Abstrakt Bakgrund: Äldre människor använder allt mer läkemedel. Risken för biverkningar och interaktioner ökar och benägenheten att följa ordinationen minskar ju fler mediciner en person använder. Undersökningar visar att patientens attityd har stor betydelse när det gäller att följa ordinerad behandling. Syfte: Att belysa äldre människors attityder till och erfarenheter av läkemedel i glesbygd i Norrlands inland. Metod: För studien valdes en kvalitativ forskningsmetod. Elva äldre personer intervjuades. Materialet analyserades med hjälp av kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultat: De äldre hade en övervägande positiv attityd till läkemedel och kände sig trygga med sin medicinering. De som använde flera ordinerade läkemedel tyckte att medicinerna hade haft avsedd verkan. Negativa till läkemedel var de som inte använde eller använde ett fåtal läkemedel. Alla med flera ordinerade mediciner hade drabbats av biverkningar men såg det inte som något stort problem. Utbytesmediciner upplevdes övervägande negativt. Informationen från läkaren uppfattades som god av de flesta medan några tyckte att den varit bristfällig. Farmaceuter uppfattades trovärdiga av halva gruppen medan hälften inte hade någon direkt uppfattning. Läkemedelsreklam påverkade inte de äldre. Hela gruppen kände till naturläkemedel men mindre än hälften använde det. Slutsats: Äldre var övervägande positiva till läkemedel och kände sig trygga. De hade anpassat sig till de problem och de speciella svårigheter som medicineringen innebar för dem och accepterade situationen.

De fristående sparbankerna går en oviss framtid till mötes. Omvärldens krav ökar ständigt vilket leder till sammanslagningar sparbanker emellan. Mitt syfte med uppsatsen var därför att undersöka vilka faktorer som främst påverkar sparbankernas framtid. Med ett induktivt förhållningssätt har jag genomfört intervjuer med personer som är väl förtrogna med sparbanksbranschen, fått berättat för mig deras åsikter samt läst in mig på teori och därmed dragit vissa slutsatser om framtidens sparbanker. Jag har kommit fram till att sparbankerna i framtiden kommer att få arbeta allt hårdare med regelverk, vilket kommer att krävas av samtliga intressenter inklusive kunder. Storleken på framtidens sparbanker kommer med säkerhet att vara helt annorlunda än idag. De små bankerna får ge vika för större enheter vilket främst kommer att ske via sammanslagningar. Sparbankernas personal kommer det i framtiden också att ställas högre krav på då högre kompetens och kvalifikationer hela tiden krävs. De allra minsta sparbankskontoren på landsbygden sjunger även de på sista versen då säkerheten inte anses tillfredställande och framtidens kunder inte kommer att kräva dess fysiska existens i samma utsträckning som idag. Branschglidning och internet är andra starka motorer som i framtiden kommer att påverka sparbankernas tjänste- och produktutbud, verksamhetsområden och servicekanaler. Sparbankerna måste bara se till att vara väl förberedda för dessa framtidsfaktorer så att deras goda namn och existens i framtiden fortfarande är berättigad.

Social support has been associated with reduced mortality and morbidity from a number of causes. To assess possible mechanisms of action relating to cardiovascular (CV) responsiveness, 90 male and female university students delivered a five-minute speech on a controversial topic to a same-sex laboratory confederate. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of three conditions in which the confederate either (a) agreed with the subject, (b) remained impassive (neutral), or (c) disagreed with the subject. Blood pressure (SBP and DBP) and heart rate (HR.) were monitored throughout the experiment. Self-report measures of state self-esteem and affective state were taken pre- and post-task, and reactions to the task were assessed with post-task self-report measures. Subjects reported strong differences in supportiveness of the confederate in the three conditions. Self-report data indicated increase in arousal during the speech (a finding synchronous with CV data), and they reported the Disagree condition to be less pleasant than the Agree condition. CV data were analyzed as a 2 x 3 (sex by experimental condition) repeated measures ANOVA assessing changes from baseline to speech task. Sex differences on CV measures matched patterns generally reported: Men had higher SBP and lower HR than women. All CV measures increased significantly and substantially during the speech task. HR was higher in the Disagree and Neutral conditions than in the Agree condition. SBP and DBP did not differ by condition. There were no sex by condition interactions; however, there was a trend towards men’s HR increasing more in the neutral condition and women’ more in the disagree condition. These data partially support earlier findings in similar experiments while suggesting that subtleties of context, task selection, and content of supportive interaction may have significant impact on the degree to which social support attenuates CV response to social stressors. Unanswered questions for future research are delineated, and implications for designing and implementing interventions that enhance social support are discussed.

Two studies were performed to provide insight into the causes and effects of client noncompliance to behavioral treatments. An Analogue Study was performed in which undergraduate participants were taught about progressive muscle relaxation. Participants were randomly assigned to either a directive condition (which placed an emphasis on describing relaxation as an expert would) or a supportive condition (which emphasized incorporating relaxation into the person's daily life). Results indicated that participants in the supportive condition reported higher levels of enjoyment, satisfaction, and homework compliance than participants in the directive condition, but did not display significantly different levels of intrasession noncompliance. As well, a Clinical Study served as a naturalistic study involving six therapist-mother pairs where the mother was presenting with parenting difficulty and worked with the therapist during six sessions of behavioral parent training. This study surprisingly found that mothers were more likely to show noncompliance immediately following therapist supportive behavior than after directive behavior, but that overall levels of directive behavior resulted in less homework completion, and that overall levels of supportive therapist behavior corresponded with higher client satisfaction and lower overall levels of intra-session noncompliance. As well, therapists were more likely to respond to client noncompliance with supportive rather than directive behavior. Reconciliation of these results with previous research was discussed, along with limitations to these studies and potential areas for future research.

La question posée est: le vote par internet à distance est-il conforme aux exigences du droit électoral québécois et canadien? Ce mémoire procède en trois étapes. Premièrement, nous déterminons quels sont les principes directeurs qui assurent à une élection sa légitimité. Deuxièmement, nous raffinons notre recherche en ne conservant que les principes qui demeurent pertinents dans un contexte électronique. Le vote doit répondre aux principes suivants: suffrage universel, périodicité, égalité, secret, liberté, sécurité et transparence du processus. Troisièmement, nous transposons les étapes du cycle électoral sur internet. Les problématiques identifiées relèvent davantage de facteurs politiques que techniques ou juridiques. Ainsi la cryptographie et l'introduction du vote individuel multiple, qui n'enregistre que le dernier vote effectué, serviraient la confidentialité du vote. La sécurité du processus pourrait être atteinte notamment par des mesures de protection physique des serveurs, une chaîne de contrôles continue et la diffusion du code source du logiciel du vote. L'accès à la technologie serait accru par la mise en place d'un réseau gratuit de points d'accès publics à internet et des activités de formation. Quant à l'accès aux handicapés, la conformité du logiciel de vote à des principes reconnus d'accessibilité y contribuerait. Pour l'identification, la stratégie des secrets partagés, entre électeurs et autorité électorale, permettrait de dématérialiser cette étape. En conclusion, les lois électorales ne s'opposent pas, dans leur esprit, au vote par internet à distance. Il suffirait de les actualiser dans leur forme. / To come to an answer, this thesis employed a three step approach; firstly, we determined the guiding principles which ensure an election's legitimacy. Secondly, we refined our research by retaining only the principles relevant in an electronic context. The vote must abide by the following principles: Vote for all, periodicity, equality, secrecy, freedom, safety and transparency of the process. Thirdly, we transposed the stages of the electoral cycle on the Internet. The identified problems are more political than they are legal or technical. For instance, the confidentiality of the vote can be helped with the use of cryptography, and the introduction of the multiple individual vote, which would make it possible to record only the last vote cast. The safety of the process can be reached by measures of physical protection of the servers, a continuous control mechanism and an access to the source code of the voting software. Accessibility to the technology could be increased with a network of public access points to the Internet, and with education clinics. With respect to the handicapped voters, the voting software should comply with recognised principles of accessibility. To identify the voters, shared secrecies between the voter and the electoral authorities could allow a dematerialisation of this procedure. In conclusion, the spirit of our electoral laws would allow for the introduction of an Internet voting process. / "Mémoire présenté à la Faculté des études supérieures en vue de l'obtention du grade de LL.M. en droit option droit des technologies de l'information"

Cross infection is a global health problem. The cost for cross infection increases every year. Florence Nightingale focused her attention on preventing cross infections by using good hygiene and as a nurse that is one of your more important tasks. Nurses have guidelines for how hygiene should be implemented in practice. The aim of this study is to investigate factors that influence nurses´ compliance to guidelines regarding hygiene. A literature review was used to analyze scientific articles related to the topic. The result showed that education increases nurses´ compliance to follow guidelines. Furthermore compliance to hand hygiene was higher after contact with the patient then before. The result also showed that the nurses were more worried about attracting an infection from the patient then giving an infection to the patient. The studies revealed that nurses want more education about guidelines and the latest research on the subject. The authors think that nurses need more education about hygiene in order to understand the importance of following guidelines. Nurses also need time for both reading updated information infection control and implementing the hygiene guidelines more frequently in practice.

Two studies were conducted to examine the hypothesis that compliance may be a "keystone" behaviour for intervention for children with developmental delays. The relations among children's behaviours were examined during teaching sessions conducted either by children's mother or an unfamiliar examiner. Specifically, the relations between children's compliance with instructional requests and their attention, affect (positive and negative), and inappropriate behaviours (inappropriate object use, inappropriate vocalizations, inappropriate sitting, wandering, and self-directed behaviour) were examined. In both studies, highly compliant children showed less negative affect and were more attentive to the tasks than were less compliant children. Highly attentive children, in turn, showed less out-of-seat behaviour/wandering, less inappropriate object use, and less negative affect, than did less attentive children. / In the second study, the hypothesis that delayed children may have greater difficulties with self-regulation than nondelayed children was investigated by examining-the effects of task difficulty on children's behaviour and affect during instruction. The responses of preschoolers with developmental delays Were compared to those of their nondelayed peers during two types of tasks (verbal and visual-perceptual) presented at three levels of difficulty (easy, moderate, and difficult). The tasks were presented in a standardized manner by an unfamiliar adult to minimize extraneous sources of variation in children's responding. To ensure that children in all groups received comparably difficult tasks, task difficulty was defined using an individualized procedure. Thus, group differences in children's responses to task requests could not be attributed to differences in their level of developmental functioning. Finally the associations between children's behaviours and task performance were examined to identify the behaviours that contributed to task success. / The results indicated that even when given comparably difficult tasks, children with delays showed less tolerance for task demands than did their nondelayed peers. The delayed children were less compliant than the nondelayed children during moderately difficult and difficult tasks and were also less attentive than the controls during difficult tasks. Also, whereas the delayed children showed reductions in compliance and on-task attention with increases in task difficulty, the nondelayed children were equally compliant and attentive at all levels of task difficulty. / All children were more compliant and attentive and showed less inappropriate behaviour during the visual-perceptual than the verbal tasks. Furthermore, compliance was strongly associated with children's performance on both types of tasks. The findings are interpreted as evidence that children with delays may have greater difficulties with emotion and self-regulation than their nondelayed peers.

This research aimed to develop a deeper understanding of trust and non-profit agency website design, and specifically focussed on the ‘Donate Now’ button. Two experiments investigated the effects of varying levels of consumer certainty, manipulated by providing varying levels of donation relevant information on the web homepage donation buttons, on aid agency trust and donation compliance. Both experiments were based on Study 1, a preliminary survey of website donation button design. Experiment 1 investigated the effects of iconic manipulation of the ‘Donate Now’ button. Results suggested that varying levels of consumer certainty through iconic manipulation of the website donation button design did not effect aid agency trust and donation compliance. Experiment 2 extended the research of Burt and Dunham (2009) to investigate the effects of varying consumer certainty levels through the provision of crisis/need and response photographs on the donation buttons. Results suggested that whilst there was no effect of level of certainty on donation compliance, there was an effect on aid agency trust. Participants’ rated aid agency trust was increased to the greatest extent in the level of greatest certainty, when the donation button contained photographs of both the crisis/need and agency response. Collectively, these results suggest that aid agency trust can be enhanced through the considered manipulation of donation button design. Subsequently photographic images may be a more effective means with which to portray donation-relevant information and reduce uncertainty. Furthermore, in both experiments results showed that those individuals who reported higher aid agency trust also reported significantly higher donation intention. Thus, the current research has implications for the non-profit sector, suggesting that whilst the internet is a viable fundraising tool, the commercially driven process of online donation generation should not be isolated from the psychological concept of trust.

There is no abstract available for this dissertation. / Department of Educational Leadership

An ongoing therapeutic concern has been effectiveness of treatment (success and satisfaction). Mahalik and Kivlighan (1988) suggested that by examining the fit between type of counseling environment and personality type, reasons for satisfaction or dissatisfaction can be better understood. Research in this area, however, is limited. The present study examined the congruence between an individual's personality and the counseling environment, using Holland's model of personenvironment interaction to examine this relationship. This study also explored the underutilization of and dissatisfaction with counseling by certain Holland personality types and the congruence of clientcounselor environment interaction as an explanation of male underutilization of counseling.Ninety four students from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, participated in this study. Participants observed a videotape illustrating a particular counseling environment and completed four questionnaires: 1) the Self-Directed Search; 2) the Expectations About Counseling-Brief Form; 3) the Attitudes Toward Counseling; and 4) the Perception of Counseling Environment. The following hypotheses were tested: (hypothesis 1) Scores on Holland's typology will predict group membership (male and female). a) Artistic and Social scores will relate positively to female group membership. b) Realistic, Investigative, and Enterprising scores will relate positively to male group membership. (hypothesis 2) Scores on Holland's typology and gender will predict attitudes toward counseling. a) Realistic, Investigative, and Conventional scores will relate negatively to more favorable attitudes toward counseling. b) Social and Artistic scores will relate positively to more favorable attitudes toward counseling. c) Female status will relate positively to more favorable attitudes toward counseling. (hypothesis 3) Scores on Holland's typology and gender will predict perception of counseling environment. a) Realistic, Investigative, and Conventional scores and male status will relate positively to a more favorable perception of the Self-Help (more structured, less personally interactive) type counseling environment. b) Social and Artistic scores and female status will relate positively to a more favorable perception of the Social/Interactive (more abstract, more personally interactive) type counseling environment. Analyses included stepwise discriminant analysis predicting group membership, stepwise multiple regression analyses predicting gender, certain Holland types, and perception of counseling environment, and a 2 x 2 analysis of variance to analyze the interaction between gender and type of counseling environment.As expected, scores on Holland's typology predicted group membership. Results of the multiple regression analyses generally predicted attitudes toward counseling and perception of counseling environment. The interaction between gender and type of counseling environment was significant with females rating the Social/Interactive type counseling environment more positively than the Self-Help type counseling environment and males rating the Self-Help type counseling environment more positively than the Social/Interactive type of counseling environment. Implications of these findings and limitations and recommendations for future research are discussed. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services