This study investigates whether mimicry of scratching, yawning, lip biting, and face touching is influenced by empathy, trust, gender, or social distance. Twenty participants counted the eye blinks...Show moreThis study investigates whether mimicry of scratching, yawning, lip biting, and face touching is influenced by empathy, trust, gender, or social distance. Twenty participants counted the eye blinks of a confederate in three social distance conditions, namely while watching a pre-recorded video, while having a live interaction, and through a live stream. During these conditions, the confederate performed the four mimicry behaviours. The participants also played investment games to measure trust and they filled in the Interpersonal Reactivity Index to measure empathy. This study did not find a significant relation between mimicry and empathy, nor between mimicry and gender. A negative relation was found between trust and mimicry, with lower levels of trust leading to more mimicry. A significant difference between yawning and face touching was also found, with face touching leading to higher levels of mimicry. However, the social distance condition that one was in did not influence the amount of mimicry. Adding empathy as a covariate also did not influence the results. Future research is needed to examine other factors that could influence the relationship between social distance and mimicry. For instance, it is possible that how comfortable one feels moderates this relationship or that people suppress behaviours to be polite.Show less
The Social Credit System (SCS) constitutes an incredibly extensive overarching plan by the Chinese government to be implemented in China. One of the main issues that the plan aims to target is to...Show moreThe Social Credit System (SCS) constitutes an incredibly extensive overarching plan by the Chinese government to be implemented in China. One of the main issues that the plan aims to target is to raise the levels of trust-keeping and sincerity within Chinese society. Considering the recent incidents of food scandals or negligence towards road traffic victims in China often described as the crisis of morality or so-called "moral crisis", it poses a question whether the Social Credit System can be considered as a certain response of the government to the low levels of social trust and moral behavior. By analyzing the founding document of SCS, this thesis explores what kind of values the plan of SCS promotes and whether and how does it respond to the low social trust.Show less
Om het vertrouwen in de journalistiek te verbeteren is het belangrijk om de accountability te verhogen. Journalisten moeten transparant zijn in hun werkwijze en waar nodig verantwoording afleggen....Show moreOm het vertrouwen in de journalistiek te verbeteren is het belangrijk om de accountability te verhogen. Journalisten moeten transparant zijn in hun werkwijze en waar nodig verantwoording afleggen. Een mogelijkheid hiervoor is bijvoorbeeld een ombudsman, maar deze is duur. Twitter, populair onder journalisten, is wellicht een goedkope oplossing. Iedere journalist is op Twitter zijn eigen ombudsman (Meier, 2009). Maar dat ligt lastiger, omdat Twitter ook een middel is om journalistieke producties te promoten. Een inhoudsanalyse naar duizend tweets van programmamakers van NOS op 3 toont aan dat frames (Esser en D’Angelo, 2003) die positief zijn voor de accountability vaker voorkomen dan frames die negatief zijn en vooral gericht ter promotie. Twitter maakt de nieuwsrubriek transparanter, omdat het een kijkje in de keuken biedt. Vooral foto’s verduidelijken het dagelijkse nieuwsproces. Echter, interviews met verschillende redacteuren van de nieuwsrubriek laten zien dat het gebruik van Twitter individueel verschilt. Een duidelijk handboek is nodig om alle neuzen dezelfde kant op te wijzen. Op die manier kan Twitter beter gebruikt worden als accountabilitytool, want die mogelijkheid lijkt het wel te bieden. Voorwaarde is dat het publiek beter aangesproken wordt, zodat er ook input komt vanuit de kijker. Nu zijn er nog nauwelijks conversaties, dus is er weinig verantwoording nodig. Al bestaat de kans dat het publiek helemaal geen behoefte heeft aan transparantie en verantwoording.Show less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
Restoring law and order and trust in the state is a challenge in a post conflict situation. Especially in the case of Bosnia Herzegovina, where the state is not easy to define. Based on field...Show moreRestoring law and order and trust in the state is a challenge in a post conflict situation. Especially in the case of Bosnia Herzegovina, where the state is not easy to define. Based on field research in the city of Mostar this thesis tries to answer theShow less
Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
The mitumba trade of second-hand clothing in Kenya has been growing rapidly the last twenty years, making the street vendors selling from huge piles of second-hand clothing very familiar in the...Show moreThe mitumba trade of second-hand clothing in Kenya has been growing rapidly the last twenty years, making the street vendors selling from huge piles of second-hand clothing very familiar in the street view. The complexity of this network behind the import, unpacking, distribution, adjusting, selling and buying of second-hand clothes, has been examined through a three month field study in Mombasa, the biggest harbor city of Kenya. By taking this chain of relationships as departure, trust and distrust have been uncovered as mechanisms which create tensions, chooses, manipulations, commitments and expectations for second-hand clothing traders. Trying to make a living in this trade requires the strategic use of reputation, social connections and information, making the complexity and applications of trust in this value chain of key importance for the study of the second-hand clothing market.Show less
This study has made a serious attempt to uncover in which domains of feedback misperceptions arise during the mentoring process of feedback by means of reciprocal communication between mentors and...Show moreThis study has made a serious attempt to uncover in which domains of feedback misperceptions arise during the mentoring process of feedback by means of reciprocal communication between mentors and their students, what possible causes are of these misperceptions, and which effect this miscommunication has on the actual usage of feedback. The domains have been examined regarding differences and possible mutual relations between and within the student populations, as well as between the student populations and their corresponding mentors. Feedback functions as a powerful instrument when it is actually brought into practice by the students to progress and develop themselves towards academic and social maturity during their self regulated study process. However, during the past few years the problem has gradually come to the surface that the received feedback is interpretated by the students in a different manner than apparently was meant by the teacher of mentor. This difference in perception of the given and received feedback has therefore been studied in detail by this study, because of its crucial importance in the student’s self regulated learning process. In line with this is studied which part four different mentoring styles play in this communication process, as well as which elements enhance the ultimate usage of the received feedback. The study comprised four third-year groups (two MBO groups and two HBO groups) with a total of 68 students (37 MBO Teaching Assistant students and 31 HBO Teacher Primary School students) and their four corresponding mentors of a secondary and a higher vocational school in the province of North Holland, The Netherlands. The educational settings of all groups studied were identical, namely based on the internships of the students. Of the four groups and their corresponding four mentors, three groups and their three mentors showed significant differences in perception concerning various feedback domains, while the perception of the mentoring styles were significantly different between all four groups and their four corresponding mentors. Clarity is marked by both student populations as the most important influencer of the usage of feedback. Both the MBO as the HBO students indicated the mentoring style Imperator to have a positive effect on Clarity. The two groups MBO students recognized in their mentors the mentoring style Imperator, and at the same time the MBO students indicated the mentoring style Imperator to have a significant influence on the actual usage of feedback. The two groups HBO students recognized in their mentors the mentoring style Initiator, and the way the mentoring styles are perceived by the HBO students is significantly affected by their fit with the education. During this study also the robustness of the three questionnaires was examined, with the question if the questionnaires are valid instruments to be utilized in MBO and HBO settings, and it can be stated that the validity and reliability of the questionnaires has been proven solid for usage in MBO and HBO populations.Show less
