Magister Public Health - MPH / Background: Cerebral malaria (CM) kills up to 25% of its patients and about one third of its survivors develop neurological impairments (NIs). With advancements in diagnostic and management techniques for CM, more children are likely to survive. The increase in the number of CM survivors may increase the prevalence of children with NIs. In Malawi, rehabilitation for children with NIs is mostly institution-based with erratic community-outreach services, resulting in poor long-term outcomes. To date, community-based rehabilitation (CBR), a comprehensive rehabilitation approach that also addresses socio-economic impact of NIs and may supplement institution-based rehabilitation services, has not been well explored and documented. Presented here are experiences and perceptions on CBR programmes for NIs following CM in Blantyre, Malawi.

The diploma thesis deals with the problem of phonemic differentiation in preschool children. The introductory part is focused on the specifics of preschool age, ontogenesis of speech and characterization of phonemic hearing. The aim of this thesis is to determine the level of phonemic differentiation in children with cochlear implant and children without hearing impairment. The results were obtained using a standardized test battery Evaluation of Phonemic Hearing in Preschool Children by authors Škodová, Mischek and Moravcová from 1995, which is created for this issue. Subsequently, the results of both groups were compared and individual differences in performance between children with cochlear implant and children without hearing impairment were examined. Research has shown that better results in phonemic distinction amounted children without hearing impairment, although the difference in success rate between the two groups was not significant. The main benefit of this work is the fact that the ability of phonemic differentiation is important in children with cochlear implant and its development should be part of rehabilitation care. KEYWORDS phonemic hearing, preschool age, cochlear implant, hearing impairment

This essay aims to examine how the disabled figure is represented in motion pictures and if these representations differ when the actors are disabled. It aims to shed some light on the social construction of normality and disability. The theoretical framework is that of stigma, social interaction and Crip Theory and the method we use is discourse analysis. The movies in which we examine this are as follow: Hur många lingon finns det i världen?, Hur många kramar finns det i världen?, Café de Flore and Le huitième jour. Our conclusion is that known stereotypes did not occur as much as limited course of action and the tendency to treat the disabled character as a group and not as individuals. Our result also indicates that the story of the disabled figure is not the one that is being told and how their humanity is something that has to be confirmed instead of being self-evident.

Background: Social exclusion of people with vision impairments is an ongoing issue. Since social inclusion emphasizes social and emotional aspects as distinct from academic ones and the aspects concerning opportunities, the focus is turned on the domain of social interactions and friendships. Adolescence is the time point when youth feels mostly the need to ‘fit in’ in social circles and groups and the social life and friendships are important aspects of young people’s well-being and development. Aim: The aim of this study is to review the existing literature on the social interactions and friendships of adolescents with visual impairments from their own perspective and investigate the interventions designed to improve their social interactions and friendships. Method: A literature search on the databases of ERIC, CINAHL and PsycINFO and a hand search on the reference lists of the relevant articles was conducted. The search was limited to recent peer reviewed studies published in English, reporting perspectives of adolescents (13-18 years old) with visual impairments on their social interactions and friendships and intervention studies aimed to support them in the aforementioned domain. Results: In the 18 included studies, adolescents with vision impairments engaged more in passive activities that were not highly interactive. They reported being satisfied with their networks and friends, however contradictions existed in the perceived quality of friendships and the feeling of loneliness. The context of school was presented often as problematic compared to other contexts, and friendships in schools were rare. According to adolescents’ voices, friendships helped to cope with the impairment, friends had a meaningful role in their life and they made school life more enjoyable. In comparison to their sighted peers, adolescents with vision impairments had smaller networks and less friends with whom they had different type of relationships. Lastly even though several barriers and facilitators were identified, which belong to domains of Body functions and structures and Physical, Attitudinal and Social environment, there was a lack of interventions aiming to support the social interactions and friendships of adolescents with vision impairments. Conclusions: Considering the importance of social interactions and friendships in adolescents’ life for them to learn, develop and enjoy, more interventions with social focus need to be designed in respect to the challenges that exist. A plethora of barriers and facilitators impacting the social interactions and friendships of adolescents with vision impairments were identified that need to be taken into consideration for future research and interventions since the existing literature provided so far is limited. Adolescents need to be engaged in this process so that their interests, preferences and their views are prioritized.

Assessor: The purpose of this study is to highlight tenants and staff’s perception of user’s involvement and influence in municipal group housing in living by the Act concerning Support and Service for Persons with Certain Functional Impairments (LSS). The study where performed in five small municipalities in the southern part of Sweden. Leading research questions have inter alia been in what way the process of decision-making is shared between the user and support person. Applied methods are mixed between qualitative interpretative modes with a certain quantitative approach. Qualitative group interviews consist of two focus groups with professional employees. One consists of three middle managers and the other one of five caregivers at special housing (LSS). Individual semi-structured interviews were conducted with three individual users, i.e. a person who has assistance according to LSS. Twenty-four quantitative questionnaires directed to professionals in varying positions, all with the common feature that they are working with people with disabilities according to LSS. The assembled data was coded and themed into participation, influence, integrity and self-determination, living like others. Findings: Users can influence through board meetings and by legal predecessors and staff. The situational built in asymmetrical power imbalance can be compensated through mutual acceptance.

There has been limited investigation into the nature of specific language impairment (SLI) in adolescence, and even less investigation into speech production in SLI, particularly beyond the preschool years. Phonological output is crucial to oral expressive language, one of the characteristic areas of deficit in SLI. It was hypothesized that adolescents with SLI present with residual speech errors. Accordingly, this study investigated the presence, nature and cause of speech deficits in adolescents with persistent SLI. Adolescents aged 13.0-14.0 years with persistent SLI (n=31) were compared to typically developing (TD) peers (n=31) on an Oral Motor Evaluation (OME) and a Speech Assessment Battery (SAB), consisting of: Multisyllabic Word Repetition, Nonsense Word Repetition, Phrase Repetition, Sentence Repetition and Tongue Twisters. Tasks were analysed in terms of accuracy and the amount of effort required, to determine efficiency and automaticity of phonological output. All participants completed a battery of memory tasks and the language abilities of the SLI group were evaluated. Caregivers completed questionnaires investigating risk factors. Results indicated that adolescents with persistent SLI produced a higher number of inconsistent and context-dependent deviant speech behaviours than TD peers, involving syllable structure changes (phoneme additions/omissions), phoneme substitutions, fluency errors and repetitions/revisions. Participants with SLI also had a higher incidence of neuromotor deficits. Persistent SLI appears to relate to a multifactorial etiology, involving both genetic and early history factors. There was high comorbidity of attention deficits, with implications for resource allocation. Results were interpreted within a functional capacity viewpoint. Speech deficits are thought to contribute to a threshold effect, where even subtle deficits in one area can compromise processing in another area. Speech production in this population appears to be more resource-demanding than in TD peers, which may affect concurrent performance on linguistic and memory tasks. This hypothesis is supported by the high correlation between speech tasks and expressive syntax for SLI participants. The high incidence of speech deficits in adolescents with SLI ii has implications for research and clinical practice with individuals of all ages with SLI.

This thesis is concerned with the experience of aphasia in Khayelitsha, a township on the outskirts of Cape Town characterised by poverty, violence, limited resources and a culture and language that differs from the setting of most speech and language services in South Africa. It is based on three years of intermittent fieldwork that entailed participant observation of the everyday life of five adults living with aphasia and interviews with participants, kin and healthcare workers in various settings. Grounded in sociocultural theory, this thesis has aimed to provide an ethnographic account of cultural frameworks of interpretation of communication impairment following stroke and of the daily reality of life for adults living with aphasia in this setting. An exploration of causal notions in this setting provided interesting commentary on social and cultural processes and how people, caught up in these processes, search for meaning and for cure. Participants entertained plural notions of causation of aphasia and explored numerous therapeutic avenues. The wide variation in causal notions included biomedical causes, social and behavioural determinants, and the influences of supernatural powers, such as witches and ancestors. Similarly participants experienced aphasia through multiple healing systems, including traditional, biomedical and religious therapy options. All however seemed to be ambiguous sources of help. Whilst encounters with the health system presented serious challenges to participants, traditional and religious avenues for help were obscured by a burgeoning and not always ethical open market offering miracle cures. An articulation of the circumstances of this group of adults provided further commentary on the influence of the social context on aphasia. In a context where sociopolitical processes have had a disintegrating effect on social cohesion, questions of support, care and security were of primary concern. Prejudices towards the elderly and women were more acutely felt and vulnerability, isolation, insecurity and fluidity of circumstance emerged as overarching themes. The central argument in this thesis is that the genesis of these experiences can be found in contextual factors in Khayelitsha, such as poverty, inequality, urbanisation and changing cultural paradigms. These emerging themes highlight the disjunctions between the medical alignment of the discipline of speech language therapy in South Africa and the capacity for socially-engaged practice. They also highlight the socio-cultural complexity of the experience of aphasia, specifically the influences of culture and poverty. There is thus theoretical and clinical relevance in using anthropological objectives to explore the world of the adult living with aphasia and the interface between context and service provision. Interventions and healthcare communications that will make a meaningful difference to adults with aphasia in a setting such as Khayelitsha are proposed.

The subject of this Master's Thesis is to present some legal aspects of employment of persons with disabilities. This thesis deals with the subject particularly with respect to national policy of employment and individual labour-law relations. The largest part of text is devoted to the efforts of the state to reach higher employment rate of persons with disabilities and to compensate their inherent handicaps. This thesis is divided into seven thematic parts. The introduction is followed by part that defines basic terms of employment of people with disabilities which are not legally defined. The issue concerns the terms which are regularly mistaken in common conversation such as disability and handicap. The third part contains an overview of the most important documents, of significant international organizations, which contain the definition of persons with disabilities. These most significant international organizations are the International Labour Organisation, the World Health Organization, the United Nations, the Council of Europe and the European Union. The fourth part contains the definitions of person with disabilities according to five acts of Czech legislation. Every act uses different legal term for persons with disabilities and it defines them in different way. Some acts do not contain...

O presente estudo teve como objetivo investigar o desempenho do salto em distância de atletas com deficiência visual em razão do tipo de comando de transição, da localização do atleta-guia e da localização em que o saltador se encontrava no momento do comando de transição. Participaram do estudo oito atletas, homens e mulheres adultos, saltadores de nível internacional, com deficiência visual \"classe 11\", e seus respectivos atletas-guia. Os atletas executaram saltos considerando a interação de duas condições: (1) o atleta-guia se comunicava de quatro locais distintos (à frente, atrás, ao lado direito e do lado esquerdo da tábua de impulsão); (2) o atleta-guia fornecia comandos de transição da corrida para a impulsão via voz ou palma. A distância do salto foi considerada como principal variável dependente. Os resultados mostraram que: (1) os comandos por palma e voz, as localizações do atleta-guia (à frente, atrás, do lado direito e do lado esquerdo da tábua de impulsão), e a localização em que o saltador se encontrava no momento do comando de transição afetaram semelhantemente o desempenho do salto em distância de atletas com deficiência visual; (2) os comandos fornecidos quando o saltador encontrava-se mais distante da tábua de impulsão foram aqueles com ele estava em menor velocidade; (3) nos últimos cinco metros os atletas aumentaram a amplitude das passadas e a velocidade em comparação com os dez metros anteriores; (4) as preferências dos saltadores e atletas-guia pelo tipo de comando de transição e local de posicionamento tiveram os mesmos efeitos / The aim of this study was to investigate the long jump performance by athletes with the visual impairment based on the type of transition command, jumper location, and athlete-guide. Participants were 8 athletes, men and women, international level jumpers, class 11 visual impairment, and their respective athletes-guide. The athletes performed jumps considering the interaction of two conditions: (1) athlete-guide communicated from four distinct locations (front, back, right side and left side of the board); (2) athlete-guide provided commands for transitioning from the running to impulsion phase by voice or palms. The distance of the jump was considered as the main dependent variable. The results showed that: (1) palm and voice commands, locations of the guide-athlete (front, back, right side and left side of the board), and the location where the jumper was at the time of the transition command similarly affected the performance of distance jumping of visually impaired athletes; (2) commands provided when the jumper was further from the impulsion board were those with his/her was at a slower speed; (3) in the last five meters athletes increased the steps amplitude and running speed in comparison with the previous ten meters; (4) preferences of jumpers and athletes-guide by the type of transition command and positioning location had the same effects

SAMMANFATTNING   Titel: Hur påverkar goodwillnedskrivningar företags kreditbetyg? - en kvantitativ undersökning av europeiska företag   Nivå: Examensarbete på Grundnivå (kandidatexamen) i ämnet företagsekonomi   Författare: Danilo Jovanovic och Sven Nelson   Handledare: Jan Svanberg   Datum: 2019 - juni   Syfte: År 2005 blev tillämpningen av IASB:s kontroversiella och värdebaserade redovisningsstandard IFRS obligatorisk för europeiska noterade bolag, genom en förordning antagen av Europarlamentet. Med tiden har allvarlig kritik kommit att riktats mot utformningen av standarden, då den inbegriper en hög grad subjektivitet i samband med goodwillnedskrivningar. Samtidigt har obligationer kommit att utgöra en allt viktigare finansieringskälla för europeiska företag. Syftet med studien är att undersöka om goodwillnedskrivningar, enligt standarden IAS 36, har någon påverkan på företags kreditbetyg.   Metod: Studien utförs i positivistisk vetenskapstradition med en hypotetiskt-deduktiv ansats. Studien har en kvantitativ forskningsstrategi som innefattar åren 2013-2017. Sekundärdata för listade europeiska företag (exkl. UK) har inhämtats från Thomson Reuters Datastream och Thomson Reuters Eikon. Urvalet består av 76 företag. Hypotesen testas genom en regressionsanalys med ordered logit modellen i programmet IBM SPSS Statistics 24.   Resultat & slutsats: Resultatet från studien bekräftar att goodwillnedskrivningar har en negativ påverkan på företags kreditbetyg. Slutsatsen medför därmed att sambandet även gäller i en europeisk kontext där man tillämpar redovisningsstandarden IAS 36. Examensarbetets bidrag: Studien bidrar till redovisningslitteraturen genom att komplettera ett forskningsgap rörande faktorer som påverkar kreditbetyg, och om en faktor som karaktäriseras av subjektivitet får genomslag på kreditbetyg. Studien bidrar även till redovisningslitteraturen genom att fylla forskningsgapet rörande sambandet mellan goodwillnedskrivningar enligt IAS 36 och kreditbetyg. Studien lämnar även ett praktiskt till  obligationsemittenter, investerare och redovisningsupprättare för bättre beslutsfattande.   Förslag till fortsatt forskning: Då ett företags kreditvärdighet är multidimensionellt, begränsas studien av de utvalda företagsspecifika faktorerna. Även avgränsningen mot ett specifikt geografiskt område, tidsperiod och företagskaraktäristik utgör en begränsning. De förslag studien lämnar till fortsatt forskning utgörs av att basera framtida studier på en diversifierad geografisk kontext, för att undersöka möjligheten att generalisera de aktuella resultaten. Ytterligare förslag är att studera kreditbetygets påverkan av andra företagsspecifika faktorer, för att skapa en större förståelse för en multidimensionell bedömning av företags kreditvärdighet.   Nyckelord: IAS 36, goodwillnedskrivning, kreditbetyg. / Abstract   Title: How does goodwill impairments affect companies bond rating? - A quantitative study of European companies   Level: Student thesis, final assignment for Bachelor Degree in Business Administration   Author: Danilo Jovanovic and Sven Nelson   Supervisor: Jan Svanberg   Date: 2019 - June   Aim: The application of IASB’s controversial and fair value-based standard of accounting, IFRS, became mandatory for listed European corporations through a statue passed by the European parliament in 2005. A severe criticism has been aimed at the framing of the standard throughout the years, due to the high degree of subjectivity in connection to goodwill impairments. In parallel, bonds have grown to become an even more significant source of finance for European companies. The aim of this thesis is to examine whether goodwill impairments, in accordance with IAS 36, have an impact on companies’ bond ratings.   Method: The study is conducted in the positivist tradition with a hypothetical-deductive research approach. The study has a quantitative research strategy including the years 2013-2017. Secondary data for the listed European companies (not including UK) have been collected using Thomson Reuters Datastream and Thomson Reuters Eikon. The sample consists of 76 companies. The hypothesis is tested by using a regression analysis with the ordered logit model in IBM SPSS Statistics 24.   Result & Conclusions: The result from the study confirms that goodwill impairments have a negative impact on companies’ bond ratings. Therefore, the study reaches the conclusion that the relationship also applies in a European context where the accounting standard IAS 36 is applied.   Contribution of the thesis: This thesis contributes to present accounting literature by filling a gap regarding how company factors affect bond ratings. This by its specific focus on the subjective characteristics of a factor and its impact on bond ratings. Furthermore, this study contributes to the literature by examining the relation between goodwill devaluation according to IAS 36 and bond ratings, and by contributing to practicians such as bond issuers, investors and standard setters for improved decision.   Suggestions for future research: As the creditworthiness of a company is multidimensional, this study is limited by focusing on specific company factors. The study is also limited geographically, time periodically and company characteristically. This thesis proposes further research by basing future research on a more diversified geographical context. This to enable the exploration of possibilities to generalize relevant results and findings. Further suggestions would be to study how other company factors affect the bond rating, to create a more profound understanding of the multidimensional assessment of a companies’ credit reliability.   Key words: IAS 36, goodwill impairment, bond ratings.