published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work

published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work

published_or_final_version / abstract / Psychology / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

published_or_final_version / Psychology / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

The study examined the effectiveness of a motivational package developed based on the components of the temporal motivational theory on reducing the participants’ tendency to procrastinate. Characteristics of a sample of 308 junior secondary school students (formed 14 groups) were matched and randomly assigned (in group unit) into treatment and control conditions. Through watching a video in a workshop, the treatment group learned the skills to reduce procrastination while the control group learned relaxation skills. Participants then completed an assignment in 10 school days after the intervention workshop to apply the strategies they have learnt. Results indicated that participants who received the intervention package showed significantly less behavioral procrastination than those who did not. Implications of the findings were discussed. / published_or_final_version / Educational Psychology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

The experimental study examined how different types of praise moderated the effect of normative information on students’ self-efficacy and intrinsic motivation when they face challenges. Two hundred and Fifty Form 1 and 2 students (114 females, 136 males) were randomly assigned to six different conditions, using a 2 (Normative information: with normative information, without normative information) X 3 (Praise: ability praise, effort praise, no praise) between-groups design. Students first worked on a logical reasoning task and received a bogus quantitative feedback of a high score (8 out of 10) and a written qualitative feedback according to their assigned conditions. Students then did a similar but more challenging task and checked their scores before completing measures of self-efficacy and intrinsic motivation. Self-reported measure showed that after facing setbacks, students receiving effort praise and normative information in the first task indicated significantly lower self-efficacy than the students only receiving effort praise. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. Keywords: effort praise, ability praise, / published_or_final_version / Educational Psychology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

Recent theories have suggested that mutual diffusion between miscible polymers may be strongly influenced by the unusual thermodynamics of mixing of high polymers; in addition the mobility properties of polymer blends are not, in general well understood. This dissertation describes experiments to investigate how these factors influence mutual diffusion in miscible polymer blends. After a general introduction and a review of some recent theories of mutual diffusion in polymer blends, experiments are described in one miscible blend system, Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC)/Polycaprolactone (PCL);x-ray microanalysis in a scanning electron microscope was used to measure the concentration dependence of the mutual diffusion coefficient. To explain this concentration dependence we need to invoke not only the thermodynamics of mixing but also the dependence on composition of the monometric friction coefficients in the system. This dependence was investigated using an ESR spin probe technique. The final section of the dissertation deals with an attempt to use the potentially powerful ion beam analysis techniques of Rutherford Backscattering (RBS) and Forward Recoil scattering (FReS) to measure mutual diffusion coefficients, as well as intradiffusion coefficients (whose concentration dependence should not be influenced by thermodynamic effects). Results obtained by these techniques are presented for three blend systems, including PVC/PCL; the results by RBS for the latter system are consistent with the results obtained by x-ray microanalysis.

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No description available.

This thesis argues for the idea that there are deep interconnections between the notions of ontology and reflexivity. It starts from the idea that ontological claims are cognitionally prior to epistemological and methodological accounts. It is argued that ontology is of particular importance to social science because the boundary between the substantive and the ontological is less clear than in natural science. Furthermore, because social science is located within its object, society, it is argued that self-referential questions about the epistemic status of every social ontology emerge. In the face of these self-referential questions concerning ontological coherence, the ‘epistemic criterion of reflexivity’ is proposed in this thesis. Meeting this criterion is required to deal successfully with the self-referential problem emerging from the fact that the knowing subject is part of her object. I argue that it is only by conceptualizing agents as self-reflective knowing subjects that an ontology has a chance of satisfying the criterion of epistemic reflexivity which is proposed by this thesis. In Chapters 1 to 3, the works of Roy Bhaskar, Pierre Bourdieu, Jügen Habermas, Alvin Gouldner and Andrew Sayer, as well as of several social constructionists and ethnomethodologists are examined, considering their contribution to the notions of ontology and epistemic reflexivity. It is argued that proponents of both relativistic and deterministic social theories cannot satisfy the criterion of epistemic reflexivity because they cannot coherently account for their knowledge-claims using their own ontologies. I thus argue that it is not enough for a social theory to provide an account of self-reflection – for the wider ontology in which it is situated may itself deny the possibility of such a self-reflective activity. It is in this sense that I argue for the need for an improved conceptualization of self-reflection in which agents are conceptualized as having the capacity of self-objectivation within context. It is through having such a presupposition that ontologies can fulfill the epistemic criterion of reflexivity proposed. The need for such a conceptualization of self-reflection leads me to explore two relevant approaches in Chapters 4 and 5, those of Archer and Castoriadis. I begin by looking at Margaret Archer’s account of the ‘internal conversation’. However, Archer’s internal dialogue will be shown problematic in the sense that it results in various contradictory claims. The thesis then considers Cornelius Castoriadis’ notion of self-reflective imagination which partially meets the epistemic criterion of reflexivity proposed in this thesis.