As the information society becomes increasingly flooded with digital images, the need for efficient image retrieval systems increases as well. To handle the vast amounts of data involved, the indexing process needs to be run automatically, using content-based descriptors extracted directly from the digital image, such as colour composition, shape and texture features. These content-based image retrieval systems are often slow and cumbersome, and can appear confusing to an ordinary user who does not understand the underlying mechanisms. One step towards more efficient and user-friendly retrieval systems might be to adjust the weight placed on various descriptors depending on which image category is being searched for. The results of this thesis show that certain categories of digital images would benefit from having extra weight assigned to colour, texture or shape features when searching for images of that category..

Citizens? interaction with governments is an area with unique implications for channel management. Governments need to take the citizens perspective into further consideration in order to be successful in delivering high-quality e-services. This paper aims to determine if a categorization of citizen-initiated contacts from a citizen-centric perspective can be a valuable basis for decisions regarding e-service development. The study consisted of three steps.

Sense of coherence, SOC, is a way to study health and wellbeing in a salutogen perspective. SOC is a theory that Aaron Antonovsky came up with and it involves three elements; comprehensibility, manageability and meaningfulness. These three elements is a objective way to look at our existence. The aim of this study was to examine how high the pupils sense of coherence was in the grades 1, 3 and 6 in a school in Karlstad. And with the result as starting point have a discussion around the pedagogical consequences and which educational work procedures we can use to work with SOC in school.

Sound surrounds us in a great extent, we all have experiences of sound and this phenomena has a great meaning in our lives. High levels of sound might be harmful for your hearing and might also cause related difficulties such as tinnitus and sensitivity to sound. Studies reveal a connection between the attitudes toward high levels of sound and the risk behaviours in these situations. The purpose of this study was to explore the experiences and meaning of sound and whether the attitudes toward sound will reflect in a family consisting parents and adolescents. A family consisting two parents and two adolescents participated each and one of them in an interview in this qualitative study that has been carried out of a phenomenological approach.

This study is about the use of textbooks in teaching English as a second language and about teachers? attitudes and opinions of using textbooks during lessons. The aim of the study is to receive a deeper understanding of the use of textbooks in English teaching and to learn about why teachers choose whether to use the textbook approach or not. The study contains an analysis of the textbooks the teachers in our study used. The analysis shows the actual content and the types of texts together with the design and the structure of the textbooks.

Fuel pellets are a refined bio fuel mostly consisting of residues from sawmills and wood industry. At Rindi Västerdala AB's combined bio energy plant in Vansbro fuel pellets are produced, while the waste heat from the process is used for district heating. The pellets are produced from sawdust, wood shavings and dry wood chips that is dried, milled and pressed into small cylindrical rods. The advantage of refining the wood material in this manner is that the energy value is greater per unit volume and unit weight, thereby the cost of transportation per energy unit is reduced. Also, less storage space is needed.Pellet manufacturing is a complex process since many parameters affects the final results.

The purpose of this essay has been to seek understanding of how young people in high school and adult education experience the use of educational media tools in teaching. Examples of questions submitted material has been: What are the positive and negative experiences of ICT in the classroom?The essay is of a qualitative nature, in which five students were interviewed about their experiences of ICT in the school environment. The result is analyzed from a sociocultural perspective and from an inward-student perspective.The results showed that students felt that it was difficult to absorb many of the ICT facilities as sources of knowledge in the school environment. Due to lack of quality in teaching material and difficulties of the pupils to sort out the important information of the injected..

This paper analyzes the content of eight Islamic Friday-sermons, held at Chalmers Technical University in Gothenburg in spring 2010, organized by Chalmers Islamiska Förening (CIF) (Chalmers Islamic community).The forces of globalization, the accessibility of information and the Internet have given rise to discourses and movements that know no national boundaries. The accessibility of these global movements and discourses through media, Internet, etc., affect the way Muslims in Sweden interpret and practice their religion. Thus, this paper includes discussions and descriptions of global Islamic revivalist-movements, and relates the contents of the sermons at Chalmers to these movements. In the sermons, the imams often discuss the concept of a global Muslim community, the umma, and their perceptions of the prescribed ethics linked to this community. They often relate this discussion of ethics to frequently discussed issues in the West such as equality, justice and ethical standards in war.

The purpose of this essay is to examine whether the descriptions of Stalin's terror in history textbooks for high school changed from the 1950s until the 2010s. Since previous research shows that textbook content is influenced from different directions and that it dominates in teaching, therefore I want to find out what similarities and differences that exist in the textbooks. The survey is based on a qualitative approach because I want to have a profound picture of the descriptions of Stalin's terror. The results of the survey show that the number of casualties and the descriptions on the famine has changed over time. Furthermore, textbooks also found it difficult to distinguish between terror, politics and ideology.

The purpose of my study is to gain insight into how the education system (particularly social studies) is morally-minded based on the governing documents, former students and a textbook. I wanted to find out what morally-minded means and if it has a big role in social studies. Through interviews with former high school students (when my thesis is aimed at high school) I wanted to find out how they felt their social studies were educational and which the values that they had taken on from the lessons. I also chose to analyze a textbook to get a broader understanding of how the morally-minded education is written in specific areas relating to social studies. My study is a qualitative study and what I came up with is that the former students consider their social studies teaching lacked to some degree when it came to the morally-minded education. My investigation concludes that the morally-minded education is important in social studies as the purpose of social studies is to promote active democratic citizens.

The aim of the study was to explore how persons with aphasiaexperience literacy and reading and writing. Seven persons with mild-moderateaphasia were interviewed. The interviews were recorded, transcribed andanalysed using qualitative content analysis. The analysis resulted in three mainthemes; A changed reading, A changed writing and How to adjust andaccommodate to new conditions. The most apparent aspect was that theinformants experienced that literacy had changed, regarding what and how theyread/write.

AbstractTitle: Message sent ? SUDD AB:s internal communication in the digital age (Message sent ? SUDD AB:s interna kommunikation i den digitala tidsåldern)Number of pages: 40 (44 including enclosures)Author: Lea KaufmannTuthor: Göran SvenssonCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: HT 2006University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala UniversityPurpose/Aim: Analyze whether a small long distance company such as SUDD AB can obtain a well-functioned internal communication by using new communication technologies.Material/Method: The analysis is based on qualitative interviews with SUDD AB:s complete staff.Main results: Proven that internal communication is a complicated and very important process also within a small company. New communication channels do not necessarily guarantee an uncomplicated and efficient internal communication but the need to collaborate with old-fashioned channels persists.Keywords: communication, information, channels, effects, content, effectiveness.

AbstractThis study examines the use of dance in the special education classes in high school. The purpose is to study the teachers? thoughts about dance within this school form. I want to see if they see any gains from having dance as a subject, and what might these be? Earlier research states that dance has a positive influence on mentally handicapped children and young people, and that it strengthens their general development.

The purpose of the study is to examine how teachers and students believe that graphing calculators affect the teaching of high school mathematics courses. By becoming aware of this, teachers and teacher students have the opportunity to reflect on the use of graphing calculators in their teaching. The empirical base consists of interviews with teachers and a survey among students at two high schools in southern Sweden. The results show that teachers especially consider the graphing calculator as a tool, much like paper and pencil. They use it if and when it is deemed able to contribute in a significant way in their teaching, either to save time and/or to help deepen the understanding of various mathematical concepts and methods.

Abstract Road cycling is well established and has always been described as a highly endurance sport. To be able to compete in such a demanding sport the physiology of the athletes needs to be greatly developed. This review will focus on high intensity interval training and its impact on the physiological characteristics of competitive road cyclists. The main difference between different levels of competitive road cyclists seems to be the capacity to maintain a high sub maximal power output over a long period of time in order to succeed. High intensity interval training, from 30 seconds to 5 minutes, leads to improved VO2peak, aerobic peak power and time trial performance.