The effects of attitudes and personality traits on mode choice

We hypothesise that differences in people's attitudes and personality traits lead them to attribute varying importance to environmental considerations, safety, comfort, convenience and flexibility. Differences in personality traits call be revealed not only in the individuals' choice of transport, but also in other actions of their everyday lives-such as how much they recycle, whether they take precautions or avoid dangerous pursuits. Conditioning on a set of exogenous individual characteristics, we use indicators of attitudes and personality traits to form latent variables for inclusion in an, otherwise standard, discrete mode choice model. With a sample of Swedish commuters, we find that both attitudes towards flexibility and comfort, as well as being pro-environmentally inclined, influence the individual's choice of mode. Although modal time and cost still are important, it follows that there are other ways, apart from economic incentives, to attract individuals to the, from society's perspective, desirable public modes of transport. Our results should provide useful information to policy-makers and transportation planners developing sustainable transportation systems.

Topic- and mode-sensitive interaction strategies : Functions of ellipsis in oral communication

In this article, we discuss ellipsis as an interactive strategy by analysing the author’s textchat corpus and the VOICE corpus of English as a Lingua Franca. It is found that there were fewer repetitions in the textchat data, and this is explained as a consequence of the textchat mode. Textchat contributions are preserved as long as the chat is active or has been saved, and therefore users can scroll through and review the discussion, compared to the more fleeting nature of oral conversation. As a result, repetition is less necessary. The frequency of other functions identified could be attributed to the topic of discourse. Discussions involve much ellipsis used to develop discourse, although some were self-presentations with repetition used to confirm details. Back-channel support and comments were often low because speakers instead used forms like yeah as supportive utterances.

Kinesiska affärsetableringar i Sverige : Kartläggning över områden som förbättrar chanserna att lyckas

Aim and starting point: The aim of the Bachelor thesis is to examine and define the paramount knowledge Chinese businessmen need in order to succeed with their establishment in Sweden. The authors also seek to answer what incentives attract Chinese businessmen to come to Sweden, as well as how Chinese establishments in Sweden can be predicted to appear in the future. Results/conclusions: The study outlines key areas in which Chinese businessmen should have knowledge in order to succeed with their establishment in Sweden. The results also gives an indication on how Chinese business establishments in Sweden will appear in the future, into which areas the Chinese mainly invest/establish in, as well as why and how these are done. On the basis of this material the authors generate proposals for educational packages which among others can be sold to Chinese businessmen. Knowledge overview: Here relevant theory connected to the area of study is presented. The knowledge overview presents the Swedish in relation to the Chinese perspective in areas such as: culture, hierarchy, relations, Face, communication, HRM, education, CSR and labour law. The knowledge overview can itself contribute to fostering an understanding of differences between Sweden and China. Method: The area of research has been accessed by a combination of methods. The study is both deductive and explorative. The main channel of information and data collection are in-depth interviews which are used as a deductive starting point, an expert investigation and as a Grounded Theory. As a complement the authors have also conducted a delphi study in which an expert panel answered questions concerning the future of Chinese establishments in Sweden. The deductive and explorative parts have been analyzed individually and have each generated a conclusion. These conclusions have then been interwoven in a synthesis that highlights and creates new knowledge.

Barriers to adapt eCommerce by rural microenterprises in Sweden : a case study

Research has shown that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are rapidly adopting the e-commerce. However, there is nearly no research into how microenterprises are adopting eCommerce. Present paper focus on microenterprise adaption of eCommerce in terms of barriers in relation to already known research on SMEs. A case study, carried out by 12 microenterprises to find out barriers to adapt eCommerce had been done. The empirical results show that the microenterprises share most of the barriers to adapt the eCommerce with studies of SMEs, but also reveal additional factors affecting adaptation option of eCommerce; supplier agreement, communication and customer strategy. Conclusions are that microenterprises need additional support and communication and customer strategy to adapt eCommerce, depending of their requirement and needs of eCommerce.

Portals for microenterprises in rural area : two cases

Research has shown that microenterprises have ability to survive and grow with the support of portals that include eCcommerce. However, almost no research has demonstrated how it’s done and what support microenterprises want. Results of our study shows that the portals have to be improved to support the use of advanced ICT applications, make it usable to use, and give more time for core business for the participating microenterprises. We have seen that portals have to solve problem with the technical solution and the process of payment. The network building activities in the portals do not happen in such extent that we have expected based on previous research. If portals will get businesses to grow in microenterprises, we propose that in addition to providing access to advanced ICT applications need to climbs one step higher in the DTI ladder and create more of eCommerce to increase sales in a greater market. We also propose that portals which support cooperation between microenterprises in rural areas from different branches have the best chances to succeed in the future.

Hur når man framgång med småskaliga energibesparingsprojekt? : Nätverk en möjlighet

Föreliggande rapport baseras på ett examensarbete på avancerad nivå inom ämnesområdet företagsekonomi. Bakgrunden är att det i dagsläget finns avancerade system för driftoptimering av energiförbrukning, vilka energibolagen tillämpar i större energisystem i form av exempelvis fjärrvärme. Det har kommit fram ny teknik som billigt möjliggör övervakning av mindre sådana system. Rapportens syfte var att undersöka om ett sådant system kan appliceras i liknande form i småskaliga energibesparingsprojekt. Resultatet av föreliggande rapport är att småskaliga energibesparingsprojekt för kommunala fastigheter kan organiseras genom en generisk nätverksmodell där både kommunala interna resurser och externa resurser kan sammanföras. Nätverket innefattar en kunskapstjänst från ett energibolag/energikonsult. Tjänsten är erbjuden till kunden i syfte att sänka dennes energiförbrukning till en nivå för vad som anses vara rimlig för liknande fastigheter. När förbrukningen har nått en sådan nivå kopplas ett tekniskt mätsystem in för att bevaka energinivån och sända signaler vid avvikelser i energiförbrukning. En lönsamhetsberäkning påvisar i en praktisk tillämpning att projektet kan resultera i att dess initialkostnad återbetalas inom en ettårsperiod. Möjligen kan denna återbetalningsperiod bli något längre vid tillämpningar i andra småskaliga system, men en tydlig lönsamhet är påvisad. Eftersom den relativa ekonomiska fördelen med att bilda denna typ av nätverk för specifika tillämpningar är så tydlig, finns det goda möjligheter till snabb spridning av nätverksmodellen. Dock har verifieringen av affärsmodellen genom tillämpning av energieffektiviseringsåtgärderna och uppföljning inte genomförts på grund av examensarbetenas tidsbegränsning.