel. C'est pourquoi ce mémoire se propose d'étudier de manière ethnographique un an d'interactions sur un fil de discussion anglophone traitant du détournement de médicaments contre la toux à des fins de recherche de sensations. Nous avons pratiqué successivement une étude de contenu des messages, une analyse conversationnelle, une analyse diachronique des interactions de l'ensemble de la durée étudiée et une analyse des évaluations des messages proposées par un dispositif ad hoc inclus dans le forum. Cette recherche, recourant systématiquement au traitement quantitatif et qualitatif des données, relève d'une méthode mixte. Son cadre théorique est triple : un axe sociologique avec l'étude des communautés, un axe interactionniste avec la référence à Goffman et un axe psychosocial lié à la dynamique des groupes restreints. Au terme de cette recherche, nous constatons que si nos observations quant aux interactions sur ce fil se rapprochent de la littérature générale sur les forums, nous avons néanmoins fait émerger quelques spécificités pour le domaine du détournement de médicaments, comme le rôle des gros contributeurs, l'expression de l'expertise ou enfin la distinction entre les notions d'expert et de leader. L'originalité de ce mémoire est d'introduire l'analyse des évaluations des messages, domaine particulièrement peu documenté. Celle-ci met en évidence l'existence de « lecteurs invisibles » (ou « lurkers ») et fait apparaître que les participants à un fil de discussion développeraient une culture spécifique à ce fil. Au terme de notre recherche et de l'observation d'une année de discussions, nous avons montré que ce type de fil ou de forum, généralement condamné par la littérature pour incitation à des pratiques dangereuses, offre une possibilité d'encadrement à ses visiteurs. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : évaluations, interactions, forum, lurkers, expertise.

The study introduces an alternative analytic framework for the investigation of online discussion forums. It focuses on the social dynamics occurring in online discussion threads situated within a tertiary e-learning context, and advocated by social learning theories. Online discussion forums are perceived as conducive environments for the evolvement and support of collaborative and socio- constructivist learning. However, the literature reviewed, revealed a growing need for finding empiric frameworks for ascertaining the materialisation of these perceptions. Attempting to address the identified need, the study adopts ethnomethodological notions, complemented by Structural Analysis approach, to produce an alternative analytic frame called the Event Centre (EC) approach for the study of online discussion forums. The theoretical framework chosen in this study enables the investigation of online discussion forums as systems of relations rather than aggregations of individuals. The EC approach enables the visual representation of networks of people interacting with each other and at the same time presenting the content discussed in each interaction. Applying the EC approach to a set of 131online discussion threads, enabled the discovery of social dynamics occurring within the discussion threads. Preliminary investigations of these visually represented dynamics revealed two overarching patterns. One depicting uni directional interactions in which all participants referred to a single message and a second one depicting sequences of interactions organised in chain like patterns. The study suggests that these overarching patterns may imply different perceptions of knowledge as enacted by the participants, and hence possibly reveal different perceptions of teaching and learning through which it may be possible to detect collaborative and social constructivist processes. The study suggests that the visual patterns introduced should be perceived as abstractions of particular events, implying their generalisability and hence possible application to different data sets.

People with a chronic illness like cancer often use the Internet to participate in online health discussions and connect with people with similar medical conditions through an online community. The purpose of this study was to explore how people affected by cancer utilize communication in an online community to access information, advice, and support. This research examines the messages of a discussion forum within an online cancer community using content and thematic analyses. This study finds that people within an online cancer community (1) give/seek information more often than they give/seek emotional support, (2) give information and emotional support more than they seek them, and (3) utilize storytelling within a majority of messages. / Department of Telecommunications

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, August, 2007. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Hong Kong, 2007. / Also available online.