We estimate the willingness to pay for electricity generated from renewable energy in the Czech Republic. Discrete choice experiment is used to elicit preferences for various attributes of renewable electricity support scheme (PM emission, GHG emission, size of RE power plant, revenue distribution, and costs). Original survey is carried with 404 respondents living in two regions - Ustecky (polluted area) and Southern Bohemia (cleaner area). We find that respondents prefer decentralized renewable electricity sources over centralized, local air quality improvements over reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. Estimated marginal willingness to pay for 1% reduction in emission of particulate matter equals to 49 CZK, respectively 3.7 % of average monthly electricity bill. In total, WTP for green electricity is larger than current compulsory contributions to renewable energy support scheme. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)

Die vorliegende Dissertation setzt sich damit auseinander, wie das Zusammenspiel von essensbezogener Umwelt und Kognition Ernährungsentscheidungen beeinflusst. Im ersten Manuskript, “When Diets Last: Lower Cognitive Complexity Increases Diet Adherence” wird die Bedeutung der kognitiven Komplexität von Ernährungsregeln für das Einhalten einer Diät untersucht. Können Diäten scheitern, weil sie aus kognitiver Perspektive zu komplex sind, z.B. weil sich Diäthaltende nicht alle wichtigen Informationen merken oder verarbeiten können? 1136 Diäthaltende nahmen an einer längsschnittlichen Onlinestudie teil. Vorangegangenes Diätverhalten, Selbstwirksamkeit, Planung und wahrgenommene Regelschwierigkeit erhöhten das Risiko, die Diät vorzeitig aufzugeben, wobei Selbstwirksamkeit und wahrgenommene Regelschwierigkeit die einflussreichsten Faktoren waren. Im zweiten Manuskript „Meat Label Design: Effects on Stage Progression, Risk Perception, and Product Evaluation” wird der Einfluss gesundheitsrelevanter Information auf Labeln für Produktbewertung und Intention, Tierhaltung und Inhaltsstoffe von Lebensmitteln in die Kaufentscheidung einzubeziehen, untersucht. Es wurde betrachtet, wie Inhalt und Kontext (separate versus conjoint Darbietung) der Labelinformation die Bewertung von Fleischprodukten beeinflusst. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass sich bei einer conjoint im Gegensatz zur separaten Darbietung die Bewertung der Produkte umkehrt. Darüber hinaus hatten Personen, die zuvor nicht motiviert waren gesundheitsrelevante Aspekte in ihr Einkaufsverhalten einzubeziehen, nach Betrachten der Label eine höhere Intention diese zu berücksichtigen. Im dritten Manuskript, „Predicting Children’s Meal Preferences: How Much Do Parents Know?“, wurden Präferenzvorhersagen bezüglich der Essensentscheidungen Anderer erforscht. Es wurde untersucht, wie gut und mit Hilfe welcher Information Eltern die Mittagessenpräferenzen ihrer Kinder vorhersagen. Die Vorhersagegenauigkeit der Eltern entsprach der Stabilität der Essenspräferenzen ihrer Kinder, d.h. dass die Eltern so genau waren, wie möglich. Die Ergebnisse suggerieren, dass Eltern vor allem spezifisches Wissen über die Präferenzen ihrer Kinder und Projektion ihrer eigenen Vorlieben für die Vorhersagen nutzten. / This dissertation focuses on food-related decision making, in particular, how food related environments and cognition interact to determine people’s food choices. The first manuscript, “When Diets Last: Lower Cognitive Complexity Increases Diet Adherence,” investigates the role of the cognitive complexity in diet adherence. Can weight loss diets fail because they are too complicated from a cognitive point of view, meaning that dieters are not able to recall or process the diet rules? The impact of excessive cognitive demands on diet adherence were investigated with 1,136 dieters in a longitudinal online-questionnaire. We measured perceived rule complexity controlling for other factors known to influence adherence. Previous diet behavior, self-efficacy, planning and perceived rule complexity predicted an increased risk to quit the diet prematurely, with self-efficacy and diet complexity being the strongest factors. The second manuscript, “Meat Label Design: Effects on Stage Progression, Risk Perception, and Product Evaluation,” presents two studies which tested the impact of health-related meat labels on product evaluation and intention. Specifically, the studies examined how informational content and the context (separate vs. conjoint evaluation) in which labels are assessed influence the evaluation of meat products. The results showed that conjoint assessment of labels can lead to contrary product rankings compared to separate evaluations. Moreover, the results suggest that being exposed to food labels containing specific health-relevant information can increase motivation to consider health aspects in those consumers without previous intention to do so. The third manuscript, “Predicting Children’s Meal Preferences: How Much Do Parents Know?” investigated prediction behavior concerning other people’s food choices. In particular, it asked how accurately and what cues parents use to predict their children’s meal choices. Overall, parents’ prediction accuracy matched the stability of children’s meal choices, implying that accuracy was as high as can be expected. The results suggest parents were able to obtain high predictive accuracy by using specific knowledge about their child’s likes and projecting their own preferences.

Recentemente, várias tarefas tem sido delegadas a sistemas computacionais, principalmente quando sistemas computacionais são mais confiáveis ou quando as tarefas não são adequadas para seres humanos. O uso de extração de preferências ajuda a realizar a delegação, permitindo que mesmo pessoas leigas possam programar facilmente um sistema computacional com suas preferências. As preferências de uma pessoa são obtidas por meio de respostas para questões específicas, que são formuladas pelo próprio sistema computacional. A pessoa age como um usuário do sistema computacional, enquanto este é visto como um agente que age no lugar da pessoa. A estrutura e contexto das questões são apontadas como fonte de variações das respostas do usuário, e tais variações podem impossibilitar a factibilidade da extração de preferências. Uma forma de evitar tais variações é questionar um usuário sobre a sua preferência entre dois comportamentos observados por ele. A questão de avaliar relativamente comportamentos observados é mais simples e transparente ao usuário, diminuindo as possíveis variações, mas pode não ser fácil para o agente interpretar tais avaliações. Se existem divergências entre as percepções do agente e do usuário, o agente pode ficar impossibilitado de aprender as preferências do usuário. As avaliações são geradas com base nas percepções do usuário, mas tudo que um agente pode fazer é relacionar tais avaliações às suas próprias percepções. Um outro problema é que questões, que são expostas ao usuário por meio de comportamentos demonstrados, são agora restritas pela dinâmica do ambiente e um comportamento não pode ser escolhido arbitrariamente. O comportamento deve ser factível e uma política de ação deve ser executada no ambiente para que um comportamento seja demonstrado. Enquanto o primeiro problema influencia a inferência de como o usuário avalia comportamentos, o segundo problema influencia quão rápido e acurado o processo de aprendizado pode ser feito. Esta tese propõe o problema de Extração de Preferências com base em Comportamentos Observados utilizando o arcabouço de Processos Markovianos de Decisão, desenvolvendo propriedades teóricas em tal arcabouço que viabilizam computacionalmente tal problema. O problema de diferentes percepções é analisado e soluções restritas são desenvolvidas. O problema de demonstração de comportamentos é analisado utilizando formulação de questões com base em políticas estacionárias e replanejamento de políticas, sendo implementados algoritmos com ambas soluções para resolver a extração de preferências em um cenário sob condições restritas. / Recently, computer systems have been delegated to accomplish a variety of tasks, when the computer system can be more reliable or when the task is not suitable or not recommended for a human being. The use of preference elicitation in computational systems helps to improve such delegation, enabling lay people to program easily a computer system with their own preference. The preference of a person is elicited through his answers to specific questions, that the computer system formulates by itself. The person acts as an user of the computer system, whereas the computer system can be seen as an agent that acts in place of the person. The structure and context of the questions have been pointed as sources of variance regarding the users answers, and such variance can jeopardize the feasibility of preference elicitation. An attempt to avoid such variance is asking an user to choose between two behaviours that were observed by himself. Evaluating relatively observed behaviours turn questions more transparent and simpler for the user, decreasing the variance effect, but it might not be easier interpreting such evaluations. If divergences between agents and users perceptions occur, the agent may not be able to learn the users preference. Evaluations are generated regarding users perception, but all an agent can do is to relate such evaluation to his own perception. Another issue is that questions, which are exposed to the user through behaviours, are now constrained by the environment dynamics and a behaviour cannot be chosen arbitrarily, but the behaviour must be feasible and a policy must be executed in order to achieve a behaviour. Whereas the first issue influences the inference regarding users evaluation, the second problem influences how fast and accurate the learning process can be made. This thesis proposes the problem of Preference Elicitation under Evaluations over Observed Behaviours using the Markov Decision Process framework and theoretic properties in such framework are developed in order to turn such problem computationally feasible. The problem o different perceptions is analysed and constraint solutions are developed. The problem of demonstrating a behaviour is considered under the formulation of question based on stationary policies and non-stationary policies. Both type of questions was implemented and tested to solve the preference elicitation in a scenario with constraint conditions.

Recentemente, várias tarefas tem sido delegadas a sistemas computacionais, principalmente quando sistemas computacionais são mais confiáveis ou quando as tarefas não são adequadas para seres humanos. O uso de extração de preferências ajuda a realizar a delegação, permitindo que mesmo pessoas leigas possam programar facilmente um sistema computacional com suas preferências. As preferências de uma pessoa são obtidas por meio de respostas para questões específicas, que são formuladas pelo próprio sistema computacional. A pessoa age como um usuário do sistema computacional, enquanto este é visto como um agente que age no lugar da pessoa. A estrutura e contexto das questões são apontadas como fonte de variações das respostas do usuário, e tais variações podem impossibilitar a factibilidade da extração de preferências. Uma forma de evitar tais variações é questionar um usuário sobre a sua preferência entre dois comportamentos observados por ele. A questão de avaliar relativamente comportamentos observados é mais simples e transparente ao usuário, diminuindo as possíveis variações, mas pode não ser fácil para o agente interpretar tais avaliações. Se existem divergências entre as percepções do agente e do usuário, o agente pode ficar impossibilitado de aprender as preferências do usuário. As avaliações são geradas com base nas percepções do usuário, mas tudo que um agente pode fazer é relacionar tais avaliações às suas próprias percepções. Um outro problema é que questões, que são expostas ao usuário por meio de comportamentos demonstrados, são agora restritas pela dinâmica do ambiente e um comportamento não pode ser escolhido arbitrariamente. O comportamento deve ser factível e uma política de ação deve ser executada no ambiente para que um comportamento seja demonstrado. Enquanto o primeiro problema influencia a inferência de como o usuário avalia comportamentos, o segundo problema influencia quão rápido e acurado o processo de aprendizado pode ser feito. Esta tese propõe o problema de Extração de Preferências com base em Comportamentos Observados utilizando o arcabouço de Processos Markovianos de Decisão, desenvolvendo propriedades teóricas em tal arcabouço que viabilizam computacionalmente tal problema. O problema de diferentes percepções é analisado e soluções restritas são desenvolvidas. O problema de demonstração de comportamentos é analisado utilizando formulação de questões com base em políticas estacionárias e replanejamento de políticas, sendo implementados algoritmos com ambas soluções para resolver a extração de preferências em um cenário sob condições restritas. / Recently, computer systems have been delegated to accomplish a variety of tasks, when the computer system can be more reliable or when the task is not suitable or not recommended for a human being. The use of preference elicitation in computational systems helps to improve such delegation, enabling lay people to program easily a computer system with their own preference. The preference of a person is elicited through his answers to specific questions, that the computer system formulates by itself. The person acts as an user of the computer system, whereas the computer system can be seen as an agent that acts in place of the person. The structure and context of the questions have been pointed as sources of variance regarding the users answers, and such variance can jeopardize the feasibility of preference elicitation. An attempt to avoid such variance is asking an user to choose between two behaviours that were observed by himself. Evaluating relatively observed behaviours turn questions more transparent and simpler for the user, decreasing the variance effect, but it might not be easier interpreting such evaluations. If divergences between agents and users perceptions occur, the agent may not be able to learn the users preference. Evaluations are generated regarding users perception, but all an agent can do is to relate such evaluation to his own perception. Another issue is that questions, which are exposed to the user through behaviours, are now constrained by the environment dynamics and a behaviour cannot be chosen arbitrarily, but the behaviour must be feasible and a policy must be executed in order to achieve a behaviour. Whereas the first issue influences the inference regarding users evaluation, the second problem influences how fast and accurate the learning process can be made. This thesis proposes the problem of Preference Elicitation under Evaluations over Observed Behaviours using the Markov Decision Process framework and theoretic properties in such framework are developed in order to turn such problem computationally feasible. The problem o different perceptions is analysed and constraint solutions are developed. The problem of demonstrating a behaviour is considered under the formulation of question based on stationary policies and non-stationary policies. Both type of questions was implemented and tested to solve the preference elicitation in a scenario with constraint conditions.

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Die vorliegende Studienarbeit beschäftigt sich mit der Fragestellung, inwiefern sich Revealed-Preference-Daten aus der deutschen Mobilitätsbefragung "Mobilität in Städten" SrV 2008 dazu eignen, um basierend auf denen im Datensatz enthaltenen Wegen Verkehrsmittelwahlmodelle zu schätzen. Dazu wurden Wegedaten aus der Befragung verwendet, und die Wahlalternativen mit Hilfe der Google Directions API rekonstruiert. Mit den rekonstruierten Variablen Reisezeit und Reisekosten sowie verschiedenen sozioökonomischen und externen Variablen aus SrV 2008 wurden verschiedene Wahlmodelle geschätzt. Durch schrittweises Hinzufügen der Variablen konnte das Modell immer weiter verbessert werden. Wie zu erwarten, erwiesen sich dabei die Reisezeit und die Reisekosten als hoch signifikant. Von den restlichen Variablen waren jedoch lediglich das Geschlecht der befragten Person sowie die Wettersituation zum Zeitpunkt der Wahlentscheidung signifikant. Für das finale Modell wurden Zeitkostensätze errechnet und mit verschiedenen europäischen Studien verglichen. Die errechneten Zeitkostensätze erwiesen sich dabei als plausibel. Die SrV-Daten eignen sich also für die Schätzung von Wahlmodellen. / The following thesis analyzes, if revealed preference data from the German mobility survey "Mobilität in Städten" SrV 2008 is suited to estimate mode choice models. For that purpose, trip data from the survey was used and the different choice alternatives were reconstructed with the Google Directions API. Several mode choice models were estimated with the help of the reconstructed variables travel time and travel costs plus several socioeconomic and external variables from SrV 2008. The variables were added to the model step by step, thereby the quality of the model improved. As expected, travel time and travel costs were highly significant. However from the remaining variables only the gender of the person and the weather at the time of the trip were significant. For the final model, values of time were calculated and these were compared with values from different European studies. The calculated values of time proved to be feasible. Therefore, SrV data is suited to be used for mode choice models.

The thesis deals with investment decision making. It starts from the decision making situation about the making of an investment portfolio of the open unit trusts. The whole decision making process is described, namely the methodical approaches used in terms of the portfolio making procedure. Thus, the main part of this paper focuses on a detailed description of an algorithm of the fuzzy weight estimation method, fuzzy multiple criteria evaluation method and fuzzy multiple objective programming method. The methods are proposed on the basis of current concepts; they conclude the new ideas as well. The fuzzy weight estimation method is able to calculate the weights of criteria according to their linguistically expressed importance. The fuzzy multiple criteria evaluation method accepts uncertain input data in the form of the fuzzy numbers. The alternatives are evaluated by the concept of the preference relations. This method provides a division of the alternatives into the effective and ineffective. The fuzzy multiple objective programming method also works with the uncertain elements as fuzzy numbers. To solve the particular mathematical models, the Bellman's optimality approach is applied. The method is proposed in the interactive form. The decision maker can change a current solution by his/her additional (vague) preferences. The proposed concepts form the two-phase decision making procedure that is applied in the practical situation of the portfolio making in the field of the capital market with open unit trusts offered by the Česká spořitelna investment company. Two types of investors are defined, the investment situations are described, and the results are analyzed in detail. The decision making theory, the fuzzy sets theory and the capital market of collective investment, or with unit trusts, are introduced in a necessary scope. The instigation of my dissertation is to solve the real decision making situation. The investment decision making process is described and the methodical approaches are proposed in order to make the portfolio of unit trusts.

Practical approach to the issue of music applicability is a multi-disciplinary taking into account the complexity of working environment, personality of modern managers and the sole human nature. Musical map could serve to HR experts in building innovative programs of staff training in accordance with organization' preferences and individuals uniqueness. Recent investigations of the connection between music and motivation, music and team work, music and creativity, music and learning process, are opening numerous options for practical applicability of music in working environment aimed at increasing existing competencies and developing the new ones. The need for an increase in staff performances has imposed a need to explore how musical practice can support creation and implementation of realistic organizational goals in intercultural environment. The main goal of this doctoral thesis is to examine musical preferences and applicability of music with its positive effects on different aspects of working environment, creating thus, via empirical research, a musical map of geographical region that could be employed to increase working performance and efficiency. In order to achieve the goals defined, a field research has been conducted via structured questionnaire including 6 socio-demographic variables (gender, age, educational degree, position in the organization, sector and working experience) and 6 dependant variables (working atmosphere, efficiency in accomplishing tasks at work, motivation, learning, team work and stress reduction). The research was conducted in Serbia, on a random sample of 126 managers and employees in Belgrade, Novi Sad and Novi Pazar. The main hypothesis was that applicative music positively affects creation of proper corporative ambient and improvement of employees' competences, and was tested via 13 auxiliary hypotheses. Main empirical outcome of the Ph.D. thesis research is the determination of Serbian working population Musical Map and results of influence of certain socio-demographic and professional factors on the Musical Map Method implementation. HR staff would subsequently implement the "concept of musical map method" within its own company that is expected to increase motivation, learning and creativity as shown empirically in the study conducted. Also team work and working efficiency are expected to increase and stress at work to decrease under the proper musical exposition and all of these are explicitly shown in the thesis research results. In addition, influence of the degree of education on musical preference at work place and in general are the most surprising data, as revealed by chi square test if independence. Although general statistics of total sample on participant's opinion, speaks in favour of hypotheses confirmation expressing positive effects of music on 6 dependent variables, there are some fine differences, influenced by cardinal and derived variables, as shown by one way ANOVA test (e.g. influence of gender on opinion of positive music effects on stress reduction etc.). The final result of the thesis is the creation of the Musical Map Method that contains original approach toward creation of musical map and determination of the necessary factors that could substantially influence its implementation. Method could be applied anywhere in the Globe to produce other unique music maps as per sponsor request.

Human body detects potentially damaging stimuli by specialized sensory nerve endings in the skin, the nociceptors. Their membranes are equipped with ion channels, molecular sensors, coding the outside stimuli into the trains of action potentials and conducting them to the higher brain centers. The most prominent group of transduction ion channels is the transient receptor potential (TRP) channel family followed by ion channels responsible for generation and conduction of action potentials from the periphery to the brain, the voltage-gated sodium channels (VGSCs). Understanding the mechanisms how particular stimulus is encoded and processed is of particular importance to find therapeutics for various types of pain conditions. We characterized the properties of VGSC subtypes NaV1.9 and NaV1.8 at high temperatures. We showed that NaV1.9 undergo large increase in current with increasing temperatures and significantly contribute to the action potential generation in dorsal root ganglion (DRG) neurons. Ciguatoxins (CTXs) are sodium channels activator toxins causing ciguatera fish poisoning, a disease manifested by sensory and neurological disturbances. We elucidated the mechanism of CTX- induced cold allodynia, a pathological phenomenon where normally innocuous cool temperatures are perceived as pain. We...

Cognitive flexibility can be described as adaptive ability to change one's behavior in response to the environment. Psychological tests measure cognitive flexibility mainly as an ability to switch between different cues, tasks or objects. This thesis is focused on cognitive flexibility in patients with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). To assess it, participants were tested in two different virtual tests of cognitive flexibility in spatial navigation task: Active allothetic place preference and Active allothetic place avoidance. In one of the tests participants have to navigate in rotating arena towads invisble goal (AAPP). In the other one they have to avoid invisible sector where time is counted upon entering (AAPA). As the sector and goal are visually imperceptible, participants have to use only cues inside and outside the arena and are also informed about entering the sector by sound signal. The sector changes its position from stable position in room frame to stable position in arena frame between conditions. Therefore, participants have to learn to switch between room and arena frame to sucessfully solve the task. Results of this study suggest that OCD patients are significantly worse in estimating position of the goal in AAPP, especially after change of condition. Further comparsion of...