<p>According to the heuristics and biases approach, the representativeness heuristic (RH) is one of the heuristics available for assessing subjective probabilities (A. Tversky & D. Kahneman, 1974). A subjective probability assessed by the RH is determined by how representative the target object is of the target category. Several aspects of the RH are argued to cause systematic biases, for example: (<i>i</i>) When the RH is used, the category is represented by one single prototypical exemplar. This feature is argued to cause biases such as misperception of chance and insensitivity to sample size. (<i>ii</i>) The RH assesses the inverse rather than the conditional probability. This feature is argued to cause biases such as the conjunction fallacy and base-rate neglect.</p><p>The present thesis focuses on the cognitive aspects of the RH. Three studies were conducted. Overall, data indicated that the RH does not play a major role when subjective probabilities are assessed. Study I indicated that subjective probabilities are not typically determined by how representative the target object is of the target category. Study II indicated that the category is not represented by one single prototypical exemplar when subjective probabilities are assessed. Study III indicated that conjunction fallacies are not caused by the RH. </p><p>The results presented in Studies I-III cast serious doubts on the claim that subjective probabilities are routinely assessed using the RH. Rather, Studies I-II suggested that subjective probabilities are based on exemplar memory and Study III suggested that the conjunction fallacy is caused by people combining component probabilities in a an inappropriate way. In the General Discussion, it is suggested that people use a weighted average rule when combining component probabilities into conjunction probabilities. A simulation showing the ecological relevance of the weighted average rule is presented.</p>

The general aim of the thesis is to answer questions on general and differential aspects of perceived exertion and on the measurement of its intensity variation. Overall perceived exertion is commonly treated as a unidemensional construct. This thesis also explores its multidimensional character. Four empirical studies are summarized (Study I-IV). Psychophysical power functions of perceived exertion obtained with the new improved Borg CR100 (centiMax) scale were found to be consistent with results obtained with absolute magnitude estimation, and with the classical Borg CR10 and RPE scales. Women gave significantly higher perceived exertion scale values than men for the same levels of workload on a bicycle ergometer. This agrees with the fact that they were physically less strong than men. With regard to the measurement of “absolute” levels of intensity, RPE- and CR-scale values were validated by physiological measurements of heart rate and blood lactate. Predicted values of maximal individual performance obtained from psychophysical functions agreed well with actual maximal performance on the bicycle ergometer. This confirms the validity of the RPE and CR scales for measuring perceptual intensity and their value for interindividual comparisons. To study the multidimensional character of perceived exertion, 18 symptoms were measured with a CR scale: in a questionnaire, and in bicycle ergometer work tests. Five factors were extracted for the questionnaire: (1) Muscles and joints; (2) Perceived exertion; (3) Annoyance/lack of motivation; (4) Head/stomach symptoms; and (5) Cardiopulmonary symptoms. Four factors were extracted for the bicycle max test: (1) Physical distress; (2) Central perceived exertion; (3) Annoyance/lack of motivation; (4) Local perceived exertion. The questionnaire is suggested for clinical use to let patients express a variety of symptoms. The thesis also resulted in improvements of the Borg CR100 scale. An extended use of the scale is recommended.

According to the heuristics and biases approach, the representativeness heuristic (RH) is one of the heuristics available for assessing subjective probabilities (A. Tversky &amp; D. Kahneman, 1974). A subjective probability assessed by the RH is determined by how representative the target object is of the target category. Several aspects of the RH are argued to cause systematic biases, for example: (i) When the RH is used, the category is represented by one single prototypical exemplar. This feature is argued to cause biases such as misperception of chance and insensitivity to sample size. (ii) The RH assesses the inverse rather than the conditional probability. This feature is argued to cause biases such as the conjunction fallacy and base-rate neglect. The present thesis focuses on the cognitive aspects of the RH. Three studies were conducted. Overall, data indicated that the RH does not play a major role when subjective probabilities are assessed. Study I indicated that subjective probabilities are not typically determined by how representative the target object is of the target category. Study II indicated that the category is not represented by one single prototypical exemplar when subjective probabilities are assessed. Study III indicated that conjunction fallacies are not caused by the RH. The results presented in Studies I-III cast serious doubts on the claim that subjective probabilities are routinely assessed using the RH. Rather, Studies I-II suggested that subjective probabilities are based on exemplar memory and Study III suggested that the conjunction fallacy is caused by people combining component probabilities in a an inappropriate way. In the General Discussion, it is suggested that people use a weighted average rule when combining component probabilities into conjunction probabilities. A simulation showing the ecological relevance of the weighted average rule is presented.

Personality and brand factors were examined to determine if consumers of certain personality dimensions would be more favorable toward specific brand factors of three major sports media companies: Sports Illustrated, ESPN, and Fox Sports News. College-age sports news followers were tested to ascertain personality, brand evaluation, and media usage. Findings disclosed associations of personality dimension and brand preference, for example, “Agreeable” participants favored ESPN branding. Participants scoring low on “Extroversion” favored the Sports Illustrated brand. Other findings included an association between “Agreeableness” and TV; and frequent digital media users favored ESPN. Findings have implications for integrating personality research in marketing strategies that target college-age consumers.

The thesis focuses on gender in primary school and the aim was to study how girls and boys construct their subjectivities in accordance with current gender discourses and how they take up those discourses in school practices. Special attention has been paid to the students' fluid subjectivities. The theoretical frameworks used are Bronwyn Davies' postructural subjectivity theory, Robert W Connells' structural concepts and cultural-sociological research studies concerning multicultural identity. The study was carried out at two schools, one ethnically homogeneous and one ethnically heterogeneous, in six classes encompassing years 0-2 and 5-6. It is ethnographic in nature and includes classroom observations, diaries, biographies, drawings, interviews with students and schoolteachers/headteachers and videotaping on a restricted scale. Data was collected over a period of approximately two school years. The results consist of local gender discourses emanating from the datamaterial and also of poststructural analyses of protocols from lessons etc. Five feminine and six masculine gender discourses, named student types, have been diagnosed: Sporty girl, Barbie, Feminist, Academic girl and Motherly girl and Macho boy, Honourable boy, Academic, Joker, Gentle boy and Ken. These student types are abstract discursive constructions developed from positions the student took up in a more or less repetitive way. They apperar in all classes but with varying frequency due to the influence of the schools' interest profile, leading teachers or leading students. Certain gender discourses are influenced by commercial trends in society, others are characterized by reactions towards the school's academic discourses. Students from working class backgrounds often take up positions as Macho boy or Sporty girl while middle class students dominate the type Academic boy/girl. Otherwise the positions are independent of social class. Immigrant students take up the most common discourses, probably an effect of ambitions to normalise to the majority culture. The analysis reveals that a dualistic and hierarchical gender structure, with male superiority was developed in all school classes and also among the boys in their own gendergroups, and among the girls but in a lesser degree. Teachers' discourses, education strategies, group size and the student's ages influence the gender order during lessons but less so during breaks. Both girls and boys, and some teachers, shift positions and even cross gender boundaries and the younger students (year 0-2) are more flexiable as also are the girls. This is considered to provide openings for changes in gender patterns. Consistently taking up equality discourse in practice influenced the gender order in one class. Some boys showed multiple subjectivities free from desire for power and some girls also wanted to break the gender barrier. Ideas about innate equalities between the genders were common and these circumstances might provide good resources for work aimed at changing gender structures. Macho and Barbie discourses ought to be questioned from the perspective of power. The results also show that cultural meetings in the classroom are characterised by the dominance of the majority culture. Immigrant students in accordance with the curriculum should experience integration taking place from two directions, enriching and strengthing their subjectivity process and also that of their fellow students. / digitalisering@umu

This study investigated age differences in generalization of causal value employing similarity as a cue to causality. Exemplars from six food categories (A+, B-, C+, D-. E+, F-) were presented to both young and older adults in two contiguous training phases. Training Phase 1 included exemplars from categories A+, B-, C+, D-. Training Phase 2 included exemplars from A+, B-, E+, F-. Foods in the “+” categories were paired with an outcome of sickness and foods in the “-” categories were not paired with sickness. Tests of causal judgment and exemplar recognition were conducted. For causal judgment, individual exemplars experienced during training and novel exemplars from all six categories were presented. For categories A+ and B-, the categories experienced in both training phases, young and older groups generalized the causal value to the category label and to all exemplars regardless of whether they were experienced in training or were novel. For categories experienced only once in training (C+, D-, E+, F-), both groups were better able to successfully judge causal value for experienced exemplars than novel exemplars. For young and older adults, experience made a difference in the ability to generalize causal value. Experienced and novel exemplars were also presented for recognition. Participants in both age groups showed a false memory effect for individual exemplars from the more experienced categories (A+, B-) suggesting that the process that allowed them to generalize causal value also interfered with their memory for individual exemplars. There was a difference between the younger and older groups for the categories that were only experienced once in training (C+, D-, E+, F-). In this case, younger participants showed better recognition than older adults for the individual exemplars. Older adults showed the same false memory effects for these categories as they showed for categories A+ and B-. These findings suggest that older adults generalize causal value as well as younger adults, but they are less able to distinguish individual exemplars. This discrepancy may be explained by differences in ability to use verbatim and gist. Older adults’ reduced verbatim processing leads to default gist encoding that enables them to focus on category level features but not process detailed exemplar identity (Brainerd & Reyna, 1990). Younger adults appear to have a flexibility that enables them to encode and retrieve both category-level gist and verbatim individualexemplar features when the task calls for it.

A section of the total tangent space of a scheme X of finite type over a field k, i.e. a vector field on X, corresponds to an X-valued 1-jet on X. In the language of jets the notion of a vector field becomes functorial, and the total tangent space constitutes one of an infinite family of jet schemes Jm(X) for m ≥ 0. We prove that there exist families of “logarithmic” jet schemes JDm(X) for m ≥ 0, in the category of k-schemes of finite type, associated to any given X and its family of divisors D = (D₁, . . . ,Dr). The sections of JD₁(X) correspond to so-called vector fields on X with logarithmic poles along the family of divisors D = (D₁, . . . ,Dr). To prove this, we first introduce the categories of pairs (X,D) where D is as mentioned, an r-tuple of (effective Cartier) divisors on the scheme X. The categories of pairs provide a convenient framework for working with only those jets that pull back families of divisors.

Communication is very common in human life. In fact, we take communication for granted and do not think about the challenges involved except when miscommunication happens. When two people communicate, information is exchanged. Each piece of information that comes through eliminates a series of structural choices an individual has available to him. According to Shannon‟s information theory, information reduces uncertainty by selecting one item from a set of possible items. That is Information distinguishes between relevant and irrelevant items in a set essentially dividing the set into two categories. Knowing also implies distinction or classification. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the relationship between information and knowledge by observing what happens when people communicate to each other in an experimental context. The focus of our observation is on three main situations: – 1. What happens when people communicate to each other in the context of known categorical attributes; 2. What happens when people communicate in the context of unknown categorical attributes; and 3. How is the communication process affected in the presence of known but misleading attributes as, for instance, in a situation of a cross-functional communication in organization? By studying the interaction between pairs of participants, we propose that information and categorical knowledge relate to each other, as in a duality, and influence the communication process. The study comprises four experimental conditions. This thesis provides a description of the experimental conditions, a brief report on what happened during people‟s performance, as well as some preliminary findings based on observations.

In recent years, there are several studies concerning brand and fashion. Nonetheless, there are few studies conducted on fashion brand which concerns embodying various industries. Without a doubt, brand value is the key factor of fashion industries success. This study will try to research on the broader usage of brand value. The purpose of this study is to research the influence of consumer¡¦s purchasing intention and willingness to pay of the commodities under each product categories; after combining with the fashion brand, under the different evaluation of fashion brand. The four hypotheses in the study are directed towards the relationship between consumers recognized evaluation of fashion brand, purchasing intention and willingness to pay for the brand separately. Hence, the investigation here will be to scrutinize the change of consumer¡¦s purchasing intention and willingness to pay after combining with particular fashion brand. The following hypotheses will be tested through a designated questionnaire with the convenience sampling method. A total number of 197 questionnaires were returned. By using a number of statistical methods and exploring the relationship between each variances and testing each hypotheses, the following conclusions are generated¡G 1. The study infers that products are non-convenience goods¡Bunnecessary goods¡Bhigh-durability¡Bhigh-visibility¡Bhigh-using-frequency can increase the consumers¡¦ willingness to pay after combining with the fashion brand. 2. The fashion brand with high-brand-evaluation when combined with most of product categories¡¦ commodities will evidently boost consumers¡¦ purchasing intention and willingness to pay. Thus, we can try to develop more feasible proposal. 3. Even in the industries that are unsuitable to incorporate the idea of fashion, we may still be able to find a feasible proposal. 4. The study suggests that fashion brands do the wholly survey on the bicycle industry and analyze their possibility and potential in this industry. Further research on the market of bicycles should be directed specifically towards young women who earn lower than 1,500,000 per year. Keywords: Fashion, Brand, Evaluation of Fashion Brand Product Category, Purchasing Intention, Willingness to Pay

Recently, there is a new advertising model created by Groupon. Its major attractions include high discount and e-coupon as transaction object. In addition, it is presented as an online group-buying business model and usually has a limit on transaction volume. Due to the prosperous growth of Groupon advertising model, this study explores what factors affect the performance of Groupon advertising model based on the empirical data and literature review. Based on the literature review and preliminary analysis of the collected empirical data, we proposed seven factors which may affect the performance of Groupon advertising model. They are discount, price, limit on transaction volume, urban income, population density, threshold of transaction and product category. These factors were included as independent variables in the regression model. The results indicated that discount, urban income, population density and threshold of transaction have significant effects on advertising performance. Among them, the threshold of transaction has the most significant impact. It indicates that setting a threshold of transaction will facilitate the transaction volume. In addition, the results also indicated that different product categories result in different performance. However, the population density has no significant impact on the advertising performance.