Purpose – This study aims to test the relationship between skepticism towards green advertisement and environmental concern, attitudes toward green products, and green purchase behaviors amongst Generation Y in Europe.Design/methodology/approach – An online survey was spread amongst people of Generation Y (defined as being born between 1980-2000) who were born or are currently living in Europe. Non-probability sampling was conducted through volunteer, snowball, and convenient sampling. A number of 431 valid responses were analyzed utilizing descriptive statistics, reliability analyses, correlation analysis, hierarchical regression analyses, and multiple linear regression analyses.Findings – Two of the three factors, namely environmental concern and green purchase behavior, are significant predictors. In contrast, attitude towards green products is no significant predictor for skepticism towards green advertisement of Generation Y in Europe. Additionally, environmental concern shows a mediation effect via attitude towards green products on skepticism towards green advertisement, yet, environmental concern is no mediator via green purchase behavior on skepticism towards green advertisement. Attitude towards green products acts as a statistically significant mediator via green purchase behavior on skepticism towards green advertisement.Practical Implications – Generation Y is an important target market. Both marketers and advertisers are recommended to evaluate their marketing strategies by considering the factors of green consumerism to decrease skepticism towards green advertising. A better understanding of environmental claims in advertising should be provided whereby consumers could identify misleading claims. Furthermore, vague and false claims should be avoided.Originality/value – This study contributes to closing the research gap by testing to which extent the three factors of green consumerism are related to skepticism towards green advertisement for Generation Y in Europe.

Forskningsfråga: Finns det ett samband mellan revisorns riskbedömning och yrkeserfarenhet? Skiljer sig sambandet mellan olika riskfaktorer? Påverkar yrkeserfarenhet den totala riskbedömningen? Syfte: Syftet är därför att undersöka om revisorns riskbedömning inför nio riskfaktorer påverkas av yrkeserfarenhet. Metod: Studien genomfördes genom en kvantitativ metod med datainsamling   genom enkäter. Deskriptiv statistik användes för att presentera hur riskbedömningen blev utifrån medelvärdet och var standardavvikelsen var som störst respektive minst. Detta följdes av Pearsons korrelationsanalys, för att se sambandet mellan riskfaktorer och yrkeserfarenhet för varje riskfaktor, och en enkel linjär regression för den totala riskbedömningen. Slutsats: Studien visade att det inte fanns något statistiskt säkerställt samband mellan yrkeserfarenhet och riskbedömning för enskilda riskfaktorer eller för den totala riskbedömningen. Baserat på det kommer studien fram till att riskbedömningen inte påverkas av yrkeserfarenhet. / Research questions: Is there a relationship between auditor's risk assessment and professional experience? Does the relationship differ between different risk factors? Does auditor’s professional experience affect the overall risk assessment? Purpose: The purpose of this study is to determine if the auditor's risk assessment of nine risk factors is affected by experience. Method: The study was conducted through a quantitative method with data collection through questionnaires. Descriptive statistics were used to present how the risk assessment turned out based on the mean value and standard deviation. This was followed by Pearson's correlation analysis, to see the relationship between risk factor and professional experience for each risk factor, and a simple linear regression for the overall risk assessment. Conclusion: The study shows no statistically significant correlation between professional experience and risk assessment for the nine risk factors individually nor together. Based on the results, auditor’s professional experience does not affect the risk assessment.

A large disconnect exists between the general public's acceptance of human-caused climate change and the prevailing consensus of actively publishing scientists. Previous research has examined both political and economic motivated reasoning, media influence in print and television, conspiracy ideation as a predictor of science rejection, and the role of the social construction of scientific knowledge in science rejection. Using these previously studied justifications for climate change rejection as a starting point, this research examines 212 written responses to a prompt at Climate Etc. asking the community to explain their acceptance / rejection of climate change. Using a textual content analysis, this study finds that media choice, motivated reasoning, conspiracy ideation, and the scientific construction of knowledge all play important roles in explanations for climate science rejection. Work and educational background, as well as a reframing of the scientific consensus as a "religion," add new analytical perspectives to the motivated reasoning explanations offered in prior research. This analysis also finds that the explanations for climate science denial given by respondents are often complex, falling into two or more of the explanation types suggesting that science rejection may be a more complex social process than previously thought.

The third general standard of fieldwork requires auditors to maintain a skeptical mindset with regards to the collection and critical assessment of audit evidence. While professional skepticism is frequently referenced by professional standards, a lack of precision in defining the concept presumably leads to variation in how skepticism is exercised in practice. Drawing on theories from the fields of psychology, economics and organizational justice, this dissertation considers different perspectives of what constitutes sufficient professional skepticism and examines how those perspectives differ between audit practitioners and regulators. First, I consider competing perspectives of professional skepticism – neutral versus presumptive doubt – and whether asking auditors to adopt alternative perspectives of skepticism may have implications for audit efficiency and effectiveness. While, too little skepticism may endanger audit effectiveness and lead to audit failure or enforcement action, too much skepticism may arguably lead to unnecessary costs and inefficiency. Second, I consider whether the nature of the auditor-client relationship threatens an auditor’s ability to maintain an attitude of professional skepticism. For example, theoretical perspectives from the fields of psychology and economics suggest that auditors may, consciously or unconsciously, be less skeptical of clients with whom they have developed close, positive working relationships or financial dependencies. More specifically, I consider whether skeptical behavior is impeded by management who display low-risk attitudes towards fraud or by client’s who are considered to be highly important to the profitability of the local office. Finally, I examine how professional skepticism is defined from a regulator’s perspective. When a public company is accused of fraudulent financial reporting, regulators may determine iii that the audit performed on the fraudulent financial statements was deficient. Prior research has suggested that in such cases, insufficient skepticism is often a leading cause of alleged audit failure. Within a fairness theory framework, this study examines enforcement actions against auditors between 1999 and 2009, and identifies certain factors that are associated with a citation for a lack of professional skepticism. Overall, results suggest that regulators approach the issue by determining whether auditors should have been more skeptical. Factors found to affect this determination include whether the auditor was perceived as having been aware of an elevated risk of fraud or whether the client was accused of having provided the auditor with false or misleading information during the course of their investigation.

<p>The purpose of this dissertation is to argue that epistemic contextualism, which proposes that the word ‘know’ is a context-sensitive term, is seriously deficient and therefore indefensible. Since epistemic contextualists claim that their semantic theory of ‘know’ contributes not only to a linguistic model of knowledge ascription but also to a unified solution to some important puzzles in epistemology, I divide my thesis into two basic parts. In the first part (i.e., Chapters 2 and 3), I argue that the proponents of both binary and ternary accounts of the supposed context-sensitivity of ‘know’ fail to provide a reasonable linguistic model of knowledge ascription. My argument in Chapter 1 indicates that ‘know’ cannot be treated as a binary context-sensitive term that is similar to paradigmatic indexical terms or gradable adjectives. Chapter 2 takes contrastivism as a representation of the ternary account of the supposed context-sensitivity of ‘know’ and argues that this theory is in an even worse position because it even fails to capture the supposed phenomena of the context-sensitivity of knowledge ascription. The second part (i.e., Chapters 4, 5, and 6) argues that epistemic contextualism does not provide us with a really satisfactory solution to the puzzles of skepticism, the epistemic closure principle and fallibilism. On the contrary, its rival, invariantism, with some support from pragmatics, psychology of belief and experimental philosophy, is able to solve the above puzzles in a quite nice way. At the end of my thesis (i.e., Chapter 7), I systematize the observations, the evaluations and the critiques of epistemic contextualism from the previous chapters and indicate that epistemic contextualists even fail to establish their supposed phenomena of the context-sensitivity of ‘know.’</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The original document does not provide an abstract. McMaster Digitization Centre, 14 March 2019. / Thesis / Master of Arts (MA)

In his Outlines of Skepticism, Sextus Empiricus claims that the Pyrrhonian Skeptic can live without holding beliefs. According to the 'Rustic' interpretation of this claim, Sextus holds that the Skeptic lives without beliefs of any kind. According to the 'Urbane' interpretation, Sextus' claim concerns only a restricted category of beliefs. I discuss each interpretation in the context of Sextus' broader philosophical stance, and argue for an Urbane interpretation. On this view, Pyrrhonism represents a practicable stance towards the world. / Master of Arts

The main objective of my dissertation is to research and to introduce hellenistic skepticism of postclassical Greece and methodical skepticism of modern times thinker Rene Descartes. There are differences between the ancient Pyrrhonism and the younger skepticism of Academy, which I would like to clear up. I have in view Descartes' skepticism too, which create a methodological technique of cognition in new way. Rene Descartes, contrary to hellenistic skeptics, doesn't accept the "epoche", which means a certain bliss, but he moves on in his research, when he believes in a possibility of truthful cognition. Purpose of my thesis is to critically take account of historical and philosophical context, from which both of skepticisms have been created, to put a question, what kind of meaning they had in history of philosophy and also to think about fundamental question of connection between hellenistic and Descartes doubt. I try to accent common characteristics and differences of both concepts. key words - skepticism, methodical skepticism, truthful cognition, probability, phenomena, senses, intellect, bliss

Auditors have a big role in society. The question of auditor independence has been debated frequently after the financial crisis. Long auditor tenure with clients has both advantages and disadvantages so the question is hard to solve. One of the traits that are encouraged with auditors is professional skepticism. An important part of professional skepticism is the personal skepticism of the auditor. The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate if a high professional skepticism can increase auditor independence by increasing profession identification and decreasing client identification. Earlier research in Social Identity Theory has shown that client identification is negatively related to auditor independence and that profession identification is positively related to auditor independence. A quantitative method is used in this dissertation. A survey was sent to 1000 qualified Swedish auditor. 273 of those replied. The material was statistically analyzed to test the different hypothesis in the dissertation. Our survey showed that professional skepticism has no relation to client- and profession identification. There is however a weak positive relation between professional skepticism and auditor independence. The conclusion is that more research is needed to investigate if auditor independence really is affected by the auditor ’s professional skepticism. / Revisorer har en stor roll i dagens samhälle. Efter finanskrisen har frågan om revisorns oberoende diskuterats flitigt. Det finns både för- och nackdelar med att en revisor varit länge på ett företag och därför är frågan svårlöst. En av egenskaperna som uppmuntras hos en revisor är professionell skepticism. En viktig del av den professionella skepticismen är revisorns personliga skepticism. Syftet med den här uppsatsen är att påvisa att en hög professionell skepticism hos revisorer kan motverka vissa oberoenderelaterade problem. Mer specifikt undersöks den professionella skepticismens påverkan på revisorns identifikation med klienten och med den egna professionen. Tidigare forskning inom Social Identity Theory har visat att identifikation med klienten är negativt relaterat till oberoende och att identifikation med den egna professionen är positivt relaterat till oberoende. I uppsatsen används en kvantitativ metod. En enkät skickades till 1000 kvalificerade svenska revisorer varav 273 svarade. Detta material analyserades statistiskt för att pröva hypoteserna i uppsatsen. Undersökning visar att professionell skepticism inte har någon påverkan på klient- och professionsidentifikation hos revisorn. Det finns däremot en svag positiv relation mellan professionell skepticism och revisorns oberoende. Slutsatsen blir därför att mer forskning behövs för att undersöka om revisorns oberoende faktiskt påverkas av revisorns professionella skepticism.

In this dissertation, I examine the influence of Pyrrhonist skepticism over Shakespeare’s sonnets. Unlike academic skepticism, which begins from a position of doubt, Pyrrhonist skepticism encourages an embrace of multiple perspectives that, according to Sextus Empiricus, leads first to a suspension of judgment and ultimately to a state of tranquility. The Pyrrhonian inflection of Shakespeare’s sonnets accounts for the pleasure and uncertainty they cultivate in readers. By offering readers multiple perspectives on a given issue, such as love or infidelity, Shakespeare’s sonnets demonstrate the instability of information, suggesting that such instability can be a source for pleasure. One essential tool for the uncertainty in the sonnets, I argue, is the figurative language they draw from a variety of fields and discourses. When these metaphors contradict one another, creating fragmented images in the minds of readers, they generate a unique aesthetic experience, which creates meaning that transcends the significance of any of the individual metaphors. In the first two chapters, I identify important contexts for Shakespeare’s sensitivity to the pliability of figurative language: Reformation-era religious tracts and pamphleteers’ debates about the value and function of the theater. In Chapter 3, I examine Shakespeare’s response to the Petrarchan tradition, arguing that he diverges from the sonneteers, who often use figurative language in an attempt to access and communicate stable truths. Shakespeare creates epistemological instability in sonnets both to the young man and to the dark lady, and, as I argue in Chapter 4, this similarity offers readers an opportunity to think beyond traditional divisions between the two sonnet subsequences.