Robots have been used in a variety of education, therapy or entertainment contexts. This thesis introduces the novel application of using humanoid robots for Robot-Mediated Interviews (RMIs). In the initial stages of this research it was necessary to first establish as a baseline if children would respond to a robot in an interview setting, therefore the first study compared how children responded to a robot and a human in an interview setting. Following this successful initial investigation, the second study expanded on this research by examining how children would respond to different types and difficulty of questions from a robot compared to a human interviewer. Building on these studies, the third study investigated how a RMI approach would work for children with special needs. Following the positive results from the three studies indicating that a RMI approach may have some potential, three separate user panel sessions were organised with user groups that have expertise in working with children and for whom the system would be potentially useful in their daily work. The panel sessions were designed to gather feedback on the previous studies and outline a set of requirements to make a RMI system feasible for real world users. The feedback and requirements from the user groups were considered and implemented in the system before conducting a final field trial of the system with a potential real world user. The results of the studies in this research reveal that the children generally interacted with KASPAR in a very similar to how they interacted with a human interviewer regardless of question type or difficulty. The feedback gathered from experts working with children suggested that the three most important and desirable features of a RMI system were: reliability, flexibility and ease of use. The feedback from the experts also indicated that a RMI system would most likely be used with children with special needs. The final field trial with 10 children and a potential real world user illustrated that a RMI system could potentially be used effectively outside of a research context, with all of the children in the trial responding to the robot. Feedback from the educational psychologist testing the system would suggest that a RMI approach could have real world implications if the system were developed further.

The aim of this thesis is to create an understanding for children’s and young people’s buddy relations when it comes to the creation of identity and socialisation, as well as to emphasise the formation of meaning and informal learning processes of these buddy relations. This is seen from a child’s perspective. The study has an ethnographic approach in order to follow children’s establishment of relations over time and in a process. The empiric data has been collected over a period of two-and-a-half years. The children were 12 years old when the study was initiated, and there are ten children in the examination. Via interviews, talks and correspondence I have been able to learn more about the children’s leisure time, hobbies, extra-curricular activities, and their school environment. To conduct research with children for this study means that the data are collected on the children’s terms. My starting-point is that human identity is shaped by and in collaboration with others. Mead’s symbolic interactionism is the main theoretical basis for my analysis. Other theoretical perspectives that have been useful are Habermas’s theory on systems and life world, as well as Ziehe’s theories on the cultural freedom of young people. The result of this study shows that having a mate is buddy is crucial when it comes to the creation of a healthy identity. The relation between mates creates trust, confidence and mutuality. It promotes well-being in children and young people, and makes them feel loved. The buddy relation becomes a confirmation of the fact that they are all right. Having friends is not the same as having mates. Many people have friends, for example classmates, which is a prerequisite for the creation of identification with others and a possibility to establish new buddy relations. The problem is, though, that all children do not feel needed and loved by a mate and that it is difficult, especially when young, to establish new close relations. The group becomes very important to the young people in their socialisation process. From the group they hope to receive, preferably together with another mate, confirmation, and the group determines whether they are good enough or not. The terms for the establishment of relations are to a large extent ruled by adult approaches and how the children’s and young people’s everyday life is structured. Since children and young people often spend time in an institutional world in which they establish relations, this has consequences for the adult professional pedagogues who work there. Perhaps one of the most important missions of the teacher training programme is to create awareness that children and young people have a need for belonging and togetherness. When you look at relations from a child’s perspective, it is clear that they long for and try to create a working togetherness, and at the same time you realise how exposed they are when doing this.

The research aim of this study is to explore how locally anchored women with interest for feminist questions perceive and reflect upon the production and reproduction of gender dichotomies in public space in Husby. Moreover, space is flexible and part of a socio-spatial-dialectic which is both produced and reproduced through social interaction which contain power hierarchies. These dialectic notions and gender contracts have been utilized in this study in order to explore perceptions regarding production and reproduction of gender dichotomies. This is a qualitative study and data was collected through semi-structured interviews with locally anchored women in Husby with interest in feminist questions. The results revealed that patriarchal orders and fear of male violence, the city planning, habits, traditional gender contracts, lack of jobs and apartments, and intersectional tendencies were perceived by the interviewees as factors which influence production and reproduction of gender dichotomies in Husby.

Syftet med denna etnografiska studie var att få större förståelse för hur hundägare samspelar med sina hundar och hur de tillskriver könsroller på sina hundar i sociala interaktioner. Studien baserades på deltagande observationer med hundägare och deras hundar när de besökte en hundrastplats i en medelstor stad i Sverige. Studien genomfördes med ett symbolisk interaktionistiskt perspektiv samt ett socialkonstruktivistiskt genusperspektiv där det hävdas att individen skapas genom sociala interaktioner. Resultatet visade att många hundägare har förväntningar på hur deras hundar skall uppföra sig efter mänskliga könsroller. Det var mer accepterat att en tik uppvisade ett stereotypiskt manligt beteende än att en hane uppvisade stereotypiskt feminina beteenden. De kvinnliga hundägarna tenderade att behandla sina hundar som barn, medan män tenderade att behandla hundarna som sina kompisar samt uppvisade en mer stoisk relation till hundarna. Studien visade även att hundägare gärna beskriver sina hundar i könade termer som bygger på mänskliga uppfattningar. Analysen koncentrerar sig på samspelet mellan hundägare och deras hundar för att öka förståelsen för hur hundägare tillskriver könsroller till sina hundar. / The purpose of this ethnographic study was to gain deeper knowledge of how dog owners interact with their dogs and how they ascribe gender roles on their dogs in social interaction. The study was based on participant observation with dog owners and their dogs when they visited a dog resting area in a medium sized city in Sweden. The study was conducted with a symbolic interactionist perspective, and from a social constructivist gender perspective, which states that the individual is created through social interactions. The results showed that many dog owners have expectations for how their dogs should behave according to human gender roles. It was more accepted that a female dog displayed a stereotypical male behavior than a male displaying stereotypically feminine behaviors. The female dog owners tended to treat their dogs like children, while men tended to treat the dogs as their friends and displayed a more stoic relationship to the dogs. The study also showed that dog owners happily describe their dogs in gendered terms, which are based on human perceptions. The analysis concentrates on the interplay between dog owners and their dogs to increase understanding of how dog owners ascribe gender roles to their dogs.

M.Ed. (Education) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

Nowadays, the impact of technological growth‏ ‏on people’s life and our society is remarkable, ‎inevitable and also worrying. The excessive influence of technology in ‎individuals’ lives has caused our community to change towards more privatisation and ‎secluded life. At this point, the role of urban public spaces in social life has become more ‎prominent and significant. Issues of social life in public spaces and the relations with creating a ‎vibrant and dynamic city has not been given too much attention in urban planning and design. ‎This thesis raises the question of considering public spaces and how urban public spaces ‎‎(especially squares) can encourage/persuade citizens ‎to increase social interaction‎. Initially, it describes a clear definition of public spaces and urban squares. Thereafter, the study addresses ‎effectual factors from the human perspective which can help to achieve the successful design of an ‎urban public square. The aim of the work is to comprehend how it might be possible to improve ‎social life and behaviour in public spaces (squares) and consequently to attain a framework in ‎order to design. Ultimately, a design is proposed for Fisktorget (Fish Square), which is one of most important public places in the Karlskrona city in Sweden. The proposed design is based on studies and analyses that have been done throughout this thesis.

Bakgrund: Det är viktigt för äldres välbefinnande och hälsa att känna delaktighet i aktivitet. Delaktighet i aktivitet påverkas av individens egna förutsättningar och miljöns utformning. Hemmet är en viktig aktivitetsmiljö där många äldre spenderar mycket tid. Det är vanligt att äldre flyttar till ett särskilt boende när de är i behov av hjälp och stöd för att klara sin vardag. Syfte: Att studera hur miljön påverkar äldres delaktighet i aktivitet på särskilt boende. Metod: En kvalitativ studie innefattande sju intervjuer med äldre och observationer på tre olika särskilda boenden har genomförts. Resultat: I resultatet framkom de fem kategorierna bristande tillgänglighet i den fysiska miljön, tillgångar i den fysiska miljön, betydelsen av hjälpmedel, betydelsen av att interagera med andra människor samt personalens betydelse för de äldres delaktighet i aktivitet. Den fysiska miljöns utformning bidrog till att de äldre inte uppfattade det särskilda boendet som hemlikt då de inte fick plats med alla de personliga tillhörigheter de önskade. Det visade sig att många äldre kände sig ensamma och inte upplevde någon samhörighet med de medboende. Gemensamma aktiviteter var mycket uppskattat av de äldre bland annat eftersom det gav dem en möjlighet att interagera med andra. Konklusion: Den fysiska och den sociala miljön på ett särskilt boende kunde både främja och hindra äldres delaktighet i aktivitet.

The purpose of the present study was to further explore evidence for the construct-related validity of the Sulliman Scale of Social Interest (SSSI) through the implementation of both convergent and discriminant procedures. This was done through (a) replicating St. John's 1992 study, (b) extending the findings of that study by incorporating additional psychological measures, and (c) examining SSI itself by means of principal axis factor analytic procedures. First, all nine of the relationships demonstrated between the SSSI and other variables in the St. John (1992) study were replicated in the present study. Second, in extending the findings of that study, 22 of 26 hypothesized relationships between the SSSI and other psychological measures were in the predicted direction. Third, the results of the factor analysis produced three factors labeled "contextual harmony," "positive treatment/response," and "confidence and trust." Taken together, the outcomes of both studies appear to offer some support for the SSI's construct validity and to provide possible directions for future research.

Individuals with disabilities face various types of social stigma. Research suggests that the presence of an assistance dog leads to an increase in social interactions. The purpose of this study was to determine whether people’s attitudes toward individuals with disabilities differ when pairing that person with an assistance dog. Undergraduate students (N= 244) were randomly assigned to view an individual with a disability either alone or with an assistance dog. Participants rated their attitudes toward the individual, completed a newly developed Implicit Association Test, and answered behavioral intention questions. Results of a hierarchical multiple regression analysis indicated that individuals with more positives attitudes toward dogs had significantly more positive social attitudes toward the individual with a disability paired with a dog, after accounting for gender and dog ownership history. Additionally, individuals had an implicit bias toward an individual with a disability paired with an assistance dog over the individual alone.

The focus of the present study was to test through SEM the relationships between family influences (FI) and school influences (SI) on factors hypothesized to be associated with adolescent social interest: school belonging (SB), extracurricular participation (EP), and peer/romantic involvement (PRI). The final model consisted of FI and SI that contributed to the expression of adolescent social interest. FI included parental communication and parental caring. SI consisted of teacher fairness. SB consisted of a child's self-reported feelings of belonging at school, EP included self-reported involvement in sports or academic clubs, and PRI consisted of self-reported desire for romantic involvement or desire for participation with others. The proposed model suggested that FI contributed significantly to self-reported SB, EP, and PRI. Additionally, it was hypothesized that SI would contribute significantly to SB and EP, but not to PRI. The data used in the current study were part of an existing data set collected as part of the National Longitudinal Study on Adolescent Health. The total sample size for the present study was 2,561 male and female adolescents aged 12-19 years. The data consisted of adolescent and parent self-report information. Results suggested a significant relationship between FI and self-reported SB and PRI. As expected, a significant relationship existed between SI and SB. Also as expected, no significant relationship existed between SI and PRI. Neither the relationship between FI and EP nor SI and EP were significant. When analyzed separately, a significant relationship existed between SB and PRI; however, no significant relationship was found between SB and EP. Results also indicated several of the fit indices, including the average off-diagonal absolute standardized residual, the comparative fit index (CFI), and the Bentler-Bonett non-normed fit index (BBNFI), were a low to moderate fit. However, the final model was highly skewed and the model chi-square and chi-square were both exceptionally high, indicating the model appeared to moderately fit the data, but the need for further refinement is clear.