DTheses (Athabasca University)
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HOW ADULTS WITH HIGH FUNCTIONING AUTISM EXPERIENCE AND UNDERSTAND LEARNING IN A MMO GAME
Get PDFThis qualitative phenomenological study investigated a gap in the literature on adults
with high functioning autism (HFA) and whether, or how, communication skills are
strengthened or learned by playing MMORPG and MMO games. These games require
players to communicate through: team playing, collaborating, trading, strategizing,
socializing, competition, overcoming obstacles, and building empires. In the gaming
culture, however, when players do not communicate effectively while playing, they are
often ignored or excluded from group play. Through multiple perspectives from adults
with HFA, four key themes emerged: transfer of information focused on the why, how,
and who HFA gamers interacted with; description of game players involved real players
and non-player characters; dislikes involved the gaming industry and other gamers; and
self-barriers demonstrated self-awareness of the participants’ own deficits due to their
autism. Overall findings report that adults with HFA who played MMORPGs and MMO
games strengthened their communication skills.2020-0
Is “free” more expensive than commercial? Open educational resources as part of a sustainable business model for postsecondary institutions
Get PDFAs the cost of postsecondary education rapidly increases in the United States and Canada, it threatens to make education less accessible to students even as the need for university credentials grows. The use of Open Educational Resources (OER), which can lower costs for students and allow institutions to share and collaborate on content development, could help to address some aspects of this problem. The question of whether OER can be part of a sustainable business model for institutions of higher education, making it easier for them to achieve their missions, is crucial, whether in monetary terms or some equivalent measure. The problem needs to be addressed systematically and have appropriate metrics established. This study compares institutions in Canada and the United States that have developed OER programs, analyzing their business models for OER through the case study method. The study explores whether OER can be part of a sustainable business model for institutions of higher education, not only in financial terms but also in terms of other measures of institutional goals and “value.” These institutions’ practices, policies, and expenditures, and their efforts to incorporate the use of OER into their programs and business models, are examined. This project will also examine the practices of OERu, an international consortium of institutions that are collaborating on the creation of courses and academic credentials that use OER. While more research is needed, results indicate that the use of OER can be part of a sustainable business model for postsecondary institutions.2020-0
Health Outcomes in a Primary Care Network Interdisciplinary Team Program
Get PDFOptimizing interdisciplinary teams through the advancement of primary care presents an opportunity to support a sustainable health care system. However, there is mixed evidence regarding the impact of interdisciplinary teams on patient outcomes in primary care. The study purpose was to examine the relationship between select patient reported health outcomes following participation in an interdisciplinary team program for adults with chronic disease. Retrospective data was analyzed for 212 patients who had completed indicators of depression (PHQ-9), quality of life (EQ-5D-5L) and self-management (PAM) at program entry and 6-month follow up. The results revealed improvement in depression, overall self rated quality of life and self-management after attendance in the program. However, functional quality of life was generally not improved. This may have been due to a small sample size which lacked statistical power to detect a difference. These findings add to the literature supporting evidence of interdisciplinary teams improving patient outcomes.June 202
Healthcare Workers' Perceptions of an Influenza Immunization Campaign
Get PDFUnimmunized healthcare workers (HCW) are at risk of transmitting influenza to the vulnerable population for whom they provide care. Health organizations’ influenza campaigns are often developed using theories of behavior change. The Health Belief Model (HBM) was used in this study as a framework to evaluate the effectiveness of influenza immunization campaign interventions that may include accessibility, messaging, education, and management support. Despite the evidence that influenza immunization is effective in decreasing morbidity, mortality, and facility outbreaks, HCWs’ influenza immunization uptake remains below protective targets. The purpose of this study was to explore HCWs’ perceptions of one health organization’s influenza immunization campaign and the effectiveness of interventions designed to change HCWs' beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors towards influenza vaccine uptake. A qualitative exploratory case study was used to explore whether the influenza campaign interventions had the desired effect. Four main themes emerged from the study, including the perceptions of convenience, communication, management support, and personal choice. The influenza campaign interventions found to be most effective were email and posters.2020-0
Video-conferencing clinical supervision of rural, remote and northern counsellors to mitigate compassion fatigue
No full textThis is a mixed methods quantitative-qualitative explanatory sequential research project informed by transformative and feminist epistemology. It investigates the patterns of engagement in clinical supervision among Canadian professional counsellors across the career span, with a particular sub-focus on the experiences of those in rural, remote, and northern contexts. It also seeks to understand how video-conferencing-based clinical supervision can support rural, remote, and northern counsellors to enhance wellness and mitigate compassion fatigue. Of the 125 survey respondents, 55% indicate that they do not have a clinical supervisor. Of those who do have a supervisor, 66% of sample had under 10 years of experience. The Gamma test revealed results approaching significance (p=.085) when considering years of experience; there may be a relationship between the number of years in practice and the likelihood that the practitioner has a supervisor. There may also be a relationship between age and the likelihood that the practitioner has a supervisor: Chi-square showed a statistically significant result of p=.03 and on average, the likelihood that the respondents have a clinical supervisor dropped by approximately 10% per decade. The Chi-square (p=.003) also revealed statistical significance indicating that respondents experience financial barriers to accessing clinical supervision. Semi-structured interviews with nine respondents were treated with thematic content analysis supported by NVivo 10 and revealed 8 higher order themes. Of particular note are the sub-themes which describe the unique opportunities inherent in the medium of video-conferencing including: live remote supervision, the use of the parallax and potential self-supervision by viewing one’s image. The following sub-themes were identified and describe the ways in which video-conferencing clinical supervision can be helpful in mitigating compassion fatigue: providing resources and ideas, decreasing isolation, normalizing experiences, creating boundaries, generating clarity, re-energizing interest in work, providing opportunity to recognise strengths and competency and by providing emotional support.2020-1
Blended Learning and Satisfaction Among University Students Experiencing Concussion Symptoms
Get PDFProfessional sport organizations have successfully raised societal awareness of the serious nature of concussions and the effect on returning to sports activities or “return-to-play.” Existing literature places significant emphasis on return-to-play protocols for concussed athletes, while minimal information is available about when and/or how a concussed person can best return to a formal educational environment. In particular, there is a gap in the literature regarding a holistic view of educational approaches, learning implications, and accommodation needs for Canadian university students recovering from a concussion. Based on this gap, in this study a comparative quantitative-dominant mixed methods research design was used to investigate the suitability of in-person and blended learning environments for university students who have experienced one or more concussions. The study also explored learning implications and accommodations required following a concussion. Fifty current or former university students who have suffered a concussion at some time in their life were placed into two groups: (1) those who had studied in an in-person learning environment; and (2) those who had studied in a blended learning environment. An online questionnaire was used to explore how the students’ concussion symptoms affected their learning, the accommodations they were provided, and self-reported satisfaction with each learning environment. The following controlled variables were considered when analyzing self-reported satisfaction: concussion symptoms, site of injury, accommodations, accident versus sport-related injury, length of time since original injury, isolated versus multiple injuries, gender, medication use, approaches to learning, age, number of courses previously taken in their respective learning environments, and grade achievement. The findings revealed that students who had studied in a blended learning environment reported a higher level of satisfaction. Recommendations focused on the reported changes in learning that follow a concussion, the use of accommodations in different learning environments, and the role of faculty as students reintegrate into a formal learning environment.202
Modeling Absorptive Capacity for Open Innovation in the Software Industry
Get PDFIn today’s fast paced world, software companies face constant challenges to keep up with their competitors and meet the changing needs of their clients through innovation. While large software companies have significant resources for innovation, small and medium companies lack resources and must innovate more efficiently. These companies are also key to the innovation cycle, often making leading-edge discoveries that large companies cannot achieve. Without the resources to develop ideas internally, these companies must find innovation ideas from any source available. These small and medium software companies must be able to effectively find, internalize and exploit innovations. This is called Absorptive Capacity and defining how small and medium software companies can maximize innovation performance using absorptive capacity is the focus of our study. Absorptive capacity is made up of the following:
1. Finding the right innovation
2. Understanding and absorb the knowledge
3. Exploiting the innovation to drive success
Thus, finding strategies to maximize absorptive capacity is the key to successful innovation for these firms. Our study will focus on finding the most effective absorptive capacity strategies for small and medium sized Canadian software firms.
Based on the available literature, the key elements that define how firms can choose the most optimal strategies for absorptive capacity are:
• Type of Innovation
• Breadth of the Knowledge Search
• Depth of Knowledge Search
• Partnering strategy
• Knowledge intake strategy
• Knowledge sharing strategy
In the study we interviewed 54 small and medium sized Canadian software firms that were engaged in External Open Innovation. The interview covered the areas above.
The results showed key relationships between the variables that resulted in the following outcomes:
• Firms Doing Radical Innovation Use External Solutions
• Firms Doing Incremental Innovation Work in House
• Centralized R&D Organizations Prefer Finding Solutions Not Knowledge
• Custom Development Firms Source Innovations and Integrate
• Product Based Firms Source and Share Ideas and Build in House
These outcomes offer an opportunity to guide firms on how to best absorb knowledge as part of their innovation process. This will help these firms absorb knowledge and build innovations based on them, and successfully enhance their futures and their ability to compete.2020-0
Leveraging local and global word context for multi-label document classification
Get PDFWith the increasing volume of text documents, it is crucial to identify the themes and
topics contained within. Labelling documents with the identified topics is called multi-label classification. Interdependencies exist between not just words, but sentences and
paragraphs. These longer sequences and more complex relationships increase the label
identification challenge. Five novel deep neural networks are proposed and evaluated for
their performance classifying longer documents. The RCLNN applies the RCL to NLP,
combining that model with a CNN which has demonstrated success on short text. The
QRCNN similarly extends a CNN in addition to implementing it with a QRNN. The
remaining three models build on these base models, integrating them in a novel pseudo-Siamese approach. Experiments find QRCNN highest performing overall, with the
PSRCNNA model a close second, indicating that the pseudo-Siamese approach can be
performant when married with attention.2020-1
A decade of maternal filicide in Canadian news: An ethnographic content analysis
Get PDFNo research to date explores how Canadian journalists disseminate information to the public regarding maternal filicide. Using ethnographic content analysis (ECA), our research team analyzed 10 years of newsprint articles from three major Canadian newspapers including: The Globe and Mail, Toronto Star, and National Post on the topic of maternal filicide. The aim of this study was to understand what journalists were publishing about maternal filicide which has implications for how the public may form opinions and attitudes about these mothers and this crime. In this thesis, I present findings from our research which highlight that Canadian reporters use neutral, fact-based language in 81% of articles (n=77) and 179 different instances. Two over-arching frames of Criminal Justice and Descriptive Narrative were revealed. Each frame consists of three themes further elucidating the narratives and discourse presented to the Canadian public via news articles. Our research also highlights a lack of contextual reporting on mental health issues related to the perpetuation of maternal filicide.2020-0
TOURISTS’ DESTINATION CHOICE: EXAMINING THE ROLE OF INVOLVEMENT AND PLACE ATTACHMENT
Get PDFThe current research investigated the impacts of involvement and place attachment factors on tourists’ destination choice. The study was conducted by collecting survey data about observed variables in involvement and place attachment, that may have influenced the tourists’ choice for the Okanagan Valley, BC, Canada’s wine region. The first objective of this research explored the tourists’ experiences in the off-season period, winter, to further development in existing measures for involvement and place attachment relationships, as previously examined by Gross, Brien, and Brown (2008). The second objective explored areas around the region's wineries to cultivate new tourist interaction points of possible influencers from the plentiful Okanagan Valley scenic vistas and recreational opportunities.
This study focused on the area called the valley floor of the Okanagan Valley, BC, from December 2018 to February 2019. By design, data collection avoided the influence of higher elevations, defined as mountaintop destinations and resorts. This study had an available population of tourists during the research period of approximately 1400 individuals who were visiting the region in the winter season. The final dataset identified the representative population sample of n=252. The survey instrument presented Likert scaled (1-10) questions inquiring about destination involvement and place attachment.
This study found influential Involvement and Place Attachment evidenced, highlighting influencing factors in Tourists’ Destination Choice.
Culinary desires and activities in winter accounted for an explained result of 52.9% influencing involvement. Expectations of the location’s scenic vistas and the abundance of awe-inspiring landscapes, paired with the culinary experiences, were anticipated in the tourists’ destination choice. The tourists’ positive recognition of the Okanagan Valley as a globally desired wine destination indicated that 10.0% of the tourists found their expectations for memorable experiences. The tourists also indicated that planned and realized events supported 4.5% of the overall influence on the place.
The results generated from this study support the region's goals to consider factors related to tourists’ involvement and place attachment as influences in travel destination choice, which can be connected to findings of Gross and Brown (2006, 2008) and Gross et al. (2008). The Government of Canada’s new Tourism Strategy (May 2019) called for research and innovations to increase visitors in the off-peak seasons, for rural/rural-remote areas of Canada. This study results support the Government of Canada’s call.
The results increase the understanding of salient dimensions for tourists’ destination choice in the winter.2020-0