This paper replicates a test performed by Burgstahler and Dichev (1997), which identifies a kink in the frequency distribution of earnings for companies listed on American stock exchanges. Their claim, that the kink is evidence of earnings management, has however been dismissed as a methodical consequence. To address this concern, this paper not only replicates the test in general, but also performs tests on a split sample, where founding family-owned companies are separated from the others, since earlier research has shown that founding family ownership is correlated with less earnings management. The results are in line with the findings of Burgstahler and Dichev, with a significant kink in the frequency distribution in the general test. The findings also show that the significance of the kink increases in the non-family-owned sample, while it disappears in the family-owned sample.

The purpose of this study is to better understand, from a foster parent perspective, how the integration process of the foster child is carried out in the foster family. The purpose is to identify the challenges and success factors in the process. The study is based on a qualitative method. The data consist of interviews with six foster families. The study?s theoretical framework is mostly based on system theory and also on the theory of ambivalence.The results show that most of our families considered five factors to be important in order to facilitate the integration process.

The thesis aims to study how rainbows families are being treated by the authorities and the surroundings. It focuses on how homosexual parents are met in society. Although, homosexuals have the legal right to have a family and enter into marriage, the social norms are still far behind and rainbows families are seen as ?the others? and abnormal.  Earlier researches have been studding how the authorities still assumes that every family are living in a heterosexual family constellation. By this assumption they exclude families who are not living in a heterosexual family.

The purpose of this study was to gain knowledge and a picture of how foster parents perceive their task, the role of the placed children and their biological parents.  Even how they perceived their family have been affected by the mandates removal. Consistently showed the most positive experiences with strong ties to the children placed. However, there are experiences of the need for additional guidance, support, education and contact with the client to enhance a sense of competence in the task and prevent collapse. Burnout experienced often based in the placed child's difficulties in integration.

The purpose of this study explains the relationship between corporate governance and the auditor's role in Swedish family firms with the definitions micro, small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) and how this relationship is affected by the firms strategy. The study is based on a survey sent out to 3000 Swedish SMEs, of which 280 responses from family firms could be used. Our findings showed that the auditor in the family firms didn?t have a specific role or contributed added value to the firm, and that the strategy didn?t affect the outcome. Furthermore, we found correlation between the perceptions of the auditor's role and added value depending on the family firms type of corporate governance.

The purpose of this article is to examine issues concerning quality assurance in the Swedish family counselling. To obtain the purpose following factors have been analysed: what kind of requirements/criteria are put on the companies/practitioners, what the respondents think about the lack of common standards and criteria and their opinions concerning ?Lagen om valfrihetssystemet?. Monitoring of criteria, privatisation and increased competition are other factors that have been analyzed. The material was obtained from the family counsellors own association and was analyzed in the light of previous research and theories regarding the quality of family counselling however we also considered theories about quality within social work in general.

The purpose of this study was to within a Swedish context and from five persons of foreign descent stories study how they have been affected by interpreting for their parents during their childhood and how this has affected the relationships within the family. Studies conducted in an American context have shown that children interpreting for their parents in everyday situations are prone to undertake roles similar of a family leader. Previous studies also show an increased danger of depression among children who interpreted for their parents. The study was conducted by the use of semi-structured interviews with five male respondents with a varying ethnic background. Using Antonovsky´s theoretical formulation ?sense of coherence? we were able to determine that although our respondents during their childhood were subjected to a large amount of stressful elements they also maintained a high sense of well-being.

Title: Hälsa i sociala medier - En kvalitativ studie om hur hälsoinformatörer upplever och påverkas  av hälsobudskap i sociala medier.Title: Health in social media - A qualitative study of how health communicators perceive and are affected by health messages in social media.Author: Anna HedströmInstitute: Karlstad University. Faculty of health, nature and engineering sciences.Tutor: Owe StråhlmanDate: 150615Number of pages: 34Keywords: eHealth literacy, health communication, health informers, health literacy, health messages, media literacy, social media Background: With an increased interest in diet and exercise, also health and fitness messages have increased in both traditional and social media. The general guidelines on physical activity and diet are forgotten as training tips increase in the media. Research shows that it is common for individuals to retrieve information from the media when it comes to their own health. In doing so media literacy, health literacy and eHealth literacy becomes increasingly important for health communicators and for those who receive health information. Objectives: The aim of this study was to examine health communicators? experiences of health messages in social media, and how they are affected by them. Method: Qualitative interviews were chosen as a method to collect data.

Syftet med studien är att undersöka i vilken mån ett urval arbetsuppgifter till skönlitterära texter i läroböcker skapar möjlighet för elever att nå de mål gällande skönlitteratur, som fastställts i läroplanen. Det empiriska underlaget består av de frågor som hör till totalt nio texter ur tre olika antologier för grundskolans senare del. Materialet har bearbetats med en innehållsanalys och analyserats dels utifrån ett receptionsteoretiskt perspektiv och dels utifrån begreppet literacy, litteracitet. Resultatet visar att läroböckernas uppgifter ger eleverna möjlighet att träna flera olika kompetenser, eftersom olika typer av frågor erbjuds till de allra flesta texterna. Brister finns dock då det är en övervikt av frågor som tränar ytlig läsförståelse.

This essay studies the concept of "livspusslet", a term in swedish that directly translates as "the jigsaw puzzle of life". In recent public debate it has been used to articulate issues concerning the combination of family life and a professional career. The empirical material consists of newspaper articles from nationwide daily newspapers Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet between 2009 and 2011. The concept of "livspusslet" relates to the debate about family values, gender equality and the public view on the issue of combining family life with a career. The widespread use of the concept indicates that the social practices surrounding the debate over family policy is shifting.

Ljungdahl, Hans och Nilsson, Marcus (2007) Mediekompetens i skolan. (Media Literacy in Secondary School Eduation). Skolutveckling och ledarskap 90p, Malmö Högskola. Syftet med detta examensarbete är att undersöka om begreppet media literacy har relevans för skolan och vilket utrymme det ges i undervisningssammanhang i skolan. Vi vill samtidigt öka vår kunskap inom området.

Placing children in foster care is today considered the best alternative for children unable to stay in their biological environment. A nuclear family consisting of a father, a mother and a child is the most common family structure within foster care today. The purpose of this thesis is to gain insight on the family norms that control the foster care system. It's a qualitative study based on interviews with six professional social workers within the field of foster care. This method gave us empirical material, that was later analyzed from two main theories and one theoretical concept.

The purpose with this essay is to take part of the process when a family is placed on the family-institution, Trollbacken. We want to know what makes the social welfare secretaries place a family in institutional care. Has Trollbacken lived up to the social welfare secretary expectations and are the social welfare secretaries following Trollbackens recommendation regarding the follow up treatment. We also want to know to what value the social welfare secretary assigns Trollbackens investigation and are they able to see changes in the family due to the placing on Trollbacken. The method is qualitative and is based on interviews from six social welfare secretaries that work around and in West Sweden.

According to international and national literacy studies (PISA, PIRLS) Swedish boys are inferior to Swedish girls when it comes to reading. There can be numerous reasons to that statement. One is that Swedish teachers require more knowledge about communication as an important component in literacy. In spite of this shortcoming, Swedish girls manage to gain sufficient literacy. Why is that? The aim of this survey was to examine if there were any differences between girls and boys regarding communication skills when they begin in school.The main questions taken in account were:Which differences and/or similarities in communication skills are discernible between boys and girls this particular preschool?How do boys and girls communicate with each other in different room contexts on this particular preschool?           To be able to answer the questions, I adopted observations and audio recordings from children aged five.

The goal and purpose of this essay is to study if and how multimodality is used within a Swedish school in Kalmar. This is accomplished by observing the different modalities inside the classroom and how the use of different modalities affects the teaching. Unstructured observations combined with a material-based thematic presentation leads up to an analysis based on social semiotics and multimodality. The essay shows how the teaching uses lots of modalities: sound, images, movies, speeches and literary text in lots of different ways. These different types of modalities are used in a multimodal context, providing good conditions for learning..