The title of this study refers to three different dimensions of goal orientation (GO), which is defined as the stable motivated pattern of cognition and action that results from the continued pursuit of mastery-approach, performance-approach, or performance-avoid goals in different situations over time. Individuals who are primarily motivated through high learning or mastery goals ("masters"), through high performance goals ("showoffs"), and by a high desire to find easy work or avoid failing their set performance goals ("slackers") will all interact on teams with varying degrees of goal completion. These differences in the likeness of GO of team members has implications for how they interact with team members, how individuals learn, and how the team performs. This study addresses this lack of attention by more explicitly examining how likeness on GO, a motivational trait associated with how individuals react to situations where they must achieve goals, can influence the degree to which individuals can effectively work with their fellow team members. In addition, this study also investigates how GO homogeneity at the team level influences team-level learning and performance. This study shows that at the individual level, GO congruence influences learning outcomes, contributions to the team, cooperative behaviors, and that this effect is mediated through metacognition and attraction to team members. This study also shows that psychological safety serves as the mechanism at the team level through which GO homogeneity influences team level performance and team-level learning behaviors.

Transformational leaders inspire followers to perform beyond expectations and to become transformational leaders themselves. Research evidence shows that transformational leadership has positive effects on people, teams, organizations, and nations. In addition to producing higher levels of follower performance, transformational leadership results in increased follower satisfaction and commitment. However, there is still much to be learned about the complex set of antecedents that predict perceptions of transformational leader behaviors, and research is scarce regarding moderators that impact the relationship between leader behavior and follower outcomes. Most research regarding antecedents of transformational leadership has focused on leader personality and other individual differences, but there are other potential predictors not addressed in the literature, such as how the match between a leader and the situation influences transformational leadership. This study expanded upon previous research by examining the constructs of person-organization fit, person-job fit (demands-abilities and needs-supplies), and motivation to lead as predictors of transformational leader behavior. Because followers' fit with the situation may influence their receptiveness to transformational leadership, I also examined follower perceptions of person-supervisor fit and person-organization fit as moderators of the relationship between transformational leadership and follower outcomes. I hypothesized that these relationships would be stronger for those with higher levels of fit perceptions and recruited participants from multiple organizations to test the hypotheses. A sample of 215 leaders across 10 organizations provided self-report data regarding the proposed antecedents, as well as their personality characteristics, the need for change in their work unit, and the performance of their followers. Their supervisors provided ratings of leader effectiveness and assessed the need for change in the leader's work unit. A sample of 1,284 followers assessed the leaders' transformational leader behaviors and provided self-report data regarding the proposed fit moderators and their own work attitudes, which included job satisfaction and intentions to quit. Analytic strategies used to test the hypotheses were correlational analysis, multiple regression, hierarchical linear modeling, and moderated mediation. Initial regression results showed that both needs-supplies fit and demands-abilities fit were significantly related to transformational leadership. After control variables were taken into account, only demands-abilities fit remained significantly related to transformational leadership. Consistent with previous research, transformational leadership was related to boss ratings of leader effectiveness as well as to follower job satisfaction, intentions to quit (negative), and organizational citizenship behaviors (but not to task performance). Of the proposed moderators, support was found for the interaction of transformational leadership and person-supervisor fit influencing intentions to quit (intentions to quit was positively related to transformational leadership; the relationship was stronger for those with higher levels of person-supervisor fit), the interaction of transformational leadership and person-organization fit influencing intentions to quit (intentions to quit was negatively related to transformational leadership; the relationship was stronger for those with higher levels of person-organization fit), and also for the interaction of transformational leadership and person-organization fit influencing task performance (task performance was positively related to transformational leadership; the relationship was stronger for those with higher levels of person-organization fit). Theoretical and managerial implications are also discussed, along with limitations of the study and suggestions for future research.

The population consisting of young people with Behavioral/Emotional/Learning challenges typically experiences poorer outcomes related to employment, in part due to lower performance levels. Effective strategies, which have a positive impact on work performance for this population, are needed. Goal setting has been used to bring about behavior change, or increase 'motivation', in many fields of study. Goal setting can be conceptualized as an establishing operation (EO), which increases the reinforcing value of goal achievement, and thereby increases the probability of the occurrence of behaviors related to reaching the goal, i.e., task completion. This study empirically examined the impact of a goal setting procedure on work-related behaviors through the use of a singlecase experimental design, to detect the individual results of the goal setting intervention, which included the manipulation of environmental events to explain behavior change, or 'motivation'. It was hypothesized that the goal setting procedure would have a positive impact on work performance for these young people with challenges in a work-type setting. Results showed that the goal setting procedure did have a positive impact on the work performance of both participants, especially when additional prompts were included in the goal setting procedure. Although goal setting may serve as an EO, the goal setting procedure, which included additional elements such as prompts and feedback, seemed to be more effective.

The factor structure of the work/family conflict scale developed by Carlson, Kacmar, & Williams (2000) was analyzed for measurement invariance between a US and an Australian/New Zealand (ANZ) sample using a multisample confirmatory factor analysis procedure. Results indicated that factor pattern fit between the female samples on the common model was good-to-mediocre, and factor pattern fit between the male samples and the common model was mediocre-to-poor. Both samples exhibited significant changes in chi square when testing for the more restrictive factor loading equivalence. Partial measurement invariance revealed a better fit between the male samples when three of the items were unconstrained, and when eight items were unconstrained between the female samples. Finally, males and females in the ANZ sample exhibited factor pattern invariance, but required two items to be unconstrained before factor loading invariance was achieved. Mean differences on the six scales revealed higher levels of time-based work interference with family and family interference with work for males than for females in the ANZ sample.

The empirical testing of theories is an important component of research in any field. Yet despite the long history of science, the extent to which theories are supported or contradicted by the results of empirical research remains ill defined. Quite commonly, support or contradiction is based solely on the "reject" or "fail to reject" decisions that result from tests of null hypotheses that are derived from aspects of theory. Decisions and recommendations based on this forced and often artificial dichotomy have been scrutinized in the past. In recent years, such an overly simplified approach to theory testing has been vigorously challenged in the past.Theories differ in the extent to which they provide precise predictions about observations. The precision of predictions derived from theories is proportional to the strength of support that may be provided by empirical evidence congruent with the prediction. However, the notion of precision linked to strength of support is surprisingly absent from many discussions regarding the appraisal of theories. Meehl (1990a) has presented a logically sound index of corroboration to summarize the extent to which empirical tests of theories provide support or contradiction of theories. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the utility of this index of corroboration and its behavior when employing path analytic methods in the context of social science research. The performance of a multivariate extension of Meehl’s Corroboration Index (Ci) was evaluated using Monte Carlo methods. Correlational data were simulated to correspond to tests of theories via traditional path analysis. Five factors were included in the study: number of variables in the path model, level of intolerance of the theory, correspondence of the theory to the ‘true’ path model used for data generation, sample size and level of collinearity. Results were evaluated in terms of the mean and standard error of the resulting multivariate Ci values. The level of intolerance was observed to be the strongest influence on mean Ci. Verisimilitude and model complexity were not observed to be strong determinants of the mean Ci. Sample size and collinearity evidenced small relationships with the mean value of Ci, but were more closely related to the sampling error. Implications for theory and practice include alternatives and complements to tests of statistical significance, a shift from comparing findings to the null hypothesis, to the comparison of alternative theories and models, and the inclusion of additional logical components besides the theory itself. Lastly, an alternative conceptualization of the multivariate corroboration index is advanced to guide future research efforts.

This thesis work was carried out at a manufacturing plant in Sweden and they are producing a different kind of components for the company. This thesis work was about an assembly line in the factory where they needed a simulation model in Plant Simulation. The main goal of the thesis work was to break down different losses, building a simulation model and compare it if the results are the same as the real assembly line with similar characteristics. The assembly line consists of several workers and AGVs with three u-shaped lines. Frame of reference describes topics that are related to the project. It consists of theories about simulation, collection of data, the bottleneck of the production line, integrated manufacturing systems and flexible workers. The chapter of literature review presents researches on similar studies, in this case, simulation, bottleneck, and workers in the assembly line. In the chapter Simulation model, there will be an explanation of how data got collected, the transformation of raw data and building a simulation model of it. Also the way the model was programmed and built. Result and analysis, the focus is to analyze the throughput, lead time and work in process parameters to get a steady state graph and confidence interval. This chapter also shows how long time does the model need for warm up and how many replications it needs to be more accurate. Discussion part reviews the whole project and its progress. It covers problems that authors got through, at the same time learning and getting a new experience of tools and methods that were used in this project.

This thesis has two distinct research threads. One thread examines the effectiveness of technology support on the performance of focus groups. Unlike previous research, the work described in this thesis addresses the fundamental issue that groups are social systems, and that comprehensive measurement of the effectiveness of group activities requires assessment of both the task-oriented and social aspects of the group activity. In this research, four different communication modes are used to compare group effectiveness. The second research thread in this thesis is the use of Systems Thinking, and specifically Soft Systems Methodology (SSM), as the framework for inquiring into the effects of technology support on group effectiveness. The strategy in this thesis for developing and evaluating hypotheses extends the general descriptions and guidance in the literature on using SSM for hypothesis testing. Systems thinking also provides the basis for examining the prevailing ???profile deviation??? view that the better the fit between the group task and the technology support the greater the group performance. Using the six perspectives of fit developed by Venkatraman (1989), the most common GSS models and other models developed to examine Task-Technology Fit (TTF) are analysed. The results show that group performance models are most often tested from a ???profile deviation??? perspective and TTF models developed from a profile deviation perspective claim to have predictive and descriptive validity for assessing the level of group performance. To assess whether an SSM based approach can improve the predictive and/or descriptive analysis of the impact of technology support on group work, a field experiment was conducted at the Australian Defence Force Academy. Twenty focus groups of officer cadets assessed their military training program using a GSS in one of four communication modes. The results showed little predictive or descriptive support for the profile deviation perspective of TTF when measuring the group???s overall effectiveness, task effectiveness, participant satisfaction or group relations. The alternative ???gestalt??? perspective, operationalised in this research by using SSM, provided a more comprehensive approach to examining the effectiveness of technology support for group work.

The relative power of goodness-of-fit test statistics has long been debated in the literature. Chi-Square type test statistics to determine 'fit' for categorical data are still dominant in the goodness-of-fit arena. Empirical Distribution Function type goodness-of-fit test statistics are known to be relatively more powerful than Chi-Square type test statistics for restricted types of null and alternative distributions. In many practical applications researchers who use a standard Chi-Square type goodness-of-fit test statistic ignore the rank of ordinal classes. This thesis reviews literature in the goodness-of-fit field, with major emphasis on categorical goodness-of-fit tests. The continued use of an asymptotic distribution to approximate the exact distribution of categorical goodness-of-fit test statistics is discouraged. It is unlikely that an asymptotic distribution will produce a more accurate estimation of the exact distribution of a goodness-of-fit test statistic than a Monte Carlo approximation with a large number of simulations. Due to their relatively higher powers for restricted types of null and alternative distributions, several authors recommend the use of Empirical Distribution Function test statistics over nominal goodness-of-fit test statistics such as Pearson's Chi-Square. In-depth power studies confirm the views of other authors that categorical Empirical Distribution Function type test statistics do not have higher power for some common null and alternative distributions. Because of this, it is not sensible to make a conclusive recommendation to always use an Empirical Distribution Function type test statistic instead of a nominal goodness-of-fit test statistic. Traditionally the recommendation to determine 'fit' for multivariate categorical data is to treat categories as nominal, an approach which precludes any gain in power which may accrue from a ranking, should one or more variables be ordinal. The presence of multiple criteria through multivariate data may result in partially ordered categories, some of which have equal ranking. This thesis proposes a modification to the currently available Kolmogorov-Smirnov test statistics for ordinal and nominal categorical data to account for situations of partially ordered categories. The new test statistic, called the Combined Kolmogorov-Smirnov, is relatively more powerful than Pearson's Chi-Square and the nominal Kolmogorov-Smirnov test statistic for some null and alternative distributions. A recommendation is made to use the new test statistic with higher power in situations where some benefit can be achieved by incorporating an Empirical Distribution Function approach, but the data lack a complete natural ordering of categories. The new and established categorical goodness-of-fit test statistics are demonstrated in the analysis of categorical data with brief applications as diverse as familiarity of defence programs, the number of recruits produced by the Merlin bird, a demographic problem, and DNA profiling of genotypes. The results from these applications confirm the recommendations associated with specific goodness-of-fit test statistics throughout this thesis.

La structure nucléaire des noyaux de la couche sd a été bien étudiée expérimentalement à proximité de la ligne de stabilité et, plus récemment, l'intérêt a porté sur les noyaux riches en neutrons. Les états normaux de parité positive sont bien décrits à l'aide de l'interaction USD dans l'espace sd (espace 0ħω) avec un cœur de 16O. Cette interaction a été récemment réajustée et les nouveaux Hamiltonians obtenus sont appelés USDA et USDB. Les spectres expérimentaux montrent l'existence, en plus des états normaux, d'un ensemble d'états de parité négative nommé "états intrus", résultant de l'excitation d'un nucléon de la couche p vers sd, pour les noyaux près de 16O ou de la couche sd vers pf pour les noyaux proches de 40Ca. Au milieu de la couche sd il y a compétition entre les deux types d'excitations pour les intrus. Avant notre travail, il n'existait pas de description unifiée des états de parité négative à travers toute la couche sd. Pour étudier les états intrus, nous avons élargi l'espace modèle de l'espace sd (cœur 16O) à l'espace complet p-sd-pf (cœur 4He) appelé espace 1ħω. Cela nécessite la construction d'une nouvelle interaction compatible avec cette extension de l'espace modèle. Cette procédure est maintenant possible en raison de l'augmentation de la puissance de calcul. Nous avons ainsi mis au point pour la première fois une interaction 1ħω appelée PSDPF, qui comporte cinq parties distinctes: p, sd et pf en plus des termes croisés p-sd et sd-pf. Les trois interactions fixes pour p, sd et pf sont respectivement: CK, USDB et SDPF-NR, cette dernière contient également les éléments de matrice à deux corps sd-pf, l'interaction p-sd est considérée comme étant l'interaction PSDT. Nous avons modifié les contributions p-sd et sd-pf pour reproduire l'évolution en énergie des états intrus de différents spins à travers toute la couche sd. Cette nouvelle interaction a été utilisée pour calculer les états intrus dans les noyaux sd avec N = Z et Z + 1. Les spectres en énergie des états + et - dans tous les noyaux sd ont aussi été calculés. La comparaison expérience-théorie montre un très bon accord et donne ainsi du crédit à notre nouvelle interaction proposée pour décrire les états intrus de la couche sd. Des états de parité - ont été attribués certains niveaux de Jπ inconnus. Les probabilités de transitions électromagnétiques réduites E2 et E3 des premiers états de parité + et -, avec Jπ = 2+ et 3- dans les noyaux pair-pairs, ont été également calculées et les charges effectives pour les transitions E3 ont été étudiées pour la première fois.

Dans cette these, nous avons effectue l'analyse des spectres d'absorption a haute resolution de H2S, D2S, HDS et SO2 enregistres pour la premiere fois ou avec une meilleure precision experimentale que les spectres anterieurs. Nous avons developpe une methode originale de "global ftting" qui nous a permis l'analyse de 22 bandes vibrationnelles soit un total de 9700 transitions rovibrationnelles pour la molecule de D2S. Nous avons applique cette meme methode a des molecules de symmetrie Cs, en particulier tout le spectre rovibrationnel de la molecule HDS a ete analyse. La methode SPGF est appliquee aux molecules triatomiques H2S, D2S, HDS. Une procedure originale permettant l'identication des bandes tres peu intenses a ete mise au point pour la premiere fois et appliquee aux bandes chaudes de la molecule SO2. Le formalisme U(p+1) est adapte aux molecules triatomiques non lineaires de symmetrie C2v et les parametres d'un Hamiltonien vibrationnel sont determines dans le cas de la molecule D2S.