Abstract As the media intensity increases, it becomes more difficult for companies to obtain people's attention, and a risk that the message will pass its target audience arises. Social media has generated new possibilities for companies to be able to profile their message and reach specific target audiences. Within all groups in society there are certain people who have an ability to influence others. These individuals have become more important on social media. Several names have been used in previous research to describe them, in this paper the term social media influencers, SMIs, will be used. Through collaborations with SMIs, companies can promote their organization or their brand. During this process, the authors of this paper have found several studies which focuses mainly on how companies should identify the right SMIs to collaborate with and also what distinguishes these individuals. The authors recognize that less research has been dedicated to studying this phenomenon from the consumers’ perspective. Therefore, this study aims to contribute to the research in this specific area. The purpose of this study is to get an insight in consumers’ attitudes towards social media influencers, as well as how consumers value and perceive corporate-sponsored posts by influencers on social media. A qualitative approach was used in this study, based on fifteen interviews with consumers who use social media in which they follow one or more SMIs. The empirics have then been analyzed based on the theoretical framework, which mainly consists of theories and previous studies within the field of marketing communication, among others buzz-marketing, sponsorship, product placement and covert marketing. The conclusion of this paper is that none of the respondents had a positive attitude towards corporate-sponsored posts. The respondents tend to trust SMIs that are genuine and have a sense of humor. The respondents trusts information from other consumers more than they trust information from companies. The credibility for SMIs decreases when they get financial compensation to publish corporate-sponsored posts. Keywords: SMI, social media, influencer, corporate-sponsored posts, trust, attitudes, credibility / Sammanfattning På grund av den ökade medieintensiteteten blir det svårare för företag att fånga människors uppmärksamhet, det uppstår en risk att budskapet passerar dess tilltänkta målgrupp. Sociala medier har skapat nya möjligheter för företag att kunna profilera sitt budskap och nå ut till specifika målgrupper. Inom alla grupper i samhället finns vissa typer av personer som har en förmåga att påverka andra människor, inom samma grupp. Dessa personer har fått ökad betydelse på sociala medier och benämns inom tidigare forskning med flera olika namn. I denna studie kommer de benämnas social media influencers, SMIs. Genom samarbeten med SMIs kan företag marknadsföra sin organisation eller sitt varumärke. Under denna process har uppsatsförfattarna funnit flera tidigare studier som har fokuserat på hur företag kan identifiera de rätta personerna att samarbeta med samt vad som utmärker dessa personer. Samtidigt har uppsatsförfattarna upplevt att mindre forskning tillägnats åt att studera fenomenet ur konsumenternas perspektiv. Därför ämnar denna studie att bidra till forskningen på detta område. Syftet med denna studie är att få en inblick i konsumenters attityder gentemot social media influencers samt hur konsumenter värderar och uppfattar företagssponsrade inlägg från dessa. Undersökningen har genomförts med en kvalitativ ansats bestående av femton personliga intervjuer med konsumenter som använder sociala medier samt följer någon eller några SMIs inom dessa. Empirin har därefter analyserats utifrån det teoretiska ramverket, vilket huvudsakligen består av teorier och tidigare studier inom marknadskommunikation, bland annat buzz-marknadsföring, sponsring, produktplacering och dold marknadsföring.   Slutsatsen i denna studie är att ingen av respondenterna i studien hade en positiv attityd gentemot företagssponsrade inlägg. Respondenterna känner mer förtroende för SMIs som är äkta, har humor och kan bjuda på sig själva. Respondenterna har även större förtroende för information från andra konsumenter än från företag. Vetskapen om att SMIs får finansiell kompensation för att publicera företagssponsrade inlägg gör att trovärdigheten för dem minskar.   Nyckelord: SMI, sociala medier, influencer, företagssponsrade inlägg, förtroende, trovärdighet, attityder

I takt med den ökade betydelsen av symbolisk konsumtion har begreppet Social Media Influencers, SMI, grundats. SMI är ett samlingsbegrepp för de oberoende personer som genom sina sociala medier påverkar och inspirerar sina följare genom att vara en förebild inom mode, skönhet, livsstil, hälsa och inredning. SMI representerar dagens opinionsledare då de genom sina sociala medier sprider marknadsföring som människor uppfattar som uppriktig och genuin. Idag används SMI strategiskt av företag för att nå ut till kunder på ett individualiserat och anpassat sätt. Den här nya typen av marknadsföringsstrategi kan ses som en modern version av Word of Mouth (WOM). Marknadsföringsstrategin grundas i att informationen som kommer från en SMI ofta uppfattas mer som rekommendationer än reklam. SMI har en betydande roll på marknaden idag då det är viktigare än någonsin att visa upp vilken social grupp man tillhör. Speciellt för unga kvinnor, som finner det viktigt att passa in och följa nya trender. Instagram är utsedd till en av de mest skadliga sociala medierna för ungdomars mentala hälsa. Detta då det bidrar till en ohälsosam självbild och skapar höga krav på människors liv. Samtidigt som SMIs roll på marknaden växer, blir konsumenter allt mer reklamtrötta. Därför ifrågasätts SMI som fenomen och 329 kvinnor runt om i Sverige har besvarat en webbenkät kring sin inställning till SMI på Instagram. Det är tydligt att många kvinnor har svårt att bilda en konkret uppfattning kring sin inställning till fenomenet och många varierar sig i sina ställningstaganden. Undersökningen visar att kvinnor med högre utbildning och i äldre åldrar är kritiska till budskapen SMI sprider via Instagram, medan kvinnor med lägre utbildning och i den yngre generationen anser marknadsföringen från SMI som uppriktig och ärlig i en högre grad. Undersökningen visar också att trots att många kvinnor har en negativ inställning till SMI säger de sig ändå handla produkter som SMI rekommenderar. / In line with the increased importance of symbolic consumption the notion of Social Media Influencers, SMI, has been found. SMI is a concept used to describe independent people who both influence and inspire other people on their social media channels by being a role model in fashion, beauty, lifestyle, health and interior design. SMI represents today’s opinion leaders by using their social media channels to spread advertising and marketing to people who perceive the information as sincere and genuine. Today SMI are used in companies business strategies to reach out to customers in a individualized and faithful manner. This new kind of marketing strategy can be seen as a modern version of Word of Mouth (WOM). The purpose by using this kind of marketing is that the information that comes from an SMI are often perceived more as recommendations than advertising. SMI’s got a significant role on the market today and it’s more important than ever before to show what social group you belong to. Especially for young womens, who finds it important to fit in and follow the last trends. Instagram is one of the social media platforms which is the most detrimental for young people’s mental health. It contributes to an unhealthy self-image and creates high demands on people's life. At the same time as SMI is rapidly growing, consumers gets tired of being constantly chased by advertising. Therefore people are now questioning SMI as a phenomenon. 329 women in Sweden have participated in a web survey about their approach to SMI at Instagram. It’s shown that many women find it hard to form a concrete perception of their attitude towards the phenomenon and many women varies in their positions. The survey shows that older women and women with higher education are critical towards what SMI’s are posting on Instagram, while women with lower education and in younger generations consider SMI's marketing to be sincere and honest. The survey also shows that despite the fact that many women got a negative attitude towards SMI, they’re still keen on buying whatever that SMI recommends them to buy.

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Sensorimotor integration (SMI) is the ability of the central nervous system (CNS) to integrate afferent (incoming) information from different body parts and formulate appropriate motor output to muscles. Effective sensorimotor integration is essential when learning new skills and when performing tasks at home and in the workplace (Rothwell &Rosenkranz, 2005). The overall aim of this thesis is to investigate the effect of acute experimental pain on sensorimotor processing. The primary outcome is the effect of acute experimental pain on somatosensory evoked potential (SEP) peaks. Secondary outcomes include the effect of pain on motor performance and the interactive effect of pain and motor training on SEP peaks. As expected for the placebo condition, no significant differences were found in any of the post-placebo peaks. Contrary to what was expected for the placebo condition, the only peak to be significantly different post-motor learning was the N24 peak. Contrary to what was expected, there were no significant differences for any of the peaks following capsaicin application. One of the secondary outcomes was the interactive effect of pain and motor learning on SEP peaks. The only peak to show any significant differences post-intervention/post-motor learning was the N24 peak. Another secondary outcome was the effect of pain on motor performance. In terms of accuracy, no significant differences were found for either condition following motor learning. However, the data does show a trend towards improved accuracy for the subjects in the intervention group while the subjects in the placebo show a trend towards decreased accuracy. As expected, there was a significant decrease in reaction time for both conditions post-motor learning. However, contrary to what was expected, reaction time decreased to a greater extent in the intervention condition as compared to the placebo condition. It was anticipated that the reaction time would decrease to a greater extent in the placebo condition as it was hypothesized that pain would negatively impact motor performance. It is suspected that the effect of the pain induced by the capsaicin made the motor training task more difficult and participants would have had to focus greater attentional resources to learn the task which lead to the enhanced performance following motor training. / UOIT

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Le facteur de transcription T-bet joue un rôle central dans la régulation de la différenciation des lymphocytes T. La protéine tyrosine kinase, la glycogène synthase kinase 3 (GSK-3), inhibe l'activation des lymphocytes T et contrôle l'expression de leurs récepteurs inhibiteurs PD-1 et LAG- 3. Bien que l'inhibition de GSK-3 puisse augmenter l'expression de T-bet, l'interrelation entre T-bet et GSK-3 dans l'immunité tumorale est inconnue. Dans cette étude, nous montrons que les souris knock-out T-bet (Tbet - / -) sont compromises dans leur capacité à contrôler la croissance des cellules tumorales du mélanome B16. Cependant, l'injection d'une petite molécule inhibitrice (SMI) de GSK-3 inverse cette condition compromise entraînant le contrôle de la croissance tumorale similaire à celle observée chez les souris de type sauvage. Un examen de Tbet - / - a montré une perte de cellules dendritiques (DC) et de cellules leucocytes polymorphonucléaires (PMN) potentiellement suppressives et de lymphocytes tumoraux T (TILs) CD4 + accompagnée d'une augmentation de cellules T CD8 +. L'analyse viSNE (avancé tSNE) a en outre montré une réduction de la population effectrice expérimentée à l'antigène dans les TILs CD8 + chez Tbet -/-. Cette population est marquée par la réduction de CD44. L'inhibition de GSK-3 n'a montré aucun effet sur la perte de DC, TILs CD4 +, PMN et les TILs CD8 + ainsi que l’expression de Granzyme B (GZMB) sur les cellules T CD8 +. La seule exception était une augmentation mineure néanmoins statistiquement significative du facteur de transcription Eomesdermin (Eomes) dans les TILs CD8 +. L'étude démontre un effet compensatoire inattendu de l'inhibition de GSK-3 sur la perte de T-bet. Il reste à élucider la nature complète du parcours de cette compensation. / The transcription factor T-bet plays a central role in regulating T-cell differentiation, while the protein tyrosine kinase, glycogen synthase kinase 3 (GSK-3) inhibits T-cell activation and controls the expression of inhibitory receptors PD-1 and LAG-3 on T-cells. Although GSK-3 inhibition can increase T-bet expression, the inter-relationship between T-bet and GSK-3 in tumor immunity is unknown. In this study, we show that T-bet knock-out (Tbet-/-) mice are compromised in their ability to control the growth of the B16 melanoma tumor cells. However, the injection of a small molecule inhibitor (SMI) of GSK-3 reverses this compromised condition resulting in the control of tumor growth similar to that seen in wild type mice. An examination of Tbet-/- showed a loss of dendritic cells (DC) and potentially suppressive polymorphonuclear leucocytes (PMN) and CD4+ cell tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs) accompanied by an increase in CD8+ cells. viSNE analysis (advanced tSNE- t-Distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding) further showed a reduction of antigen experienced effector marker CD44 in CD8+ TILs in Tbet-/-. GSK-3 inhibition showed no effect on the loss of DCs, CD4+ TILs or the presence of PMNs or CD8+ T-cells or the loss of Granzyme B (GZMB) on CD8+ cells. The one exception was a minor but statistically significant increase in the transcription factor Eomesodermin (Eomes) in CD8+ TILs. The study demonstrates an unexpected compensatory effect of GSK-3 inhibition on the loss of T-bet. The full nature of the pathway that accounts for this compensation remains to be elucidated.

Background:  Over the years, traditional entrepreneurs started businesses due to either pull or push factors within their environments. Research has been carried out in profiling different types of entrepreneurs and their characteristics. The social media influencers are new forms of entrepreneurs who recently appeared due to changes in the technological environments. The existence of social media platforms has enhanced the possibility of entrepreneurial activities online. The platforms are available for everyone, but some have more entrepreneurial orientation or characteristics than others.  Purpose: The aim of this research is to measure the entrepreneurial orientation and the characteristics of social media users, compare social media influencers with other social media users, to determine if differences exist. Methods:       This research uses the Individual Entrepreneurial Orientation scale (Bolton & Lane, 2012) and the Individual Personality Traits measuring scale (Al Mamun, Bin Yusoff, & Ibrahim, 2018). This is a deductive study, testing the above-mentioned theories on social media users, and a quantitative study aided using data collected from online survey. Conclusion:   The results of this study show that Social Media Influencer have higher entrepreneurial traits than non-Social Media Influencers.  The result also supports the three-factor structure and satisfactory reliability of the IEO scales and subscales. Subsequently, I found out that non-SMIs do create online contents and carry out entrepreneurial activities online too.