Search results for: income smoothing perspective

Authors: Poonam Magu, Kumud Khanna, P. Seetharaman

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A kitchen is a major workplace in any home. A large variety of tasks, mainly related to meal preparation is performed here. The types of activities performed are varied and vast. In a way, it is the activities performed that determine the way the space within the kitchen is going to be utilised. A study was conducted in 510 Indian kitchens belonging to middle-income group families living in Delhi. It was conducted in three phases. In the first phase, 510 non-working homemakers were interviewed and questions pertaining to their personal characteristics, meal preparation and physical aspects related to the kitchen were asked. In the second phase, the technique of Path Process Chart was developed. Subsequently, a sub-sample of 50 homemakers was selected from the larger group. The activity of meal preparation was carried out by the homemakers themselves in their kitchens. A time and motion study was conducted using the technique of Path Process Chart. The results were analysed using the appropriate analysis sheets and conclusions were drawn. It was found that the entire kitchen and more specifically, the counter had been 'divided' into a number of workplaces. These workplaces were being used either for performing operations or for the purpose of storage. In many cases, it was used for both. On the whole, in 50 kitchens studied, 21 workplaces were identified which were used for performing operations related to meal preparation and 17 for storage It was also observed that almost the entire kitchen was used for the purpose of storage of some item or the other. The major workplaces where operations were performed were the range, workplaces to the right and left of range and sink and workplaces to the right or left of the sink. The same workplaces were also used for the purpose of storage. There were some workplaces outside the kitchen too, which were used for operations or storage. These were the dining table, courtyard or balcony, bedroom cupboard. On the whole, the range centre and the sink centre were found to be the two most important centres in an Indian kitchen belonging to urban middle-income group family.

Keywords: kitchen, workplace, meal preparation, path process chart

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Authors: Mariam Fishere

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The proposed research study aims at developing an Internet-based transdiagnostic treatment and evaluating its efficacy. Based on the Common Elements Treatment Approach (CETA), a combined low-intensity and technology supported transdiagnostic treatment protocol will be culturally adapted for usage by nonprofessional therapists in Arabic-speaking countries. This Internet-based CETA intervention will target individuals suffering from one or more of the following disorders: depression, anxiety and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which are all major contributors to the global burden of mental illness. The growing body of research in the area of transdiagnostic treatment has proven to be effective in high-income countries (HICs), but there remain questions about its efficacy, cultural appropriateness, and validity for low- to middle-income countries (LMICs). The aim of this dissertation project is to investigate the efficacy of a newly developed Internet-delivery of an evidence-based transdiagnostic treatment – CETA – for a sample of Arabic-speaking individuals suffering from at least one of the following disorders; depression, anxiety, and PTSD.

Keywords: transdiagnostic, internet-based interventions, mental health, Arab world

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Authors: Jonardan Koner

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The study attempts to find out the impact of infrastructural investment on state economic growth in India. It further tries to determine the magnitude of the impact of infrastructural investment on economic indicator, i.e., per-capita income (PCI) in Indian States. The study uses panel regression technique to measure the impact of infrastructural investment on per-capita income (PCI) in Indian States. Panel regression technique helps incorporate both the cross-section and time-series aspects of the dataset. In order to analyze the difference in impact of the explanatory variables on the explained variables across states, the study uses Fixed Effect Panel Regression Model. The conclusions of the study are that infrastructural investment has a desirable impact on economic development and that the impact is different for different states in India. We analyze time series data (annual frequency) ranging from 1991 to 2010. The study reveals that the infrastructural investment significantly explains the variation of economic indicators.

Keywords: infrastructural investment, multiple regression, panel regression techniques, economic development, fixed effect dummy variable model

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Authors: Vasilios Kanellopoulos

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The present paper examines the effect of innovation efficiency on the production of new knowledge from a firm level perspective. It resorts to the Greek version of community innovation survey (CIS 2012-2014 microdata) and employs 1274 firms of the manufacturing, which constitutes the main sector of examination. It assumes a knowledge production function (KPF) and finds that R&D spillovers related to the expenditures on innovation activities, internal R&D, external R&D, skilled labor, and the expenditures in the acquisition of machinery have a positive and significant effect on the production of new knowledge when OLS techniques are applied. However, innovation efficiency comes from a Banker and Morey (1986) data envelopment analysis (DEA) with categorical variables has a statistically insignificant impact on the production of new knowledge measured by firm’s turnover.

Keywords: firms, innovation efficiency, production of new knowledge, R&D spillovers

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Authors: Cüneyit Akar, Mustafa Başaran, Ufuk Uluçınar

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The purpose of this research is to examine the critical thinking dispositions of pre-service teachers in terms of several variables. In the line of this aim, we have investigated what their levels of critical thinking dispositions and whether there is any significant different in their critical thinking dispositions. Also, we have examined the relations between their critical thinking dispositions and their parents’ education statues, the number of their siblings, family income levels, and their religiosity level. 202 pre-service teachers who are studying at different departments at faculty of education at Uşak University participated in this research. In study, critical thinking dispositions scale by one of researchers was utilized and its validity and reliability was performed. The findings indicate that the level of their critical thinking dispositions was found to be .376 (arithmetic mean). On the other hand, we found that there is no significant difference in terms of their gender and the department at which they are studying. Furthermore, although there aren’t significant relationships between critical thinking dispositions and their mother education statues, their income levels, their religiosity levels and the number of their siblings; there is any significant positively at low level the relation between thinking dispositions and father educational statues. The findings obtained will be discussed together with literature and other research’ results.

Keywords: preservice teachers, critical thinking dispositions, pedagogy, education

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Authors: William Wong Xiu Shun, Yoonjin Hyun, Mingyu Kim, Seongi Choi, Namgyu Kim

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Recently, the demand of extracting the R&D keywords from the issues and using them in retrieving R&D information is increasing rapidly. But it is hard to identify the related issues or to distinguish them. Although the similarity between the issues cannot be identified, but with the R&D lexicon, the issues that always shared the same R&D keywords can be determined. In details, the R&D keywords that associated with particular issue is implied the key technology elements that needed to solve the problem of the particular issue. Furthermore, the related issues that sharing the same R&D keywords can be showed in a more systematic way through the issue clustering constructed from the perspective of R&D. Thus, sharing of the R&D result and reusable of the R&D technology can be facilitated. Indirectly, the redundancy of investment on the same R&D can be reduce as the R&D information can be shared between those corresponding issues and reusability of the related R&D can be improved. Therefore, a methodology of constructing an issue clustering from the perspective of common R&D keywords is proposed to satisfy the demands mentioned.

Keywords: clustering, social network analysis, text mining, topic analysis

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Authors: Shlomit Hon-Snir, Sharon Teitler-Regev, Anabel Lifszyc Friedlander

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Tourism, one of the world's largest and fastest growing industries, exerts a major economic influence. The number of international tourists is growing every year, and the relative portion of independent (FIT) tourists is growing as well. The characteristics of independent tourists differ from those of tourists who travel in organized trips. The purpose of the research is to identify the factors that affect the individual tourist's expenses in Israel: total expenses, expenses per day, expenses per tourist, expenses per day per tourist, accommodation expenses, dining expenses and transportation expenses. Most of the research analyzed the total expenses using OLS regression. The determinants influencing expenses were divided into four groups: budget constraints, socio-demographic data, psychological characteristics and travel-related characteristics. Since the effect of each variable may change over different levels of total expenses the quantile regression (QR) theory will be applied. The current research will use data collected by the Israeli Ministry of Tourism in 2015 from individual independent tourists at the end of their visit to Israel. Preliminary results show that: At lower levels of expense, only income has a (positive) effect on total expenses, while at higher levels of expense, both income and length of stay have (positive) effects. -The effect of income on total expenses is higher for higher levels of expenses than for lower level of expenses. -The number of sites visited during the trip has a (negative) effect on tourist accommodation expenses only for tourists with a high level of total expenses. Due to the increasing share of independent tourism in Israel and around the world and due to the importance of tourism to Israel, it is very important to understand the factors that influence the expenses and behavior of independent tourists. Understanding the factors that affect independent tourists' expenses in Israel can help Israeli policymakers in their promotional efforts to attract tourism to Israel.

Keywords: independent tourist, quantile regression theory, tourism expenses, tourism

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Authors: Diamant Irene, Dar Tamar

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Burnout, conceptualized within the framework of stress research, is to a large extent a result of a threat on resources of time or a feeling of time shortage. In reaction to numerous tasks, deadlines, high output, management of different duties encompassing work-home conflicts, many individuals experience ‘time pressure’. Time pressure is characterized as the perception of a lack of available time in relation to the amount of workload. It can be a result of local objective constraints, but it can also be a chronic attribute in coping with life. As such, time pressure is associated in the literature with general stress experience and can therefore be a direct, contributory burnout factor. The present study examines the relation of chronic time pressure – feeling of time shortage and of being rushed, with another central aspect in subjective temporal experience - time perspective. Time perspective is a stable personal disposition, capturing the extent to which people subjectively remember the past, live the present and\or anticipate the future. Based on Hobfoll’s Conservation of Resources Theory, it was hypothesized that individuals with chronic time pressure would experience a permanent threat on their time resources resulting in relatively increased burnout. In addition, it was hypothesized that different time perspective profiles, based on Zimbardo’s typology of five dimensions – Past Positive, Past Negative, Present Hedonistic, Present Fatalistic, and Future, would be related to different magnitudes of chronic time pressure and of burnout. We expected that individuals with ‘Past Negative’ or ‘Present Fatalist’ time perspectives would experience more burnout, with chronic time pressure being a moderator variable. Conversely, individuals with a ‘Present Hedonistic’ - with little concern with the future consequences of actions, would experience less chronic time pressure and less burnout. Another temporal experience angle examined in this study is the difference between the actual distribution of time (as in a typical day) versus desired distribution of time (such as would have been distributed optimally during a day). It was hypothesized that there would be a positive correlation between the gap between these time distributions and chronic time pressure and burnout. Data was collected through an online self-reporting survey distributed on social networks, with 240 participants (aged 21-65) recruited through convenience and snowball sampling methods from various organizational sectors. The results of the present study support the hypotheses and constitute a basis for future debate regarding the elements of burnout in the modern work environment, with an emphasis on subjective temporal experience. Our findings point to the importance of chronic and stable temporal experiences, as time pressure and time perspective, in occupational experience. The findings are also discussed with a view to the development of practical methods of burnout prevention.

Keywords: conservation of resources, burnout, time pressure, time perspective

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Authors: Ge Song

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Hong Kong’s bilingual street signs declare a kind of correspondence, equivalence and thus translation between the English and Chinese languages. This study finds four translation phenomena among the street signs: domestication with positive connotation, foreignization with negative connotation, bilingual incompatibilities, and cross-street complexities. The interplay of, and the tension between, the four features open up a space where the local and the foreign, the vulgar and the elegant, alternate and experiment with each other, creating a kaleidoscope of methods for expressing and domesticating foreign otherness by virtue of translation. An analysis of the phenomena from the functional perspective reveals how translation has been emancipated to inform a variety of dimensions. This study also renews our understanding of translation as both a concept and a practice.

Keywords: street signs, linguistic landscape, cultural hybridity, Hong Kong

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Authors: Mukondi Esther Nethavhakone

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In 2020 World Health Organization announced the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), also known as Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. To curb or contain the spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID 19), global governments implemented social distancing and lockdown regulations. Subsequently, it was no longer business as per usual, life as we knew it had changed, and so many aspects of people's lives were negatively affected, including financial and employment stability. Mainly, because companies/businesses had to put their operations on hold, some had to shut down completely, resulting in the loss of income for many people globally. Finances and employment insecurities are some of the issues that exacerbated many social issues that the world was already faced with, such as school drop-outs, teenage pregnancies, sexual assaults, gender-based violence, crime, child abuse, elderly abuse, to name a few. Expectedly the majority of the population's mental health state was threatened. This resulted in an increased number of people seeking mental healthcare services. The increasing need for mental healthcare services in Low and Middle-income countries proves to be a challenge because it is a well-known fact due to financial constraints and not well-established healthcare systems, mental healthcare provision is not as prioritised as the primary healthcare in these countries. It is against this backdrop that the researcher seeks to find viable, cost-effective, and accessible mental health solutions for low and middle-income countries amid the pressures of any pandemic. The researcher will undertake a systematic review of the technology-based mental health solutions that have been implemented/adopted by developed countries during COVID 19 lockdown and social distancing periods. This systematic review study aims to determine if low and middle-income countries can adopt the cost-effective version of digital mental health solutions for the healthcare system to adequately provide mental healthcare services during critical times such as pandemics (when there's an overwhelming diminish in mental health globally). The researcher will undertake a systematic review study through mixed methods. It will adhere to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. The mixed-methods uses findings from both qualitative and quantitative studies in one review study. It will be beneficial to conduct this kind of study using mixed methods because it is a public health topic that involves social interventions and it is not purely based on medical interventions. Therefore, the meta-ethnographic (qualitative data) analysis will be crucial in understanding why and which digital methods work and for whom does it work, rather than only the meta-analysis (quantitative data) providing what digital mental health methods works. The data collection process will be extensive, involving the development of a database, table of summary of evidence/findings, and quality assessment process lastly, The researcher will ensure that ethical procedures are followed and adhered to, ensuring that sensitive data is protected and the study doesn't pose any harm to the participants.

Keywords: digital, mental health, covid, low and middle-income countries

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Authors: Mamta Jat

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Background: The increased longevity has resulted in the increase in the percentage of the global population aged 60 years or over. With this “demographic transition” towards ageing, “epidemiologic transition” is also taking place characterised by growing share of non-communicable diseases in the overall disease burden. So, many of the older adults are ageing with chronic disease and high levels of frailty which often results in lower levels of quality of life. Although frailty may be increasingly common in older adults, prevention or, at least, delay the onset of late-life adverse health outcomes and disability is necessary to maintain the health and functional status of the ageing population. This is an effort using SAGE data to assess levels of frailty and its socio-demographic correlates and its relation with quality of life in LMICs of India, China, Ghana, Mexico, Russia and South Africa in a comparative perspective. Methods: The data comes from multi-country Study on Global AGEing and Adult Health (SAGE), consists of nationally representative samples of older adults in six low and middle-income countries (LMICs): China, Ghana, India, Mexico, the Russian Federation and South Africa. For our study purpose, we will consider only 50+ year’s respondents. The logistic regression model has been used to assess the correlates of frailty. Multinomial logistic regression has been used to study the effect of frailty on QOL (quality of life), controlling for the effect of socio-economic and demographic correlates. Results: Among all the countries India is having highest mean frailty in males (0.22) and females (0.26) and China with the lowest mean frailty in males (0.12) and females (0.14). The odds of being frail are more likely with the increase in age across all the countries. In India, China and Russia the chances of frailty are more among rural older adults; whereas, in Ghana, South Africa and Mexico rural residence is protecting against frailty. Among all countries china has high percentage (71.46) of frail people in low QOL; whereas Mexico has lowest percentage (36.13) of frail people in low QOL.s The risk of having low and middle QOL is significantly (p<0.001) higher among frail elderly as compared to non–frail elderly across all countries with controlling socio-demographic correlates. Conclusion: Women and older age groups are having higher frailty levels than men and younger aged adults in LMICs. The mean frailty scores demonstrated a strong inverse relationship with education and income gradients, while lower levels of education and wealth are showing higher levels of frailty. These patterns are consistent across all LMICs. These data support a significant role of frailty with all other influences controlled, in having low QOL as measured by WHOQOL index. Future research needs to be built on this evolving concept of frailty in an effort to improve quality of life for frail elderly population, in LMICs setting.

Keywords: Keywords: Ageing, elderly, frailty, quality of life

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Authors: Ting Li Liu

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‘Leftover woman’ or ‘3S’ woman is the term used to describe a well-educated, high income, independent woman who is single and never married around 30 years in Chinese society. With the naming of this demographic of ‘leftover women’, their family, dating culture, mate selection and marriage attract public concern. Massive media representations of ‘leftover women’ occur daily; the research aims to present several media representations of women’s anxiety about their singlehood and related marital issues around thirty. The research triangulates two areas of media representation of ‘leftover women’: films and audience reviews on ‘Douban Movie’ website. Drawing on traditional media studies, Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis combined with multimodal techniques is applied to the research to analyze the representations of ‘leftover women’ and their implications for marital culture in China, in conjunction with a feminist perspective. The conference paper will discuss two case studies: the film ‘The last woman standing’ and ‘I Do’. Paying attention to different aspects of ‘leftover women’, the research aims to re-examine the representations of ‘leftover women’ in selected scenes, such as their age anxiety, family, marriage, dating process, careers, etc. The paper also includes public beliefs about ‘leftover women’ from online audience reviews. In conclusion, the emergence of ‘leftover women’ is a reflection of Chinese tradition’s impact on people’s lives and new changes in Chinese families and their attitude to marriage.

Keywords: leftover women, marriage, family, media culture, China

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Authors: Onur Arugaslan, Ajay Samant, Devrim Yaman

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Financial advisors and investors seek new assets which could potentially increase portfolio returns and decrease portfolio risk. Cryptocurrencies represent a relatively new asset class which could serve in both these roles. There has been very little research done in the area of the risk/return tradeoff in a portfolio consisting of fixed income assets, stocks, and cryptocurrency. The objective of this study is a rigorous examination of this issue. The data used in the study are the monthly returns on 4-week US Treasury Bills, S&P Investment Grade Corporate Bond Index, Bitcoin and the S&P 500 Stock Index. The methodology used in the study is the application Modern Portfolio Theory to evaluate the risk-adjusted returns of portfolios with varying combinations of these assets, using Sharpe, Treynor and Jensen Indexes, as well as the Sortino and Modigliani measures. The results of the study would include the ranking of various investment portfolios based on their risk/return characteristics. The conclusions of the study would include objective empirical inference for investors who are interested in including cryptocurrency in their asset portfolios but are unsure of the risk/return implications.

Keywords: financial economics, portfolio diversification, fixed income securities, cryptocurrency, stock indexes

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Authors: Luo Xi

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Taking the English translation of Yu Hua's To Live as an example, this paper makes a quantitative description and qualitative analysis of its overseas dissemination and acceptance from the perspective of the actual audience -- readers. It is found that the English translation of To Live has been widely disseminated and accepted overseas. The book has been well received overseas. With the English version of To Live, overseas readers have an in-depth understanding of Chinese history, politics, and culture. At the same time, the work shows the admirable qualities of Chinese people. It also conveys the core human values. And thus, overseas readers have gained a deeper understanding of life and are spiritually inspired. From the perspective of readers, this paper studies the successful overseas dissemination of the English translation of Yu Hua's To Live to provide a reference for the further overseas dissemination of Chinese culture.

Keywords: to live, english translation, overseas dissemination and acceptance, readers’ comments

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Authors: Gao ya

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This present study aims to find the relationship between self-efficacy and life satisfaction and the effects of self-efficacy on life satisfaction among Chinese people whose age is from 27-32, born between 1990 and 1995. People who were born between 1990 and 1995 are worthy to receive more attention now because the 90s was always received a lot of focus and labeled negatively as soon as they were born. And a large number of researches study people in individualism society more. So we chose the specific population whose age is from 27 to 32 live in a collectivist society. Demographic information was collected, including age, gender, education level, marital status, income level, number of children. We used the general self-efficacy scale(GSC) and the satisfaction with Life Scale(SLS) to collect data. A total of 350 questionnaires were distributed in and collected from mainland China, then 261 valid questionnaires were returned in the end, making a response rate of 74.57 percent. Some statistics techniques were used, like regression, correlation, ANOVA, T-test and general linear model, to measure variables. The findings were that self-efficacy positively related to life satisfaction. And self-efficacy influences life satisfaction significantly. At the same time, the relationship between demographic information and life satisfaction was analyzed.

Keywords: marital status, life satisfaction, number of children, self-efficacy, income level

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Authors: Ali Atashbar Orang, Carlo Massimo Casciola

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A novel numerical approach for the steady incompressible turbulent flows is presented in this paper. The artificial compressibility method (ACM) is applied to the Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations. A new Characteristic-Based Turbulent (CBT) scheme is developed for the convective fluxes. The well-known Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model is employed to check the effectiveness of this new scheme. Comparing the proposed scheme with previous studies, it is found that the present CBT scheme demonstrates accurate results, high stability and faster convergence. In addition, the local time stepping and implicit residual smoothing are applied as the convergence acceleration techniques. The turbulent flows past a backward facing step, circular cylinder, and NACA0012 hydrofoil are studied as benchmarks. Results compare favorably with those of other available schemes.

Keywords: incompressible turbulent flow, method of characteristics, finite volume, Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model

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Authors: Remy Jonkam Oben

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Using a time series approach, this study investigates how natural resources impact financial development from a global perspective over the 1980-2019 period. Some important determinants of financial development (economic growth, trade openness, population growth, and investment) have been added to the model as control variables. Unit root tests have revealed that all the variables are integrated into order one. Johansen's cointegration test has shown that the variables are in a long-run equilibrium relationship. The vector error correction model (VECM) has estimated the coefficient of the error correction term (ECT), which suggests that the short-run values of natural resources, economic growth, trade openness, population growth, and investment contribute to financial development converging to its long-run equilibrium level by a 23.63% annual speed of adjustment. The estimated coefficients suggest that global natural resource rent has a statistically-significant negative impact on global financial development in the long-run (thereby validating the financial resource curse) but not in the short-run. Causality test results imply that neither global natural resource rent nor global financial development Granger-causes each other.

Keywords: financial development, natural resources, resource curse hypothesis, time series analysis, Granger causality, global perspective

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Authors: Edwin Mwasakidzeni Mutyenyoka

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Without ignoring migration-related challenges in transit zones and places of origin, this inquiry focuses on arrived international immigrants’ exacerbated vulnerability during crises. The aim is to underline longstanding inequalities and demonstrate that crises merely amplify and exacerbate challenges that low-income migrants already face during ‘non-crises’ periods. Social protection, as an agenda for reducing vulnerability, poverty, and risk for low-income households, with regard to basic consumption and services, has been foregrounded in the post-apartheid development discourse in South Africa. Evidently, however, the state, through the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA), systemically excludes the majority of non-citizens from state-sponsored social assistance programs - often leaving them heavily dependent on sporadic non-state options and erosive coping mechanisms. In this paper, migration itself should not only be understood as a social protection strategy against poverty and risk but also as a source of vulnerability that often requires social protection. For quasi-ethnographic, it use one migrant destination, Alex Park Township, as a “contact zone” and space of negotiation during the pandemic.

Keywords: south-south migration, crises, social protection, Covid-19 pandemic

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Authors: Essam Mansour

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The key purpose of this study is to provide first-hand information about beggars in Egypt, especially from the perspective of their information seeking behaviour including their information needs. The researcher tries to investigate the information-seeking behaviour of Egyptian beggars with regard to their thoughts, perceptions, motivations, attitudes, habits, preferences as well as challenges that may impede their use of information. The research methods used were an adapted form of snowball sampling of a heterogeneous demographic group of participants in the beggary activity in Egypt. This sampling was used to select focus groups to explore a range of relevant issues. Data on the demographic characteristics of the Egyptian beggars showed that they tend to be men, mostly with no formal education, with an average age around 30s, labeled as low-income persons, mostly single and mostly Muslims. A large number of Egyptian beggars were seeking for information to meet their basic needs as well as their daily needs, although some of them were not able to identify their information needs clearly. The information-seeking behaviour profile of a very large number of Egyptian beggars indicated a preference for informal sources of information over formal ones to solve different problems and meet the challenges they face during their beggary activity depending on assistive devices, such as mobile phones. The high degree of illiteracy and the lack of awareness about the basic rights of information as well as information needs were the most important problems Egyptian beggars face during accessing information. The study recommended further research to be conducted about the role of the library in the education of beggars. It also recommended that beggars’ awareness about their information rights should be promoted through educational programs that help them value the role of information in their life.

Keywords: user studies, information-seeking behaviour, information needs, information sources, beggars, Egypt

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Authors: Yadav Shyamjeet Maniram

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Despite reports of more than seventy million population of India affected by rare diseases, it rarely figured on the agenda of the Indian scientist and policymakers. Hitherto ignored, a fresh initiative is being attempted to establish the first national registry for rare diseases. Though there are registries for rare diseases, established by the clinicians and patient advocacy groups, they are isolated, scattered and lacks information sharing mechanism. It is the first time that there is an effort from the government of India to make an initiative on the rare disease registries, which would be more formal and systemic in nature. Since there is lack of epidemiological evidence for the rare disease in India, it is interesting to note how rare disease policy is being attempted in the vacuum of evidence required for the policy process. The objective of this study is to analyse rare disease registry creation and implementation from the parameters of evolutionary policy perspective in the absence of evidence for the policy process. This study will be exploratory and qualitative in nature, primarily based on the interviews of stakeholders involved in the rare disease registry creation and implementation. Some secondary data will include various documents related to rare disease registry. The expected outcome of this study would be on the role of stakeholders in the generation of evidence for the rare disease registry creation and implementation. This study will also try to capture negotiations and deliberations on the ethical issues in terms of data collection, preservation, and protection.

Keywords: evolutionary policy perspective, evidence for policy, rare disease policy, rare disease in India

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Authors: Ibrahim Aliyu Isah, Mohd Mansor Ismail, Salim Hassan, Norsida Bint Man

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Global and National contributions of Extension Agents in income derive through stingless beekeeping production as acknowledged globally as a new source of wealth creation, which contributes significantly to the positive, sustainable economic growth of Malaysia. A common specie, Trigona itama, production through effective utilization of highly competent agents of extension services led to high increase of output that guaranteed high income and sustainability to farmers throughout the study areas. A study on impacts of extension services on stingless bee production and its profitability and sustainability in both Peninsular Malaysia and East (Sarawak) Malaysia was conducted with the following objectives: (i) to examined various impacts of extension services on sustainability as variables in enhancing stingless beekeeping production for positive profitability. (ii) to determine the profitability and sustainability of stingless beekeeping production in the study area through transfer of technology and human resources development. The study covers a sample of beekeepers in ten states of Peninsular Malaysia and Sarawak. The sample size of 87 respondents were selected out of the population and 54 of filled questionnaires were retrieved. Capital budgeting analysis was carried out and economic performance was evaluated. Data collected was analysed using SPSS version 23.0. Correlation and Regression analyses were used. The capital budgeting analysis and government incentive schemes was incorporated in the applied projection of stingless bee farms. The result of Net Present Value (NPV) is determined as an accepted projection to the financial appraisal. The NPV in the study indicated positive outcome of production that can generate positive income and indicated efficient yield of investment and Profitability index (PI). In summary, it is possible for the extension services to increase output and hence increase profit which is sustainable for growth and development of agricultural sector in Malaysia.

Keywords: extension services, impacts, profitability and sustainability, Sarawak and peninsular Malaysia, trigona itama production

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Authors: Lina Martinez, Juan David Rivera Acevedo, Isabella Franco

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The informal economy plays a significant role in the job market in Colombia. Cali, the third largest city in the country, is characterized by a high percentage of socially and economically vulnerable population groups who take part in the urban informal economy, with street vending as their primary source of income. This paper studies the socio-economic dimensions of street vendors in Cali. In particular, it examines why they are unable to capitalize on their comparatively high earnings and are not likely to escape poverty even though they usually profit from government welfare and tax evasion due to the non-regulated character of informality. The analysis of an observational study and two surveys with 637 and 300 participants show that street vending is a cash-based day-to-day activity. Since most of the street vendors do not have access to formal banking systems, they depend on payday loans with incomparably high interest rates which absorb a large share of their income and maintain a continuous indebtedness. This is one of the main reasons why they are unable to improve their living conditions. However, the daily cash flow masks the high opportunity cost of loans and long-term deficits.

Keywords: Colombia, informal economy, payday loans, street vendors

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Authors: Abm Mostafa, Rumbidzai Mukono, Peijie Wang

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Using 285 respondents from two microfinance institutions, this research aims to assess the impact of microfinance on women’s economic empowerment in Bangladesh. Empirical measures of economic empowerment used in this paper are underpinned by a bargaining theory of household. Questionnaire is used for data collection following purposive sampling. Descriptive statistics, chi-square test, Kruskal-Wallis test, binary, and ordinal logistic regressions are deployed for data analysis. The findings of this study show that around three quarters of respondents have increased household income. They have increased their savings overwhelmingly; nonetheless, many of them are found to have a very small amount of savings. Still, more than half of the respondents are reported to have increased their savings when it is checked against at least 500 BDT per month. On the contrary, the percentage of women is moderate in terms of increasing control over finances. Empirical findings demonstrate the evidence of a relationship between the amount of loan and women’s household income, their savings, and control over finances. Nonetheless, no relationship is found in women’s areas. This study infers that women’s access to financial resources is fundamental to empower them in economic dimension.

Keywords: microfinance, women, economic, empowerment, Bangladesh

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Authors: Minjung Maing, Sibei Liu

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This research discusses the results of a study of window opening behavior of large housing developments in the high-density megacity of Hong Kong. The methods used for the study involved field observations using photo documentation of the four cardinal elevations (north, south-east, and west) of two large housing developments in a very dense urban area of approx. 46,000 persons per square meter within the city of Hong Kong. The targeted housing developments (A and B) are large public housing with a population of about 13,000 in each development of lower income. However, the mean income level in development A is about 40% higher than development B and home ownership is 60% in development A and 0% in development B. Mapping of the surrounding amenities and layout of the developments were also studied to understand the available activities to the residents. The photo documentation of the elevations was taken from November 2016 to February 2018 to gather a full spectrum of different seasons and both in the morning and afternoon (am/pm) times. From the photograph, the window opening behavior was measured by counting the amount of windows opened as a percentage of all the windows on that façade. For each date of survey data collected, weather data was recorded from weather stations located in the same region to collect temperature, humidity and wind speed. To further understand the behavior, simulation studies of microclimate conditions of the housing development was conducted using the software ENVI-met, a widely used simulation tool by researchers studying urban climate. Four major conclusions can be drawn from the data analysis and simulation results. Firstly, there is little change in the amount of window opening during the different seasons within a temperature range of 10 to 35 degrees Celsius. This means that people who tend to open their windows have consistent window opening behavior throughout the year and high tolerance of indoor thermal conditions. Secondly, for all four elevations the lower-income development B opened more windows (almost two times more units) than higher-income development A meaning window opening behavior had strong correlations with income level. Thirdly, there is a lack of correlation between outdoor horizontal wind speed and window opening behavior, as the changes of wind speed do not seem to affect the action of opening windows in most conditions. Similar to the low correlation between horizontal wind speed and window opening percentage, it is found that vertical wind speed also cannot explain the window opening behavior of occupants. Fourthly, there is a slightly higher average of window opening on the south elevation than the north elevation, which may be due to the south elevation being well shaded from high angle sun during the summer and allowing heat into units from lower angle sun during the winter season. These findings are important to providing insight into how to better design urban environments and indoor thermal environments for a liveable high density city.

Keywords: high-density housing, subtropical climate, urban behavior, window opening

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Authors: Ghorbanali Mohammadi

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New approaches to sequencing mixed-model manufacturing systems are present. These approaches have attracted considerable attention due to their potential to deal with difficult optimization problems. This paper presents Multi-Objective Simulated Annealing Algorithms (MOSAA) approaches to the Just-In-Time (JIT) sequencing problem where workload-smoothing (WL) and the number of set-ups (St) are to be optimized simultaneously. Mixed-model assembly lines are types of production lines where varieties of product models similar in product characteristics are assembled. Moreover, this type of problem is NP-hard. Two annealing methods are proposed to solve the multi-objective problem and find an efficient frontier of all design configurations. The performances of the two methods are tested on several problems from the literature. Experimentation demonstrates the relative desirable performance of the presented methodology.

Keywords: scheduling, just-in-time, mixed-model assembly line, sequencing, simulated annealing

Procedia PDF Downloads 117

Authors: Teodorica G. Ani

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Economic activity requires an encouraging regulatory environment and effective rules that are transparent and accessible to all. The World Bank has been publishing the annual Doing Business reports since 2004 to investigate the scope and manner of regulations that enhance business activity and those that constrain it. A streamlined business environment supporting the development of competitive small and medium enterprises (SMEs) may expand employment opportunities and improve the living conditions of low income households. Asia has emerged as one of the most attractive markets in the world. Economies in East Asia and the Pacific were among the most active in making it easier for local firms to do business. The study aimed to describe the ease of doing business and its effect to economic growth among selected economies in Asia for the year 2014. The study covered 29 economies in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia and Middle Asia. Ease of doing business is measured by the Doing Business indicators (DBI) of the World Bank. The indicators cover ten aspects of the ease of doing business such as starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts and resolving insolvency. In the study, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was used as the proxy variable for economic growth. Descriptive research was the research design used. Graphical analysis was used to describe the income and doing business among selected economies. In addition, multiple regression was used to determine the effect of doing business to economic growth. The study presented the income among selected economies. The graph showed China has the highest income while Maldives produces the lowest and that observation were supported by gathered literatures. The study also presented the status of the ten indicators of doing business among selected economies. The graphs showed varying trends on how easy to start a business, deal with construction permits and to register property. Starting a business is easiest in Singapore followed by Hong Kong. The study found out that the variations in ease of doing business is explained by starting a business, dealing with construction permits and registering property. Moreover, an explanation of the regression result implies that a day increase in the average number of days it takes to complete a procedure will decrease the value of GDP in general. The research proposed inputs to policy which may increase the awareness of local government units of different economies on the simplification of the policies of the different components used in measuring doing business.

Keywords: doing business, economic growth, gross domestic product, Asia

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Authors: Anne Öman

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Today in Sweden and in other countries, a variety of digital artefacts, such as laptops, tablets, interactive whiteboards, are being used at all school levels. From an educational perspective, digital artefacts challenge traditional teaching because they provide a range of modes for expression and communication and are not limited to the traditional medium of paper. Digital technologies offer new opportunities for representations and physical interactions with objects, which put forward the role of the body in interaction and learning. From a multimodal perspective the emphasis is on the use of multiple semiotic resources for meaning- making and the study presented here has examined the differential use of semiotic resources by pupils interacting in a digitally designed task in a primary school context. The instances analyzed in this paper come from a case study where the learning task was to create an advertising film in a film-software. The study in focus involves the analysis of a single case with the emphasis on the examination of the classroom setting. The research design used in this paper was based on a micro ethnographic perspective and the empirical material was collected through video recordings of small-group work in order to explore pupils’ communication within the group activity. The designed task described here allowed students to build, share, collaborate upon and publish the redesigned products. The analysis illustrates the variety of communicative modes such as body position, gestures, visualizations, speech and the interaction between these modes and the representations made by the pupils. The findings pointed out the importance of embodied communication during the small- group processes from a learning perspective as well as a pedagogical understanding of pupils’ representations, which were similar from a cultural literacy perspective. These findings open up for discussions with further implications for the school practice concerning the small- group processes as well as the redesigned products. Wider, the findings could point out how multimodal interactions shape the learning experience in the meaning-making processes taking into account that language in a globalized society is more than reading and writing skills.

Keywords: communicative learning, interactive learning environments, pedagogical issues, primary school education

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Authors: Burcin Basyazici

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The history of urban regeneration in Istanbul dates to the 1980s and has been generated by various reasons, from political state-based decisions to cultural migrations and/or translocations and economical private sector-based reasons. However, one of the latest regeneration areas in Fikirtepe that have been still under construction for ten years becomes dissimilar to other regeneration areas in Istanbul. The region is located very close to Kadıkoy's downtown area but was still considered a slum due to its inhabitants -who mostly belong to lower-income immigrants. The process begun in 2011 with the decision of the government, and the settlement has been emptied and demolished also by the government -together with the investors and construction companies. Although there has been much research on the process of deconstruction and the relocation of landlords, there hasn’t been any research on what happened after the regeneration. While many high-rise luxurious gated communities were constructed and inhabited in five years, many constructions have stopped due to the latest economic devastation in Turkey. Then the region stayed as an unfinished construction area with its new upper-income and upper-middle-income residents and old low-income landlords. This situation has also changed the commercial activities in Fikirtepe. While some new retail facilities have been offered for new residents, some of the oldest ones have also survived in new-Fikirtepe. This study aims to investigate the urban everyday life of Fikirtepe with relation to its retail-based regeneration with the help of the theories of Bourdieu called cultural capital and cultural omnivorousness. To achieve this aim, after presenting the historical background of urban regeneration in Istanbul, Bourdieu’s conceptualism of cultural capital, habitus, and the consumption tendencies related to those are introduced and discussed within the scope of the Fikirtepe case. To represent the retail-based regeneration in the area, the current situation of retail premises is mapped by comparing to its pre-situation before urban gentrification. To better understand the change of cultural capital and the consumption tendencies of the new residents, eighteen semi-structured in-depth interviews have been conducted with twelve inhabitants from three different luxurious gated communities and six shop owners containing the new ones after regeneration and old ones before it. The interview questions have been structured to understand the motivation of change and/or inhibition of retail premises and the consumption tendencies of the new residents. In conclusion, the study shows that even though the cultural capital has been changed in Fikirtepe, the new residents also tend to act as culturally omnivorous by referring to Bourdieu's theories on multi-cultural tendencies of the upper-class and upper-middle-class societies, that should be questioned regarding the cultural regeneration in in-town urban regeneration areas in metropoles.

Keywords: bourdieu, cultural omnivorousness, fikirtepe, urban regeneration in istanbul

Procedia PDF Downloads 155

Authors: Farhan A. Alenizi

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Digital watermarking has evolved in the past years as an important means for data authentication and ownership protection. The images and video watermarking was well known in the field of multimedia processing; however, 3D objects' watermarking techniques have emerged as an important means for the same purposes, as 3D mesh models are in increasing use in different areas of scientific, industrial, and medical applications. Like the image watermarking techniques, 3D watermarking can take place in either space or transform domains. Unlike images and video watermarking, where the frames have regular structures in both space and temporal domains, 3D objects are represented in different ways as meshes that are basically irregular samplings of surfaces; moreover, meshes can undergo a large variety of alterations which may be hard to tackle. This makes the watermarking process more challenging. While the transform domain watermarking is preferable in images and videos, they are still difficult to implement in 3d meshes due to the huge number of vertices involved and the complicated topology and geometry, and hence the difficulty to perform the spectral decomposition, even though significant work was done in the field. Spatial domain watermarking has attracted significant attention in the past years; they can either act on the topology or on the geometry of the model. Exploiting the statistical characteristics in the 3D mesh models from both geometrical and topological aspects was useful in hiding data. However, doing that with minimal surface distortions to the mesh attracted significant research in the field. A 3D mesh blind watermarking technique is proposed in this research. The watermarking method depends on modifying the vertices' positions with respect to the center of the object. An optimal method will be developed to reduce the errors, minimizing the distortions that the 3d object may experience due to the watermarking process, and reducing the computational complexity due to the iterations and other factors. The technique relies on the displacement process of the vertices' locations depending on the modification of the variances of the vertices’ norms. Statistical analyses were performed to establish the proper distributions that best fit each mesh, and hence establishing the bins sizes. Several optimizing approaches were introduced in the realms of mesh local roughness, the statistical distributions of the norms, and the displacements in the mesh centers. To evaluate the algorithm's robustness against other common geometry and connectivity attacks, the watermarked objects were subjected to uniform noise, Laplacian smoothing, vertices quantization, simplification, and cropping. Experimental results showed that the approach is robust in terms of both perceptual and quantitative qualities. It was also robust against both geometry and connectivity attacks. Moreover, the probability of true positive detection versus the probability of false-positive detection was evaluated. To validate the accuracy of the test cases, the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curves were drawn, and they’ve shown robustness from this aspect. 3D watermarking is still a new field but still a promising one.

Keywords: watermarking, mesh objects, local roughness, Laplacian Smoothing

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Authors: S. M. Tavakoli Sani, M. Sabbet Moghadam, Y. Khorram Farhadi, Iraj Rezayi Nejad

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The concept of national security in Iran is a permanently effective factor in acceptance or rejection of many international obligations. These obligations had been defined according to the type of legislation of Iran in many aspects. Therefore, there are several treaties at international level which requires Iran’s security to come in contact with obligations in these treaties in a way that an obstacle to join to them and their passage in parliament. This issue is a typical category which every country pays attention to be accepted in treaties or to include their national security in that treaties and also they can see the related treaties from this perspective, but this issue that 'what is the concept of Iran’s national security', and 'To what extent it is changed in recent years, especially after Islamic Revolution' are important issues that can be criticized. Thus, this study is trying to assess singed treaties from the perspective of Iran’s national security according of the true meaning of treaty and to investigate how the international treaties may be in conflict with Iran’s national security.

Keywords: treaties, national security, Iran, Islamic Revolution

Procedia PDF Downloads 457