Article 334 of the Constitution of India (1950) stipulates that certain electoral districts in each state should be reserved for minority groups, namely the “Scheduled Caste”(SC) and the Scheduled Tribe”(ST), through the reservation of seats in the states' legislative assemblies. Even though the original article stated that the reservation policy would be in place for just twenty years, it has been amended several times and is still in effect. This dissertation examines the impact of the policy on the education and health outcomes of the SC population. Variations in seat quotas are generated by the timing of elections in different states and the states’ fluctuating SC populations. The first paper on education uses data from 25 Indian States and 3 Union Territories for the years 1990-2011 to form a panel dataset to estimate the impact of the quota system on both enrollment and dropout rates among SC students in all levels of schooling. I use the fixed effect regression to test the mechanisms through which an elected SC legislator could have an influence on the education outcomes for the SC population in the represented state. I then use the resulting variables as my controls to identify the causal relationship using the dynamic panel data model. I find that a SC legislator has the potential to influence the number of schools built, as well as the amount of education and welfare expenditure allocated to the SC population. Moreover, I find that the SC political reservation has a positive and statistically significant impact on the SC enrollment rates and a negative and significant impact on the dropout rates, in all levels of schooling. Likewise, I use the NFHS-3 dataset and the Cox Proportional Hazard Model to estimate the hazard rates (risks of dying) of children under the age of 12 months (IMR) and under the age of 60 months (U5MR) as influenced by different SC quota share quintiles. I find that the 50-60% quota-share quintile has the biggest impact in reducing the IMR and U5MR among the SC children.

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Because of their seemingly universal appeal, game elements such as points, goals and leaderboards, are increasingly being incorporated into non-entertainment situations with the aim of increasing user performance. This process is referred to as gamification. However, little empirical research exists on gamification’s effectiveness in enhancing performance, particularly with respect to moderating influence of user personality traits. Social gamification that involves more than one participant incorporates social interdependence, which takes form as negative interdependence (competitive in nature) or positive interdependence (cooperative in nature). Based on the hypothesis that the interdependence type underlying a gamification system would appeal to differing personality traits, this study reports a quasi-experiment involving a platform designed to manipulate participant interdependence structure among cooperation, competition, and neutrality, with the latter acting as the control condition. These three interdependence structures functioned as the experiment’s independent variable, with measures of participant performance as dependent variables, together with the participant personality traits assessed using the five factor model of personality acting as moderating variables. 294 undergraduate participants worked with the platform on a voluntary basis over an eight-week period, spending 38,180 minutes and performing 3,275 actions. At the conclusion of the experiment, the data collected were analysed using Kruskal-Wallis, ANOVAs, multilevel mixed method regression models, and a generalised estimating equation. The study’s results yield significant evidence that incorporating gamification in the experimental platform increases participant performance as measured by completed actions on the platform, and that participant personality traits moderated performance depending on interdependence structure. Significant results suggest that within the gamified platform, Extraversion positively moderates performance under competition and Openness positively moderates performance under cooperation.

Due to the growth of online shopping and services, various types of products can be recommended to an individual. After reviewing the current methods for cross-domain recommendations, we believe that there is a need to make different types of recommendations by relying on a common base, and that it is better to depend on a target customer’s information when building the base, because the customer is the one common element in all the purchases. Therefore, we suggest a recommender system (RS) that develops a personality profile for each product, and represents items by an aggregated vector of personality features of the people who have liked the items. We investigate two ways to build personality profiles for items (IPPs). The first way is called average-based IPPs, which represents each item with five attributes that reflect the average Big Five Personality values of the users who like it. The second way is named proportion-based IPPs, which consists of 15 attributes that aggregate the number of fans who have high, average and low Big Five values. The system functions like an item-based collaborative filtering recommender; that is, it recommends items similar to those the user liked. Our system demonstrates the highest recommendation quality in providing cross-domain recommendations, compared to traditional item-based collaborative filtering systems and content-based recommenders.

This thesis deals with circumstances of the economic reform designed by Kurt Rozsypal in 1958 -- 1959. It starts with the study of economic and political situation after the Second world war, postwar reconstruction, question of socialization and take over of the communist party. Then, it focuses on analysis of the first Soviet five year plan and effects of its application on Czechoslovak economy. This part is followed by the study of the first economic crisis and the era of New course. Analysis of the second five year plan, its consequences, preparation and realization of Rozsypal's reform and explanation of the reasons its failure are the second part of the thesis. It finishes with the third five year plan, collapse of the economy in 1963 and cancellation of the plan as well as Rozsypal's reform.

The aim of this thesis with the topic "Strategic analysis" is to elaborate the strategic analysis of the První zemědělská, a.s. Tuněchody company,i.e. to analyse the external and internal environment, to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats and last but not least to conceive strategic recommendations. The thesis is divided into two main parts, the theoretical part and the application part.

The aim is to analyze the competitive environment of the selected organization, in which the student focuses on rivalries between competitors in terms of its substance, behavior (practices) competition, the probability of attack, reprisal from the competition and dynamic environment. He also analyzes the sources and competitiveness indicators (success) and sources of competitive advantage in the industry (market segment), with the help VRIO analysis identifies the key capabilities, which are selected organization source of competitive advantage over competitors. Outcome of this work is to design a strategy for the competitiveness of selected organizations along with steps for its implementation.

The aim of this thesis is to analyse the economic development of Czechoslovakia during the Fourth Five-Year Plan (1966-1970) taking into account political development concerning mainly the formation of the second economic reform in Czechoslovakia. The theoretical section of the thesis deals with the political and the economic situation in Czechoslovakia between 1947-1965. It also looks into the characteristics of mechanisms of the functioning of the Czechoslovak economy. The analytical section deals with Šik´s Reform including its most important economic documents. It analyses the Fourth Five-Year Plan focussing on the most significant indicators of the national economy - national income, investments, industry, agriculture and forestry, transport and communications, water management, international trade, construction industry, standards of living, research and development. Despite the continuation of Šik´s Reform which had little influence on changing the economic progress, and despite the political tensions culminating in August 1968, the economic development during the Fourth Five-Year Plan can be regarded as quite successful.

Final thesis deals with an analysis of a Czech firm Mountfield which business activity lies in selling of garden equipment, swimming pools and hobby products. Based on this analysis a country is chosen, which is suitable for a future expansion. Consequently, the chosen market is segmented together with creating a targeting and positioning of Mountfield products on this market. Marketing mix for the market and customers in question is created in the last part of this thesis.

Human behavior varies widely as does the design of spoken dialog systems (SDS). The search for predictors to match a user’s preference and efficiency for a specific dialog interface type in an SDS was the focus of this research. By using personality as described by the Five-Factor Method (FFM) and the Wizard of Oz technique for delivering three system initiatives of the SDS, participants interacted with each of the SDS initiatives in scheduling an airline flight. The three system initiatives were constructed as strict system, which did not allow the user control of the interaction; mixed system, which allowed the user some control of the interaction but with a system override; and user system, which allowed the user control of the interaction. In order to eliminate gender bias in using the FFM as the instrument, participants were matched in gender and age. Participants were 18 years old to 70 years old, passed a hearing test, had no disability that prohibited the use of the SDS, and were native English speakers. Participants completed an adult consent form, a 50-question personality assessment as described by the FFM, and the interaction with the SDS. Participants also completed a system preference indication form at the end of the interaction. Observations for efficiency were recorded on paper by the researcher. Although the findings did not show a definitive predictor for a SDS due to the small population sample, by using a multinomial regression approach to the statistical analysis, odds ratios of the data helped draw conclusions that support certain personality factors as important roles in a user’s preference and efficiency in choosing and using a SDS. This gives an area for future research. Also, the presumption that preference and efficiency always match was not supported by the results from two of the three systems. An additional area for future research was discovered in the gender data. Although not an initial part of the research, the data shows promise in predicting preference and efficiency for certain SDS. Future research is indicated.