Current fast development requires continuous improvement of employees’ skills and knowledge.

Therefore, companies are looking for the best way for improving the employees’ qualifications

and understanding of new concepts and tools which have to be implemented in

manufacturing areas. One method employs gamification for this purpose. The aim of this

paper is to present how gamification can increase the acquisition of knowledge concerning

lean manufacturing concept implementation. Gamification is an active learning approach for

people who will understand the subject easier by ‘feeling’ and ‘touching’ personally the analysed

problems. The research utilized a questionnaire which assessed the game participants’

engagement level. The assessment focused specifically on the participants’ motivation, cognitive

processing and social aspects. The participants were also examined before and after the

game in order to assess the increase of their understanding of different lean manufacturing

topics and tools. Five different games with different groups of participants were played. The

results confirmed the hypothesis that gamification has a positive impact on the knowledge

acquisition as well as on motivation, cognitive processing and social aspects. Finally, various

insights on how to better design, conduct and utilize gamification in the similar technical

context are presented.

The complexity of the phenomena associated with the course of the cognitive processes that determine an efficient learning, excludes the possibility of collecting knowledge in other ways than neuronal-information. It excludes also possibilities of interpreting it, in other ways than with use of respectively formalized cognitive models. The presented paper is a kind of summary of the latest achievements in this field.

Populism is understood here according to the widely accepted definition by C. Mudde as a para-ideology containing two components, anti-elitism and the sovereignty of the people. It expresses itself in the form of social movements, specific forms of policy pursued, which sustains or inspires social conflicts, and at the same time is intended to please the people. Politics is led by a charismatic leader who gains legitimacy through elections, but the conditions of electoral competition are modified in various ways to ensure the success of the populist party and its leader. The article discusses the results of psychological research that deal with the psychological determinants of populist attitudes. They concern the emotionalmotivational and cognitive functioning of those who accept the para-ideology of populism and populist power. The genesis of populism is also discussed, which is related to some important defects in liberal democracies.

In the article, the authors propose a typology of political knowledge from online learning activities and test its validity in an empirical qualitative study. The essence of their proposal is that meaningful study of the process of acquiring knowledge (rational analysis of factors modifying attitudes) must take into account both the perspective of the citizen (the demand for information) and an analysis of the publicly available knowledge (the supply of information). The authors distinguish three main methods of acquiring information: heuristic, reflective, and by-product learning. They note the importance of generational factors in shaping the cognitive activity of Internet users. There has been a gradual increase in the importance of source management, with simultaneous alienation and skepticism towards information obtained on the Internet. While the authors’ analysis is restricted to the Internet, their approach is not reductionist in that they consider the internet to be a medium for traditional media and its influence on civic attitudes.