bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Primary Teachers' Mathematical Beliefs and Practices in the Maldives
Authors:   , Adam Mohamed Shameem 
Published: November 2021

<p>Recent reforms in mathematics education have been influenced by such theoretical perspectives as constructivism, which have reconceptualised teaching and learning. Mismatches between teachers’ beliefs about teaching and learning, and ideas underpinning reform are often viewed as major obstacles to implementing educational reforms. This study examined the mathematical beliefs and practices, and factors affecting practices, of eight primary teachers selected from four schools in two different regions of the Maldives. The research used a multiple case study approach within a qualitative methodology. A questionnaire, semi-structured interviews, and observations were used to collect data about teachers’ beliefs and practice. Teachers’ lesson notes, worksheets, samples of student work, and test papers were used to understand teachers’ practice. Data were analysed within and across cases using a thematic approach. Teachers demonstrated a range of beliefs that included both constructivist and traditional elements to different degrees. In general, teachers’ observed practice was more traditional than their beliefs about teaching and learning mathematics. The teachers’ practice showed some consistency with their beliefs about the nature of mathematics, mathematics teaching and learning; however, the degree of consistency between beliefs and practice differed from teacher to teacher. Overall, the findings indicated there are several factors affecting teachers’ practice, including methods of assessment, teacher accountability for students’ results, limited time to cover the curriculum, lack of resources, and parental pressure to use textbooks. National assessment practices, affecting many factors found to limit practice, emerged as being particularly influential on the teachers’ instructional behaviour. The study suggests the need to change the nature of national assessment, and remove other barriers if teachers are to be best placed to implement their constructivist beliefs and the Maldives mathematics curriculum. The findings also have implications for professional development and teacher education programmes.</p>
Calling to Complain: An Ethnographic and Conversation Analytic Account of Complaints to an Industry Ombudsman
Authors:   , Dewar Joe 
Published: November 2021

<p>Although the term complaining represents an ostensibly straightforward behaviour, it has come to obtain a range of meanings within academic and commercial works which have directed research toward understanding the behaviour and attempting to improve the way that it is undertaken, particularly in commercial environments where complaint handling constitutes an important field of commercial practice for many firms. It is proposed in this thesis that such variation in the way that complaining is approached is problematic, as it is treated ways that frequently underemphasise the fundamental point that it is overwhelmingly conducted in interpersonal interactions using language as its primary vehicle (Edwards, 2005). This thesis offers an approach to complaint handling and complaining that eschews such approaches in favour of an empirically grounded account based on the principles of ethnographic analysis, conversation analysis, and discursive psychology. Through investigating the complaint handling procedures as practiced by employees in an institution expressly dedicated to the receipt of complaints and enquiries from customers by employing participant observation and interviews, an account of complaint handling is developed that identifies how a range of forces works to impact on the way that it is performed in an institutional environment, furnishing complaint handling with a level of detail not currently offered in managerial literature dedicated to developing the practice. Next, two research chapters present the investigation of two different aspects of complaint interactions themselves. The first of these focuses on call openings as customers and institutional agents work to align themselves to the project of the call, demonstrating varying orientations to institutional complaining as callers demonstrate their own procedures for complaining (and enquiring) which may not match the institutional prerogatives and procedures of the agents receiving the calls. The final research chapter offers an analysis of a recurrent practice in the complaint calls themselves: callers’ use of self-disclosure in the service of rendering matters as problematic and warranting complaint. This finding adds to existing discursive understandings of how complaining is done. Taken together the findings offer an alternative approach to investigating complaint handling by treating it as an indexical practice bound to local demands. This offers a detailed depiction of complaint handling and complaining ‘in situ’ that may offer researchers and commercial entities a new approach to investigating how it is that complaining is done and how, in commercial or institutional contexts, complaint handling may be improved through the methods employed in the thesis.</p>
Managing Risks in Offshore Outsourcing Relationships with China: A Relational View
Authors:   , Zhang Yiying 
Published: November 2021

<p>Over the past two decades, offshore outsourcing to emerging economies, such as China, has been viewed by firms as an efficient way to gain competitive advantage. Literature indicates that offshore outsourcing can enhance firms’ competitiveness and efficiency by reducing costs, expanding relational ties, freeing up scarce resources, and leveraging capabilities. However, the research relating to risk management of offshore outsourcing relationships has not been widely reflected in extant literature. This study addresses this research gap by developing a conceptual model that examines the association between management approaches and the risks in offshore outsourcing relationships. This study applies two types of risks being relational risk and performance risk, as dependent variables. Based on social exchange theory and transaction cost theory, this study proposes two management approaches to minimise risks in offshore outsourcing relationships, which are the relational approach and the transactional approach. Empirical testing of the conceptual model employed a quantitative approach using an online survey of 41 managers from Australia and New Zealand. The survey data was analysed using a multiple regression technique, which revealed four valuable findings. Firstly, a higher level of relational risk leads to a higher level of performance risk. Secondly, the relational approach, based on interdependence of outsourcing exchange firms, can reduce performance risk. Thirdly, an increased level of relationship-specific investments contributes to the rise of performance risk. More importantly, the survey results show that relational risk plays a mediating role between relational factors and performance risk. This study recommends that offshore outsourcing firms employ the relational approach to manage performance risk. The mediating role of relational risk also indicates that firms should not just concentrate on minimising the performance risks of offshore outsourcing relationships, but should also manage relational risks due to uncooperative behaviours such as opportunism.</p>
"Now the War is Over, We Have Something Else to Worry Us": New Zealand Children's Responses to Crises, 1914-1918
Authors:   , Bennett Charlotte Jayne Sylvia 
Published: November 2021

<p>World War One has long been identified as a key moment in early twentieth-century history. This conflict, however, was not the only dramatic event that occurred during the mid-to-late 1910s. A deadly influenza virus swept across the world between 1918 and 1919, and this global health crisis proved particularly devastating for those countries who had already suffered through more than four years of warfare. Children were ever-present on New Zealand's home front, facing both the First World War and then the influenza pandemic in 1918. Yet, despite their significant presence within this environment, little is known about children's experiences during this tumultuous period in New Zealand's past. This thesis aims to deepen understandings of children's priorities and concerns between 1914 and 1918 through an investigation of youth reactions to World War One and the 1918 flu. A wide range of sources have been utilised in order to achieve insight into the lives of these historical figures. These include letters written by children during the mid-to-late 1910s, school magazines and religious publications directed at youth, and recollections of children's experiences from this period as captured through oral histories. Ultimately, it is asserted that New Zealand youth engaged with these events to the extent that they impacted children's worlds. Children's concerns and priorities, while often differing from those held by adults during the same period, were far from universal. Emotional and geographical proximity and age all played a significant role in mediating and varying children's exposure and responses to crises between 1914 and 1918.</p>
Organisational Identity and Alcohol Use in Knowledge-Intensive Workplaces
Authors:   , Walker Benjamin Webster 
Published: November 2021

<p>The use of alcohol is an integral social act in many cultures and societies. The reasons for its use, as well as its mental and physical effects on people, have been a topic of academic interest for decades. This thesis examines the relationship between the work lives of individuals and their use of alcohol. At a more specific level, the thesis examines the relationship between alcohol use and the concept of organisational identity. Using data collected from interviews with members of a knowledge-intensive workplace, findings are presented that illustrate how alcohol use can be understood as an important part of processes of organisational identification, and how workers' alcohol use can be affected by an organisation's identity itself. The theoretical implications of these findings are numerous. Firstly, these findings suggest that organisational concepts, such as organisational identity, can be exceptionally useful in gaining an understanding of the reasons why individuals use alcohol in the ways that they do. In addition, the findings suggest that knowledge-intensive workplaces represent a valuable site for further advancing understandings of the work-alcohol relationship. Finally, it is argued that alcohol use in many situations should be understood as a part of individuals' organisational life, and not just a product or outcome of their participation in an organisation.</p>
The Interpretation of Cultural Heritage: Sharing Māori Cultural Tourism Experiences with International Visitors
Authors:   , Dwyer Trisha 
Published: November 2021

<p>Māori cultural tourism can be an important part of the experience for visitors to New Zealand. The purpose of this research is to gain insights into the way guides manage visitor experiences in order to enhance the understanding and appreciation of Māori culture. International visitors are culturally and linguistically diverse. Therefore, not only are there differences in perspectives and beliefs, but also in communication. Furthermore, visitors arrive with differences in knowledge, interest and expectations. This thesis considers approaches to guiding and interpretation in Māori cultural tourism experiences by examining how guides, as cross-cultural mediators, share Māori cultural heritage so that it is meaningful and relevant to visitors. The literature on Māori tourism has examined issues of ownership, participation, control over representation, and the diversification of Māori tourism products. In spite of the shift to reflect tribal diversity, stereotypes are still reinforced in marketing images and tourism products. Although acknowledged as important, there are no published studies on the role of Māori guides. Developed from a social constructivist perspective, this study compares perspectives on and approaches to guiding and interpretation by Māori and non-Māori guides. Data collection was through semi-structured interviews with tour guides and a manager from the chosen case studies, Te Puia and Te Papa, with 21 interviews conducted in June and July 2011. Using a visitor-centred approach to interpretation, guides select information and find relevant connections. Furthermore, the quantity and complexity of information, as well as the style and level of communication is considered. Guides manage the relationship so that visitors feel comfortable, which not only enables interaction and encourages questions but is also important for managing visitors' attitudes. The main challenge identified is the language barrier and working with outside language interpreters. In the comparison between Māori and non-Māori guides, the key differences are found in the guide's background and ways of learning about Māori cultural heritage. This research contributes to the literature on interpretation and indigenous tourism by identifying factors influencing the process of the interpretation of cultural heritage. Furthermore, comparing the perceptions of Māori and non-Māori guides provides a key contribution. The findings of this study have management implications for training of guides.</p>
Behavioural and Neurochemical Consequences of MDMA Self-Administration in Rats
Authors:   , Do Jennifer 
Published: November 2021

<p>Rationale: Over the past few decades, MDMA has been shown to produce persistent detrimental effects. Animal models have been developed to investigate the effects of self-administered drugs on brain and behaviour, but only a limited number of studies have investigated effects of MDMA. Objectives: The present thesis sought to determine the effects of MDMA self-administration on working memory and tissue levels of 5HT in rats. The role of the 5HT₁ₐ autoreceptor in MDMA-produced deficits in tissue levels of 5HT was also evaluated using neurochemical and behavioural assays. Methods: Rats self-administered a total of 165mg/kg MDMA, and were then tested in the Novel Object Recognition (NOR) task 1 week or 9 weeks following the last session of MDMA self-administration. Tissue levels of 5HT were measured in separate groups of rats, following self-administration of a total dose of 165mg/kg or 315mg/kg. 8-OH-DPAT-induced lower lip retraction (LLR) was measured in rats 2 weeks following either self-administered (315mg/kg) or experimenter-administered (40mg/kg) MDMA. In subsequent studies, chronic 8-OH-DPAT (daily injections over 7 days; 1.0mg/kg/day), chronic trazodone (continuous infusion over 14 days via osmotic minipump; 10mg/kg/day) and tryptophan loading (oral administration over 7 days; 125mg/day via gavaging needle) were administered after MDMA treatment (either self-administered; 315mg/kg or experimenter-administered; 40mg/kg) and tissue levels of 5HT were measured. Results: Self-administered MDMA produced deficits in NOR that recovered 10 weeks following self-administration. There was a small decrease in tissue levels of 5HT at both 2 weeks and 10 weeks following the low dose of self-administered MDMA. Two weeks following the high dose, tissue levels of 5HT were decreased by about 30% in all brain regions examined, and there was recovery 10 weeks following exposure. 8-OH-DPAT-induced LLR was unchanged in MDMA-treated rats. Furthermore, none of the treatments restored tissue levels of 5HT following MDMA exposure, even though the treatment (chronic 8-OH-DPAT) shifted the basal 8-OH-DPAT-induced LLR curve to the right, suggesting autoreceptor desensitisation. Conclusions: Self-administered MDMA produced deficits in NOR, which may reflect impaired attention, encoding, novelty seeking or other cognitive processes. Dose- and time-dependent deficits in tissue levels of 5HT were modest compared to those produced by experimenter-administered MDMA. Therefore, MDMA self-administration may be important for pre-clinical investigation of long-term consequences of MDMA. The findings are not consistent with the idea that the 5HT₁ₐ autoreceptor became supersensitive as a result of MDMA exposure, and it is therefore not a viable pharmacological target for restoring tissue levels of 5HT.</p>
Reputation Description and Interpretation
Authors:   , Chard Ryan 
Published: November 2021

<p>Reputation is an opinion held by others about a particular person, group, organisation, or resource. As a tool, reputation can be used to forecast the reliability of others based on their previous actions, moreover, in some domains it can even be used to estimate trustworthiness. Due to the large scale of virtual communities it is impossible to maintain a meaningful relationship with every member. Reputation systems are designed explicitly to manufacture trust within a virtual community by recording and sharing information regarding past interactions. Reputation systems are becoming increasingly popular and widespread, with the information generated varying considerably between domains. Currently, no formal method to exchange reputation information exists. However, the OpenRep framework, currently under development, is designed to federate reputation information, enabling the transparent exchange of information between reputation systems. This thesis presents a reputation description and interpretation system, designed as a foundation for the OpenRep framework. The description and interpretation system focuses on enabling the consistent and reliable expression and interpretation of reputation information across heterogeneous reputation systems. The description and interpretation system includes a strongly typed language, a verification system to validate usage of the language, and a XML based exchange protocol. In addition to these contributions, three case studies are presented as a means of generating requirements for the description and interpretation system, and evaluating the use of the proposed system in a federated reputation environment. The case studies include an electronic auction, virtual community and social network based relationship management service.</p>
We Do Not Have an Adequate Conception of Art Until We Have One that Accommodates Gardens
Authors:   , Powell John Francis 
Published: November 2021

<p>In the first part of this thesis (chapters 1 – 4) I argue that we do not have an adequate conception of art until we have one that accommodates gardens. I argue for this by demonstrating that gardens are sufficiently like paradigmatic types of art to be included in the category of art. While doing this I show not just how gardens are similar to other types of art but also how they combine qualities shared with other types of arts in a way that is unique. In the second part (chapters 5 and 6) I develop this claim. I consider the dynamic nature of gardens and argue that gardens are most like performance arts such as music and dance, and that their distinctiveness relies on the particular dynamic character of the living organisms that constitute their principal materials. I concludes this thesis (chapter 7) by considering gardens in the context of the contemporary art genres of installation and environmental art.</p>
The Organization of the Islamic Cooperation and the Conflict in Southern Thailand
Authors:   , Waesahmae Paoyee 
Published: November 2021

<p>The current wave of insurgency in the southern provinces of Thailand, where the majority of population are Muslim, sparked up in 2004 but shows no sign of ending in the near future. The insurgency caused by the conflict in the region which, along the time, has risen and fallen depending on surrounding circumstances. Given the scale and intensity of the conflict, it has increasingly attracted the attention of the outside world especially the Islamic world since the conflict is believed to be connected with religious elements. Despite of this, no specific Islamic countries have played a direct role in intervention in the conflict. The only intervention involved in the conflict was carried out by the OIC, a representative of 57 Islamic countries. This essay attempts to examine the intervention of the OIC into the conflict in the southern provinces of Thailand in the name of Islamic countries in order to protect the rights of Muslim minorities as it claims and will explore the consequences of the tension between the OIC’s mission to uphold these rights and sovereign states.</p>
Beyond Aid: Sustainable Community-Owned Cooperative Business
Authors:   , Scotts Margaret 
Published: November 2021

<p>This thesis seeks to answer the question as to how the Colville Cooperative Society has withstood social and economic change where many other rural businesses offering similar services, in similar rural communities have failed. Joint entrepreneurship is a demanding form of entrepreneurship. Democracy is manage and difficult to sustain. What role does the organisation's cooperative principles and community ownership play in its sustainability? The research seeks to expand the knowledge of community-owned cooperative business as a viable alternative for community economic development; expand the New Zealand research on cooperative models; provide insight for cooperative member's to reflect on past successes and challenges in order to improve practice; and share knowledge about what makes a community-owned business work. The study found that the sustainability of the Colville Cooperative was dependant on several key factors. First amongst these is that the enterprise provides what the community needs. This is the basis of support for the enterprise and can overcome structural disadvantages. Vision and leadership that cleaves to the cooperative's principles, aims and objectives was just as important. To bring to expression and sustain these there had also had to be adequate business skills, and business continuity. It is the thesis of this research that the sustainability of the cooperative rests partly in the core beliefs and organising skills of the people who started it, partly in the resilience of cooperative forms of enterprise, and partly in the willingness and capacity of the community to sustain it. It is argued this type of community owned cooperative, where assets and shares are effectively held in trust on behalf of the community, can create a common wealth which frees communities from unsustainable sources of income, and creates viable enterprises that are independent of changing government policy fashions.</p>