M.Sc. (Information Technology) / In Africa, the economy is largely dominated by SMMEs that represent 90% of private businesses and contribute to more than 50% of employment and GDP. However, these SMMEs struggle to sustain their businesses in the current economic climate. To address this, advancements in mobile and cloud technology introduce new possibilities such as digital business ecosystems to support environment where small, micro, and medium enterprises can interoperate. The fundamental challenge for SMMEs in a digital business ecosystem is the selection of transaction partners. SMMEs are interested to transact with other SMMEs that will benefit their business through successful transactions. This leads to the sustainability and growth of SMMEs and consequently the economy. However, not all SMMEs behave as predicted and therefore, being able to trust another SMME in the digital business ecosystem is important. Trust is an essential part of business and personal life. The social nature of trust makes trust very personalised and for each individual, trust is interpreted, understood and perceived according to past experience and social behaviour. These factors are largely influenced by cultural norms and behaviours that individuals conform to. In African and some other regions, collectivist cultural norms and behaviours are common whereas in Westernised regions, individualist cultures are common. Therefore, it is not enough to just consider trust from a technical perspective but also from a cultural perspective. For small businesses in Africa and other regions in the world, this is especially true. Compared to larger companies in developed economies, SMMEs in Africa are more informal and operate in a more personal manner. This implies that trust decisions are largely influence an owner or employee’s cultural norms and behaviour. The research conducted in this dissertation proposes a trust model, known as Trustcv that supports the cultural norms and behaviours of collectivist cultures for trust in a digital business ecosystem. Digital business ecosystems, trust, culture and social network analysis provide the literature foundation for Trustcv. The effectiveness of Trustcv is measured through simulations of a digital business ecosystem in Africa, which provides interesting results compared to an existing trust model. The results indicate that Trustcv could be used to support trust in collectivist digital business ecosystems used by collectivist cultural SMMEs.

The purpose of this diploma thesis is to analyze the different possibilities of using social networks in marketing, and to compare the situation in the Czech Republic with the rest of the world. In the theoretical section, the term social network is clearly defined and the historical development of social networks and their popularity in the world and in the Czech Republic are discussed. Later, the thesis focuses on individual components of marketing strategy and marketing mix and their implementation on social networks. The key part of the thesis centers on the discussion of different marketing tools, which are used on the most popular social networks today and provides practical examples of their use. The final chapter is a detailed analysis of the marketing strategy and communication campaigns within the most successful companies on social networks in order to identify the reasons for their success. These conclusions are then compared with marketing activities on social networks in the Czech Republic. Finally, the thesis compares the way in which international firms that operate in the Czech Republic are using social networks for marketing abroad and in our country.

The main aim of this thesis is to verify the suitability of the use of Facebook as the main tool of communication mix within a specific marketing campaign. Individual Facebook applications will be analyzed and provide the basis for the practical part of the work. On this basis, the project consists of using social networking site Facebook for a particular company and will subsequently be analyzed in two campaigns that take place on the social network. The analysis will be carried out market research among potential customers of the company. The analysis of the results of research respondents reveals the structure of social networks the target group. The operational objective will design and content of subsequent Facebook campaign for the company.

The purpose of this diploma thesis is to analyze marketing through social networks. The first chapter is focused on Internet, marketing and communication mix. In the second chapter there are discussed social networks and their history. Moreover, this chapter also characterizes generations X, Y and Z. The key part of the thesis aimed to analyze each of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+. Main attention is given to provide a detail view of social media tools and possibilities that companies can use for marketing.

This diplom thesis is about the problems, which are connected to our main themes, that are information and all the aspects around it. At the first part of this work we're going to focus on the concept of information and its role in the gaining new knowledge and the communication process. With communication, which is an essential element of every working social society, we will talk about media and mass media. In the third chapter we will deals with the history of all kinds media and compare them to each other, especially about internet, which became a phenomenon of our society. The last sentences of this chapter is about the concept of New media, or social network. The next part of this work is focused on the relationship between information and society, we will compare the actual situation of internet using in Vietnam and in the Czech republic. The fifth chapter of this diplom thesis is about my empirical research about the impacts of internet and social network to people's lifestyle and behavior. The last two chapters will deal with the effects of media to our social society, globalization and we will also prove, that media can be a very powerful political weapon.

The Master's thesis focuses on adidas ČR, s.r.o. and its communication on social media. The aim of this thesis is to analyze communication of adidas Company on social media and to recommend proposals for improvement and how to be more effective. The thesis is divided into two parts. First theoretical part defines social media and its position in marketing strategies of companies. In the analytical part is provided analysis of competition and its communication's strategies on social media and comparison with adidas Company. Benefits of this thesis are proposals of improvement for communication of adidas Company on social media and recommendation to the future.

Metabolic syndrome is a constellation of risk factors, including abdominal obesity, hypertriglyceridemia, low HDL cholesterol, high blood pressure, and high fasting glucose, that commonly cluster together and can result in cardiovascular disease. The prevalence of metabolic syndrome and the components that comprise the syndrome vary by age and by racial/ethnic group. In addition, previous research has indicated that the risk factors contributing to metabolic syndrome may be exacerbated by exposure to perceived stress. This study utilized data from the 2002, 2004, and 2006 Health and Retirement Study (HRS) and National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) data sets. It was hypothesized that depression and anxiety (conceptualized as stress in this study) increase the risk of presenting with metabolic syndrome while social support decreases the risk of metabolic syndrome. While results of cross-sectional analysis do not indicate a significant relationship between depression and metabolic syndrome (t = -.84, ns), longitudinal analysis does indicate a significant relationship between depression and metabolic syndrome over time (t = -5.20, p <.001). However, anxiety is not significantly related to metabolic syndrome when the relationship is examined through cross-sectional analysis (t = -1.51, ns) and longitudinal analysis (&#967;² = 13.83, ns). Similarly, social support is not significantly related to metabolic syndrome when examined in cross-sectional (&#967;² = .63, ns) and longitudinal (t = 1.53, ns) analysis. Although level of stress is not significantly related to metabolic syndrome as a whole, there is a significant relationship between stress and both triglyceride level (t = -2.94, p = .003) and blood glucose level (t = -3.26, p = .001).

The study seeks to find a baseline of Twitter usage of traditional media. Findings suggest that traditional media are using Twitter (a non-traditional medium) in a traditional way. The study explores why a tool like Twitter needs to be approached by journalists in ways to which they may not be accustomed. The study additionally finds that newsrooms are underutilizing Twitter's potential for audience interactivity and have not established guidelines for journalists in the use of Twitter for work purposes. Conclusions include the need for more understanding of Twitter on the part of managers, a usage of Twitter that fits the medium, rather than traditional journalism models and more study in the future so that the journalism business can stay ahead of the curve when new communication technologies are introduced.

In this study, pro-environmental behaviors are investigated by studying if one's primary information sources about environmental issues either from their social network or the media influence this behavior. Data was collected from the 2002 Detroit Area Study with a total of 267 respondents. Three indexes were constructed to separately measure all seven pro-environment behavioral items, five conservation behavioral items, and two consumption behavioral items. A complex sample model was utilized in these analyses. Findings suggest that information sources are correlated to self-reported environmental behavior. As predicted, the people whose primary information source was social network were more likely to obtain higher scores on all three separate indexes than those individuals who primarily received information about environmental issues from the media.

Interpersonal relationships are among the most important contributors to health and well-being. This dissertation investigates how and why relationships confer such benefits and proposes that relationships function as dynamic regulatory systems that enable people to cope effectively with challenging situations and pursue important goals. Across five Chapters, this work reveals the role of relationships in scaffolding effective individual self-regulation, dyadic coregulation (how partners dynamically modulate each other’s responses and regulate as a unit), and developmental regulation (adaptation to age-related challenges across the lifespan), particularly in the context of social support interactions. Chapter 1 introduces past research on the importance of social relationships, summarizes the rationale for focusing on social support interactions as a key context in which interpersonal regulation occurs, and presents an overview of the research and methods discussed in this dissertation. Chapter 2 investigates the role of social support in promoting effective self-regulation by conceptualizing, validating, and testing a new theoretical construct, Regulatory Effectiveness of Social Support (RES). RES proposes that recipients benefit from social support to the extent that it addresses their motivations to understand and manage their situation. In eight studies and a meta-analysis, this chapter reveals that receiving social support higher on RES predicts downstream outcomes that are important for effective self-regulation. Chapter 3 examines how social support interactions give rise to dyadic coregulation—dynamic coupling of partners’ physiological states. Results from this chapter demonstrate that social support interactions may be a context in which such coregulation is especially likely to occur, in order to help partners return to an equilibrium of responding, and underscore the importance of considering how dyads regulate as a single, interdependent unit. Chapter 4 presents preliminary evidence for how coregulation among older couples might influence developmental regulation. This chapter shows how between-dyad differences in coregulation processes in turn predict individual self-regulation processes in the face of a stressor. Chapter 5 synthesizes findings across chapters and highlights new avenues for future research. Overall, these findings suggests important self- and coregulatory implications of social support interactions, which may be a crucial mechanism through which interpersonal relationships influence health and well-being over time.