Music schools in Latvia provide pupils with musical education both in the towns and rural areas of Latvia. Studies include instrumental playing, history of music, and music theory lessons. An actual pedagogical problem at the time is activation of pupils' learning. Self-regulated learning acquires significant meaning for pupils' future life. A way of helping pupils' self-regulation in learning is differentiation of learning methods and forms. The aim of the paper is to research the meaning of music schools' ensemble work (collective performance) for enhancing pupils' self-regulated learning. Learning is a process where an individual inherits accumulated experience of the society acquires skills, knowledge, attitudes, enhances his experience, individually and responsibly working and discovering himself, nature and society. Learning as an activity is based on learning experience. According to L.S. Vygotsky's theory of learning, the cultural development depends upon social interaction. The use of ensemble work (collective performance) in school as a form of learning activity and method observes a reciprocal movement towards didactic goal, includes the components of due learning contents (knowledge, skills, instrumental playing experience, attitudes), the results of learning process and its evaluation. Analysis of the obtained data shows that music teachers choose ensemble work as method and form of teaching to indirectly influence the self-regulated learning of pupils, whereas the pupils do not fully understand the significance of ensemble work for enhancing self-regulated learning techniques.

This study was conducted to investigate the lifestyle of post-graduate students. The purpose of the present study was to find out opinion of the post-graduate students how significant are physical activities and healthy eating in their life. The study was initiated due to the growing knowledge of the importance of healthy food. The study was carried out by using empirical methods and the opinion of post-graduate students living in Latvia analysed. The authors have used questionnaire method and in February 2008 received answers from 86 respondents who are the post-graduate students of Latvia University of Agriculture (LLU). Studies showed that the biggest part of research subjects appreciates the importance of physical activities and healthy eating, and treats it as a positive part of the post-graduate studies process.

The urban forest is recognized as a potential to improve the quality of life of urban dwellers and increase the sustainability and ecological stability of the city. However, there is little data on professional attitude to urban naturalistic landscapes. This research studies the attitude of professionals and decision makers to the naturalistic forest landscapes in urban area of Riga city, Latvia, in contrast to more traditional – formal landscape. The survey includes the opinions of territorial planners and environment specialists from Riga municipality and other institutions related to ecological, practical, planning and conservation activities, and private working landscape architects. The statistical analysis and data’s empirical distribution showed that professionals in Riga city recognize the values and benefits of naturalistic forest landscape. However, environmental preferences may depend more on affective reactions than on ecologically-based logical operations.

In recent years, farmers’ markets have become one of the most popular places for alimentary shopping. People searching for the alternative and healthier products often choose farmers’ markets instead of shopping centres. However, farmers’ markets face the same or even tougher competition than the conventional shopping places: farmers not only compete with powerful shopping chains, they have to compete among each other for every single customer. Therefore, customer loyalty becomes inevitable in this industry. Knowing the factors that lead customers to switch to another vendor becomes very important for consumer retention. The aim of the research is to determine the factors influencing customer switching behaviour in farmers’ markets in Lithuania. In order to reach the aim, the research was conducted in several stages: 1) the expert evaluation was provided to determine the factors influencing the customer switching behaviour that would be relevant to the industry; 2) a questionnaire survey regarding latter factors was provided; 3) the influence of the factors on customer switching behaviour regarding the different states of customer loyalty was assessed.

Considering the deficiencies of social services for the elderly in governmental institutions and growing demand of ensuring services in rural areas, the paper aims to assess the needs of elderly people for social services in the selected rural areas and to propose the social services’ development opportunities in terms of domestic help for the elderly. The social services facilitate support to elderly dependents in their homes, without interrupting their relationships with the family and the community, and improving their quality of life. The survey has shown that the municipality usually satisfies only basic biological needs of old people in rural areas. In order to ensure the well-being of elderly people, a complete cooperation among governmental and non-governmental institutions is required. Development of the services should be focused on the provision of the domestic help services for elderly people who do not receive them, and the diversity of the services for those residents who receive services from the municipality. The implementation of the development project of the domestic help services would enable the elderly residents of the rural municipality to have access to the most necessary services at the required frequency and intensity, considering the recipients’ needs, thus improving the quality of life of the elderly people of local community and ensuring their dignified ageing.

Increasing competition among health care service providers for pets and constantly growing requirements for the veterinary service quality, force veterinary service providers to search for some possibilities to remain competitive in the market in order to meet both customer needs and expectations, and animal needs best. The aim of the research is – having identified the choice motives for animal health care service, to enumerate the factors, influencing the choice of veterinary service. In order to find the pet keepers’ approach concerning the factors, influencing the choice of veterinary service, a pilot research was completed. According to the gained primary data results in the research, it was found that the key factors, influencing the choice of veterinary service are as follows: the service quality of health care, the recommendation of the person responsible for animal care and the price for the delivered service.

Nowadays, when the general rate of unemployment in Latvia is not that high anymore, there are still a lot of people who are unemployed for many years and during all those years they are abusing the budget of municipality by receiving social benefits. The aim of the article was to examine the way how the long-term unemployed social benefit receivers assess the meaning of support in job searching. On the basis of The Theory of Planned Behaviour a questionnaire was developed by the authors, 37 long-term unemployed social benefit receivers registered in Riga Social Service were asked to take part in the survey and gave informed consent. The results show that the respondents who are longer unemployed receive more support from their families. Statistically significant correlations (p=0.03) were found between the duration of unemployment and person’s determination to search a job, the unemployed who are longer without a job are less active in job searching process. Direct support in the job searching process is deeply connected with the possibility to share individual’s thoughts and emotions with the family. There is no statistically significant correlation between men and women responses.

Pulses (Fabaceae) are an excellent source of nutrients with protein content equal to the protein of meats. Regularly choosing such meat alternatives as pulses can help minimize the amount of saturated fat and increase the amount of fibre in the diet. New pulse products could benefit vegetarians and people struggling with new diet changes. The aim of this study was to determine pulse consumption patterns of Latvian adults. An 11 question survey was developed on an online survey website www.visidati.lv to analyse consumer attitudes towards pulse consumption in Latvia. The questionnaire was completed by 780 respondents from September to December 2013. During the Baltics food industry fair ‘Riga Food 2013’ five question survey was carried out after vegetarian bean spread tasting. The questions were related to pulse consumption and preference; five questions survey consisted of overall preference and quality determination of the product. The results show that the majority of Latvian omnivore adults consume pulses about once a week or less; while pulse intake in vegetarian adults is significantly higher (p is less than 0.05). Latvian adults prefer green peas (Pisum sativum L.), navy and broad beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.), lentils (Lens culinaris Medik.), chickpeas (Cicer arietinum L.) and maple peas (Pisum sativum L. var. arvense). Overall preference of vegetarian bean spread with sun-dried tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum L.) is ‘like very much’ (4.5 – 4.6) and most of the respondents would purchase this product if it was available in a store.

Celiac disease is an autoimmune enteropathy disease, triggered in genetically susceptible individuals by ingested gluten from wheat (Triticum), rye (Secale cereale), barley (Hordeum vulgare) and other closely related cereal grains. The only way of the effective daily treatment is a strict gluten-free diet. From the investigation of products available in the local market, it was found that Latvian producers do not offer gluten-free products. The aim of this research was to study a celiac patient’s attitude to gluten-free product quality and availability in the Latvian market and purchasing habits. The survey was designed using website www.visidati.lv, and a questionnaire was sent to people suffering from celiac disease. The respondents were asked to fill in the questionnaire from the beginning of December 2010 till the end of July 2011. The questionnaire was performed with 131 celiac patients, respondents were from all Latvian regions and they answered 15 questions. One of the most important questions was aimed to find out consumers’ opinion about quality of gluten-free products, consumption patterns of gluten-free products, and, moreover, their interest in products made in Latvia. Respondents were asked to name gluten-free products they mainly buy and give specific purchase locations, evaluate the quality of products and necessity for products produced in Latvia. The results of questionnaire show that the consumers are satisfied with the quality of gluten-free flour, flour blends and pasta, but are not satisfied with the quality of bread and confectionery available in the Latvian markets.

This article analyses the advantages of applicable measures of motivation, taking into consideration the internal environment of an organization as a whole and focuses on the impact of internal environmental factors upon the results of the organization. The paper is based on the survey results obtained by inquiring, municipal administration employees in Lithuanian districts in February-June 2010. The goal of the research was to propose and justify theoretical components for the motivation model of municipal administration employees. The major integrated groups of motivation measures that are the most influential to the factors of internal environment as the main results of research were identified. The authors focus on the positional adjustment of the combinations of motivation measures, in order to improve the motivation of municipal administration employees.