Active transportation (AT) is a form of physical activity involving human-powered transportation (e.g., walking) and is associated with health benefits. However, the majority of Canadians do not use AT. Although environmental factors, such as proximity, are correlated with AT, interventions to change such factors have been ineffective. According to social cognitive theory, both environmental and personal factors (i.e., social and spatial cognitions) may influence motivated behaviour. The social cognitions of interest in the present study included self-regulatory efficacy to schedule (i.e., confidence to regularly schedule walking for AT), and to overcome barriers (i.e., confidence to cope with barriers to walking for AT). Spatial cognitions included distance and travel time cognitions. The purpose of the study was to examine whether social cognitive personal factors (i.e., scheduling self-efficacy, barriers self-efficacy), spatial cognitive personal factors (i.e., distance and travel time cognitions), and an environmental factor (i.e., proximity) were associated with walking for AT to/from a university campus over a two-week period in a convenience sample of adults. Participants in this prospective observational study were a convenience sample of 105 students, faculty, and staff at a western Canadian university, who ranged in age from 17 to 55 years (M = 24.62 years, SD = 8.15). Participants completed three online surveys over a two-week period. Social cognitions for the following two-week period and spatial cognitions were assessed at Time 1. Recall of walking for AT to/from a university campus in the previous week was assessed at Time 2 and Time 3. Total walking for AT to/from campus over the two-week period was the outcome variable. The overall hierarchical multiple regression model predicting AT from the social and spatial cognitions and proximity was significant (R2adjusted = .53; p < .01). As hypothesized, scheduling (ßstd = .44, p < .01) and barriers (ßstd = .23, p < .05) self-efficacy were associated with AT. Scheduling self-efficacy was the strongest predictor. Contrary to hypotheses, distance and travel time cognitions and proximity were not significant (ps > .05). Social cognitions, particularly self-regulatory efficacy to schedule, and efficacy to overcome barriers, may play an important role in individuals use of walking for AT to/from a university campus. Future research should continue to examine social cognitive-theory based personal and environmental predictors of AT, such as self-regulatory efficacy to goal set, outcome expectations, the weather and residential density, to better understand potential determinants of this health-promoting type of physical activity.

People engage in a constant and reflexive process of categorizing others according to their race, gender, age or other salient social category. Decades of research have shown that social categorization often elicits stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination. Social perception is complicated by the fact that people have multiple social identities and self-categorization with these identities can shift from one situation to another, coloring perceptions and evaluations of the self and others. This dissertation provides evidence that self-categorization with a novel group can override ostensible stable and pervasive racial biases in memory and evaluation and examines the neural substrates that mediate these processes. Experiment 1 shows that self-categorization with a novel mixed-race group elicited liking for ingroup members, regardless of race. This preference for ingroup members was mediated by the orbitofrontal cortex – a region of the brain linked to subjective valuation. Participants in novel groups also had greater fusiform and amygdala activity to novel ingroup members, suggesting that these regions are sensitive to the current self-categorization rather than features associated with race. Experiment 2 shows that preferences for ingroup members are evoked rapidly and spontaneously, regardless of race, indicating that ingroup bias can override automatic racial bias. Experiment 3 provides evidence that preferences for ingroup members are driven by ingroup bias rather than outgroup derogation. Experiment 4 shows that self-categorization increases memory for ingroup members eliminating the own-race memory bias. Experiment 5 provides direct evidence that fusiform activity to ingroup members is associated with superior memory for ingroup members. This study also shows greater amygdala activity to Black than White faces who are unaffiliated with either the ingroup or outgroup, suggesting that social categorization is flexible, shifting from group membership to race within a given social context. These five experiments illustrate that social perception and evaluation are sensitive to the current self-categorization – however minimal – and characterized by ingroup bias. This research also offers a relatively simple approach for erasing several pervasive racial biases. This multi-level approach extends several theories of intergroup perception and evaluation by making explicit links between self-categorization, neural processes, and social perception and evaluation.

The Internet has continued to reach new audience members and is an integral part of United States society. Social Cognitive Theory addresses the impact of the environment on health behavior, providing justification for surveillance of the digital environment in health behavior research. Health information headlines from two highly trafficked news sites were analyzed using content analysis. Search terms used were health, Blacks, African American, ethnicity and 2011. The headlines were coded by independent graduate level individuals and assessed for nine indices of interest. There were 209 headlines analyzed for the study. Headlines contained health information that correlated with social predictors and indicators for moral exclusion and social injustice. This study indicates that racial assumptions continue to be evident in the reporting of news and the conveyance of health information, assumptions that shape attitudes for research, policy and practice.

Active transportation (AT) is a form of physical activity involving human-powered transportation (e.g., walking) and is associated with health benefits. However, the majority of Canadians do not use AT. Although environmental factors, such as proximity, are correlated with AT, interventions to change such factors have been ineffective. According to social cognitive theory, both environmental and personal factors (i.e., social and spatial cognitions) may influence motivated behaviour. The social cognitions of interest in the present study included self-regulatory efficacy to schedule (i.e., confidence to regularly schedule walking for AT), and to overcome barriers (i.e., confidence to cope with barriers to walking for AT). Spatial cognitions included distance and travel time cognitions. The purpose of the study was to examine whether social cognitive personal factors (i.e., scheduling self-efficacy, barriers self-efficacy), spatial cognitive personal factors (i.e., distance and travel time cognitions), and an environmental factor (i.e., proximity) were associated with walking for AT to/from a university campus over a two-week period in a convenience sample of adults. Participants in this prospective observational study were a convenience sample of 105 students, faculty, and staff at a western Canadian university, who ranged in age from 17 to 55 years (M = 24.62 years, SD = 8.15). Participants completed three online surveys over a two-week period. Social cognitions for the following two-week period and spatial cognitions were assessed at Time 1. Recall of walking for AT to/from a university campus in the previous week was assessed at Time 2 and Time 3. Total walking for AT to/from campus over the two-week period was the outcome variable. The overall hierarchical multiple regression model predicting AT from the social and spatial cognitions and proximity was significant (R2adjusted = .53; p < .01). As hypothesized, scheduling (ßstd = .44, p < .01) and barriers (ßstd = .23, p < .05) self-efficacy were associated with AT. Scheduling self-efficacy was the strongest predictor. Contrary to hypotheses, distance and travel time cognitions and proximity were not significant (ps > .05). Social cognitions, particularly self-regulatory efficacy to schedule, and efficacy to overcome barriers, may play an important role in individuals use of walking for AT to/from a university campus. Future research should continue to examine social cognitive-theory based personal and environmental predictors of AT, such as self-regulatory efficacy to goal set, outcome expectations, the weather and residential density, to better understand potential determinants of this health-promoting type of physical activity.

With sport organizations venturing into the global realm, it is important to discover sport management students' interest in studying abroad in sport. Previous research has attempted to discover career intentions using the social cognitive career theory (SCCT). SCCT focuses on the interaction of several factors which include personal behaviors such as self-efficacy, outcome expectations, choice goals, barriers, and supports. The purpose of this thesis was to identify barriers and supports to studying abroad, the relationship between the barriers and supports and one's study abroad self-efficacy, and the relationship among study abroad self-efficacy, outcome expectations, interests, and choice goals (i.e., intent). Two different studies were administered with Study One taking a qualitative approach to better analyze supports and barriers, while Study Two incorporated the results from Study One, providing a quantitative aspect to the research. Data were collected from sport management undergraduate students from a southwestern Division I institution for Study One (n = 19), as well as for Study Two (n = 71). Questionnaires for both studies were developed using the basic tenets of SCCT to measure self-efficacy, interest, intent, supports, barriers, and outcome expectations to studying abroad in sport. Data analysis included coding data into themes and calculating percentages for Study One, while items for Study Two were analyzed for reverse coding, and descriptive statistics for the study variables were performed. Means, standard deviations, and bivariate correlations were included with the statistics in Study Two. Likewise, linear regression and bivariate correlations were performed to evaluate the basic relationships between all the study variables within Study Two, while reliability estimates (Cronbach's alpha) for each study variable were assessed. The results revealed that barriers (e.g., cultural differences) and supports (e.g., further education) were correlated with self-efficacy. Furthermore, there were correlations between interest and intent, self-efficacy and interest, self-efficacy and intent, and self-efficacy and outcome expectations. Recommendations and implications were provided for sport management academia followed by limitations and future directions of this study.

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This study uses Business Next magazine 2008 number one rating 3C product discussion group website Mobile01¡¦s ¡§open box experience¡¨ professional writers as study objects. The purpose of this study is to explore ¡§open box experience¡¨ sharing phenomenon and to understand writers¡¦ motivation and feedback in order to analyze the website management implication on this phenomenon. This study is based on soial cognitive theory, explores each dimension based on social cognitive theory and related items. The structure of this study includes people (capacity, attainment, enjoyment, positive feedback outcome expectation), environment (source of the product, exchange, feedback), behavior (the process of open box experience publication, reactions to feedback). This study adapts case study method. Researcher explored related journals, observed study object website. Based on the basic question categorization structure to construct interview questions, invited ¡§open box experience¡¨ experts and conducted open-ended expert in-depth interview. After each interview, the interview contents were typed into transcription. The transcription and the website data were used to describe ¡§open box experience¡¨ sharing phenomenon. Then the theme words which are related to the study were extracted from the transcription and became this study¡¦s basic elements. There are 264 themes extracted, coded and categorized in order to focus on the question. Finally, there are 252 effective themes selected and analyzed. Based on the major study findings, there are two conclusions: 1. The motivation of ¡§open box experience¡¨ writing is based on people¡¦s capacity, attainment and enjoyment. It also resulted by positive feedback outcome expectation by ¡§self purchase¡¨ or product source provided by online environment as well as exchange and feedback. 2. Negative feedback can result in keeping ¡§open box experience¡¨ writers from sharing and cause the lost of information for websites. Based on the above conclusions, this study provides suggestions to website owners, administrators, product vendors, ¡§open box experience¡¨ writers and readers. The suggestions can be used as references for website owners, administrators, product vendors when they are forming management strategies.

Virtual community has long been a hot topic in e-commerce that some people even think only virtual community management is the feasible way to develop e-commerce. Therefore, almost all types of websites intend to step into the virtual community management and the websites that completely emphasize on the community has been springing up like mushrooms. The cost for the construction of a virtual community website is not so high like that for any other type of website and the website techniques and commercial model are easy to be imitated and duplicated. So running a virtual website is not difficult, however, how to operate an active and successful virtual community needs not only efforts but also skills. For a virtual community, the value of community is built on the rich knowledge about community and the accumulation of knowledge about community depends on the knowledge-sharing among community members. Therefore, the promotion of knowledge-sharing behaviors in a community has been an important topic for the community operators. With social cognitive theory as the core, this research tries to explore the effects of the aspects of environment and individual on the knowledge-sharing behaviors by community members and understand the relationship between the knowledge-sharing behaviors as well as knowledge quality and the satisfaction and consumer behavior in the community. The results of research can be inducted into following points: 1) the ¡§knowledge-sharing behaviors¡¨ by the virtual community is primarily and positively affected by the ¡§identification-based trust¡¨, the ¡§self-efficacy of members¡¨, the ¡§expectation of personal results¡¨ and the ¡§expectation of community related results¡¨; 2) the ¡§self-efficacy of knowledge-sharing¡¨ by community members is positively affected by the ¡§identification-based trust¡¨; 3) the ¡§satisfaction¡¨ of the community members is positively affected by the ¡§knowledge-sharing behaviors¡¨, the ¡§knowledge quality¡¨; 4) the ¡§consumer behavior¡¨ by the community members is positively affected by the ¡§satisfaction¡¨ of the community.

In recent years, people using information technology more to meet their demand for entertainment. For example, on-line game, MP3, on-line TV, movies and so on, which are belong such technology. The increasing of this demand is accompanied the growth of motivation and behavior of piracy. This study focused on recognize and decision pattern of behavior that downloading unauthorized movies, and tried to join the emotion impact, and, understanding college students¡¦ intention of downloading. The research model of this study based on triangle interaction from Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) and its core ¢w Self-efficacy, and developing questionnaire from literature review. The questionnaire measuring the social cognize and personal belief about the behavior which downloading unauthorized movies, and make up an movie with text and post, in order to engagement into the situation, and measuring the impact of intention. The results showed that the research model based on SCT will explain the detail of motivations and decision making about the intention to illegal downloading of common college students, and verified that emotion have the impact in decision making process. According to result, we recommend the irrational factor to research about piracy. For practice, we recommend the preventive of piracy will not only by viewpoint of ¡§crime¡¨ but also by investigate the motivation of piracy.

This dissertation engages in two major hypotheses regarding infants' naïve theory of social relationships. First, it proposes that infants may apply a domain-specific understanding to represent and reason about social groups defined by affiliation amongst their members. Second, it argues that infants may have an understanding of the causal role that behavioral conformity plays in promoting affiliation, and that this understanding may help to determine how infants reason about the coalitional social groups referred to in the first hypothesis. Experiments across three chapters address different aspects of these hypotheses. The experiments in Chapter 2 ask whether infants selectively use coalitional groups to make certain sorts of behavioral inferences, in contrast to the inferences they draw regarding other animate and inanimate categories. The experiments in Chapter 3 investigate the role of similarity of appearance in infants' representations of coalitional groups. Finally, the experiments in Chapter 4 look at how infants evaluate behavioral conformity and what they think it indicates about the attitudes of conformers and their targets. Chapter 5 synthesizes this work and discusses how it might apply to the study of imitation in both developmental and comparative fields. / Psychology