Buchbesprechungen

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Value orientations and motivational interference in school-leisure conflict: The case of Vietnam

The experience of motivational interference during studying and leisure in a school-leisure conflict and its relationship to pupils' value orientations were investigated in a self-report study of Vietnamese pupils (N = 346, mean age = 15 years). The results were compared with a combined sample consisting of pupils from nine other countries (N = 2155). From a cross-cultural perspective, the mean values of the variables show that Vietnamese pupils differ with regard to their values and motivational interference from pupils in other countries. Within the Vietnamese sample, modern value orientation was positively related to decision for a studying activity in a school-leisure conflict and to experience of motivational interference during a leisure activity and negatively related to interference during studying. For post-modern value orientation, the relationships were mostly reversed. Despite differences between sample means, the consistency in the relationships between the variables across the samples indicates that the pattern of relationships can be generalized.     

Cognitive ability and personality variables as predictors of school grades and test scores in adolescents

The predictive power of cognitive ability and self-control strength for self-reported grades and an achievement test were studied. It was expected that the variables use of time structure, academic procrastination, and motivational interference during learning further aid in predicting students’ achievement because they are operative in situations of school-leisure conflict. A sample of 697 eighth-graders was tested twice within the interval of a single school year (about eight months). Cognitive ability and self-control explained substantial variance of grade changes. Procrastination displayed a further portion of the variance. Personality variables were better predictors of grades, while cognitive ability showed higher variance with the achievement test. Variables tapping aspects of self-control strength have been interpreted as key determinants of learning outcomes. The findings suggest that it might be useful to identify students who are at risk, allowing these students to train their ability to shield studying from leisure distractions.     

Child Labour and the Contribution of Working Children's Organisations in the Third World

International Review of Education -     

Effiziente Vertr?glichkeitsprüfung und automatische Migration von Workflow-Instanzen bei der Evolution von Workflow-Schemata

Sollen Workflow-Management-Systeme (WfMS) in umfassender Weise für die rechnerbasierte Verwaltung und Steuerung von Gesch?ftsprozessen einsetzbar sein, müssen die von ihnen verwalteten Workflow-Schemata und -Instanzen bei Bedarf rasch anpassbar sein. Dabei müssen die auf Basis eines (alten) Workflow-Schemas erzeugten Instanzen auch nach dessen ?nderung ungest?rt weiterlaufen k?nnen, etwa durch Bereitstellung geeigneter Versionskonzepte. Sehr viel schwieriger wird es, wenn die angewandten Schema?nderungen – wo gewünscht und m?glich – auch auf die bereits (vielleicht in gro?er Zahl) laufenden Workflow-Instanzen übertragen werden sollen. Dies bei Bedarf zu k?nnen – und zwar ohne Inkonsistenzen oder Fehler zu verursachen – ist aber ungemein wichtig, wenn ein WfMS breit und flexibel einsetzbar sein soll. In diesem Beitrag wird ein Ansatz zur effizienten Prüfung der Vertr?glichkeit von Workflow-Instanzen mit einem ge?nderten Workflow-Schema vorgestellt. Durch Einbeziehung aller Beschreibungskonstrukte (z.B. auch Schleifen und Datenflüsse) und damit zusammenh?ngender Fragestellungen wird darüber hinaus zum ersten Mal die Grundlage für ein umfassendes ?nderungsmanagement geschaffen. Au?erdem wird aufgezeigt, wie der Benutzer bei der Migration vertr?glicher Instanzen auf das neue Schema konkret unterstützt werden kann.     

Dealing with forward and backward jumps in workflow management systems

Zusammenfassung. Workflow management systems (WfMS) offer a promising technology for the realization of process-centered application systems. A deficiency of existing WfMS is their inadequate support for dealing with exceptional deviations from the standard procedure. In the ADEPT project, therefore, we have developed advanced concepts for workflow modeling and execution, which aim at the increase of flexibility in WfMS. On the one hand we allow workflow designers to model exceptional execution paths already at buildtime provided that these deviations are known in advance. On the other hand authorized users may dynamically deviate from the pre-modeled workflow at runtime as well in order to deal with unforeseen events. In this paper, we focus on forward and backward jumps needed in this context. We describe sophisticated modeling concepts for capturing deviations in workflow models already at buildtime, and we show how forward and backward jumps (of different semantics) can be correctly applied in an ad-hoc manner during runtime as well. We work out basic requirements, facilities, and limitations arising in this context. Our experiences with applications from different domains have shown that the developed concepts will form a key part of process flexibility in process-centered information systems.Received: 6 October 2002, Accepted: 8 January 2003, This paper is a revised and extended version of [40]. The described work was partially performed in the research project Scalability in Adaptive Workflow Management Systems funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).