Après son indépendance, la République tunisienne a essayé d’instaurer un système éducatif égalitaire. Bien que l’objectif de rendre l’école accessible pour tous les élèves sans tenir compte de leurs classes sociales et de leur genre soit réalisé, d’autres formes d’inégalités apparaissent. Les politiques publiques sont, en effet, centrées sur une seule dimension de l’égalité qui est celle d’accès. Il en résulte, en autres, des inégalités scolaires de traitement et de résultat. Les statistiques mettent en évidence un déplacement des inégalités en faveur des filles. Ces dernières affichent une meilleure performance par rapport aux garçons, tel qu’observé dans le contexte occidental. La présente étude vise ainsi à comparer les parcours scolaires des filles et des garçons et d’examiner les facteurs socio scolaires à l’origine des inégalités entre les deux groupes d’élèves en Tunisie. L’étude s’intéresse précisément au cas de la région de Sfax. À partir des données administratives collectées auprès de quatre établissements scolaires dans la commission scolaire de Sfax, nous analysons la réussite, le décrochage scolaire et la note annuelle. Les analyses montrent que le taux de réussite des filles est plus élevé que celui des garçons même en tenant compte des caractéristiques socioéconomiques et scolaires. En ce qui a trait au décrochage scolaire, des résultats similaires sont soulignés. En d’autres mots, résider en milieu rural ou avoir un père au chômage ou exerçant un métier d’ouvrier augmente le risque de décrochage chez les garçons, mais n’a pas d’effet statistiquement significatif chez les filles. Comme pour la réussite scolaire et le décrochage, la moyenne annuelle, supérieure chez les filles à celle des garçons, serait plus associée à l’origine sociale chez les garçons que chez les filles. À partir de ces constats, l’étude suggère quelques pistes d’interprétation pour mieux comprendre les facteurs sous-jacents de ces inégalités. / After independence, the young Tunisian republic tried to establish an egalitarian education system. Although the goal of making school accessible to all students regardless of their social class, economic level and gender is achieved, other forms of inequality are emerging. Public policies are, in fact, centered on a single dimension of equality, which is that of access. This results, among other things, in educational inequalities in terms of treatment and results. Statistics have reveal a shift in inequalities in favor of girls. Girls display a better performance compared to boys like the situation in the Western context. The present study thus aims to compare the educational paths of girls and boys and to examine the socio-educational factors at the origin of the inequalities between the two groups of students in Tunisia. We precisely analyse the case of Sfax region. Based on administrative data collected from four schools in the school board of Sfax, we analyze students’ success, dropping out of school and the final score. The analyses show that the success rate of girls is higher than that of boys even when taking into account socioeconomic and educational characteristics. With regard to dropping out of school, similar results are highlighted. In other words, living in a rural area or having an unemployed father or working as a laborer increases the risk of dropping out for boys, but has no statistically significant effect for girls. As with school success and dropping out, the annual average, higher for girls than for boys, is more associated with social origin for boys than for girls. Based on these findings, the study suggests an interpretation to better understand their underlying factors.

Die vorliegende Arbeit beschäftigt sich mit Kants Projekt der transzendentalen Deduktion der reinen Verstandesbegriffe hinsichtlich ihrer Fragen, Annahmen, und Argumente. Anders als viele Interpreten schlage ich vor, dass Kants Fragestellung in der transzendentalen Deduktion im metaphysischen Sinne meta-semantisch ist. Indem er alle möglichen konkurrierenden Theorien ablehnt, zeigt Kant überzeugend die Notwendigkeit seiner kopernikanischen Lösung und die Plausibilität der Auffassung von „keiner notwendigen Verknüpfung ohne notwendige Instanziierung“. Ich werde argumentiert, dass Kant verschiedene Argumentationsansätze in der transzendentalen Deduktion entwickelt: das Argument aus der Erkenntnis, das Argument aus dem Selbstbewusstsein, das Argument aus dem Urteil und das Argument aus der Wahrnehmung, und dass sie alle in erster Linie nicht im Wesen anti-skeptisch, sondern erklärend sind. Diese von mir vorgeschlagene Interpretation von Kants transzendentaler Deduktion zeigt, wie ernst Kant seinen transzendentalen Weg für notwendig hält und warum Kants Ansatz vor allem als problemorientiert, nicht aber als gründungsmotiviert angesehen werden sollte. / This present work addresses Kant’s project of transcendental deduction of the pure concepts of understanding with regard to its question, assumptions, and arguments. Unlike many interpreters, I propose that Kant’s question in transcendental deduction is meta-semantic in the metaphysical sense. By rejecting all the possible rival theories, Kant convincingly shows the necessity of his Copernican solution and the plausibility of the view of “no necessary connection without necessary instantiation”. I argue that Kant develops different lines of arguments in transcendental deduction: the argument from cognition, the argument from self-consciousness, the argument from judgment and the argument from perception, and that all of them are primarily not anti-skeptical, but explanatory in character. This interpretation of Kant’s transcendental deduction reveals how seriously Kant takes his transcendental path to be necessary and why Kant’s approach should be viewed as problem-oriented, rather than foundation-motivated.

This study explored undergraduate and graduate students' attitudes toward the pleasurability of educational gamification in online learning environments. The study is a sequential explanatory mixed-methods research that investigated students' attitudes quantitatively, then qualitatively. In the quantitative phase, an online survey, the Pleasurable Learning Experiences scale (PLLEXs), was administrated at one of the largest public southwestern universities in the U.S. (N = 119). The qualitative phase involved conducting eight semi-structured interviews with selected participants. The PLLEXs uses a 4-point Likert scale that encompasses 4 subscales: (a) Preferences for Instructions, (b) Preferences for Instructors' Teaching Styles, (c) Preferences for Activities, and (d) Preferences for Learning Effectiveness. A series of analyses of variances (ANOVAs) were used to identify predictors of students' overall attitudes toward educational gamification. The main findings were: (a) students had strong preferences toward educational gamification with Preferences of Instructions rated the highest subscale and Preferences for Activities rated the lowest subscale, (b) major was a statistically significant predictor of students' attitudes toward educational gamification, (c) international students had statistically significant lower preferences toward educational gamification compared with U.S. domestic students, (c) online learning experiences measured by the number of previous online courses and the number of hours spent weekly on computers for academic-related work were statistically significant predictors of students' attitudes toward educational gamification, (d) instructor's feedback was the most important aspect and online collaboration was the most challenging aspect in online learning environments, and (e) the use of multimedia in LMSs can support or hinder teaching and learning activities.

School science education prepares learners to study science at a higher level, prepares them to follow a career in science and to become scientific literate citizens. It is the responsibility of the educator to ensure the learners’ conceptual framework is developed to the extent that secures success at higher level studies. The purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of conceptual change teaching strategies on the conceptual development of grade 11 learners on Newton’s second law of motion. The two strategies employed were the cognitive conflict strategy and the development of ideas strategy. A sequential explanatory mixed-method research design was used during this study. The qualitative data were used to elucidate the quantitative findings. The quantitative research consisted of a quasi-experimental design consisting of a single-group pre-test–post-test method. During the qualitative part of the research a phenomenological research approach was utilised to gain a better understanding of participants’ learning experiences during the intervention. The quantitative research made use of an adapted version of the Force Concept Inventory (FCI). The data collected from the pre-test were used to inform the intervention. The intervention was videotaped and the video analysis or qualitative data analysis was done. After the intervention the post-test was written by the learners. Hake’s average normalised learning gain <g> from pre- to post-scores was analysed to establish the effectiveness of the intervention. The two sets of results (quantitative and qualitative) were integrated. Information from the qualitative data analysis was used to support and explain the quantitative data. The quantitative results indicate that there was an improvement in the students’ force conception from their initial alternative conceptions, such as that of an internal force. Especially the learners’ understanding of contact forces and Newton’s first law of motion yielded significant improvement. The qualitative data revealed that the understanding of Newton’s second law of motion by the learners who partook in this study did improve, since the learners immediately recognised the mistakes made when confronted with the anchor concept. The cognitive conflict teaching strategy was effective in establishing the anchor concept of force which proved to be useful as bridging concept in the development of ideas teaching strategy. The data from both datasets revealed that the cognitive conflict teaching strategy for the initial part of the intervention was effective. It was evident that for development of the idea teaching strategy the two data sets revealed mixed results. Recommendations were made for future research and implementation of conceptual development teaching strategies. / MEd (Natural Sciences Education), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

School science education prepares learners to study science at a higher level, prepares them to follow a career in science and to become scientific literate citizens. It is the responsibility of the educator to ensure the learners’ conceptual framework is developed to the extent that secures success at higher level studies. The purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of conceptual change teaching strategies on the conceptual development of grade 11 learners on Newton’s second law of motion. The two strategies employed were the cognitive conflict strategy and the development of ideas strategy. A sequential explanatory mixed-method research design was used during this study. The qualitative data were used to elucidate the quantitative findings. The quantitative research consisted of a quasi-experimental design consisting of a single-group pre-test–post-test method. During the qualitative part of the research a phenomenological research approach was utilised to gain a better understanding of participants’ learning experiences during the intervention. The quantitative research made use of an adapted version of the Force Concept Inventory (FCI). The data collected from the pre-test were used to inform the intervention. The intervention was videotaped and the video analysis or qualitative data analysis was done. After the intervention the post-test was written by the learners. Hake’s average normalised learning gain <g> from pre- to post-scores was analysed to establish the effectiveness of the intervention. The two sets of results (quantitative and qualitative) were integrated. Information from the qualitative data analysis was used to support and explain the quantitative data. The quantitative results indicate that there was an improvement in the students’ force conception from their initial alternative conceptions, such as that of an internal force. Especially the learners’ understanding of contact forces and Newton’s first law of motion yielded significant improvement. The qualitative data revealed that the understanding of Newton’s second law of motion by the learners who partook in this study did improve, since the learners immediately recognised the mistakes made when confronted with the anchor concept. The cognitive conflict teaching strategy was effective in establishing the anchor concept of force which proved to be useful as bridging concept in the development of ideas teaching strategy. The data from both datasets revealed that the cognitive conflict teaching strategy for the initial part of the intervention was effective. It was evident that for development of the idea teaching strategy the two data sets revealed mixed results. Recommendations were made for future research and implementation of conceptual development teaching strategies. / MEd (Natural Sciences Education), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

This research was stimulated by an indication that members of the Africa Gospel Church do not utilise professional health care services optimally, probably due to religious reasons. This may also be the result of registered nurses&#8217; inability to render culture congruent care. To render culture congruent care, nurses require knowledge of the belief system and the health seeking behaviours of the church members. The qualitative research investigated the religious beliefs and health seeking behaviours of members of the Africa Gospel Church in Francistown, Botswana. An exploratory ethnonursing research method was applied. Semi-structured interviews were held with two purposively selected samples. Qualitative data analysis was done using computer software to reduce data and interpret the research results. The study indicated that members utilise the Church structure for health care purposes and seek health care mainly from priests and prophets. / Advanced Nursing Sciences / M.A. (Nursing Science)

L’annotation en rôles sémantiques est une tâche qui permet d’attribuer des étiquettes de rôles telles que Agent, Patient, Instrument, Lieu, Destination etc. aux différents participants actants ou circonstants (arguments ou adjoints) d’une lexie prédicative. Cette tâche nécessite des ressources lexicales riches ou des corpus importants contenant des phrases annotées manuellement par des linguistes sur lesquels peuvent s’appuyer certaines approches d’automatisation (statistiques ou apprentissage machine). Les travaux antérieurs dans ce domaine ont porté essentiellement sur la langue anglaise qui dispose de ressources riches, telles que PropBank, VerbNet et FrameNet, qui ont servi à alimenter les systèmes d’annotation automatisés. L’annotation dans d’autres langues, pour lesquelles on ne dispose pas d’un corpus annoté manuellement, repose souvent sur le FrameNet anglais. Une ressource telle que FrameNet de l’anglais est plus que nécessaire pour les systèmes d’annotation automatisé et l’annotation manuelle de milliers de phrases par des linguistes est une tâche fastidieuse et exigeante en temps. Nous avons proposé dans cette thèse un système automatique pour aider les linguistes dans cette tâche qui pourraient alors se limiter à la validation des annotations proposées par le système. Dans notre travail, nous ne considérons que les verbes qui sont plus susceptibles que les noms d’être accompagnés par des actants réalisés dans les phrases. Ces verbes concernent les termes de spécialité d’informatique et d’Internet (ex. accéder, configurer, naviguer, télécharger) dont la structure actancielle est enrichie manuellement par des rôles sémantiques. La structure actancielle des lexies verbales est décrite selon les principes de la Lexicologie Explicative et Combinatoire, LEC de Mel’čuk et fait appel partiellement (en ce qui concerne les rôles sémantiques) à la notion de Frame Element tel que décrit dans la théorie Frame Semantics (FS) de Fillmore. Ces deux théories ont ceci de commun qu’elles mènent toutes les deux à la construction de dictionnaires différents de ceux issus des approches traditionnelles. Les lexies verbales d’informatique et d’Internet qui ont été annotées manuellement dans plusieurs contextes constituent notre corpus spécialisé. Notre système qui attribue automatiquement des rôles sémantiques aux actants est basé sur des règles ou classificateurs entraînés sur plus de 2300 contextes. Nous sommes limités à une liste de rôles restreinte car certains rôles dans notre corpus n’ont pas assez d’exemples annotés manuellement. Dans notre système, nous n’avons traité que les rôles Patient, Agent et Destination dont le nombre d’exemple est supérieur à 300. Nous avons crée une classe que nous avons nommé Autre où nous avons rassemblé les autres rôles dont le nombre d’exemples annotés est inférieur à 100. Nous avons subdivisé la tâche d’annotation en sous-tâches : identifier les participants actants et circonstants et attribuer des rôles sémantiques uniquement aux actants qui contribuent au sens de la lexie verbale. Nous avons soumis les phrases de notre corpus à l’analyseur syntaxique Syntex afin d’extraire les informations syntaxiques qui décrivent les différents participants d’une lexie verbale dans une phrase. Ces informations ont servi de traits (features) dans notre modèle d’apprentissage. Nous avons proposé deux techniques pour l’identification des participants : une technique à base de règles où nous avons extrait une trentaine de règles et une autre technique basée sur l’apprentissage machine. Ces mêmes techniques ont été utilisées pour la tâche de distinguer les actants des circonstants. Nous avons proposé pour la tâche d’attribuer des rôles sémantiques aux actants, une méthode de partitionnement (clustering) semi supervisé des instances que nous avons comparée à la méthode de classification de rôles sémantiques. Nous avons utilisé CHAMÉLÉON, un algorithme hiérarchique ascendant. / Semantic role annotation is a process that aims to assign labels such as Agent, Patient, Instrument, Location, etc. to actants or circumstants (also called arguments or adjuncts) of predicative lexical units. This process often requires the use of rich lexical resources or corpora in which sentences are annotated manually by linguists. The automatic approaches (statistical or machine learning) are based on corpora. Previous work was performed for the most part in English which has rich resources, such as PropBank, VerbNet and FrameNet. These resources were used to serve the automated annotation systems. This type of annotation in other languages for which no corpora of annotated sentences are available often use FrameNet by projection. Although a resource such as FrameNet is necessary for the automated annotation systems and the manual annotation by linguists of a large number of sentences is a tedious and time consuming work. We have proposed an automated system to help linguists in this task so that they have only to validate annotations proposed. Our work focuses on verbs that are more likely than other predicative units (adjectives and nouns) to be accompanied by actants realized in sentences. These verbs are specialized terms of the computer science and Internet domains (ie. access, configure, browse, download) whose actantial structures have been annotated manually with semantic roles. The actantial structure is based on principles of Explanatory and Combinatory Lexicology, LEC of Mel’čuk and appeal in part (with regard to semantic roles) to the notion of Frame Element as described in the theory of frame semantics (FS) of Fillmore. What these two theories have in common is that they lead to the construction of dictionaries different from those resulting from the traditional theories. These manually annotated verbal units in several contexts constitute the specialized corpus that our work will use. Our system designed to assign automatically semantic roles to actants is based on rules and classifiers trained on more than 2300 contexts. We are limited to a restricted list of roles for certain roles in our corpus have not enough examples manually annotated. In our system, we addressed the roles Patient, Agent and destination that the number of examples is greater than 300. We have created a class that we called Autre which we bring to gether the other roles that the number of annotated examples is less than 100. We subdivided the annotation task in the identification of participant actants and circumstants and the assignment of semantic roles to actants that contribute to the sense of the verbal lexical unit. We parsed, with Syntex, the sentences of the corpus to extract syntactic informations that describe the participants of the verbal lexical unit in the sentence. These informations are used as features in our learning model. We have proposed two techniques for the task of participant detection: the technique based in rules and machine learning. These same techniques are used for the task of classification of these participants into actants and circumstants. We proposed to the task of assigning semantic roles to the actants, a partitioning method (clustering) semi supervised of instances that we have compared to the method of semantic role classification. We used CHAMELEON, an ascending hierarchical algorithm.

Ce mémoire propose de faire l’analyse épistémologique du pouvoir créateur de la sélection naturelle. L’objectif sera de déterminer en quelle mesure il est légitime ou non de lui attribuer un tel pouvoir. Pour ce faire, il sera question de savoir si l’explication sélectionniste peut répondre à la question de l’origine des formes structurelles du vivant. Au premier chapitre, nous verrons le raisonnement qui mena Darwin à accorder un pouvoir créateur à la sélection naturelle. Nous comprendrons alors qu’un cadre exclusivement darwinien n’est peut-être pas à même de répondre au problème de la nouveauté évolutionnaire. Au deuxième chapitre, nous verrons dans une perspective darwinienne qu’il est possible de conserver l’essence de la théorie darwinienne et d’accorder à la sélection naturelle un pouvoir créateur, bien que deux des piliers darwiniens fondamentaux doivent être remis en question. Au troisième chapitre, nous verrons dans une perspective postdarwinienne que le pouvoir cumulatif de la sélection naturelle n’est peut-être pas à même d’expliquer l’adaptation sur le plan individuel, ce qui remet lourdement en question le pouvoir créateur de la sélection naturelle. Nous comprendrons alors que le débat, entre partisans d’une vision positive et partisans d’une vision négative de la sélection naturelle, dépend peut-être d’un présupposé métaphysique particulier. / This thesis proposes an epistemological analysis of the creative power of natural selection. The aim will be to determine to what extent it is legitimate or not to give to this selection such power. To do this, we will have to know if the selectionist explanation can answer the question of the origin of structural forms of life. In the first chapter, we will see the reasoning leading Darwin to give a creative power of natural selection. We will then understand that an exclusively Darwinian framework is maybe unable to address the problem of evolutionary novelty. In the second chapter, we will see in a Darwinian way that it is possible to retain the essence of Darwinian theory and to give natural selection a creative power, although two of the fundamental Darwinians pillars must be questioned. In the third chapter, we will see in a post-Darwinian way that the cumulative power of natural selection is maybe unable to explain adaptation at individual level, challenging seriously the creative power of natural selection. We will then understand that the debate, between supporters of a positive view and supporters of a negative view of natural selection, may depend on a particular metaphysical assumption.

Entscheidungsunterstützungssysteme in der Finanzwirtschaft sind nicht nur für die Wis-senschaft, sondern auch für die Praxis von großem Interesse. Um die Finanzmarktüber-wachung zu gewährleisten, sehen sich die Finanzaufsichtsbehörden auf der einen Seite, mit der steigenden Anzahl von onlineverfügbaren Informationen, wie z.B. den Finanz-Blogs und -Nachrichten konfrontiert. Auf der anderen Seite stellen schnell aufkommen-de Trends, wie z.B. die stetig wachsende Menge an online verfügbaren Daten sowie die Entwicklung von Data-Mining-Methoden, Herausforderungen für die Wissenschaft dar. Entscheidungsunterstützungssysteme in der Finanzwirtschaft bieten die Möglichkeit rechtzeitig relevante Informationen für Finanzaufsichtsbehörden und Compliance-Beauftragte von Finanzinstituten zur Verfügung zu stellen. In dieser Arbeit werden IT-Artefakte vorgestellt, welche die Entscheidungsfindung der Finanzmarktüberwachung unterstützen. Darüber hinaus wird eine erklärende Designtheorie vorgestellt, welche die Anforderungen der Regulierungsbehörden und der Compliance-Beauftragten in Finan-zinstituten aufgreift.

Ce mémoire propose de faire l’analyse épistémologique du pouvoir créateur de la sélection naturelle. L’objectif sera de déterminer en quelle mesure il est légitime ou non de lui attribuer un tel pouvoir. Pour ce faire, il sera question de savoir si l’explication sélectionniste peut répondre à la question de l’origine des formes structurelles du vivant. Au premier chapitre, nous verrons le raisonnement qui mena Darwin à accorder un pouvoir créateur à la sélection naturelle. Nous comprendrons alors qu’un cadre exclusivement darwinien n’est peut-être pas à même de répondre au problème de la nouveauté évolutionnaire. Au deuxième chapitre, nous verrons dans une perspective darwinienne qu’il est possible de conserver l’essence de la théorie darwinienne et d’accorder à la sélection naturelle un pouvoir créateur, bien que deux des piliers darwiniens fondamentaux doivent être remis en question. Au troisième chapitre, nous verrons dans une perspective postdarwinienne que le pouvoir cumulatif de la sélection naturelle n’est peut-être pas à même d’expliquer l’adaptation sur le plan individuel, ce qui remet lourdement en question le pouvoir créateur de la sélection naturelle. Nous comprendrons alors que le débat, entre partisans d’une vision positive et partisans d’une vision négative de la sélection naturelle, dépend peut-être d’un présupposé métaphysique particulier. / This thesis proposes an epistemological analysis of the creative power of natural selection. The aim will be to determine to what extent it is legitimate or not to give to this selection such power. To do this, we will have to know if the selectionist explanation can answer the question of the origin of structural forms of life. In the first chapter, we will see the reasoning leading Darwin to give a creative power of natural selection. We will then understand that an exclusively Darwinian framework is maybe unable to address the problem of evolutionary novelty. In the second chapter, we will see in a Darwinian way that it is possible to retain the essence of Darwinian theory and to give natural selection a creative power, although two of the fundamental Darwinians pillars must be questioned. In the third chapter, we will see in a post-Darwinian way that the cumulative power of natural selection is maybe unable to explain adaptation at individual level, challenging seriously the creative power of natural selection. We will then understand that the debate, between supporters of a positive view and supporters of a negative view of natural selection, may depend on a particular metaphysical assumption.