Genom att undersöka hur sex olika grupper i kommunerna Katrineholm och Malmö pratar om och argumenterar kring källsortering syftar studien till att identifiera argument och uppfattningar kring källsortering i de två kommunerna. Tre fokusgrupper i ålderskategorierna 20-26, 30-45 och 46-65 utfördes i varje kommun. Dessa sex fokusgrupper jämfördes sinsemellan för att undersöka likheter och skillnader mellan de tre ålderskategorierna och kommunerna. Dessutom ställdes resultatet mot tidigare forskning för att utläsa om studien speglade återkommande argument i tidigare studier eller om nya argument framställs. Resultatet av studien visar på att närhet till återvinningsstationer, underhåll av återvinningsstationer, platsbrist i hemmet, kunskap om källsorteringsprocessen och hur individen ska sortera, tanken för miljön och positiv feedback benämndes som drivkrafter till att deltagarna i studien sorterade mera. Faktorer som lagkrav och taxeringsavgifter uttryckte deltagarna som obetydliga eller rentav hinder när det kommer till deras källsortering. Resultatet av studien visar på att inga direkta skillnader mellan kommunerna kunde utläsas, dock kunde skillnader i argument mellan ålderskategorierna utläsas. / By examine how six different groups in Katrineholm and Malmö talks and arguments about recycling this study aim to identify arguments and perceptions about recycling in the two municipalities. Three focus groups in the age categories 20-26, 30-45 and 46-65 were performed in each municipality. These six focus groups were compared among each other to identify similarities and differences between the age categories and municipalities. Furthermore, previous science and the results from this study were compared in aim to investigate whether this study reflects arguments and perceptions in previous studies or if new arguments were established. The result in this study show that proximity to recycling stations, maintenance of recycling stations, lack of space in the home, knowledge about recycling processes, knowledge about how to recycle, the environmental mentality and positive feedback are, for the participants in this study, working as motivation factors to recycle more. Factors as legislative demands and rate billing were seen as insignificant or in some cases obstacles when increase the participant’s recycling. The results of this study show no differences between the two municipalities, however, differences in arguments and perceptions between the age categories could be interpreted.

This dissertation provides an account of an often-noted change in the history of French: the shift in the expression of the internal argument of a small class of dynamic two-place verbs best represented by aider ‘to help’ from “dative”, i.e., as an indirect object with the preposition à, to “accusative”, i.e., as a direct object with no preposition. The change does not appear to be correlated with a change in the meaning of the verbs. Traditional commentators have viewed it as random, affecting only a few lexical items, rather than systematic. One of the central results of this thesis is that the valency change affects a class of some twenty verbs at approximately the same period and it follows the same time course. Moreover, three properties distinguish this class of verbs from all others taking indirect objects in French: following current ideas about the syntactic manifestation of verbs and their arguments, they have a non relational argument structure, they do not possess lexical directionality, and they select for first or third order entities. These facts suggest that a structural change underlies the change in the realization of the internal argument. Adopting Lightfoot’s (1999, 2006) “cue-based” approach to language change, it is proposed that the valency change is a result of the loss of a functional item encoding directionality. Directionality is a derived property in Medieval French, available in particular to prepositions. It is demonstrated that when à was able to encode direction, it was also able to license first and third order complements in a broader range of contexts, namely, with aider-type verbs. The loss of this functional item is also correlated with several other structural changes that occurred in the 16th and 17th century.

This thesis shows that the mapping of semantics to syntax can be more complex than is generally assumed. In general, the mapping of semantics to syntax is thought to be many-to-one; for instance, many types of external argument roles are mapped to a subject position, and a theme or patient role is mapped to an object position. Contrary to this view, I show, by studying the syntax and semantics of external arguments, that one-to-one mapping between syntax and semantics is possible. External arguments are generally assumed to be introduced by a functional head, called Voice or v, regardless of the semantics of the argument, rather than being actual arguments of the verbs. A high Appl head similar to Voice has recently been argued to introduce external arguments as well as arguments of other semantic types. At present, no theories propose how these heads are distinguished in argument structure. This thesis articulates the differences between the external argument introducing heads and explores the consequences of these differences. Moreover, this thesis proposes a new type of event-related applicative, namely peripheral Appl. Like Voice and high Appl, peripheral Appl introduces an argument external to the verb phrase. The key differences among the external argument introducing heads are in their semantics as well as their syntactic position. Semantically, Voice is specified for agentivity, but high and peripheral Appls are specified for non-agentivity. Syntactically, high Appl merges below Voice, not above, while peripheral Appl can merge above Voice. An important result emerging from this thesis is that not all external arguments are treated in the same way in syntax: not only are agent and non-agent external argument roles mapped into different positions, but different types of non-agent roles are also mapped into different positions.

This dissertation provides an account of an often-noted change in the history of French: the shift in the expression of the internal argument of a small class of dynamic two-place verbs best represented by aider ‘to help’ from “dative”, i.e., as an indirect object with the preposition à, to “accusative”, i.e., as a direct object with no preposition. The change does not appear to be correlated with a change in the meaning of the verbs. Traditional commentators have viewed it as random, affecting only a few lexical items, rather than systematic. One of the central results of this thesis is that the valency change affects a class of some twenty verbs at approximately the same period and it follows the same time course. Moreover, three properties distinguish this class of verbs from all others taking indirect objects in French: following current ideas about the syntactic manifestation of verbs and their arguments, they have a non relational argument structure, they do not possess lexical directionality, and they select for first or third order entities. These facts suggest that a structural change underlies the change in the realization of the internal argument. Adopting Lightfoot’s (1999, 2006) “cue-based” approach to language change, it is proposed that the valency change is a result of the loss of a functional item encoding directionality. Directionality is a derived property in Medieval French, available in particular to prepositions. It is demonstrated that when à was able to encode direction, it was also able to license first and third order complements in a broader range of contexts, namely, with aider-type verbs. The loss of this functional item is also correlated with several other structural changes that occurred in the 16th and 17th century.

This thesis shows that the mapping of semantics to syntax can be more complex than is generally assumed. In general, the mapping of semantics to syntax is thought to be many-to-one; for instance, many types of external argument roles are mapped to a subject position, and a theme or patient role is mapped to an object position. Contrary to this view, I show, by studying the syntax and semantics of external arguments, that one-to-one mapping between syntax and semantics is possible. External arguments are generally assumed to be introduced by a functional head, called Voice or v, regardless of the semantics of the argument, rather than being actual arguments of the verbs. A high Appl head similar to Voice has recently been argued to introduce external arguments as well as arguments of other semantic types. At present, no theories propose how these heads are distinguished in argument structure. This thesis articulates the differences between the external argument introducing heads and explores the consequences of these differences. Moreover, this thesis proposes a new type of event-related applicative, namely peripheral Appl. Like Voice and high Appl, peripheral Appl introduces an argument external to the verb phrase. The key differences among the external argument introducing heads are in their semantics as well as their syntactic position. Semantically, Voice is specified for agentivity, but high and peripheral Appls are specified for non-agentivity. Syntactically, high Appl merges below Voice, not above, while peripheral Appl can merge above Voice. An important result emerging from this thesis is that not all external arguments are treated in the same way in syntax: not only are agent and non-agent external argument roles mapped into different positions, but different types of non-agent roles are also mapped into different positions.

Sammanfattning Titel: Skilda meningar gällande komponentavskrivning - Instansernas argumentation i olika regelverk Nivå: D-uppsats i ämnet företagsekonomi Författare: Viktoria Alstermark och Reine Haddad Handledare: Arne Fagerström Datum: 2013 – juni Syfte: Syftet med studien är att undersöka hur argumenten i diskussionen kring komponentavskrivning tagit form i IAS 16, RR12, IFRS för SME samt K3. Studien syftar även till att undersöka vilka argument för- och mot som har varit aktuella vid införandet av avskrivningsmetoden för de olika regleringarna. Metod: Studien har genomförts med en kvalitativ och induktiv ansats baserad på sekundärdata. Analyserna har genomförts med hjälp av ett egenkonstruerat kodningsschema baserat på olika slags analysmodeller. Resultat och slutsats: Resultatet visar på att det finns skilda meningar bland instansernas syn avseende komponentavskrivning. De flesta instanser som har valt att uttrycka någon åsikt i frågan är negativt inställda till avskrivningsmetoden. Komponentavskrivningsmetoden anses vara komplex att tillämpa och har därför inte stöd från instanserna. Utifrån undersökningen kan slutsatsen dras att de instanser som valt att uttrycka en åsikt har gjort det i syfte att gynna sig själva. Uppsatsens bidrag: Studien kan användas av standardsättare i framtida fall gällande att införa komponentavskrivningsmetoden för flera företag. Utifrån kan de se en sammanställning av alla instansers åsikter kring avskrivningsmetoden, vilket innebär att de själva inte behöver göra en sammanställning och sparar därmed tid i övervägandet att införa metoden. Ett annat bidrag som uppsatsen genererar är till de olika instanserna som kan läsa uppsatsen och referera till den här undersökningen i det fall standardsättarna skulle komma på tanken att införa komponentavskrivning även för de ännu mindre företagen. Nyckelord: Komponentavskrivning, argument, K3, IFRS för SME, instanser, remissvar.

La présente étude porte sur une hiérarchisation des arguments de verbes innus qui détermine quels arguments sont marqués dans les flexions du verbe et quel argument est incorporé en position médiane. Le corpus est constitué de 1 275 verbes innus comportant chacun au moins une parmi cinq médianes dites « classificatoires ». Faisant suite aux travaux de Drapeau (2008) qui traite de verbes comportant des médianes génériques (non-classificatoires), chaque argument sémantique se voit attribué un rôle sémantique (thématique) selon la position qu'il occupe dans la décomposition lexicale du verbe. L'objectif de l'étude est de vérifier les conclusions de Drapeau (2008), soit que, d'une part, la hiérarchisation des arguments résulte d'une interaction entre la hiérarchie des rôles sémantiques, la « animacy hierarchy », et la « possessor constraint» et que, d'autre part, l'argument auquel renvoie la médiane est toujours le plus bas dans l'hiérarchie des arguments. Les résultats démontrent que la hiérarchisation proposée par Drapeau explique les données avec les médianes classificatoires. Ainsi, ils démontrent un parallélisme entre les deux types de médianes. Toutefois, ils mettent en valeur une faiblesse dans le système d'attribution de rôles sémantiques utilisé en relevant la nécessité de mieux définir le rôle de thème et celui d'instrument. Finalement, l'analyse des verbes comportant des médianes doubles remet en question la définition que donne Goddard (1990) des processus de dérivation primaire et secondaire dans les langues algonquiennes. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Innu, Médiane, Classificateur, Incorporation, Hiérarchie, Rôle sémantique.

Galen Strawson’s Basic Argument is an attempt to prove that no agent can meet the demands for true moral responsibility. The Basic Argument proceeds on the assumption that, in order for an agent to be truly morally responsible for her actions, she must be truly responsible for her reasons for performing those actions, which Strawson contends is impossible since it requires an infinite regress of truly responsible decisions to have the reasons one has. In my thesis, I take issue with the Basic Argument. I argue that, contrary to Strawson’s claims, the Basic Argument is not persuasive to those who reject that one’s reasons cause one’s actions. For those who are willing to overlook this shortcoming, I then argue that it is possible for an agent to evade the threat of infinite regress, particularly in situations where two simultaneous choices (at least partially) explain each other.

In this study we explored some of the factors associated with biased processing of attitude-relevant information. We were particularly interested in the possibility that a self-affirmation, by reducing self-evaluative concerns, might increase participants' willingness to impartially evaluate information that conflicts with their current views. We examined students' reactions to arguments about increasing tuition as a function of four factors: attitude importance, argument strength, the congruence of arguments with existing attitudes, and our experimental manipulation of affirmation. We found that affirmation reduced biased evaluation only for participants who rated the issue as important. We also found that affirmation dramatically impacted the perception of argument strength. Stronger counterattitudinal arguments were rejected by non-affirmed participants, who did not distinguish them from weak arguments, presumably because of the esteem threat posed by a strong ideological challenge. Affirmed participants, though, evaluated strong counterattitudinal arguments more positively.

The purpose of this paper is to examine and to analyze the arguments about a possible Swedish law against the veil. I have therefore highlighted how notions about the veil creates and reproduces power-structures and meaning-systems. I structured the arguments in a pro et contra schedule and then analyzed them by using a theoretical framework consisting post-colonial feminism, orientalism, multi-culture and intersectionality together with research produced by Joan Wallach Scott (2010), Pia Karlsson Minganti (2007) and Anne Sofie Roald (2003). The results of the study shows that the people who either argue for or against a veil-law agree that the veil is an oppression of women and that it must be resisted. To be objective in the discussion of the veil seems to be impossible and the women it affects deprived voice. A piece of cloth has never been as controversial as the veil and the question is whether it is possible to reach consensus on its symbolism, the arguments that I analyzed contradicts it.