Background: The importance of creativity and innovation is frequently stressed in modern literature on management. The significance of innovation gives entrepreneurs the reason to prior to the commencement of a relationship with a venture capitalist, obtain necessary insights regarding the Influences such a relationship may have, in terms of innovation. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to scrutinise the Influence of venture capital firms on their portfolio companies regarding their ability to be innovative. Delimitations: The intent is to study the impact of a venture capitalist from the viewpoint of its portfolio companies. In other words, what the portfolio companies have perceived as changes is our main area of concern, rather than what the venture capitalist has perceived as change.

There is a change happening in the Swedish market of commerce. Studies indicate that the trend of the last decades; that external shopping centres are more attractive than centres of commerce, is about to turn. It is predicted that the centre of commerce will be the most attractive in the future.No matter how the market will develop, it is important for merchants to take account of their customers by understanding their behaviour and preferences concerning what constitute an attractive marketplace. A marketplace is attractive in terms of the characteristics that creates its offer, these characteristics are called "determinants of attractiveness." This paper is based on a field study of 200 consumers in Norrtälje regarding why they are choosing to shop in the centre of Norrtälje. The purpose is to answer the question "What creates an attractive centre of commerce " in terms of a) the determinants of attractiveness and b) each determinants' Influence on customer satisfaction.

Tail-biting in pigs is an animal welfare issue and in Sweden during 2002 the producers lost tree million Swedish crowns because of tail biting. This economic loss depends on the pigs which are discarded at slaughter because of tail biting. Tail biting can be separated into two stages, "pre-injury" and "injury". The aim of this study is to investigate if tail biting depends on environment or genetic background.A lot of research on the environments effects on the behaviour of pigs but not so much on the genetic effects has been performed. The frequency of tail biting in pig farms Influence among others of environment enrichment, ventilation, gender and breed of the pig.

It gets more and more important for companies to get involved in Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, when stakeholders now are more aware of the responsibility companies should take. Through their communication companies show how they take responsibility. Reflected by their goals by which they want to achieve acceptance and understanding through an open dialogue. The paper examines this issue. CSR is an abbreviation for Corporate Social Responsibility which is engagement in responsibility for companies and organisations.

Kronisk smärta drabbar många personer och kostar samhället stora summor pengar varje år. Det är inte bara den kroniska smärtans inskränkningar i den drabbades rörelseapparat, utan också dess påverkan på den psykiska hälsan. Syftet med detta arbete är att utreda på vilket sätt den psykiska hälsan påverkas hos personer med kronisk smärta. Metoden som använts är litteraturbaserade studier med kvalitativa artiklar och bygger på Granskär & Höglund?Nielsen (2008).

Retail marketing is a field with many different enbranchements. Some of these can be considered relatively well explored, while the lack of knowledge concerning others is almost total. For example, the existing knowledge regardng the possible impact that non-musical sound can have on the customer can be considered non-existent. With this in mind, the intention with the thesis was to closer investigate how non-musical sound can Influence the customer's decision process and attitude in and to a grocery store. The authors started out with theories on associative networks and automatic processing.

Socially Responsible Investments (SRI) and Active Ownership have become increasingly important concepts when it comes to the corporate governance of investors today. Institutional owners highlight the importance of engaging in dialogue, in their pursuit to Influence the companies to become sustainable. However, stakeholders and academia are requesting more insight into the workings of these dialogues, concerning their purpose, design and function. This study attempts to increase the existing knowledge of dialogue as a tool for active engagement, used by institutional investors in Sweden. The performed study is based on interviews with five public and private Swedish institutional investors, an SRI consultant firm as well as representatives from two NGOs.

The object of this essay was to illustrate and analyse what determines that a contract treatment investigation for a drug addict is initiated and what factors Influence the investigation itself, from the probation service officer's perspective.We selected the following two questions:- What does the probation service officer see as being the deciding factor for a contract treatment investigation to be initiated?- What questions appear in a contract treatment investigation and how do they Influence the investigation, according to the probation service officer?To find answers to these questions we conducted interviews with 11 probation service officers, during November and December 2005, at three different locations across Skåne. We decided to use the qualitative method for collecting the data we needed.In our essay we came to the conclusion that the will and motivation of the client is a deciding factor whether or not a contract treatment investigation is to be initiated. An important collaborator in this process is the social services. According to the probation service officers, many of the problems that may appear in the co-operation are due to the tough economic constraints experienced by the social services.

Research has concluded that meaningless differentiation with trivial attributes sometimes can be a successful strategy. However, the effect varies with respect to certain aspects such as the price of the product and the decision context. How the characteristics of the consumer Influence the effect of trivial attributes has until now been unknown. This thesis investigates how the consumer?s level of knowledge and personal involvement Influence the effects of trivial attributes on product preferences and product attitudes.

The aim of this thesis is to examine the relationship between user education at high schools and the context in which it takes place. In order to accomplish this qualitative interviews have been executed with librarians at five Swedish high schools. The theoretical framework of this thesis is based on the sociocultural perspective and four approaches to user education developed by Olof Sundin. Based on the empirical material six themes have been identified. Each one represents a contextual factor which Influences the user education.

Mergers and Acquisitions have become more and more in common knower days among the companies. Factors that might Influence could be such as power of competition or it could even be the aim of new strategies of the company. In mergers is it not only the buildings and the physical objects that is put together, also the human beings within the organization are put together. Each person contributes to the culture, which makes the situation more complicated. In making a merger successful, it is important to pay attention to the organizational culture.

This study investigates, through parental evaluations, communicativeand adaptive abilities within a group of children with various developmentaldisorders, after the parents had participated in AKKTIV (Augmentative andAlternative Communication ? Early Intervention) parental education. The studyalso investigates through case studies how parents experience the Influence ofAKKTIV-intervention in their children?s development a few years aftercompletion. The parents estimated their children?s abilities using three differentquestionnaires; the Swedish Communicative Developmental Inventories(SECDI), Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales-II (VABS-II) and parts of theform? Parents? perception of the interaction with their child?, before and afterthe intervention.

The parental education groups are an activity that attracts the majority of all couples that awaits their first child. Therefore this is a forum with strong Influence on the formulation of the parenting. The aim of the study was to examine how parental education within Swedish child health care, affects the construction and shaping of parenthood. We have also studied this from a gender perspective. The starting point for our understanding of parenting is that it is socially constructed.

This master thesis is intended to give an increased understanding of the stress state in an axle, which is assembled in one of Atlas Copco?s mountain drilling rigs. The main problems investigated were how the axle is affected when the bearing is worn, when the pretension is varied, and how to dimension the axle. Answers to these questions were found by using hand calculations, practical testing and with Finite Element analyzes. The dimensioning of the axle is currently based on the bending stress, but the author?s opinion is that the axle should be dimensioned considering the equivalent stress.

A radical change is taking place in the world today: some former colonies are now booming economically while several former colonizers are suffering from economic crisis. Postcolonial theory states that old structures from the colonization are keeping the South poor and the North rich. Today there?s a shift in these structures as former colonizers Spain and Portugal are forced to ask for economical support from their former colonies.The colonial discourse separated white from black and depicted the population in the colonies as the absolute antithesis of the Europeans. In Portugal circulated also lusotropicalism, an ideology that claimed Portugal as absolutely free of racism, a statement with great Influence in the postcolonial Portugal.On the basis of semi-structured focus groups I will in this paper do a discourse analysis of young, university educated Portuguese identity/ies in relation to the former colonies and the changing relations to these countries.