Our study illustrates the nature and characteristics of the virtual world Second Life. We have identified that the online community aims to satisfy hedonistic needs through social and conspicuous consumption, for online use only, concentrating on socially accepted identity construction..

The purpose of this thesis is to achieve an increased understanding of factors and considerations of importance to larger companies? purchases of tax consultancy services. Based on a qualitative case study, the thesis more specifically analyzes purchasing companies? perception of quality in tax consultancy services, how the companies organize their purchases of such services and the relationship between purchasing companies and tax consultants. The study suggests that tax consultancy services constitute a heterogeneous group of services which are normally purchased by people in charge of either accounting or tax matters in the purchasing company.

This work investigates the breeding success of the Black-throated Diver, Gavia arctica, related to the water quality in three lakes located in the Vallentuna area, north of Stockholm, Sweden.For more than 30 years, I have studied the bird life around these three and other nearby lakes, and noticed that the Black-throated Diver breeds in some lakes, but not in others.The results confirm that the deep and clear lakes Tärnan and Stora Harsjön have good water quality regarding pH, alkalinity, aluminium and Secchi disk values. As expected, the Black-throated Diver shows breeding success in those two lakes, but does not breed in the shallow and eutrophic lake Mysslingen. .

The aim of this Masters thesis is to examine how disabled people who receive the shut-in-service in one community define service quality. The purpose is also to examine the shut-in-service and to look at the users' context. Answers are sought to the following questions: - How do users experience the service quality of the shut-in-service? - What kind of service does the shut-in-service offer to the user? - How can the user be described and which are his/her requests? The analysis is based on theory about service quality by Christian Grönroos. The theory makes a distinction between two kinds of service quality, technical vs functional quality, as experienced by the user through the profile of the organization.

The quality of meals is included in the constant improvement of each preschool. The study is carried out on behalf of the City of Malmö and Environmental Management and focuses on this quality work. By compiling a checklist of meal quality and by identifying what the meal quality means for persons working with the meal (managers, cooks, educators and parents), it is our wish that this will be a help in their quality work. To inspire the composition various organizations working methods and ways to manage, evaluate and make use of different models and tools to improve the dining quality, has been studied. In the literature, the work has received confirmation of theories that emerged during the analysis work of what a meal is and how quality can be measured. The results show that food quality is described as a complex concept consisting of different parts, where the food, atmosphere, service, together form the meal quality. The semi-structured interviews and the inquiry form, have given an indication of the preschool work with quality in the meal activities and it shows that on a wide range and large differences.

Lite mindre än en femtedel av Sveriges befolkning utgörs av personer som är över 65 år och av dessa bor cirka 6,2 % i särskilda boendeformer. Syftet med studien var att undersöka faktorer som är av betydelse för livskvaliteten för äldre på särskilt boende. Metoden som använts var en litteraturstudie med kvalitativ ansats som inbegrep åtta vetenskapliga artiklar. Artiklarna analyserades med innehållsanalys inspirerad av Graneheim och Lundman (2004). Resultatet presenteras utifrån de fyra kategorierna; vikten av personlig trygghet, denna rubrik sammanfattar vad som påverkar om den äldre känner sig trygg på det särskilda boendet, betydelsen av mellanmänskliga relationer, denna rubrik innefattar hur äldre upplever kontakten med personal, familj och övriga vänner.

In 2005 a public housing company in Uppsala, Sweden introduced the service quarter host. The focus on comfort (life quality in American programmes) is similar to the non-tolerance programmes. The idea of non-tolerance derived from the theory of Broken windows. The purpose is to examine how the service works according to the theories of Broken windows and social control. The aim is also to examine if the manifest and the latent functions are the same in different areas.

In 2005 a public housing company in Uppsala, Sweden introduced the service quarter host. The focus on comfort (life quality in American programmes) is similar to the non-tolerance programmes. The idea of non-tolerance derived from the theory of Broken windows. The purpose is to examine how the service works according to the theories of Broken windows and social control. The aim is also to examine if the manifest and the latent functions are the same in different areas.

The urbanization of the world is increasing. How it affects bird populations have been well studied during the last decade, and comparisons between urban and non-urban habitats have been carried out. A common method for measuring habitat quality is to calculate the population density. This method is easy to use, but have been criticized during the last couple of years. In this study, data of population densities was compared with data on reproduction success.

The aim of this paper is to get a deeper understanding if research about international relations has any practical meaning. The main focal point is about the importance of the scholar idea soft power, and its meaning on foreign policy actions through expressions. A quantity and quality method is used. The point of the main theory that concerns international relations takes a rationalistic perspective, and expands it to the notion that ides can have an impact on policy outcomes. Three different types of research utilization can be traced to determine in which way an idea is getting implemented.

The purpose of this thesis is to map out and investigate how the banking sector affects a customer?s willingness to change bank, and what the switching costs are for a customer when making these changes. A case study was performed through qualitative and quantitative questionnaires and interviews. The qualitative part was carried out to create hypotheses. The hypotheses was tested in a quantitative survey to be able to either accepted or rejected these them.

Purpose: To examine how IR-related press releases affect share price for stock companies, and to explore how said companies practice Investor Relations.Methods: The study was conducted using an event study as well as e-interviews. The event study has a quantitative deductive research approach where the market model is used for calculating the abnormal return based on press releases. The e-interviews have a qualitative research approach and follow a semi structured interview guide. The study includes all listed stock companies within the Swedish construction industry and includes press releases from the last decade.Theory: The study is based on the efficient market hypothesis and its semi strong form, theories within Investor Relations and previous research.Results: The event study shows a significant negative abnormal return during a four day period starting the day after the press release event. The negative abnormal return could derive from investor relations being used by companies as damage control, or that the investors? expectations are too high as a result of IR.

Syftet med denna litteraturstudie var att belysa hur livet förändras hos patienter som fått genomgå en stomioperation. Metoden som användes var en litteraturstudie och inkluderade både kvalitativa och kvantitativa artiklar. Tio studier inkluderades och resultatet presenterades under de tre huvudrubrikerna sexualitet, psykologiskt samt socialt. Resultatet visade att patienter med stomi har stort behov av information och stöd från närstående. Den egna kroppsbilden påverkas mycket visade många studier.

The purpose of this study was to examine the ways in which the Swedish lifestyle magazine VeckoRevyn construct the sex and love relations of bi- and homosexuals. We analyzed 22 unique texts in magazines, from 2009 to 2014, in order to get a result as current as possible.To represent the magazine overall we have selected texts from various parts of the magazine. With a critical discourse analysis and through relevant and significant theories and perspectives such as social constructionism and heteronormativity, we found that VeckoRevyn represent sex and love relations of bi- and homosexuals through four discourses.The outcome of our study shows that VeckoRevyn only represent a limited part of bi- and homosexuals sex and love relations. In the analysed texts bi- and homosexuals are forced to ?come out of the closet? repeatedly and their sexual relations are rarely represented.

Audit is a service of society that takes place in the public interest. To guarantee the quality of auditing a quality control is done with predetermined time intervals. The purpose of this paper is to investigate and analyze the concept quality and the procedure of the quality control and further to tie concepts like trust and ethics to the audit profession. To make the picture complete the paper also provides an insight regarding what deficiencies in quality, in other words failures, means to the audit profession. By performing semi-structured interviews with seven qualified auditors, active on different auditing firms in Skåne, substantial information was collected.