Making accurate predictions of private consumption expenditures is a difficult task. This thesis examines if consumer confidence can be used to forecast consumption. Using regression analysis, the link between consumer confidence and private consumption expenditures is analyzed for Sweden between the years 1994 and 2005. Two different models are estimated. In the first model consumption is regressed only on consumer confidence, while model two is extended to contain more variables.

Background:Studies show that when nurses are experiencing problems in the care of non-Swedish speaking patients, it is often due to obstacles in the communication. Studies also show that a prerequisite for adequate care is that there is a basis for a direct communication. Nurses perceive interpreters as an important link to the patient when they do not share a mutual language, the nurses perceive interpreters as a bridge in the conversation.Aim:The purpose of the study is to describe nurses' experiences of the quality of assessments done with the help of an interpreter.Method:The study was conducted through interviews with ten nurses, working at psychiatric clinics. Qualitative content analysis was used for the analysis, which resulted in five categories.Results:The analysis resulted in one theme: "it´s the interpreter who tells me and have not the feeling that the patient has" and five categories: "shades of the language", "conversation structure", "the interpreter's competence", "interpreting implementing" and "the interpreter's gender and origin". The nurses experience working with interpreters as a challenge.

The international requirement of Swedish healthcare today is high and due to a good reputation and a long history of reliable methods through extended experience. For those Swedish companies within this business, the process of internationalization is often a attractive option.This study aims to describe, analyze and translate how minor Swedish companies within the care keeping section establish their business on the international market.The study is based upon a qualitative approach and is an empirical study carried out through semi-structured interviews.The result presented in the study shows that internationalization of companies within this business does often require a lot of time and money, is based upon establishments through networks and were learning-by-doing often is used as a strategic approach for the companies penetrating a new market.The study also accounts for major entry barriers, which declares for being to some part of political nature, but mostly of cultural nature.Differences in language and culture are shown in the study to be a major entry barrier and host-countries different cultural levels are very conclusive for the success of internationalization. .

A new site- and construction-law came into effect in May 2011. The new law, PBL2010:900 implies several different changes of the law. These changes concern bothconstructors, people working in municipality and county councils and other peoplethat in some way are related to the building sector. Except from the change in orderof the chapters and the renewed and modernized language, the law has now beenextended with a few new phases.According to the new law a certificate has to be issued to start and finish theconstruction; the construction consulting has changed name into technical consultingand the protocol for the controls has to show what the control is being compared to.This diploma work concerns control visits on construction sites as related to the newlaw. The reason why visits on construction sites are now implemented in the law isbecause the government saw a lack of trustworthiness in the old law.

Postoperative site infections are the second most common health care associated infection in Sweden. Surgical procedures can lead to postoperative site infection causing great suffer for the patient and an extended care time with an increased cost as a result. In preparation for surgery, it is important that the skin is well prepared with antiseptics to decrease the risk of postoperative site infection. The purpose with this study was to shed light upon the skin preparation before surgery and its significance to postoperative site infection. Ten scientific articles have been scrutinized and compiled and two themes have been identified ? the preoperative and the intraoperative skin preparation.

This paper describes the process of building a machine translation lexicon for use in the train and transport domain with the machine translation system MATS. The lexicon will consist of a Swedish part, an English part and links between them and is derived from a Tradostranslation memory which is split into a training(90%) part and a testing(10%) part. The task is carried out mainly by using existing word linking software and recycling previous machine translation lexicons from other domains. In order to do this, a method is developed where focus lies on automation by means of both existing and self developed software, in combination with manual interaction. The domain specific lexicon is then extended with a domain neutral core lexicon and a less domain neutral general lexicon.

The aim of my work was, from the point of view from my respondents and literature, to create a picture of why so many highly educated people born abroad don't have an employment that coincides with their education.The question at issue was: How come highly educated people born abroad don't have an employment that coincides with their education from the native country?In my work, I carried out interviews with six highly educated people born abroad that moved to Sweden in the 1990's. In my results and my conclusion I started with the view of the respondents and the literature, linked together to some theories I have found fruitful for my understanding of the respondents' answers.The theoretical starting point for analysis of my work was the human capital theory, the theory of growth, the signal and filter theory and Habermas' theory.The result of my studies show that there are several factors that causes many highly educated people born abroad to have difficulties in getting an employment that coincides with their education. Such factors are weaknesses in the language, the lack of networks within one's profession and the fact that it takes a long time to complement the education..

This report is about helping Q-Med AB in Uppsala to start its implementation of uncertainty of measurements analyses in their manufacturing department. Prior to this, the company relied solely on personal experience or did not take this uncertainty into consideration at all during different kind of measurements, which means that some of the processes that the company previously believed were within specified acceptance limits, will actually fail when considering these sources of uncertainties.Q-Med AB needed some sort of instruction to help the company, in a systematic way, to investigate different types of disorders that are affecting all kinds of measurements. This instruction includes a short summary about measurements and uncertainty of measurements in general and a detailed procedure about how these uncertainties are going to be handled in their daily work.The goal was to be able to use this instruction to systematically locate, eliminate (when possible) and analyze all kinds of disorders when measuring. Q-Med is using a lot of different types of instruments when measuring different types of quantities, including temperature, mass, pressure and density. This instruction will hereafter be used for every instrument, regardless of quantity and type of instrument.The instruction is tested through 4 different kinds of measurements, for mass, temperature and humidity.

The aim of this study was to investigate whether a direct shift inpostural alignment results in changes in voice source characteristics. Ninemales with untrained voices were recorded standing in ideal posturalalignment and in the deviant postures swayback and kyphosis characterizedby extended hips and a slump back respectively. The voice source wasderived from the audio signal by inverse filtering. The parameters pulseamplitude, maximal flow declination rate, level difference between the firstand second voice source partials, closed quotient and the normalizedamplitude quotient in relation to subglottal pressure were compared betweenideal postural alignment and swayback and kyphosis respectively. Resultsindicate an impact of changed postural alignment on the voice source.Swayback posture gave significantly less pulse amplitude and maximal flowdeclination rate and significantly higher subglottal pressures thus resulting ina less effective phonation.

Since the emergence of social media websites as an established part of our society, the landscape ofcommunication has undergone dramatic changes. Especially in the field of journalism, the impact ofsocial media websites, such as Twitter, has been the subject of discussions about the actual partsocial media play in communication and news reporting. The general opinion has been that socialmedia has revolutionized the way we communicate and that a shift in power is taking place as themasses now engage in, and affect, our societies way of spreading information. This study is acritical discussion about whether Twitter in particular, and social media in general, has affected thejournalistic field in the extent that many claim it has. By comparing theories about traditionalmedia, such as television and newspapers, with recent studies about Twitter, we conclude that it isto early to establish the role of social media.

In the pulp industry, digesters are used to disolve lignin in wood chips. The concentration of lignin is measured and is called the Kappa number. In this thesis, the question of whether an online Kappa sensor, taking samples from the mid-phase of the digester, is useful or not is analyzed. For the samples to be useful, there has to be a relationship between the measured Kappa at the mid- phase and the measured Kappa in the blowpipe at the bottom of the digester. An ARX model of the lower part of the digester has been estimated.

n this dissertation a comparison of two evolutionary methods for evolving ANNs for robot control is made. The methods compared are SANE with enforced sub-population and delta-coding, and marker-based encoding. In an attempt to speed up evolution, marker-based encoding is extended with delta-coding. The task selected for comparison is the hunter-prey task. This task requires the robot controller to posess some form of memory as the prey can move out of sensor range.

This study is based on an ongoing debate regarding the Stockholm Stock Exchange, which centers around the possible abolition of quarterly reports. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to this debate by examining how the relationship between financial reports and stock price correlates. The study's methodological approach is based on the Capital Market Research frame-work in which an ERC model and an extended model are used to measure the relationship. Three hypotheses were formed to categorize the direction of the study, these categorizations treats the differences in impact between quarterly and annual reports on stock price, as well as differences in impact as a casual effect of company size and seasonal sensitivity. The results of the study show that quarterly reports have a stronger impact on the share price than annual reports.

There is a known link between relative deprivation and street crime among market liberal countries. Although some research has been done with cross-national data, there is none to suggest that the observed link is as valid in a country well known for its extended welfare and generous social expenditure like Sweden. The following study uses longitudinal data to see if this recognized link between relative deprivation and street crime also stands in a country with almost a century long tradition of striving for social-, economic- and cultural equality. Even though Sweden, over the last decade, has been subjected to a series of deregulations due to policy changes at national level, and with a following rise in inequality, it is still considered to be one of the most equal countries in the west. It is therefore not unlikely that the high degree of social security will reduce the negative impact of relative deprivation on social relations among its citizens, perhaps enough so that the correlation will be significantly weakened.

Veterinary hospital care and advanced veterinary services are rapidly growing industries. As of January 1, 2010, veterinary nursing became a licensed vocation, the title of veterinary nurse became protected, and the act regulating competence among the professions of the veterinary field was extended. These changes, along with increased demands and expectations from owners, have given rise to greater demands on the staff's qualifications and have increased the need for well-educated staff with expertise in several different areas. The aim of this study was to find out what the licensed veterinary nurse can do in terms of rehabilitation for the hospitalized equine patient suffering from orthopedic injury. This has been carried out through qualitative interviews with veterinary surgeons experienced in treating such patients, and also by reviewing the relevant literature.