Die vorliegende Publikation stammt aus der Reihe "Tipps und Tricks" im Umgang mit Pro Engineer. Es werden BMX-Funktionalitäten zur Dimensionierung eines Massenausgleiches algorithmisch dargestellt. Als Beispiel dient ein Schubkurbelgetriebe, welches bezüglich seiner Gestellkraftkomponenten analysiert wird. Mit Hilfe eines Lancaster-Ausgleiches kann die Lage des Massenschwerpunktes bezüglich der X- und Y-Komponente optimiert werden.

This thesis argues that the recent erasure of digital pro-anorexia ("pro-ana") narratives by websites such as Tumblr, Pinterest, and Instagram represents an attempt to silence female self-starvers and reify the authority of medical associations to speak for female bodies. I draw parallels between these attempts and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's theory of epistemic violence, since the experiences of women are effectively discredited, through metaphors that render the thin body dangerous, to shore up professional medical authority. As an attempt to privilege the experiences of the self-starvers, I analyze one Tumblr blog with eating disorder content to listen to the letters users anonymously write to their bodies in contrast to narratives written by "recovered" self-starvers that are officially endorsed by the National Eating Disorder Association. Finally, I argue that the Internet provides us with the opportunity to foster response-able witnessing, for which Kelly Oliver has advocated. I extend Oliver's research to argue that we must foster response-ability for all attempts to bear witness. I suggest that creating response-able spaces where others might witness their different embodied experiences can enable female self-starvers to reclaim subjectivity that medicine has taken from them. In so doing, they might learn to become response-able to their eating disorders, and, eventually, their own bodies.

Crisis pregnancy center advertisements like billboards that ask whether a downcast woman of color is "Pregnant? Scared?" appear to be a locus of the overlapping factors of United States racial politics, bodily control, and a neoliberal sensibility. In order to investigate these relationships, I situate analyses of anti-abortion media products alongside current U.S. political discourses. What is the relationship between the elements of racism and bodily control in CPC visual rhetoric and growing neoliberal culture? This project brings these factors into a dialogue by analyzing the anti-abortion rhetoric shaped by CPC organizations and the white U.S. mainstream. As I discuss in Chapter One, anti-abortion organizations target specific communities and use large-scale media advertising to retain disproportionate control over the image of abortion in the U.S. cultural imaginary. The second chapter details how that imaginary and the current political situation overlap in immigration, population, and border panic that reduces Latinas to sexualized stereotypes. In Chapter Three, I report on the U.S. medical and political systems' shameful oppression of black women's reproductive freedom in order to situate the advertising rhetoric of three more anti-abortion organizations. The discourses these groups perpetrate are all reflected in the moral individualism of a growing neoliberal social politic. In sum, anti-abortion organizations use neoliberal rhetoric and racialized advertising to perpetuate destructive discourses of what it means to be a person of color in reproductive crisis. These discourses approach race with entrenched stereotypes, paternalistic moralizing, and euphemistic concern for low-income people of color. A critical feminist lens helps draw serious attention to dangerous patterns in anti-abortion rhetoric and the politics of race and reproductive justice. / text

Since its ruling in Buckley v. Valeo, the U.S. Supreme Court has expressed concern regarding corruption or the appearance of corruption stemming from political quid pro quo arrangements and the deleterious consequences it may have on citizens’ democratic behavior. However, no standard has been set as to what constitutes “the appearance of corruption,” as the Court was and continues to be vague in its definition. As a result, campaign finance cases after Buckley have relied on public opinion polls as evidence of perceptions of corruption, and these polls indicate that the public generally perceives high levels of corruption in government. The present study investigates the actual impact that perceptions of corruption have on individuals’ levels of political participation. Adapting the standard socioeconomic status model developed most fully by Verba and Nie (1972), an extended beta-binomial regression estimated using maximum likelihood is performed, utilizing unique data from the 2009 University of Texas’ Money and Politics survey. The results of this study indicate that individuals who perceive higher levels of quid pro quo corruption participate more in politics, on average, than those who perceive lower levels of corruption. This suggests that at least part of the Supreme Court’s rationale for upholding the FECA contribution limits in Buckley v. Valeo was unfounded. A similar test was performed using questions from the 2008 American National Election Study that have been used as proxies for corruption in previous studies, with inconclusive results. The more precise measure in the Money and Politics survey relates directly to the role of money in politics and provides better information than the ANES proxies have in the past, as those have been found to be related to factors other than money in politics. / text

The purpose of the study was to investigate how Irish pro-choice organizations work in respect of free choice in relation to abortion, since abortion is illegal except when there is a substantial risk to the mother’s life. This purpose was constructed with the significance of social work as a practical profession restricted by regulations, at the same time as it is a profession to support and help deprived people. This was a qualitative study with semi-structured interviews with seven different people from five different pro-choice organizations. The interviews indicated that in Ireland abortion was a stigmatized matter, as well as taboo to talk about. The results showed that the pro- choice organizations work to provide support and information and they viewed the right to abortion as a fundamental right and that women going through crisis pregnancy should be able to access a free choice. Still, it is the stigmatizing environment as well as the existing laws that become an obstacle for accessing free choice.

The theory of planned behaviour proposes that behaviour is predicted by behavioural intention which is, in turn, predicted by attitudes toward the behaviour, subjective norms regarding the behaviour and perceived control over the behaviour. Implied within this theory is that each of the three base components (attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control) influences intentions. However, despite being one of the most widely used theories in social psychology, few studies have investigated this basic premise. In addition, research on cognitive dissonance, public commitment, confirmation bias, implemental mindset, and the false consensus effect suggest that there may be a reverse-causal influence of intentions back on the base components of the theory. This potential reverse-causal sequence was tested in three studies. The first was correlational, the second was a lab-based experiment, and the third was a quasi-experimental field study. Study 1 employed a cross-lagged correlation design and showed that a reciprocal relation between intentions and base components was plausible. For the behaviour of supporting an environmental organization, Study 1 showed that attitudes were likely to influence intention-setting and that intention-setting subsequently influenced subjective norms. Study 2 employed a modified version of a free choice paradigm in which participants chose to set an intention to support one of two environmental organizations (using different support behaviours). Consequently participants rated the base components for the chosen organization higher and the rejected organization lower. However, this effect was primarily observed if participants were not initially committed to supporting an organization before the study began. Study 3 was a field study in which chemistry lab users who were exposed to an intervention that targeted behavioural intentions subsequently perceived more positive subjective norms (one aspect of subjective norms was changed). Together, the three studies demonstrate that a reverse-causal relation between intentions and base components is plausible and, thus, the theory of planned behaviour should be modified to include a reciprocal relation between these constructs. Intentions are most likely to influence base components that are least relevant to actual behaviour. When attitudes, subjective norms or perceived behavioural control are associated with actual behaviour, the one that is most strongly associated is least likely to change in response to setting an intention to engage in that behaviour. Other, less relevant, base components are more likely to change. / Graduate / 0451 / 0621 / 0768

The most devastating effects of climate change may be avoided if humans reduce activities that produce greenhouse gases and engage instead in more sustainable ecological behaviors. The current mixed methods study of 279 undergraduate students explored whether environmental worldview, belief in climate change, knowledge of climate change, personal efficacy, and intention to address climate change influenced participants’ engagement in ecological behavior. Results indicated that those with a stronger intention to address climate change and a more ecocentric worldview reported significantly more ecological behavior. Next, the study examined whether participants’ intentions to address climate change mediated the relationship between their belief in climate change and engagement in ecological behavior and whether intentions mediated the relationship between efficacy and ecological behavior. Intentions to address climate change did not mediate the relationship between belief and ecological behavior but fully mediated the relationship between efficacy to address climate change and ecological behavior.

In the last thirty years an increasing number of governments are taking an interest in the growth rate and age structure of their populations. The chief concern among advanced economies is that pay-as-you-go pension and health care systems for the elderly will be unsustainable as the ratio of younger workers to older beneficiaries shrinks from aging populations. Resistance to reforms such as reduced or delayed benefits, or higher taxes has focused attention on a third option, growing the working-age population. There is a growing consensus on the economic benefits of population growth, a reversal from the 1960s through 80s. Governments try to grow the population through incentives for more children and/or accepting more immigrants. This report compares the population policies of Singapore, the United States, France, and Japan to analyze governments' motives and policy outcomes. Middle-income nations like China and Brazil can learn from the experiences of developed nations to avoid the same predicament in the future. Each government's mix of fertility incentives, immigrants, and guest workers is a product of their economic and political circumstances. The surest way to grow the population, accepting immigrants, is usually the least popular. The most popular is the most unproven, providing benefits for larger families. There is no consensus what the most effective fertility incentives are. Population policy has never been just about the economy, it is steeped in political and cultural visions. Shedding that political baggage is a prerequisite to a more rational, sustainable policy approach to demography. / text

This study examined the perception of barriers to pro-environmental behaviour for different population segments in British Columbia. Cultural cognition scales were used to assign cultural values to participants (i.e., hierarchy-egalitarianism scale and individualism-communitarianism scale). Psychological and socio-cultural barriers were assessed using the list of dragons of inaction. Data on cultural values, perception of climate change risk, perception of barriers, frequency of pro-environmental behaviour, climate change knowledge and socio-demographic variables were collected using online surveys. Egalitarian values were correlated with greater climate change risk perception and with weaker perception of barriers to pro-environmental behaviour. Greater climate change risk perception was also associated with more pro-environmental behaviour. The effect of cultural values on barrier perception was partly mediated by climate change risk perception. These findings suggest that future research should focus on lessening the discrepancy between scientific climate change risk perception and public climate change risk perception, which can, in turn, increase the frequency of pro-environmental behaviour. / Graduate / 0768 / 0451 / lacroixk@uvic.ca

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