Why are male students less likely to opt for social science courses? : a theory-driven analysis

Copyright © 2020 SageIn this article, we discuss the question of why only a few men decide to study social science courses such as social work. While the conceptual base of our analysis includes the theory of planned behaviour and theories centring on gender role orientations, the empirical base is a random cluster sample of high-school graduates in Switzerland. The results show different gender effects, as well as direct and indirect effects, for all the theory of planned behaviour factors. Gender role orientations and the question of how a social science profession fits one’s own gender identity appear to be of particular importance only among male students

Educational Expansion and Interest in Politics in Temporal and Cross-cultural Perspective: A Comparison of West Germany and Switzerland

Interest in politics is a prerequisite for political participation and political engagement. The promotion of political engagement and the education of citizens to become politically mature were basic concerns of educational reforms in the 1960s. This article examines whether educational expansion since then has had an impact on citizens' political interest. The effects of education, age, period, and cohort on political interest are analysed simultaneously. A cross-cultural perspective is included by comparing these effects in Switzerland, a direct democracy that provides its people with extensive opportunities to participate, and West Germany, a representative democracy with less such opportunities. The data base consists of cumulated data sets (ALLBUS, UNIVOX). Results show that there is a robust effect of education: the more educated are more politically interested. The younger generation is not, as is often suggested, more distant from politics. Taking into account their higher educational level, these younger cohorts show the same level of political interest as the older cohorts did at the same ag

Unkonventionelle Politische Partizipation Im Zeitverlauf: Hat die Bildungsexpansion zu einer politischen Mobilisierung beigetragen?

Zusammenfassung: In Demokratien wird von vielen Seiten eine zunehmende Abkehr der Bürger und Bürgerinnen von Politik beklagt. Haben die Bildungsreformen der 1960er Jahre, zu deren Grundanliegen auch die Förderung politischen Engagements und die Erziehung zu mündigen Bürgerinnen und Bürgern gehörten, in diesem Punkt versagt? Im Rahmen dieses Beitrags wird der Frage nachgegangen, ob die Bildungsexpansion eine politische Mobilisierung zur Folge hatte, im Zuge derer unkonventionelle politische Partizipationsformen an Bedeutung gewonnen haben. Unter Nutzung kumulierter ALLBUS-Datensätze (1988-2000) werden zunächst soziale Hintergrundmechanismen des Zusammenhangs zwischen Bildung und politischer Partizipation auf der individuellen Ebene betrachtet, um dann anhand einer simultanen Modellierung von Alters-, Perioden-und Kohorteneffekt unkonventionelle politische Partizipation im Zeitverlauf zu untersuchen. Im Ergebnis zeigen sich gleich bleibend starke Effekte des Bildungsniveaus sowie Hinweise, dass eine politische Mobilisierung stattgefunden hat. Während die höher Gebildeten sich als die hauptsächlichen Träger dieses Prozesses erweisen, bleibt die Distinktion der niedrigen Bildungsgruppen im Hinblick auf ein geringes Niveau politischer Partizipation erhalte

Migrant Background and Higher Education Participation in Europe: The Effect of the Educational Systems

The main aim of this article is to shed light on the extent to which differences in higher education participation between people with and without a migrant background of low/higher social origin can be explained by two macro-level characteristics of national educational institutions: stratification of the secondary school system and provision of alternative access to higher education. General assumptions are that people with a migrant background of low social origin benefit in low-stratified secondary school systems and in systems that provide alternative access to institutions of higher education more than their native peers in the same social stratum, owing to primary and secondary effects of migrant background. Database is a pooled dataset of the five waves of the European Social Survey. Results of logistic multi-level analyses indicate that a low-stratified secondary school system improves the probability of people with a migrant background/low social origin attaining a higher education degree. On the other hand, a stratified secondary school system reduces their chances regarding this educational stage. The provision of alternative access to an institution of higher education improves their likelihood of becoming higher education graduate

Sistemas educativos basados en políticas públicas, caso Finlandia, Chile y Colombia: Lecciones para Colombia desde la óptica del Derecho Comparado

Artículo de investigaciónEl artículo 67 de la Constitución Política de Colombia de 1991 establece que “la educación es un derecho y un servicio público que tiene una función social”, entendiendo lo anterior Colombia ha construido una serie de políticas públicas en torno a la educación, que han ido avanzando con el tiempo. No obstante, lo anterior, la cobertura y la calidad de la educación en todo el territorio colombiano, aún son un tema pendiente para la administración nacional. El sistema educativo en Colombia se encuentra conformado por la educación formal que se divide en tres niveles que son: educación preescolar, la educación básica y la educación media; sobre cada uno de estos niveles se han hecho políticas públicas que permiten a los ciudadanos acceder a los mismos y mejorar el nivel educativo de la población en general, en razón de lo anterior que se realizo un análisis de dichas políticas y contrastarlas con políticas educativas que han adoptado países como Chile y Finlandia teniendo en cuenta la calidad de estos sistemas educativos, pues de la experiencia que vivieron los países nombrados se tomo las lecciones que guiaran a Colombia al siguiente paso en el desarrollo educativo y posiblemente al desarrollo social.INTRODUCCIÓN 1. GENERALIDADES DE LA EDUCACION 2. POLÍTICAS PÚBLICAS DE EDUCACIÓN EN LATINOAMÉRICA 3. POLÍTICAS PUBLICAS DE LA EDUCACIÓN EN EUROPA 4.CONCLUSIONES BIBLIOGRAFÍA ANEXOSPregradoAbogad

Bildung und subjektives Wohlbefinden im Zeitverlauf, 1984-2002: Eine Mehrebenenanalyse

Zusammenfassung: Diese Analyse des subjektiven Wohlbefindens verfolgt zwei Ziele. Zum einen wird die Entwicklung des subjektiven Wohlbefindens über die Periode zwischen 1984 und 2002 untersucht. Dabei werden Alters-, Perioden- und Kohorteneffekte simultan betrachtet. Als soziale Mechanismen hinter den Wandlungsprozessen, das heißt als Prädiktoren für das subjektive Wohlbefinden und die Variation im Zeitverlauf, werden Bildung und Bildungsexpansion thematisiert und in die Analysemodelle eingeführt. Um die Lebenszufriedenheit unabhängig von gesundheitlichen Aspekten zu untersuchen, wird die Gesundheitszufriedenheit kontrolliert. Methodisch folgt der Beitrag einem Mehrebenenansatz. Zur Datenanalyse werden Hierarchisch Lineare Modelle (HLM) herangezogen. Detailliert wird auf die benötigte Datenstruktur, die Anwendbarkeit und die Parameter-Schätzungen von HLM eingegangen. Die Datengrundlage bildet das Sozio-Ökonomische Panel (SOEP), wobei nur die Teil-Stichprobe der Westdeutschen in die Analyse einbezogen wird. In den Resultaten zeigen sich - neben einem starken Einfluss der Gesundheitszufriedenheit - u.a. robuste Bildungseffekte, ein substanzieller Alterseffekt und ein schwacher negativer Kohorteneffekt auf die Lebenszufriedenhei

Theoretical study of non-relativistic electron dynamics under intense laser fields

Strong field approximation (SFA) is the most important approximation in the analytical theory of intense laser matter interaction. Based on SFA many analytical theories have been developed such that a broad spectrum of strong field physics phenomena can be described. The central idea of SFA-based theories is to approximate the electron propagation in the continuum by the Gordon-Volkov wavefunction - a well studied analytical solution to the time-dependent Schr\"{o}dinger equation where the electron is driven by the laser field only. This approximation captures some of the essential features of strong-field physics, but at the same time causes several problems in the theory. In this thesis a comprehensive study of the SFA has been presented. We introduce the SFA in both the length gauge and the velocity gauge. The adequacy of SFA has been discussed by comparing the theory to the numerical solution to the time-dependent Schr\"{o}dinger equation (TDSE). The numerical method of solving TDSE is presented as a separate chapter. In order to obtain a better understanding of the applicability of SFA-based theory, we tested the major approximations in the theory by using three different models: the zero-range potential, the hydrogen atom and the hydrogen molecular ion. The accuracy of the method of steepest descent (MSD) and other major approximations in the analytical theory have also been examined. Targeting at the generalization of the SFA-based theories, several extensions and improvements of SFA have been proposed. We will review them in detail and bring them into unity. One of the most successful aspect of the SFA-based theories is to describe and decompose electron dynamics into components such that identification of different physical processes becomes possible. For instance, the direct ionization and non-sequential double ionization bear clear definitions only within the SFA-based framework. The physical interpretation becomes more straight forward due to the fact that there is a close connection between the quantum orbital and classical trajectory. The MSD is a mathematical tool to bridge the quantum orbital and the classical trajectory in an SFA-based theory. We will discuss MSD within a systematic framework so that the higher order asymptotic expansion terms can be obtained in a straight forward way. After gaining substantial understanding of the SFA and the MSD we developed a graphic user interface (GUI) software that is capable of calculating strong field ionization rates, photo-electron spectra and high harmonic generation spectra. The software interface and algorithms have been presented in the thesis. Sample calculations were done and compared with the previously obtained results. In the last chapter of the thesis, we further developed the theory to describe a two-laser ionization scheme where one laser is chosen to be resonantly coupled two real states and the other is a strong few-cycle laser pulse. We demonstrate the periodic dependence of the total ionization on the appearance time of the strong few-cycle laser pulse. In the case of few-cycle pulses with lower intensity, we observed side-bands in the photoelectron spectrum, whose intensity vary periodically with the appearance time of the pulse. We show that our extended theory is able to explain these phenomena adequately