In recent years, research related to older adults and long-term care has been growing. Although much research in the past was focused on biomedical issues, more recent research has examined psychosocial issues faced by older adults within the long-term care setting. Despite the increase in literature and research on aging, long-term care, and dementia, there are still many gaps in our understanding of these phenomena. The concepts of body, self-identity, and place have received some attention over the last decade or so, but little systematic attempt has linked these concepts together, especially with relation to older adults and long-term care. In addition, the adjustment process of older adults into the long-term care facility has been examined, but the socialization processes have not been systematically examined. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to examine the process of socialization for new residents into the long-term care culture and environment, specifically focussing on how identities, bodies, and place are constructed and reconstructed by residents. Three residents were recruited for this study from a home for the aged in northwestern Ontario. Participant observation and three interviews over a six-month period with these residents focussed on concepts of place, self, and the body, as well as adjustment. Fifteen staff were also interviewed initially to gain an understanding of the long-term care environment and culture. Thirteen staff and two family members were interviewed at the end of the six-month period to gain an understanding of their perceptions of the resident’s transition into the long-term care facility. The findings indicate that a dismantling of the self occurs prior to coming into long-term care. Life in long-term care was described as living an altered life. Once admitted to the home for the aged, two types of socialization processes occurred—institutional and (inter)personal. Institutional socialization processes consisted of placing the body, defining the body, focussing on the body, managing the body, and relating to the body. Placing the body refers to the placement within the physical and social environment, residents’ adjustment to a new place, and how space within the facility was used. Defining the body refers to the assessments that were used just after admission which were focussed on the body as dysfunctional and limited. Focussing on the body occurred through the institution’s focus on body care, as well as the residents’ focus on their aging and unpredictable bodies, with a greater awareness of mortality and the immanence of death. Managing the body occurred through routines, risk management, and waiting. Finally, relating to the body referred to the boundaries of relationships that were defined, both resident relationships and staff relationships. The (inter)personal socialization processes capture the ways that residents internalized the institutional socialization processes. Internalizing the body refers to being a number and being a burden. Accommodating the body suggests ways in which residents complied to the institutional socialization processes. Accepting-resisting the body refers to the struggle residents had in accepting and fighting becoming a body, body limitations, and life in the institution. Re-creating the body illustrates ways in which residents reclaimed the body and alternative identities. All of these processes came together to create institutional bodies. These findings lead to a greater understanding of the ways in which body, self and identity, and place are intertwined. The institution served as a container for life, defining each of the lifeworld existentials. Lived space became institutional space, as personal space was redefined by the institution. Lived time also became structured by the institution, as temporal dimensions were defined by institutional time. The lived other became the institutional other, as staff became institutional brokers, attempting to balance the needs of the residents while adhering to the rules and regulations of the institution. The lived body also became the institutional body. The care encounter brought these dimensions together, and was the site for the production of institutional bodies. The findings of this study invite a rethinking of conceptions of the body and old age, particularly within the context of institutionalization, with bodies viewed as repositories of memories and containing both youth and age, rather than age as a ‘mask’. Residents exist within paradoxical rhythms of life, and thus, old age and institutionalization are not easily defined or theorized, but rather, reflect the complexity of lived experience.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how different incentive contracts that include forward-looking and contemporaneous goals motivate managers to make decisions consistent with the organization’s long-term objectives, in tasks of varying complexity. Two research questions are addressed. First, in a long-term horizon setting, how do incentive contracts based on various combinations of forward-looking and contemporaneous measures influence decisions? Second, how does task complexity influence the expected effect of various incentive contracts on management decisions? I address my research questions using a multi-period experiment where I compare the effects of three different incentive structure types and two different levels of task complexity. Results show that in a low complexity task, individuals perform better when only contemporaneous goal attainment is rewarded in the incentive contract than when both forward-looking and contemporaneous goal attainment is rewarded. In a high complexity task, individuals perform better when both contemporaneous and forward-looking goal attainment is rewarded, but only when the contemporaneous goal attainment is weighted more heavily in the incentive contract. My research contributes to the existing literature in two ways. First, this is the first study of which I am aware that compares the performance effects of long-term incentive contracts that reward forward-looking and contemporaneous goal attainment. Second, this study is the first of which I am aware to experimentally test incentive contracts, for employees with a long-term horizon, that incorporate various weightings of forward-looking measures in the contract. In addition, this study will be amongst the first to examine the impact of task complexity on incentive contract effectiveness.

The technological progress the world is experiencing has also changed the way banking is done in Sweden today. One tough challenge for the banking industry is the moderately homogenous products and services they offer, which make banking particularly exposed and sensitive to customers and their switching behaviour. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate what the role of Facebook is in relationship marketing within banking, a case study in SEB, Sweden. The theoretical framework is focusing on three major parts for this paper. Bank marketing involves ways of marketing and segmenting a bank, furthermore relationship marketing includes theories on building long-lasting relations with customers, and finally service related technology contains technological developments and strategies of social media This thesis is done according to an explanatory technique as material has been collected by qualitative interviews and the findings have been textual data. The study has been designed into a single case study of SEB. Interviews has been conducted to understand the way a Swedish retailing bank is using social media to enhance their customer relation. It was found that SEB is seen as a personal and rather modern bank with good accessibility according to the respondents. Furthermore, customers are kept satisfied and maintained through trust, loyalty, and proactive acting. Also, the Facebook service is a good communication tool that gives fast replies and is available to use anytime. The role of Facebook within banking is multiple in association to relationship marketing. For instance, it brings along a fast communication tool and a great flexibility. SEB is rather innovative in their operation by rapidly adopting new means of technologies. The bank’s brand image as a personal and proactive bank can further be strengthened through Facebook. Additionally long term relations can be stimulated through the increased communication, collaboration, and trust that Facebook builds. SEB operates proactive relationship marketing and Facebook is one of their latest proactive approaches. What has been realised is the role of Facebook to enhance customer satisfaction and relations in the long run.

The purpose of this thesis is to find out the reasons and perhaps some answers to the problem as we see it, the sickness benefit expiration of those who experience this. By this said we have also taken into account the different laws and adjustments in the long-term sickness benefit, but also major reformation of the security net in the Swedish society. The efficiency of the law on passive long-term sickness absence was added in July 2008, but was later in January 2010 supplemented. The purpose of this law wasn’t only to reduce the long-term sickness absence but also to reduce exclusion. These changes had also been highlighted by the media that people were actually being excluded from the society. It creates marginalization. The aim of this study is to highlight individuals' feelings about the whole performing hedge process. The survey was conducted through semi-structured interviews where we wanted a deeper knowledge of the interviewee’s experiences. In order to give the interviewee the opportunity and possibility to form their own mind and own reflections and express their own thoughts, the questions were open for answers. This allowed us to ask supplementary questions. After collecting the empirical data we did a breakdown in the following three themes: the experiences of the sickness absence, the experiences by the response of the concerned authorities. The theories chosen in this study are stigma, social exclusion, sense of coherence (SOC) and sick role. The economic exclusion creates social exclusion where as the sense of shame among the interviewee’s increase. By this said, the interviewee’s are not able to participate actively in the social activities to the same extent, but also they cannot provide for themselves. This can obviously lead to increased risk for mental illness. In our analysis we aim to discuss our issues based on the experiences for the interviewees’.

Background and Problem: Human Resources are considered one of the most important assets when competing with other companies. There are a lot of studies made in general on the subject while studies considering a specific context are missing. To consider the context when adapting a HR-strategy is interesting as the structure of the organization and the environment affects both the organization and the individuals within it. To study how the controversial context affects an organization is particularly interesting as the context is subject for discussion in the society. Aim: The study's purpose is to investigate how Human Resources are handled in a controversial business and to identify success factors when adapting the strategy to the controversial context. Methodology: The study started out by collecting theories connected to the subject with Fombrun, Devanna & Tichys HR-cycle. Interview questions where made based on the theories and answered by three of the case company's employees, whom all are well familiar with the case company's HR-strategy. Conclusion: We have come to the conclusion that there are no remarkable differences when handling Human Resources in a controversial context then in earlier published theories. However the importance of an adjusted HR-strategy to best be able to handle the employees are proven. Some areas must be considered more important when adjusting the HR-strategy to the context. In these situation areas resulting in long-term relationships between the employee and the organization seems to be high valued.Key words: Human Resource, controversial context, gambling company and long-term relationships. / Bakgrund och Problem: Mänskliga resurser anses vara en av de viktigaste tillgångarna som leder till företagets konkurrensfördelar. Många studier har genomförts, främst i generella sammanhang. Men det saknas studier som tar hänsyn till en specifik kontext. Att ta hänsyn till hur en specifik kontext påverkar HR-arbetet är intressant eftersom att organisationens egen uppbyggnad samt omgivningen påverkar såväl organisationen som individerna vilka arbetar i den. Att undersöka hur den kontroversiella kontexten påverkar organisationen är extra intressant då den bidrar till diskussion i dagens samhälle. Syfte: Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur HR-arbetet fungerar i en kontroversiell verksamhet samt att identifiera framgångsfaktorer med utgångspunkt i anpassning till kontexten. Metod: Studien började med insamlande av teorier kopplade till ämnet med utgångspunkt i Fombrun, Devanna & Tichys HR-cykel. Med utgångspunkt i HR-cykeln formades intervjufrågor som sedan ställdes till tre av fallföretagets anställda. Dessa tre är välbekanta med organisationen HR-arbete. Slutsats: Genom studien har vi kommit fram till att det inte finns några markanta skillnader mellan hur HR-arbetet fungerar i en kontroversiell kontext och tidigare publicerade teorier. Däremot bevisas vikten av att anpassa sina HR-strategier för att på bästa sätt hantera sin personal. Från detta kan vi se att vissa områden anses viktigare än andra vid anpassning till kontexten. I denna situation verkar de områden vilka resulterar i långvariga relationer mellan organisationen och medarbetarna vara högt värderade.Nyckelord: Human Resources, kontroversiell kontext, spelföretag och långsiktiga relationer.

One goal in the development of future cellular systems is to increase performance. Channel dependent scheduling can possibly contribute to a performance enhancement. It requires channel qualityinformation and uplink channel knowledge is often incomplete. This master thesis work compares channel dependent scheduling and channel independent scheduling for a Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access-based uplink in time domain and time and frequencydomain assuming continuous channel quality information updates. It also evaluates different methods for providing channel quality information by investigating how the limited channel knowledge they supply affects the performance of channel dependent scheduling. Single-cell simulations with perfect channel knowledge indicate small gains for channel dependent scheduling. Large gains are seen when performing frequency and time domain scheduling instead of only time domain scheduling. Limited channel knowledge causes performance loss for channel dependent scheduling. The performance is only slightly decreased if a method with sufficiently frequent providing of channel quality information updates is applied. More realistic multi-cell simulations show large gains for channel dependent scheduling. It is possible that these results are influenced by link adaptation and scheduling problems due to non predictable interference when performing dynamic scheduling. In the comparison between channel dependent and channel independent scheduling the channel dependent scheduling can benefit from the fact that the selected channel dependent scheduling algorithms result in a more static scheduling than the selected channel independent scheduling algorithms do.

The documentation of Recreation Therapy and Leisure Opportunities in Long-term Care The Recreation Therapy discipline at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre (SHSC) has undergone a series of research initiatives to ensure a patient focused philosophy is integrated into their practice. The purpose of the study is the development of documentation procedures that will enable the recreation therapy practitioners to engage in authentic and professional documentation of the residents’ experiences in recreation therapy and leisure opportunities based on a patient focused philosophy. This research project followed an action research methodology and was guided by a hermeneutic framework adapted from Karkainen and Eriksson (2004). The recreation therapists at SHSC were involved in all aspects of the project as co-research participants. This project employed a variety data collection techniques including focus groups, a hermeneutic dialogue, self-reflective activities and active application sessions. The information collected through the various data collection phases in this project led to the creation of a new documentation framework and associated sample documentation, which allow for a more patient focused documentation process. A series of quality indicators were also developed in this project to help authentically express the experiences in leisure and recreation of the residents living at SHSC. This research project has added to the growing base of knowledge focused on the integration of a patient focused care philosophy into the recreation therapy practice at SHSC.

In recent years, research related to older adults and long-term care has been growing. Although much research in the past was focused on biomedical issues, more recent research has examined psychosocial issues faced by older adults within the long-term care setting. Despite the increase in literature and research on aging, long-term care, and dementia, there are still many gaps in our understanding of these phenomena. The concepts of body, self-identity, and place have received some attention over the last decade or so, but little systematic attempt has linked these concepts together, especially with relation to older adults and long-term care. In addition, the adjustment process of older adults into the long-term care facility has been examined, but the socialization processes have not been systematically examined. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to examine the process of socialization for new residents into the long-term care culture and environment, specifically focussing on how identities, bodies, and place are constructed and reconstructed by residents. Three residents were recruited for this study from a home for the aged in northwestern Ontario. Participant observation and three interviews over a six-month period with these residents focussed on concepts of place, self, and the body, as well as adjustment. Fifteen staff were also interviewed initially to gain an understanding of the long-term care environment and culture. Thirteen staff and two family members were interviewed at the end of the six-month period to gain an understanding of their perceptions of the resident’s transition into the long-term care facility. The findings indicate that a dismantling of the self occurs prior to coming into long-term care. Life in long-term care was described as living an altered life. Once admitted to the home for the aged, two types of socialization processes occurred—institutional and (inter)personal. Institutional socialization processes consisted of placing the body, defining the body, focussing on the body, managing the body, and relating to the body. Placing the body refers to the placement within the physical and social environment, residents’ adjustment to a new place, and how space within the facility was used. Defining the body refers to the assessments that were used just after admission which were focussed on the body as dysfunctional and limited. Focussing on the body occurred through the institution’s focus on body care, as well as the residents’ focus on their aging and unpredictable bodies, with a greater awareness of mortality and the immanence of death. Managing the body occurred through routines, risk management, and waiting. Finally, relating to the body referred to the boundaries of relationships that were defined, both resident relationships and staff relationships. The (inter)personal socialization processes capture the ways that residents internalized the institutional socialization processes. Internalizing the body refers to being a number and being a burden. Accommodating the body suggests ways in which residents complied to the institutional socialization processes. Accepting-resisting the body refers to the struggle residents had in accepting and fighting becoming a body, body limitations, and life in the institution. Re-creating the body illustrates ways in which residents reclaimed the body and alternative identities. All of these processes came together to create institutional bodies. These findings lead to a greater understanding of the ways in which body, self and identity, and place are intertwined. The institution served as a container for life, defining each of the lifeworld existentials. Lived space became institutional space, as personal space was redefined by the institution. Lived time also became structured by the institution, as temporal dimensions were defined by institutional time. The lived other became the institutional other, as staff became institutional brokers, attempting to balance the needs of the residents while adhering to the rules and regulations of the institution. The lived body also became the institutional body. The care encounter brought these dimensions together, and was the site for the production of institutional bodies. The findings of this study invite a rethinking of conceptions of the body and old age, particularly within the context of institutionalization, with bodies viewed as repositories of memories and containing both youth and age, rather than age as a ‘mask’. Residents exist within paradoxical rhythms of life, and thus, old age and institutionalization are not easily defined or theorized, but rather, reflect the complexity of lived experience.

The purpose of this study is to investigate how different incentive contracts that include forward-looking and contemporaneous goals motivate managers to make decisions consistent with the organization’s long-term objectives, in tasks of varying complexity. Two research questions are addressed. First, in a long-term horizon setting, how do incentive contracts based on various combinations of forward-looking and contemporaneous measures influence decisions? Second, how does task complexity influence the expected effect of various incentive contracts on management decisions? I address my research questions using a multi-period experiment where I compare the effects of three different incentive structure types and two different levels of task complexity. Results show that in a low complexity task, individuals perform better when only contemporaneous goal attainment is rewarded in the incentive contract than when both forward-looking and contemporaneous goal attainment is rewarded. In a high complexity task, individuals perform better when both contemporaneous and forward-looking goal attainment is rewarded, but only when the contemporaneous goal attainment is weighted more heavily in the incentive contract. My research contributes to the existing literature in two ways. First, this is the first study of which I am aware that compares the performance effects of long-term incentive contracts that reward forward-looking and contemporaneous goal attainment. Second, this study is the first of which I am aware to experimentally test incentive contracts, for employees with a long-term horizon, that incorporate various weightings of forward-looking measures in the contract. In addition, this study will be amongst the first to examine the impact of task complexity on incentive contract effectiveness.

The presence of human pharmaceuticals in the aquatic environment is now becoming a well-established fact. The identified problems associated with their presence include the fact that these compounds are biologically active, some of them are toxic in nature, and a number of compounds have potential to foster and maintain drug resistant microorganisms. They are discharged into the aquatic environment from a variety of sources, but mainly by the excretion of incompletely metabolized pharmaceuticals by individuals into the wastewater. This situation makes finding a source-control strategy difficult. However, healthcare facility (hospitals and long-term-care homes) effluents are suspected to have relatively higher concentrations of these compounds, as such facilities use pharmaceuticals in large amounts for diagnostic, cure and research purposes. It is expected that controlling discharges from these facilities may provide a cost-effective solution to reduce the pharmaceutical loads entering the aquatic environment.