Inledning: Rekommendationerna om distansarbete under pandemin har haftstor påverkan på arbetsmiljön. Kommunikationskanalerna och de naturligamötesplatserna har förändrats, vilket i sin tur har påverkan påsamordningsmekanismerna inom målstyrningen. Syfte: Syftet med uppsatsen är att genom en kvalitativ fallstudie upptäcka hursamordningsmekanismer förändras av distansarbete och vilka konsekvenser detkan få för målkongruensen och måluppfyllelsen i ett företag. Metod: I denna rapport har en fallstudie med kvalitativa intervjuer genomförtspå ett företag med två fokusgrupper, som framtagits genom ett målstyrt urval.Detta med syftet att uppnå en fördjupad förståelse för respondenternasupplevelser. Slutsatser: Studien fastslår att styrningsmekanismerna påverkas till följd avdistansarbetet. De formella mekanismerna ökar, medan de informella minskar,vilket leder till osäkerhet, missförstånd och ineffektivitet på arbetsplatsen. / Introduction: The recommendations on teleworking during the pandemic havehad a major impact on the work environment. The communication channels andthe natural meeting places have changed, which in turn has an impact on thecoordination mechanisms within goal management. Purpose: The purpose of the thesis is to discover through a qualitative casestudy how coordination mechanisms are changed by teleworking and whatconsequences it can have for goal congruence and goal fulfillment in acompany. Method: In this report, a case study with qualitative interviews was conductedat a company with two focus groups, which was produced through agoal-directed selection. This with the aim of achieving an in-depthunderstanding of the respondents' experiences. Conclusions: The study states that the control mechanisms are affected as aresult of the telework. The formal mechanisms increase, while the informalones decrease, leading to insecurity, misunderstandings and inefficiencies inthe workplace.

No description available.

How congruence cues and congruence-based expectations may together shape perception in virtual reality (VR) still need to be unravelled. We linked the concept of plausibility used in VR research with congruence-based modulation by assessing brain responses while participants experienced vehicle riding experiences in VR scenarios. Perceptual plausibility was manipulated by sensory congruence, with multisensory stimulations confirming with common expectations of road scenes being plausible. We hypothesized that plausible scenarios would elicit greater cortical responses. The results showed that: (i) vibrotactile stimulations at expected intensities, given embedded audio-visual information, engaged greater cortical activities in frontal and sensorimotor regions; (ii) weaker plausible stimulations resulted in greater responses in the sensorimotor cortex than stronger but implausible stimulations; (iii) frontal activities under plausible scenarios negatively correlated with plausibility violation costs in the sensorimotor cortex. These results potentially indicate frontal regulation of sensory processing and extend previous evidence of contextual modulation to the tactile sense.

Since the end of the Cold War, modern Russian and Chinese relations have been characterized by strategic defense, economic, and diplomatic cooperation. This strategic cooperation has become increasingly coordinated, with the motives behind Russo-Sino cooperation increasingly becoming the focus of academic debate. While both states declare that it is not an “alliance,” other terms have been used, such as “alignment”. This concept has only recently gained greater academic attention. This paper presents a theoretical framework on alignment as a process and its constituent mechanisms. Drawing on neo-classical realism and alliance theory, this paper bridges theoretical IR concepts to empirical data, employing a case study methodology that utilizes congruence analysis. It highlights that alignment is a present feature of modern Russian-Chinese relations and it is driven by their perceptions of threat and the global and regional balances of power.

No description available.

No description available.

Mergers and acquisitions (M&As) are not only becoming more common globally, but they are also increasing in size and value in Sweden. The pace of this trend has not even slowed down due to the eruption of the global pandemic, there is rather a tendency showing the opposite. In solitude may this have its reasonable causes but when delving deeper into the matter may the effects of a M&A be alarming, especially for the individual. Scholars are often stressing their concerns that M&As often ends in failure or being devastating in terms of their performance. While some have argued that cultural aspects play a crucial part for the realization of a deal- transaction, have the findings either been inconclusive or inconsistent.  This thesis is therefore exploring the notion of culture and the role it plays in the M&A-process, particularly the pre-deal phase in order to shed light on the matter. By doing so have a theoretical framework been developed that connects the phases of the M&A-process with social identity theory and the modes of acculturation which the seller and buyer may desire prior to entering a deal. Thus, by investigating the actions taken by both an acquirer, “Alfa”, and a targeted firm, “Bravo”, from an acquisition in 2021, have a case study been developed for a later thematic analysis. While the former is a publicly listed company in the central regions of Sweden, is the latter a privately held company in the northern parts. Both companies operate within the construction industry which may limit the transferability to other settings. However, the methodological and qualitative design choices of this study make it possible to favor interpretations and inductive reasoning of the semi-structured interviews through which the data has been collected.  It has been found that there is no one best way for companies who are entering a M&A-deal to make sure that they will be culturally congruent with one another and that various acculturation modes might be simultaneously occurring. From the case has the modes of integration and separation been found to be present which have caused acculturation stress to transpire during the post-deal phase. Having a decentralized structure in tandem with clear communication and sharing information to those individuals being affected by the M&A has been found to be vital factors for mitigating acculturation stress, making parties more congruent, and creating favorable conditions in which implementation can be successful.

<p dir="ltr">Many tasks require processing, filtering, and responding to information from multiple sensory modalities. Crossmodal interactions are common and visual dominance often arises with incongruent sensory information. Past studies have shown that visual dominance tends to be strong in spatial tasks. Experiments in a crossmodal attention switching paradigm with physical-spatial stimuli (e.g., stimuli in left and right locations) have demonstrated a robust visual dominance congruence pattern with conflicting visual-spatial information impairing responses to auditory-spatial stimuli, but conflicting auditory-spatial information having less impact on visual-spatial processing. Strikingly, this pattern does not occur with verbal-spatial stimuli (e.g., the words LEFT and RIGHT as stimuli). In the present study, experiments were conducted to systematically examine the occurrence and underlying basis of this distinction. Participants were presented with either verbal-spatial or physical-spatial stimuli, simultaneously in the visual and auditory modalities, and were to selectively attend and respond to the location of the cued modality. An initial experiment replicated previously reported effects, with similar patterns of crossmodal congruence effects for visual and auditory verbal-spatial stimuli. Three further experiments directly compared crossmodal congruence patterns for physical-spatial and verbal-spatial stimuli across varying attentional conditions. Intermixing verbal and physical spatial stimulus sets did not meaningfully alter the distinct congruence patterns compared to when the sets were blocked, and biasing attention to verbal-spatial processing amplified the modality-congruence interaction for physical-spatial stimuli. Together, the consistent findings of the modality-congruence interaction showing visual dominance for physical-spatial stimuli but not for verbal-spatial stimuli suggests that the effect is driven by the particular spatial sets based on their sensory properties rather than endogenous attentional mechanisms.</p>

Débat public, participation, délibération, autant de termes utilisés pour parler de normes et de dispositifs qui participeraient au nouvel « impératif délibératif » (Blondiaux et Sintomer 2002). Ce mémoire présente une analyse du débat public sur le plan d'urbanisme de Montréal avec un schéma d'analyse inspiré de celui de Simard et Fourniau (2007). Notre discussion du processus de débat porte non seulement sur la phase formelle des audiences publiques, mais aussi sur les étapes de concertation en amont et sur divers processus plus ou moins publicisés en aval. Ceci permet une réflexion d'ordre procédural plus riche qui considère la diversité des dispositifs dans une perspective de complémentarité. Pour chercher des effets du débat public sur le plan d'urbanisme, nous adoptons le parti de la congruence (Offner 1993), ce qui nous amène à une analyse de l'interaction entre des dynamiques contextuelles et des mobilisations des participants au débat. Certaines de ces congruences concordent avec des modifications au plan d'urbanisme. Notre étude propose aussi des implications du contexte particulier de la nouvelle ville de Montréal (avec la création des arrondissements) sur le contenu du débat public, sur certaines de ses manifestations procédurales ainsi que sur sa portée. Notre dernier chapitre montre que la dynamique du débat public en aval, dans la phase de mise en oeuvre du plan d'urbanisme, se déploie beaucoup plus dans les débats sur les grands projets que sur les mécanismes prévus à cette fin, qui comportent des embûches de par leur faible publicité et le caractère technique du processus réglementaire. Dans l'ensemble, notre étude met en lumière l'importance du contexte : autant le processus de débat que ses effets s'inscrivent dans des dynamiques contextuelles. / In this master thesis, the mechanisms of public debate used to discuss the urban master plan of Montreal are analysed with a framework inspired by Simard and Fourniau (2007), which contains a serie of deliberative criterion. Public debate is used as a terminology to include diverse possible mechanisms and norms of debate and of public participation. Our discussion covers not only the formal phase of the debate (in the public hearings) but also the informal forums. We conclude that this allows for a richer procedural analysis based on a perspective of complementarity between diverse mechanisms of public debate. In the search for effects of the public debate on the urban master plan, we found a number of cases where contextual dynamics interacted with the demands of participants. These « congruences » (Offner 1993) concurred with the evolution of the planning document. This master thesis also presents interesting findings related to constraints on public debate brought about by the particular political and institutional context of Montreal. The coordination between the scale of the central city and the newly constituted boroughs had implications on the content of the debate, on procedural components as well as on its impact in the plan and the implementation phase. This suggests that studies of public debate and of public participation events should consider as an important dimension the contextual dynamics.

This thesis extends a localisation theory for finite algebras to certain classes of infinite structures. Based on ideas and constructions originally stemming from Tame Congruence Theory, algebras are studied via local restrictions of their relational counterpart (Relational Structure Theory). In this respect, first those subsets are identified that are suitable for such a localisation process, i. e. that are compatible with the relational clone structure of the counterpart of an algebra. It is then studied which properties of the global algebra can be transferred to its localisations, called neighbourhoods. Thereafter, it is discussed how this process can be reversed, leading to the concept of covers. These are collections of neighbourhoods that allow information retrieval about the global structure from knowledge about the local restrictions. Subsequently, covers are characterised in terms of a decomposition equation, and connections to categorical equivalences of algebras are explored. In the second half of the thesis, a refinement concept for covers is introduced in order to find optimal, non-refinable covers, eventually leading to practical algorithms for their determination. Finally, the text establishes further theoretical foundations, e. g. several irreducibility notions, in order to ensure existence of non-refinable covers via an intrinsic characterisation, and to prove under some conditions that they are uniquely determined in a canonical sense. At last, the applicability of the developed techniques is demonstrated using two clear expository examples. / Diese Dissertation erweitert eine Lokalisierungstheorie für endliche Algebren auf gewisse Klassen unendlicher Strukturen. Basierend auf Ideen und Konstruktionen, die ursprünglich der Tame Congruence Theory entstammen, werden Algebren über lokale Einschränkungen ihres relationalen Gegenstücks untersucht (Relationale Strukturtheorie). In diesem Zusammenhang werden zunächst diejenigen Teilmengen identifiziert, welche für einen solchen Lokalisierungsprozeß geeignet sind, d. h., die mit der Relationenklonstruktur auf dem Gegenstück einer Algebra kompatibel sind. Es wird dann untersucht, welche Eigenschaften der globalen Algebra auf ihre Lokalisierungen, genannt Umgebungen, übertragen werden können. Nachfolgend wird diskutiert, wie dieser Vorgang umgekehrt werden kann, was zum Begriff der Überdeckungen führt. Dies sind Systeme von Umgebungen, welche die Rückgewinnung von Informationen über die globale Struktur aus Kenntnis ihrer lokalen Einschränkungen erlauben. Sodann werden Überdeckungen durch eine Zerlegungsgleichung charakterisiert und Bezüge zu kategoriellen Äquivalenzen von Algebren hergestellt. In der zweiten Hälfte der Arbeit wird ein Verfeinerungsbegriff für Überdeckungen eingeführt, um optimale, nichtverfeinerbare Überdeckungen zu finden, was letztlich zu praktischen Algorithmen zu ihrer Bestimmung führt. Schließlich erarbeitet der Text weitere theoretische Grundlagen, beispielsweise mehrere Irreduzibilitätsbegriffe, um die Existenz nichtverfeinerbarer Überdeckungen vermöge einer intrinsischen Charakterisierung sicherzustellen und, unter gewissen Bedingungen, zu beweisen, daß sie in kanonischer Weise eindeutig bestimmt sind. Schlußendlich wird die Anwendbarkeit der entwickelten Methoden an zwei übersichtlichen Beispielen demonstriert.