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The purpose of this paper is to analyze and discuss experiences, in terms of challenges and opportunities, of teacher-researchers who engage in research on the learning study approach. The following two questions will be addressed: how can the teaching experience influence, and become an asset, in the research process and what challenges do teachers face when they enter the research practice?

Each question will be explored through some empirically grounded themes. The analysis is based on experiences from participation in a PhD program, where learning study was used as a method and variation theory was the main theoretical framework. One learning study was focusing on creative writing in primary school and the other was focusing on historical primary source analysis in upper secondary school.

The first question is addressed through the following themes: choosing and identifying research problems; planning and conducting research lessons; analyzing research lessons and students’ learning; and process of self-reflection, and the second question through: teaching as an object of research; to use and develop theories; and communication and review in research. The findings indicate that learning study is a practice-based research approach where teaching experience and academic skills are intertwined in many ways. Both approaches bring opportunities as well as challenges.

The paper is expected to contribute insights and knowledge about the advantages, as well as hindrances to overcome, for teacher-researchers who use learning study as a research method. The results can also be related to the performing of action research in teachers’ classroom practice.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss how teachers’ practice knowledge is used as a tool in a Learning Study and how teachers’ practice knowledge is challenged by using Variation Theory as a tool in the process?

The analysis is based on data from the research process in a Learning Study. The data consists of meeting notes of ten research meetings, field notes of the research meetings and from the enactment of the lessons, video recordings of the lessons and reflective notes after and between the meetings. The analysis is qualitative and the findings are described in themes.

Teachers’ practice knowledge was used and challenged in different ways in the process. This is described in five themes. Teachers’ practice knowledge was visible in the process since it enabled relevant questions to be addressed and subtle signals from students to be taken into account. It also ensured that the activities used were suitable for the students. The theory provided a focus on the object of learning and a language to talk about teaching and learning. It also challenged teachers’ assumptions about teaching and learning and allowed them to be discussed.

The paper addresses both teachers’ practice knowledge and Variation Theory in relation to a Learning Study. It focusses on how practice knowledge of teachers can be used and challenged in the same process. The perspective is from the inside, from a teacher researcher’s point of view.

This paper aims to contribute to the marketing literature and practice by examining the effect of product placements on the host brand. The declining effectiveness of traditional advertising has prompted increasing interest in strategies for placing products in media programming. Most existing research adopt the perspective of the brands embedded in media products, with limited attention to the impact that product placement has on the media product that serves as a host brand for the embedded brands. The authors investigate this effect in the context of motion pictures and develop a theory-driven conceptual model.

The authors test their hypotheses with two experiments in which randomly assigned participants view one of seven versions of a custom-made, seven-minute short film that differ in their level of placement prominence.

The results from a mediation analysis indicate that, after controlling for audiences’ general attitudes toward the embedded brand, greater placement prominence heightens consumers’ reactance to persuasion attempts and negatively affects their evaluations of the host brand. A post hoc experiment confirms that even very low levels of placement prominence can worsen host brand evaluations.

This research is among the first to investigate the effects of product placement from a host brand perspective. It issues a warning to producers of entertainment content: a product placement strategy may generate additional earnings, but it also can lower audiences’ evaluations of the focal entertainment product.

Financial crises pose a challenge to the legal systems of the concerned countries and international organizations. The current crisis has exposed significant failures of regulation and supervision, making the Financial Market Law a key topic on the political agenda. Thus, great changes and challenges are ahead of us. These were the focus of an interdisciplinary and comparative conference held at the University of Marburg. The paper deals with the individual presentations and carries out an overall analysis.

The paper covers the most important issues in financial regulation.

An extensive regulation is confronted with several obstacles; suitable approach could be the co-regulation; desirable aim is the instauration of the mechanism of capital markets. Those who gain the benefits in case of success should also bear the losses in case of failure instead of being rescued at taxpayers’ expense.

The difficulties arising from extensive regulation suggest a more liberal approach to financial regulation.