While it has been long known that the behaviour of others can influence individual behaviour, norms (the views and behaviours of others) are not generally reported as strong motivators of physical activity. Using the theory of normative social behaviour as a guiding framework, the purpose of this research was to examine if descriptive norms (the perceived prevalence of others behaviour) would be more important in predicting activity than previously suspected. A secondary purpose was to extend this examination to another health behaviour, healthy eating. Three independent studies were conducted. The first two studies examined what individuals thought motivated their physical activity (Study 1) and eating (Study 2) as well as the relationship between descriptive norms and participants own activity behaviour and healthy eating intentions. Results revealed that, despite being rated by participants as less motivating, descriptive norms were stronger predictors of activity behaviour and healthy eating intentions than other well-established non-normative reasons. It also was found that descriptive norm perceptions about a group proposed to be high in group identity (i.e., friends) was most related to physical activity behaviour and healthy eating intentions. To extend these results, a third study manipulated normative and non-normative messages to examine effects on physical activity. Participants were grouped into one of four conditions (descriptive norm, health, appearance, and control) and received motivation-based email messages specific to their condition encouraging them to be active. It was hypothesized that participants in the descriptive norm condition would experience the greatest increase in physical activity but results did not support this hypothesis, as participants across all conditions significantly increased total physical activity after receiving the messages. A secondary hypothesis examining the focal nature of the targeted behaviours was supported in that responses to normative messages were greatest with the most focal behaviour (using the stairs). Taken together, the results of the first two studies provide preliminary evidence to suggest that the relationships between both descriptive norms and physical activity and descriptive norms and healthy eating may be going undetected. In light of the results of the third study, however, future studies are needed.

This essay investigates how Southern society functions during the latter part of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century in America. This is done by looking for signs of patriarchy, religion and its influence, and also at the expectations on women in the story “A Rose For Emily”, which takes place in Jefferson, Mississippi. Patriarchy, religion and expectations on women are visible through the analysis of the protagonist Miss Emily’s relationship to her father, her relationship to her lover Homer Barron and when she is on her own at the end of her life. Furthermore, the townspeople are the narrators in this story and how they treat and view Miss Emily in the three examined parts of her life represents how the American South functions. Also, the analysis is done with a feminist theoretical perspective. Through the analysis, the conclusion is made that the South is a very patriarchal and sexist society. Men are considered to be the superior sex and rule over women. Because of the Puritan religion, women live in an oppressive environment and live very strict lives. For Southern women, marriage is a must if they want to survive both socially and financially.

In this era emphasizing the knowledge economy, corporate survival has been paid special attention following the financial depression. For the corporate under the era of knowledge economy, competitive advantages are from knowledge sharing and organizational innovation. More recently, literature has emerged that offers findings about social capital as a complete concept to explore its influences and functions. In this study, we seek to address the three dimensions, namely relationship, trust, and norms of the internal social capital in the context of Chinese culture and further explore the interactive relationships and influences among them. Using the structure equation model, we use data collected 385 knowledge workers from the high-tech, financial and medical industries of Taiwan. The findings show that (1) relationship has positive influences on norms and trust; (2) the relationship, norms, and trust have positive influences on knowledge sharing; (3) the internal social capital has positive influences on organizational innovation; (4) knowledge sharing has a positive influence on organizational innovation; (5) knowledge sharing has partial mediating effects on social capital and organizational innovation. Furthermore, we proposed a theoretical model of relationship, norms, and trust for future research. These findings could be useful in academic field and practical applications.

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This research investigated the decision process surrounding the self-regulated learning of new uses of existing technology. With firms investing up to 50% of their capital budgets on information technology (in excess of 1 trillion dollars in aggregate), understanding what factors motivate or inhibit more encompassing use of technology is of practical concern (Bowen 1986; Nambisan et al. 1999; Mahmood et a. 2001). I introduced a dynamic element to the technology adoption/acceptance literature by using a framework based upon deferral option theory. This framework allows for the decision to learn a new use of technology to occur over time. I found that potential users chose to defer learning new uses of technology even when usefulness was evident and ease of learning was not prohibitive. Further, an additional benefit to using the deferral option framework was its inclusion of both rewards and penalties; I found that not only do potential users consider what can be gained by learning, but also what can be lost by trying to learn and failing. In addition to using a framework premised on deferral option theory, I investigated the properties of time pressure and subjective norms on the decision to learn new uses of technology. As time pressure offered a possible alternate explanation for why potential users defer learning, I controlled for it experimentally and determined that time pressure did affect deferral choice. Further, as subjective norms have had limited success as a predictor of intent to use technology in prior literature, I investigated the separate pieces of the theoretical construct, referent group perceptions and the motivation to comply with those perceptions. By manipulating environment between work and play settings, different motivational sources were enacted by the potential users. Specifically, I found that when potential users were externally motivated subjective norms did influence deferral, and when internally motivated, subjective norms did not influence a potential user??s decision to defer learning a new use of technology.

Both The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne and My Ántonia by Willa Cather depict characters that perform non-traditional gender roles. In these novels, there are expectations about how women and men should act. The purpose of this comparative study is to look at how the female and male protagonists’ actions correspond to, or differ from, these expectations and if they do so in similar ways. The analytical approach is based on Judith Butler’s theory of gender performance. This study also examines in what ways the characters’ actions conflict with, or conform to, social norms of the time by investigating the social expectations for women in the Puritan society and in the late nineteenth century. Even though the settings are separated by two hundred years, this study shows that the protagonists challenge traditional gender role norms in similar ways and that both female protagonists show a feminist desire to exist outside the binary understanding of gender.

Since Wakefield, Murch, Anthony, Linnell, Casson, Malik, Berelowitz, Dhillon, Thomson, Harvey, Valentine, Davies and Walker-Smith’s (1998) proposed a causal link between the MMR vaccine and autism and Crohn’s disease (a form of irritable bowel disease: IBD), vaccine uptake rates gradually declined in the UK. Parents of young children began to question the safety of MMR immunisation and were required to assess the risks and benefits of MMR immunisation during their decision-making process. The studies in the present thesis aimed to investigate factors influencing parents’ risk assessment, MMR intentions and behaviour to gain an understanding of parents’ decision-making process. A mixed method approach was taken, using both quantitative and qualitative methods. Four studies involving parents of young children and students were carried out in Scotland. The first study was a cross-sectional questionnaire-based study which used Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) and Subjective Norm (SN) to understand parents’ MMR immunisation intentions and behaviour for first dose and second dose MMR vaccine. The results suggest PMT was a useful psychometric risk model when examining first-dose and second-dose MMR immunisation and associated risks. The inclusion of SN in the model increased its overall robustness. Differences between immunising parents and non-immunising parents were identified. Immunisers perceived measles, mumps and rubella to be severe diseases and reported greater susceptibility and fear in relation to the diseases, whereas non-immunisers reported more concern about the associated risks of autism and IBD. Additionally, immunisers were more likely to follow the advice of health professionals (GP and health visitor) and reported them to be important sources of information, whereas non-immunisers were less likely to follow advice from health professionals and reported the media and internet to be important sources of information. The second study used a similar methodology to the first study but used PMT and SN to investigate MMR immunisation decision-making in a sample of 90 previously non-immunised university students during a mumps outbreak on campus. PMT and SN were found to be important constructs when understanding the students’ immunisation behaviour. In comparison with non-immunising students, immunising students reported greater fear, severity and perceived risks of the vaccine-preventable diseases. Non-immunisers perceived greater external barriers to immunisation and anxiety about immunisation to be an internal barrier. Both groups valued the information provided by health professionals and were more likely to follow the advice from these referents than any other referent group. Comparisons were made between the results of the first two studies. The findings indicate PMT, including SN, was a useful model when examining the MMR decision-making process for immunisers and non-immunisers in different population groups. Parents and students reported similar threat appraisals in relation to the vaccine-preventable diseases, but were different in their coping responses (response efficacy and self-efficacy). Many similar patterns between students and parents were illustrated, but parents reported stronger beliefs related to their parental role. The results indicate that MMR decision-making differs depending on the population under study. The third study used 5 focus groups and thematic analysis to explore the role of subjective norm (SN) and other social norms in greater depth with immunising parents. The findings indicate that social norms play a central role in the decision-making process, in addition to SN. Social normative factors which were found to contribute to the decision process included: group identification and norms, SN, descriptive norms, private self, relational self, and moral norms. The ‘private self’, i.e. own personal identity as ‘parents’, and feelings of moral obligation to their child were perceived as important social norms during the MMR decision. Parents were willing to listen to the advice of significant others but perceived their ‘private self’ as playing a more active role during the decision process. Experience of other parents’ MMR behaviour (descriptive norm) contributed to the risk assessment of the MMR vaccine and increased confidence in their own decision when congruent. The dual role of health professionals (who were also parents) as a ‘medical professional’ and as a ‘parent’ was influential during the decision process. The final study further investigated the influence of health professionals (HPs) on parents’ MMR decision-making. The role of interpersonal and generalised trust was explored using one-to-one interviews with 6 MMR immunisers, 3 non-immunisers and 8 immunisers with single vaccines. All groups of parents reported generalised mistrust in the Government based on the provision of biased information and past experiences of Government behaviour. Parents who opted for the MMR vaccines described interpersonal trust with their own HPs, where HPs were willing to openly discuss concerns relating to the MMR vaccine. Parents opting for the single vaccines or refusing all vaccines tended to report mixed experiences with their HPs, with some parents citing them as unhelpful and unwilling to discuss MMR concerns. Greater trust was illustrated by all parents, regardless of immunisation status, for their own health professionals and the NHS than for private clinics offering the single vaccines. Parents opting for the single vaccines perceived them to be safer (in terms of autism and IBD) than the MMR vaccine but questioned their credibility. The four studies illustrate that PMT facilitates understanding of parents’ MMR decision making and behaviour, and highlights the importance of including social norms (as well as important sources of information) and trust in future MMR immunisation research. Furthermore, comparisons with parents and students illustrate differences in coping appraisal between the two groups and suggest risk assessment differs depending on the saliency of the risk for the population group.

The purpose of this analysis was to define norms for grammatical morpheme development in Spanish for Spanish-English bilingual children ages 4;0-7;6 relative to their use of Spanish. This study uses secondary data analysis based on two existing datasets. Participants included 334 Spanish-English bilingual children that were recruited from school districts in Texas, Utah, and Pennsylvania. Grammatical morpheme accuracy was determined by performance on the BESA (Bilingual English Spanish Assessment) (Peña, Gutiérrez-Clellen et al., in preparation). Percentage of current use of Spanish was estimated based on a parental interview in which parents estimated children language input and output. The average percent accuracy of grammatical morphemes was calculated and analyzed as a function of current use of Spanish and of chronological age. Results show that the percentage of accurately produced morphemes has a general upward trend as Spanish use and age increases. These findings will help define expectations for bilingual children that in turn can inform the development of intervention goals. / text

We provide a framework for understanding managerial implications of multinational teams. In addition to context, four major categories of variables have a determining influence on multinational team performance: universal values, norms of behavior, perceptions of others and self, and personality traits. Size of teams, kind of task, learning opportunities, power and interests change the effects of these variables. Of particular importance is the team implementation process, which can neutralize adverse effects of wrong perceptions, helps to establish team norms and, thus, contributes to success of multinational teams. (author's abstract) / Series: EI Working Papers / Europainstitut