Die vorliegende Dissertation behandelt in fünf wissenschaftlichen Artikeln Grundfragen aus dem Themenfeld der Konsumenten-Marken Beziehung. Artikel 1 befasst sich mit der Fragestellung, was Konsumenten dazu führt, eine Marke in Betracht zu ziehen. Artikel 2 untersucht den Zusammenhang von Kundenzufriedenheit und Loyalität. Artikel 3 analysiert Konsumentenreaktionen auf Beziehungsverstöße und die Rolle von Beziehungsnormen. Artikel 4 untersucht den Einfluss negativer Informationen auf die Stärke der Markeneinstellung von Konsumenten. Im abschließenden 5. Artikel werden schließlich Kommunikationsstrategien für den Fall negativer Markenvorfälle entwickelt. / This dissertation consists of five articles concerned with different aspects of consumer-brand relationships. Article 1 looks at what makes consumers consider a brand in the first place, the precondition for a brand to establish a relationship with a consumer. Article 2 deals with sustaining consumer-relationships and the role of satisfaction in retaining customers. Article 3 looks at whether consumers stay with the brand in the case of a relationship problem, actively work to sustain the relationship or silently let it deteriorate. It shows that relationship norms constitute an important factor in how consumers react to such negative incidents in a relationship. Article 4 investigates the effect of negative brand information on consumers’ attitudes and article 5 develops communication strategies for companies to employ when negative brand incidents occur.

I den nuvarande Big data-eran där stora mängder information samlas och bearbetas för att användas i kommersiellt syfte har den digitala integritetens betydelse ökat. Oro kring hur information samlas in och används har blivit mer aktuellt de senaste åren. Facebook-Cambridge Analytica-skandalen är ett exempel på hur information har använts utan användares samtycke med allvarliga konsekvenser. Detta har ökat den oro många känner kring sin personliga integritet. I Europa har General Data Protection Regulation haft en viktig roll i att skydda användares digitala integritet. Tidigare studier visar att oro kring den digitala integriteten har ökat bland vissa grupper i Sverige. En av dessa grupper är universitetsstudenter som är fokus för denna undersökning. Syftet med denna studie var att undersöka oron för den digitala integriteten som finns i samhället utifrån studenters perspektiv. Den metod som har använts är semi-strukturerade intervjuer. Undersökningens resultat visar att studenter känner trygghet när de använder informationsteknologi. Resultatet tyder på att de faktorer som påverkar studenters oro, eller brist på den, för sin digitala integritet är kopplat till tillit och kontext. Resultatet visar att orsaken till detta är tillit till GDPR, tillit till att företag kommer att följa de lagar som finns, tron att viss personlig information inte anses ha högt värde samt tillit till den egna förmågan att kunna skydda sig själva. Resultatet visar också att studenter är villiga att ge tillgång till personlig informationen om de anser att det är nödvändigt eller gynnar dem på något sätt. / In the current Big data era, where large amounts of information is collected and processed for commercial use, the importance of digital integrity has become more evident. The Facebook-Cambdrige analytica scandal is an example on how information has been used without consent. This has increased the concerns about users personal information. In Europe the General Data Protection Regulation has been an important part of protecting users digital integrity.  Previous studies show that concerns about digital integrity have increased among certain groups in Sweden. One of these groups are university graduates which are the focus of this study. The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the concern for digital integrity that exists in society from the students perspective. The method that has been used in this study has been individual semi-structured interviews.  The results of the study shows that students feel secure when they use information technology. The results suggest that the factors that affect students' concerns, or lack thereof, of their digital integrity are linked to trust and context. The results shows that the reason for this is trust in GDPR, trust that companies will follow the law, belief that some personal information isn't of a high value and belief in their own ability to protect themself. The results of the study also shows that the informants were willing to let websites get access to certain personal information when they trusted the website and when they found it beneficial to them.

Till följd av coronapandemin tvingades många organisationer göra en hastig och ofrivillig övergång till distansarbete. Detta skifte i arbetssätt för med sig nya krav, inte minst på ledare som tvingas kommunicera och leda via digitala verktyg. Följaktligen ämnade denna studie undersöka ledares upplevelser under denna tidsperiod och hur ledarskapet medierats med hjälp av informations- och kommunikationsteknik (IKT). För att besvara forskningsfrågan genomfördes semistrukturerade intervjuer med tolv ledare. Empirin analyserades sedan huvudsakligen utifrån en affordance-lins, i kombination med ett leader-member exchange-perspektiv vilket belyser den dyadiska relationen mellan ledare och medarbetare. Resultatet visar på att IKT är oumbärligt för ledarskap på distans, men att en stor problematik ligger i att ledare tidigare utvecklat en ledarskapsstil som till stor del förlitar sig på informell kommunikation och uppföljning som sker fysiskt. Även om individuella egenskaper har en avgörande betydelse för hur väl och i vilken omfattning digitala affordances aktualiseras, påvisas att IKT inte lyckas skapa och förmedla sociala affordances i samma utsträckning som den fysiska miljön. Emellertid har en utveckling skett sedan distansarbetets början och användandet av teknik har alltmer integrerats i ledarskapet. För att uppnå e-ledarskap behöver dock nya e-kompetenser utvecklas, där IKT används effektivt, medvetet och ändamålsenligt. / Due to the covid-19 pandemic, organisations were forced to make a rapid and involuntary transition to teleworking. This shift in labour entails new demands, especially on leaders who are forced to rely on digital tools for communication and leadership. Accordingly, the aim of this study was to investigate experiences of leaders during this period of time, and how leadership is mediated through information and communication technology (ICT). To answer the research question, semi structured interviews were conducted with twelve leaders. The results were primarily analyzed through an affordance lens, combined with a leader-member exchange perspective, which emphasizes the dyadic relationship between leader and follower. The results imply that ICT is essential for remote leadership. However, a major issue arises as leaders previously has developed a leadership style that primarily relies on informal communication and following up with employees face-to-face. Although individual characteristics matter in regards to how well and to what extent digital affordances are actualized, digital tools do not manage to create and transmit social affordances to the same extent as the physical environment. Yet, a progress has been made since the start of the pandemic-induced telework, and the use of ICT has increasingly been integrated in the leadership. To fully reach so-called e-leadership, new e-competencies are nevertheless required, where ICT is applied effectively, deliberately and appropriately.

Bakgrund och problemformulering: Skiftet till digitala banktjänster innebär ett annat arbetssätt att bibehålla förtroendet hos sina kunder då servicen blir mindre personlig. Förtroende och service är en viktig del hos kunderna samtidigt som det ställs nya krav gällande bekvämlighet och automatiserade självtjänster. Mot denna bakgrund är möjliga problem som kan uppstå en bristande säkerhet samt riskerna kring integriteten.   Syftet: Studiens syfte är att undersöka om det finns ett samband mellan kundernas förtroende och bankernas digitala banktjänster. Utöver detta vill forskarna få en förståelse för bankkunders förtroende för sin digitala bank.   Metod: Undersökningen bygger på kvantitativ metod i form av en enkätundersökning som sedan används för att genomföra en korrelationsanalys och regressionsanalys.  Teoretisk referensram: Technology Acceptance Model, Social Exchange Theory, Perceived Risk och Digitala Tillitsmodellen.  Empiri: Empirin har fyra olika fokusområden: kontrollfrågor, förtroende, digitala banktjänster samt risk och säkerhet. Dessa sammanställs och testas i en korrelationsanalys och regressionsanalys för att undersöka samband och testa hypoteser.   Slutsats: Resultatet visar att det föreligger ett positivt samband mellan digitala banktjänsters användbarhet och förtroende för digitala banktjänster samt att upplevd integritetsrisk har ett negativt samband med förtroendet. Trots att det kan finnas ett samband mellan digitala banktjänsternas användarvänlighet och förtroende finns inte tillräckligt med stöd för att bevisa detta. / Background and problem formulation: The shift to digital banking services means a different way of working to maintain the trust of its customers, this as the service has become less personal. Trust and service are valued highly for the customers, while new demands are being made regarding convenience and automated self-service. Against this background, possible problems that may arise are a lack of security and the risks surrounding integrity.  Purpose: The purpose of the study is to investigate whether there is a relationship between customers' trust and the banks' digital banking services. In addition to this, the researchers want to gain an understanding of bank customers' trust in their digital bank.  Method: The survey is based on a quantitative method in the form of a questionnaire which is then used to carry out a correlation and regression analysis.  Framework: Technology Acceptance Model, Social Exchange Theory, Perceived Risk and Digital Trust Model.  Empiricism: The empiricism has four different focus areas: control questions, trust, digital banking services and lastly risk as well as security. These are compiled and tested in a correlation and regression analysis to examine relationships by testing hypotheses.  Conclusions: The findings show that there is a positive relationship between the usability of digital banking services and trust in digital banking services, and that perceived integrity risk has a negative relationship with trust. Although there may be a link between the ease of use of digital banking services and trust, there is not enough support to prove this.

Syfte: Ledarskap är en viktig del i att skapa motivation hos idrottande individer. Med bakgrund mot den dramatiska nedgången av idrottare mellan 18-30 år inom den organiserade idrotten har studien haft som syfte att ta reda på vilken typ av ledarskap som motiverar dessa individer. Studiens förhoppning är att en större förståelse för denna fråga kan leda till att fler individer i den studerade målgruppen stannar inom idrotten vilket i förlängningen kan generera positiva resultat på folkhälsan.  Metod: Genom användningen av en kvalitativ forskningsmetod, har det i denna studie genomförts semistrukturerade intervjuer med en hjälp av konstruerad intervjuguide som bygger på det teoretiska ramverk studien förhåller sig till. Det genomfördes 10 olika intervjuer med respondenter som faller inom den population som studien ämnar att undersöka.   Resultat och slutsats: Studiens resultat visar på att ett mer individanpassat ledarskap skapar mer motivation inom den studerade kontexten. Genom att individanpassa och involvera idrottarna i större grad visar fynden i studien på en större motivation till fortsatt idrottande. I studien kunde en skillnad urskiljas mellan den individuella- och lagidrotten där graden av individanpassning generellt var bättre inom den individuella idrotten.   Examensarbetets bidrag: Denna studie bidrar med kunskap kring hur ledare kan anpassa sin ledarskapsstil i syfte att skapa motivation hos följarna, i detta fall inom en idrottskontext. Studien presenterar även förslag på vilka åtgärder som skulle kunna fungera och bidra till ett större kvarhållande av idrottare. Studien har även kunnat kontextualisera omfattande ledarskapsteorier inom det studerade ämnet. Det genererar en möjlighet till att besvara forskningsfrågan, men även utgöra en grund för framtida forskning inom ämnet.   Förslag på vidare forskning: Studiens frågeställning kan enligt oss besvaras med användningen av olika typer av forskningsmetoder. En kvantitativ forskningsmetod eller liknande kan generera en högre grad av generaliserbarhet i förhållande till populationen. Motivation samt ledarskap och dess implikationer på kvarhållandet av idrottare överlag är även en forskningsbar aspekt som bör beaktas. Det kan vara fördelaktigt att studera olika former av populationer inom samhällets ramar, för att bidra till en bredare förståelse inom ämnet. / Aim: Leadership is an important part of creating motivation amongst athletes. Against the background of the dramatic decline in athletes between the ages of 18-30 in organized sports, the study aims to find out what type of leadership that motivates these individuals. The study aspire to provide with a greater understanding of this issue which in the long run can lead to more individuals, in the studied target group, staying in sports and also generate positive results on public health.  Method: The study uses a qualitative research method in the form of semi-structured interviews. The interviews have been conducted with the help of a constructed interview guide based on the theoretical framework the study relates to. 10 different interviews were realized with respondents who are within the population in which the study intends to examine.    Results and conclusions: The results of the study showed that more individualized leadership creates more motivation within the studied context. By adapting to the individual and involving the athletes to a greater extent, the findings in the study showed a greater motivation for continued sports. In the study, a difference could be distinguished between the individual and team sports where the level of individual adaptation generally was better in the individual sport.  Contribution of the thesis: This study contributes with knowledge about leaders and how they can adapt their leadership style in order to create motivation within the followers, in this case within a sports context. The study also presents suggestions on what measures could work and contribute to greater retention of athletes. The study has also been able to contextualize extensive leadership theories within the studied subject. This generates an opportunity to answer the question in the study, but also form a basis for future research.   Suggestions for further research:We believe that different types of research methods can be applied to conduct this study.  A quantitative research method or similar can generate a greater degree of generalizability in relation to the population. Motivation and leadership and their implications for the retention of athletes in general is also a researchable aspect that should be considered. It can be beneficial to study different forms of populations within the framework of society, in order to generate a broader understanding of the subject.

The ability to backfill leadership positions has become a key focus of business leaders since 2005 when the baby boom workforce started to age. An aging workforce threatens the capability of business leaders to develop leadership pipelines to ensure business success. Grounded by the social exchange theory, the purpose of this qualitative single case study was to explore successful strategies that technology services managers used to align core business objectives to improve succession planning at a technology services organization located in Dallas, Texas. Data collection and triangulation included semi structured telephone interviews with 12 technology services managers, company documents, and archival information. Data analysis included the examination of rich text data, coding, and classification of themes using Yin's 5-step approach. Four themes emerged, revealing that these managers (a) created and sustained a leadership talent pipeline for high potential employees for future leadership roles; (b) sourced internal candidates with core leadership competencies; (c) remediated leadership skills gaps through developed relationships and documented processes; and (d) re-engineered the replacement planning process for the internal leadership talent pipeline. Implications for positive social change include the potential for technology services managers to implement effective succession planning strategies that could increase employee morale, enhance profitability and growth, and promote healthy community partnerships.

The fast development of the tourism industry has created both positive and negative impacts on host communities. Reacting to these impacts, host residents hold various attitudes towards tourism and tourists. It has come to common agreement that a supportive host community plays a vital role in the successful and long-term development of community tourism. In order to explain the antecedents of community attitudes towards tourism, researchers have investigated the topic from both the extrinsic perspective (such as stage-based models) and the intrinsic perspective (such as the Social Exchange Theory). Nevertheless, there are still several important research gaps and deficiencies within the existing literature. First, the influence of psychological factors (personality) on attitudes towards tourism is somewhat neglected. Second, when examining the relationship between community attitudes towards tourism and the influential factors, the majority of previous studies do not distinguish the orthogonal dimensions of attitudes (such as positive dimension and negative dimension). Third, the existing literature has not addressed the issue of whether specific attitudes towards tourism will lead to a corresponding behaviour when interacting with tourists, and what other factors are determinant in host-guest interactive behaviour. Aiming to address such research gaps and deficiencies, this study has a major objective of developing a theoretical model (encompassing attitude element) to understand the antecedents of host-guest interaction. A quantitative approach was employed for the entire project. A self-administrated questionnaire survey was used to collect primary data. A total of 878 useful questionnaires were returned for analyses. Stratification sampling methods were utilized in communities where population database was accessible, while random sampling methods were used in other communities. The findings from this study confirmed the two major hypotheses in terms of community attitudes towards tourism. First, there was a significant relationship between an individual's personality and his/her attitudes towards tourism. Residents being high on Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion and Agreeableness traits and low on the Neuroticism trait tended to be more positive towards tourism than their counterparts. Second, while some factors were found to be influential on both positive and negative dimensions of attitudes towards tourism, others only demonstrated influences on one dimension. The Resident-Tourist Interaction Model developed in this study provided a comprehensive theoretical framework in modelling and predicting host residents' interactive behaviour towards tourists. Drawing on the evaluation results of three leading behavioural theories belonging to the school of cognition, the Model identified attitudinal, volitional, social, motivating and habitual factors for the prediction of resident-tourist interactive behaviour. Motivating factor (intention) was the critical and immediate element for action, which, in turn, was best predicted by subjective norms. External factors (gender, age and personality traits) only moderated the predictive power of the Model by less than two percent. The Model was valid and reliable for the current data. The present study advanced resident-tourist interactive behavioural study by establishing a sound theoretical framework. It also consolidated the body of knowledge in understanding community attitudes towards tourism. Findings from this study have significant practical implications for community tourism planning and management.

This paper explores the political behavior process in information system implementation process. The organizational politics is the critical success/failure factor in the IS implementation process. We expect to understand, in different organizational contexts, what kind of political behavior will occur? What will be the events and processes of these political behaviors? Who's idea? At what time? In what setting? What will be the interaction among these dimensions? How will these political behaviors affect IS outcome and organization? This study will explain political behavior in IS implementation process from different interpretations and perspectives. This study relies on qualitative data collected from two cases--manufacturer Theta and government enterprise Delta--in the forms of interviews, documented data, archival data, and observation over eight month. The data are interpreted through five internally coherent theoretical perspectives: personal perspective, strategic contingency theory, conflict theory, social exchange theory, and structuration theory. Contributions include the following. In practice, we group 35 kind of political behavior into four types: aggression, defense, strengthen, withdrawal. Besides the adverse effects, some kinds of political behavior can lead to the success of the project. The detailed descriptions we use to describe the political behavior process in IS implementation process can help in similar cases to show how to reduce or prevent any negative consequences. Academically, we conduct contextual and process theory analyses of these processes, and use five theoretical perspectives to interpret these phenomena.

The aim of this dissertation was (1) to examine the work choice motivation for accepting the contingent employment in relation to various outcomes (job satisfaction, job involvement, and psychological contract) and the effect on work performance (obedience, and work expectation), and (2) to test whether workers¡¦ interaction may assist in explaining difference between the various outcome and the effect on work performance. The results of this study challenged earlier assumptions on the importance of volition in temporary work research. Analyses were based on a sample of 415 contingent workers from various organizations and types of the contingent employment. The most striking findings were that work choice motivation did not consistently associate with favorable outcomes and the effect on work performance, and that the relationship between work choice motivations related to work performance outcomes were non-significant. By way of contrast, self-fulfilling motive has positively effects on job satisfaction and job involvement, work-life balance motive and self-constrain motive have positive effect on psychological contract, and work control motive has negative effect on job involvement, and psychological contract. Also, this dissertation established that workers¡¦ interaction may have potential to improve the variations on predictions. The result showed that task-related interaction between standard and contingent workers has positive effect on job satisfaction, job involvement, work expectation, and obedience. Moreover, the non-task related interaction has negative effect on obedience. The interaction effects of work choice motivation and workers¡¦ interaction on job attitudes and work performance were also examined in this study. The result shows that the interaction between work-life balance motive and non-task related interaction has positive effect on psychological contract. Moreover, the interaction effect of self-constrain motive and non-task related interaction also has positive effect on psychological contract. The implications were also discussed in this study.

Social games have become popular on social media such as Facebook and MySpace. While there are plenty of market reports regarding social media, the related academic research is limited. This study applies Homans’ cost‐reward structure from Social Exchange Theory to investigate how social games change people’s social behavior on social media. The concepts of rewards are drawn from the gratifications of social media use, and the concepts of costs are drawn form the symptoms of media addiction. In a survey of 323 college students, participants’ perceived rewards and costs of Facebook use and game play are measured. The results indicate social game players perceived significantly higher costs of Facebook use than non‐players. In addition, costs of Facebook use and costs of game play also play important roles to influence social game players’ willingness to play more social games. Discussion and limitations are provided. / text