This study is aimed at finding out how nursery and pre-school teachers carry out their obligation to report suspected child abuse, and their views on the issue. The study was alsoa imed at highlighting any difficulties teachers might have when dealing with children who arem istreated. In addition, the study examines the impact on teachers and children when thet eachers decide to either report or not report abuse.The main issues addressed by this study are:  Are pre-school and nursery teachers aware of their duty to report suspected child abuse and what are their opinions regarding this duty?How do the teachers claim they behave if obliged to report and what difficulties dothey encounter?In order to find the answer to these questions, qualitative interviews were made with eight pre-school teachers. The empirical evidence has been put in relation to theories of action and communication as well as to previous research in the area that concerns children who are mistreated.

This essay is about the consequences of alcohol and driving. The topic was chosen because of all the accidents that have taken place during the last couple of years, where the drivers have been under the influence of alcohol. A number of these accidents have had severe consequences, and in some cases the outcome has been deadly. The author has interviewed members of Länkarna; a non-profit organisation that helps people with alcohol related problems.The purpose of writing this essay was to find a reason why alcoholics drive while being intoxicated. Is there really a reason? It is important to look at this because a drunk driver is hazardous to himself and to other drivers.

Att arbeta med prostituerade kvinnor är en kvalitativ studie om hur arbetet med prostitution bedrivs och upplevs av socialarbetare. Studiens resultat bygger på semistrukturerade intervjuer med fem kvinnliga socialarbetare varav tre från prostitutionsenheten, som är den enda myndigheten i Sverige som arbetar med frågor som rör prostitution, och två från Rose Alliance som är en frivillig organisation som arbetar för sex- och erotikarbetares rättigheter i Sverige. Studiens syfte är även att jämföra om det finns likheter och/eller skillnader i yrkesutövningen beroende på om arbetet bedrivs från en myndighet eller frivillig organisation. I tolkningsramen presenteras olika stressteorier, lagrum och organisationsbeskrivningar som sedan används för att analysera studiens resultat. I studiens resultat framkommer det bland annat att respondenterna upplever sitt arbete som betydelsefullt men att olika typer av stress och dilemman kan förekomma.

The aims of the present study were to implement and evaluate a three-session Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) stress management intervention in a non-clinical group of university students (N = 25) and to investigate the importance of practice in an ACT-intervention. A design with pre-test and double post-test was chosen. A comparison was made between a nine-hour ACT-intervention containing practice for the participants, a two-hour lecture on ACT and stress management containing no practice for the participants and a control group. Psychological flexibility was assessed with Acceptance and Action Questionnaire-2 and mindfulness was measured with Kentucky Inventory of Mindfulness Skills. Perceived stress level was measured with Perceived Stress Scale.

I detta examensarbete analyseras och utvärderas påverkan av ett system som gör det möjligt att fjärrstyra fjärrvärmeventiler. Principen för systemet är att fastighetens energitillförsel reduceras under kortare stunder, vilket ska åstadkomma vinster för både fjärrvärmeleverantören och fastighetsägaren utan att ha negativ påverkan på inomhuskomforten. Tyngdpunkten i rapporten är att påvisa vilka vinster som kan åstadkommas med en sådan typ av applikation, främst dess påverkan på kundernas fjärrvärmeanvändning och deras effektbehov har studerats.Initiativet till examensarbetet är taget av Tekniska Verken i Linköping AB som under hösten 2009 till våren 2010 har haft ett fjärrstyrningssystem från NODA Intelligent Systems i drift. Systemet har varit installerat på nio större fjärrvärmecentraler i Linköping, sammanlagt cirka 65 000m2 boarea. Systemet har varit i drift veckolånga perioder varvat med opåverkade veckor, detta för att skapa referensdata att jämföra med.

Vi vill med det här kandidatarbetet inleda en konversation med havet. Tillsammans med Karen Barads posthumanistiska performativitet, agentiell realism, vill vi utmana och ifrågasätta den antropocentriska designerrollen där materialiteten ses som passiv och designern som ensam härskare över meningsskapandet i designprocessen.Med Barads onto-epistemologiska utgångspunkt undersöker vi hur design-processen uppstår i arrangemang av både mänskliga och icke-mänskliga aktörer, där mening framförhandlas genom relationer inom fenomen. Genom att tillämpa detta posthumanistiska förhållningssätt i lekfulla experiment tillsammans-med-havet kan vi se hur mening är situerad och skapas inom de materiell-diskursiva fenomen och apparater som utgör designprocessen. Vi förstår designprocessen som ett ingripande i världens tillblivelse. Ett ingripande där ett kollektiv av aktörer står som medskapare, där mening, kroppar, subjekt och objekt uppförs och samformas genom intra-aktion. Detta förhållningssätt föder en medvetenhet om vårt ansvar i att ingripa i världens tillblivelse och vårt ansvar för de kroppar som skapas, en etik i handling. .

The study deals with the causes of unjustified differences in pay between women and men in the banking sector. The purpose of this paper has been to examine how a gender project implemented in the private banking organizations from a gender-and implementation perspective. The aim of the project examined is to even unjustified differences in pay between men and women in the banking and finance sector. The main issues are: ? How has the project been implemented and what are the real and perceived results? ? How can the opportunities and barriers to successful implementation course with emphasis on gender? The method used is a qualitative study, where the empirical material consisted of focus group interviews.

In the government's bill on infrastructure for 2010-2021, the government presents that road investments should be prioritized before investments in the railway. The grants for operation and maintenance of the railways are much higher then in the last government's bill. Furthermore the current founding of investment in railways is higher then for road investment which is in opposite of the bill on infrastructure's directives. Therefore the purpose with my thesis is to find which factors that can explain how come the government has chosen to take these actions. As a model to help me achieve my purpose I have been using a modified version of the DBO-theory, where the basic factors to explain an action is Desire, Belief and Opportunities.

Officially, the EU gender policy since 2000 has been guided by the strategy of Gender Mainstreaming. This strategy aims to promote gender equality and is informed by a feminist ontology which stipulates that women are structurally subordinated.In this essay, I examine whether the European Commission has adequately adhered to this gender policy in its free trade negotiations with the ACP (African, Caribbean, and Pacific) countries as part of the Cotonou Agreement. As a result of my text analysis of documents related to the negotiations, opinion pieces by interested actors and policy papers of the EU, I find that the Commission does not act in accordance to its stated gender policy.To explain this discrepancy between policy intent and actions, I employ postliberal feminist theory and Robert Putnam's Two-Level Game Theory Model. By analyzing statistics and published research, I explore how gender issues are being represented politically on a domestic and international level.My findings show that a key cause of this discrepancy lies in the low levels of female participation in the political institutions of the EU and ACP; a lack of participation that is especially pronounced in the area of international economics. In explaining the constraints on female participation and the prospects of full implementation of the EU's gender policy in the international political economy, I emphasize the role of culturally and historically gendered institutions..

This masters thesis investigates the relation between China and the Information Society as it is manifested in the UN conference the World Summit on the Information Society WSIS. The first phase of this two-phase conference took place in Geneva 10-12 December 2003, with two documents, Declaration of principles DP and Plan of action PA, as main results. The information policy is central to an authoritarian rule in its efforts to keep control over the national identity. The thesis investigates the impact that the information revolution and Internet might have on the Chinese national identity through the acceptance of DP and PA in various aspects. With the use of the information science theories by Manuel Castells and Frank Webster, the vision of WSIS was compared with the Chinese information policy.

Our curiosity was awakened when we became aware that many social workers use "mindfulness" methods in their profession. In this study, we used qualitative methodology in our desire to examine and understand why the mindfulness approach, with its roots in eastern philosophy, is becoming established in society at large and, simultaneously, being used in the social work field. We were interested in when and why social workers choose to use mindfulness with their clients. Our prior research has revolved around development and use of methods in social work, and on the human reaction to stress.We conducted seven semi-structured interviews, which incorporated four comprehensive questions:1. Why has the mindfulness method become established in the social work field and in the culture in general?2.

In the essay the author examines how pilgrimage can be used as a tool to radicalise democracy in a late modern society marked by neoliberalism. Applying a dialectic perspective on social movements the essay puts forward how the pilgrimage movement Pilgrim?s Walk for Future, administrated by Church of Sweden, is working in line with the historical pilgrimage theology - a modern critical ecclesiology- to mobilise political action to prevent climate change. The result of the study shows how PWFF meet the neoliberal hegemony with a mobilisation of alternative values beyond the order of capitalism, in line with Christian theology and tradition. The mobilisation is made possible by new forms of identifications with oneself and the social world that meet a modern power/knowledge- regime based on rational thought, and which questions norms and practises by paying attention to their negative effects on nature and on human life in general.

Today's urban centers become denser, which contributes to higher demands on sound and noise. It is therefore highly relevant to build homes with good sound environment while maintaining living space. This thesis aimed to reduce the current concrete walls and see how the mass law affects the reduction index value and flanking transmissions. Handmade calculations were calculated according to the Swedish standard SS-EN 21354-1, where only air sound was calculated.Calculations we­­­re performed on wall elements with different weights and thicknesses, and compared with results from Bastian.In Bastian calculations of flanking transmissions were also made, this was made to see the impact of the flanking transmission when changing the mass per unit area. Mass law's impact was examined by flanking transmission and the result shows that they are not affected as long as the ratio between the thickness and the density remains the same.A questionnaire survey was conducted to determine the actual sound experience; this questionnaire was conducted on three concrete buildings in Växjö.

This essay examines the olfactory reading as a possible way to make sense of a fragmented novel, in this case Sara Stridsberg?s debut Happy Sally (2004). Through close reading, the essay identifies the source of the smells, who perceives it, and how this is portrayed in the text. The smell?s position in the text is understood in relation to Maurice Merleau-Ponty?s phenomenology, where the body, as created in the literary text, is considered as a source of knowledge.

This report describes the development of an application in collaboration with Designingenjörerna AB. The company has worked for a long time with a community platform and they required an application where users can create their own unique profile representations, called Avatar Creator. An Avatar Creator is computer based application, which makes it possible to create a virtual character. The problem area behind this is that, large websites require a lot of administrative work when people upload profile pictures on different community pages. They can contain abusive material or pictures of other people rather than those who created the profile.The questions in this report are, how can an Avatar Creator help user to get a unique profile of himself? What are the advantages and disadvantages of an Avatar Creator? How to create a user-friendly application?To understand how an Avatar Creator works and get ideas to create an application, exiting Avatar Creators were reviewed on the Web.Collaborative work with Designingenjörerna AB was done to pin down the requirements for the Avatar creator application.