A capital project represents a significant investment by a firm to create future economic benefits. Since the global economic recession begun in 2008, corporate owners have paid increased attention to business-project interfaces with the aim of improving alignment between business strategy and capital project development. Despite its importance, the business-project interface has not been quantitatively measured and no empirical evidence exists about its effects on performance outcomes. This dissertation intends to identify and quantify the business-project interfaces in the development of a capital project in terms of personnel involvement and task interaction, and to investigate its effects on performance outcomes and the value of best practices. To achieve these objectives, a conceptual framework for assessing the involvement and interaction on business-project interfaces was developed. Based on the conceptual framework, a questionnaire including quantitative measures for the assessment of personnel involvement and task interaction was designed. Supplemental survey responses were received for several industrial capital projects that had initially provided capital project data to the CII Benchmarking & Metrics database. The effects of the business-project interface in terms of cost, schedule, change, and business performance were documented. Data analyses show that project groups with high involvement by business personnel and high interaction between business and project units tend to show remarkably improved project performance. Furthermore, this dissertation presents confirmation that projects with high involvement of business unit personnel and intensive implementation of best practices tend to show superior project performance. The primary contribution of this research is to provide a quantitative assessment tool to assess the business-project interface and to document the interface throughout project life cycle. Another contribution is empirical evidence of the benefits on project performance from implementing best practices that were supported by management. / text

A review of participatory methods used by forty-nine of the fifty State Departments of Transportation during preparation of their most recently adopted statewide long-range transportation plan revealed the flexibility needed to design context-sensitive methods tailored to the specific planning situation. Four parameters are used to characterize methods used by the States: the planning purpose, participatory goal, timing, and the public scale. The report discusses five opportunities to optimize the participatory process that can broaden reach while maintaining a slim budget. These value-added strategies include taking the process to the public, taking stock of public knowledge and understanding, leveraging existing local relationships, using online techniques to supplement face-to-face contact, and integrating public input into the plan. / text

As societies the world over move towards defining inclusive and effective education systems this presents the educator with the new challenge of providing an equal and democratic education environment for all students. With children the nature of functioning and environmental settings varies greatly in comparison with adults and assessing children’s involvement in activities is of particular importance to ensure effective and inclusive society building through education. Building on the existing and previous participation research this thesis specifically aims to provide a means to theorize participation from two perspectives (frequency of attending and intensity of involvement) and put in to operation using five dimensions of the environment: availability, accessibility, affordability, accommodability, and acceptability. Contextually this has been done by investigating children in need of additional support (including children with disabilities) at school. Results indicate that while research and theory take a holistic and balanced approach by using participation based on two perspectives, this has yet to filter down to practice. A new approach to measuring inclusive education using social capital, the five environmental dimensions, and the ICF-CY is proposed and tested. However, while the ICF-CY provides a consistent descriptive framework, no clear connections between social capital and inclusive education policy could be drawn and the five environmental dimensions – especially the involvement-related ones – need further development. The final paper presents evidence from the individual perspective for a third ICF-CY activities and participation qualifier to represent the subjective experience of involvement. Participation can thus be regarded as a multi-dimensional phenomenon with two main conceptual roots: sociology and developmental psychology. / MURINET project (Multidisciplinary Research Network on Health and Disability in Europe, European Commission project funded within the Sixth Framework Programme, MRTN-CT-2006-035794).

User involvement is generally regarded as something positive within social work, and is something social authorities in Sweden (as in many other countries) propagates for. This study aims to highlight social workers perceptions and experiences of user involvement within the specific context addiction treatment. A context where users individual status has proved needed to be strengthened. Five social workers, all working within Swedens national government-funded social service agency, are given a voice on the subject. By using semi-structured interviews, the results show how broad and ambiguous the concept of user involve-ment is, when the respondents is asked to define it. This found is supported by earlier studies results, in which researchers also declare the concept unclear. This studys result includes se-veral examples of what the social workers comprehend the involvement consists of in their daily work. The conditions for user involvement to take place in this study’s specifik practice, shows to be closely associated with factors such as the bureaucratic regime, organizational framework agreements and with assessments of the client in question knows its own good (on the basis that drugs affect the human cognitive system in different ways).

The following dissertation examines the role of collaborative planning in the redevelopment of National Priorities List Superfund sites and the implementation of Superfund site redevelopment plans. To examine the effect of collaborative planning, two models were constructed: one to predict Superfund site redevelopment and one to predict implementation of Superfund site redevelopment plans. Two test the two models, data was collected primarily from a survey of federal cleanup managers conducted between August 2008 and April 2009. Variables were then constructed and tested using bivariate and multivariate regression analysis. Results from the statistical analysis suggest that use of collaborative planning is positively and significantly associated with Superfund site redevelopment. Collaborative planning’s effect on Superfund site redevelopment plan implementation was inconclusive. To further explore the role of collaborative planning on Superfund site redevelopment and plan implementation, four case studies were developed that describe redevelopment planning at four Superfund sites. Overall, results suggest that collaborative planning is an important tool for the facilitation of Superfund site redevelopment. The effect of collaborative planning on plan implementation is somewhat ambiguous. Additional research is necessary, however, to draw firmer conclusions regarding both phenomena. / text

Media reports and interviews with counselors indicate that academic stress and adolescent distress is a significant problem in India, but little systematic research has been conducted on the issue. A combination of quantitative and qualitative methods was used in the current study - surveys assessed the prevalence of academic stress and adolescent distress, and interviews with 12th standard students explored their perceptions of the issue and their understanding of the role of parents.In the survey part of the study, the prevalence of the problem was assessed with the use of scales that measured depression and anxiety. Surveys were completed by 12th standard students (n = 588) from the south Indian city of Chennai. A majority of students reported that they were stressed by the coming school year, and rates of depression and anxiety were very high in the sample. In contrast with previous research and contrary to expectations, few gender, academic track and school type differences were found. Further analyses indicated that different groups of students appeared to experience distress in different ways.Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12th standard students (n = 24) to explore their perceptions of academic stress and adolescent distress. Their perceptions could be categorized into six themes: busy schedules, experience of stress, somatic symptoms, attitudes and beliefs about 12th standard, the role of God vs. hard work, and education reform. The same interview data was also used to understand the role of parents. Analysis suggested that parents were involved in their child's education in five ways - they had specific expectations for achievement, they put pressure on their children, they compared their child to others, they controlled the study environment, and they were supportive of their children. Some categories appeared to be associated with a greater experience of academic stress and adolescent distress than others. The interview data was also explored for gender, academic track, and school type differences.Jointly, these findings suggest that academic stress and adolescent distress is indeed a significant problem in Chennai, India. A variety of interventions are suggested to address the issue.

In recent years, smartphone has become the most popular products, the literature for smartphone is relatively less, most of using Technology Acceptance Model ¡]TAM¡^ as the main research framework to explore. Influencing the consumer intension is concept of cognition ¡]perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use¡^, thereby affecting subsequent behavioral intentions, but what kind of product characteristics affect consumer¡¦s perceiving are seldom addressed. This study proposes "Involvement - Brand Loyalty Model" as the theoretical basis, with the "involvement" concept applied to smartphone users in order to explore the brand loyalty. Involvement antecedent focuses on "product utility", and explores what kind of product characteristics affect the product utility from the past literature, and then is combined with the social influence to investigate smartphone usage. Finally, the study will also compare different groups based on with or without owning a smartphone, and then provide the final analysis of the research results. The final results show that user involvement does affect the brand loyalty of the smartphone, and if the users are highly involved, regardless of whatever the user experience may be, product involvement will affect the brand involvement. Comparison with previous studies finds the similarity and the differences between those two groups. The common is the high involvement of smartphone. The differences lie in the user experience that does affect the user for the demand of products characteristics, and the impact of the social influence. The three products characteristics: convergence, innovation and network externality will definitely affect the product utility for someone who has smartphone, but we can understand that the user experience will impact convergence by analyzing the groups without smartphone. It is difficult to measure the value of convergence for someone who doesn¡¦t have smartphone, so in the study show that the convergence does not significantly affect the product utility, while the other two product characteristics ¡]innovation, network externalities¡^ are significant impact the product utility. For people who have usage experience, the social influence can directly affect their brand judgment, nevertheless without the usage experience, the social influence has impact on the brand involvement only through the product involvement.

Känslan av att man alltid ska vara produktiv är medfödd hos oss människor. Att få de anställda att vara motiverade och därmed prestera bra på arbetet är något som blivit en utmaning för arbetsgivarna, eftersom många arbetstagare numera söker arbetstillfredsställelse på andra sätt än bara genom det faktum att man får lön för mödan. För att undersöka huruvida arbetsmotivationen skiljer sig beroende på kön, tjänst och arbetslivserfarenhet genomfördes en enkätundersökning på ett medelstort svenskt företag. Enkäten innehöll fem frågeområden som tillsammans mäter arbetsmotivation. Deltagare var 64 anställda, varav 48 män och 16 kvinnor. Resultaten visade att män värderade engagemang högre än kvinnor gällande arbetsmotivation. I övrigt visade resultaten inga signifikanta skillnader i arbetsmotivation mellan grupperna vilket kan tolkas som att de anställda på det aktuella företaget utgjorde en homogen grupp med likvärdig arbetsmotivation.

Patient safety strategies have traditionally involved the promotion of provider-oriented practices aimed at reducing known risks associated with surgery, infection, and continuity of care. With the knowledge that patient safety incidents can significantly impact patients, providers, and health care organizations, greater emphasis on patient involvement as a means to mitigate risks warrants further research. The primary objective of this research was to determine the relationship between perceptions of patient safety and the likelihood of patient involvement in both factual and challenging patient safety practices. This mixed methods study was conducted at two tertiary hospital sites located in Atlantic Canada between February 2011 and January 2012. The study design was the sequential explanatory model of mixed methods design, integrating both quantitative survey methods and qualitative focus group methods for both patient and provider participants. Survey data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and partial least squares (PLS) analysis. Focus group sessions were transcribed and analyzed using thematic analysis. The development and analysis of this research was guided by the Health Belief Model. Overall, patients were more willing to engage in factual patient safety practices (e.g., asking questions of their doctors) than challenging patient safety practices (e.g., asking a provider if they have washed their hands). The patient PLS analysis revealed relationships between patient perceptions of threat and self-efficacy and the performance of factual and challenging patient safety practices, explaining 46% and 42% of the variance, respectively. The provider PLS model found that perceptions of safety culture accounted for 34% of the variance in perceptions of threat and 42% of the variance in perceptions of barriers versus benefits. Thematic analysis resulted in the identification of four major themes for both patient and providers related to the phenomenon of patient involvement. Quantitative and qualitative results were complementary in nature. Perceptions of patient safety were shown to influence both patient and provider likelihood in engaging in selected patient safety practices. Greater understanding of the roles that perceptions play in patient involvement in their care may help to improve the safety and quality of care delivered.

This study explores the conceptions and practices of parent involvement in education that exist among Latin American families with students in Toronto Schools. The individual and collective life histories of 3 immigrant families from Latin America were collected in order to understand how parents and students conceive of parents’ role the education of their children. The findings of this research demonstrate that families’ conceptions are much broader and expansive than what is currently defined as parent involvement within policy and practice in Ontario and are informed by their educational trajectory in their home country and throughout the migration process and their ideas on education. This research serves to shed light on the experiences of Latin American families in their interactions with educational institutions and gives voice to their experiences, ideas and aspirations in their new home.