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- Abou-Ali, Hala, 1972, et al.
(author)
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Evaluating the welfare effects of improved water qualityusing the choice experiment method
- 2004
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- This paper analyzes the welfare effects of improved health status through increased water quality using a choice experiment. The survey was administered to a random sample of households in metropolitan Cairo, Egypt. We apply a random parameter logit model in the analysis and illustrate the richness of information that can be obtained from this type of model by estimating individual level willingness to pay (WTP). We find a significant WTP for improved health status, both for short-run and long-run health effects. However, the estimated WTP is fairly low compared with the costs of a program that would achieve these improvements.
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- Adelbratt, Thomas, 1949
(author)
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Beliefs about real life decision strategies
- 2004
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- What kind of behavior is seen as most adaptive for everyday decision makers? How do they invest their mental energy? Is it in complex information integration, which traditionally is considered rational, or in other cognitive procedures? With these underlying questions 25 subjects were encouraged to give written accounts of their decision strategies in real life. The instructions promoted sequential descriptions without being too obtrusive. All reports were contents analyzed and condensed to six reflective and six intuitive categories with contrasting qualities. These indicated that the subjects had good analytic intentions, but rarely employed any demanding strategies and were almost unaware of the possibility of using different integration rules. The subjects rather preferred other sorts of deliberation, in areas like strategic planning, social adjustment, value co-ordination, and assessment calibration. Several of these activities were focused on evaluative phenomena and quite often prepared for systematic restructuring of values, criterion levels, and attribute weights to simplify the process. A strong regulating factor was the intuitive influence from emotions, established principles, identity concepts, and wishful thinking. It is concluded that the relative priority of evaluative phenomena has certain advantages for the individual. The strategy is probably easier to understand and to justify. It has a more natural relation to fundamental needs, identity aspects, social ties, etc. Finally, it is in direct contact with the individual?s emotional life and thus a connecting bridge between analysis and intuition.
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- Agrenius, Stefan, 1948
(author)
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Övervakning av mjukbottenfaunanlängs Sveriges västkust Rapport från verksamheten år 2003
- 2004
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- Summary in English The soft-sediment macrofauna of the west coast of Sweden is monitored by comission of the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency in collaboration with “Bohuskustens vattenvårdsförbund” and the counties of Västra Götaland and Halland. The purpose is to detect long time changes in the marine environment, principally those caused by eutrophication and oxygen deficiency. 31 localities along the west coast of Sweden are sampled once a year in May. Four samples are taken with a 0.1m2 Smith-McIntyre grab at 12 localities and two samples at 19 localities. The red-ox condition of the sediment are measured at each locality. All fauna retrieved on a 1mm sieve are taxonomically identified and counted. This report is based on all the samples from 2002, and localities which are sampled with 4 replicates from 2003. A total of 27.488 individuals belonging to 248 different taxa were identified in the 2002 sampling program. Neither the red-ox measurements nor the oxygen measurements, performed within the monitoring program of the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, indicate that there had been any periods with severe oxygen deficiency at any of the localities during the period May 2002 to May 2003. The major change in the fauna structure during the same period is that high abundance and biomass of the opportunistic sub surface deposit feeding polychaet Scalibregma inflatum has decreased in the deeper parts of Skagerrak, especially in the northern area. This, together with that the number of species and individuals has decreased at all localities deeper than 50m in northern Kattegatt and Skagerrak is a strong indication of a decreased organic input into these water masses. Analysis of similarity in the community structure between all localities, show that the species composition differs in some respect depending on how exposed the localities are situated. Localities along the coast and in the outer archipelago are dominated by species typical for an environment with a strong bento-pelagic coupling. Sub-surface deposit feeders, which are more typical in hydrodynamic calmer environments, are more dominant in localities at greater depth in the open sea. In the inner archipelago and fjords surface deposit feeders are dominant among the fauna. Calculation of a Benthic Quality Index (BQI) shows that all localities had a high or good environmental status according to the European Union Framework Directive. One locality was classified as “moderately affected”. This locality is situated in a small depression with a high content of detritus close to the harbour of Göteborg. It is also noteworthy that the localities in Brofjorden close to the refinery are classified to have the same environmental status as the localities in the archipelago outside the fjord.
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- Alarik, Björn, 1943
(author)
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Kunskapsintegration i fusioner
- 2004
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Reports (other academic/artistic)abstract
- To what extent knowledge synergy is developed in mergers and acquisitions depends on the ambitions of the parties, the relations between the knowledge spheres of both sides, and the methods used for knowledge integration. A high degree of knowledge integration is not always required; sometimes it is sufficient to know who knows what. Whether knowledge synergy arises or not is effected by how knowledge is related to each other and if the frames the knowledge is based are similar or different. Methods for knowledge integration which are based on instructions, manuals, and persuasion do not seem to work properly. When the merging parties viewed knowledge integration as a mutual process starting from scratch with an ongoing dialogue where experiences are exchanged and knowledge compared, adapted and elaborated, knowledge synergy seemed to develop to a greater extent.
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