Word-of-mouth marketing (WOM) has been considered as one of the most effective marketing tools, yet the least understood. While its lucrative effects have been well proven in academic studies worldwide, little is yet known of why consumers engage in WOM, and what factors actually drive this sought-after behavior, particularly in an online context. While today's research lacks holistic views on the simultaneous effects of multiple WOM-drivers, this paper takes on a meta-analytic approach by building on the pertinent literature to construct an aggregated model, including several previously acknowledged drivers divided into two categories: (1) Brand related drivers and (2) Personal and situational drivers. The authors then empirically examine what drivers are the most influential on WOM in an online social media context. By doing so, this thesis does not only contribute to marketing managers' better understanding of online communications management, it also sheds light on the theoretical knowledge of the behavioral drivers of WOM.

This essay is about the Northern Ireland Conflict and the Belfast Agreement. Its focus is on the development in Northern Ireland politics after the implementationof the Agreement which was ratified in a referendum. The essay is a case studywhich analyzes the progress towards an Assembly Government and powersharingbetween the unionists and the nationalists/republicans. The development is analyzed with Robert D. Putnam's theory of Two-Level Games? The essay first analyzes the changes in the unionist society where the opinion towards the agreement has been negative which depends on the concessions made by the unionist.

In recent years, the Internet has exploded with different kinds of social media, where a significant function is to share your life in text and images. This changes how we form our identity, our religious identity included. The aim of this paper was to study how Instagram forms a space for the creation and development of religious and spiritual beliefs. For this purpose, Instagram updates from five women with yoga oriented Instagram accounts have been analyzed in relation to two theories: Paul Heelas? och Linda Woodhead?s theory of a spiritual revolution and Heidi Campbell?s theory of networked religion.The aim of the study was to explore how these women presented themselves in their Instagram flow and what part religion and spirituality had in their presentations.

This study has researched different motivations for user participation in brand related activities on social media. The study used three types of participation to evaluate motivations for user participation. These types were the following: consuming content, contributing to existing content and creating new content. An online questionnaire was distributed on brand Facebook pages and was used as a foundation for two focus group interviews that were then held. The goal of the study was to see what motivates user participation, in order to aid companies and organizations in understanding users.

The background to the study was that the school agency published a report stating that students, after completing school, did not meet the criteria to receive the grade ?Pass? in mathematics. The study presents the reasoning of work teams from five different preschool departments?, about ways to work with the subject with children in the ages four to five. The study may help future teachers to develop new attitudes regarding mathematics in the preschool, by letting them take part of others pedagogues? thoughts and experiences.

This study is based on three focus group interviews with minors living in Örnsköldsviks municipality. The aim is to investigate what minor individuals want to gain more influence in that concerns their citizenship rights. It also aims to investigate what obstacles there is in their surroundings that prevent them from influencing it. I have conducted semi-structured interviews with the focus groups. The theoretical framework consist of T.H Marshalls theories about citizenship, with the division of civil, political and social rights.

This thesis aims to discuss how an information system and its users may adapt to each other. The main discussion is how to create an information system that is adaptable without losing its organising properties. The thesis uses a holistic approach to the topic and the areas being dealt with are information architecture, interactive information retrieval and information searching. The practical work consisted of constructing a database for Autoliv?s Research and Development branch.

The Swedish consumer electronic industry has recently experienced an increasingly intensive price war. The price war has forced some operators in the business to declare bankruptcy, as the only way to compete has been by driving down prices. A challenge that retail chains in the consumer electronics industry is facing is to increase their margins. If store personnel can success with upselling, the companies will increase their profits. The purpose of this paper is to examine if the sales people in the consumer electronic industry can influence the customer to buy a more expensive product and what the effects the upselling has on the customers' attitudes.

My goal with this thesis was to investigate how educational material in the subjects of history, geography and social studies relate to the fact that Sweden has a history marked by prejudice and racism.I have chosen to focus on four areas in the Swedish history that I think deserves some special attention, these four areas have been: the Swedish slave trade on the island of Saint Barthelemy in the eighteenth century, Swedish eugenics and oppression of the Sami people, forced sterilization services during the twentieth century and Sweden's aid and concessions to Nazi Germany during World War II. With these areas in focus I?ve studied three textbooks in the courses Geography A, Civics A and History A to se how they deal with prejudice and racism in the Swedish history.The result I have come to is that none of the books addresses all four of the areas I?ve focused on. Even if the books are taken as a whole the image that they convey is not adequate. In the event that the four areas that I?ve focused on been mentioned the information have been scant and rarely, if ever, has Sweden been paired with phenomenons like racism, slavery, colonialism, eugenics, forced sterilization, etc.

PURPOSE: By analysing collected data using theory, we aim to interpret the design, implementation and the usage of BSC in NPO?s to be able to contribute to the research. METHODOLOGY: A case study design has been made through semi-structured interviews and backed up by a quantitative survey and internal documents. THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES: Based on the sources given from the creators of the scorecard together with some sceptics and some followers, we have outlined the bases of balanced scorecard. To map out the non-profit sector and its strategic needs, the theories have tried to settle the specific need for the strategic tool given.

The aim of this study was to examine how two integrating social enterprises relate to and combines social, ecological and economic sustainability and how they work with sustainable development in the field of social work. The study has been focusing on three questions: What are the values underpinning ?Macken? and ?Vägen uts? approach to sustainable development? What motivates these companies to work with ecological sustainability in the creation of new jobs? How do these companies combine social, ecological and economic sustainability? To answer our questions we have been interviewing nine employees through semi-structured interviews combined with observations and this study was analysed through a symbolic perspective. The conclusion of this study showed that these companies worked with specific themes to reach social sustainability. Recurring themes in the study was empowerment, recovery and the employee?s own experience of exclusion.

This survey deals with textile production and how it was carried out during the late Iron Age,with main focus on a central place, Uppåkra. A comparison has been carried out betweenUppåkra and two agrarian settlements, Fosie and V. Karaby, from the nearby landscape toinvestigate whether any variation in production can be detected. The value of textiles has alsobeen investigated to determine whether a potential specialization in production may have ledto a surplus.An analytical and comparative method has been used with focus on the context of thematerial.The results show that the textile production vary at the different sites, and that a need fordifferent types of textiles has existed. At Uppåkra, the possibility to produce fine threads andtextiles existed as demonstated by the findings of small and lightweighted spindle whorls.This suggests that the production may have included both fine and coarse textiles.

The aim of this study has been to create an understanding for the situation of an often forgotten group in foster care, the carers? own children. Our main focus has been the experience this group has of foster care, their experience of participation in caring for the foster children and their possible need of support and help. Our chosen method has been qualitative interviews with six adult children of foster carers, two men and four women. The theory used in this study has been Sense of Coherence.Our interviewees gave mainly a positive description of being part of a foster family even though they could give examples of difficult situation and of loss.

There are many kinds of joint operations and combinations of combined arms. This thesis puts its focus on Close Air Support, CAS. Throughout history there have been several cases of success, regarding these kinds of operations, but also failure. Much can be taught from organizational behaviour studies, applied on these military organisations in their cooperation with each other. The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the cooperation between the Swedish army and air force to determine the functionality of their process.

Abstract:Title: Engelska (Svenska)Number of pages: 40 (47 including appendix)Author: Carl StrandTutor: Göran SvenssonCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Fall 2005University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala UniversityPurpose/Aim: The purpose of this essay is to analyze how young people, in the ages 18 to 25, relate to the subject of file sharing, and what their attitudes to this phenomenon are. I aim to describe how they use file sharing, their knowledge about it, how their usage have changed due to the new copyright law, what their stands are on the question of resource control and management on the Internet, and what they think of the future of file sharing.Material/Method: The method being used is a qualitative focus group interview model, used to investigate how young people look at the subject of file sharing. The results of the interviews is then applied to a theoretical framework based on thoughts of Denis McQuail, Lawrence Lessig concerning creativity, copyright, resource management and file sharing on the InternetMain Results: My conclusion is that the widespread file sharing habits of young people is not only caused by the temptation of getting free stuff, but of the lack of commercial and legal alternatives. Youths are willing to pay for media if the distribution is superior to the illegal file sharing alternative. They are a generation of young people that has grown up in a society where the tendency in many fields has been to make everything faster and more effective.