Theses and Dissertations from UMD

Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2

New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM

More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.

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2009 - 20102

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    UNDERSTANDING THE SOCIAL AND COGNITIVE EXPERIENCES OF CHILDREN INVOLVED IN TECHNOLOGY DESIGN PROCESSES
    (2010) Guha, Mona Leigh; Druin, Allison; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Technology has become ubiquitous not only in the lives of adults, but also in the lives of children. For every technology, there is a process by which it is designed. In many cases, children are involved in these design processes. This study examined the social and cognitive experiences of children who were integrally involved in a technology design process in partnership with adults. This research study employed a Vygotskian lens with a case study research method, to understand the cognitive and social experiences of child technology design partners over a one-year period of design and partnership. Artifact analysis, participant observation, and interviews were used to collect and analyze data. Results from this study demonstrated that children involved in technology design process in partnership with adults experienced social and cognitive experiences which fall into the areas of relationships, enjoyment, confidence, communication, collaboration, skills, and content.
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    Cognitive and Motivational Parameters in Motivated Biases in Human Judgment
    (2009) Chen, Xiaoyan; Kruglanski, Arie W.; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Motivational and cognitive factors can determine the extent and direction of information processing in judgment. When biasing motives are present, information can be distorted and judgment biased. The extent of this bias can be determined by the nature of the information, the relative magnitude of competing goals, and the individual's cognitive resources. Studies 1, 2 and 3 explored the effect of resource depletion on motivated distortions in judgment. Studies 4 and 5 examined the role of relative goal magnitude (of a biasing goal vs. a specific judgment goal) in the phenomena. I departed from the assumption that human knowledge is malleable, and that its alteration in a motivationally desirable direction may vary in difficulty across instances. It was assumed that overcoming the difficulty requires cognitive and/or motivational resources hence under certain circumstances resource-depletion should diminish individuals' ability to motivationally bias judgments. I also hypothesized when information is clear-cut (rather than ambiguous) making distortion difficult, a sufficient amount of biasing motivation could overcome the "reality constraints," holding the cognitive resources constant. In my first two studies participants' resources were depleted either via complex or simple presentational format of the information given (Study 1), or via engagement in a fatiguing prior activity (Study 2). In the third study (Study 3), I measured participants' stable cognitive capacity as a proxy for their available cognitive resources. All three studies provided supportive evidence for the hypothesis that motivated distortion is resource dependent. In Study 4 I manipulated the relative goal magnitude by experimentally increasing goal importance for either an academic success goal in line with the specific judgment task or a social wellbeing goal as the biasing goal. In Study 5 I altered relative goal magnitude through enhancing either a neutral goal or health concerns as the biasing goal. In both Study 4 and 5, orthogonal to the relative goal magnitude manipulation, stimulus ambiguity was made either high or low. Findings from Study 4 and 5 supported the hypothesis that sufficient magnitude of biasing goal could overcome distortion difficulty even in highly constraining circumstances.