The problem of separating a non-rectangular foreground image from a background image is a classical problem in image processing and analysis, known as matting or keying. A common example is a film frame where an actor is extracted from the background to later be placed on a different background. Compositing of these objects against a new background is one of the most common operations in the creation of visual effects. When the original background is of non-constant color the matting becomes an under determined problem, for which a unique solution cannot be found. This thesis describes a framework for computing mattes from images with backgrounds of non-constant color, using Bayesian statistics.

Since the 1950s new laws on higher education have led to a ?mass education phenomenon? in Sweden. This has led to a surplus of people with a university degree measured against available positions on the labor market. As a result of that development it must be assumed that in this over qualified society it is not anymore the degree but additional factors which are decisive for getting a job. In this respect the importance of the class background for getting a jobb that is equal to once level of education shall beexamined.The research was carried out by means of a Quantitative Analysis based on data from anational database called Undersökningar av Levnadsförhållanden (Survey of LivingConditions).

This essay aimed to give a basis for the departement of social work in Lund in its task to recruit students from underrepresented parts of the population to the departement and to the university by presenting which social groups are underrepresentated. The research also aimed to give an explanation of how the backgrounds of the student´s have influenced them and lead them to undertake studies of social work. The main questions were: - What background do the students at the departement of social work have as seen from the variables; sex, age, national background, class, parents' educational level, society of childhood and direction of upper secondary school? - How can the background of the students at the departement of social work be explaned by the theories of Pierre Bourdieu? The research was performed with a quantative method based on a questionnaire. The data received by the questionnaire were compared with data of the general students population and of the population of Sweden at large.

AbstractPurpose/Aim: My study aims to analyse, using Pierre Bourdieu´s theory, whether the social background plays a significant part in the attitudes and use of Apples mp3-player iPod. The study also aims to determine whether it is possible to group the focus groups used in my study and iPod into Bourdieu´s model.Material/Method: The reference material used in this paper is mainly gathered from books concerning Pierre Bourdieu´s theories. I have also had four focus groups of two different characters, to study their attitudes towards Apples mp3-player iPod. I have then applied the results of the focus groups to Bourdieu´s theories and models concerning habitus, social fields, capital and lifestyles, and studied whether there are any divergences in attitudes between the groups.Main results: My findings are that the focus groups as well as iPod can be put into Bourdieu´s model. According to the responses from the people in the focus groups, the attitude and usage of iPod do not mirror people?s social class or background, which goes against Bourdieu´s? theory.

This study is about how students 'performance in school is influenced by parents' educational background. The study has been performed by cooperation with two schools in Stockholm. One class in each school has participated and the students have amongst other questions answered regarding their grades in natural science subjects. To examine whether parents 'educational background affect students' performance, a quantitative survey in the form of poll has been conducted. Even a literature review was conducted in this area to get a clearer picture of how parents' educational background affects the performance of students.This study shows that students who have academic parents perform better than students who have not got academically educated parents.

This paper examines how recruiters use social media during their recruitment process. The paper focuses on the staffing industry and will further examine how recruiters are handling jobseekers personal privacy when they are using social media in a recruitment process. The paper are trying to understand the meaning of what personal integrity means and how or if recruiters show consideration to this in a recruitment process when they are using social media as a recruitment tool. Our result demonstrates that, today recruiters use social media daily to conduct background checks on job applicants. There are no clear instructions and rules on how recruiters should handle background checks through social media. Recruiters believe that job seekers are responsible for the information contained on the their social media.

Numerous studies raise the topic of highly educated immigrants whose education and list of qualifications devalue in the context of the Swedish labour market. However, little is known of those with foreign background who enter into higher education in Sweden. Our study attempts to shed some light onto the value of higher education relative to that of a person?s ethnic background. The background material features nine in-depth interviews of foreign background academics, as well as data extracted from an extensive survey study previously carried out at Växjö University. Initially, the quantitative data showed that students with foreign background, including Swedish-born children of immigrants, had not managed to find qualified work upon completion of studies to the same extent as their Swedish background counterparts.

The purpose of this study is to compare the representation of criminals in the Swedish television show ?Efterlyst? regarding ethnical background between the year 1998 and the year 2006. The aim is to determine if and how the representation of ethnicity have changed over the examined years. We have then examined 13 shows from each year and categorized the criminals by ethnicity, type of crime and length of each segment. We have come to a conclusion that the show has a noticeable overrepresentation of criminals with non-Swedish ethnical background.

The purpose of this study was to, using statistical analysis, investigate to what extent families of a different cultural background have participated in family therapy and other family treatment programs at Familjeenheten in Lund. With questions regarding the goals of treatment, and the importance of cultural competence in the treatment process we have let two unit managers comment on the statistics. The population of the study is too small to allow general conclusions to be drawn, however, we have been able to ascertain that families of a different background are over-represented relative to their percentage of Lund´s population. Familjeenheten has no statistical record of ethnicity and the interviewed persons express no certain importance in the families´ cultural origins. They express no need to develop special treatment methods that take the clients´ cultural background in regard as they feel that so many of family issues are universal.

Title: How do music students with different genre backgrounds perceive the same music? In this paper I report a study about how music students with different genre background perceive the same music. I let twentyone classical music upper secondary school pupils and twentyone rock music upper secondary school pupils listen to ten short music pieces of different character and styles. While listening, they were asked to answer four questions about which instruments they could perceive, what they could tell about pulse, rhythm and beat in the music, which component they thought was the most important in the piece and what word they thought best described the feeling of the piece. All four questions had to be answered for each piece of music to facilitate analysis of differences connected to genre background in those answers.

Numerous studies raise the topic of highly educated immigrants whose education and list of qualifications devalue in the context of the Swedish labour market. However, little is known of those with foreign background who enter into higher education in Sweden. Our study attempts to shed some light onto the value of higher education relative to that of a person?s ethnic background. The background material features nine in-depth interviews of foreign background academics, as well as data extracted from an extensive survey study previously carried out at Växjö University. Initially, the quantitative data showed that students with foreign background, including Swedish-born children of immigrants, had not managed to find qualified work upon completion of studies to the same extent as their Swedish background counterparts.

The aim of the study was to examine the retinal ON- and OFF-pathways of the canine electroretinogram (ERG). The ON- and OFF-pathways are used to distinguish objects from their backgrounds. A dark object is discernible from a lighter background using the OFFpathway and the ON-pathway is used to descry a light object upon a darker background. This study shows that the dog ERG has both ON- and OFF-responses and that these responses can be separated by prolonging the flash duration over 50 ms. The dog OFF-response waveform was more similar to the cat OFF-response than the human OFF-response (Frishman, 2006; Zrenner and Gouras, 1979). In this study six female three-year-old Beagle dogs were included. Both background and flash stimuli were provided by LEDs (light emitting diodes) with a wavelength of 470 nm, a wavelength that is absorbed almost as effectively by the canine M/L-cones as by the S-cones. These stimuli gave ERGs with both ON- and OFF-responses.

The North-American sociologist Michael Lipsky has characterized social workers as street-level bureaucrats with a substantial discretion in the relationship between the welfare state and its citizens. Within Lipsky´s theoretical framework social workers appear as a powerful group that socializes the citizens to uphold certain expectations towards the welfare state and its (re)distributional programs. From this point of view, it is important to learn more about social workers and the attitudes they express towards the welfare state. The aim of this study is to analyze how the welfare-political attitudes of future social workers are affected by their social background (e.g. class background and ancestral homeland).

Young women with immigrant background are generally looked upon as victims of patriarchal structures and cultural determinism.The purpose of this bachelor thesis was therefore to have a salutogen perspective. We investigated how young women with a transcultural background are affected by and how they use their experiences from different backgrounds in their creating of identity.We based our essay on qualitative interviews and current research on the subjects of multi culture, identity and youth. The interviewees were seven young women with experience of multi cultural background and performing different kind of artistic activity.The theory and empirical material combined and compared resulted in three themes: affinity, cultural hybridization, and salutogen factors.We saw that for those young women affinity functioned as a basis for creating identity and that their double background enriches them in several aspects. The three major salutogen factors that the interviewees had in common, and we emphasize, are their struggle, open mind and awareness of freedom.The global youth culture has a great impact upon the young women and to some extent we could recognize cultural hybridization. We consider this neglected subject urgent and very relevant for social work in the multi cultural society of Sweden..

This master thesis is about art activity in the public library. The essay takes its starting point from Government cultural political directives and my purpose has been to study how these are followed up in the municipal level. My survey takes place at the main library of Flen in the county of Södermanland. What I am looking for is, what the art activity looks like, what is decided regarding it and what the strategies are. Furthermore I look into how library visitors understand and participate in the art activity.