3,578 research outputs found

    The Comparative Intercultural Sensitivity of American Faculty Teaching Abroad and Domestically : A Mixed-Methods Investigation Employing Participant-Generated Visuals

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    This thesis aimed to identify and compare the intercultural sensitivity, or IS, of tertiary American instructors teaching mono-national, non-American student populations abroad in the UAE and that of American tertiary instructors in multinational, non-American student populations domestically in the US. The study investigated the use of reflexive photography and photo-elicitation interviews methods as both data collection approaches and possible cultivators of IS, as well as any variation in findings between the two participant groups. The study employed a mixed-methods approach involving surveys and semi-structured photo-elicitation interviews following a four-week reflexive photography project. Qualitative data were analyzed through the lens of a developmental framework and inductively through thematic analysis to capture fuller images of participants’ environments. Both groups of participants self-report fairly high IS, with the US-based group’s sensitivity averaging higher than the UAE-based group. Both groups, on average, showed slightly increased IS quantitatively following the reflexive photography project and photo-elicitation interviews, with the UAE-based group experiencing a slightly greater increase. This research involves a small number of participants; findings should be considered for indicative purposes only. Participants’ IS, when observed through the theoretical lens, indicate more progressive sensitivity among US-based participants. Thematic analysis of interview data reflects distinct teaching contexts faced by each participant group, with five and six themes emerging from the UAE- and US-based groups, respectively. This research is the first to the best of the author’s knowledge to investigate the IS of tertiary American faculty teaching internationally diverse student populations domestically and is also the first to compare differences in IS between this group and America

    The outlooks of international students when immersed in an Irish higher education setting

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    Ireland’s history of education for understanding internationalisation in education is important. The country once used English as a second language but was provoked by famine and opportunity to gradually shift to be an English speaking country. The impacts of this language on Ireland have been profound, and discussion in this analysis establishes how the nation viewed education as a means of opportunity. In the 20th Century, Ireland developed rapidly following membership of the OECD and the EU. Notably, as Ireland modernised it responded to international commonalities, while higher education and participation in the EHEA made Ireland transition to be a more competitive producer of education. The Global Financial Crisis (GFC) impacted Ireland in unprecedented ways. Ireland had been preparing to engage in greater internationalisation in higher education, until economic catastrophe expediated this process. A series of policy changes were implemented in this era signalling widespread reform to meet the requirements of the Bologna Process and economic restrictions. In 2010 and 2016, Irish strategies for internationalisation were revealed. These strategies are critiqued, and a thorough understanding of their outcomes and expectations is considered. Linguistic imperialism is applied to comprehend and establish aspects such as Irish government’s interpretation of global citizenship, which influences the strategies. An interpretivist paradigm guides data collection of semi-structured interviews which analyse the experiences students from China. The significance of the data collected for this study comes from providing Chinese students in Ireland an opportunity to share their experiences and to have a voice in discussions on internationalisation. Five themes emerged from the data: experiences; being a Chinese student in Ireland; role of the university; social networks; career benefits. The penultimate discussion and analysis show the presence of student agency in almost every action carried out. Agency was analysed and discussed in relation to students attempts to become more independent, their need for transferable experiences, and establishing a sense of belonging. Currents mechanisms for assessing students’ progress and supporting life and learning in Ireland appear inadequate and in need of revision

    An examination of the verbal behaviour of intergroup discrimination

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    This thesis examined relationships between psychological flexibility, psychological inflexibility, prejudicial attitudes, and dehumanization across three cross-sectional studies with an additional proposed experimental study. Psychological flexibility refers to mindful attention to the present moment, willing acceptance of private experiences, and engaging in behaviours congruent with one’s freely chosen values. Inflexibility, on the other hand, indicates a tendency to suppress unwanted thoughts and emotions, entanglement with one’s thoughts, and rigid behavioural patterns. Study 1 found limited correlations between inflexibility and sexism, racism, homonegativity, and dehumanization. Study 2 demonstrated more consistent positive associations between inflexibility and prejudice. And Study 3 controlled for right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation, finding inflexibility predicted hostile sexism and racism beyond these factors. While showing some relationships, particularly with sexism and racism, psychological inflexibility did not consistently correlate with varied prejudices across studies. The proposed randomized controlled trial aims to evaluate an Acceptance and Commitment Therapy intervention to reduce sexism through enhanced psychological flexibility. Overall, findings provide mixed support for the utility of flexibility-based skills in addressing complex societal prejudices. Research should continue examining flexibility integrated with socio-cultural approaches to promote equity

    Advance care planning in Asia and Indonesia:Cultural perspectives

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    "It's not a career": Platform work among young people aged 16-19

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    In the online gig economy, or platform work as it is sometimes known, work can be organised through websites and smartphone apps. People can drive for Uber or Deliveroo, sell items on eBay or Etsy, or rent their properties on Airbnb. This research examines the views of young people between the ages of 16 and 19 in the United Kingdom to see whether they knew about the online gig economy, whether they were using it already to earn money, and whether they expected to use it for their careers. It discovers careers professionals’ levels of knowledge, and their ability (and desire) to include the gig economy in their professional practice. This research contributes to discussions about what constitutes decent work, and whether it can be found within the online gig economy. The results point to ways in which careers practice could include platform work as a means of extending young people’s knowledge about alternative forms of work. This study also makes a theoretical contribution to literature, bringing together elements of careership, cognitive schema theory, and motivational theory and psychology of working theory, in a novel combination, to explain how young people were thinking about platform work in the context of their careers

    Not our script: a narrative exploration of voluntary childlessness in Ecuador

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    Voluntary childlessness, also called “childfreeness”, is not a new phenomenon, it is currently discussed in the media, and there is abundant literature on the topic available. Nonetheless, literature pertaining to Latin America is scarce compared to other regions in the world, and literature exclusive to Ecuador is not available. The present study explores and analyses voluntary childlessness in Ecuador by drawing from narrative theory and decolonial feminism. The data was produced through individual narrative interviews with nine voluntarily childless Ecuadorian women living in Ecuador, ages ranging from 25 to 49. The material emerged in the dialogical encounters between the storytellers (participants) and the listener (me-the researcher) and was analysed narratively taking into account the broader social context of Ecuador. The findings reveal how voluntary childless women in Ecuador construct their narrative identity and negotiate their social positionings while also creating counterstories that protect their identity as childfree women in a pronatalist context. The material also allowed me to discuss the status of bodily autonomy in Ecuador and to understand the social underpinnings of master narratives that conflate womanhood with motherhood. This study contributes to the growing scholarship on voluntary childlessness in Latin America

    A Critical Review Of Post-Secondary Education Writing During A 21st Century Education Revolution

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    Educational materials are effective instruments which provide information and report new discoveries uncovered by researchers in specific areas of academia. Higher education, like other education institutions, rely on instructional materials to inform its practice of educating adult learners. In post-secondary education, developmental English programs are tasked with meeting the needs of dynamic populations, thus there is a continuous need for research in this area to support its changing landscape. However, the majority of scholarly thought in this area centers on K-12 reading and writing. This paucity presents a phenomenon to the post-secondary community. This research study uses a qualitative content analysis to examine peer-reviewed journals from 2003-2017, developmental online websites, and a government issued document directed toward reforming post-secondary developmental education programs. These highly relevant sources aid educators in discovering informational support to apply best practices for student success. Developmental education serves the purpose of addressing literacy gaps for students transitioning to college-level work. The findings here illuminate the dearth of material offered to developmental educators. This study suggests the field of literacy research is fragmented and highlights an apparent blind spot in scholarly literature with regard to English writing instruction. This poses a quandary for post-secondary literacy researchers in the 21st century and establishes the necessity for the literacy research community to commit future scholarship toward equipping college educators teaching writing instruction to underprepared adult learners

    The Crossroads We Make: Intergenerational Trauma and Reparative Reading in Recent Asian American Memoirs (2018-2022)

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    This project extends reparative reading practices to recent Asian American memoirs, specifically trauma memoirs from the past five years (2018-2022) that detail personal trauma and communal, intergenerational trauma. Reparative reading is explored within five memoirs: Stephanie Foo’s What My Bones Know (2022), Esmé Weijun Wang’s The Collected Schizophrenias (2019), Phuc Tran’s Sigh, Gone (2020), Cathy Park Hong’s Minor Feelings (2020), and Nicole Chung’s All You Can Ever Know (2018). In considering the reparative turn in Asian American memoirs, this thesis draws on and extends Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick’s reparative frameworks and bell hooks’ theories on pedagogy and love. A critical analysis of self-writings through pre-existing reparative reading models alongside traditional Asian American scholarship on racial melancholia resists the monopolistic dominance of overwhelming negative affects (such as shame, guilt, and anger) that saturate Asian American lives and life-writing. Instead, this alternative interpretative practice exposes how authors seek love, pleasure, and positivity within their texts and within their own lives, while also exploring the methods through which the memoirists themselves embody the reparative in writing and self-analysis. Thus, shaping the reparative turn for Asian America illuminates the productive ways reshaped methods of writing and criticism, and its resultant ethics of living, can push back against lived racial oppression and pain as well as decades of cultural erasure and intergenerational trauma. This varied engagement with love-based and reparative frameworks allows Asian American authors to begin healing from trauma, and this is evidenced through non-traditional psychiatric healing methods, literary methods, and strategies of communal formation

    Predicate Matrix: an interoperable lexical knowledge base for predicates

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    183 p.La Matriz de Predicados (Predicate Matrix en inglés) es un nuevo recurso léxico-semántico resultado de la integración de múltiples fuentes de conocimiento, entre las cuales se encuentran FrameNet, VerbNet, PropBank y WordNet. La Matriz de Predicados proporciona un léxico extenso y robusto que permite mejorar la interoperabilidad entre los recursos semánticos mencionados anteriormente. La creación de la Matriz de Predicados se basa en la integración de Semlink y nuevos mappings obtenidos utilizando métodos automáticos que enlazan el conocimiento semántico a nivel léxico y de roles. Asimismo, hemos ampliado la Predicate Matrix para cubrir los predicados nominales (inglés, español) y predicados en otros idiomas (castellano, catalán y vasco). Como resultado, la Matriz de predicados proporciona un léxico multilingüe que permite el análisis semántico interoperable en múltiples idiomas
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