Reliable methods to analyze food for the presence of almond are important ? not only for those allergic to almond, but also for monitoring the compliance with labelling regulations (EG directive 2003/89). Until now the Swedish National Food Administration has used methods like rocket immunoelectrophoresis and real-time PCR to detect almond in food. These methods are, however, not sensitive enough for protecting the most sensitive individuals. Therefore, the performance of a commercial ELISA kit was tested with regard to specificity/cross reactivity and limit of detection for almond both in solution and in different matrixes.The limit of quantitation was at least 3,1 ppm (mg/kg) in solution and similar concentrations were measured in bisquits and chocolate.

The purpose of this study is to illustrate teacher humor by critically examining it from an interpersonal- and humor communicative-perspective; and to discuss teacher interpersonal humor communication-skills in relation to the Swedish high school curriculum, collegial relationships and pedagogical aspects. The study?s empiric material consists of semi-structured interviews with six high school-teachers currently working at the same school, but of different age and gender. The interviews indicate that the informants all have developed humor competence, an interpersonal communicative-skill that allows them to use humor efficiently. Moreover, the result demonstrates that the teachers have various humor approaches but that they all use humor in the classroom for much of the same reasons.

When performing studies that test the reactions of horses in different situations, important information may be available about the horse?s reactivity level. With information from these tests, accidents and dangerous situations may be prevented. When the behaviours from tests are compared with race performance it may be possible to evaluate if some behaviours are more desirable at the race track than others. The aim of this study was to see if behavioural responses correlated with physiological parameters (heart rate, cortisol), the trainer?s opinions and actual race performance.

Companies have in the past decades changed fromtraditional manufacturing organizations into serviceorganizations. For these service organizationsinformation and competence have become animportant resource. The traditional view oninformation is that an employee use and search forinformation to reduce uncertainty for their decisionmaking. Even though information is strategicallyimportant for organizations, information is not valuedin any way. Hence, this thesis aims to valueinformation in terms of the utility it brings to theorganization.The conclusion is that four factors are important whenvaluing information in terms of utility.

The aim of this master thesis is to gain greater knowledge of interpersonal communication. This study explores on one hand how interpersonal communication can be used as an important part of reference work in a Swedish electronic synchronous reference service, and on the other how interpersonal communication affects the relationship between user and librarian. By using communication theory and establishing a positive relational contact with the user in the electronic environment, the outcome of the reference encounter can be successful for both the librarian and the user. Furthermore, the importance of recognising relational barriers is of great relevance to the relational contact. The scope of this master thesis is to find what relational factors are used and can be used in the interaction between user and librarian.

This thesis work researches what motivates swedish Facebook users to pass along and shareinformation on Facebook, their attitude towards shared information and what affects this behavior. The goal of this thesis is to research todays behavior and motivations to enlighten  what makes information worth sharing to others on Facebook, instead of simply attracting attention. By using a web survey we have collected data by sampling a part of the actual population  of  swedens Facebook users.Our results show that swedish Facebook users main reason for using Facebook is to socialize with offline friends and share information to show otherssomethingtheybelivetheywillhaveuseforand/orwillappriciate.WecompareourfindingstoexistingresearchandtheFIROtheoryabouthumaninterpersonalneeds.Wefindthatuserssharinghabitscanbeidentifiedasmotivatedbyinterpersonalneedstomaintainsocialbonds,influenceothersopinionaboutthemselves,feeluniqueandstandoutinthecrowd.WeconcludethathumanneedsarecontributingtosharingactivityonFacebookandinfluencethesharinghabitsoftheSwedishFacebookusers.Theusersshowacriticalviewonsharingbehavioringeneralbutdonotbelievethattheyshareforthesamereasonthemselves..

The main purpose of the essay was to evaluate whether investments in index-linked bonds were suitable investments for smaller investors on the international finance market. To determine whether the index-linked bonds are good investments, the variables yield, cost and risk were used to measure the index-linked bonds against investments in stocks and funds. The reason for the interest in this subject is that investments in index-linked bonds have grown furiously the last few years. With the growth of the investments the criticism of index-linked bonds has also grown stronger. The critics? main point is the cost of the product, and they imply that investors can create their own index-linked bond and thereby avoid the bank fees.This study used a quantitative approach, because all the data of yield, cost and risk consist of numbers.

I denna undersökning konstrueras fundamentala aktieindex med aktier innefattade av indexetStockholm OMX30 under perioden 1999-04-01 till och med 2009-03-31. Dels konstruerasenskilda index där indexeringen sker efter faktorerna bokvärde, utdelning, försäljning, resultat,kassaflöde och antal anställda, dels ett index där faktorerna sammanvägs. Detta för att undersökahuruvida fundamentala index bättre speglar företags fundamentala värde och därmed genererarhögre riskjusterad avkastning i förhållande till ett marknadsvägt referensindex. De enskildaindexen bokvärde, utdelning, försäljning, antal anställda samt det sammanvägda indexet visarhögre riskjusterad avkastning än referensindexet. Kassaflödes- och resultatindexet presterardäremot markant sämre än referensindexet.

From an early age kids learn that their good performance and efforts will be rewarded. Unfortunately, not all leaders in the media industry are rewarded or given the same opportunities to exercise their communicative leadership, according to studies in media research. The aim of our study is to highlight female managers' experiences of their communicative leadership in the Swe-dish media industry. This study was based on qualitative interviews with four female respondents in management positions. The core of the study concerns female communicative leadership and interpersonal communication.

In this thesis, a computer program that in a simple way can calculate the performance of control loops at the refinery Preemraff Lysekil has been created. The computer program has been adapted to the environment at Preemraff Lysekil. Theories for evaluation has been studied in aspect of reliability and of automatic implementation. The evaluation has been carried out from data collected directly from control loops at the refinery and from simulated control loops with implemented errors. Among the studied methods are Harris index and Stattin´s oscillation index.

Det finns få studier där kombinationer av nyckeltal används för att indentifiera undervärderade bolag. Denna undersökning kombinerar P/E-tal, P/B-tal samt direktavkastning för att ta reda på hur värdeinvesteringar har gett för avkastning mellan 1980 till 2010. Risken tas även hänsyn till.Denna studie testade hypoteserna statisktikt, vilket inte gjorts tidigare i stor utrstäckning. Resultaten blev att värdeinvesteringar har överavkastat index i Norden under tidsperioden, men det blev inte statistiskt signifikant. Värdeinvesteringar avkastade i genomsnitt 55,72 % mot index som avkastade 18,87 % i genomsnitt.Vi undrar om det är värt att ta hänsyn till risken vid värdeinvesteringar över så lång tidsperiod.

The long-term external financing of a corporation is satisfied through the bond market where issues of index-linked bonds, which are discussed in this thesis, is one alternative. (Finnerty&Emery 2001) An index- linked bond is a debt instrument where the investor is guaranteed the principal and premium amount in real terms. As the bonds cash flows are indexed to the inflation this implies that the issuer of an index-linked bond assumes an inflation risk. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to describe and examine corporate motives for choosing index-linked bonds as way of financing their business. Realization: Primary data was collected through interviews with corporate issuers of non-swapped index-linked bonds.

Purpose/Aim: Our purpose with this study is to examen the differences in communication between digital immigrants and digital natives, how the digitization has changed our way to communicate in an interpersonal matter.Main Results: Through our study we have concluded that barriers do exist between students (natives) and teachers (immigrants), but not to the extent we first predicted. The digitization has resulted in a change in the way we communicate and our relation to each other. But in a purely communicative matter, the digitization hasn?t made it harder for natives and immigrants to understand each other, but it has contributed to new vocabulary and the use of the language. New codes has been developed, but thanks to the younger generations ability to adapt to change - this linguistic difference it is not a problem for the understanding of the code used by the immigrants.

This study explores whether environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues affect the monetary value of a company.The samples used in this study have been taken from the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) in South Africa. Since 2010, JSE have been categorizing companies using the King Code III criteria to establish a Socially Responsible Investment index (SRI index). Companies that fulfill the required number of criteria are classified as 'best performers' using the SRI index.  In this study the monetary value of a random sample of 'best performers' has been compared to the monetary value of a random sample of companies without an SRI index evaluation.This study found that companies without a SRI index have a higher unique risk, which means a lower stock price with a higher dividend yield. Companies with an SRI index evaluation have a lower unique risk, which means a higher stock price and lower dividend yield. In conclusion, this study shows that SRI adjusted companies have an enhanced monetary value in comparison to non- SRI adjusted companies..

This paper examines the interpersonal and intercorporate networks of interlocking boardmembers among Sweden's 50 largest publicly traded companies in 1985 and 2005. We find that both the interpersonal and intercorporate networks of 1985 are considerably more coherent and densely connected than those of 2005. The observed changes in social network structure are compared to changes in company ownership in Swedish publicly traded companies during the same period, and it is found that the observed changes in network density and cohesion can be related to a notable increase in the number of foreign board members. These results imply that the social organization of the Swedish system of corporate governance has changed notably during the period. Social network theory suggests that these changes can explain the greater demand for external regulation, decreased homogeneity of board members and increase in board member compensation observed under the period.