Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Psychology / Richard J. Harris / Systems that support or require human interaction are generally easier to learn, use, and remember when their organization is consistent with the user’s knowledge and experiences (Norman, 1983; Roske-Hofstrand & Paap, 1986). Thus, in order for interface designers to truly design for the user, they must first have a way of deriving a representation of what the user knows about the domain of interest. The current study evaluated three techniques for eliciting knowledge structures for how General Aviation pilots think about weather information. Weather was chosen because of its varying implications for pilots of different levels of experience. Two elicitation techniques (Relationship Judgment and Card Sort) asked pilots to explicitly consider the relationship between 15 weather-related information concepts. The third technique, Prime Recognition Task, used response times and priming to implicitly reflect the strength of relationship between concepts in semantic memory. Techniques were evaluated in terms of pilot performance, conceptual structure validity, and required resources for employment. Validity was assessed in terms of the extent to which each technique identified differences in organization of weather information among pilots of different experience levels. Multidimensional scaling was used to transform proximity data collected by each technique into conceptual structures representing the relationship between concepts. Results indicated that Card Sort was the technique that most consistently tapped into knowledge structure affected by experience. Only conceptual structures based on Card Sort data were able to be used to both discriminate between pilots of different experience levels and accurately classify experienced pilots as “experienced”. Additionally, Card Sort was the most efficient and effective technique to employ in terms of preparation time, time on task, flexibility, and face validity. The Card Sort provided opportunities for deliberation, revision, and visual feedback that allowed the pilots to engage in a deeper level of processing at which experience may play a stronger role. Relationship Judgment and Prime Recognition Task characteristics (e.g., time pressure, independent judgments) may have motivated pilots to rely on a more shallow or text-based level of processing (i.e., general semantic meaning) that is less affected by experience. Implications for menu structure design and assessment are discussed.

Cette Thèse s'inscrit au coeur d'un programme de recherche visant, entre autres, l'évaluation de la relation d'attachement mère-enfant à travers divers programmes d'intervention avec des clientèles variées. "L'attachment Q-Sort" (version 3) de Waters (1995) a été utilisé aux fins de la formation au construit de l'attachement, ainsi que pour l'évaluation de la qualité de la relation parent-enfant. Étant donné que cet instrument Q-Sort s'inscrit dans une tradition de recherche distincte selon que l'on privilégie des approches quantitatives ou qualitatives, il y avait lieu d'explorer plus systématiquement la contribution de chacune quant au potentiel de discrimination des patrons relationnels d'attachement mère-enfant sur le plan de la comparaison intra- et intergroupe. Cette démarche analytique a été réalisée selon les paramètres de la démarche normative employée couramment dans les recherches rapportées dans la littérature sur l'attachement, en plus d'aborder le traitement statistique habituellement adopté par les tenants de la méthodologie Q (Stephenson, 1953). Les résultats obtenus démontrent qu'effectivement les scores critères de sécurité et de dépendance permettent de bien distinguer les quatre échantillons à l'étude, sélectionnés sur la base de conditions pouvant compromettre la qualité du lien d'attachement mère-enfant. Quant aux résultats des analyses Q, ils permettent de mettre en évidence des profils d'attachement plus variés et l'utilisation par les évaluatrices des items les plus probants dans la description de ces profils. Dans l'ensemble, les résultats normatifs distinguent quatre profils d'attachement mère-enfant et les résultats descriptifs issus des analyses Q permettent d'identifier 47 des 90 items, ayant davantage contribué à la description des profils obtenus aux analyses factorielles Q.

Today most computer have a multicore processor and are depending on parallel execution to be able to keep up with the demanding tasks that exist today, that forces developers to write software that can take advantage of multicore systems. There are multiple programming languages and frameworks that makes it possible to execute the code in parallel on different threads, this study looks at the performance and effort required to work with two of the frameworks that are available to the C programming language, POSIX Threads(Pthreads) and OpenMP. The performance is measured by paralleling three algorithms, Matrix multiplication, Quick Sort and calculation of the Mandelbrot set using both Pthreads and OpenMP, and comparing first against a sequential version and then the parallel version against each other. The effort required to modify the sequential program using OpenMP and Pthreads is measured in number of lines the final source code has. The results shows that OpenMP does perform better than Pthreads in Matrix Multiplication and Mandelbrot set calculation but not on Quick Sort because OpenMP has problem with recursion and Pthreads does not. OpenMP wins the effort required on all the tests but because there is a large performance difference between OpenMP and Pthreads on Quick Sort OpenMP cannot be recommended for paralleling Quick Sort or other recursive programs.

O amido, encontrado abundantemente na natureza, é formado por dois polímeros: a amilopectina e a amilose. Ambos polímeros possuem excelentes qualidades industriais tais como, a biodegradabilidade e o baixo custo de obtenção. Entretanto, a amilopectina possui baixa solubilidade em solução aquosa. Para expandir a gama de aplicações deste polímero como, por exemplo, a produção de filmes biodegradáveis solúveis em água e que possam ser usados como revestimento de proteção no transporte de alimentos, ainda se fazem necessários alguns estudos. Um deles é tentar correlacionar como a funcionalização do seu esqueleto polimérico pode afetar a reação de formação destes filmes. Neste sentido, o objetivo desta Dissertação de Mestrado foi estudar a síntese da carboximetil amilopectina (CMAm) variando-se a pressão, temperatura e razão entre água e solvente orgânico. Sintetizamos várias CMAm a partir da amilopectina de milho ceroso, por meio de uma reação heterogênea utilizando hidróxido de sódio e ácido cloroacético. Empregou-se uma mistura de dimetilsulfóxido (DMSO) e água como solvente, com uma proporção variável entre 0 a 50% de água, para as pressões ambiente (758,3 mmHg) e reduzida (80 ± 20 mmHg) e para as temperaturas 70 e 80 ºC. Para cada uma das condições sintéticas estudadas, obtivemos CMAm com graus de substituição (GS) diversos. Os GS foram determinados por titulações condutimétricas com hidróxido de amónio e para as amostras sintetizadas com 0 a 40% de água foram confirmados por cromatografia líquida de alta eficiência (HPLC), obtendo-se uma boa correlação entre estes valores (R2 de 0,94263). Atribuiu-se os picos referentes às estruturas monossubstituídas (2-; 3- ou 6-mono-O-carboximetil glicose), dissubstituídas (2,3-; 2,6- ou 3,6-di-O carboximetil glicose) e trissubstituídas (2,3,6-tri-O-carboximetil glicose) por meio da cromatografia líquida acoplada a espectrometria de massa (LC-MS). A síntese realizada a 70 oC, pressão reduzida apresenta uma distribuição de CMAm substituída mais homogênea do que as demais condições sintéticas estudadas. Por medidas de potencial zeta em função do pH, determinaram-se para as CMAm de GS 0,86 e 0,43 o ponto isoelétrico no pH de 3,6 e 4,6; respectivamente. O espalhamento dinâmico de luz mostrou que a funcionalização da amilopectina com grupos carboximetílicos levou a abertura da sua estrutura inicial, extremamente ramificada, permitindo a formação de agregados maiores em solução aquosa para as amostras sintetizadas a 80 ºC sob pressão reduzida. Em contraste, as sínteses a 70 ºC nas pressões ambiente e reduzida provocaram uma diminuição no tamanho dos agregados em solução aquosa em função do GS. Por fim, a análise por microscopia ótica e eletrônica de varredura dos filmes de CMAm sintetizadas neste trabalho mostraram que são totalmente dependentes do GS, tipo de substituinte e o tamanho dos agregados em solução aquosa. / Starch is abundant in nature and composed by two polymers: amylopectin and amylose. Both biopolymers have excellent industrial characteristics, such as biodegradability and low cost. However, amylopectin has a very low solubility in aqueous solution. In order to expand the uses this biopolymer, for instance, the production of aqueous soluble and biodegradable films for food packing, there are still many open fields to study. One of them is to find the correlation between how the functionalization of the polymer backbone can affect the film formation process. For this reason, the goal of this work was to study the synthesis of carboxymethyl amylopectin (CMAm) varying the employed pressure, temperature and the ratio of water and organic solvent. Several CMAm were synthetized using amylopectin from maize, by means of an heterogeneous reaction using sodium hydroxide and chloroacetic acid. We have used a mixture of dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) and water as reaction solvent with variable ratio of 0 to 50% of water, employed ambient (758,3 mmHg) or reduced (80 ± 20 mmHg) pressure and temperatures of 70 and 80 ºC. The degree of substitution (DS) were determined for every synthetic condition studied in this work. The DS were determined through conductometric titration with ammonium hydroxide. The DS of the samples synthesized with 0 to 40% of water, were confirmed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), with good correlation between these values (R2 of 0,94263). The peaks of the monosubstituted structures (2-; 3- ou 6-mono-O-carboxymethyl glucose), disubstituted (2,3-; 2,6- ou 3,6-di-O carboxymethyl glucose) e trisubstituted (2,3,6-tri-Ocarboxymethyl glucose) were attributed by liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry (LC-MS). The synthesis made at 70 oC, reduced pressure, showed a more even distribution of substituted CMAm than the other synthetic conditions analyzed in this work. The isoelectric point of CMAm of DS of 0.86 and 0.43 were determined by zeta potential as function of pH. They were, respectively of pH 3.6 and 4.6. The dynamic light scattering showed that the funcionalization of the amylopectin with carboxymethyl groups has opened the initial branched polymer backbone, for samples synthesized at 80 ºC under reduced pressure, forming large aggregates in aqueous solution. On the other hand, the synthesis at 70 ºC at ambient and reduced pressures has caused a reduction of the aggregates sizes in aqueous solution as function of increasing DS. The optic and electronic scan microscopies of the CMAm films showed that they are completely dependent on DS, sort of susbstituents and sizes of the aggregates in aqueous solution.

The practice of evaluating situations with the Riverside Situational Q-Sort (RSQ:Wagerman & Funder, 2009) is relatively new. The present study aimed to investigate the theoretical framework supporting the RSQ with regards to the potential confounds of emotional state and the use of Likert-type ratings. Data were collected from a sample of Florida Atlantic University students (N = 206). Participants were primed for either a positive or negative mood state and asked to evaluate a situation with the RSQ in either the Q-Sort or Likert-type response format. Results suggested that response format has a significant influence on RSQ evaluations, but mood and the interaction between mood and response format do not. Exploratory analyses were conducted to determine the underlying mechanisms responsible. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.S.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2014. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

In this experiment I investigated the relationship between set-switching and transfer learning, both of which presumably invoke executive functioning (EF), which may in turn be correlated with intelligence. Set-switching was measured by a computerized version of the Wisconsin Card Sort Task. Another computer task was written to measure learning-transfer ability. The data indicate little correlation between the ability to transfer learning and the capacity for set-switching. That is, these abilities may draw from independent cognitive mechanisms. The major difference may be requirement to utilize previous learning in a new way in the learning-transfer task.

<p>This project aims to investigate the impact of culture on the results of established methods of usability testing. The production and use of technologically advanced information and communication applications are no longer restricted to the Western world, and there are indications that usability testing procedures developed for use in, e.g., Europe or the US do not give reliable results in countries such as India, China or Malaysia. This project is an in-depth investigation of the cultural specifics that go into usability test situations in three countries: Denmark, India and China. In a second phase we want to explore possible developments of the testing methods in order to avoid cultural bias and produce comparable results across countries of the world</p> / This research is a part of project of Culturalusability. http://culturalusability.cbs.dk/

In this experiment I investigated the relationship between set-switching and transfer learning, both of which presumably invoke executive functioning (EF), which may in turn be correlated with intelligence. Set-switching was measured by a computerized version of the Wisconsin Card Sort Task. Another computer task was written to measure learning-transfer ability. The data indicate little correlation between the ability to transfer learning and the capacity for set-switching. That is, these abilities may draw from independent cognitive mechanisms. The major difference may be requirement to utilize previous learning in a new way in the learning-transfer task.

The purpose of this study was to gain a fuller understanding of the sort of assistance, support, or education parents feel they need from school counselors in parenting adolescents. The research question examined was: What sort of assistance, support, or education do independent school parents feel they need from school counselors in raising adolescent children? The participants for this study were parents of middle school children attending an independent school located in an urban southern city. All parents of children attending the independent school were asked to respond to an online “needs assessment” survey asking parents to select parent education topics that are of interest to them. Parents participating in this phase of the study had an opportunity to volunteer for the next phase of the study, an online card sort activity. Parents who volunteered for the online card sort activity were sent a link to the online card sort activity where they took a list of parent education topics and arranged them into groups as they saw fit. Analysis of the results revealed nine themes, or categories of topics that are of interest to parents of middle school children: Parenting Skills, Adolescent Self-Management, Self-Awareness and Esteem, Academic Opportunities and Career Choices, Peer Relationships and Skills, Emotional Wellness, Physical Health and Wellness, Parent-Teacher/Staff Communication, and Technology Safety and Use. An informal concept map was created to visually represent the categories of parent education topics that emerged from the study. The results of this study can assist professional school counselors in designing parent education and consultation curriculum and interventions, and help ensure that school counselors better meet parents’ needs.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-05-14T12:43:26Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 parte1.pdf: 2302245 bytes, checksum: f98c3c4ecd87d4ddde9243caffb3fd15 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010-09-13 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior - CAPES / This study it has as objective to observe the human development, which is carried through in the social activity mediated by the language. To explain the human development, we cite some chains as: the behaviourism, the construtivismo, the cognitivismo and the social interacionismo. Demons one has detached special to the sociocognitivismo, compromised to the understanding of the language as a cognitivo phenomenon that if develops from the exploration of the interaction concept during the process of the writing. The interactions if do not give outside of a social context, but they become possible in the one limits determined social situation. We look for to make a synthesis of what it is the language as corporate assets, that is, without a doubt, one of the most important instruments used, to a large extent, of our acts of communication. We list some concepts of the language and the writing, some authors. Supported in estimated sociointeracionistas, the research chose the sort opinion article as link of comment of the development of the sociocognitivas abilities. Metodologicamente, we elaborate a didactic sequência that was applied the five pupils of graduation of the UFPB. For analysis of the data four categories had been raised: interpretation of the text, sequência of the ideas, coherence and boarding of the subject. The results had pointed with respect to the perception of the importance of the collective knowledge on the part of the searched pupils. We can conclude that the study carried through in it gave a clear vision to them on the interaction and of that it is in acting with the other that truily we construct our knowledge. / Este estudo tem como objetivo observar o desenvolvimento humano, o qual é realizado na atividade social mediado pela linguagem. Para explicarmos o desenvolvimento humano, citamos várias correntes como: o behaviorismo, o construtivismo, o cognitivismo e o interacionismo social. Demos um destaque especial ao sociocognitivismo, comprometido com a compreensão da linguagem como um fenômeno cognitivo que se desenvolve a partir da exploração do conceito de interação durante o processo da escrita. As interações não se dão fora de um contexto social, mas tornam-se possíveis nos limites de uma determinada situação social. Procuramos fazer uma síntese do que é a língua como patrimônio social, que é, sem dúvida, um dos mais importantes instrumentos utilizado, em grande parte, dos nossos atos de comunicação. Listamos alguns conceitos da língua e da escrita, de vários autores. Apoiados em pressupostos sociointeracionistas, a pesquisa elegeu o gênero artigo de opinião como elo de observação do desenvolvimento das habilidades sociocognitivas. Metodologicamente, elaboramos uma sequência didática que foi aplicada a cinco alunos de graduação da UFPB. Para análise dos dados foram levantadas quatro categorias: interpretação do texto, sequência das ideias, coerência e abordagem do tema. Os resultados apontaram para a percepção da importância do conhecimento coletivo por parte dos alunos pesquisados. Podemos concluir que o estudo realizado nos deu uma visão clara sobre a interação e de que é no agir com o outro que verdadeiramente construímos nossos conhecimentos.