<p>The subject of the thesis is to examine what communication tools the students of Kungsmadskolan in Växjö uses to communicate on the Internet and what are the motives that lie behind this choice and continued use. The thesis focus on five groups of communication tools: chat, Internet forum, community, Internet telephony and e-mail. The purpose of the study is to investigate and understand the motive that lies behind the choice of Internet-based communication tools done by high school students. We have chosen a qualitative method to conduct our research. We have collected empirical data through discussions with two focus groups divided into one with only boys and one with only girls from Kungsmadskolan in Växjö. We then analyze this data and draw conclusions from it. Prior to the focus group discussions, we created a theoretical framework. This framework has been used to steer and support the discussions and as a theoretical support in our analysis. The framework consists of five parts: communication, communication tools, motivation, choice and acceptance. Through this study we have been able to establish that the most important influence on the students choice of communication tools comes from their friends. This means that the strongest motivation to their choice comes from the search for social communion. Communication tools that the students use are: MSN, Flashback.com, Forumet.nu, Fuska.nu, Bilddagboken.se, Lunarstorm, Community.se, Helgon.nu, Facebook, Hotmail, school-mail, work-mail and Spraymail.</p> / <p>Ämnet för uppsatsen är att undersöka vilka kommunikationsverktyg gymnasieelever på Kungsmadskolan i Växjö använder sig av för att kommunicera på Internet, vilka motiv som ligger bakom valet av kommunikationsverktyg och det fortsatta användandet. Uppsatsen inriktar sig på fem olika typer av kommunikationsverktyg: chatt, Internetforum, community, Internettelefoni och e-post. Undersökningens syfte är föreståelseinriktat, vilket innebär att vi ämnar att undersöka och förstå vilka motiv som avgör gymnasieelevernas val. Vi har valt en kvalitativ metod för vår undersökning. Vi har genom diskussion med två stycken fokusgrupper indelade i en med bara killar och en med bara tjejer från Kungsmadskolan i Växjö samlat in empirisk data. Denna data har vi sedan analyserat och dragit slutsatser utifrån. Inför våra diskussioner med fokusgrupperna har vi skapt en teoretisk referensram. Denna referensram har fungerat både som underlag för att styra och stödja diskussionerna och som teoretiskt stöd vid analysen av resultatet. Referensramen är uppdelad i fem avsnitt: kommunikation, kommunikationsverktyg, motivation, val och acceptans. Vi kom fram till att vänner i den direkta omgivningen har störst påverkan på vilken/vilka kommunikationsverktyg gymnasieeleverna använder sig av och väljer att börja använda. Detta innebär också att den starkaste motivationsfaktorn i valet är sökandet efter social gemenskap. Kommunikationsverktygen gymnasieeleverna använder är: MSN, Flashback.info, Forumet.nu, Fuska.nu, Bilddagboken.se, Lunarstorm, Community.se, Helgon.nu, Facebook, Hotmail, skolmail, jobbmail och Spraymail.</p>

The subject of the thesis is to examine what communication tools the students of Kungsmadskolan in Växjö uses to communicate on the Internet and what are the motives that lie behind this choice and continued use. The thesis focus on five groups of communication tools: chat, Internet forum, community, Internet telephony and e-mail. The purpose of the study is to investigate and understand the motive that lies behind the choice of Internet-based communication tools done by high school students. We have chosen a qualitative method to conduct our research. We have collected empirical data through discussions with two focus groups divided into one with only boys and one with only girls from Kungsmadskolan in Växjö. We then analyze this data and draw conclusions from it. Prior to the focus group discussions, we created a theoretical framework. This framework has been used to steer and support the discussions and as a theoretical support in our analysis. The framework consists of five parts: communication, communication tools, motivation, choice and acceptance. Through this study we have been able to establish that the most important influence on the students choice of communication tools comes from their friends. This means that the strongest motivation to their choice comes from the search for social communion. Communication tools that the students use are: MSN, Flashback.com, Forumet.nu, Fuska.nu, Bilddagboken.se, Lunarstorm, Community.se, Helgon.nu, Facebook, Hotmail, school-mail, work-mail and Spraymail. / Ämnet för uppsatsen är att undersöka vilka kommunikationsverktyg gymnasieelever på Kungsmadskolan i Växjö använder sig av för att kommunicera på Internet, vilka motiv som ligger bakom valet av kommunikationsverktyg och det fortsatta användandet. Uppsatsen inriktar sig på fem olika typer av kommunikationsverktyg: chatt, Internetforum, community, Internettelefoni och e-post. Undersökningens syfte är föreståelseinriktat, vilket innebär att vi ämnar att undersöka och förstå vilka motiv som avgör gymnasieelevernas val. Vi har valt en kvalitativ metod för vår undersökning. Vi har genom diskussion med två stycken fokusgrupper indelade i en med bara killar och en med bara tjejer från Kungsmadskolan i Växjö samlat in empirisk data. Denna data har vi sedan analyserat och dragit slutsatser utifrån. Inför våra diskussioner med fokusgrupperna har vi skapt en teoretisk referensram. Denna referensram har fungerat både som underlag för att styra och stödja diskussionerna och som teoretiskt stöd vid analysen av resultatet. Referensramen är uppdelad i fem avsnitt: kommunikation, kommunikationsverktyg, motivation, val och acceptans. Vi kom fram till att vänner i den direkta omgivningen har störst påverkan på vilken/vilka kommunikationsverktyg gymnasieeleverna använder sig av och väljer att börja använda. Detta innebär också att den starkaste motivationsfaktorn i valet är sökandet efter social gemenskap. Kommunikationsverktygen gymnasieeleverna använder är: MSN, Flashback.info, Forumet.nu, Fuska.nu, Bilddagboken.se, Lunarstorm, Community.se, Helgon.nu, Facebook, Hotmail, skolmail, jobbmail och Spraymail.

Introduktion: Inom sjukvården ska många lagar och föreskrifter följas, inte minst vad gäller patientnära arbete och hantering av utrustning för att minska risken för vårdrelaterade infektioner. Omkring 60 000 patienter drabbas årligen av vårdrelaterade infektioner i Sverige och av dessa anses mellan 30–50 procent kunna förebyggas. Vårdgivaren spelar en stor roll i att följa föreskrifter och lagar för att ge patienten en god, säker och jämlik vård. Konsekvenserna av att inte följa basala hygienrutiner vid blodkomponentframställning kan bland annat resultera i att patienten som får blodprodukten får en transfusionsreaktion. Syfte: Syftet med studien var att studera attityder till basala hygienrutiner hos vårdpersonal som arbetar med blodkomponentframställning. Metod: En kvalitativ semi-strukturerad intervjustudie genomfördes. Sex informanter deltog i intervjuerna och fick svara på elva frågor. Informanterna arbetade på en blodcentral och det var frivilligt att deltaga efter att informanterna lämnat muntligt samtycke. Innehållet i intervjuerna analyserades sedan med tematisk innehållsanalys med induktiv ansats. Resultat: Fyra teman kunde identifieras ”Attityder och medvetenhet till basala hygienrutiner”, ”Värde kopplat till efterlevnaden av basala hygienrutiner”, ”Vidmakthållande av följsamhet till basala hygienrutiner inom arbetsgruppen” och ”Förutsättningar till korrekt efterlevnad av basala hygienrutiner”. Studiens resultat visade på en positiv attityd till basala hygienrutiner. Slutsats: De teman som togs fram representerade olika aspekter av basala hygienrutiner, den personliga attityden och medvetenheten, vilket värde efterlevnaden av basala hygienrutiner har, vad som bidrar till följsamhet av basala hygienrutiner i arbetsgruppen samt förutsättningar som krävs för att kunna utföra basala hygienrutiner på ett korrekt sätt. / Introduction: Within healthcare, there are many laws and regulations that must be followed, not least regarding work close to patients and handling of equipment to reduce the risk of healthcare-related infections. The caregiver plays a major role in following regulations and laws to provide the patient with good, safe and equal care. The consequences of not following basic hygiene routines when producing blood components can result in the patient receiving the blood product having a transfusion reaction. Aim: The aim of the study was to study attitudes towards basic hygiene routines in health care professionals who work with blood component production. Method: A qualitative semi-structured interview study was conducted. Six informants participated in the interviews and answered eleven questions. The informants worked at a blood center and participation was voluntary after the informants gave verbal consent. The content of the interviews was then analyzed using thematic content analysis with an inductive approach. Results: Four themes could be identified "Attitudes and awareness towards basic hygiene routines", "Value linked to compliance with basic hygiene routines", "Enforcement of adherence to basic hygiene routines within the work group" and "Prerequisites for correct compliance with basic hygiene routines". The results showed a positive attitude towards basic hygiene routines. Conclusion: The themes that were developed represent different aspects of basic hygiene routines; the personal attitude and awareness, the value of compliance with basic hygiene routines, what contributes to adherence to basic hygiene routines in the work group and the conditions required to be able to perform basic hygiene routines correctly.

There is a great demand and need for oral health care during the course of HIV disease (HIV Costs and Services Utilization Study; Marcus et. al., 2005). HIV+ patients identified three key barriers to obtaining oral health treatment: 1) beliefs and attitudes of dental health care providers (DHCPs) may have lead to their unwillingness to treat HIV/AIDS patients; 2) the existence of racial and ethnic disparities in health care in the United States, and 3) how DHCPs perceive their risk of contracting HIV. The fear and stigma associated with treating patients with HIV further compromises their access to care and their health status. Oral health conditions associated with HIV disease are frequently more severe than those of the general population, making access to both dental and medical care imperative. Plus, Florida has some of the highest numbers of HIV/AIDS patients in the nation. This study was descriptive, cross-sectional and used quantitative methods to explore the dental hygienists' behavioral and normative beliefs, attitudes, and intentions toward treating patients with HIV/AIDS. A three-phase pilot study was conducted to assess the validity and reliability of the survey instrument. An email delivery method was used to implement the survey, and a 22% response rate was achieved (n=219). The majority of respondents were female (96%), white (89%), married (77%), currently working (86%), and had treated HIV/AIDS patients in private practice (80%). Bivariate analysis showed that dental hygienists' intentions toward treating HIV/AIDS patients were significantly associated with five independent variables, and binary logistic regression confirmed the significance of two of these associations. Overall, study participants indicated that they were willing to, and had positive attitudes toward, clinically treating HIV/AIDS patients; they were confident in their ability to treat them, and their normative beliefs did not hinder their intention to do so, and they did not worry about acquiring HIV in the workplace. Three recommendations were made: increase access to oral health care for HIV/AIDS patients within community settings by removing barriers to care, incorporate cultural/sensitivity training in all dental/dental hygiene school curriculums, and mandate Florida HIV/AIDS continuing education requirements every biennium for dentists and dental hygienists.

This research explores the relationship between intention and actual usage of self-service technology (SST), and investigates the effects of facilitating conditions and customer readiness on customer adoption of SST. In recent years, self-service technologies have created many new service contents; nevertheless, the actual utilization is not actually common yet. Therefore, this research try to explore the relationship between customer readiness and facilitating conditions on the actual use of SST, then focus on narrowing the gap between intention to use SST and actual usage of SST. We believe that this understanding is imperative for service providers to make proactive strategies for fostering customers’ intention and actual usage of the SST. The framework makes it possible to understand and predict customer trial related to using self-service technology by thoroughly examining underlying customer readiness degree and use the internet to illustrate how our framework can be applied to study customer behavior related to a specific self-service technology. To analyze the longitudinal effect, a two-stage survey was conducted and lasted for seven months. As it is well known that behavior intention does not necessary lead to actual behavior, our findings offer proactive strategies to service providers in turning intention into actual usage. Implications are discussed for managerial strategy as well as for future research. The research can be referred as marketing strategy for self-service or kiosk industry, and on academic contribution of narrowing the gap between intention and actual use. It is expected that it is helpful to facilitate self-service development and to enrich customer experience and competitiveness in Taiwan.

Young et al.(2009) report a gap in customers’ buying habits which is referred to a value action gap. This value action gap is typically where customers are concerned about environmental issues but have a hard time interpreting it when making a purchase. In the same way, Peattie and Crane (2005) report that there has been a slight growth on green purchasing since 1990, they also identified a significant gap between concerns and actual purchasing among customers. Datta (2011) states, it is important to increase people’s environmental awareness and consciousness, because as customers, they can impact the environment through their positive purchasing decisions. Datta (2011) further argues that the growing number of customers and consumers who prefer and are willing to buy Eco-friendly products are creating opportunities for businesses that are using “Eco-friendly” or “environmentally friendly” as a component of their value proposition . Considering the fact that printers produce carbon foot prints (Lubick, 2007), the authors have decided to conduct their research on the consumers’ purchasing gap towards Eco printers in Swedish market. Thus, the purpose of this study is to identify and analyze the factors which can influence consumers’ green purchasing intention. More specifically, it aims to find and analyze the factors that can influence consumers’ green purchasing intention towards buying an Eco printer in the Swedish market.  Therefore, the following research question has been formulated: What factors can influence the consumers’ green purchasing intention towards buying environmentally friendly printer? In this thesis both primary and secondary data have been used to establish its findings. A questionnaire of 201 respondents was analyzed to answer the research question. In conclusion the authors h found that there are several determinants which can influence the green purchasing intentions. Among these determinants, green knowledge and Eco literacy, attitude and green belief, environmental laws and guidelines and willingness to pay are indentified as strong influencing factors while demographics found as less stronger factor. However, subjective norms and social influence found as a weak one.

This study explored the effect of public relations message strategies on beliefs, attitudes, and behavioral intentions of individuals regarding boater safety. An experiment was conducted using seven safety messages. Specifically, Fishbein and Ajzen’s (1975) theory of reasoned action and J.E. Grunig’s (1997) situational theory of publics were used to examine the communication effects of message strategies proposed by Hazleton and Long’s (1988) public relations process model. The findings of this study support the predictions of the theory of reasoned action—that salient beliefs predict attitude toward behavior and attitude toward behavior and subjective norm predict behavioral intent. Of the three attitude items measured— attitude toward message, attitude toward issue, and attitude toward organization—salient beliefs had the greatest effect on the attitude toward issue measure. Subjective norm was shown to be the stronger predictor of the three attitude items. In addition, support was found for the predictions of the situational theory of publics. The independent variables—problem recognition, constraint recognition, and level of involvement—were found to predict information seeking behaviors. However, the use of public relations message strategies in boater safety communication produced minimal effects on the same variables. It was determined that the power strategies, threat and punishment and promise and reward, would be most effective when communicating to a passive public such as the sample tested in this study. This study is significant to public relations literature because it examined how active boaters and non-boaters perceive safety messages. There appeared to be no research on the use of safe boating messages. Thus, there was no research on how public relations messages about boater safety affect boaters’ attitudes, awareness, and behavioral intentions prior to the implementation of this study. Determining effective boater safety messages will help to reduce boater accidents, injuries, and fatalities in years to come (U.S. Coast Guard, 2009), making this study both necessary and original.

Utilizing communication and activist organization perspectives, this empirical study examined activist message strategies and how they influence variables related to the receiver of activist communication. Specifically, J.E. Grunig's (1997) situational theory of publics and Fishbein and Ajzen's (1975) theory of reasoned action were used to explain the communication effects of the seven activist message strategies developed from Hazleton and Long's (1988) public relations process model. The findings of this study support the premise of situational theory of publics and contribute to the extension of the theory through the inclusion of goal compatibility as a predictor of information seeking behavior and the use of alternative items to operationalize information seeking behavior, such as visiting a Web site. Only partial support was found for the predictions of the theory of reasoned action. Attitude toward behavior was not found to have a significant influence on behavioral intent. However, the importance of subjective norm to the prediction of behavioral intent was reiterated. Also, the proposition that message strategies influence behavioral intent via their influence on attitude toward strategy was supported. Finally, results of this study partially supported the hypothesis that receiver variables are influenced by activist message strategies. Problem recognition, goal compatibility, attitude toward strategy, and attitude toward behavior were found to be affected by activist message strategies. Problem recognition was influenced most by the persuasive strategy, goal compatibility was most influenced by the threat and punishment strategy, and attitude toward strategy and attitude toward behavior were both influenced most by the cooperative problem-solving strategy. Overall, the results of this research suggest that, of the seven activist message strategies, activist organizations will be most successful using persuasive and coercive strategies. This important finding offers a recommendation to activist organizations regarding the most effective strategy to use in message development.

Submitted in fulfillment of the requirements of the Degree of Doctor of Technology: Business Administration, Durban University of Technology, 2014. / This thesis integrates social capital and ‘reasoned action’ theory to construct a theoretical model for investigating the factors which predict an individual’s intention to share tacit knowledge in a University of Technology. It utilizes Nahapiet and Ghoshal (1998: 243) definition and conception of social capital. They define social capital as “the sum of the actual and potential resources embedded within, available through, and derived from the network of relationships possessed by an individual or social unit”. This study examined tacit knowledge sharing behaviour (i.e., knowledge that is shared between individuals) within the context of social capital. The specific type of tacit knowledge that is being studied relates to work experience ‘know-what’ and ‘know-how’. ‘Know-what’ refers to the basic mastery of a discipline that professionals achieve through education and training. ‘Know-how’ refers to procedural knowledge about a business process and the individual’s capability to perform an action with an understanding of why the action is appropriate in the particular context, (i.e., action skill or applied competence). Specifically, this study examines the relationship between the structural, relational and cognitive dimensions of social capital and the individual’s attitude towards the sharing of tacit knowledge. It further examines the relationship between the individual’s attitude towards tacit knowledge sharing, their perceived norms and perceived behavioural control over the sharing of tacit knowledge (mediating variables) and their intention to share tacit knowledge. It is a case study which consists of a mixed methods research design, incorporating nine research interviews and five hundred and fifty four self administered questionnaires. The theoretical model is examined using structural equation modeling (SEM) and as a result of the findings, the initial model is revised into a set of theoretical models, which are tested using SEM and found to be consistent with the data (i.e., a good fit). The direct, indirect and total effects of the identified predictor (social capital) and mediating variables (‘reasoned action’) on the individual’s intention to share tacit knowledge, in each model, is examined and the results are presented. Each dimension of social capital is found to be significant for predicting the criterion variable ‘attitude towards tacit knowledge sharing’. The individual’s attitude towards tacit knowledge sharing is found to be highly significant for predicting the individual’s intention to share tacit knowledge but the ‘reasoned action’ variables are found to be not as significant, particularly perceived behavioural control over the sharing of tacit knowledge. The results of this study enrich our collective understanding regarding social capital and tacit knowledge sharing behaviour.

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Communication, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 42-46).