Recent years’ terrorist attacks in Europe and the flow of foreign fighters joining the terrorist organisation Daesh, has made the understanding of radicalisation evermore crucial. This thesis investigates if push and pull factors leading into violent Islamic extremism differentiate between men and women. Furthermore, it assesses how preventive measures from The United Kingdom, Sweden and Denmark targets push and pull factors and if these are sensitive to sex. To fulfil this objective an exploratory thematic analysis was used to synthesise secondary qualitative research surrounding push and pull factors. The push and pull factor analysis revealed three trends: there were limited variation in the overall categories describing the push and pull factors present for men and women; what caused push and pull factors to manifest differed according to sex; and, there were differences in how much men and women were affected by these factors. The assessment of prevention measures showed that none of the measures explicitly mentioned push and pull factors, yet they all had the potential of targeting these. Sex was included in some aspects of the measures, but was not a consideration in relation to the targeting of push and pull factors. The thesis ends with a discussion of what implications the found results have for practice and offers suggestions to how prevention measures can be improved.

More than half of the violations of information systems security policies are initiated by non-malicious activities of insiders. To investigate these non-malicious activities, we utilized the theory of workaround and argued that the application of neutralization techniques impacts the use of workarounds. We built our model using three theories: the theory of workaround, push-pull-mooring theory, and techniques of neutralization. We identified the elements of workarounds related to non-malicious violations and proposed a theoretical perspective using the push-pull-mooring theory to investigate non-malicious workarounds empirically. We propose that non-malicious activities of insiders can be seen as a switching behavior, with push factors such as system dissatisfaction and time pressure, and pull factors such as convenience and alternative attractiveness. The mooring factors in our model are techniques of neutralization, including denial of injury, denial of responsibility, and defense of necessity. We employed the scenario-based factorial survey method to mitigate the effect of social desirability bias. Our mixed model analysis indicates that time pressure, convenience, denial of injury, and defense of necessity significantly impact an individual's likelihood of engaging in non-malicious workarounds. Additionally, the relative weight analysis of our model shows that convenience and time pressure explain most of the variance in our model.

From 2015, a huge influx of refugees came from the Middle East, the Balkans, Central Asia and Africa to Europe. It is triggered by various persecutions, armed wars, economic impossibility. The majority of those arrived were refugees, those who had fled their country due to imminent threat or persecution and were even trying to reach the European continent at the risk of their lives. The others are economic immigrants who have migrated to the European Union in the hope of a better life - to work, study or reunite. The UK has been a major destination for both migrants and refugees for many decades. The dissertation draws attention to the complex effects of migration, with a particular focus on the host country, and highlights, especially in the UK, the need for migrants in an aging society in Europe, even if the public thinks otherwise. With the Brexit, the UK has exited the European Union, cut back on previous benefits for EU migrants and is opening up to former Commonwealth members as sending countries.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the manual and automatic analysis methods for force-time curve analysis of the isometric mid-thigh pull (IMTP) test. The visual analysis, first derivative analysis and threshold analysis methods were used to analyse onset time and time-specific forces at 50 ms, 90 ms, 200 ms and 250 ms on the force-time curve. Ninety-three collegiate sports athletes’ trials were selected and analysed by each method. The visual analysis method was set as the reference method for paired comparisons with the first derivative analysis method and threshold analysis method. Onset time comparisons revealed that the first derivative analysis method was comparable with the visual analysis method with average difference at about 30 ms. Results from the weighted least products regression analysis and the Bland-Altman analysis showed that large fixed bias confounded by proportional bias existed in the threshold analysis method, and time-specific force variables obtained from the first derivative analysis method were closer to those from the visual analysis method when compared with the threshold analysis method. These findings suggest that the first derivative analysis method could be an effective tool for force-time curve analysis of the IMTP test.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the use of isometric mid-thigh pulls to determine lower-limb asymmetrical strength differences in NCAA D-I athletes. Sixty-six subjects (40 males and 26 females) performed 2 maximal effort isometric pulls over two force plates sampling at 1000 Hz each. Peak force was scaled for body weight, and rate of force development was examined from 0-200ms. Results of the study show subjects' produced significantly greater scaled force with the left leg as compared to the right leg; however, no significant differences existed for rate of force development (RFD). Men exhibited significant differences between both scaled peak force and RFD, while women only showed significant differences in scaled peak force. Of the 66 subjects tested, 6 subjects (5 men and 1 woman) exhibited percent differences of 15% or greater asymmetry for scaled peak force. The results indicate that isometric mid-thigh pulls are a way to show the presence of asymmetries in D-I athletes.

This dissertation presents dynamic system models of continuous manufacturing systems based on analogies with electrical systems. The developed modeling technique has the capability to explicitly specify production control schemes including control points, material and information flow paths, and logical operations. The model provides standard graphical representations and governing equations to describe both the steady state and transient responses of continuous manufacturing systems. For deterministic systems, these equations can be solved to get closed-form solutions. For stochastic systems, numerical solutions can be obtained for any probabilistic distribution. The electrical analogs provide an excellent tool to model control signals and logical operations. This is especially important for pull control schemes where qualitative descriptions often found in the literature can be ambiguous. The proposed technique is demonstrated by modeling push and a variety of pull systems. The developed models are used to study the relative performance of push, CONWIP, and kanban control systems. The results show that the card count distribution significantly affects the performance of a kanban system, and that drawing conclusions on kanban performance requires card count optimization. The results also show that the relative performance of push and CONWIP systems varies with operational factors. The factors studied in this dissertation are the bottleneck utilization, line balance, demand rate variability, and processing rate variability. At some combinations of these factors, the push system is superior to the CONWIP system, with other combinations, the CONWIP system is the superior system. In this work, push systems tend to have better relative performance (compared to CONWIP) at high variability levels in the processing rates and low variability levels in the demand rate, while CONWIP systems tend to have better relative performance (compared to push) at high variability levels in the demand rate and low variability levels in the processing rates. CONWIP systems tend to have higher relative performance at high utilization levels and in lines where a distinct bottleneck exists.

Technology push product development presents a number of challenges over the more typical market pull product development. Despite these challenges, enough advantages exist to motivate firms to develop technology push products at greater risk. Modularity is a tool that can address some of these challenges. Currently most research and application of modularity have focused on market pull product development efforts. The research in this thesis explores the value of modularity in technology push product development through the development of methods and the analysis of 68 example products including 35 technology push products. A method has been developed for quantifying the degree to which a product is market pull and technology push by applying scores derived from customer feedback. In the development of the scoring method, the meaning of the terms market pull and technology push have been explored and clarified allowing for beneficial application. The scoring method was applied to 68 example products and then statistically evaluated to determine the effect that the market pull and technology push scores have on the probability of product success. With the market pull and technology push scores as a basis for the probability of success, the effect of modularity in technology push products can be determined. The concept of technology modularity was introduced in comparison to product modularity. Each of the 35 technology push products was evaluated to determine the level of both product and technology modularity present. These levels are used to statistically evaluate the affect of modularity on the probability of product success. This research presents methods for determining if technology modularity can significantly improve the probability of product success with examples indicating its value and application. Technology modularity, and its application, is validated as an important concept for technology push product developers. Three example products are provided to illustrate the application of this research to improve product development decisions. The methods, results, and conclusions of this research provide product developers with a powerful tool to aid them in the successful development and commercialization of technology push products.

This thesis involves the development and study of a finite element model of a hermetic, single-vane compressor and a single-phase alternating current induction motor assembled in a common housing. The manufacturer of this unit is experiencing a high scrap rate due to interference during operation between the stator and rotor of the motor. The rotor shaft of the motor is non-typical because of its cantilever design. The finite element model was first subjected to eigenvalue analysis. This revealed that the interference producing displacements were not the result of torque application to the rotor at a frequency close to an eigenvalue of the mechanical system. After a review of the literature and discussions with Electrical Engineering Department faculty possessing extensive motor experience, it was surmised that the physical phenomenon causing the rotor displacement was unbalanced magnetic pull. This phenomenon occurs in the air gap of rotating electric machines due to eccentricity in the air gap. The model was then subjected to simultaneous harmonic force inputs with magnitudes of unity on the rotor and stator surfaces to simulate the presence of unbalanced magnetic pull. It was found that the rotor shaft acts as a cantilever beam while the stator and housing are essentially rigid. The displacements due to these forces were examined and then scaled to develop the motor parameters necessary to produce the radial forces required for stator/rotor interference. Several recommendations were then made regarding possible solutions to the interference problem. / Master of Science

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Syftet med projektet var att utveckla en multiplexanalys för att detektera antigen från SARS-CoV-2, influensa och respiratoriskt syncytial virus genom att använda en masspektrometrisk metod som involverar antigenspecifika bindare. Bindarna klonades, renades och biotinylerades innan de användes i en analys utvecklad genom en målinriktad metod som involverade antigenerna. En slutsats som drog var att det var möjligt för Avi-märkta bindare att specifikt binda antigen-härledda peptidmål i multiplexanalysen. / The purpose of project was to develop a multiplex assay capable of detecting antigens from SARSCoV-2, influenza and respiratory syncytial virus by utilizing a mass spectrometric approach involving antigen-specific binders. Binders were cloned, purified and biotinylated before being employed in an assay developed by though a targeted method involving the antigens. It was concluded to be possible for Avi-tagged binders to specifically bind antigen-derived peptide targets in the multiplex assay.