Search results for: local social ties

Authors: Samrina Jafrin, Till Talaulicar

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This study investigates stakeholder perceptions of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) reporting patterns and their effectiveness in enhancing trust and transparency. Utilizing a multi-method approach, including experimental research and systematic literature review, insights are gathered from investors, employees, customers, suppliers, managers, and community members. The findings reveal diverse stakeholder expectations and perceptions and emphasize the importance of effective ESG reporting strategies in building credibility and trust. This research contributes to the academic discourse on corporate sustainability reporting and provides practical recommendations for optimizing ESG reporting practices.

Keywords: ESG reporting, stakeholder perceptions, corporate sustainability, transparency, trust

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Authors: Ali Liaghat, Navid Tavanpour, Nima Tavanpour

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An increase in population and prevalence of urbanity have led plan makers and decision makers put effort into sustainable development of cities at national and local levels. One of the important issues in urban development is compliance with safety issues in cities. Despite natural disasters and unexpected events such as floods, earthquakes, hurricanes, fires, etc., urban development should be regarded as an axiom, or else any form of construction and development is not safe, because it will greatly harm economic growth and development and pose an obstacle to achieving sustainable development, plus a loss to lives and finances of people. Therefore, in line with urban development, it is necessary to identify particular environmental and local issues as determinants and pay attention to them at the top of everything, in that we can call it a good action and factor in urban sustainable developments. Physical structure of each city represents how it has developed or its development shaped and what incidents, changes, natural disasters it has undergone over time. Since any form of development plan should be in accordance with the previous situations of cities, disregarding it, unfortunately, can escalate into uncontrolled urban development, non-resistant and unstable construction against earthquake or invasion of river areas, destruction of agricultural lands or vegetation, periodic floods over time. It has been viewed as serious threats to developing cities, and typically caused destruction of bed and other urban facilities as well as damages to lives and finances. In addition, uncontrolled development has caused cities to look ugly in terms of urban façade, and off and on such unplanned measures caused the country to face countless losses, and it not only vitiates expenses incurred, but it will also impose additional costs of reconstruction, i.e. it is unsustainable development. Thus, in this paper, in addition to a discussion about necessity for a profound attitude toward this subject and making long-term plans, programs for organizing river and its surrounding area, creating open and green urban spaces, retrofitting and flood preventing are presented for sustainable safety and development of cities along with a critique of successful countries.

Keywords: flood, sustainable development, urbanisation, urban management

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Authors: José Antonio Donaire Benito, Konstantina Zerva

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Historically, cities have been places where people from many nations and cultures have met and settled together, while population flows and density have had a significant impact on urban dynamics. Cities' high density of social, cultural, business offerings, everyday services, and other amenities not intended for tourists draw not only tourists but a wide range of city users as well. With the coordination of city rhythms and the porosity of the community, city users order and frame their urban experience. From one side, recent literature focuses on the shift in urban tourist experience from 'having' a holiday through 'doing' activities to 'becoming' a local by experiencing a part of daily life. On the other hand, there is a debate on the 'touristification of everyday life', where middle and upper class urban dwellers display attitudes and behaviors that are virtually undistinguishable from those of visitors. With the advent of globalization and technological advances, modern society has undergone a radical transformation that has altered mobility patterns within it, blurring the boundaries between tourism and everyday life, work and leisure, and "hosts" and "guests". Additionally, the presence of other 'temporary city' users, such as commuters, digital nomads, second home owners, and migrants, contributes to a more complex transformation of tourist cities. Moving away from this traditional clear distinction between 'hosts' and 'guests', which represents a more static view of tourism, and moving towards a more liquid narrative of mobility, academics on tourism development are embracing the New Mobilities Paradigm. The latter moves beyond the static structures of the modern world and focuses on the ways in which social entities are made up of people, machines, information, and images in a moving system. In light of this fluid interdependence between tourists and guests, a question arises as to whether overtourism, which is considered as the underlying cause of citizens' perception of a lower urban quality of life, is a fair representation of perceived mobility excessiveness, place consumption disruptiveness, and residents displacement. As a representative example of an overtourism narrative, Barcelona was chosen as a study area for this purpose, focusing on the incoming city users to reflect in depth the variety of people who contribute to mobility flows beyond those residents already have. Several statistical data have been analyzed to determine the number of national and international visitors to Barcelona at some point during the day in 2019. Specifically, tracking data gathered from mobile phone users within the city are combined with tourist surveys, urban mobility data, zenithal data capture, and information about the city's attractions. The paper shows that tourists are only a small part of the different incoming city users that daily enter Barcelona; excursionists, commuters, and metropolitans also contribute to a high mobility flow. Based on the diversity of incoming city users and their place consumption, it seems that the city's urban experience is more likely to be impacted by over-mobility tan over-tourism.

Keywords: city users, density, new mobilities paradigm, over-tourism.

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Authors: Amr A. El Hanafy, Yasser M. Saad, Saleh A. Alkarim, Hussein A. Almehdar, Elrashdy M. Redwan

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Camels are substantial providers of transport, milk, sport, meat, shelter, fuel, security and capital in many countries, particularly Saudi Arabia. Identification of animal breeds has progressed rapidly during the last decade. Advanced molecular techniques are playing a significant role in breeding or strain protection laws. On the other hand, fingerprinting of some molecular markers related to some productive traits in farm animals represents most important studies to our knowledge, which aim to conserve these local genetic resources, and to the genetic improvement of such local breeds by selective programs depending on gene markers. Milk records were taken two days in each week from female camels of Majahem, Safara, Wathaha, and Hamara breeds, respectively from different private farms in northern Jeddah, Riyadh and Alwagh governorates and average weekly yields were calculated. DNA sequencing for CSN2 gene was used for evaluating the genetic variations and calculating the genetic distance values among four Saudi camel populations which are Hamra(R), Safra(Y), Wadha(W) and Majaheim(M). In addition, this marker was analyzed for reconstructing the Neighbor joining tree among evaluating camel breeds. In respect to milk yield during winter season, result indicated that average weekly milk yield of Safara camel breed (30.05 Kg/week) is significantly (p < 0.05) lower than the other 3 breeds which ranged from 39.68 for Hamara to 42.42 Kg/week for Majahem, while there are not significant differences between these three breeds. The Neighbor Joining analysis that re-constructed based on DNA variations showed that samples are clustered into two unique clades. The first clade includes Y (from Y4 to Y18) and M (from M1, to M9). On the other hand, the second cluster is including all R (from R1 to R6) and W (from W1 to W6). The genetic distance values were equal 0.0068 (between the groups M&Y and R&W) and equal 0 (within each group).

Keywords: milk yield, beta-casein precursor (CSN2), Saudi camel, molecular markers

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Authors: Sathapath Kilaso

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Nowadays people who live in the city tend to have a pet in order to relief the loneliness more than usual. It can be observed by the growth of the local pet industry. But the essentials of lifestyle of the urban people which is restricted by time and work might not allow the owner to take care of the pet properly. So this article will be about how to develop the prototype of pet care monitoring with Arduino Microcontroller. This prototype can be used to monitor the pet and its environment around the pet such as temperature (both pet’s temperature and outside temperature), humidity, food’s quantity, air’s quality and also be able to reduce the stress of the pet. This prototype can report the result back to the owner via online-channel such as website etc.

Keywords: pet care, Arduino Microcontroller, monitoring, prototype

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Authors: Joane Adeclas, Yoonyoung Kim, Taekyun Hur

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This study investigates individual’s intrinsic motivation to practice their leisure activities, as well as, how the cultural environment may influence their motivation to practice their activities. Focused on the positive psychology, the present study proposed redefinition of leisure activities considering two factors. First, leisure activities could be as any activities that provide pleasure or meaning to individuals. Second, they can be practiced alone or in groups. In fact, based on this definition, a four-dimensional model of leisure activities was developed, to measure individual’s perception of their leisure experience, based on four factors that are: personal pleasure, social pleasure, personal meaning and social meaning. Furthermore, recent studies have argued that leisure activities can be interpreted and understood differently across cultures. Therefore, the present study proposed to examine the possible role of the cultural context of individual’s leisure practices. To do so, two cultural groups (Koreans vs. French) were compared in terms of the four-dimensional model of leisure activities. Three hundred Koreans and three hundred French participants were asked to answer an online survey about their leisure activities. Participants had to respond to questions related to several aspects of leisure practices as followed: the reason why their practice their leisure activities, the reason why they fail to practice their leisure, and their obsession relate to their leisure activities. Factor analyses based on participant’s responses proposed a moderate fit of the four-dimensional model of leisure activities. Furthermore, significant cultural differences were also found. As a result, the cultural context seems to influence the reason why individuals practice their leisure activities based on our model. In fact, Koreans explained more than French, the practice of their leisure activities with social-pleasurable reasons. At a contrary, French explained more than Koreans, the practice of their leisure activities with social-meaningful reasons. The two cultural groups also significantly differ on their perception of failure. The results showed that French participants used more meaningful social factors to explain why they failed to practice their leisure activities than did Koreans participants. Finally, Koreans and French significantly differed regarding their obsession on their leisure activities. In general, French tend to have more obsession than Koreans about their leisure activities. Those results validated the four-dimensional model of leisure, as well as, the cultural differences in leisure practices. However, further studies are needed to validate this model at an individual and cultural level.

Keywords: culture, leisure, meaning, pleasure

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Authors: Zain Alammari, Emna M. Mhedhbi, Claudio G. Grunewald

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This study aims to compare a standard F2 media to a local media called Altakamul. The new media was tested in Nannochloropsissp cultures at a lab scale. The main difference between both media is the Nitrogen source (NaNO3 in F/2 and NH4 in Altakamul). According to the preliminary results during three weeks experiments, no significant differences were found between F2 and Alatakamul media in terms of Nannochloropsis growth. We can anticipate that Altakamul media will be the cheapest media option for microalgae cultivation at a higher scale, reducing the OPEX

Keywords: microalgae, nannochloropsis, culture, nitrogen

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Authors: Burcu Doymus, Fatma N. Kok, Sakip Onder

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Titanium and titanium-based materials are commonly used to replace or regenerate the injured or lost tissues because of accidents or illnesses. Hospital infections and strong bond formation at the implant-tissue interface are directly affecting the success of the implantation as weak bonding with the native tissue and hospital infections lead to revision surgery. The purpose of the presented study is to modify the surface of the titanium substrates with nano/microspheres for local drug delivery and to prevent hospital infections. Firstly, titanium surfaces were silanized with APTES (3-Triethoxysilylpropylamine) following the negatively charged oxide layer formation. Then characterization studies using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) were done on the modified surfaces. Secondly, microspheres/nanospheres were prepared with chitosan that is a natural polymer and having valuable properties such as non-toxicity, high biocompatibility, low allergen city and biodegradability for biomedical applications. Antibiotic (ciprofloxacin) loaded micro/nanospheres have been fabricated using emulsion cross-linking method and have been immobilized onto the titanium surfaces with different immobilization techniques such as covalent bond and entrapment. Optimization studies on size and drug loading capacities of micro/nanospheres were conducted before the immobilization process. Light microscopy and SEM were used to visualize and measure the size of the produced micro/nanospheres. Loaded and released drug amounts were determined by using UV- spectrophotometer at 278 nm. Finally, SEM analysis and drug release studies on the micro/nanospheres coated Ti surfaces were done. As a conclusion, it was shown that micro/nanospheres were immobilized onto the surfaces successfully and drug release from these surfaces was in a controlled manner. Moreover, the density of the micro/nanospheres after the drug release studies was higher on the surfaces where the entrapment technique was used for immobilization. Acknowledgement: This work is financially supported by The Scientific and Technological Research Council Of Turkey (Project # 217M220)

Keywords: chitosan, controlled drug release, nanosphere, nosocomial infections, titanium

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Authors: Milan Joshi, Harsh Agrawal, Pallaw Mishra, Sanand Sule

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Predicting electricity usage is a crucial aspect of organizing and controlling sustainable energy systems. The task of forecasting electricity load is intricate and requires a lot of effort due to the combined impact of social, economic, technical, environmental, and cultural factors on power consumption in communities. As a result, it is important to create strong models that can handle the significant non-linear and complex nature of the task. The objective of this study is to create and compare three machine learning techniques for predicting electricity load for both the day ahead and intraday, taking into account various factors such as meteorological data and social events including holidays and festivals. The proposed methods include a LightGBM, FBProphet, combination of FBProphet and LightGBM for day ahead and Motifs( Stumpy) based on Mueens algorithm for similarity search for intraday. We utilize these techniques to predict electricity usage during normal days and social events in the Himachal Region. We then assess their performance by measuring the MSE, RMSE, and MAPE values. The outcomes demonstrate that the combination of FBProphet and LightGBM method is the most accurate for day ahead and Motifs for intraday forecasting of electricity usage, surpassing other models in terms of MAPE, RMSE, and MSE. Moreover, the FBProphet - LightGBM approach proves to be highly effective in forecasting electricity load during social events, exhibiting precise day ahead predictions. In summary, our proposed electricity forecasting techniques display excellent performance in predicting electricity usage during normal days and special events in the Himachal Region.

Keywords: feature engineering, FBProphet, LightGBM, MASS, Motifs, MAPE

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Authors: Valentina Piric, Maja Martinovic, Zoran Barac

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The application of marketing to the domain of politics has become relevant in recent times. With this article the authors wanted to explore the issue of the current political engagement among young people in Croatia. The question is what makes young people (age 18-30) politically active in young democracies such as that of the Republic of Croatia. Therefore, the objective of this study was to discover the real or hidden motivations behind the decision to actively participate in politics among young members of the two largest political parties in the country – the Croatian Democratic Union and the Social Democratic Party of Croatia. The study expected to find that the motivation for political engagement of young people is often connected with a possible achievement of individual goals and egoistic needs such as: self-acceptance, social success, financial success, prestige, reputation, status, recognition from the others etc. It was also expected that, due to the poor economic and social situation in the country, young people feel an increasing disconnection from politics. Additionally, the authors expected to find that there is a huge potential to engage young people in the political life of the country through a proper and more interactive use of marketing communication campaigns and social media platforms, with an emphasis on highly ethical motives of political activity and their benefits to society. All respondents included in the quantitative survey (sample size [N=100]) are active in one of the two largest political parties in Croatia. The sampling and distribution of the survey occurred in the field in September 2016. The results of the survey demonstrate that in Croatia, the way young people feel about politics and act accordingly, are in fact similar to what the theory describes. The research findings reveal that young people are politically active; however, the challenge is to find a way to motivate even more young people in Croatia to actively participate in the political and democratic processes in the country and to encourage them to see additional benefits out of this practice, not only related to their individual motives, but related more to the well-being of Croatia as a country and of every member of society. The research also discovered a huge potential for political marketing communication possibilities, especially related to interactive social media. It is possible that the social media channels have a stronger influence on the decision-making process among young people when compared to groups of reference. The level of interest in politics among young Croatians varies; some of them are almost indifferent, whilst others express a serious interest in different ways to actively contribute to the political life of the country, defining a participation in the political life of their country almost as their moral obligation. However, additional observations and further research need to be conducted to get a clearer and more precise picture about the interest in politics among young people in Croatia and their social potential.

Keywords: Croatia, marketing communication, motivation, politics, young people

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Authors: Aico Nogueira

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This paper examines the interinstitutional dialogues within the Brazilian federal structures, which comprises federal, state and local levels, around the themes of new approaches and interventions aimed to promote sustainable rural development, particularly rural development as part of a territorial approach. The work seeks to understand to what extent the various levels of the state interact with these strategies, particularly with the locally constituted powers, focusing on the importance of the transition of traditional agriculture methods to more sustainable agroecological systems and its effects on food security and sustainable rural development. The research analyses as case studies the Sustainable Rural Territories Development Program (PRONAT) of the Ministry of Agrarian Development at the federal level, as well as the State of São Paulo and the Vale do Ribeira Territory, an area characterized by environmental and social vulnerability, restrictive environmental laws and attempts to promote sustainable development. In order to examine how the interrelationships between different levels of governance and civil society, in addition to the neo-institutionalist polity centered literature, the research uses an adaptation of the concept of arena in Ostrom and Hannigan, produced at different scales of decision-making processes, as well as the multilevel governance literature. Document analysis, interviews, focus groups and direct observation techniques are also used. The main findings of this study are that how different levels of governance understand and organize themselves for this work and have a direct impact on the actions taken. Consequently, programs formulated for this purpose are not associated with the creation of institutions capable of breaking with a traditional sectoral view that has historically prevailed in policymaking. And the transition from traditional agriculture to agroecological production systems is hampered by a sectorial foundation, based on large-scale production and the strengthening of the traditional country's land concentration model.

Keywords: agroecology, food security, inter-institutional dialogue, rural poverty, sustainable rural development, territorial development

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Authors: T. Obateru, Samuel Olaniran

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In an era when the new media is affording easy access to packaging and dissemination of information, the social media have become a popular avenue for sharing information for good or ill. It is evident that the traditional role of journalists as ‘news breakers’ is fast being eroded. People now share information on happenings via the social media like Facebook, Twitter and the rest, such that journalists themselves now get leads on happenings from such sources. Beyond the access to information provided by the new media is the erosion of the gatekeeping role of journalists who by their training and calling, are supposed to handle information with responsibility. Thus, sensitive information that journalists would normally filter is randomly shared by social media activists. This was the experience of journalists in Jos, Plateau State in January 2010 when another of the recurring ethnoreligious crisis that engulfed the state resulted in another widespread killing, vandalism, looting, and displacements. Considered as one of the high points of crises in the state, journalists who had the duty of covering the crisis also relied on some of these sources to get their bearing on the violence. This paper examined the role of Facebook in the work of journalists who covered the 2010 crisis. Taking the gatekeeping perspective, it interrogated the extent to which Facebook impacted their professional duty positively or negatively vis-à-vis the peace journalism model. It employed survey to elicit information from 50 journalists who covered the crisis using questionnaire as instrument. The paper revealed that the dissemination of hate information via mobile phones and social media, especially Facebook, aggravated the crisis situation. Journalists became news followers rather than news breakers because a lot of them were put on their toes by information (many of which were inaccurate or false) circulated on Facebook. It recommended that journalists must remain true to their calling by upholding their ‘gatekeeping’ role of disseminating only accurate and responsible information if they would remain the main source of credible information on which their audience rely.

Keywords: crisis, ethnoreligious, Facebook, journalists

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Authors: Benjamin K. Ghansah, Richard K. Appoh, Iliya Nababa, Eric K. Forkuo

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The Nasia River is an important source of water for domestic and agricultural purposes to the inhabitants of its catchment. Major farming activities takes place within the floodplain of the river and its network of tributaries. The actual inundation extent of the river system is; however, unknown. Reasons for this lack of information include financial constraints and inadequate human resources as flood modelling is becoming increasingly complex by the day. Knowledge of the inundation extent will help in the assessment of risk posed by the annual flooding of the river, and help in the planning of flood recession agricultural activities. This study used a simple terrain based algorithm, Height Above Nearest Drainage (HAND), to delineate the floodplain of the Nasia River and its tributaries. The HAND model is a drainage normalized digital elevation model, which has its height reference based on the local drainage systems rather than the average mean sea level (AMSL). The underlying principle guiding the development of the HAND model is that hillslope flow paths behave differently when the reference gradient is to the local drainage network as compared to the seaward gradient. The new terrain model of the catchment was created using the NASA’s SRTM Digital Elevation Model (DEM) 30m as the only data input. Contours (HAND Contour) were then generated from the normalized DEM. Based on field flood inundation survey, historical information of flooding of the area as well as satellite images, a HAND Contour of 2m was found to best correlates with the flood inundation extent of the river and its tributaries. A percentage accuracy of 75% was obtained when the surface area created by the 2m contour was compared with surface area of the floodplain computed from a satellite image captured during the peak flooding season in September 2016. It was estimated that the flooding of the Nasia River and its tributaries created a floodplain area of 1011 km².

Keywords: digital elevation model, floodplain, HAND contour, inundation extent, Nasia River

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Authors: Kasra Majbouri Yazdi, Adel Majbouri Yazdi, Saeid Khodayi, Jingyu Hou, Wanlei Zhou, Saeed Saedy

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Fake news and false information are big challenges of all types of media, especially social media. There is a lot of false information, fake likes, views and duplicated accounts as big social networks such as Facebook and Twitter admitted. Most information appearing on social media is doubtful and in some cases misleading. They need to be detected as soon as possible to avoid a negative impact on society. The dimensions of the fake news datasets are growing rapidly, so to obtain a better result of detecting false information with less computation time and complexity, the dimensions need to be reduced. One of the best techniques of reducing data size is using feature selection method. The aim of this technique is to choose a feature subset from the original set to improve the classification performance. In this paper, a feature selection method is proposed with the integration of K-means clustering and Support Vector Machine (SVM) approaches which work in four steps. First, the similarities between all features are calculated. Then, features are divided into several clusters. Next, the final feature set is selected from all clusters, and finally, fake news is classified based on the final feature subset using the SVM method. The proposed method was evaluated by comparing its performance with other state-of-the-art methods on several specific benchmark datasets and the outcome showed a better classification of false information for our work. The detection performance was improved in two aspects. On the one hand, the detection runtime process decreased, and on the other hand, the classification accuracy increased because of the elimination of redundant features and the reduction of datasets dimensions.

Keywords: clustering, fake news detection, feature selection, machine learning, social media, support vector machine

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Authors: Catherine Mary Abou-Zaid, Sandra Goodwin

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This study was conducted in a cardiac center in Bahrain. The rise in the amount of obese patients’ both men and women, being admitted for surgical procedures has become an issue to the nurses and doctors as these patients pose a high risk of major complications arising from their problem. The cessation of obesity in the country is very high and obesity-related diseases has been the cause of concern among men and women, also related individual diseases such as cardiovascular, diabetes and chronic respiratory diseases are rising dramatically within Bahrain in the last 10 years. Rationale for the Study: The ontological approach will help to understand and assess the true nature of the social world and how the world looks at obesity. Obesity has to be looked at as being a realistic ongoing issue. The epistemological approach will look at the theory of the origins of the nature of knowledge, set the rule of validating and learning in the social world of what can be done to curb this concept and how this can help prevent otherwise preventable diseases. Design Methodology: The qualitative design methodology took the form of an ontological/epistemological approach using phenomenology as a framework. The study was based on a social research issue, therefore, ontological ‘realism and idealism’ will feature as the nature of the world from a social and natural context. Epistemological positions of the study will be how we as researchers will find the actual social world and the limiting of that knowledge. The one-to-one interviews will be transcribed and the taped verbatim will be coded and charted giving the thematic analytic results. Recommendations: The significance of the research brought many recommendations. These recommendations were taken from the themes and sub-themes and were presented to the centers management and the necessary arrangements for updating knowledge and attitudes towards obesity in cardiac patients was then presented to the in-service education department. Workshops and training sessions on promoting health education were organized and put into the educational calendar for the next academic year. These sessions would look at patient autonomy, the patients’ rights, healthy eating for patients and families and the risks associated with obesity in cardiac disease processes.

Keywords: cardiac patients, diabetes, education & training, obesity cessation, qualitative

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Authors: Rachel Gough

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In 2014, Skellig Michael, an island off Ireland’s western seaboard and UNESCO world heritage site became a major setting in Disney’s Star Wars franchise. The subsequent influx of tourists to the site has proven to be a point of contention nationally. The increased visitor numbers have uplifted certain areas of the local economy, the mainland, but have caused irreparable damage to historic monuments and to endangered bird populations who breed on the island. Recent research carried out by a state body suggests far-reaching and longterm negative impacts on the island’s culture and environment, should the association with the Star Wars franchise persist. In spite of this, the film has been widely endorsed by the Irish government as providing a vital economic boost to historically marginalised rural areas through film tourism. This paper argues quite plainly that what is taking place on Skellig is neocolonialism. Skellig Michael’s unique resources, its aesthetic qualities, its ecosystem, and its cultural currency have been sold by the state to a multinational corporation, who profit from their use. Meanwhile, locals are left to do their best to turn a market trend into sustainable business at the expense of culture ecology and community. This paper intends to be the first dedicated study into the psychogeographic and cultural impact of Skellig Michael’s deterioration as a result of film tourism. It will discuss the projected impact of this incident on Irish culture more broadly and finally will attempt to lay out a roadmap for more collaborative filmmaking and touristic approach, which allows local cultures and ecosystem’s to thrive without drastically inhibiting cultural production. This paper will ultimately find that the consequences of this representation call for a requirement to read tourism as a split concept — namely into what we might loosely call “eco-tourism” and more capital-based “profit-bottom-line tourism.”

Keywords: ecology, film tourism, neocolonialism, sustainability

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Authors: Saeko Takahashi, Kazuo Hiraki

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Is it more fun to watch videos together than watching alone? Previous studies showed that synchronizing with others enhances subsequent prosocial behavior and affiliation, and conversely, prosocial individuals tend to coordinate with a partner to a greater extent. However, compared to adults, less is known about interpersonal coordination of young children in real-life situations because most studies have focused on children’s particular movement using specific tools or tasks in a laboratory setting. It has also been unclear if prosociality of young children affect the extent of interpersonal coordination within dyads. The present study examined data from motion capture of five body parts of 4-year-old dyads watching the same stimuli together or alone. A questionnaire survey including participants’ prosocial trait was also conducted. The wavelet coherence of each body parts within dyads was calculated as a measure of the extent of interpersonal coordination. Results showed that the dyads became significantly more coordinated in a social situation compared to a non-social situation. Moreover, dyads with averagely higher prosociality were more coordinated. These results shed some light on the development of interpersonal coordination in terms of social ability in young children. This study also offers a useful method for a study of spontaneous coordination in young children and infants without instructions or verbal responses.

Keywords: child development, interpersonal coordination, prosociality, synchrony, wavelet transform

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Authors: Sue S. Feldman, Bradley Tipper, Benjamin Schooley

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Nearly every community in the US has been impacted by opioid related addictions/deaths; it is a national problem that is threatening our social and economic welfare. Most believe that tackling this problem from a prevention perspective advances can be made toward breaking the chain of addiction. One mechanism, community based participatory research, involves the community in the prevention approach. This project combines that approach with a design science approach to develop an integrated solution. Findings suggested accountable care communities, transpersonal psychology, and social exchange theory as product kernel theories. Evaluation was conducted on a prototype.

Keywords: substance use and abuse recovery, community resource centers, accountable care communities, community based participatory research

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Authors: Fitri CaturLestari

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According to National Population and Family Planning Board (BKKBN), demographic bonus will occur in 2025-2035, when the number of people within the productive age bracket is higher than the number of elderly people and children. This time will be a gold moment for Indonesia to achieve maximum productivity and prosperity. But it will be a demographic bomb if it isn’t balanced by economic and social aspect considerations. Therefore it is important to make a prediction mapping of all provinces in Indonesia whether in demographic bomb or bonus condition after 100 years Indonesian independence. The purpose of this research were to make the demographic mapping based on the economic and social aspects of the provinces in Indonesia and categorizing them into demographic bomb and bonus condition. The research data are gained from Statistics Indonesia (BPS) as the secondary data. The multiregional component method, regression and quadrant analysis were used to predict the number of people, economic growth, Human Development Index (HDI), and gender equality in education and employment. There were different characteristic of provinces in Indonesia from economic aspect and social aspect. The west Indonesia was already better developed than the east one. The prediction result, many provinces in Indonesia will get demographic bonus but the others will get demographic bomb. It is important to prepare particular strategy to particular provinces with all of their characteristic based on the prediction result so the demographic bomb can be minimalized.

Keywords: demography, economic growth, gender, HDI

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Authors: Ana Luiza Blanco, Luiza de Pádua Penteado, Daniella Pires Nunes

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Ageism is a widespread and prevalent phenomenon that affects older adults and directly affects healthy aging. Identifying the factors that contribute to ageism is important to discuss interventions that minimizes its social and emotional impact. To identify factors related with ageism in Brazilians older adults. Quantitative study, with a cross-sectional and analytical design. 134 older adults completed an online questionnaire about Sociodemographic and Health Characteristics, Discrimination (Ageism Survey), Depressive Symptoms (The Geriatric Depression Scale), Family Function (Family APGAR) and Loneliness. The Mann Whitney and Kruskal Wallis tests were used for data analysis, with a significance level of 5%. The mean age was 66.93 years (sd=0.50), mostly women (84.20%), married (52.60%) and with more than 12 years of schooling (75.93%). The results showed that older adults with a regular self-perception of health had higher median ageism scores when compared to individuals who rated their health as very good or good (p=0.006). The same occurred for individuals with depressive symptoms when compared to those without signs of depression (p=0.001). Regarding family function, it was observed that people with low family functionality tend to suffer more ageism than those with high functionality (p=0.017). Loneliness was also a factor related with the experience of ageism in this study. Lonely individuals had higher median ageism scores (p=0.002). There was relationship between ageism and self-perception of health, depressive symptoms, loneliness and dysfunctional family. Such findings demonstrate the importance of considering the psychosocial determinants of aging to reduce discrimination and promote healthy aging, focusing on social support and educational interventions.

Keywords: ageism, age stereotypes, healthy aging, social conditions

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Authors: Pui-Lai To, Chechen Liao, Tzu-Ling Lin

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Virtual communities have created a range of new social spaces in which to meet and interact with one another. Both as a stand-alone model or as a supplement to sustain competitive advantage for normal business models, building virtual communities has been hailed as one of the major strategic innovations of the new economy. However for a virtual community to evolve, the biggest challenge is how to make members actively give information or provide advice. Even in busy virtual communities, usually, only a small fraction of members post information actively. In order to investigate the determinants of information giving willingness of those contributors who usually actively provide their opinions, we proposed a model to understand the reasons for contribution in communities. The study will definitely serve as a basis for the future growth of information giving in virtual communities.

Keywords: information giving, social identity, trust, virtual community

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Authors: Rassima Salimbayeva, Kaliash Stamkulova, Gulparshyn Satbayeva

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In order to adapt projects to promote Sustainable Development Goal 11. «Ensuring openness, security, resilience and environmental sustainability of cities and human settlements», presented in the UN Concept, it is necessary to assess the environmental sustainability of cities. From the analysis of the problems of sustainable development of cities in Kazakhstan, it can be seen that the industrial past created a typical range of problems -transport, housing, environment, and, importantly, image. Most studies on air pollution have focused on assessing the impact of pollutants on sustainability in megacities, but little is known about their relationship in cities whose economies are dominated by a single industry or company. Based on the data of ecological, economic, and social indicators of five single-industry towns of the Karaganda region of Kazakhstan, an assessment of the risks of the negative impact of environmental factors on the health of the population was carried out, including by paying special attention to air quality. In order to investigate the relationship between the structure of industry, environmental pressure, and environmental sustainability of resource-oriented cities, an analysis of the main components was carried out to measure the structure of industry, environmental stress, and environmental sustainability of single-industry towns. It has been established that in resource-based cities, economic growth mainly depends on the development of one main industry, which primarily depends on local natural resources. Empirical results show that the regional structure of industry has a significant negative impact on the environmental sustainability of cities, in particular on the health of the population living in them. The article complements the study of the theory of urban sustainability and clarifies the relationship between industrial structure and environmental pressure on health safety and environmental sustainability of cities and towns, which is crucial for further promoting the "green" development of single-industry towns based on natural resources.

Keywords: public health risks, urban sustainability, suspended solids, single-industry towns, atmospheric air, environmental pollution

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Authors: Caja Thimm

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Already well before the Corona pandemic hit the world, ‘fake news‘ were no longer regarded as harmless twists of the truth but as intentionally composed disinformation, often with the goal of manipulative populist propaganda. During the Corona crisis, particularly conspiracy narratives have become a worldwide phenomenon with dangerous consequences (anti vaccination myths). The success of these manipulated news need s to be counteracted by trustworthy news, which in Europe particularly includes public broadcasting media and their social media channels. To understand better how the main public broadcasters in Germany, the UK, and France used Instagram strategically, a comparative study was carried out. The study – comparative analysis of Instagram during the Corona Crisis In our empirical study, we compared the activities by selected formats during the Corona crisis in order to see how the public broadcasters reached their audiences and how this might, in the longer run, affect journalistic strategies on social media platforms. First analysis showed that the increase in the use of social media overall was striking. Almost one in two adult online users (48 %) obtained information about the virus in social media, and in total, 38% of the younger age group (18-24) looked for Covid19 information on Instagram, so the platform can be regarded as one of the central digital spaces for Corona related information searches. Quantitative measures showed that 47% of recent posts by the broadcasters were related to Corona, and 7% treated conspiracy myths. For the more detailed content analysis, the following categories of analysis were applied: • Digital storytelling and instastories • Textuality and semantic keys • links to information • stickers • videochat • fact checking • news ticker • service • infografics and animated tables Additionally to these basic features, we particularly looked for new formats created during the crisis. Journalistic use of social media platforms opens up immediate and creative ways of applying the media logics of the respective platforms, and particularly the BBC and ARD formats proved to be interactive, responsive, and entertaining. Among them were new formats such as a space for user questions and personal uploads, interviews, music, comedy, etc. Particularly the fact checking channel got a lot of attention, as many user questions were focused on the conspiracy theories, which dominated the public discourse during many weeks in 2020. In the presentation, we will introduce eight particular strategies that show how public broadcasting journalism can adopt digital platforms and use them creatively and, hence help to counteract against conspiracy narratives and fake news.

Keywords: fake news, social media, digital journalism, digital methods

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Authors: Na Zhou, Chun-Lai Zhang, Qing Li, Bingqi Zhu, Xun-Ming Wang

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The understanding of the dynamics of aeolian sand in the Yarlung Zangbo River Valley (YLZBV), southern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, including its origins, transportation,and deposition, remains preliminary. In this study, we investigated the extensive origin of aeolian sediments in the YLZBV by analyzing the distribution and composition of sediment’s grain size and geochemical composition in dune sediments collected from the wide river terraces. The major purpose is to characterize the sedimentological and geochemical compositions of these aeolian sediments, trace back to their sources, and understand their influencing factors. As a result, the grain size and geochemistry variations, which showed a significant correlation between grain sizes distribution and element abundances, give a strong evidence that the important part of the aeolian sediments in the downstream areas was firstly derived from the upper reaches by intense fluvial processes. However, the sediments experienced significant mixing process with local inputs and reconstructed by regional wind transportation. The diverse compositions and tight associations in the major and trace element geochemistry between the up- and down-stream aeolian sediments and the local detrital rocks, which were collected from the surrounding mountains, suggest that the upstream aeolian sediments had originated from the various close-range rock types, and experienced intensive mixing processes via aeolian- fluvial dynamics. Sand mass transported by water and wind was roughly estimated to qualify the interplay between the aeolian and fluvial processes controlling the sediment transport, yield, and ultimately shaping the aeolian landforms in the mainstream of the YLZBV.

Keywords: grain size distribution, geochemistry, wind and water load, sand source, Yarlung Zangbo River Valley

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Authors: Andrew Adjah Sai, Portia Opoku Boadi

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Explaining change is an abstract endeavor. Many management scholars have adopted metaphors to explain change. In this paper, we deal with the drivers of technological change. We use a historical and theoretical approach to review and elaborate on the concepts and context about a specific case. We discuss the limitations of each approach proffered and the implications as a consequence on technological change. We present plurality and multiplicity of perspectives using a socio-technical approach to explain technological change contextually on an organizational level. We show by using our model how technology absorption and diffusion can be accelerated through artefactual institutions to enable social change. The multiplicity of perspectives and plurality of our arguments creates a fine explanation of the e-Estonia case as an example.

Keywords: artefactual institutions, e-Estonia, social change, technological trajectories

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Authors: Tolga Levent

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Throughout the past few decades, forced immigration has been a significant problem for many developing countries. Turkey is one of those countries, which has experienced lots of forced immigration waves in the Republican era. However, the ongoing forced immigration wave of Syrians started with Syrian Civil War in 2011, is strikingly influential due to its intensity. In six years, approximately 3,4 million Syrians have entered to Turkey and presented high-level spatial concentrations in certain cities proximate to the Syrian border. These concentrations make Syrians and their problems relatively visible, especially in those cities. The problems of Syrians in Turkish cities could be associated with all dimensions of daily lives. Within economical dimension, high rates of Syrian unemployment push them to informal jobs offering very low wages. The financial aids they continuously demand from public authorities trigger anti-Syrian behaviors of local communities. Moreover, their relatively limited social adaptation capacities increase integration problems within social dimension day by day. Even, there are problems related to public health dimension such as the reappearance of certain child's illnesses due to the insufficiency of vaccination of Syrian children. These problems are significant but relatively easy to be prevented by using different types of management strategies and structural policies. However, there are other types of problems -urban problems- emerging with socio-spatial impacts of Syrians on Turkish cities in a very short period of time. There are relatively limited amount of studies about these impacts since they are difficult to be comprehended. The aim of the study, in this respect, is to understand these rapidly-emerging impacts and urban problems resulted from this massive immigration influx and to discuss new qualities of urban planning facing them. In the first part, there is a brief historical consideration of forced immigration waves in Turkey. These waves are important to make comparison with the ongoing immigration wave and to understand its significance. The second part is about quantitative and qualitative analyses of the spatial existence of Syrian immigrants in the city of Mersin, as an example of cities where Syrians are highly concentrated. By using official data from public authorities, quantitative statistical analyses are made to detect spatial concentrations of Syrians at neighborhood level. As methods of qualitative research, observations and in-depth interviews are used to define socio-spatial impacts of Syrians. The main results show that there emerges 'cities in cities' though sharp socio-spatial segregations which change density surfaces; produce unforeseen land-use patterns; result in inadequacies of public services and create degradations/deteriorations of urban environments occupied by Syrians. All these problems are significant; however, Turkish planning system does not have a capacity to cope with them. In the final part, there is a discussion about new qualities of urban planning facing these impacts and urban problems. The main point of discussion is the possibility of resilient urban planning under the conditions of uncertainty and unpredictability fostered by immigration crisis. Such a resilient planning approach might provide an option for countries aiming to cope with negative socio-spatial impacts of massive immigration influxes.

Keywords: cities, forced immigration, Syrians, urban planning

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Authors: Qianying Sun, Abdelhadi Kassiba, Guorong Li

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ZnO with wurtzite structure is a well-known semiconducting oxide (SCO), being applied in thermoelectric devices, varistors, gas sensors, transparent electrodes, solar cells, liquid crystal displays, piezoelectric and electro-optical devices. Intrinsically, ZnO is weakly n-type SCO due to native defects (Znⱼ, Vₒ). However, the substitutional doping by metallic elements as (Al, Ti) gives rise to a high n-type conductivity ensured by donor centers. Under CO+N₂ sintering atmosphere, Schottky barriers of ZnO ceramics will be suppressed by lowering the concentration of acceptors at grain boundaries and then inducing a large increase in the Hall mobility, thereby increasing the conductivity. The presented work concerns ZnO based ceramics, which are fabricated with doping by TiO₂ (0.50mol%), Al₂O₃ (0.25mol%) and MgO (1.00mol%) and sintering in different atmospheres (Air (A), N₂ (N), CO+N₂(C)). We obtained uniform, dense ceramics with ZnO as the main phase and Zn₂TiO₄ spinel as a secondary and minor phase. An important increase of the conductivity was shown for the samples A, N, and C which were sintered under different atmospheres. The highest conductivity (σ = 1.52×10⁵ S·m⁻¹) was obtained under the reducing atmosphere (CO). The role of doping was investigated with the aim to identify the local environment and valence states of the doping elements. Thus, Electron paramagnetic spectroscopy (EPR) determines the concentration of defects and the effects of charge carriers in ZnO ceramics as a function of the sintering atmospheres. The relation between conductivity and defects concentration shows the opposite behavior between these parameters suggesting that defects act as traps for charge carriers. For Al ions, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) technique was used to identify the involved local coordination of these ions. Beyond the six and forth coordinated Al, an additional NMR signature of ZnO based TCO requires analysis taking into account the grain boundaries and the conductivity through the Knight shift effects. From the thermal evolution of the conductivity as a function of the sintering atmosphere, we succeed in defining the conditions to realize ZnO based TCO ceramics with an important thermal coefficient of resistance (TCR) which is promising for electrical safety of devices.

Keywords: ceramics, conductivity, defects, TCO, ZnO

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Authors: Amanda M. McLeroy, Tiera Tanksley

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The 2020 movement for Black Lives, ignited by anti-Black police brutality and exemplified by the public execution of George Floyd, underscored the dual potential of social media for political activism and perilous exposure to traumatic content for Black students. This study employs Critical Race Technology Theory (CRTT) to scrutinize algorithmic anti-blackness and its impact on Black youth's lives and educational experiences. The research investigates the consequences of vicarious exposure to police brutality on social media among Black adolescents through qualitative interviews and quantitative scale data. The findings reveal an unprecedented surge in exposure to viral police killings since 2020, resulting in profound physical, socioemotional, and educational effects on Black youth. CRTT forms the theoretical basis, challenging the notion of digital technologies as post-racial and neutral, aiming to dismantle systemic biases within digital systems. Black youth, averaging over 13 hours of daily social media use, face constant exposure to graphic images of Black individuals dying. The study connects this exposure to a range of physical, socioemotional, and mental health consequences, emphasizing the urgent need for understanding and support. The research proposes questions to explore the extent of police brutality exposure and its effects on Black youth. Qualitative interviews with high school and college students and quantitative scale data from undergraduates contribute to a nuanced understanding of the impact of police brutality exposure on Black youth. Themes of unprecedented exposure to viral police killings, physical and socioemotional effects, and educational consequences emerge from the analysis. The study uncovers how vicarious experiences of negative police encounters via social media lead to mistrust, fear, and psychosomatic symptoms among Black adolescents. Implications for educators and counselors are profound, emphasizing the cultivation of empathy, provision of mental health support, integration of media literacy education, and encouragement of activism. Recognizing family and community influences is crucial for comprehensive support. Professional development opportunities in culturally responsive teaching and trauma-informed approaches are recommended for educators. In conclusion, creating a supportive educational environment that addresses the emotional impact of social media exposure to police brutality is crucial for the well-being and development of Black adolescents. Counselors, through safe spaces and collaboration, play a vital role in supporting Black youth facing the distressing effects of social media exposure to police brutality.

Keywords: black youth, mental health, police brutality, social media

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Authors: Dean Sinković, Tea Golja, Morena Paulišić

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Upon the end of the vicious war in former Yugoslavia in 1995, international development community widely promoted microfinance as the key development framework to eradicate poverty, create jobs, increase income. Widespread claims were made that microfinance institutions would play vital role in creating a bedrock for sustainable ‘bottom-up’ economic development trajectory, thus, helping newly formed states to find proper way from economic post-war depression. This uplifting neoliberal narrative has no empirical support in the Republic of Croatia. Firstly, the type of enterprises created via microfinance sector are small, unskilled, labor intensive, no technology and with huge debt burden. This results in extremely high failure rates of microenterprises and poor individuals plunging into even deeper poverty, acute indebtedness and social marginalization. Secondly, evidence shows that microcredit is exact reflection of dangerous and destructive sub-prime lending model with ‘boom-to-bust’ scenarios in which benefits are solely extracted by the tiny financial and political elite working around the microfinance sector. We argue that microcredit providers are not proper financial structures through which developing countries should look way out of underdevelopment and poverty. In order to achieve sustainable long-term growth goals, public policy needs to focus on creating, supporting and facilitating the small and mid-size enterprises development. These enterprises should be technically sophisticated, capable of creating new capabilities and innovations, with managerial expertise (skills formation) and inter-connected with other organizations (i.e. clusters, networks, supply chains, etc.). Evidence from South-East Europe suggest that such structures are not created via microfinance model but can be fostered through various forms of social enterprises. Various legal entities may operate as social enterprises: limited liability private company, limited liability public company, cooperative, associations, foundations, institutions, Mutual Insurances and Credit union. Our main hypothesis is that cooperatives are potential agents of social and economic transformation and community development in the region. Financial cooperatives are structures that can foster more efficient allocation of financial resources involving deeper democratic arrangements and more socially just outcomes. In Croatia, pioneers of the first social enterprises were civil society organizations whilst forming a separated legal entity. (i.e. cooperatives, associations, commercial companies working on the principles of returning the investment to the founder). Ever since 1995 cooperatives in Croatia have not grown by pursuing their own internal growth but mostly by relying on external financial support. The greater part of today’s registered cooperatives tend to be agricultural (39%), followed by war veterans cooperatives (38%) and others. There are no financial cooperatives in Croatia. Due to the above mentioned we look at the historical developments and the prevailing social enterprises forms and discuss their advantages and disadvantages as potential agents for social and economic transformation and community development in the region. There is an evident lack of understanding of this business model and of its potential for social and economic development followed by an unfavorable institutional environment. Thus, we discuss the role of governance and management in the formation of social enterprises in Croatia, stressing the challenges for the governance of the country’s social enterprise movement.

Keywords: financial cooperatives, governance and management models, microfinance institutions, social enterprises

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Authors: Hussein Lujuo Mohamed

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Introduction: Public health has always been influenced by climate and weather. Changes in climate and climate variability, particularly changes in weather extremes affect the environment that provides people with clean air, food, water, shelter, and security. Tanzania is not an exception to the threats of climate change. The health sector is mostly affected due to emergence and proliferation of infectious diseases, thereby affecting health of the population and thus impacting achievement of sustainable development goals. Methodology: A desk review on documented issues pertaining to climate change and health in Tanzania was done using Google search engine. Keywords included climate change, link, health, climate initiatives. In cases where information was not available, documents from Ministry of Health, Vice Presidents Office-Environment, Local Government Authority, Ministry of Water, WHO, research, and training institutions were reviewed. Some of the reviewed documents from these institutions include policy brief papers, fieldwork activity reports, training manuals, and guidelines. Results: Six main climate resilience activities were identified in Tanzania. These were development and implementation of climate resilient water safety plans guidelines both for rural and urban water authorities, capacity building of rural and urban water authorities on implementation of climate-resilient water safety plans, and capacity strengthening of local environmental health practitioners on mainstreaming climate change and health into comprehensive council health plans. Others were vulnerability and adaptation assessment for the health sector, mainstreaming climate change in the National Health Policy, and development of risk communication strategy on climate. In addition information, education, and communication materials on climate change and to create awareness were developed aiming to sensitize and create awareness among communities on climate change issues and its effect on public health. Conclusion: Proper implementation of these interventions will help the country become resilient to many impacts of climate change in the health sector and become a good example for other least developed countries.

Keywords: climate, change, Tanzania, health

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