Search results for: social networks security issues

Authors: Serag El Hegazi

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The development of an assessment methodological framework for local and institutional sustainability is a key factor for future development plans and visions. This paper develops an approach to local and institutional sustainability assessment (ALISA). The ALISA methodology is a methodological framework that assists in the clarification, formulation, preparation, selection, and ranking of key indicators to facilitate the assessment of the level of sustainability at the local and institutional levels in North African and Middle Eastern cities. According to the literature review, this paper formulates a methodological framework, ALISA, which is a combination of the UNCSD (2001) Theme Indicators Framework and the issue-based Framework illustrated by McLaren (1996). The methodological framework has been implemented to formulate, select, and prioritise key indicators that most directly reflect the issues of a case study at the local community and institutional level. Yet, in the meantime, there is a lack of clear indicators and frameworks that can be developed to apply successfully at the local and institutional levels in the MENA Region, particularly in the cities of Benghazi and Amman. This is an essential issue for sustainability development estimation. Therefore, a conceptual framework was developed to be tested as a methodology to collect and classify data. The Approach to Local and Institutional Sustainability Assessment (ALISA) is a methodological framework that was developed to apply to certain cities in the MENA region. The main goal is to develop the ALISA framework to formulate, choose, and prioritize sustainability key indicators, which then can assist in guiding an assessment progress to improve decisions and policymakers towards the development of sustainable cities at the local and institutional level in the city of Benghazi. The conceptual, methodological framework, which supports this research with joint documentary and analysed data in two case studies, including focus-group discussions, semi-structured interviews, and questionnaires, reflects the approach required to develop a combined framework that assists the development of sustainability indicators. To achieve this progress and reach the aim of this paper, which is developing a practical approach for sustainability indicators framework that could be used as a tool to develop local and institutional sustainability indicators, appropriate stages must be applied to propose a set of local and institutional sustainability indicators as follows: Step one: issues clarifications, Step two: objectives formation/analysing of issues and boundaries, Step three: indicators preparation, First list of proposed indictors, Step four: indicator selection, Step five: indicator rating/ranking.

Keywords: sustainability indicators, approach to local and institutional level, ALISA, policymakers

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Authors: Afrah Saad Mohsen Al-Mahfadi

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In rural areas of developing countries, participation of all stakeholders in water supply projects is an important step towards further development. As most of the beneficiaries are women, it is important that they should be involved to achieve successful and sustainable water supply projects. Women are responsible for the management of water both inside and outside home, and often spend more than six-hours a day fetching drinking water from distant water sources. The problem is that rural women play a role of little importance in the water supply projects’ phases in rural Yemen. Therefore, this research aimed at analyzing the different reasons of their lack of participation in projects and in what way a full participation -if achieved- could contribute to sustainable water supply projects in the rural mountainous areas in Yemen. Four water supply projects were selected as a case study in Al-Della'a Alaala sub-district in the Al-Mahweet governorate, two of them were implemented by the Social Fund and Development (SFD), while others were implemented by the General Authority for Rural Water Supply Projects (GARWSSP). Furthermore, the successful Al-Galba project, which is located in Badan district in Ibb governorate, was selected for comparison. The rural women's active participation in water projects have potential consequences including continuity and maintenance improvement, equipment security, and improvement in the overall health and education status of these areas. The majority of respondents taking part in GARWSSP projects estimated that there is no reason to involve women in the project activities. In the comparison project - in which a woman worked as a supervisor and implemented the project – all respondents indicated that the participation of women is vital for sustainability. Therefore, the results of this research are intended to stimulate rural women's participation in the mountainous areas of Yemen.

Keywords: assessment, rural woman, sustainability, water management

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Authors: Deborah A. Hollingworth

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The key tenets associated with ‘environmental justice’, were first articulated in a global context in Principle 10 of the United Nations Declaration on Environment and Development at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 (the Rio Declaration). The elements can be conflated to require: public participation in decision-making; the provision of relevant information to those affected about environmental hazards issues; access to judicial and administrative proceeding; and the opportunity for redress where remedy where required. This paper examines the legislative and regulatory arrangements in place for the implementation these elements in a number of industrialised democracies, including Australia. Most have, over time made regulatory provision for these elements – even if they are not directly attributed Principle 10 or the notion of environmental justice. The paper proposes, that of these elements the most critical to the achievement of good environmental governance, is a legislated recognition and role of public participation. However, the paper considers that notwithstanding sound legislative and regulatory practices, environmental regulators frequently struggle, where there is a complex decision-making scenario or long-standing enmity between a community and industry to achieve effective engagement with the public. This study considers the dilemma confronted by environmental regulators to given meaningful effect to the principles enshrined in Principle 10 – that even when the legislative expression of Principle 10 is adhered to – does not prevent adverse outcomes. In particular, it considers, as a case study a prominent environmental incident in 2014 in Australia in which an open-cut coalmine located in the regional township of Morwell caught fire during bushfire season. The fire, which took 45 days to be extinguished had a significant and adverse impact on the community in question, but compounded a complex, and sometime antagonistic history between the mine and township. The case study exemplifies the complex factors that will often be present between industry, the public and regulatory bodies, and which confound the concept of environmental justice, and the elements of enshrined in the Principle 10 of the Rio Declaration. The study proposes that such tensions and complex examples will commonly be the reality of communities and regulators. However, to give practical effect to outcomes contemplated by Principle 10, the paper considers that regulators will may consider public intervention more broadly as including early interventions and formal opportunities for “conferencing” between industry, community and regulators. These initiatives help to develop a shared understanding and identification of issues. It is proposed that although important, options for “alternative dispute resolution” are not sufficiently preventative, as they come into play when a dispute has arise. Similarly “restorative justice” programs, while important once an incident or adverse environmental outcome has occurred, are post event and therefore necessarily limited. The paper considers the examples of how public participation at the outset – at the time of a proposal, before issues arise or eventuate to ensure, is demonstrably the most effective way for building commonality and an agreed methodology for working to resolve issues once they occur.

Keywords: environmental justice, alternative dispute resolution, domestic environmental law, international environmental law

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Authors: Domenico Chizzoniti, Monica Moscatelli, Letizia Cattani, Piero Favino, Luca Preis

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A settlement strategy is to anticipate and respond the needs of existing and future communities through the provision of primary health care facilities in marginalized areas. Access to a health care network is important to improving healthcare coverage, often lacking, in developing countries. The study explores that a good sanitary system strategy of rural contexts brings advantages to an existing settlement: improving transport, communication, water and social facilities. The objective of this paper is to define a possible methodology to implement primary health care facilities in disadvantaged areas of emerging countries. In this research, we analyze the case study of Lauro de Freitas, a municipality in the Brazilian state of Bahia, part of the Metropolitan Region of Salvador, with an area of 57,662 km² and 194.641 inhabitants. The health localization system in Lauro de Freitas is an integrated process that involves not only geographical aspects, but also a set of factors: population density, epidemiological data, allocation of services, road networks, and more. Data were collected also using semi-structured interviews and questionnaires to the local population. Synthesized data suggest that moving away from the coast where there is the greatest concentration of population and services, a network of primary health care facilities is able to improve the living conditions of small-dispersed communities. Based on the health service needs of populations, we have developed a methodological approach that is particularly useful in rural and remote contexts in emerging countries.

Keywords: healthcare, settlement strategy, urban health, rural

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Authors: Sri Widati, Ira Nurmala

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The Se’i Tradition was considered to contribute highly to the high maternal mortality rate in South Amanuban, East Nusa Tenggara. This tradition is still preserved due to the social support that has influenced the decision to carry out the Se’i to pregnant women and post-partum women. The purpose of this study is to analyze this social support towards the Se’i Tradition on pregnant women in East Nusa Tenggara. This research was an explorative study with in-depth interviews, observations, and focus group discussions (FGD) in collecting the data. This study showed that emotional support towards Se’i was commonly given by families, specifically by the mother-in laws. Instrumental support was shown by the husbands and the traditional midwives who helped delivered the babies. Informational support was found on the pregnant women and their mother-in laws. Appraisal support was given by all the neighbors and relatives of the pregnant women by telling how comfortable it was to go through this tradition which eventually affected those women to carry it out themselves. The Se’i Tradition is still carried out and mostly supported by the relatives of the pregnant women. The first recommendation of this study is to suggest people to only follow the suggestions from the local health staff to give birth in the local health centers and not to do the tradition anymore. The second recommendation is to urge the government to give support in the form of transportation facilities for pregnant women to reach the local health staff.

Keywords: the Se’i tradition, social support, pregnant women, maternal mortality, post-partum women

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Authors: Abha Gupta, Deepak K. Mishra

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The focus of food security studies in India has been on the adequacy of calories and its linkage with poverty level. India currently being undergoing a massive demographic and epidemiological transition has demonstrated a decline in average physical activity with improved mechanization and urbanization. Food consumption pattern is also changing with decreasing intake of coarse cereals and a marginal increase in the consumption of fruits, vegetables and meat products resulting into a nutrition transition in the country. However, deficiency of essential micronutrients such as vitamins and minerals is rampant despite their growing importance in fighting back with lifestyle and other modern diseases. The calorie driven studies can hardly tackle the complex problem of malnutrition. This paper fills these research lacuna and analyses mean intake of different major and micro-nutrients among different socio-economic groups and adequacy of these nutrients from recommended dietary allowance. For the purpose, a cross-sectional survey covering 304 households selected through proportional stratified random sampling was conducted in six villages of Aligarh district of the state of Uttar Pradesh, India. Data on quantity consumed of 74 food items grouped into 10 food categories with a recall period of seven days was collected from the households and converted into energy, protein, fat, carbohydrate, calcium, iron, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin and vitamin C using standard guidelines of National Institute of Nutrition. These converted nutrients were compared with recommended norms given by National Nutrition Monitoring Bureau. Per capita nutrient adequacy was calculated by dividing mean nutrient intake by the household size and then by comparing it with recommended norm. Findings demonstrate that source of both macro and micro-nutrients are mainly cereals followed by milk, edible oil and sugar items. Share of meat in providing essential nutrients is very low due to vegetarian diet. Vegetables, pulses, nuts, fruits and dry fruits are a poor source for most of the nutrients. Further analysis evinces that intake of most of the nutrients is higher than the recommended norm. Riboflavin is the only vitamin whose intake is less than the standard norm. Poor group, labour, small farmers, Muslims, scheduled caste demonstrate comparatively lower intake of all nutrients than their counterpart groups, though, they get enough macro and micro-nutrients significantly higher than the norm. One of the major reasons for higher intake of most of the nutrients across all socio-economic groups is higher consumption of monotonous diet based on cereals and milk. Most of the nutrients get their major share from cereals particularly wheat and milk intake. It can be concluded from the analysis that although there is adequate intake of most of the nutrients in the diet of rural population yet their source is mainly cereals and milk products depicting a monotonous diet. Hence, more efforts are needed to diversify the diet by giving more focus to the production of other food items particularly fruits, vegetables and pulse products. Awareness among the population, more accessibility and incorporating food items other than cereals in government social safety programmes are other measures to improve food security in India.

Keywords: hidden hunger, India, nutrients, recommended norm

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Authors: Abu Zafor Sadek

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Pharmaceuticals were one of the least impacted business sectors during the corona pandemic as they are the center point of Covid-19 fight. Emergency use authorization, unproven indication of some commonly used drugs, self-medication, research and production capacity of an individual country, capacity of producing vaccine by many countries, Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) related uncertainty, information gap among manufacturer, practitioners and user, export restriction, duration of lock-down, lack of harmony in transportation, disruption in the regulatory approval process, sudden increased demand of hospital items and protective equipment, panic buying, difficulties in in-person product promotion, e-prescription, geo-politics and associated issues added a new dimension to this industry. Although the industry maintains a reasonable growth throughout Covid-19 days; however, it has been characterized by both long- and short-term effects. Short-term effects have already been visible to so many countries, especially those who are import-dependent and have limited research capacity. On the other hand, it will take a few more time to see the long-term effects. Nevertheless, supply chain disruption, changes in strategic planning, new communication model, squeezing of job opportunity, rapid digitalization are the major short-term effects, whereas long-term effects include a shift towards self-sufficiency, growth pattern changes of certain products, special attention towards clinical studies, automation in operations, the increased arena of ethical issues etc. Therefore, this qualitative and exploratory study identifies the post-covid-19 landscape of the global pharmaceutical industry.

Keywords: covid-19, pharmaceutical, businees, landscape

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Authors: Bhaskar Basu

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Universities and higher education institutes are finding it increasingly difficult to engage students fruitfully through traditional pedagogic tools. Web 2.0 technologies comprising social networking sites (SNSs) offer a platform for students to collaborate and share information, thereby enhancing their learning experience. Despite the potential and reach of SNSs, its use has been limited in academic settings promoting higher education. The purpose of this paper is to assess the perception of social networking sites among business school students in India and analyze its role in enhancing quality of student experiences in a business school leading to the proposal of an agenda for future research. In this study, more than 300 students of a reputed business school were involved in a survey of their preferences of different social networking sites and their perceptions and attitudes towards these sites. A questionnaire with three major sections was designed, validated and distributed among  a sample of students, the research method being descriptive in nature. Crucial questions were addressed to the students concerning time commitment, reasons for usage, nature of interaction on these sites, and the propensity to share information leading to direct and indirect modes of learning. It was further supplemented with focus group discussion to analyze the findings. The paper notes the resistance in the adoption of new technology by a section of business school faculty, who are staunch supporters of the classical “face-to-face” instruction. In conclusion, social networking sites like Facebook and LinkedIn provide new avenues for students to express themselves and to interact with one another. Universities could take advantage of the new ways  in which students are communicating with one another. Although interactive educational options such as Moodle exist, social networking sites are rarely used for academic purposes. Using this medium opens new ways of academically-oriented interactions where faculty could discover more about students' interests, and students, in turn, might express and develop more intellectual facets of their lives. hitherto unknown intellectual facets.  This study also throws up the enormous potential of mobile phones as a tool for “blended learning” in business schools going forward.

Keywords: business school, India, learning, social media, social networking, university

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Authors: Mitchell T. Grothaus, Cory Grigsby, Timothy S. Hare

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This study aims to determine if there is a relationship between elevated cancer risks in eastern Kentucky and the environmental effects of black shale. Previous research shows that black shale formations, such as those in eastern Kentucky contain high levels of toxic elements including arsenic and radon compared to average rocks and sediment. Similarly, the population of eastern Kentucky has higher rates of many health conditions, including lung cancer and cardiovascular disease, than surrounding regions. These poor health outcomes are typically explained in relation to social, economic, behavioral, and healthcare factors. The rates of many conditions, however, have not decreased as these factors improve with regional development. Black shale is known to affect environmental conditions such as by increasing radiation levels and heavy metal toxicity. We are mapping the effects of black shale through monitoring radiation, microbes, and chemical standards of water sources. In this presentation, we report on our measuring pH, dissolved oxygen, total dissolved solids, conductivity, temperature, and discharge and comparison with water quality standards from the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection. The conditions of water sources combined with an environmental survey of the surrounding areas provide a greater understanding of why the people in eastern Kentucky face the current health issues.

Keywords: black shale, eastern Kentucky, environmental impact, water quality

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Authors: Erdinc Ozturk, Gizem Akcan

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The aim of this study was to determine some psychosocial variables that predict childhood trauma and dissociation in university students. These psychosocial variables were perceived social support, relationship status, gender and life satisfaction. 250 (125 males, 125 females) university students (bachelor, master and postgraduate degree) were enrolled in this study. They were chosen from universities in Istanbul at the education year of 2016-2017. Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES), Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ), Multidimensional Perceived Social Support Scale, Life Satisfaction Scale and Relationship Scales Questionnaire were used to assess related variables. Demographic information form was given to students in order to have their demographic information. Frequency distribution, multiple linear regression, and t-test analysis were used for statistical analysis. As together, perceived social support, relationship status and life satisfaction were found to have predictive value on trauma among university students. However, as together, these psychosocial variables did not have predictive value on dissociation. Only, trauma and relationship status had significant predictive value on dissociation. Moreover, there was significant difference between males and females in terms of trauma; however, dissociation scores of participants were not significantly different in terms of gender.

Keywords: childhood trauma, dissociation, perceived social support, relationship status, life satisfaction

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Authors: Wolfram Karg

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The Occupy-Movement came into in 2011 existence in the US as a reaction to one of the worst economic crisis since World War II. With cuts in benefits and social services, with people being evicted from their homes on the one hand and high bonuses granted to their managers of the very same companies, a strong feeling of injustice besieged people in the US and caused them to voice their anger peacefully in social media and on the streets. Due to the world-wide-web, users all around the world read about this movement and recognized the same injustice in their own countries, making Occupy a global movement. The vast array of topics covered by Occupy offers a unique chance to carry out a corpus-based discourse analysis based on the DIMEAN-Model. The focus on this paper is limited to two aspects of DIMEAN: intertextual references and the use of connectors in texts. Because the discourse is to a large extent carried out via posts in blogs, online-articles and comments, the paper also analyses, in how far modern (i.e. computer-based media) there is a correlation between the use of connectors in different communicative types used by the Occupy-Movement.

Keywords: discourse, new media, occupy, corpus analysis

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Authors: Tas Yong Koh, Steve Rowlinson, Yuzhong Shen

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In construction safety management, safety climate has long been linked to workers' safety behaviors and performance. For this reason, safety climate concept and tools have been used as heuristics to diagnose a range of safety-related issues by some progressive contractors in Hong Kong and elsewhere. However, as a diagnostic tool, safety climate tends to treat the different components of the climate construct in a linear fashion. Safety management in construction projects, in reality, is a multi-faceted and multilevel phenomenon that resembles a complex system. Hence, understanding safety management in construction projects requires not only the understanding of safety climate but also the organizational-systemic nature of the phenomenon. Our involvement, diagnoses, and interpretations of a range of safety climate-related issues which culminated in the project’s sub-optimum safety performance in an infrastructure construction project have brought about such revelation. In this study, a range of data types had been collected from various hierarchies of the project site organization. These include the frontline workers and supervisors from the main and sub-contractors, and the client supervisory personnel. Data collection was performed through the administration of safety climate questionnaire, interviews, observation, and document study. The findings collectively indicate that what had emerged in parallel of the seemingly linear climate-based exploration is the exposition of the organization-systemic nature of the phenomenon. The results indicate the negative impacts of climate perceptions mismatch, insufficient work planning, and risk management, mixed safety leadership, workforce negative attributes, lapsed safety enforcement and resources shortages collectively give rise to the project sub-optimum safety performance. From the dynamic causation and multilevel perspective, the analyses show that the individual, group, and organizational levels issues are interrelated and these interrelationships are linked to negative safety climate. Hence the adoption of both perspectives has enabled a fuller understanding of the phenomenon of safety management that point to the need for an organizational-systemic intervention strategy. The core message points to the fact that intervention at an individual level will only meet with limited success if the risks embedded in the higher levels in group and project organization are not addressed. The findings can be used to guide the effective development of safety infrastructure by linking different levels of systems in a construction project organization.

Keywords: construction safety management, dynamic causation, multilevel analysis, safety climate

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Authors: Yi-De Liu

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The aim of this paper is to discuss how the construct of networking and social capital can be used to understand the effect events can have on the cultural sector. Based on case study, this research sought the views of those working in the cultural sector on Liverpool’s year as the European Capital of Culture (ECOC). Methodologically, this study involves literature review to prompt theoretical sensitivity, the collection of primary data via online survey (n= 42) and follow-up telephone interviews (n= 8) to explore the emerging findings in more detail. The findings point to a number of ways in which the ECOC constitutes a boost for networking and its effects on city’s cultural sector, including organisational learning, aspiration and leadership. The contributions of this study are two-fold: (1) Evaluating the long-term effects on network formation in the cultural sector following major event; (2) conceptualising the impact assessment of organisational social capital for future ECOC or similar events.

Keywords: network, social capital, cultural impact, european capital of culture

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Authors: Antonio Horta, Renato Marinho, Raimir Holanda

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Considered as an evolution of the Blockchain, the Ethereum platform, besides allowing transactions of its cryptocurrency named Ether, it allows the programming of decentralised applications (DApps) and smart contracts. However, this functionality into blockchains has raised other types of threats, and the exploitation of smart contracts vulnerabilities has taken companies to experience big losses. This research intends to figure out the number of contracts that are under risk of being drained. Through a deep investigation, more than two hundred thousand smart contracts currently available in the Ethereum platform were scanned and estimated how much money is at risk. The experiment was based in a query run on Google Big Query in July 2022 and returned 50,707,133 contracts published on the Ethereum platform. After applying the filtering criteria, the experimentgot 430,584 smart contracts to download and analyse. The filtering criteria consisted of filtering out: ERC20 and ERC721 contracts, contracts without transactions, and contracts without balance. From this amount of 430,584 smart contracts selected, only 268,103 had source codes published on Etherscan, however, we discovered, using a hashing process, that there were contracts duplication. Removing the duplicated contracts, the process ended up with 20,417 source codes, which were analysed using the open source SAST tool smartbugswith oyente and securify algorithms. In the end, there was nearly $100,000 at risk of being drained from the potentially vulnerable smart contracts. It is important to note that the tools used in this study may generate false positives, which may interfere with the number of vulnerable contracts. To address this point, our next step in this research is to develop an application to test the contract in a parallel environment to verify the vulnerability. Finally, this study aims to alert users and companies about the risk on not properly creating and analysing their smart contracts before publishing them into the platform. As any other application, smart contracts are at risk of having vulnerabilities which, in this case, may result in direct financial losses.

Keywords: blockchain, reentrancy, static application security testing, smart contracts

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Authors: Pedram Saadati, Zahra Nazari

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Anticipating and identifying future opportunities and challenges facing industry activists for the emergence and entry of new knowledge and technologies of personal financial planning, and providing practical solutions is one of the goals of this research. For this purpose, a future research tool based on receiving opinions from the main players of the insurance industry has been used. The research method in this study was in 4 stages; including 1- a survey of the specialist salesforce of life insurance in order to identify the variables 2- the ranking of the variables by experts selected by a researcher-made questionnaire 3- holding a panel of experts with the aim of understanding the mutual effects of the variables and 4- statistical analyzes of the mutual effects matrix in Mick Mac software is done. The integrated analysis of influencing variables in the future has been done with the method of Structural Analysis, which is one of the efficient and innovative methods of future research. A list of opportunities and challenges was identified through a survey of best-selling life insurance representatives who were selected by snowball sampling. In order to prioritize and identify the most important issues, all the issues raised were sent to selected experts who were selected theoretically through a researcher-made questionnaire. The respondents determined the importance of 36 variables through scoring, so that the prioritization of opportunity and challenge variables can be determined. 8 of the variables identified in the first stage were removed by selected experts, and finally, the number of variables that could be examined in the third stage became 28 variables, which, in order to facilitate the examination, were divided into 6 categories, respectively, 11 variables of organization and management. Marketing and sales 7 cases, social and cultural 6 cases, technological 2 cases, rebranding 1 case and insurance 1 case were divided. The reliability of the researcher-made questionnaire was confirmed with the Cronbach's alpha test value of 0.96. In the third stage, by forming a panel consisting of 5 insurance industry experts, the consensus of their opinions about the influence of factors on each other and the ranking of variables was entered into the matrix. The matrix included the interrelationships of 28 variables, which were investigated using the structural analysis method. By analyzing the data obtained from the matrix by Mic Mac software, the findings of the research indicate that the categories of "correct training in the use of the software, the weakness of the technology of insurance companies in personalizing products, using the approach of equipping the customer, and honesty in declaring no need Customer to Insurance", the most important challenges of the influencer and the categories of "salesforce equipping approach, product personalization based on customer needs assessment, customer's pleasant experience of being consulted with consulting robots, business improvement of the insurance company due to the use of these tools, increasing the efficiency of the issuance process and optimal customer purchase" were identified as the most important opportunities for influence.

Keywords: personal financial planning, wealth management, advisor robots, life insurance, digital transformation

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Authors: Rosyidah Muhamad

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New media is facilitating collective action in ways never thought possible. Although the broader political climate may have a powerful influence on the success or failure of emerging social movement organizations, the Internet is enabling groups previously incapable of political action to find their voices Whether this shift is offering greater relative benefit to previously underrepresented or incumbent political fixtures is subject to debate, but it is clear that like-minded people are now able to better locate and converse with each other via many Internet. The recent social movement in Malaysia – the BERSIH Movement had attracted demonstrators from countries all over the world. The movement with an unforeseen mixture of nationalities became world news. Interestingly, the new media seemed to play a crucial role in the organization of the protests around the world. This article maps this movement via an analysis of their websites. It examines the contribution of these websites based on the collective identity, actual mobilization and a network of organizations. This research indicates signs of an integration of different organizations that contributed to an important role of the new media.

Keywords: Bersih Movement, Malaysian politics, new media, social movement

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Authors: Aminul Haque, Quazi Zahangir Hossain, Dilshad Sharmin Chowdhury

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The human migration is getting growing concern around the world, and recurrent disasters and climate change impact have great influence on migration. Bangladesh is one of the disaster prone countries that/and has greater susceptibility to stress migration by recurrent disasters and climate change. The study was conducted to investigate the factors that have a strong influence on current migration and changing pattern of life and livelihood means of the southwest coastal part of Bangladesh. Moreover, the study also revealed a strong relationship between disasters and migration and appropriate policy concern. To explore this relation, both qualitative and quantitative methods were applied to a questionnaire survey at household level and simple random sampling technique used in the sampling process along with different secondary data sources for understanding policy concern and practices. The study explores the most influential driver of migration and its relationship with social, economic and environmental drivers. The study denotes that, the environmental driver has a greater effect on the intention of permanent migration (t=1.481, p-value=0.000) at the 1 percent significance level. The significant number of respondents denotes that abrupt pattern of cyclone, flood, salinity intrusion and rainfall are the most significant environmental driver to make a decision on permanent migration. The study also found that the temporary migration pattern has 2-fold increased compared to last ten (10) years. It also appears from the study that environmental factors have a great implication on the changing pattern of the occupation of the study area and it has reported that about 76% of the respondent now in the changing modality of livelihood compare to their traditional practices. The study bares that the migration has foremost impact on children and women by increasing hardship and creating critical social security. The exposure-route of permanent migration is not smooth indeed, these migrations creating urban and conflict in Chittagong hill tracks of Bangladesh. The study denotes that there is not any safeguard of the stress migrant on existing policy and not have any measures for safe migration and resettlement rather considering the emergency response and shelter. The majority of (98%) people believes that migration is not to be the adoption strategies, but contrary to this young group of respondent believes that safe migration could be the adaptation strategy which could bring a positive result compare to the other resilience strategies. On the other hand, the significant number of respondents uttered that appropriate policy measure could be an adaptation strategy for being the formation of a resilient community and reduce the migration by meaningful livelihood options with appropriate protection measure.

Keywords: environmental driver, livelihood, migration, resilience

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Authors: Dimitris Kokkinos, Panagiotis Prinos

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In the last three decades, climate change has been studied extensively from scientific community, and its consequences are more than clear all around the world. Most countries have carried out a great effort to reduce global warming rates with the ratification and implementation of several international treaties. Moreover, many of them have already adopted national plans in order to adapt to climate change effects and mitigate human and economic losses. Coastal environments, with their inherent physical sensitivity, will face important challenges as a result of projected changes in climate conditions and hundreds of millions of people will be affected. Coastal zones are of high social and economic value and this research focuses on the Mediterranean basin, which is a densely populated and highly urbanized area. With 40% of its land used for human activity and the inevitability of the impacts of the climate change, it is obvious that some form of adaptation measures will be necessary. In this regard, the EU tools, policies and legislation concerning adaptation to climate change are presented. Additionally, the National Adaptation Strategies of State members of the Mediterranean basin are compared and analyzed concerning the coastal areas, along with an overview of projects and programs results focused on coastal issues at different spatial scales. The purpose of this research is to stress the differences between Mediterranean State members at methodologies implemented, to highlight the possible gaps in co-ordination and to emphasize on research initiatives that EU can build upon moving towards an integrated adaptation planning on a region-wide basis.

Keywords: coastal adaptation, Mediterranean Basin, climate change, coastal environments

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Authors: Larissa Pliska, Isabel Neitzel, Michael Buschermöhle, Olga Kunina-Habenicht, Ute Ritterfeld

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Visual preferences, which can be assessed using eye tracking technologies, are considered one of the defining hallmarks of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Specifically, children with ASD show a decreased preference for social images rather than geometric images compared to typically developed (TD) children. Such differences are already prevalent at a very early age and indicate the severity of the disorder: toddlers with ASD who preferred geometric images when confronted with social and geometric images showed higher ASD symptom severity than toddlers with ASD who showed higher social attention. Furthermore, the complexity of social pictures (one child playing vs. two children playing together) as well as the mode of stimulus presentation (video or image), are not decisive for the marker. The average age of diagnosis for ASD in Germany is 6.5 years, and visual preference data on this age group is missing. In the present study, we therefore investigated whether visual preferences persist into school age. We examined the visual preferences of 16 boys aged 6 to 11 with ASD and unimpaired cognition as well as TD children (1:1 matching based on children's age and the parent's level of education) within an experimental setting. Different stimulus presentation formats (images vs. videos) and different levels of stimulus complexity were included. Children with and without ASD received pairs of social and non-social images and video stimuli on a screen while eye movements (i.e., eye position and gaze direction) were recorded. For this specific use case, KIZMO GmbH developed a customized, native iOS app (KIZMO Face-Analyzer) for use on iPads. Neither the format of stimulus presentation nor the complexity of the social images had a significant effect on the visual preference of children with and without ASD in this study. Despite the tendency for a difference between the groups for the video stimuli, there were no significant differences. Overall, no statistical differences in visual preference occurred between boys with and without ASD, suggesting that gaze preference in these groups is similar at primary school age. One limitation is that the children with ASD were already receiving Autism-specific intervention. The potential of a visual preference task as an indicator of ASD can be emphasized. The article discusses the clinical relevance of this marker in elementary school children.

Keywords: autism spectrum disorder, eye tracking, hallmark, visual preference

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Authors: Edeaghe Ehikhamenor, Jennifer Nnamdi

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Introduction: Gender-based violence (GBV) was a well-known global crisis before the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic burden only intensified the crisis. With prevailing lockdowns, increased poverty due to high unemployment, especially affecting females, and other mobility restrictions that have left many women trapped with their abusers, plus isolation from social contact and support networks, GBV cases spiraled out of control. Prevalence of economic with cultural disparity, which is greatly manifested in Nigeria, is a major contributory factor to GBV. This is made worst by religious adherents where the females are virtually relegated to the background. Our societal approaches to investigations and sanctions to culprits have not sufficiently applied forensic/DNA tools in combating these major vices. Violence against women or some rare cases against men can prevent them from carrying out their duties regardless of the position they hold. Objective: The main objective of this research is to highlight the origin of GBV, the victims, types, contributing factors, and the applications of forensics/DNA tools and remedies so as to minimize GBV in our society. Methods: Descriptive information was obtained through the search on our daily newspapers, electronic media, google scholar websites, other authors' observations and personal experiences, plus anecdotal reports. Results: Findings from our exploratory searches revealed a high incidence of GBV with very limited or no applications of Forensics/DNA tools as an intervening mechanism to reduce GBV in Nigeria. Conclusion: Nigeria needs to develop clear-cut policies on forensics/DNA tools in terms of institutional framework to develop a curriculum for the training of all stakeholders to fast-track justice for victims of GBV so as to serve as a deterrent to other culprits.

Keywords: gender-based violence, forensics, DNA, justice

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Authors: Raj C. Aparna

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In India, the mandatory clause on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in Companies Act, 2013 has led to varying responses from the companies. From excessive spending to resistance, the private and the public stakeholders have been considering the law from different perspectives. This paper tends to study the characteristics of CSR spending in India with emphasis on the locations to which the funds are routed. This study examines the effects of CSR fund flow on regional development by considering the growth in Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP), agriculture, education and healthcare using panel data for the 29 States in the country. The results confirm that the CSR funds have been instrumental in improving the quality of teaching and healthcare in the areas around the industrial hubs. However, the study shows that the corporates mostly invest in regions which are easily accessible to them, by their physical presence, irrespective of whether the area is developed or not. Such a skewness is visible in the extensive spending in and around the metropolitan cities, the established centers, in the country to which large chunks of CSR funds are channeled. The results show that there is a variation from what the government had proposed while initiating the CSR law to promote social inclusion and equality in the rural and isolated areas in the country. The implication is that even though societal improvement is the aim of CSR, ease of access to the needy is an essential factor in corporate choices. As poverty and lack of facilities are found in the innermost parts, it is vital to have government policies for their aid as corporate help.

Keywords: corporate social responsibility, geographic spread, panel data analysis, strategic implementation

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Authors: Samara E., Kilintzis P., Katsoras E., Martinidis G.

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Regions play an important role in the global economy by driving research and innovation policies through a major tool, the Regional Innovation System (RIS). RIS is a social system that encompasses the systematic interaction of the various organizations that comprise it in order to improve local knowledge and innovation. This article describes the methodological framework for developing and validating a RIS model utilizing system dynamics. This model focuses on the functional structure of the RIS, separating it in six diverse, interacting sub-systems.

Keywords: innovations, regional development, systems thinking, social system

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Authors: E. Grochowska-Niedworok, K. Brukalo, B. Całyniuk, J. Piekorz, M. Kardas

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The aim of the study was to assess diets of residents of nursing homes. Provided by social welfare home, 10 day menus were introduced into the computer program Diet 5 and analyzed in respect of protein, fats, carbohydrates, energy, vitamin D and calcium. The resulting mean values of 10-day menus were compared with the existing Nutrition Standards for Polish population. The analysis menus showed that the average amount of energy supplied from food is not sufficient. Carbohydrates in food supply are too high and represent 257% of normal. The average value of fats and proteins supplied with food is adequate 85.2 g/day and 75.2 g/day. The calcium content of the diet is 513.9 mg/day. The amount of vitamin D supplied in the age group 51-65 years is 2.3 µg/day. Dietary errors that have been shown are due to the lack of detailed nutritional guidelines for nursing homes, as well as state-owned care facilities in general.

Keywords: assessment of diet, essential nutrients, social welfare home, nutrition

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Authors: Babak Nematshahrbabaki, Fallahi Arezoo

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Objective: The aim of this study was to describe teenagers’ decisions to undergo orthodontic treatment through a qualitative study. Materials and methods: Twenty-three patients (12 girls), aged 12–18 years, at a dental clinic in Sanandaj the western part of Iran participated. Face-to-face and semi-structured interviews and two focus group discussions were held to gather data. Data analyzed by the grounded theory method. Results: ‘Decision-making’ was the core category. During the data analysis four main themes were developed: ‘being like everyone else’, ‘being diagnosed’, ‘maintaining the mouth’ and ‘cultural-social and environmental factors’. Conclusions: cultural- social and environmental factors have crucial role in decision-making to undergo orthodontic treatment. The teenagers were not fully conscious of these external influences. They thought their decision to undergo orthodontic treatment is independent while it is related to cultural- social and environmental factors.

Keywords: decision-making, qualitative study, teenager, orthodontic treatment

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Authors: M. D. D. Chathurangi, M. G. K. Nayanathara, K. M. H. M. M. Gunapala, G. M. R. G. Dayananda, Kavinga Yapa Abeywardena, Deemantha Siriwardana

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Due to the growing popularity of social media platforms at present, there are various concerns, mostly cyberbullying, spam, bot accounts, and the spread of incorrect information. To develop a risk score calculation system as a thorough method for deciphering and exposing unethical social media profiles, this research explores the most suitable algorithms to our best knowledge in detecting the mentioned concerns. Various multiple models, such as Naïve Bayes, CNN, KNN, Stochastic Gradient Descent, Gradient Boosting Classifier, etc., were examined, and the best results were taken into the development of the risk score system. For cyberbullying, the Logistic Regression algorithm achieved an accuracy of 84.9%, while the spam-detecting MLP model gained 98.02% accuracy. The bot accounts identifying the Random Forest algorithm obtained 91.06% accuracy, and 84% accuracy was acquired for fake news detection using SVM.

Keywords: cyberbullying, spam behavior, bot accounts, fake news, machine learning

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Authors: A. Degale Desta, Tamirat Kebamo

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Background: Recent advances in computer vision and pattern recognition have significantly improved activity recognition through video analysis, particularly with the application of Deep Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs). One-stage detectors now enable efficient video-based recognition by simultaneously predicting object categories and locations. Such advancements are highly relevant in educational settings where CCTV surveillance could automatically monitor academic activities, enhancing security and classroom management. However, current datasets and recognition systems lack the specific focus on campus environments necessary for practical application in these settings.Objective: This study aims to address this gap by developing a dataset and testing an automated activity recognition system specifically tailored for educational campuses. The EthioCAD dataset was created to capture various classroom activities and teacher-student interactions, facilitating reliable recognition of academic activities using deep learning models. Method: EthioCAD, a novel video-based dataset, was created with a design science research approach to encompass teacher-student interactions across three domains and 18 distinct classroom activities. Using the Roboflow AI framework, the data was processed, with 4.224 KB of frames and 33.485 MB of images managed for frame extraction, labeling, and organization. The Ultralytics YOLOv8 model was then implemented within Google Colab to evaluate the dataset’s effectiveness, achieving high mean Average Precision (mAP) scores. Results: The YOLOv8 model demonstrated robust activity recognition within campus-like settings, achieving an mAP50 of 90.2% and an mAP50-95 of 78.6%. These results highlight the potential of EthioCAD, combined with YOLOv8, to provide reliable detection and classification of classroom activities, supporting automated surveillance needs on educational campuses. Discussion: The high performance of YOLOv8 on the EthioCAD dataset suggests that automated activity recognition for surveillance is feasible within educational environments. This system addresses current limitations in campus-specific data and tools, offering a tailored solution for academic monitoring that could enhance the effectiveness of CCTV systems in these settings. Conclusion: The EthioCAD dataset, alongside the YOLOv8 model, provides a promising framework for automated campus activity recognition. This approach lays the groundwork for future advancements in CCTV-based educational surveillance systems, enabling more refined and reliable monitoring of classroom activities.

Keywords: deep CNN, EthioCAD, deep learning, YOLOv8, activity recognition

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Authors: Onur Ozveri, Korkut Karabag, Cagri Keles

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It is an important issue that the occurring of production downtime and repair costs when machines fail in the machine intensive production industries. In the case of failure of more than one machine at the same time, which machines will have the priority to repair, how to determine the optimal repair time should be allotted for this machines and how to plan the resources needed to repair are the key issues. In recent years, Business Process Management (BPM) technique, bring effective solutions to different problems in business. The main feature of this technique is that it can improve the way the job done by examining in detail the works of interest. In the industries, maintenance and repair works are operating as a process and when a breakdown occurs, it is known that the repair work is carried out in a series of process. Maintenance main-process and repair sub-process are evaluated with process management technique, so it is thought that structure could bring a solution. For this reason, in an international manufacturing company, this issue discussed and has tried to develop a proposal for a solution. The purpose of this study is the implementation of maintenance and repair works which is integrated with process management technique and at the end of implementation, analyzing the maintenance related parameters like quality, cost, time, safety and spare part. The international firm that carried out the application operates in a free region in Turkey and its core business area is producing original equipment technologies, vehicle electrical construction, electronics, safety and thermal systems for the world's leading light and heavy vehicle manufacturers. In the firm primarily, a project team has been established. The team dealt with the current maintenance process again, and it has been revised again by the process management techniques. Repair process which is sub-process of maintenance process has been discussed again. In the improved processes, the ABC equipment classification technique was used to decide which machine or machines will be given priority in case of failure. This technique is a prioritization method of malfunctioned machine based on the effect of the production, product quality, maintenance costs and job security. Improved maintenance and repair processes have been implemented in the company for three months, and the obtained data were compared with the previous year data. In conclusion, breakdown maintenance was found to occur in a shorter time, with lower cost and lower spare parts inventory.

Keywords: ABC equipment classification, business process management (BPM), maintenance, repair performance

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Authors: Jasna Milošević Đorđević, Jelisaveta Blagojević, Jovana Timotijević, Alison Mckinley

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Young people in Serbia, have grown up in turbulent times during the Balkan wars, in a cultural and economic isolation without adequate education on (ethnic, gender, social,..) equality. They often have very strong patriarchal gender stereotypes. The perception of gender in Serbia is still heavily influenced by traditional worldview and young people have little opportunity in traditional educational system to challenge it, receiving no formal sex education. Educational policies have addressed achieving gender equality as one of the goals, supporting all young people to gain better educational opportunities, but there are obvious shortcomings of the official education system in implementation of those goals. Therefore new approaches should be implemented. We evaluate the impact of non traditional approach, such as participatory theatre performance with strong transformative potential, especially in relation to gender issues. Theatre based intervention (TBI) was created to provoke the young people to become aware of their gender constructs. Engaging young people in modern form of education such as transformative gender intervention through participatory theatre could have positive impact on their sex knowledge and understanding gender roles. The transformative process in TBI happens on two levels – the affective and the cognitive. The founding agency of the project and evaluation is IPPF. The most important aim of this survey is evaluation of the transformative TBI, as a new educational approach related to better understanding gender as social construct. To reach this goal, we have measured attitude change in three indicators: a) gender identity/ perception of feminine identity, perception of masculine identity, importance of gender for personal identity, b) gender roles on the labor market, c) Gender equality in partnership & sexual behavior. Our main hypothesis is that participatory theatre-based intervention can have a transformational potential in challenging traditional gender knowledge and attitudes among youth in Serbia. To evaluate the impact of TB intervention, we implement: online baseline and end-line survey with nonparticipants of the TBI on the representative sample in targeted towns (control group). Additionally we conducted testing the experimental group twice: pretest at the beginning of each TBI and post testing of participants after the play. A sample of 500 respondents aged 18-30 years, from 9 towns in Serbia responded to online questionnaire in September 2017, in a baseline research. Pre and post measurement of all tested variables among participants in nine towns would be performed. End-line survey with 500 respondents would be conducted at the end of the project (early year 2018). After the first TBI (60 participants) no impact was detected on measured indicators: perception of desirable characteristics of man F(1,59)= 1.291, p=.260; perception of desirable characteristics of women F(1,55)=1.386, p= .244; gender identity importance F(1,63)= .050, p=.824; sex related behavior F(1,61)=1,145, p=.289; gender equality on labor market F(1,63)=.076, p=.783; gender equality in partnership F(1,61)=.201, p=.656; However, we hope that following intervention would bring more data showing that participatory theatre intervention explaining gender as a social construct could have additional positive impact in traditional educational system.

Keywords: educational impact, gender identity, gender role, participatory theatre based intervention

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Authors: K. C. Wong, K. L. Siu, S. N. Ng, K. N. Yip, Y. Y. Yuen, K. W. Lee, K. W. Wong, C. C. Li, H. P. Lam

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Background: Occupational injuries among nursing profession were found related to repeated bedside nursing care, such as transfer, lifting and manual handling patients from previous studies. Likewise, undergraduate nursing students are also exposed to potential safety hazard due to their similar work nature of registered nurses. Especially, those students who worked as Temporary undergraduate nursing students (TUNS) which is a part-time clinical job in hospitals in Hong Kong who mainly assisted in providing bedside cares appeared to at high risk of work-related injuries. Several studies suggested the level of compliance with safe work behaviors was highly associated with work-related injuries. Yet, it had been limitedly studied among nursing students. This study was conducted to assess and compare the compliance with safe work behaviors and the levels of awareness of different workplace safety issues between undergraduate nursing students with or without TUNS experiences. Methods: This is a quantitative descriptive study using convenience sampling. 362 undergraduate nursing students in Hong Kong were recruited. The Safe Work Behavior relating to Patient Handling (SWB-PH) was used to assess their compliance of safe-work behaviors and the level of awareness of different workplace safety issues. Results: The results showed that most of the participants (n=250, 69.1%) who were working as TUNS. However, students who worked as TUNS had significantly lower safe-work behaviors compliance (mean SWB-PH score = 3.64±0.54) than those did not worked as TUNS (SWB-PH score=4.21±0.54) (p<0.001). Particularly, these students had higher awareness to seek help and use assistive devices but lower awareness of workplace safety issues and awareness of proper work posture than students without TUNS experiences. The students with TUNS experiences had higher engagement in help-seeking behaviors might be possibly explained by their richer clinical experiences which served as a facilitator to seek help from clinical staff whenever necessary. Besides, these experienced students were more likely to bear risks for occupational injuries and worked alone when no available aid which might be related to the busy working environment, heightened work pressures and high expectations of TUNS. Eventually, students who worked as TUNS might target on completing the assigned tasks and gradually neglecting the occupational safety. Conclusion: The findings contributed to an understanding of the level of compliance with safe work behaviors among nursing students with different clinical experiences. The results might guide the modification of current safety protocols and the introduction of multiple clinical training courses to improve nursing student’s engagement in safe work behaviors.

Keywords: Occupational safety, Safety compliance, Safe-work behavior, Nursing students

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Authors: S. K. Ashiquer Rahman

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the paper concentrations on the importance of hourly compensation, emphasizing the significance of the unemployment rate. There are the two most important factors of a nation these are its unemployment rate and hourly compensation. These are not merely statistics but they have profound effects on individual, families, and the economy. They are inversely related to one another. When we consider the unemployment rate that will probably decline as hourly compensations in manufacturing rise. But when we reduced the unemployment rates and increased job prospects could result from higher compensation. That’s why, the increased hourly compensation in the manufacturing sector that could have a favorable effect on job changing issues. Moreover, the relationship between hourly compensation and unemployment is complex and influenced by broader economic factors. In this paper, we use panel data regression models to evaluate the expected link between hourly compensation and unemployment rate in order to determine the effect of hourly compensation on unemployment rate. We estimate the fixed effects model, evaluate the error components, and determine which model (the FEM or ECM) is better by pooling all 60 observations. We then analysis and review the data by comparing 3 several countries (United States, Canada and the United Kingdom) using panel data regression models. Finally, we provide result, analysis and a summary of the extensive research on how the hourly compensation effects on the unemployment rate. Additionally, this paper offers relevant and useful informational to help the government and academic community use an econometrics and social approach to lessen on the effect of the hourly compensation on Unemployment rate to eliminate the problem.

Keywords: hourly compensation, Unemployment rate, panel data regression models, dummy variables, random effects model, fixed effects model, the linear regression model

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