The focus of this study was to evaluate different search engines on Swedish text. Information retrieval is widely used by both people and organizations, and it is important to be able to efficiently retrieve needed information at the right time. The study determined that relevance and speed are the most important factors in search engines. The evaluation measures the precision and recall which are relevance measurements, and speed of two search engines, Elastic search and MarkLogic. The evaluation has determined that there is no significant difference in the relevance of the retrieved results between the engines. The evaluation has also determined that there is a statistically significant difference in speed between the engines, with Elastic search outperforming MarkLogic. Both search engines performed very well in terms of successful searches, meaning to return a relevant document in the first 20 results. Both engines succeeded in fulfilling the information need 96% of the time. / Fokus för denna studie var att utvärdera olika sökmotorer på svensk text. Informationshämtning används i stor utsträckning av både människor och organisationer, och det är viktigt att effektivt kunna hämta nödvändig information vid rätt tidpunkt. Studien fastställde att relevans och hastighet är de viktigaste faktorerna för sökmotorer. Utvärderingen mäter precision och recall som är relevansmätvärden och responstid som hastighetmätvärde för två sökmotorer, Elasticsearch och MarkLogic. Utvärderingen har visat att det inte finns någon signifikant skillnad i relevansen av de hämtade resultaten mellan motorerna. Utvärderingen har också visat att det finns en statistiskt signifikant skillnad i hastighet mellan motorerna, där Elasticsearch överträffar MarkLogic. Båda sökmotorerna presterade väldigt bra när det gäller lyckade sökningar, vilket innebär att returnera ett relevant dokument i de första 20 resultaten. Båda motorerna lyckas uppfylla informationsbehovet 96% av tiden.

The aim of this study is to examine whether search engine marketing may influence consumers’ brand awareness in terms of brand recall and brand recognition. The theoretical background derives from the definition and rationale of brand awareness. The study is further based on a theoretical outline of search engine marketing and its components. Furthermore, the Hierarchy of Effects Model is used in order to describe the steps a company may influence consumers in their purchase process. In order to capture consumers’ reasoning and behaviour in the search engine context, a two-way study approach was conducted. Firstly, by letting ten participants conduct a log related to their search engine behaviour, spanning for a period of ten days. Secondly, by conducting semi-structured interviews, using their logs as a base for further discussions. Results from this study show that search engine marketing can have an effect on consumers’ brand awareness by creating initial awareness or by building upon existing awareness. Secondly, in the context of unknown brands, the results show that it had a particular strong effect on brand recognition among the participants. Thirdly, it appeared that SEM can work as a gateway for brands and an enabler for building a brand attitude amongst its potential customers. Lastly, the website experience is a crucial step for brands in order to positively influence consumers in their purchase process.

The study developed from realisation that there is no information available about strategies or processes in the iBT speaking scoring rubrics, although ETS (Educational Testing Service) claims that the iBT speaking test is designed to measure strategic processes, which is one constructs of academic proficiency. Therefore, the study investigates which strategic processes are used to complete given speaking tasks. This would provide evidence to help in the evaluation of the validity claims proposed by the test designers. Six Korean participants, studying at English-medium universities, completed 2 independent tasks and 2 integrated tasks both in a test and in their class. Participants’ speech samples were collected during the performances and stimulated recall verbalisation was conducted after they had completed the tasks. Speech samples were coded into five categories: approach, compensation, cognitive, metacognitive strategies and feelings. Consequently, the study examined how strategies reported through stimulated recalls were present in actual speech. The findings showed that metacognitive strategies were used most frequently under both conditions. Fair-level speakers employed more strategies in the test, while good-level speakers used more strategies in the class. Moreover, integrated task types elicited more strategy use for both conditions. Speakers reported that they felt significantly more negative under test conditions than in the class. More importantly, two conditions shared 67.74% of the strategy types, and 84% of the strategy types used in the test were also used in the classroom, which may strengthen the validity of the iBT speaking test in terms of strategy use. Finally, evidences of strategy use were identified in actual speech, which can open the way to operationalised strategy use assessment in speaking test. However, the figure of evidenced strategy use was very low: 5.28% and 2.66% respectively in the test and in the class. It is recommended that future research be carried out with a large number of participants in order to generalise strategy use in speaking performance. Moreover, further studies might be conducted to examine the significance of observable strategic evidence in speech, to inform decisions to include strategies in the scoring rubrics.

The purpose of this paper is two-fold. The first goal is to qualitatively explore what ethics is and how companies can create a lasting culture of ethics. I explore the meanings of ethics, corporate ethics, and the responsibilities that companies have to shareholders and the public. The second goal is to demonstrate how a culture of ethics can help to prevent product recalls by creating a control environment that catches potentially dangerous products before they leave the facility. This is achieved through an analysis of three case studies: 1) Johnson & Johnson’s response to the Chicago Tylenol Murders of 1982, 2) Peanut Corporation of America’s response to its peanut butter recalls in 2009, and 3) Toyota Motor Corp’s response to the recalls of 2009-2011. The paper concludes by discussing trends in product safety over the last forty years and explaining why business ethics are an economic imperative, not just in preventing product recalls but also in protecting consumers.

The purpose of this study was to determine the construct validity of self-reported historical walking, running, and jogging (WRJ) activity. The criterion measure was concurrent performance on a maximal treadmill test. Subjects completed a medical exam and treadmill test between the years 1976 and 1985, and completed a follow-up questionnaire in 1986. Questionnaire included an item that assessed WRJ for each year from 1976 through 1985. Data analysis included Spearman correlations, partial correlations, ANOVA, and ANCOVA. Results indicated self-reported historical WRJ can be assessed with reasonable validity when compared with concurrently measured treadmill performance, and there is no decay in the accuracy of this reporting for up to ten years in the past.

In second language (L2) listening assessment, various factors have the potential to impact the validity of listening test items (Brindley & Slatyer, 2002; Buck & Tatsuoka, 1998; Freedle & Kostin, 1999; Nissan, DeVincenzi, & Tang, 1996; Read, 2002; Shohamy & Inbar, 1991). One relatively unexplored area to date is who controls the aural input. In traditional standardized listening tests, an administrator controlled recording is played once or twice. In real world or classroom listening, however, listeners can sometimes request repetition or clarification. Allowing listeners to control the aural input thus has the potential to add test authenticity but requires careful design of the input and expected response as well as an appropriate computer interface. However, if candidates feel less anxious, allowing control of listening input may enhance examinees' experience and still reflect their listening proficiency. Comparing traditional and self paced (i.e., examinees having the opportunity to start, stop, and move the audio position) delivery of multiple choice comprehension items, my research inquiry is whether self paced listening can be a sufficiently reliable and valid measure of examinees' listening ability. Data were gathered from 100 prospective and current university ESL students. They were administered computer based multiple choice listening tests: 10 identical once played items, followed by 33 items in three different conditions: 1) administrator paced input with no audio player visible, 2) self paced with a short time limit, and 3) self paced with a longer time limit. Many facet Rasch (1960/1980) modeling was used to compare the difficulty and discrimination of the items across conditions. Results indicated items on average were similar difficulty overall but discriminated best in self paced conditions. Furthermore, the vast majority of examinees reported they preferred self paced listening. The quantitative results were complemented by follow up stimulated recall interviews with eight participants who took 22 additional test items using screen capture software to explore whether and when they paused and/or repeated the input. Frequency of and reasons for self pacing did not follow any particular pattern by proficiency level. Examinees tended to play more than once but not two full times through, even without limited time. Implications for listening instruction and classroom assessment, as well as standardized testing, are discussed.

Recall of expository prose after one of two learning techniques was determined. Pearson correlation did not discover a significant difference between the recall writings of the examinees who studied by discussion and those who studied by underlining. The significance of the difference between two proportions found that the group which underlined recalled significantly better than the group which discussed what they had read. This highly significant difference was almost identical when all synonyms from the Turbo Lightning computer program were considered correct recall and analyzed by the significance of the difference between two proportions.

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of news commentary on the image of political candidates. Subjects were exposed to a political debate, which was followed by three experimental manipulations of a news commentary. One group saw a commentary biased toward one candidate and against the other. In a second group the bias was reversed. A third experimental group saw a neutral commentary and the control group viewed the debate but no commentary. The primary statistical analyses used were a multivariate analysis of variance, a multiple discriminant analysis and a factor analysis. The results indicated that the commentary did have some effects on the perception of the candidates' images. Furthermore, the commentaries affected the amount of the candidates' message which was recalled by the subjects, and cued the subjects to recall specific issues which were mentioned in the commentaries. Finally, the factor analysis indicated certain characteristics of the images of political candidates.

The powerful technical capabilities of smartphones offer unprecedented opportunities for collecting dietary information. We have developed an enhanced smartphone application called MyEnergyBalance, which permits imaged-based self-monitoring of all foods consumed, and links to a convenient and user-friendly web-based dietary assessment tool. The primary objective of this pilot study was to determine if the MyEnergyBalance app (with use of images) in combination of the associated website improves dietary recall compared to diet analysis on the MyEnergyBalance website alone. We also generated preliminary data on the usability of the MyEnergyBalance iPhone app and website. This pilot study was a crossover study design of healthy, college students. Participants were randomly assigned to two groups. Both groups consumed their normal diet for the first day with one group recording their food intake with image functions of the MyEnergyBalance app, while the other group did not use the app. On the second day, all participants logged into the MyEnergyBalance website to record their food intake from the previous day; one group using the images from the app to assist in recalling what they ate, while the other group recalled what they ate from memory. The diet analysis results were compared to those obtained using the ASA24 website. The groups were then crossed over to the opposite vs no-image assisted recalls. Ten participants (seven females and three males) aged 20 to 22 years completed this study. The average BMI of all participants was 23.12 kg/m2 (ranging from 18.95 to 32.28 kg/m2). There was no statistically significant differences in the estimates of the energy intake between the MyEnergyBalance app and website compared to ASA24. The SUS mean score for the MyEnergyBalance app and website was 86 and 69.5, respectively. A strong, negative correlation was found between the system usability scale scores and the absolute differences in energy intake of the MyEnergyBalance app and ASA24. Although we were not able to demonstrate a significant benefit of the images from the iPhone app at improving food recall (perhaps due to the small study sample size), we were able to demonstrate a high usability score for the iPhone app, average usability score for the website, and a significant correlation between subjects' usability scores and relative accuracy of the subjects' food recall using the images from the iPhone app. A future study with a larger sample size will hopefully provide more information on the efficacy of image-based food recalls.

A memory aid, that used brief (33ms) presentations of previously learned information (target words), was assessed on its ability to reinforce memory for target words while the subject was performing an interference task. The interference task required subjects to learn new words and thus interfered with their memory of the target words. The brief presentation (momentary memory priming) was hypothesized to refresh the subjects' memory of the target words. 143 subjects, in a within subject design, were given a 33ms presentation of the target memory words during the interference task in a treatment condition and a blank 33ms presentation in the control condition. The primary dependent measure, memory loss over the interference trial, was not significantly different between the two conditions. The memory prime did not appear to hinder the subjects' performance on the interference task. This paper describes the experiment and the results along with suggestions for future research.