Motivação dos trabalhadores na sociedade do conhecimento

RESUMO: Nas sociedades avançadas da actualidade, aqui denominadas por sociedades do conhecimento, os níveis de responsabilidade e de exigência mental das organizações para com os seus trabalhadores é superior a qualquer outra realidade anterior. É emergente a necessidade de redefinir a estrutura das organizações, para que os reponsáveis e os seus respectivos colaboradores usufruam de condições potenciadoras do seu desempenho profissional. Os perfis ideais dos responsáveis de equipas e , em especial, dos «novos» trabalhadores produtores de conhecimento, incorporam determinadas características fundamentais para favorecerem o processo criativo e o trabalho autónomo. Mas as alterações não estão confinadas à dimensão laboral, pois surgiram igualmente mudanças profundas no seio da sociedade, as quais obrigam à existência de uma nova relação entre a vida pessoal e a vida profissional dos cidadãos. Todas estas transformações resultam na necessidade de uma componente motivacional muito forte por parte dos trabalhadores, os quais dependem apenas de si mesmos para a conseguir obter e manter. A solução desta problemática surge aqui configurada sob a forma de uma mudança de atitude por parte de todos os trabalhadores, a qual deverá fomentar a ocorrência de «Experiências óptimas» provenientes do desenvolvimento da actividade profissional dos mesmos, tal como é sugerido pela Teoria do Fluxo. Esta versão profunda da motivação intrínseca e estável é proposta como modelar e mesmo fulcral para o trabalhador na Sociedade do conhecimento. ABSTRACT: In today’s advanced societies, here referred as Knowledge Societies, the levels of responsibility and mental demanding which organizations require from their workers is higher than ever before. The need to redefine organizations structures is now emerging in order to allow CEO’s and their co-workers having access to encouraging conditions which improve their work performance. The ideal profile for a team leader and especially for the «new» Knowledge production workers, incorporate a defined group of fundamental characteristics to encourage the creative process and the autonomous work. But changes are not confined to the labor dimension. The Society core also suffered profound changes which demand the existence of a new relation between personal and professional life of its citizens. All these changes create the need for the existence of high motivational levels inside all workers, which now have to find their own ways to get and maintain it. The solution for this problem is presented here as a switch in workers attitude, which will increase the occurrence of optimal experiences coming directly from the development of their professional activity like it’s suggested in the flow theory. This version of the deep intrinsic and stable motivation is proposed as a model or even a central solution to the worker in the Knowledge Society.

Sexual presence and intentional dynamics: deviant and non-deviant sexual self-regulation from the first person stance

Child molesters (n=13) and sexually non-deviant subjects (n=29) were immersed with virtual characters depicting relevant sexual features while their sexual arousal and gaze behaviour were assessed to characterize their sexual preferences and intentional dynamics. Sexual arousal was measured using circumferential penile plethysmography (PPG). Gaze behaviour dynamics was derived from average gaze radial angular deviation (GRAD) and GRAD coefficient of variation (GRADCV). Results show distinct sexual arousal profiles according to sexual preferences and point towards the existence of specific gaze behaviour dynamics guided by sexual intentions. Theoretical interpretations are based on the ecological psychology of J.J. Gibson and the integrated theory of sexual offending (Ward, 2009; Ward & Beech, 2006). Theoretical underpinnings coming from these approaches are advocated as being especially well suited to explain how virtual reality can help probing into child molesters’ phenomenology as lived from the first-person stance.

Technology enhanced learning and augmented reality : an application on multimedia interactive books

Multimedia Interactive Book (miBook) reflects the development of a new concept of virtual interpretation of traditional text books and audio-visual content. By encompassing new technological approaches, using augmented reality technology, allows the final user to experience a variety of sensorial stimuli while enjoying and interacting with the content; therefore enhancing the learning process. miBook stands for a global educational intention to enable people not only to access but also to appropriate intellectually valuable contents coming from different linguistic and cultural contexts.

A atitude dos professores face à inclusão de alunos com deficiência : a influência do nível de ensino

RESUMO: A conjuntura actual veicula a necessidade de reflexão e de mudança acerca da concepção do modelo educativo, que se reformulam em novas realidades e ajustam a incumbência de adaptar. É certo que as necessidades de mudança devem partir de uma reflexão séria, fundamentando-se e difundindo o seu propósito em valores superiores. Estes desafios, que se cruzam na moralização social, tornam a discussão acerca do Paradigma Inclusivo substancial. O carácter quantitativo do estudo, assume o pressuposto de encontrar uma forma de monitorização de dados, decorrentes da aplicação de um inquérito por questionário, que para além da recolha de informações, visava também promover a reflexão dos professores, acerca das suas atitudes. Numa lógica de investigação em mosaico, obteve-se uma amostra total de 741 inquiridos, seleccionados no universo docente de forma aleatória. O tratamento estatístico foi desenvolvido por meio do suplemento EZanalyze, recorrendo-nos do teste paramétrico de análise de variância – ANOVA. Assim, pareceu-nos pertinente, centrar este estudo na figura activa do professor, no processo ensino-aprendizagem em contexto de sala de aula, propondo-nos a procurar eventuais analogias entre as variáveis Nível de Ensino e Grupo Disciplinar em estreita relação com a atitude dos docentes, relativas às vantagens da educação inclusiva, tanto para os alunos ditos normais como para os alunos portadores de deficiência, averiguando tanto a deficiência no seu âmbito geral, como especificando ainda a Deficiência Mental e a Deficiência Motora. Verificou-se que as variáveis Nível de Ensino e o Grupo Disciplinar influenciam directamente a atitude dos professores face aos benefícios para os alunos, que advêm da implementação do Paradigma Inclusivo. Verificou-se ainda que as vantagens que a inclusão proporciona, vão-se esbatendo à medida que o nível de ensino vai avançando. Naturalmente, destacam-se de forma positiva, os Educadores de Infância e os professores do 1º ciclo como os que se aproximam de atitudes mais inclusivas. Por sua vez constatou-se que as atitudes dos docentes do 2º ciclo ao ensino secundário evidenciavam atitudes bastante idênticas. ABSTRACT: The present context conveys the need for reflection and transformation on the educational model, which will reshape into new realities and readapt. It is true that the need for change must start from a serious enquiry, basing himself and his purpose on spreading higher standards. These challenges are intertwined in social moralizing which makes the discussion surrounding the Inclusive Paradigm substantial. The quantitative nature of the study, assumes the purpose of finding a way to monitor data from the application of a questionnaire that in addition to the collection of information, also aimed at promoting teachers reflection about their attitudes. In the logics of mosaic research, we obtained a total sample of 741 respondents, all of them were teachers selected at random. Statistical analysis was developed through EZanalyze, using the parametric test analysis of variance - ANOVA. Thus, it seemed appropriate that this study focused on the teacher's active figure on the teaching-learning process in the classroom, offering us a look for possible analogies between the variables Education Degree and Discipline Group in close relation with the teacher’s attitude concerning the advantages of inclusive education, for normal students as for students with disabilities, examining the deficiency within the general scope, such as specifying mentally and physical disabled. It was concluded that the variables Level of Education and Discipline Group directly influence teacher’s attitude, towards student’s benefits, coming from implementation of the Inclusive Paradigm. It was also concluded that the benefits of inclusion, are blurred as the education level progresses. Standing in a positive way, Early Childhood Educators and First Degree Teachers have more inclusive attitudes. Also, teachers from Second Degree to Secondary Degree has evidenced has being fairly homogeneous related to their attitudes towards the benefits of implementing a truly Inclusive Paradigm.

The dialectic of silence and remembrance in Lily Brett’s ''Things could be worse''

The dynamics of silence and remembrance in Australian writer Lily Brett’s autobiographic fiction Things Could Be Worse reflects the crisis of memory and understanding experienced by both first and second-generation Holocaust survivors within the diasporic space of contemporary Australia. It leads to issues of handling traumatic and transgenerational memory, the latter also known as postmemory (M. Hirsch), in the long aftermath of atrocities, and problematises the role of forgetting in shielding displaced identities against total dissolution of the self. This paper explores the mechanisms of remembrance and forgetting in L. Brett’s narrative by mainly focusing on two female characters, mother and daughter, whose coming to terms with (the necessary) silence, on the one hand, and articulated memories, on the other, reflects different modes of comprehending and eventually coping with individual trauma. By differentiating between several types of silence encountered in Brett’s prose (that of the voiceless victims, of survivors and their offspring, respectively), I argue that silence can equally voice and hush traumatic experience, that it is never empty, but invested with individual and collective meaning. Essentially, I contend that beside the (self-)damaging effects of silence, there are also beneficial consequences of it, in that it plays a crucial role in emplacing the displaced, rebuilding their shattered self, and contributing to their reintegration, survival and even partial healing.

Innovation, talent attraction and retention

The success of an organization isn’t, in most cases, only shown trough their profits. Today the value of a company, with respect to its market value exceeds their financial quality. Intellectual capital is a major share in the value of the company. Managing employees with an emphasis on intellectual capital and talent is an emergency that arises in the path of human resource managers. The definition of intellectual capital and talent, leads us, first, to a high IQ (Intelligence Quotient), good schools and / or university results. But the intellectual capital and talent of an employee must be linked to his ability, to high performance and good results. How to manage, attract and keep these employees in organizations is also something that requires talent. Now, the basic skills of employees aren’t sufficient for competitive companies. There are currently required higher levels of skills, because there are a growing number of activities that involve "knowledge work". Most companies in the world have a great challenge for the coming years: the challenge of scarcity of talent. The most competitive companies will be those that have the most talented employees. In terms of originality, this paper aims to create discussion about the relationship between talent attraction, talent retention and innovation, as drivers of business competitiveness. The research is based on the categorization methodology defined by Yin (2003) as single case study carried out in a company that is specialized in high precision components.The findings presented here show a strong link between talents attraction, talents retention and innovation.

As Narrativas Biográficas e as metodologias de investigação-acção sobre a memória e o esquecimento

The integration of Biographical Knowledge in research processes is a methodological proposal of critical empiricism that shifts the centre of production of knowledge to the research objects. We try to show haw Biographical Narratives can allow bypassing the locks and the deviations from real observation by the researcher and focus is work on actors in process. In the critique of the Eurocentric paradigm and is production of hegemonic scientific discourses by Bonaventura Sousa Santos (Santos, 2000) proposes the "south epistemologies" as a research process and the inclusion of knowledge of actors as the research field. In the article we will try to look at the process of production of biographical narratives using the tools of south epistemological proposal. We start reviewing the methodologies working on biographical objects. Then we present the preliminary studies and research we have been doing in communities in southern Mozambique in Djabula Community Centre. These results should be completed with other works on the ground, and now we opened as a collaborative process discussion on African Studies community. The project will be completed in the coming months, through the proposal of a "House of memories" to develop with the local population through articles, stories, sounds and dances that are chosen and will support the chosen narratives by the community. The projects created with local players, from their problems allow rapprochement and dialogue between the different knowledge.