The DuPont formula is one of the most well known and basic tools used for financial statement analysis and is highly useful for understanding firms strategies and operating environment. Previous studies on American listed companies have also shown that analysis of the changes in the DuPont components is useful in forecasting contexts. In this thesis we test whether disaggregating the change in return on net operating assets provides incremental information about future performance for Swedish listed and not listed companies. We find that the change in asset turnover is a leading indicator of increased profitability for both listed and private companies, regardless of size. We also find evidence that the usefulness of the disaggregation for understanding future performance is greater in capital intense industries and lesser in service industries..

Virtual Communities is an increasingly common phenomenon on the Internet. Most of the Virtual Communities are operated and maintained on a non-profit basis with a direction towards entertainment. However, as more state administrated and commercial services become web-based, we believe that the number of Virtual Communities with a community-based or commercial direction will increase in a near future. In this thesis, we describe our participation in, and studies of, a number of Virtual Communities with focus on the IRC-channel ?3dfxsweden?.

The purpose of this study is to examine whether personality traits, self-esteem, performance-based self-esteem and demographic data relate to, and can explain the variation in psychological ill-health among students at Lund University. A questionnaire was distributed to students attending the Psychology program, Bio-technology program, Theologian program and Law program. There were 247 respondents to the questionnaire, mainly attending their second or third semester. General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12), Rosenberg's Self- Esteem scale, Hallstens scale measuring performance-based self-esteem, questions relating to demographic data and a short version of the personality inventory scale Big Five were included in the questionnaire. Positive correlations were found between psychological ill-health and the variables neuroticism and performance-based self-esteem.

The goal of this work has been to create a flexible strategic group-based artificial intelligence for the Arrowhead Game Studios-game Magicka, by implementing, using and examining different AI-techniques that's used in many commercial games in more or less extent. C# is the programming language that has been used in the development, and the implementation has been made as flexible as possible to make further development and extending AI-rules etc. easier..

Background: The audit has not always been as it is today. The first law requiring auditing was legislated in the Companies Act 1895. Many events have taken place in the audit history; among them was the Krueger crash, which affected the auditing profession hard in Sweden. This led to new recommendations and laws that would save the profession. Because of the events in the past, there are many who question the audit profession and discussions have been held regarding the auditor's independence and objectivity.

With the help of large amount of archive material I have examined how Gustavsberg in Värmdö were affected by the great labor migration in Gustavsberg porcelain factory during the period 1869-1924. I have chosen to investigate how the municipality dealt with the poverty relief issue out of the labour immigration perspective. To my surprise I found out that Värmdö was not responsible for Gustavsberg in the poverty issue. The workers belonged to the factory, which had a relatively well-developed system of poverty relief in place. This is not to say that the workers received any support from the factory to any great extent.

This report presents an investigation and a new design of Habo Ullspinneris old industrial premises. It is based on the owners visions and wishes, two questionnaires and also considering of the historical value.Habo Ullspinneri was founded in 1882 by Frans August Johansson and was moved to the location it has today, near Hökån in Habo, three years later. The electricity that the machines in the industry needed was extracted from the small river that is placed under the building. In 1960 there was a fire and the result became the end of the industrial activity that had taken place in the building.There is no steady activity in the building at the moment. It is nowadays temporarily used as an agriculture museum and as a store room.

Background: Several accounting scandals have caused a development from rules-based to principles-based regulation. Swedish municipalities follow the principle-based recommendations issued by RKR (The Council for Municipal Accounting). An explicit requirement of component depreciation has been introduced prior to 2014. The principles-based regulatory framework raises some choices regarding the introduction and demands that professional judgments are made. There is some risk that comparability decreases.

Background: Sweden is one of many countries which have a long history of immigration during the past decades. Each yearSweden receives numerous immigrants from different parts of the world, which has madeSweden to a multi-culture country.Aim: The aim was to describe nurses? experiences of encounters with patients from different cultures.Method: A literature-based study based on qualitative research, nine scientific articles were performed.Result: The analysis of the data resulted in four themes such as; insufficient communication, family members as a link to the patient, unfamiliar situation, and attentive to the patients? vulnerability with seven subthemes.Conclusion: For a well functioning encounter between nurse and patient from different cultures, a prerequisite is that the nurses establish a relationship based on good communication with the patient and relatives. This can prevent inequality, suffering based on lack of nursing, violation and misunderstandings..

Intramuscular injections to cats can generate strong reactions in some individuals while reactions of the same extent, according to the author, not always are recognized when using the subcutaneous route. The reactions are probably caused by fear, stress and/or pain. When the injection can generate pain one has to take that into account, which can be a limitation in treatment. It is well known that injections generate pain, but knowledge about the cause and processes of the injection-associated pain is limited. This is mainly due to the difficulty in finding objects to study pain on, high cost of use of laboratory animals and difficulty to obtain objective measurements. Although there is evidence that there may be a local muscle injury by intramuscular injection, it is not always that the extent of damage is related to the pain experienced. Facts about the causes of injection-associated pain have been studied in a literature review.

The aim of this thesis is to examine the customer profitability in a wholesale company. A case study of Eugen Wiberger AB has been conducted. Firstly the authors have examined the current perception of the company regarding their customer profitability and the results of their calculation of the customer profitability. Secondly an Activity-Based Costing analysis has been performed and has been compared to the perception in the case company. The conclusions are that the smaller customers are the least profitable, and in some cases unprofitable, whereas the larger customers are profitable.

The purpose of this thesis is to ascertain the main determinable factors of Swedish SMEs capital structure decisions and to investigate whether existing capital structure theories are applicable on Swedish SME financing. We have used panel data to run regressions of various capital structure determinants on three measures of capital structure; short- term debt, long-term debt and total debt. We found that growth opportunities, profitability and age are the most important capitalstructures determinants for our sample. Firm size shows a small explanatory result but the effective tax rate and the asset tangibility do not seem to explain the capital structure at all. Thematurity matching principle is considered significant..

AbstractThis essay aims to problematize and illuminate the connection between special-education and nature-based activities. With a theoretical ground that is based upon a sociocultural perspective I consider the information from the field. Through a qualitative and critical perspective I performed individual interviews with five pupils from the sixth school-year in the Swedish elementary-school. I also performed Focus-group interviews with two educators and three teachers in the same school-form. By a Hermeneutical working-method I have found out that the informants in my survey have a common experience that activities performed in nature has a positive effect on learning.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the sentences handed down to young offenders can be considered fair. We wanted to take an in-depth look at the penalties to understand how they work. To clarify our purpose, we used the following questions: How does organizing sanctions work in practice? What support services are offered to the young? What can be done to ensure sentences are as favorable as possible for young people? The empirical material is based on qualitative semi-structured interviews with six social workers from two different municipalities. We also made use of previous research in the field as a reference tool.

The purpose of this study was to examine earnings quality and earnings management in U.S. ex-post failed firms. A quantitative study was made, using the Modified Jones Model, to identify abnormal accruals up to six years before bankruptcy. 9 003 continuing firms and 187 bankrupt firms, active sometime between 1990 and 2010, were examined. The study concludes that U.S.