The purpose of this study is to investigate a loyalty card and its relation to accompanying promotional benefits, and their linkages to grocery retail service loyalty. Also, the aim sets out to find relationships between demographic variables and proneness towards the promotional benefits, the loyalty card, and loyalty. A quantitative approach has been assumed and empirical data has been collected through the use of questionnaires. The data has been analyzed through descriptive statistics, correlations, and regression analysis. An operationalization used to measure satisfaction of the loyalty card and attitudinal loyalty is also presented.

The main aim of this thesis is to investigate the implications and dynamics behind consistency between individual resource allocation decisions and corporate strategy concept. The telecom industry, a high-velocity environment going through an extensive deregulation process, is put under the magnifying glass. Japanese telecom giant NTT Group is compared to its German counterpart Deutsche Telekom. Potential antecedent factors in the strategic decision-making process to consistency are studied. It is also examined whether there is a direct interplay between consistency and economic performance.

In the post Cold-War era, world politics was transforming itself through its emerging complex issues such as terrorism and influential and interdependent actors such as the European Union. In this new era, the European Union was developing its Common Foreign and Security Policy pillar both to present a coherent and unified EU policy and to prove its political potent in order to become an influential actor on world politics. On the other side, security environment was also transforming its content through emerging actors and issues. As one of the most prominent actors of the world politics, the EU was influenced by the transformation of security environment, whose economic ?soft power? proved necessary but insufficient for being a global power in this emerging security environment.

Forskare har under de senaste decennierna försökt finna förklaringar kring den finansiella gåta, känd som the forward premium puzzel, som har visat sig på valutamarknaden. Denna finansiella gåta har skapats då forskare sett statistiska avvikelserna från det öppna ränteparitetet (UIP) på valutamarknaden. UIP förutsätter att det inte ska finnas någon skillnad i avkastning mellan att hålla kapital i olika valutor, vilket empiriskt har visat sig inte stämmer. Detta misslyckande har tagits som bevis för att valutamarknaden är ineffektiv och att valutaspekulerare kan erhålla en överavkastning. Syftet med studien har varit att genom ett lönsamhetstest, med SEK som grundvaluta, undersöka huruvida valutamarknaden har varit effektiv under åren 1997-2012.Studien utgår från en deduktiv forskningsansats där den teoretiska grunden utgörs av den effektiva marknadshypotesen. Den kvantitativa forskningsmetoden bygger på uppgifter från Datastream om valutors utveckling mellan åren 1997-2012.Vår regression visade på att tio utav tolv valutapar återspeglade the forward premium puzzel.

Övervikt och fetma är ett snabbt växande folkhälsoproblem som medför ökad risk för psykosocialt lidande och många allvarliga sjukdomar. Särskilt oroande är att övervikt och fetma allt oftare drabbar barn och ungdomar. Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka om det finns ett samband mellan Body Mass Index (BMI) och Känsla Av SAMmanhang (KASAM) hos elever i skolår 9, samt att analysera kön och psykosociala faktorers (familje- och kamratrelationer) eventuella inverkan på relationen BMI och KASAM.Det statistiska materialet är hämtat från undersökningen ?Liv och hälsa - Ung 2004 Västmanland? där KASAM- skalan med 13 frågor används. Analysmetoden är en multipel regression.Resultaten indikerar svaga samband mellan variablerna.

Mediation of fiction for adult users in Swedish public libraries is a subject which has been little studied from a theoretical perspective. The motivation for this thesis was based on this realization, and the opinion that actual library users too seldom get their voices heard in library and information science-research. The thesis analyzes interviews with seven library users in which they have been asked to talk about the librarys work with mediating fiction. The answers are analyzed using a discourse analytic approach to see how the librarys work with mediating fiction is constructed in the users talk.Two main discourses are identified, one authoritative and one neutral. In the authoritative discourse librarians are talked of as experts who have the knowledge to guide users to the ?right? literature.

New method for measuring road quality- A statisticalstudy of the relationship between road quality andsocioeconomic development A new tool with implications for road maintenance has the potential to yield statistical data for road quality in a large number of regions. This thesis investigates the possibility to develop a method, from this data, for evaluating the effects of road quality on socioeconomic development.The thesis is essentially divided into two parts. Part one looks to qualitatively establish the link between socioeconomic development and road quality and the second part focuses on how to develop a method for evaluating the effects of road quality on socioeconomic development. A method was devised using categorical data and a multinomial regression model. This method provides a comprehensive overview of the complex relationship between a variety of different variables.

This bachelor thesis examines the relation between countries? degree of economic freedom and their economic performance. Economic freedom as a concept is defined as the degree of market economy within a nation.The variable of measure that is used is the Frasier institute Economic freedom of the world index (EFI). The paper is built upon the Solow growth model and is extended by incorporation of additional variables; among which of course economic freedom. The study is performed through regression analysis, based on the neoclassical model both on rich countries, poor countries and on all investigated countries.Two investigations are performed: i) the impact from economic freedom on countries level of GDP per capita and ii) the impact from economic freedom on the growth rate in GDP per capita.The finding is that economic freedom can be seen as a relevant determinant of differences in GDP per capita growth rates between nations.

The worldwide industrial demand of energy, often in form of fossil fuel, is continuously growing and at the same time these resources are coming to an end (Hamamre, 2013). The interest and focus in renewable sources are then more important than ever and plants are suggested to be a good alternative for production of raw material for industrial purposes (Nilsson et al., 1998). But the world is also facing an increasing world population which also increase the nutritional needs, plants therefore need to be suitable for both industrial and nutritional purposes. To achieve this, common plants need to be improved but it also need new potential crops to be developed and introduced (Carlsson et al., 2009). Modern technology like gene engineering is an important tool to achieve these challenges (Carlsson et al., 2011). This work focused on analyzes and evaluation of different transgenic lines of field pepperweed (Lepidium campestre L.).

In 2022, Russia completed its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The EU responded with powerful restrictive measures against Russia to demonstrate its unified support for Ukraine, indicating that the perception of Russia as an external threat to the EU, particularly in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), has become increasingly evident following the invasion. Drawing on theory and previous research suggesting that external threats strengthen group identities, I argue that Russia is perceived as an external threat to EU identity in CEE after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Stephan and Stephan's integrated threat theory considers an external threat as either realistic, posing a threat to the ingroup's existence, or symbolic, posing a threat to the ingroup's worldview. The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between EU identity and the perception of Russia as a group threat to the EU among individuals in CEE based on the nature of the group threat: realistic and symbolic.

Syftet med denna enkätstudie var att jämföra två olika förklaringsmodeller för tinnitusbesvär; fear avoidance och acceptans. Förutom att undersöka sambanden till tinnitusbesvär, testades även modellerna mot utfallsmåtten tinnitusvigilans och livskvalitet. Då nivå av depression och ångest är kända prediktorer för tinnitusbesvär, användes de som kontrollvariabler. Även processerna mindfulness och värderad riktning testades. Deltagare i studien var 362 patienter med tinnitus som någon gång mellan åren 2004-2011 varit i kontakt med Öronkliniken Hörselvården vid universitetssjukhuset i Linköping.

This two years master?s thesis is about book circles for children, arranged by the public libraries in Sweden. The purpose is to gain knowledge about how children experience their participation in book circles, and how they experience their own reading. It focuses on children aged 10 to 12 years, and their leisure reading. The research questions are: What are the book circles? function for the participants? How and why do the children read? What kind of literature do they like? Do the children experience that their reading has developed through their participation in the book circles? What parts of the reading process do the book circles influence?The theoretical framework is threefold.

Our post-modern society is being continually more characterized by the working life, where corporate relations and the understanding of human momentum, limitations and knowledge is the basis of the quality of the corporation. In other words, it is of the greatest importance to keep in mind the attitudes, behaviour, stress levels and motivations that constitute a good working environment. We find it interesting to study what social psychological approaches and social processes could be of importance to good cooperation. The research has its starting point in a qualitative method focused on semi- structured interviews, where we have interviewed eight respondents working within the psychiatry. The research has strengthened our pre-understanding but also made clear the existence of other social processes and approaches that affect cooperation.

The translation of financial records of foreign subsidiaries gives rise to currency translation adjustments that affect total group equity. If unwanted, fluctuations in translation adjustments can be avoided using net investment hedges. This study aims to find the extent of net investment hedging in Sweden today and in a short historical perspective, and find explanations to varying levels of hedging and firms' decisions to hedge. Based on annual reports, we determine Swedish firms' net investment hedging policies and their level of hedging. The 32 largest companies listed on the Stockholm stock exchange in the years 1993, 2004, 2006, and 2009 are studied.

A possible explanation for the inability of the governments of the world to implement necessary environmental policies is that they are worried of being punished by voters for implementing too forceful policies. But do voters actually punish governments that implement more stringent environmental policies? Few studies have explored this question directly. Parts of the literature on environmental policy and public opinion indicate that voters would predominantly reward governments that implement more stringent environmental policies, while other parts indicate that voters would predominantly punish them. It is also possible that voters punish governments that implement more stringent environmental policies in some contexts, but reward them in others.