For teachers and educators, developing students’ interest in the classroom has been a primary concern. Relatedly, for decades educational researchers have explored the construct of interest and the factors that influence students’ interest. However, despite the importance given to context to interest development in these theoretical descriptions, less attention has been paid to understanding teacher and classmate characteristics as contextual factors that may influence, positively and negatively, students’ interest. Therefore, with the goal of exploring the role of the teacher and classmates in students’ interest in a course throughout a semester, this study explored mediator effects of students’ perceptions of teacher enthusiasm and of peer enthusiasm on the relation between their initial interest and their situational interest at the end of the semester. Also, students’ motivation for affiliation with their teacher and with peers was added to investigate associations between these student variables and their perceptions of teacher and peer enthusiasm. Data were collected in 12 different classes with different instructors. In total, 455 students participated in the study, by filling out surveys at the beginning and end of the semester. For the main analysis, a path analysis was used in order to explore the relationships among initial interest, background knowledge, perceptions of teacher enthusiasm, perceptions of peer enthusiasm, motivation for affiliation with the teacher, motivation for affiliation with peers, and the situational interest variables of “hold interest” and “catch interest” at the end of the semester. Results indicated that the relationships between initial interest and “hold” as well as “catch” interest were mediated by perceptions of peer enthusiasm but not teacher enthusiasm. Also, perceptions of teacher enthusiasm and of peer enthusiasm had direct effects on “hold” interest as well as “catch” interest. Also, students’ affiliative motivation with the teacher and peers had direct effects on their perceptions of teacher and peer enthusiasm. Overall, this study makes a contribution to an appreciation for the importance of contextual factors as well as students’ own individual variables to understanding the mechanisms by which students’ interest in a course develops and is maintained throughout the semester. / text

Diss.--Munich, 1965. / Bibliography: p. 257-272.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Catholic University of America, 1935. / At head of title: The Catholic University of America. "A select bibliography": p. 155-169.

No description available.

Thesis--Columbia University. / Includes bibliographical references.

Diss.--Munich, 1965. / Bibliography: p. 257-272.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, Department of Germanic Studies, August 2002. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the Internet.

No abstract.

This research discusses how to motive and retain employees in China based on analyzing factors influencing employee enthusiasm and strategies to motivate employees under the framework of Herzberg’s two-factor theory. With the proposition that hygiene factors and motivators both influence the work enthusiasm, 15 interviews were arranged to collect the needed data for further analysis. According to the information obtained from the 15 interviewees from P&G, hygiene factors and motivators all exert influences over their work behaviors and the impact of the factors differs according to the different conditions of the employees. The findings of this research generally agree with the two-factor theory. Based on how the work enthusiasm of P&G’s employees are influenced by each of the factors, strategies are correspondingly formulated to motivate employees at work. Generally speaking, this research is significant for being conducted from a microscopic perspective to the macroscopic perspective. In other words, a specific organization is studied to figure out the answers to the research questions and the findings can be used for future studies as well for practical purposes. More specifically, when conducting this study, such factors as unsatisfying wages and benefits, heavy workload, task conflicts, ambiguous duties, interpersonal conflicts and ineffective management system, etc., all discourage the enthusiasm of employees. In response to that, a reasonable management system and sound motivational mechanism should be established to keep employees active at work or retain those who want to resign.

This is an investigation of the enthusiasm, scenes and cultural industry of contemporary modified-car culture in Australia, based on fieldwork research with an online-based car club – where I participated as an enthusiast – and archival research of 30 years of enthusiast magazines and other texts. I develop a post-Kantian event-based conception of enthusiasm by drawing on the previous scholarship on modified-car culture read through post-structuralist theories of the ‘event’ and ‘affect’. The oeuvre of Gilles Deleuze is a key theoretical influence on this work, which also draws on the historical method and philosophy of Michel Foucault, the practical social theory of Pierre Bourdieu, and develops Theodor Adorno’s work on the cultural industry by examining its biopolitical dimension. Enthusiasm is often thought of as a charismatic relation between the enthusiast subject and the enthusiast object modified cars. But here, enthusiasm is understood as the event of a multiplicity of affects that exists on transversal scales from the personal to the scene and beyond. I argue that the charismatic relation of enthusiasm is a reduction that enables the enthusiasm of a given scene to become a resource for cultural industries servicing that scene. The event of enthusiasm is defined by the affects that circulate across bodies and which are actualised in the capacities of enthusiasts, the objects engaged with, and practices performed. The scene is defined by the character of the cultural events which populate it and the enthusiasts who participate in the events. The cultural events include cruising, working on cars, racing, showing, and consuming or participating in the enthusiast media. I draw on my fieldwork to examine the affective composition of some of these events. Transformations to the cultural identity of scenes and enthusiasms correlate with broader social changes exemplified by the processes of globalisation. The event of enthusiasm is repeated in different ways that make connections between the scales of the subjectively experienced affects of cultural events to the global-level transformations of the automotive industry and scene. The cultural industries and social institutions enable the enthusiasm by investing in the infrastructure of the scene and facilitating the existence of cultural events through sponsorship or practical support. Archival research on enthusiast magazines allows me to map the transformations to the composition of power relations (dispositif) between the state (governmental regulatory bodies), social institutions (online and offline car clubs, and federations), enthusiast cultural industries (magazines, event promoters, and later importers) and different populations of enthusiasts (from interested public to highly skilled and devoted enthusiasts). The periods roughly delineated include the militancy of street rodding era (the 1970s), the spectacle of street machining era (1980s through to the present), and the immanent online-sociality of the import era (mid-1990s through to the present). The power relations of the three eras of contemporary modified-car culture in Australia are contrasted and I argue that the current dominant set of relations involve spectacular cultural events. In the context of 1980s street machining, I examine the way elite level vehicles built by highly skilled enthusiasts following spectacular head turning styles of modification are used by event promoters and magazines to collectively individuate a population of the interested public. The ‘head turner’ is a singularity that organises the social spaces of the street and car shows and the discursive space of magazines. I argue that the emergent synergistic relation between magazines and event promoters is organised around the capacity of ‘head turners’ to mediate relations between different populations of enthusiasts so that enthusiasm is reduced to a charismatic relation and cultural events become spectacular. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)