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When choosing a gift, the gift-giver has three distinct but interdependent goals: the item must 1) satisfy the recipient 2) be self-reflective for the gift-giver, and 3) indicate the nature of the relationship between the giver and the recipient. However, these goals are often mutually exclusive, making it infeasible for the giver to meet both his/her own and the recipient’s needs with his/her gift choices. In both essays we look at how the important moderator of social closeness between the giver and recipient influences givers’ prioritization of these goals. In Essay 1, we constrain givers to choose from a gift registry and posit that purchasing an identity-incongruent product can threaten an individual’s identity, particularly when purchasing for a close (vs. distant) friend who is an integral part of the self. Five experiments in the context of gift registry show that givers choosing identity-incongruent gifts for a close (vs. distant) friend experience an identity threat and seek to re-establish their shaken identities by endorsing the threatened identity and choosing identity-expressive products in subsequent decisions. In Essay 2 we loosen the constraints of the gift choice and allow givers to choose or reject the gift registry. Our main hypothesis is that when choosing for a close (vs. distant) friend, the giver will discount the recipient’s explicit preferences in favor of a gift that signals the giver’s identity or the relationship between them. However, prior research indicates that close friends choose inaccurately for one another as they conflate their own preferences with those of the recipients’. Thus we suggest that since givers are more likely to make a free choice (vs. registry choice) for a close (vs. distant) friend, they face an increased likelihood of choosing a less desirable gift for their close friends. / text

Many observers are concerned about the ramifications of the policy regulation in Nigeria that allows public servants to accept gifts without restriction on the basis of culture. The purpose of this qualitative case study was to better understand this cultural practice and its implications for the integrity of public servants. Using Mettler and SoRelle's conceptualization of policy feedback theory, the research questions focused on the perceptions of leaders of civic organizations on this cultural practice in relation to the integrity of public servants in a particular region of Nigeria. Data were collected from 10 purposely selected leaders of civic organizations using open-ended, semi-structured interview protocols, and other publicly available documents. The data were subjected to an inductive coding procedure followed by thematic analysis. Findings suggested that the perceptions of the cultural practice of unrestricted giftgiving in the public service were negative and unethical. Consequently, the findings suggested an amendment to the relevant sections of Nigerian Constitution to provide for a restricted monetary value of gifts allowable in the public service. The implications for positive social change include discussing how policy makers and practitioners may be able to act on the study findings to bring about ethical, effective, and efficient public service in Nigeria.

隨著國際化的發展，現今社會可說是文化全球化的現象，人們的日常生活受到各式思想傳播的影響，讓「送禮」這件事成為了日常，也因此增加了多次送禮的機會，而這本該感到開心的事情卻讓不少台灣人感到困擾。根據統計31%的台灣人在選擇禮物時感到壓力，亦衍伸出為了送禮而送禮的行為。除了送禮方面的困擾外，有半數以上的台灣人表示並不喜歡收到的禮物，顯示台灣人不管對於送禮或收禮都備感壓力。此外，網路興盛的發展使台灣人對於網路的使用越來越依賴，許願池平台的發想主要為了解決關於送禮及收禮的問題，「提供一個省時、精準且方便的送禮模式」。為因應台灣人對於網路的依賴設立選購禮物平台，結合多品牌商家提供完善的購物及送禮流程。 商業模式部分，許願池為一平台提供使用者列出許願清單，藉由達到精準送禮吸引使用者在平台進行互相送禮的消費行為，進而讓品牌商家在平台上建立銷售通路，另外，許願池平台會向商家抽成，做為商家的行銷經費，並將部分回饋給使用者，藉此吸引更多的送禮行為。藉由提升整體送禮行為的金流量為平台創造出更多的獲利，故平台宗旨期望能建立平台、使用者與商家三者正向的回饋機制，使網路送禮更加健全。 許願池平台的獲利來源有二，主要來源為平台向商家收取每筆訂單金額8%，扣除回饋3％給消費者後的5%才是平台的營收；另外，許願池也提供廣告版位開放給經銷商於平台投放廣告，藉此可增加商家的曝光率，提高商品被列入許願清單的可能性，同時為許願池平台帶來額外的營收。 最後，透過市場規模評估、銷售預測、損益表與現金流量等進行財務規劃，並在一般預估與保守預估分析下預測損益平衡點分別為第一年與第五年，平台毛利均能穩定成長。 / Referring to the cultural globalization, “gift-giving” is now more and more common all over the world. People get very used to it, yet harassed by it. As we know that “gift-giving” is originally a happy circumstance, it is now becoming standardized though. According to statistics, there’s 31% Taiwanese bothered by gift preparing, and more than 50% people didn’t like the presents they received. It shows up that neither receiving nor preparing gifts caused huge pressure. Due to this situation, here creates a platform called “Gift You Wish” which offers a way to deal with every problem caused by gift-giving, and the main value of “Gift You Wish” would be “a new gift-giving model that offers a convenient and time-saving solution. And for all that matters is its precision.” Besides, people in these days are heavily addicted to internet. For it, “Gift You Wish” creates an online shopping site to combine consumers and stores in one place. It in favor of our members to complete a perfect gift-giving procedure. The business model of “Gift You Wish” is that it opens to every target audience to sign up for free, and make a wish list. All members can glance others wish lists when needed. With the information that collects from every member’s wish list, “Gift You Wish” cooperates with as many stores as it could and combines them to the online shopping site. In addition, all stores owners would have to pay 8% of the products price to “Gift You Wish” in every single order, which is for their marketing expenses. After that, “Gift You Wish” would take 3% out of the 8% as an extra dividend and give it to the members who have sent a gift by our platform. Because of the convenience of “gift-giving” and the extra reward from doing so, it would bring out more cash flow through “Gift You Wish” platform, and makes more profits for “Gift You Wish” as well. It is totally a win-win situation. Apart from the 8% of products price that pay by store owners for marketing expenses to “Gift You Wish”, there’s also another way for the platform to earn profits which would be the advertising banner fee. “Gift You Wish” offers the advertising banner on the platform for advertisers who want to promote their products and brand. And for “Gift You Wish” itself, it’s kind of an extra revenue. Last but not least, there’s some estimation about the market size of “Gift You Wish”, and market potential as well. According to the result from the estimation, the break-even point would be at the first year after the business started; and for the conservative estimation would be at the fifth year. However, the profit of “Gift You Wish” platform perform a steady increase in both estimations.

To the present-day reader texts are widely available. However, to the early modern reader this access was limited. While book ownership increased in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, it was not universal – even libraries were both limited in their collections and exclusive to the communities they served. Libraries were to be found all over Early Modern England, from city libraries to town subscription libraries. One could gain access to books but these collections were often rather limited in the variety and number of books they offered. Undoubtedly many libraries purchased books for their collections, but frequently books were also given to them by benefactors. One fine example of a community library which reflects its readers and members is the library of St Peter’s Cathedral, York Minster. York Minister library owes its existence to traceable benefactors and donations. One could study the collection to give an insight into reading practices and interests of the Early Modern Period. But in doing so we fall foul of becoming static and failing to develop the historiography of Book History. Instead, we can re-evaluate this collection by drawing from the old focus of genres but shifting this focus and approach the collection from a different path: a material path. These books resonate value. Not solely due to their genres and subject matter, but their value is also generated in how the books became accessible, through generosity and donation. As donations from benefactors these books should not be considered solely as works of literature, but as gifts from one agent to another. Gifts given with both intention and purpose.

The Jack Wills brand and the name Jack Wills has become synonymous with an elite group identity in British society, namely the 18-24 demographic of the ‘upper-middle classes’. This group – wealthy, privately educated and attending a Russell Group university – are the subject of this thesis, specifically those involved in the co-ordination and lifestyle events of the Jack Wills brand. This study tracks and distils the identity and sociality of this social group through the prism of the Jack Wills brand’s corporate activity, a role that I outline to be central to the group’s social networking and cohesion through convivial pursuits and lifestyle events. This, I show, creates an elite core group who become the face of the brand; their life being the life-style element that the corporation sells to their consumers. Central to this thesis is the distinction between this elite, core-group of persons that become the basis of Jack Wills advertised lifestyle and those who purchase the product at market. The distinction I make is between a gift and commodity economy where, on the one hand, gifts develop intricate friendships and lasting social ties amongst a small few as an elite segment of the group and commodities, on the other hand, develop a residual role and make those purchasing the clothes an aspirational group. The name of the corporation comes to stand for the name of the group. And this name contains a contradiction; that of the gift and the commodity as the aspired and the aspirational persons, respectively. This contradiction is explored and dubbed ‘the dialectic of gentry’. Tracing this contradiction at the heart of the brand and the gentry group Jack Wills’s target, the thesis traces the value of the brand through ethnographic investigation: What type of economic object is a brand? Arguing it is what anthropologists call ‘inalienable wealth/valuables’, I claim the social group’s elite identity arises through the gifts and patronage the Jack Wills brand supplies them as they withhold these valuables from wider circulation and, therein, the value of the brand is manifested and given its elite stature. Bolstered by ethnographic material I attempt to demonstrate that the Jack Wills brand embodies the aspirational core of elite British identity and aids in the reformation of this elite group in the face of globalising pressures and new forms of sociality mediated by branded goods.

Contract of donation may be considered as one of the most common contractual type of the civil law that everyone can meet in everyday life. On the opposite its present legislation in the Civil Code represents one of the briefest ones in comparison with other contracts regulated there. Not only for this reason problems while interpretation appear, especially with respect to the special legal institute of return of the gift which gives the donor the right to revoke the gift under certain circumstances. The aim of this thesis is to provide its reader the comprehensive view of the contract of donation and subsequently return of the gift itself not only from the viewpoint of the civil theory but also from the perspective of judicial practice when it is impossible to dispense with it given the concise legislation. It is not an easy objective particularly when it comes to the institute of the return of the gift that is defined in only one provision of the Civil Code which provoked just from the beginning of its existence a number of consideration and discussion among professional public over some controversial matters; there is no need to mention that suggested solutions diverge. Then there is also important role of practice of the courts that attempts to interpret the undefined terms, but it is similar as...

1 Summary This thesis deals with the issue of donation and its modalities. Due to the fact that the contract of donation is a very often concluded nominate contract, which is like a contract of purchase or exchange, a legal title of ownership transfer, the topic is contemporary and useful for practice. The aim of this thesis is to analyze the current legal regulation of donation, while using relevant judicial decisions. This thesis consists of eight chapters, which are for the purpose of better clarity logically divided into subchapters. The introductory chapter revolves around the issue of donation in general, especially with respect to the conceptual elements of donation, that is gratuitousness, voluntariness and the object of donation. Separate subchapters are then focused on distinguishing donation from similar legal conduct as well as from the pledge to donate. The second chapter deals with the legal regulation of the contract of donation itself, whereas outlined are firstly the differences between a real and a consensual contract of donation. In this part of the thesis the transfer of ownership of the gift is also briefly tackled. Special subchapter is then dedicated to the issue of parties and subjects of the contract of donation. Also discussed in this chapter is the form of contract of donation as...

The work deals with the topic of portability of test questions and creating a program unit for on-line testing. It mentions standards used for data exchange among e-learning systems and describes formats used for import and export of test questions. On the basis of gained knowledge a concept and subsequently a complex program unit for on-line testing of students were created, which matches the requirements for work with test questions, test management and evaluation and the possibility of exchanging questions with other systems.