Libraries all over the world struggle against the threat of decreased funding and a lack of governmental interest. In countries with an under-developed library sector the interest from the government is often minimal or non-existent. Since the 80´s Sida, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency has contributed to the library development in Central America through the Royal Library of Sweden. Nicaragua was the first country to be counterpart in the project. For a period of eight weeks I have completed a field study in Nicaragua and visited the National Library Rubén Darío and public libraries in the country.

The aim of this Master's thesis is to understand public library users' perceptions of librarians' attitudes to users and professional knowledge. The purpose was also to investigate the relative importance to the user of pleasant or a knowledgeable librarian. As a theoretical framework we use theory from business economy where the experience of the user is in focus. Answers were sought to the following questions: How do users perceive librarians attitudes to users? How do users perceive librarians professional knowledge? How do users want to be treated by public librarians? What kind of knowledge should public librarians have, according to users? We interviewed twelve students in university education that are users of public libraries.

This candidate essay aims to examine the possibilities occupational therapists (OT) have in order to support refugee children in Sweden. The authors find the subject of current interest because there is a constant and frequently debate in our society concerning refugees, which makes us question what role the OT could have with this group. Method: This study has a qualitative approach with focus group methodology as method. At two occasions, four respectively three OTs met to discuss an in advance given interview guide. The discussions were coded on the basis of person-, group- and society perspectives.

In the early 1990?s more and more companies of the Swedish public sector were exposed to competition, and this started the debate on how such actions might affect the business and even society.The first chapter examines how the public sector and especially health care, is financed and managed. We also explore what it means to be exposed to competition and find that there are many different ways of exposing the public sector to competition. The study examines dental care as an example of a market with both publicly and privately owned companies. The purpose of this paper is to explore how publicly and privately owned health care companies view their relationship with their consumers.

The habits of living are seen as important factors for public health, and are related to the primary socialization. Exercise and food habits are two main factors for development of health or ill health and are both related to the overweight epidemic. The overweight increase among children and youth has been given particular attention. The aim of this study is to examine how 15 year olds Body Mass Index, food- and exercise habits are connected to each other and also how they are related to socialization. The study is a cross sectional survey among 208 pupils in ninth grade, Kristianstad.

The aim of this master thesis has been to investigate discussions about public access to Internet in public libraries. Areas of interest were the debate in Sweden as well as in the United States. The approach was qualitative and questionnaires were distributed by e-mail to a number of Swedish public libraries. The results from the survey were then supplemented with a theoretical background and a literature study. The usable questionnaires obtained from 20 libraries showed a rather uniform approach among the Swedish librarians of how the Internet is best provided by public libraries.

The aim of this Master?s thesis is to examine how health information is integrated into knowledge in an everyday health related context on the web. The more specific aim is, from a LIS point of view, to map knowledge related discourses with the focus on pregnancy, in discussion forums on Swedish health related web sites. The following main questions in this paper are: (1) a) What discourses on pregnancy knowledge can be found and b) how are they expressed? (2) What are the functions of the recognised discourses? and (3) what are the relations between the identified discourses? The theoretical and methodological starting-point is discourse theory with the main focus on discursive psychology according to Wetherell?s and Potter?s theoretical and empirical work.

AbstractPurpose/Aim: The aim of this essay is to paint a picture of science news reporting in the Swedish Public Service science programme, vetenskaps-radion. Key issues to be adressed are: What areas in science are prioritised? How much of the total broadcast time are devoted to each area? Are there any differences in reporting between weeks? How well does the swedish science radio match common interets? Are the news in the form of short ?soundbites? or are they more lengthy in-depth?Material/Method: Quantitative analysis of radio programmes. The variables used are based on the different major areas in natural sciences.Main results: This study shows that most broadcast time is devoted to news regarding biology and medicine and that the news rather are in the form of short snippets of news than more lengty in-depth stories. This is put in light of how journalistes tend to present news and that the subjects involved has to relate to peoples everyday lives.

This thesis aims to examine the possibility of understanding social change by using new institutionalism approaches on a specific case, The case, which describes the implementation of new public management reform in the Swedish health care system, is analysed from two separate new institutionalismperspectives; the tool perspective and the symbol perspective. These approaches differ from one another in the sense that the first relies on a rational choice ontology, while the latter rather refers to a sociological tradition. In the analysis, causal explanations as well as aim related explanations are presented. Formative moments such as economic stagnation, non-socialist governments and ideological isomorfism are presented as important factors behind the reformation. By using the tool perspective, the motives of the idea spreading and reformation of the Swedish health care system, are connected to a strictly rationalbasis such as cost efficiency and quality improvements.

The purpose of the master thesis was to reflect and analyze music library activities and policies in the public libraries in the area around the city of Borås, in the south-western part of Sweden. With this thesis I also wanted to look at the interaction between the public libraries, the music school and the music associations in the same area. To investigate these matters, qualitative method was used in the form of interviews with seven librarians from seven different libraries and five representatives of different local music organizations. Other methods used were observations and source studies. The literature used discusses the role of the music department of public libraries as well as that of a music librarian working in a public library.

This Master thesis aims to study the relation between Swedish governmental cultural policy and cultural events at two Swedish public libraries. The Masters thesis demonstrates how national cultural policy regulates every part of the public library. This demonstration is a result based upon national cultural policy documents and interviews with employees at two public libraries in Sweden. The conclusion that national cultural policy regulates this part of the public library is drawn with help of the circle of culture as applied in Culture Studies and Michel Foucault theories of power. The thesis contains the answer of four questions, two involving cultural policy and the other two events at the library.

ABSTRACT: Introduction: There are intentions from the Swedish government to provide guidelines and tools for a healthy social planning. The field is in a Swedish context relatively unstudied regarding psychosocial health and the neighbourhood. Aim: The study aimed to examine how social planning can affect the health of individuals. The focus areas were contextual and compositional factors related to individuals' psychosocial health and the contextual risk- and health factors that exist in the neighbourhood. Method: A literature-based study was conducted and 15 scholarly articles form the basis for analyse.

The western societies is characterized by a strong future concern and the members of the society are valued most of all according to their capability to produce. In our time the elder ness is representing a rapidly increasing number of relatively well kept elders. What sight of the future does the aging human have? Are one meditating of what kind of service and care one are going to need? The purpose with this study was to describe how individuals in ages between 60 and 96 sees, both the future and their coming need for care in relation to sex, age, social activities and experienced health. The material was taken from ?SNAC-Blekinge? witch is a part of a bigger national study; SNAC (The Swedish National study on Aging and Care).

An individual's social capital consists largely of the social networks that may consist offamily, friends and acquaintances. The social network is of great significance on olderpeople's physical and mental health. Aim: The overall purpose is to examine the knowledgeof social network and the health of the elderly. Method: Litterature review, using threedifferent databases, CINAHL, PubMed and Scoupus for searching of articles, with differentcombinations of keywords. Results: Different types of social networks have both positive andnegative effects on health.

This thesis is a discourse analysis analyzing public library librarians' talk on the subject of public library meeting places. Within the field of Library and Information Science the public libraries' functions as social meeting places have been scrutinized for more than a decade. Researchers in the Nordic countries in particular have looked at library users' use of the library space and have highlighted the sociologic dimensions of the public library and the meeting place functions. Few however have paid much attention to the library personnel's point of view. The discourse analysis perspective is about language use and how people construct the reality.