Search results for: subject knowledge base

Authors: Aboubakr Mashali

Abstract:

Context: The paper focuses on the relationship between architecture and nature, emphasizing the importance of incorporating natural elements in design to reconnect individuals with the natural environment. It highlights the positive impact of a harmonious architecture on people's well-being and the environment, as well as the concept of sustainable architecture. Research aim: The aim of this research is to showcase how nature can be integrated into architectural designs, ultimately reestablishing a connection between humans and the natural world. Methodology: The research employs an in-depth approach, delving into the subject matter through extensive research and the analysis of case studies. These case studies provide practical examples and insights into successful architectural designs that have effectively incorporated nature. Findings: The findings suggest that when architecture and nature coexist harmoniously, it creates a positive atmosphere and enhances people's wellbeing. The use of materials obtained from nature in their raw or minimally refined form, such as wood, clay, stone, and bamboo, contributes to a natural atmosphere within the built environment. Additionally, a color palette inspired by nature, consisting of earthy tones, green, brown, and rusty shades, further enhances the harmonious relationship between individuals and their surroundings. The paper also discusses the concept of sustainable architecture, where materials used are renewable, and energy consumption is minimal. It acknowledges the efforts of organizations such as the US Green Building Council in promoting sustainable design practices. Theoretical importance: This research contributes to the understanding of the relationship between architecture and nature and highlights the importance of incorporating natural elements into design. It emphasizes the potential of naturefriendly architecture to create greener, resilient, and sustainable cities. Data collection and analysis procedures: The researcher gathered data through comprehensive research, examining existing literature, and studying relevant case studies. The analysis involved studying the successful implementation of nature in architectural design and its impact on individuals and the environment. Question addressed: The research addresses the question of how nature can be incorporated into architectural designs to reconnect humans with the nature. Conclusion: In conclusion, this research highlights the significance of architecture being in harmony with its surrounding, which in turn should be in harmony with nature. By incorporating nature in architectural designs, individuals can rediscover their connection with nature and experience its positive impact on their well-being. The use of natural materials and a color palette inspired by nature further enhances this relationship. Additionally, embracing sustainable design practices contributes to the creation of greener and more resilient cities. This research underscores the importance of integrating nature-friendly architecture to foster a healthier and more sustainable future.

Keywords: nature, architecture, reconnecting, greencities, sustainable, openspaces, landscape

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Authors: ZeinolAbedin Rahmani, Marzieh Evazi Borazjani, Nooshin Salehi

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Organizations are increasingly facing changes and developments scientific, technological, social, cultural changes among these organizations those ones are reckoned successful and effective that in addition to coordinating the development of modern society can forecast future changes and be able to accommodate these changes in order to create favorable developments to build a better future. But we can change that with the changes that occur in the organization of the program it will distinguish. Today's organizations need leaders that change and grow them have to survive. In fact, without transformational managers and leaders, it is certainly difficult to create changes in organizations. Both private and public organizations need to increase knowledge and awareness of the cause widespread changes in the structure, culture and practice for the viability and sustainability of life and growth and development. By now, different signs have determined different causes for a suitable function of employees. However, the important thing is that the commitment of the employees to their organization has always been very important. Since the decrease of organization commitment causes the high rate of absenteeism, turnover intentions, and even to reduce the impact of health staff. and these factors prevent organizations from achieving its goals. If organizations want to retain staff, the organization must find a way to be happy and continue their work with commitment, motivation, and willingness. So here is the need for strong leaders, analysts, creative and transformational upper ranks more than ever is felt. The aim of this study is to revise history, the leadership style of managers shipbuilding company by using the MLQ model.

Keywords: leadership style, managers, organizational, manufacturing company, sustainability of life

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Authors: Maher El-Masri, Jamie Crawley, Judy Bornais, Abeer Omar

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Background: Misuse of Emergency Department (ED) for non-urgent healthcare results in unnecessary crowdedness that can result in long ED waits and delays in treatment, diversion of ambulances to other hospitals, poor health outcomes for patients, and increased risk of death Objectives: The main purpose of this study was to explore the independent predictors of non-urgent ED visits in Erie St. Clair LHIN. Secondary purposes of the study include comparison of the rates of non-urgent ED visits between urban and rural hospitals Design: A secondary analysis of archived population-based data on 597,373 ED visits in southwestern Ontario Results The results suggest that older (OR = .992; 95% CI .992 – .993) and female patients (OR = .940; 95% CI .929 - .950) were less likely to visit ED for non-urgent causes. Non-urgent ED visits during the winter, spring, and fall were 13%, 5.8%, and 7.5%, respectively, lesser than they were during the summer time. The data further suggest that non-urgent visits were 19.6% and 21.3% less likely to occur in evening and overnight shifts compared to the day shift. Non-urgent visits were 2.76 times more likely to present to small community hospitals than large community hospitals. Health care providers were 1.92 times more likely to refer patients with non-urgent health problem to the ED than the decision taken by patients, family member or caretakers. Conclusion: In conclusion, our study highlights a number of important factors that are associated with inappropriate use of ED visits for non-urgent health problems. Knowledge of these factors could be used to address the issue of unnecessary ED crowdedness.

Keywords: emergency department, non-urgent visits, predictors, logistic regression

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Authors: Bishwa Nath Oli

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Nepal is highly impacted by climate change and adaptation has been a major focus. This paper investigates the gaps and coherence in national policies across water, forestry, local development and agriculture sectors, identifies their links to climate change adaptation and national development plans and analyzes the effectiveness of climate change policy on adaptation. The study was based on a content analysis of relevant policy documents on the level of attention given to adaptation and key informant interviews. Findings show that sectoral policies have differing degrees of cross thematic coherence, often with mismatched priorities and differing the paths towards achieving climate change goal. They are somewhat coherent in addressing immediate disaster management issues rather than in climate adaptation. In some cases, they are too broad and complicated and the implementation suffers from barriers and limits due to lack of capacity, investment, research and knowledge needed for evidence-based policy process. They do not adequately provide operational guidance in supporting communities in adapting to climate change. The study recommends to a) embrace longer-term cross-sectoral planning within government structures to foster greater policy coherence and integrated adaptation planning, b) increase awareness and flow of information on the potential role of communities in climate change, c) review the existing development sectors from the climate change perspectives, and d) formulate a comprehensive climate change legislation based on the need to implement the new Constitution.

Keywords: agriculture, climate change adaptation, forestry, policies

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Authors: Anna-Lisa Osvalder, Jonas Borell

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There are several reasons behind the use, non-use, or inadequate use of personal protective equipment (PPE) in the construction industry. Comfort and accurate size support proper use, while discomfort, misfit, and difficulties to understand how the PPEs should be handled inhibit correct usage. The need for several protective equipments simultaneously might also create problems. The purpose of this study was to analyse the correct usage, comfort, and fit of different types of PPEs used for construction work. Correct usage was analysed as guessability, i.e., human perceptions of how to don, adjust, use, and doff the equipment, and if used as intended. The PPEs tested individually or in combinations were a helmet, ear protectors, goggles, respiratory masks, gloves, protective cloths, and safety harnesses. First, an analytical evaluation was performed with ECW (enhanced cognitive walkthrough) and PUEA (predictive use error analysis) to search for usability problems and use errors during handling and use. Then usability tests were conducted to evaluate guessability, comfort, and fit with 10 test subjects of different heights and body constitutions. The tests included observations during donning, five different outdoor work tasks, and doffing. The think-aloud method, short interviews, and subjective estimations were performed. The analytical evaluation showed that some usability problems and use errors arise during donning and doffing, but with minor severity, mostly causing discomfort. A few use errors and usability problems arose for the safety harness, especially for novices, where some could lead to a high risk of severe incidents. The usability tests showed that discomfort arose for all test subjects when using a combination of PPEs, increasing over time. For instance, goggles, together with the face mask, caused pressure, chafing at the nose, and heat rash on the face. This combination also limited sight of vision. The helmet, in combination with the goggles and ear protectors, did not fit well and caused uncomfortable pressure at the temples. No major problems were found with the individual fit of the PPEs. The ear protectors, goggles, and face masks could be adjusted for different head sizes. The guessability for how to don and wear the combination of PPE was moderate, but it took some time to adjust them for a good fit. The guessability was poor for the safety harness; few clues in the design showed how it should be donned, adjusted, or worn on the skeletal bones. Discomfort occurred when the straps were tightened too much. All straps could not be adjusted for somebody's constitutions leading to non-optimal safety. To conclude, if several types of PPEs are used together, discomfort leading to pain is likely to occur over time, which can lead to misuse, non-use, or reduced performance. If people who are not regular users should wear a safety harness correctly, the design needs to be improved for easier interpretation, correct position of the straps, and increased possibilities for individual adjustments. The results from this study can be a base for re-design ideas for PPE, especially when they should be used in combinations.

Keywords: construction work, PPE, personal protective equipment, misuse, guessability, usability

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Authors: Hakam Alkhateeb

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Oleuropein, the main constituent of leaves and fruits of the olive tree, has been demonstrated to exert beneficial effects on parameters relevant to the normal homeostatic mechanisms of glucose regulation in rat skeletal muscle. However, the antidiabetic effect of oleuropein, to our knowledge, has not been examined. Therefore, in this study, we examined whether oleuropein ameliorated palmitate-induced insulin resistance in skeletal muscle. To examine this question, insulin resistance was rapidly induced by incubating (12h) soleus muscle with a high concentration of palmitate(2mM). Subsequently, we attempted to restore insulin sensitivity by incubating (12h) muscles with oleuropien (1.5mM), while maintaining high concentrations of palmitate. Palmitate treatment for 12 h reduced insulin-stimulated glucose transport, GLUT4 translocationandAS160 phosphorylation. Oleuropein treatment (12 h) fully restoredinsulin-stimulated glucose transport, GLUT4translocationandAS160 phosphorylation. Inhibition of PI3K phosphorylation with wortmannin (1µM)did not affect the oleuropein-induced improvements in insulin-stimulated glucose transport, GLUT4 translocation, and AS160 phosphorylation. These results suggested that the improvements in these parameters cannot account for activating PI3K pathway. Taken altogether, it appears that oleuropein, through activation of another pathway like activated protein kinase (AMPK), may provide a possible strategy by which they ameliorate palmitate-induced insulin resistance in skeletal muscles.

Keywords: AS160, diabetes, GLUT4, oleuropein

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Authors: Sedigheh Salemi, Mahnaz Sanjari, Maryam Aalaa, Mohammad Mirzabeigi

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Clinical governance is the framework within which the health service provider is required to ongoing accountability and improvement of the quality of their services. This cross-sectional study was conducted in 661 nurses who work in government hospitals from 35 hospitals of 9 provinces in Iran. The study was approved by the Nursing Council and was carried out with the authorization of the Research Ethics Committee. The questionnaire included 24 questions in which 4 questions focused on clinical governance defining from the nurses' perspective. The reliability was evaluated by Cronbach's alpha (α=0/83). Statistical analyzes were performed, using SPSS version 16. Approximately 40% of nurses correctly answered that clinical governance is not "system of punishment and rewards for the staff". The most nurses believed that "clinical efficacy" is one of the main components of clinical governance. A few of nurses correctly responded that "Evidence Based Practice" and "management" is not part of clinical governance. The small number of nurses correctly answered that the "maintenance of patient records" and "to recognize the adverse effects" is not the role of nurse in clinical governance. Most "do not know" answer was to the "maintenance of patient records". The most nurses unanimously believed that the implementation of clinical governance led to "promoting the quality of care". About a third of nurses correctly stated that the implementation of clinical governance will not lead to "an increase in salaries and benefits of the medical team". As a member of the health team, nurses are responsible in terms of participation in quality improvement and it is necessary to create an environment in which clinical care will flourish and serve to preserve the high standards.

Keywords: clinical governance, nurses, salary, health team

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Authors: Vivek Hokam, Vishrut Landge

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An ideal maintenance program for an industrial road network is one that would maintain all sections at a sufficiently high level of functional and structural conditions. However, due to various constraints such as budget, manpower and equipment, it is not possible to carry out maintenance on all the needy industrial road sections within a given planning period. A rational and systematic priority scheme needs to be employed to select and schedule industrial road sections for maintenance. Priority analysis is a multi-criteria process that determines the best ranking list of sections for maintenance based on several factors. In priority setting, difficult decisions are required to be made for selection of sections for maintenance. It is more important to repair a section with poor functional conditions which includes uncomfortable ride etc. or poor structural conditions i.e. sections those are in danger of becoming structurally unsound. It would seem therefore that any rational priority setting approach must consider the relative importance of functional and structural condition of the section. The maintenance priority index and pavement performance models tend to focus mainly on the pavement condition, traffic criteria etc. There is a need to develop the model which is suitably used with respect to limited budget provisions for maintenance of pavement. Linear programming is one of the most popular and widely used quantitative techniques. A linear programming model provides an efficient method for determining an optimal decision chosen from a large number of possible decisions. The optimum decision is one that meets a specified objective of management, subject to various constraints and restrictions. The objective is mainly minimization of maintenance cost of roads in industrial area. In order to determine the objective function for analysis of distress model it is necessary to fix the realistic data into a formulation. Each type of repair is to be quantified in a number of stretches by considering 1000 m as one stretch. A stretch considered under study is having 3750 m length. The quantity has to be put into an objective function for maximizing the number of repairs in a stretch related to quantity. The distress observed in this stretch are potholes, surface cracks, rutting and ravelling. The distress data is measured manually by observing each distress level on a stretch of 1000 m. The maintenance and rehabilitation measured that are followed currently are based on subjective judgments. Hence, there is a need to adopt a scientific approach in order to effectively use the limited resources. It is also necessary to determine the pavement performance and deterioration prediction relationship with more accurate and economic benefits of road networks with respect to vehicle operating cost. The infrastructure of road network should have best results expected from available funds. In this paper objective function for distress model is determined by linear programming and deterioration model considering overloading is discussed.

Keywords: budget, maintenance, deterioration, priority

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Authors: Nalini Kaul, Barrie Drewitt, Elsie Kohoot

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Hyperpigmentation is the third most common pigmentary disorder where dermatologic treatment is sought. It affects all ages resulting in skin darkening because of melanin accumulation. An uneven skin tone because of either exposure to the sun (solar lentigos/age spots/sun spots or skin disruption following acne, or rashes (post-inflammatory hyperpigmentation -PIH) or hormonal changes (melasma) can lead to significant psychosocial impairment. Dyschromia is a result of various alterations in biochemical processes regulating melanogenesis. Treatments include the daily use of sunscreen with lightening, brightening, and exfoliating products. Depigmentation is achieved by various depigmenting agents: common examples are hydroquinone, arbutin, azelaic acid, aloesin, mulberry, licorice extracts, kojic acid, niacinamide, ellagic acid, arbutin, green tea, turmeric, soy, ascorbic acid, and tranexamic acid. These agents affect pigmentation by interfering with mechanisms before, during, and after melanin synthesis. While immediate correction is much sought after, patience and diligence are key. Our objective was to assess the effects of a facial product with pigmentation treatment and UV protection in 35 healthy F (35-65y), meeting the study criteria. Subjects with mild to moderate hyperpigmentation and fine lines with no use of skin-lightening products in the last six months or any dermatological procedures in the last twelve months before the study started were included. Efficacy parameters included expert clinical grading for hyperpigmentation, radiance, skin tone & smoothness, fine lines, and wrinkles bioinstrumentation (Corneometer®, Colorimeter®), digital photography and imaging (Visia-CR®), and self-assessment questionnaires. Safety included grading for erythema, edema, dryness & peeling and self-assessments for itching, stinging, tingling, and burning. Our results showed statistically significant improvement in clinical grading scores, bioinstrumentation, and digital photos for hyperpigmentation-brown spots, fine lines/wrinkles, skin tone, radiance, pores, skin smoothness, and overall appearance compared to baseline. The product was also well-tolerated and liked by subjects. Conclusion: Facial hyperpigmentation is of great concern, and treatment strategies are increasingly sought. Clinical trials with both subjective and objective assessments, imaging analyses, and self-perception are essential to distinguish evidence-based products. The multifunctional cosmetic product tested in this clinical study showed efficacy, tolerability, and subject satisfaction in reducing hyperpigmentation and global photoaging.

Keywords: hyperpigmentation; photoaging, clinical testing, expert visual evaluations, bio-instruments

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Authors: Olatokunbo Shoyemi, Mario Brito, Ian Dawson

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In recent times, the Nigerian motor insurers have experienced high volume of motor insurance claim pay-outs and insignificant contribution to the net premium income of the Nigerian insurance market, which has been a major concern for the shareholders/stakeholders. It has been argued that there are many factors that have brought about these concerns. However, anecdotal evidence (ongoing debates among industry practitioners) suggests prevalence of fraud due to poor practices in motor insurance business in Nigeria. This study is therefore aimed to carry out an assessment of fraud in motor insurance claims as perceived by experts in the Nigerian insurance market. This study adopted a descriptive research design, and the analysis was built on a survey among insurance experts in Nigeria using a designed questionnaire. A purposive and snowball sampling were used to select our sample (N = 120) - representing a selection of all professionally qualified insurance experts in Nigeria insurance industry. The study found that Nigerian insurance experts (i) largely agree that there is a problematic level of fraud in the Nigerian motor insurance industry; (ii) perceive soft fraud to be about 3 times more common than hard fraud in the Nigerian motor insurance industry, and (iii) strongly agree there are problematic impacts from fraud on the solvency of the Nigerian motor insurers. This paper has provided an empirical understanding of the existence, extent, and impact of fraud risks within the Nigerian insurance market based on expert knowledge and insights rather than, as has often been the case, a reliance on individual anecdotes.

Keywords: claims, net premium income, motor insurance, soft fraud, hard fraud

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Authors: Iwuchukwu J. C., Mbah C.

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There seems to be dearth on information on how oil bean is being exploited, processed and conserved locally. This gap stifles initiatives on the evaluation of the suitability of the methods used and the invention of new and better methods. The study; therefore, assesses activities of processors in domestication/conservation and processing of oil bean (Pentaclethra macrophylla) Enugu State, South East Nigeria. Three agricultural zones, three blocks, nine circles and seventy-two respondents that were purposively selected made up the sample for the study. Data were presented in percentage, chart and mean score. The result shows that processors of oil bean in the area were middle-aged, married with relatively large household size and long years of experience in processing. They sourced oil bean they processed from people’s farmland and sourced information on processing of oil bean from friends and relatives. Activities involved in processing of oil bean were boiling, dehulling, washing, sieving, slicing, wrapping. However, the sequence of these activities varies among these processors. Little or nothing was done by the processors towards the conservation of the crop while poor storage and processing facilities and lack of knowledge on modern preservation technique were major constraints to processing of oil bean in the area. The study concluded that efforts should be made by governments and processors through cooperative group in provision of processing and storage facility for oil bean while research institute should conserve and generate improved specie of the crop to arouse interest of the farmers and processors on the crop which will invariably increase productivity.

Keywords: conservation, domestication, oil bean, processing

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Authors: Kshama Sharma

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Education is one of the most powerful tools to transform the world into a just, sustainable, and more peaceful place for existing lives across the globe. However, its recent objective approach focused on materialistic, factual, and existing knowledge, has a constraint of human experiences that is limited to certain dimensions only. And leads to a materialistic world which is deprived of spiritual approaches and makes it less compassionate, and more grades oriented. To make it more comprehensive, education should explore the subjective approaches towards spiritualism to connect lives with the greater self and consciousness of cosmic intelligence. This approach will bring a major shift in the orientation of pedagogical processes, assessment strategies, and administrative management of the present education system. Spirituality often related to the religious aspect of human civilization and development, however, when universal consciousness /cosmic intelligence (which is often claimed as dark energy) and the human mind competencies works in coherence and coordination then the efficiency of human mind reaches to a different dimension and achieve extraordinary level of human understanding. Quantitative analysis of the existing secondary data from the different agencies working in the field of meditation had been analyzed to conclude its implications on human mind and further how it can effectively use in education to bring the desired and expected results. Any kind of meditation practice affects the cognitive, mental, physical, emotional, and conscious state of mind. If aligned with the teaching and learning methodology will lead to conscious learner and peaceful world.

Keywords: spirituality, cosmic intelligence, consciousness, mind competencies

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Authors: S. Abera, T. Gidey, W. Terefe

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Introduction: Testing for HIV is the key entry point to HIV prevention, treatment, and care and support services. Hence, predictive data mining techniques can greatly benefit to analyze and discover new patterns from huge datasets like that of EDHS 2011 data. Objectives: The objective of this study is to build a predictive modeling for HIV testing and identify determinants of HIV testing for adults with age above fourteen years using data mining techniques. Methods: Cross-Industry Standard Process for Data Mining (CRISP-DM) was used to predict the model for HIV testing and explore association rules between HIV testing and the selected attributes among adult Ethiopians. Decision tree, Naïve-Bayes, logistic regression and artificial neural networks of data mining techniques were used to build the predictive models. Results: The target dataset contained 30,625 study participants; of which 16, 515 (53.9%) were women. Nearly two-fifth; 17,719 (58%), have never been tested for HIV while the rest 12,906 (42%) had been tested. Ethiopians with higher wealth index, higher educational level, belonging 20 to 29 years old, having no stigmatizing attitude towards HIV positive person, urban residents, having HIV related knowledge, information about family planning on mass media and knowing a place where to get testing for HIV showed an increased patterns with respect to HIV testing. Conclusion and Recommendation: Public health interventions should consider the identified determinants to promote people to get testing for HIV.

Keywords: data mining, HIV, testing, ethiopia

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Authors: L. Cruz-Lopes, M. Sell, P. Escudeiro, B. Esteves

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It might be difficult for deaf people to communicate since spoken and written languages are different from sign language. When it comes to getting information, going to places of cultural heritage, or using services and infrastructure, there is a clear lack of inclusiveness. By creating assistive technology that enables deaf individuals to get around communication hurdles and encourage inclusive tourism, the ICHT- Inclusive Cultural Heritage Tourism initiative hopes to increase knowledge of sign language. The purpose of the Inclusive Cultural Heritage Tourism (ICHT) project is to develop online and on-site sign language tools and material for usage at popular tourist destinations in the northern region of Portugal, including Torre dos Clérigos, the Lello bookstore, Maia Zoo, Porto wine cellars, and São Pedro do Sul (Viseu) thermae. The ICHT system consists of an application using holography, a mobile game, an online platform for collaboration with deaf and hearing users, and a collection of International Sign training courses. The project also offers a prospect for a more inclusive society by introducing a method of teaching sign languages to tourism industry professionals. As a result, the teaching and learning of sign language along with the assistive technology tools created by the project sets up an inclusive environment for the deaf community, producing results in the area of automatic sign language translation and aiding in the global recognition of the Portuguese tourism industry.

Keywords: inclusive tourism, games, international sign training, deaf community

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Authors: Kiurski S. Jelena, Aksentijević M. Snežana, Kecić S. Vesna, Oros B. Ivana

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The prosperity of electronic equipment in photocopying environment not only has improved work efficiency, but also has changed indoor air quality. Considering the number of photocopying employed, indoor air quality might be worse than in general office environments. Determining the contribution from any type of equipment to indoor air pollution is a complex matter. Non-methane hydrocarbons are known to have an important role of air quality due to their high reactivity. The presence of hazardous pollutants in indoor air has been detected in one photocopying shop in Novi Sad, Serbia. Air samples were collected and analyzed for five days, during 8-hr working time in three-time intervals, whereas three different sampling points were determined. Using multiple linear regression model and software package STATISTICA 10 the concentrations of occupational hazards and micro-climates parameters were mutually correlated. Based on the obtained multiple coefficients of determination (0.3751, 0.2389, and 0.1975), a weak positive correlation between the observed variables was determined. Small values of parameter F indicated that there was no statistically significant difference between the concentration levels of non-methane hydrocarbons and micro-climates parameters. The results showed that variable could be presented by the general regression model: y = b0 + b1xi1+ b2xi2. Obtained regression equations allow to measure the quantitative agreement between the variation of variables and thus obtain more accurate knowledge of their mutual relations.

Keywords: non-methane hydrocarbons, photocopying process, multiple regression analysis, indoor air quality, pollutant emission

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Authors: Majid Al-Eissa, Hassan Saleheen, Fatimah Al Shehri, Maha AlMuneef

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Global efforts are being made to combat child maltreatment (CM); however, in 2011 the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s (KSA) response to this issue was found to be mediocre. Several developments have been implemented in KSA since then, and reevaluation is now necessary. The aim of this study is to assess the CM-prevention readiness (CMPR) of KSA in regard to implementing large-scale, evidence-based CM-prevention programs. Participants were decision makers and senior managers in the field of CM. Face-to-face interviews were conducted in the participants’ offices. This was a cross-sectional study. We used the multi-dimensional tool “Readiness Assessment for the Prevention of Child Maltreatment - short version,” which examines ten dimensions concerning this topic. Comparison between the results of this study and those of the 2011 examination was performed to determine how the situation in KSA has changed. Sixty informants were interviewed; the majority being females (57%) and from governmental institutions (56%). The average total score for the ten dimensions was 47.4%, an increase from the 43.7% reported in 2011. The strongest dimensions were legislations and mandates (8.3/10), followed by knowledge (7.1/10) and institutional links and resources (5.8/10). The lowest scores concerned human and technical resources (1.7/10) and attitude towards CM (2.8/10). Compared to the 2011 results, some dimensions showed significant improvements, but the majority had remained consistent. Time and commitment are necessary to secure CMPR improvement. Periodic assessment of CMPR is required to provide proper recommendations to the government regarding the progress of CM-prevention strategies.

Keywords: assessment, child maltreatment, prevention, readiness, Saudi Arabia

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Authors: Ashok Sachdeva

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This research paper delves into the application of digital tools, especially Voyant Tools and AntConc version 4.0, for the analysis and interpretation of Seamus Heaney's poems. Scholars and literary aficionados can acquire deeper insights into Heaney's writings by utilising these tools, revealing hidden nuances and improving their knowledge. This paper outlines the methodology used, presents sample analyses and evaluates the merits and limitations of using digital tools in literary analysis. The combination of traditional close reading with digital analysis tools promises to offer new paths for understanding Heaney's vast tapestry of poetry. Seamus Heaney, a Nobel winner known for his vivid poetry, provides a treasure mine of literary discovery. The advent of digital tools gives an exciting opportunity to reveal previously unknown layers of meaning within his works. This paper investigates the use of Voyant Tools and AntConc version 4.0 to analyse and understand Heaney's writings, demonstrating the symbiotic relationship between traditional literary analysis and cutting-edge digital methodologies. Methodology: To demonstrate the efficiency of digital tools in the analysis of Heaney's poetry, a sample of his notable works will be entered into Voyant Tools and AntConc version 4.0. The former provides a graphic representation of word frequency, word clouds, and patterns over numerous poems. The latter, a concordance tool, enables detailed linguistic analysis, revealing patterns, and linguistic subtleties.

Keywords: digital tools, resonance, assonance, alliteration, creative quotient

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Authors: Nene Pearl Eluchie

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Globally, metal ion, particularly those generated from oil and gas effluents, form environmental pollution, particularly in developing regions like Nigeria, where water borne disease is fatal. This is clear evidence for metal ion contamination within the environment. Ecofriendly and cost effective biomaterials are the best ways of reducing metal ion contamination, thus reducing the need for chemical treatment of oil and gas effluent. Despite this, research efforts to understand the mechanism of adsorption and possible bio-adsorptive remediation interventions are limited. The study combined biomaterial and adsorption techniques: A. Indica, UV-Visible spectroscopy, SEM, FTIR in a progressive manner to provide insight. The biosorption efficiency of Azadirachta Indica silver nanoparticle AI-AgNPs was within the range of 63-95%. The study demonstrates that AI-AgNPs can be a promising agent, cheap, efficient, and biodegradable bio-sorbent for lowering oil and gas effluents. This is one of the studies to show that Azadirachta Indica is just one of the many biomaterials to synthesize silver nanoparticles through the reduction of active constituents (Nimbidin) present in them to ensure stability and surface properties, which are critical for their performance in effluent treatment. Therefore, leveraging the knowledge from this study to raise awareness through public health initiatives and community engagement will help. The prevalence of metal ions observed in the visible region in the study indicates the need for bio-adsorptive remediation interventions, not only in social settings but also in the immediate environment. There is, thus, an urgent need for targeted interventions in vulnerable communities.

Keywords: Azadirachta indica, bioadsorption, biosynthesis, effluent, nimbidin, silver nanoparticle

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Authors: Al-Tammar M. Shahah

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Background and Objective: A novel pneumonia caused by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which is spreading domestically and internationally, has been identified by the Chinese city of Wuhan since the end of December 2019. Limited studies examined the psychological experience such as anxiety, depression, and stress during Corona pandemic. Moreover, to the best of author's knowledge, there is no study to date has examined the psychological resilience and mental health during Corona pandemic in Kuwait. Therefore, the present research investigates the role of psychological resilience in predicting psychological distress among Kuwaiti adults during Corona pandemic. Method: Kuwaiti citizens (N = 735) completed an online survey, which includes four scales the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale HADS (anxiety and depression), the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC-25), and the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS). A cross-sectional correlational design was used. Results: A high level of stress was observed, with 59% reported moderate to severe stress. In contrast, low levels of anxiety and depression were observed; with 70% reporting no anxiety symptoms and 74% report no depression symptoms. Psychological resilience was negatively correlated with anxiety, depression, and stress, consistent with previous studies. As expected, resilience was found to account for significant variance in anxiety and stress after controlling for quarantine variables and demographic variables. Conclusion: The findings suggest that increasing psychological resilience might help reduce psychological distress after confronting with stressful live events in Kuwaiti citizen.

Keywords: anxiety, corona, depression, psychological resilience, stress

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Authors: Shavindrie Cooray

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It is vital that students are supported in having balanced conversations about topics that might be controversial. This process is crucial to the development of critical thinking skills. This can be difficult to attain in e-learning environments, with some research finding students report a perceived loss in the quality of knowledge exchange and performance. This research investigated if Systems Theory could be applied to structure the discussion, improve information sharing, and reduce conflicts when students are working in online environments. This research involved 160 participants across four categories of student groups at a college in the Northeastern US. Each group was provided with a shared problem, and each group was expected to make a proposal for a solution. Two groups worked face-to-face; the first face to face group engaged with the problem and each other with no intervention from a facilitator; a second face to face group worked on the problem using Systems tools to facilitate problem structuring, group discussion, and decision-making. There were two types of virtual teams. The first virtual group also used Systems tools to facilitate problem structuring and group discussion. However, all interactions were conducted in a synchronous virtual environment. The second type of virtual team also met in real time but worked with no intervention. Findings from the study demonstrated that the teams (both virtual and face-to-face) using Systems tools shared more information with each other than the other teams; additionally, these teams reported an increased level of disagreement amongst their members, but also expressed more confidence and satisfaction with the experience and resulting decision compared to the other groups.

Keywords: e-learning, virtual teams, systems approach, conflicts

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Authors: Araceli Martínez Ortiz

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An educational research effort is analyzed using systems theory to document the power of collective impact when addressing multiple factors contributing towards the retention of students majoring in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) academic programs. This research promotes understanding on how networked communities may work effectively toward a shared vision and mutually aligned activities that result in sustained, large scale change. The actions of a team of researchers in their third year of collaboration are presented to describe a model that positively aligns work efforts resulting in greater total gains. The goals of the multiple programs managed by the funded program team are to: 1) expand the number of students who choose to study a STEM field of study; 2) promote student collaborative learning; 3) support faculty understanding of the funds of knowledge of diverse students and 4) establish innovative and robust STEM education research that will lead to the development of nationally replicable, scalable models for broadening participation in STEM. The impacts of this research effort are measured through quantitative statistical analysis of the changes in second-year STEM undergraduate student retention rates and representation rates of women, Hispanics and African American STEM majors.

Keywords: collaborative impact, diversity, student retention, systems theory, STEM education

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Authors: Huawei Bai, Jianguo Yao, Fellow, IEEE

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Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common form of heart arrhythmia and is closely associated with mortality and morbidity in heart failure, stroke, and coronary artery disease. The development of single spot optical sensors enables widespread photoplethysmography (PPG) screening, especially for AF, since it represents a more convenient and noninvasive approach. To our knowledge, most existing studies based on public and unbalanced datasets can barely handle the multiple noises sources in the real world and, also, lack interpretability. In this paper, we construct a large- scale PPG dataset using measurements collected from PPG wrist- watch devices worn by volunteers and propose an attention-based two-stream heterogeneous neural network (TSHNN). The first stream is a hybrid neural network consisting of a three-layer one-dimensional convolutional neural network (1D-CNN) and two-layer attention- based bidirectional long short-term memory (Bi-LSTM) network to learn representations from temporally sampled signals. The second stream extracts latent representations from the PPG time-frequency spectrogram using a five-layer CNN. The outputs from both streams are fed into a fusion layer for the outcome. Visualization of the attention weights learned demonstrates the effectiveness of the attention mechanism against noise. The experimental results show that the TSHNN outperforms all the competitive baseline approaches and with 98.09% accuracy, achieves state-of-the-art performance.

Keywords: PPG wearables, atrial fibrillation, feature fusion, attention mechanism, hyber network

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Authors: Alice Schittek, Isabelle Roskam, Moira Mikolajczak

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Background: Perfectionistic strivings (PS) and perfectionistic concerns (PC) are associated with an increase in parental burnout (PB), and PB causally increases violence towards the offspring. Objective: To our best knowledge, no study has ever investigated whether perfectionism (PS and PC) predicts violence towards the offspring and whether PB could explain this link. We hypothesized that an increase in PS and PC would lead to an increase in violence via an increase in PB. Method: 228 participants responded to an online survey, with three measurement occasions spaced two months apart. Results: Contrary to expectations, cross-lagged path models revealed that violence towards the offspring prospectively predicts an increase in PS and PC. Mediation models showed that PB is not a significant mediator. The results of all models did not change when controlling for social desirability. Conclusion: The present study shows that violence towards the offspring increases the risk of PS and PC in parents, which highlights the importance of understanding the effect of child maltreatment on the whole family system and not just on children. Results are discussed in light of the feeling of guilt experienced by parents. Considering the insignificant mediation effect, PB research should slowly shift towards more (quasi) causal designs, allowing to identify which significant correlations translate into causal effects. Implications: Clinicians should focus on preventing child maltreatment as well as treating parental perfectionism. Researchers should unravel the effects of child maltreatment on the family system.

Keywords: maltreatment, parental burnout, perfectionistic strivings, perfectionistic concerns, perfectionism, violence

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Authors: Muhammad Ajmair

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This empirical study followed structural vector auto regression (SVAR) approach proposed by the so-called AB-model of Amisano and Giannini (1997) to check the impact of relevant macroeconomic determinants on economic growth in Pakistan. Before that auto regressive distributive lag (ARDL) bound testing technique and time varying parametric approach along with general to specific approach was employed to find out relevant significant determinants of economic growth. To our best knowledge, no author made such a study that employed auto regressive distributive lag (ARDL) bound testing and time varying parametric approach with general to specific approach in empirical literature, but current study will bridge this gap. Annual data was taken from World Development Indicators (2014) during period 1976-2014. The widely-used Schwarz information criterion and Akaike information criterion were considered for the lag length in each estimated equation. Main findings of the study are that remittances received, gross national expenditures and inflation are found to be the best relevant positive and significant determinants of economic growth. Based on these empirical findings, we conclude that government should focus on overall economic growth augmenting factors while formulating any policy relevant to the concerned sector.

Keywords: economic growth, gross national expenditures, inflation, remittances

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Authors: Kobus-Cisowska Joanna, Flaczyk Ewa, Gramza-Michalowska Anna, Kmiecik Dominik, Przeor Monika, Marcinkowska Agata

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In recent years, proceed to the attractiveness of typical bakery products. Expanding the education and nutrition knowledge society will develop the production of functional foods, which has a positive impact on human health. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to evaluate the effect of the addition of white mulberry fruit on the content of biologically active compounds in the new designed functional bread premixes designed for selected disease: anemia, diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease. For flavonols and phenolic acids content UPLC was conducted, using an NovaPack C18 column and a gradient elution system. It was found that all attempts bread characterized by a high content of biologically active compounds: polyphenols, phenolic acids, and flavonoids. The highest total content of polyphenolic compounds found in the samples of bread for anemia, diabetes and cardiovascular disease both before and after storage. The analyzed sample differed in content of phenolic acids. The highest content of these compounds were found in samples of bread for anemia and diabetes. It was found that the analyzed sample contained phenolic acids that are derivatives of hydroxybenzoic and hydroxycinnamic acid. The new designed bread contained significant amounts of flavonols, of which the dominant was routine.

Keywords: mulberry, antioxidant, polyphenols, phenolic acids, flavonols

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Authors: Juan S. Mantilla, Peter Thomson

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Seismic events may result in discomfort on occupants of the buildings, structural damage or even buildings collapse. Traditional design aims to reduce dynamic response of structures by increasing stiffness, thus increasing the construction costs and the design forces. Structural control systems arise as an alternative to reduce these dynamic responses. A commonly used control systems in buildings are the passive friction dampers, which adds energy dissipation through damping mechanisms induced by sliding friction between their surfaces. Passive friction dampers are usually implemented on the diagonal of braced buildings, but such devices have the disadvantage that are optimal for a range of sliding force and out of that range its efficiency decreases. The above implies that each passive friction damper is designed, built and commercialized for a specific sliding/clamping force, in which the damper shift from a locked state to a slip state, where dissipates energy through friction. The risk of having a variation in the efficiency of the device according to the sliding force is that the dynamic properties of the building can change as result of many factor, even damage caused by a seismic event. In this case the expected forces in the building can change and thus considerably reduce the efficiency of the damper (that is designed for a specific sliding force). It is also evident than when a seismic event occurs the forces in each floor varies in the time what means that the damper's efficiency is not the best at all times. Semi-Active Friction devices adapt its sliding force trying to maintain its motion in the slipping phase as much as possible, because of this, the effectiveness of the device depends on the control strategy used. This paper deals with the development and performance evaluation of a low cost Semiactive Variable Friction Damper (SAVFD) in reduced scale to reduce vibrations of structures subject to earthquakes. The SAVFD consist in a (1) hydraulic brake adapted to (2) a servomotor which is controlled with an (3) Arduino board and acquires accelerations or displacement from (4) sensors in the immediately upper and lower floors and a (5) power supply that can be a pair of common batteries. A test structure, based on a Benchmark structure for structural control, was design and constructed. The SAVFD and the structure are experimentally characterized. A numerical model of the structure and the SAVFD is developed based on the dynamic characterization. Decentralized control algorithms were modeled and later tested experimentally using shaking table test using earthquake and frequency chirp signals. The controlled structure with the SAVFD achieved reductions greater than 80% in relative displacements and accelerations in comparison to the uncontrolled structure.

Keywords: earthquake response, friction damper, semiactive control, shaking table

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Authors: Min Koo Choi

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The paper will examine Im Sun-dŭk’s two short stories, 'Iryoil' (Sunday, 1937) and 'Nazuoya' (A Godmother, 1942), which illuminate the subjects of Korean intellectuals going through the later period of a harsh and oppressive Japanese colonial rule. When Japan went to war against China in 1937, Korea, a colony of Japan since 1910, became an outpost for Japanese expansionism into China, and the Korean people were mobilized into the war effort. Nationalist movements and radical ideas that posed a threat and opposition to Japanese colonial rule in Korea and its colonial expansionism were ruthlessly suppressed, and Koreans were forcibly assimilated into becoming Japanese citizens without political rights. Racial discrimination between Koreans and Japanese was prevalent. Im Sun-dŭk, who participated in the Socialist movement in the 1930s, had his debut as a literary writer and a critic in the late 1930s, when Korean literary society was reincorporated in order to collaborate with the Japanese war effort through writing and public speech. Sun-duk's writing illuminates the unique internal landscape of a female subject who strives to live on while preserving her commitment and dignity under the circumstances that force Korean intellectuals either to collaborate with or acquiesce to Japanese colonial rule. 'Iryoil' (Sunday, 1937) foregrounds an educated intellectual, Hyeyŏng, who supplies her fiancé in prison for political involvement in resistance against Japan. On Sundays, she turns down her friends’ suggestion for enjoying holidays outside, due to her indebtedness to her fiancé. Her fiancé's imprisonment indicates the social conscience that still remains, and she seeks to share the commitment and suffering with her fiancé. The short story 'Nazuoya' (A Godmother, 1942), written in Japanese due to the suppression of Korean language publications at the time, also problematizes Japanese policy that forces Koreans to change their names into Japanese. Through the narrator I, who struggles to find a meaningful name for her cousin brother’s baby, she highlights how meaningful one’s name is for one’s life and identity. What makes her two stories unique is that her writing draws other people’s confessions into its own narrative through fragmentary forms, such as part of letter or reflection. The voices of others are intersected with the main character in 'Iryoil' (Sunday, 1937) and a narrator in 'Nazuoya' (A Godmother, 1942). In many ways, the narrator and main character provide the confessional voices who display the characters' gloomy interiorities. Even though these confessional voices do not share the commitment and values, both the main character and I in the stories reveal a more open set of viewpoints to them. In this way, they seek to form bonds and encouragement and acquire a more resilient sensibility that embraces those who strive to survive and endure in the gloomy days of the later period of Japanese colonial rule.

Keywords: Im Sun-dŭk, Japanese colonial rule, Korean literature, socialist movement

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Authors: Siti Rodliyah, Andrik Purwasito, Bani Sudardi, Abdullah Wakit

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This study employs sociological-ethnographic basic method and the cultural studies paradigm as the approach in understanding the habitus within the customary marriage of the East Nusa Tenggara society who require belis as a bride-price. The conceptual basis underlying the application of habitus theory and symbolic power in East Nusa Tenggara (NTT) society refers to the Bourdieu’s framework. This study is a result of participatory observation on habitus of a marital system using belis observed by the NTT society as a cognitive structure which connects individuals to the social activities of the customary marriage and makes it unquestionable habits. Knowledge of the social world under the pretext of prosperity for the recipients (family) of a bride-price can be a political instrument for the sustainability of power relations. The ritual-mythical system in the society has never been fully present as a neutral habit. The habitus reflected in the marital relationship among the NTT society enables the men to obtain and exercise their power relations. The sustainability of power relations can be seen from the representation of the social status of a girl and the properties attached to her. This is what gave birth to a symbolic rule, in which the social rules about bride-price or belis eventually will serve the interests of those who occupy a dominant position in the social structure, namely the rich men.

Keywords: belis, habitus, East Nusa Tenggara, marital system, power, symbolic

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Authors: S. J. M. Mohd Saleh, S. Guo

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Composite materials have become an important option for the primary structure of aircraft due to their design flexibility and ability to improve the overall performance. At present, the option for composite usage in aircraft component is largely based on experience, knowledge, benchmarking and partly market driven. An inevitable iterative design during the design stage and validation process will increase the development time and cost. This paper aims at presenting the correlation between laminate and composite thin-wall beam structure, which contains the theoretical and numerical investigations on stiffness estimation of composite aerostructures with applications to aircraft wings. Classical laminate theory and thin-walled beam theory were applied to define the correlation between 1-dimensional composite laminate and 2-dimensional composite beam structure, respectively. Then FE model was created to represent the 3-dimensional structure. A detailed study on stiffness matrix of composite laminates has been carried out to understand the effects of stacking sequence on the coupling between extension, shear, bending and torsional deformation of wing box structures for 1-dimensional, 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional structures. Relationships amongst composite laminates and composite wing box structures of the same material have been developed in this study. These correlations will be guidelines for the design engineers to predict the stiffness of the wing box structure during the material selection process and laminate design stage.

Keywords: aircraft design, aircraft structures, classical lamination theory, composite structures, laminate theory, structural design, thin-walled beam theory, wing box design

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Authors: E. A. Krasikov

Abstract:

As the service life of an operating nuclear power plant (NPP) increases, the potential misunderstanding of the degradation of aging components must receive more attention. Integrity assurance analysis contributes to the effective maintenance of adequate plant safety margins. In essence, the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) is the key structural component determining the NPP lifetime. Environmentally induced cracking in the stainless steel corrosion-preventing cladding of RPV’s has been recognized to be one of the technical problems in the maintenance and development of light-water reactors. Extensive cracking leading to failure of the cladding was found after 13000 net hours of operation in JPDR (Japan Power Demonstration Reactor). Some of the cracks have reached the base metal and further penetrated into the RPV in the form of localized corrosion. Failures of reactor internal components in both boiling water reactors and pressurized water reactors have increased after the accumulation of relatively high neutron fluences (5´1020 cm–2, E>0,5MeV). Therefore, in the case of cladding failure, the problem arises of hydrogen (as a corrosion product) embrittlement of irradiated RPV steel because of exposure to the coolant. At present when notable progress in plasma physics has been obtained practical energy utilization from fusion reactors (FR) is determined by the state of material science problems. The last includes not only the routine problems of nuclear engineering but also a number of entirely new problems connected with extreme conditions of materials operation – irradiation environment, hydrogenation, thermocycling, etc. Limiting data suggest that the combined effect of these factors is more severe than any one of them alone. To clarify the possible influence of the in-service synergistic phenomena on the FR structural materials properties we have studied hydrogen-irradiated steel interaction including alternating hydrogenation and heat treatment (annealing). Available information indicates that the life of the first wall could be expanded by means of periodic in-place annealing. The effects of neutron fluence and irradiation temperature on steel/hydrogen interactions (adsorption, desorption, diffusion, mechanical properties at different loading velocities, post-irradiation annealing) were studied. Experiments clearly reveal that the higher the neutron fluence and the lower the irradiation temperature, the more hydrogen-radiation defects occur, with corresponding effects on the steel mechanical properties. Hydrogen accumulation analyses and thermal desorption investigations were performed to prove the evidence of hydrogen trapping at irradiation defects. Extremely high susceptibility to hydrogen embrittlement was observed with specimens which had been irradiated at relatively low temperature. However, the susceptibility decreases with increasing irradiation temperature. To evaluate methods for the RPV’s residual lifetime evaluation and prediction, more work should be done on the irradiated metal–hydrogen interaction in order to monitor more reliably the status of irradiated materials.

Keywords: hydrogen, radiation, stability, structural steel

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