Background: There is a ubiquitous societal trend to define one’s self-worth based on externalities such as looks. The visibility of idealised and homogenous, mainly white, ‘perfect’ bodies in mass media contributes to the surge in body dissatisfaction of individuals, especially young women. This is accompanied by ethical problems such as mental diseases and eating disorders. Moreover, it renders young women with a high body dissatisfaction a profitable target group for several industries. Purpose: This paper develops and tests a model on how different levels of Body Image Satisfaction impact young female’s emotional responses and their attitude towards the advertisements and the brand that uses them. It directly compares these effects for Body Positivity (BoPo) advertising (visuals of diversities of physical appearances) and traditional, idealised imagery in an experimental setup. With this, this study aims to prove that a high level of Body Image Satisfaction and thus BoPo content makes economic sense. Method: This study measures the psychological constructs Body Image Satisfaction, experiential emotional response and attitude. It draws on research on how different body types are used to profit from the effects of self-esteem advertising while linking them to research on the Body Image Satisfaction of young females. BoPo commercials are compared to traditional, idealised imagery in commercials and measured consumer reactions to both using a quantitative survey in a representative panel in Germany. Conclusion: High Body Image Satisfaction leads to a more positive experiential emotional response, a more positive attitude towards commercials, and a more positive attitude towards brands for any type of commercials. Commercials with BoPo content are highly accepted. As the exposure to BoPo content leads to a higher Body Image Satisfaction, BoPo content in mass media is ethically desirable and also economically beneficial.

The Swedish procedural legislation on class actions before general courts, GrL, was when coming into force in January 2003 the first generally applicable class action regime of continental Europe. However, it seems, it was never used in any notable extent. In this thesis I have analysed GrL, it’s potential flaws, how it could be affected by the ongoing EU legislative procedure of establishing a directive regarding representative actions for the protection of the collective interests of consumers, and what the Swedish legislator could potentially learn from the Dutch model being primarily based on a regime of mass settlements. The ongoing EU legislative procedure will by all accounts result in a directive requiring Swedish class action regime to be adjusted with a few minor modifications, primarily the introduction of a certification procedure of entities to allow these to initiate representative actions in disputes concerning the protection of consumers’ collective interests. Apart from adjustments of Swedish class action legislation in order to harmonise it with the directive, I have argued for several additional adjustments of proceedings under GrL in order to make it in an increased degree correspond with the reasons by which the legislation was motivated, and in order to in general function in a more effective manner. For that purpose, I have argued that the opt in mechanism should be replaced with an opt out mechanism, or that opt out should at least be introduced as a supplementing option to an opt in main rule. Independently of the issue of whether an opt in or an opt out mechanism should be used to constitute the represented group, I have furthermore argued that the mechanism used should allow group members to leave the group during the proceedings. Finally, I have argued that the courts should be encouraged to use a for the Swedish legal system untypically active direction of proceedings in class actions specifically.

Leaders in the Federal Government of the United States have a problem ensuring the contract management resources used to administer and monitor contracts meet organizational performance goals. Contracting officer's representatives (CORs) are members of the acquisition workforce responsible for contract management. This study explored the ways in which resource-based strategies can improve the quality of CORs' performance in contract management by exploring an organizational framework based on strategic management approaches. Interview data were collected from 41 CORs from the 10 Federal Government agencies that represented 85% of the fiscal year 2014 expenditures. These CORs had all managed contracts with successful outcomes. Data analysis utilizing descriptive and magnitude coding resulted in several findings: (a) a recognition of the influence the COR's environment has on the contract outcomes, (b) an understanding of the CORs' processes within the various organizational structures, and (c) the importance of organizational support for the COR. These findings resulted in elements of a potential resource-based management model framework that link the identified attributes of the CORs' resource management to organizational performance. The social contribution from this emergent framework is the recognition of the CORs' value in ensuring optimal contract driven organizational performance. Positive social change can result from Federal Government leaders' use of this resource-based framework to improve the quality of management of CORs' functions and processes. This framework and its implication for the acquisition workforce may facilitate superior performance and enhance organizational capital.

The literature on descriptive and substantive representation focuses on elected representatives, but overlooks the gender of those who play an integral role in policy process (agenda-setting) and outcomes (implementation): The elected’s chief of staff, senior policy advisors, and, in council-manager systems, the city manager. This thesis examines the role policy staff and city manager gender plays in substantive representation. After analyzing staff composition and agenda priorities — gleaned from State of the City addresses — for mayors of the 50 most-populous cities in the United States, I found substantial evidence to support my hypotheses that the chief of staff’s gender, not the elected’s gender, will drive the overall gender of staff as well as the gender characterization of policy agendas. Mayors — regardless of gender — with female chiefs of staff in this dataset have more female staffers and more neutral policy agendas. Mayors — regardless of gender — with male chiefs of staff have more male staffers and mostly masculine policy. In weak mayor systems, city managers’ gender strongly influences mayoral policy agendas, especially in small cities; since most city managers are male, those policy agendas are more masculine, regardless of the mayor’s and chief of staff’s gender. Thus, I find that staff who are involved in the intricacies of policy process and outcome have a stronger influence on policy than the public-facing elected official. These results, supplemented by interviews with mayors and chiefs of staff from across the country, could change the importance scholars place on descriptive representation, and alter scholars’ approach to studying both substantive representation for women and American democracy in general.

Syftet med studien är att lyfta hur förskollärare talar om våldsrepresentativa lekar och populärkulturen på förskolan genom fokusgrupper. Vi vill synliggöra och bidra med kunskap om på vilket sätt förskollärare talar om och därigenom ger uttryck för hur de tolkar och upplever våldsrepresentativa lekar på förskolan. Studiens teoretiska ramverk utgörs av socialkonstruktionism och diskursteori, enligt vilken förståelse skapas i sociala interaktioner där diskurser uppkommer i den sociala världen. Insamling av data har skett genom fokusgrupper med sammanlagt sex förskollärare. Det insamlade materialet bearbetades sedan med hjälp av en kritisk diskursanalys med syftet att identifiera vilka diskurser som framträder i talet mellan förskollärarna. Diskurserna som identifierades genom den kritiska diskursanalysen var: Leken som bearbetning, Populärkultur som pedagogisk potential, De yngsta oförstörda barnen, Leken inom de kontrollerade ramarna, Förbud som balansakt, Leken som indikator på när förskollärare bör agera. Slutsatsen för studien är att våldsrepresentativ lek alltid kommer finnas på förskolan trots att den förbjuds eller inte. Som förskollärarna själva talar om så tar barnen med populärkulturen in i leken och det är därför upp till pedagogerna själva att bestämma vilken betydelse leken får för barnen. / The purpose of this study is to visualize how preschool teachers discuss violence-representative play and popular culture in preschools through focus groups. We aim to provide visibility and contribute knowledge on how preschool teachers discuss and express their interpretations and experiences of violence-representative play in preschools. The theoretical framework of the study is based on social constructionism and discourse theory, which suggests that understanding is developed through social interactions where discourses emerge in the social world. Data collection was carried out through focus groups with a total of six preschool teachers. The collected material was then processed using critical discourse analysis to identify the discourses that emerge in the teacher’s language. The discourse identified through the critical discourse analysis were: Play as processing, Popular culture as pedagogical potential, The youngest and most innocent children, Play within controlled boundaries, Prohibition as a balancing act, Play as an indicator of when preschool teachers need to take action. The conclusion of the study is that violence-representative play will always exist in preschools, regardless of whether it is prohibited or not. As the teachers themselves discuss, children bring popular culture into their play, and it is there for up to educators to determine the significance of play for children.

В магистерской диссертации изучаются официальные сайты полномочных представителей Президента России в федеральных округах. Уделено внимание развитию института полномочных представителей в России, анализируется информационное наполнение и функциональные возможности сайтов. Особое внимание уделено сравнительному анализу работы веб-сайтов. / The master's thesis studied the official sites of plenipotentiaries of the President of Russia in federal districts. Attention is paid to the development of the institute of authorized representatives in Russia, analyzes the content and functionality of the site. Particular attention is paid to the comparative analysis of the web sites.

E-mental health and home treatment are treatment approaches that have proven to be effective, but are only slowly implemented in the German health care system. This paper explores the attitudes toward these innovative treatment approaches. Data was collected in two large, non-clinical samples representative of the German population in spring 2020 (N = 2,503) and winter 2020/2021 (N = 2,519). Statistical associations between variables were examined using two-tailed tests. Binary and multinomial logistic regressions were performed to predict attitudes toward online-based treatment concepts and home treatment approaches. Only few (<20%) people preferred online-based treatment approaches, while a larger proportion (~50%) could imagine being treated at home. Overall, younger subjects were more open to online-therapy approaches, while people with lower education preferred more often a traditional therapy setting. Acceptance of online-therapy did not raise significantly during the first months of the COVID-19 pandemic. When different online-based treatment options were available, the probability of accepting home treatment significantly increased with increasing levels of therapeutic support. Further promotion of acceptance for online-therapy and home treatment seems to be necessary. In the future, more information on innovative treatment approaches should be actively provided.

<p>Injection to the subcutaneous (SC) tissue is one of the preferred methods for drug delivery of pharmaceuticals, from small molecules to monoclonal antibodies. Delivery to SC has become widely popular in part thanks to the low cost, ease of use, and effectiveness of drug delivery through the use of auto-injector devices. However, injection physiology, from initial plume formation to the eventual uptake of the drug in the lymphatics, is highly dependent on SC mechanics, poroelastic properties in particular. Yet, the poroelastic properties of SC have been understudied. In this thesis, I present a two-pronged approach to understanding the poroelastic properties of SC. Experimentally, mechanical and fluid transport properties of SC were measured with confined compression experiments and compared against gelatin hydrogels used as SC-phantoms. It was found that SC tissue is a highly non-linear material that has viscoelastic and porohyperelastic dissipation mechanisms. Gelatin hydrogels showed a similar, albeit more linear response, suggesting a micromechanical mechanism may underline the nonlinear behavior. The second part of the thesis focuses on the multiscale modeling of SC to gain a fundamental understanding of how geometry and material properties of the microstructure drive the macroscale response. SC is composed of adipocytes (fat cells) embedded in a collagen network. The geometry can be characterized with Voroni-like tessellations. Adipocytes are fluid-packed, highly deformable and capable of volume change through fluid transport. Collagen is highly nonlinear and nearly incompressible. Representative volume element (RVE) simulations with different Voroni tesselations shows that the different materials, coupled with the geometry of the packing, can contribute to different material response under the different kinds of loading. Further investigation of the effect of geometry showed that cell packing density nonlinearly contributes to the macroscale response. The RVE models can be homogenized to obtain macroscale models useful in large scale finite element simulations of injection physiology. Two types of homogenization were explored: fitting to analytical constitutive models, namely the Blatz-Ko material model, or use of Gaussian process surrogates, a data-driven non-parametric approach to interpolate the macroscale response.</p>

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The challenge of climate change is twofold: to mitigate (prevent) the causes of climate change and to prepare (adapt) to the inevitable effects and consequences. Building and construction are key sectors for decarbonisation (mitigation). The increase in intensity, frequency and duration of heat waves threatens indoor comfort and constitutes a health and comfort risk (adaptation).Therefore, regulations are being changed to take into account related emissions and extreme episodes through new indicators. However, up to now, past climate observations are still used in the calculation of these indicators. This raises the question of how to integrate future climate predictions into regulations. This work aims at characterising the vulnerability of buildings to climate change and aimsat taking into account future climate predictions in building design. It establishes a method for constructing standard weather data based on climate projections and for identifying vulnerable building typologies that are at risk. This project stands out for the use of a large number of building and meteorological data. 77 residential buildings from the Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment (CSTB) database and 78 years (1981-2058) of weather data for 9 climate models (RCP8.5 scenario) are crossed for Dynamic Thermal Simulations (DTS) on COMETh. The study first highlights the relevance of using reference and extreme years, representative of the climate data, to reduce the number of simulations. The reference year makes it possible to observe the average needs over a period. The extreme year estimates the range of values around this mean.The report then raises the issue of cooling systems as one of the major challenges for energy needs. Under the effect of climate change, heating requirements are decreasing and largely compensate the increase of cooling needs. But few buildings in France are already equipped with cooling systems and the creation of a need exceeding a threshold leads to the purchase of new units. This raises a problem of social equity in access to thermal comfort. Moreover, the environmentalimpact of these systems is more related to refrigerants necessary for the manufacturethan to energy consumption.The research finally proposes a method to classify passive or active buildings (in the sense of cooling needs), that are adapted or not adapted to future extreme weather conditions. This involves applying a clustering algorithm (k-means) to group similar buildings together in terms of energy requirements for different climate models. This method already makes it possible to identify the buildings at risk and to prioritise the measures to be taken (energy renovation). This classification also opens up the possibility of extending this work to newer, larger and more diversified samples. Similar encouraging results were obtained from 2470 offices. They could helpidentify technical and architectural characteristics and assist in the design of efficient passive buildings.