Search results for: social problems
Commenced in January 2007
Frequency: Monthly
Edition: International
Paper Count: 14485

Search results for: social problems

13645 Museums and Corporate Social Responsibility: Environmental Impact and Strategies in Corporate Social Responsibility Policies

Authors: Nicola Urbino

Abstract:

The definition of corporate social responsibility policies is a central topic in contemporary museology, as the role of museums in developing social, cultural, and environmental impact strategies has become increasingly prominent. An overarching perspective in this domain can be provided by the publication of the primary tool for impact verification and reporting in the CSR field: the Social Report. The presentation, based on an international and national theoretical and regulatory assessment, focuses on the operational significance of structured social reporting for Italian museums. The study involves analyzing over 25 Social Reports from leading Italian museums over the past 5 years to assess their CSR practices, examining both the strengths and weaknesses, in order to offer a comprehensive overview of the phenomenon of social responsibility in the national context. Moreover, a benchmark will be done between the legislative framework and guidelines and the effective implementation of CSR policies and practices. That said, the contribution aims at analyzing the strategies of the main Italian museums regarding their environmental impact on the territory. Through the analysis of the Social Balance Sheets published by a group of museums from the north to the south of Italy, it will highlight the relations that museums have established over the years with the territory and the environment, their sensitivity to climate change, and the strategies proposed to mitigate their environmental impact. Starting from a general analysis, the paper will help to highlight best practices and management models to be followed for sustainable growth, analyzing best practice, case studies and strategies applied to the museological field.

Keywords: museums, social report, sustainable development, footprint

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13644 The Role of Indigenous Informal Local Institutions and Social Capital for Adoption of Agricultural Innovation: A Special Emphasis in Ethiopia

Authors: Molla Tadesse Lakew

Abstract:

Researchers tried to find out the socio-economic and supply-side constraint factors to adoption. However, they overlooked the role of social networks and relationships among the community. Therefore, the aims of this review were to review the roles and negative effects of social capital. Based on its contents, relevancy, and time duration, only 121 (journals, books, and paper reports) were selected. It concludes that social capital has an indispensable role in facilitating cooperation and connection between members of the farmers' community, informal and experiential knowledge sharing, and access to research-based knowledge and contributes to reducing the transaction cost of adoption. On the contrary, inside the black box of social capital, the negative effects include the exclusion of outsider’s knowledge and experiences, excessive claims on group members, and restrictions on individual freedom.

Keywords: social capital, local institutions, adoption, Ethiopia

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13643 The School-to-Work Transition: The Case of NEET Youths from Rural Areas

Authors: Anđelka Stojanović, Ivan Mihajlović, Ivica Nikolić

Abstract:

In the past years, due to the financial crisis and the tightening of conditions on the labor market, young people are facing great challenges in achieving financial independence and finding their place in society. Higher unemployment rates, poorer living conditions, separation from the labor market, and longer school-to-work transitions particularly affect rural youth and make significant differences between youth groups in rural and urban areas. Improving employability skills and development of instruments for further learning among young people “Not in Education, Employment, or Training” (NEET) should not be only the concerns of these people, already adequately be directed and supported by the institutions. According to the World Bank data, the share of youth not in education, employment or training (NEET), in the European Union in the past few years decreases but still shows a significant share in the total percentage of the youth population. In 2017 rate was 10.96% while in 2018 that value was 10.38%. When observing individual countries in Europe, especially those with lower incomes, this rate is much higher. It was concluded that this topic was not sufficiently elaborated and presented in the social and scientific environment. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to identify and systematize the problems of school-to-work transition among young NEETs living in rural areas as well as the initiatives for addressing their problems.

Keywords: NEET youth, risks and initiatives, rural youth, school-to-work transition

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13642 Performance Assessment of Multi-Level Ensemble for Multi-Class Problems

Authors: Rodolfo Lorbieski, Silvia Modesto Nassar

Abstract:

Many supervised machine learning tasks require decision making across numerous different classes. Multi-class classification has several applications, such as face recognition, text recognition and medical diagnostics. The objective of this article is to analyze an adapted method of Stacking in multi-class problems, which combines ensembles within the ensemble itself. For this purpose, a training similar to Stacking was used, but with three levels, where the final decision-maker (level 2) performs its training by combining outputs from the tree-based pair of meta-classifiers (level 1) from Bayesian families. These are in turn trained by pairs of base classifiers (level 0) of the same family. This strategy seeks to promote diversity among the ensembles forming the meta-classifier level 2. Three performance measures were used: (1) accuracy, (2) area under the ROC curve, and (3) time for three factors: (a) datasets, (b) experiments and (c) levels. To compare the factors, ANOVA three-way test was executed for each performance measure, considering 5 datasets by 25 experiments by 3 levels. A triple interaction between factors was observed only in time. The accuracy and area under the ROC curve presented similar results, showing a double interaction between level and experiment, as well as for the dataset factor. It was concluded that level 2 had an average performance above the other levels and that the proposed method is especially efficient for multi-class problems when compared to binary problems.

Keywords: stacking, multi-layers, ensemble, multi-class

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13641 Media and Women Empowerment: An Exploration of TV Popular Shows in India

Authors: Mamita Panda

Abstract:

Popular shows are considered to be powerful medium for bringing social change and development. It has the responsibility for not only entertaining, but spreading awareness among common mass which it results social intervention in the major social institutions. Gender construction in one of these social institutions where one can build their capacity to construct a better human society. Mass media in general, TV in particular has an important intervening factor in responding to these processes. The obligatory role of media not only through news but popular shows (serials) becomes compulsion for social formation including construction through gender. This paper attempts to map and examine the gendered contents from serials including viewer’s response to understand the level of influence. The regression analysis shows that socio-economic factors have wider influence on understanding of gender equality including TV popular contents. The social construction of gender through serials remains a serious debatable issue and concern thereafter.

Keywords: construction, empowerment, gender, media and women

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13640 A Multidimensional Indicator-Based Framework to Assess the Sustainability of Productive Green Roofs: A Case Study in Madrid

Authors: Francesca Maria Melucci, Marco Panettieri, Rocco Roma

Abstract:

Cities are at the forefront of achieving the sustainable development goals set out in the Sustainable Development Goals of Agenda 2030. For these reasons, increasing attention has been given to the creation of resilient, sustainable, inclusive and green cities and finding solutions to these problems is one of the greatest challenges faced by researchers today. In particular urban green infrastructures, including green roofs, play a key role in tackling environmental, social and economic problems. The starting point was an extensive literature review on 1. research developments on the benefits (environmental, economic and social) and implications of green roofs; 2. sustainability assessment and applied methodologies; 3. specific indicators to measure impacts on urban sustainability. Through this review, the appropriate qualitative and quantitative characteristics that are part of the complex 'green roof' system were identified, as studies that holistically capture its multifunctional nature are still lacking. So, this paper aims to find a method to improve community participation in green roof initiatives and support local governance processes in developing efficient proposals to achieve better sustainability and resilience of cities. To this aim, the multidimensional indicator-based framework, presented by Tapia in 2021, has been tested for the first time in the case of a green roof in the city of Madrid. The framework's set of indicators was implemented with other indicators such as those of waste management and circularity (OECD Inventory of Circular Economy indicators) and sustainability performance. The specific indicators to be used in the case study were decided after a consultation phase with relevant stakeholders. Data on the community's willingness to participate in green roof implementation initiatives were collected through interviews and online surveys with a heterogeneous sample of citizens. The results of the application of the framework suggest how the different aspects of sustainability influence the choice of a green roof and provide input on the main mechanisms involved in citizens' willingness to participate in such initiatives.

Keywords: urban agriculture, green roof, urban sustainability, indicators, multi-criteria analysis

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13639 The Amount of Conformity of Persian Subject Headlines with Users' Social Tagging

Authors: Amir Reza Asnafi, Masoumeh Kazemizadeh, Najmeh Salemi

Abstract:

Due to the diversity of information resources in the web0.2 environment, which is increasing in number from time to time, the social tagging system should be used to discuss Internet resources. Studying the relevance of social tags to thematic headings can help enrich resources and make them more accessible to resources. The present research is of applied-theoretical type and research method of content analysis. In this study, using the listing method and content analysis, the level of accurate, approximate, relative, and non-conformity of social labels of books available in the field of information science and bibliography of Kitabrah website with Persian subject headings was determined. The exact matching of subject headings with social tags averaged 22 items, the approximate matching of subject headings with social tags averaged 36 items, the relative matching of thematic headings with social tags averaged 36 social items, and the average matching titles did not match the title. The average is 116. According to the findings, the exact matching of subject headings with social labels is the lowest and the most inconsistent. This study showed that the average non-compliance of subject headings with social labels is even higher than the sum of the three types of exact, relative, and approximate matching. As a result, the relevance of thematic titles to social labels is low. Due to the fact that the subject headings are in the form of static text and users are not allowed to interact and insert new selected words and topics, and on the other hand, in websites based on Web 2 and based on the social classification system, this possibility is available for users. An important point of the present study and the studies that have matched the syntactic and semantic matching of social labels with thematic headings is that the degree of conformity of thematic headings with social labels is low. Therefore, these two methods can complement each other and create a hybrid cataloging that includes subject headings and social tags. The low level of conformity of thematic headings with social tags confirms the results of backgrounds and writings that have compared the social tags of books with the thematic headings of the Library of Congress. It is not enough to match social labels with thematic headings. It can be said that these two methods can be complementary.

Keywords: Web 2/0, social tags, subject headings, hybrid cataloging

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13638 Mining User-Generated Contents to Detect Service Failures with Topic Model

Authors: Kyung Bae Park, Sung Ho Ha

Abstract:

Online user-generated contents (UGC) significantly change the way customers behave (e.g., shop, travel), and a pressing need to handle the overwhelmingly plethora amount of various UGC is one of the paramount issues for management. However, a current approach (e.g., sentiment analysis) is often ineffective for leveraging textual information to detect the problems or issues that a certain management suffers from. In this paper, we employ text mining of Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) on a popular online review site dedicated to complaint from users. We find that the employed LDA efficiently detects customer complaints, and a further inspection with the visualization technique is effective to categorize the problems or issues. As such, management can identify the issues at stake and prioritize them accordingly in a timely manner given the limited amount of resources. The findings provide managerial insights into how analytics on social media can help maintain and improve their reputation management. Our interdisciplinary approach also highlights several insights by applying machine learning techniques in marketing research domain. On a broader technical note, this paper illustrates the details of how to implement LDA in R program from a beginning (data collection in R) to an end (LDA analysis in R) since the instruction is still largely undocumented. In this regard, it will help lower the boundary for interdisciplinary researcher to conduct related research.

Keywords: latent dirichlet allocation, R program, text mining, topic model, user generated contents, visualization

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13637 Resiliency, Peer and Parental Support as Determinants of Adolescents' Social Adjustment among Secondary Students in Ilorin, Kwara State

Authors: Titilola Adebowale

Abstract:

Some factors are responsible for the social adjustment among the adolescents. The study investigated resiliency, peer and parental support as factors that could determine social adjustment among adolescents in Ilorin, Kwara state. The study adopted descriptive survey research design. A sample size of 300 SS1 & SS2 students from ten secondary schools, six public and four private schools were randomly selected within Ilorin Metropolis. Self-structured questionnaire that was validated and the reliability ensured was used to collect data from the respondents. Four hypotheses were postulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. Data collected was analysed using Pearson Product Moment Correlation (PPMC) and Regression Analysis. The findings revealed that there was a positive relationship between resiliency and social adjustment: r (298) = .402, p<0.01, r2 = .162; that there was a positive relationship between peer support and social adjustment: r (298) = .570, p<0.01, r2 = .325; that there was a positive relationship between parental support and social adjustment: r (298) = .451, p<0.01, r2 = .203; also reveals significant joint contribution of the independent variables (resilience, peer support, parental support) to the prediction of social adjustment: F (3,296) = 55.587, P<0.01. Various recommendations were given which includes the roles of government, agencies, individuals, parents, teachers, religious and marriage institutions.

Keywords: resiliency, peer support, parental support, adolescents, social adjustment

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13636 Public Participation as a Social Inclusion Tool in the Urban Planning Process: A Case Study of Abuja, Nigeria

Authors: Nwachi Prosper Louis, Cynthia Ogonna Ikesee

Abstract:

The urban planning system of cities varies by country, but in general, it is an instrument for establishing long-term sustainable frameworks and plans for social, institutional and economic development. There is limited knowledge, development, and implementation of effective and sustainable urban planning structures and plans that encourage social inclusion in most communities. This has led to social, economic and environmental deficiencies resulting in community isolation and segregation in class, ethnicity, and race. Encouraging public participation in the urban planning process is one of the instruments that cities can utilise to achieve better social inclusion outcomes. This paper explores how public participation can be used as a social inclusion tool in the urban planning process to achieve better outcomes in Abuja urban planning system. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of this approach. Also, a conceptual model was developed which evaluates the relationship between public participation and social inclusion outcomes in the urban planning process. It was seen that every community has its peculiar way of life and challenges, and an understanding of these social societal needs is paramount in the urban planning process. Therefore, the involvement of the public in identifying their needs, selecting priorities and identifying strategies offer better chances for developing solutions that are sustainable, feasible and implementable.

Keywords: public participation, social inclusion, urban planning, urban planning process

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13635 An Investigation into Problems Confronting Pre-Service Teachers of French in South-West Nigeria

Authors: Modupe Beatrice Adeyinka

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French, as a foreign language in Nigeria, is pronounced to be the second official language and a compulsory subject in the primary school level; hence, colleges of education across the nation are saddled with the responsibility of training teachers for the subject. However, it has been observed that this policy has not been fully implemented, for French teachers in training, do face many challenges, of which translation is chief. In a bid to investigate the major cause of the perceived translation problem, this study examined French translation problems of pre-service teachers in selected colleges of education in the southwest, Nigeria. This study adopted a descriptive survey research design. The simple random sampling technique was used to select four colleges of education in the southwest, where 100 French students were randomly selected by selecting 25 from each school. The pre-service teachers’ French translation problems’ questionnaire (PTFTPQ) was used as an instrument while four research questions were answered and three null hypotheses were tested. Among others, the findings revealed that students do have problems with false friends, though mainly with its interpretation when attempting French-English translation and vice versa; majority of the students make use of French dictionary as a way out and found the material very useful for their understanding of false friends. Teachers were, therefore, urged to attend in-service training where they would be exposed to new and emerging strategies, approaches and methodologies of French language teaching that will make students overcome the challenge of translation in learning French.

Keywords: false friends, French language, pre-service teachers, source language, target language, translation

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13634 Housing Harmony: Social Integration in Singapore Public Housing

Authors: Yingjie Feng, Lei Xu, Zhenyu Cao

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In the process of urbanization, public housing is often a powerful means to deal with large floating population. In the developed countries like the U.S, France, Singapore, and Japan, the experience on how to make use of public housing to realize social integration in aspects of race, class, religion, income is gained through years of practice. Take the example of Singapore, the article first introduces the ethnic composition background and public housing development in Singapore, and then gives a detailed explanation and analysis on social integration in public housing from the views of Ethnic quotas policy, community organization construction and design of public space. Finally, combined with the Chinese situation, the article points out that the solution for social integration in China is the organic mix of different income groups in public housing.

Keywords: floating population, public housing, Singapore, social integration, urbanization

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13633 Current Challenges Associated with Women Education in Pakistan and the Proposed Solutions

Authors: Sanam Mujahid, Aliza Ahmad

Abstract:

Women education and empowerment has fundamental importance in the development of a civilized society however, in a developing country like Pakistan, there are serious challenges in this regard. Herein, we summarize the findings of 2012 study which revealed the key problems associated with women education and their proposed solutions. A survey tool was used to question female students and female faculty members in 20 different public sector universities of all four provinces of Pakistan. In this study, 1755 female students and 410 female faculty members responded. In addition to survey, semi-structured interview were also conducted with 25 female students and 10 female faculty members. Respondents of the survey emphasize the lack of adequate educational institutions in nearby vicinity, social exclusion including gender discrimination, shortage of female teachers, lack of resources and inefficient government policies are the major factors that influence female education. To solve these problems, the main recommendations by respondents include safe and secure learning environment for females in educational institutions, community and parental support, well qualified and sufficient number of female teachers. One of the most important proposals was the participation of females at policy level. Current study will provide a general layout to design the future educational strategies for promoting women education in all regions of Pakistan thus, developing towards modern educated society.

Keywords: women education, education strategies, developing countries, Pakistan

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13632 Using Mixed Methods in Studying Classroom Social Network Dynamics

Authors: Nashrawan Naser Taha, Andrew M. Cox

Abstract:

In a multi-cultural learning context, where ties are weak and dynamic, combining qualitative with quantitative research methods may be more effective. Such a combination may also allow us to answer different types of question, such as about people’s perception of the network. In this study the use of observation, interviews and photos were explored as ways of enhancing data from social network questionnaires. Integrating all of these methods was found to enhance the quality of data collected and its accuracy, also providing a richer story of the network dynamics and the factors that shaped these changes over time.

Keywords: mixed methods, social network analysis, multi-cultural learning, social network dynamics

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13631 Social Action for Strengthening Craftsmen's Bargaining Position in Marketing of Product of Tourism Souvenir

Authors: Dumasari, Pujiati Utami

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The bargaining position is important for a craftsman in every transaction. A strong bargaining position to encourage craftsmen to gain feasible prices on souvenirs tourism products are sold in several market segments. Some social actions of craftsmen turned out to also determine the conditions bargaining. The main goal of this study is to assess the range of social action to strengthen the bargaining position of craftsmen in marketing various products of tourism souvenir. Location of the study is set intentionally in the Sub-District of Baturaden, Banyumas Regency and also the Sub-District of Purbalingga Wetan, Purbalingga Regency. Both of them are located in the Central Java Province, Indonesia. The research method is the descriptive case study. The results showed that the craftsmen not only carry out one or two type of social action. They do all of the social action: the first is rational based instrumental, the second is rational based on the values, the third is affective, and the fourth is traditional. However, craftsmen also develop other social actions namely: collective, productive and creative action. At respondents in Baturaden dominant type of social action that is instrumentally rational, productive and creative. Meanwhile, respondents in Purbalingga more dominant social action collective, productive and creative. Some social actions implemented simultaneously by the respondents. Because of this, they concluded that the rational action that modified by themselves is more easily for strengthening the bargaining position when facing the craftsmen traders collectors. Collective and rationality social action has the highest sensitivity value for strengthening the bargaining position of craftsmen.

Keywords: bargaining position, craftsmen, strengthen, social actions, marketing of tourism souvenir

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13630 Problems of Boolean Reasoning Based Biclustering Parallelization

Authors: Marcin Michalak

Abstract:

Biclustering is the way of two-dimensional data analysis. For several years it became possible to express such issue in terms of Boolean reasoning, for processing continuous, discrete and binary data. The mathematical backgrounds of such approach — proved ability of induction of exact and inclusion–maximal biclusters fulfilling assumed criteria — are strong advantages of the method. Unfortunately, the core of the method has quite high computational complexity. In the paper the basics of Boolean reasoning approach for biclustering are presented. In such context the problems of computation parallelization are risen.

Keywords: Boolean reasoning, biclustering, parallelization, prime implicant

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13629 Understanding the Operational Challenges of Social Enterprises: A Review of Real-Life Issues in the Context of Developing Countries

Authors: Humayun Murshed

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There is growing importance of ‘social enterprise’ among the researchers and policy makers around the globe. Such enterprises have been viewed as alternative means for addressing the concerns relating to financing of corporate enterprises and social empowerment. This, some cases, has led to relatively unrealistic and higher level of expectations among policy makers and the members of the society at large. There is a general perception among different social actors that these enterprises provide universal and magic solution towards employment generation, and thus resulting in eradicating poverty, and ensuring equitable distribution of income and wealth. However, in many cases, these enterprises find a challenging journey in terms of prevailing market structure, socio-political environment, and unrealistic perception and expectations of social participants. This paper is focused on reviewing case studies based on empirical research and information from secondary sources and geared to looking at the challenges that social enterprises face. The research will draw the experience primarily from the developing countries’ perspective by adopting case study methodology. A tentative action plan will be suggested for further review by the policy makers and researchers in this growing arena of discipline. This research will attempt to highlight the myths and realities surrounding the operation of social enterprises.

Keywords: social enterprises, social empowerment, economic development, financing need

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13628 Development of E-Tendering Models for Nigerian Public Procuring Entities

Authors: Bello Abdullahi, Kabir Bala, Yahaya M. Ibrahim, Ahmed D. Ibrahim

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Public sector tendering has traditionally been conducted using manual paper-based processes which are known to be inefficient, less transparent, and more prone to manipulations and errors. However, the advent of the Internet and its associated technologies has led to the development of numerous e-Tendering systems that addressed many of the problems associated with the manual paper-based tendering system. Currently, in Nigeria, the public tendering processes are largely conducted based on manual paper-based system that is bedevilled by a number of problems such as inordinate delays, inefficiencies, manipulation of the tender evaluation process, corruption, lack of transparency and competition, among other problems. These problems can be addressed through the adoption of existing web-based e-Tendering systems which are known to address most of these problems. However, these existing e-Tendering systems that have been developed are not based on the Nigerian legal procurement processes and as such their suitability for local application is very limited. This paper is part of a larger study that attempt to address this problem through the development of an e-Tendering system that is based on the requirements of the Nigerian public procuring entities. In this paper, the identified tendering processes commonly used by Nigerian public procuring entities in the selection of construction sources are presented. A multi-methods research approach was used to identify those tendering processes. Specifically, 19 existing business use cases used by Nigerian public procuring entities were identified and 61 system use cases were prescribed based on the identified business use cases. The use cases were used as the basis for the development of domain and software conceptual models. The models were successfully used to guide the development of an e-Tendering system called NPS-eTender. Ripple and Unified Process were adopted as the software development methodologies.

Keywords: e-tendering, e-procurement, requirement model, conceptual model, public sector tendering, public procurement

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13627 A Comparative Study of Social Entrepreneurship Centers in Universities of the World

Authors: Farnoosh Alami, Nazgol Azimi

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Universities have recently paid much attention to the subject of social entrepreneurship. As a result, many of the highly ranked universities have established centers in this regard. The present research aims to investigate vision and mission of social entrepreneurship centers of the best universities ranked under 50 by Shanghai List 2013. It tries to find the common goals and features of their mission, vision, and activities which lead to their present success. This investigation is based on the web content of the first top 10 universities; among which six had social entrepreneurship centers. This is a qualitative research, and the findings are based on content analysis of documents. The findings confirm that education, research, talent development, innovative solutions, and supporting social innovation, are shared in the vision of these centers. In regard to their missions, social participation, networking, and leader education are the most shared features. Their common activities are focused on five categories of education, research, support, promotion, and networking.

Keywords: comparative study, qualitative research, social entrepreneurship centers, universities in the world

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13626 Delaunay Triangulations Efficiency for Conduction-Convection Problems

Authors: Bashar Albaalbaki, Roger E. Khayat

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This work is a comparative study on the effect of Delaunay triangulation algorithms on discretization error for conduction-convection conservation problems. A structured triangulation and many unstructured Delaunay triangulations using three popular algorithms for node placement strategies are used. The numerical method employed is the vertex-centered finite volume method. It is found that when the computational domain can be meshed using a structured triangulation, the discretization error is lower for structured triangulations compared to unstructured ones for only low Peclet number values, i.e. when conduction is dominant. However, as the Peclet number is increased and convection becomes more significant, the unstructured triangulations reduce the discretization error. Also, no statistical correlation between triangulation angle extremums and the discretization error is found using 200 samples of randomly generated Delaunay and non-Delaunay triangulations. Thus, the angle extremums cannot be an indicator of the discretization error on their own and need to be combined with other triangulation quality measures, which is the subject of further studies.

Keywords: conduction-convection problems, Delaunay triangulation, discretization error, finite volume method

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13625 Students' Perceptions of Social Media as a Means to Improve Their Language Skills

Authors: Bahia Braktia, Ana Marcela Montenegro Sanchez

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Social media, such as Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, has been used for teaching and learning for quite some time. These platforms have been proven to be a good tool to improve various language skills, students’ performance of the English language, motivation as well as trigger the authentic language interaction. However, little is known about the potential effects of social media usage on the learning performance of Arabic language learners. The present study explores the potential role that the social media technologies play in learning Arabic as a foreign language at a university in Southeast of United States. In order to investigate this issue, an online survey was administered to examine the perceptions and attitudes of American students learning Arabic. The research questions were: How does social media, specifically Facebook and Twitter, impact the students' Arabic language skills, and what is their attitude toward it? The preliminary findings of the study showed that students had a positive attitude toward the use of social media to enhance their Arabic language skills, and that they used a range of social media features to expose themselves to the Arabic language and communicate in Arabic with native Arabic speaking friends. More detailed findings will be shared in the light data analysis with the audience during the presentation.

Keywords: foreign language learning, social media, students’ perceptions, survey

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13624 The Return of Daily Life — Improvement Experiments on Urban Village in the Post-Urban Village Era

Authors: Gan Lu, Xu Lei

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This is an era when urban village is disappearing in China. A series of social phenomenon presented in post-urban village era is forcing rethinking of the future of urban village. Existing monotonous urban renewal mode based on gentrification is questioned, and the social values of urban village has been gaining increasing attention while the daily life and spatial power of underclass is being focused on. Based on the consensus on the positive meaning of urban village phenomenon, social sectors have taken amount of improvement experiments to explore the possibility of modern transition of urban village on the premise of existence. These experiments revealed that urban tremendous changes impact a lot on social daily life, and pointed out that it is necessary to bring up the responsibility of architects and the definition of urban for discussion again.

Keywords: post-urban village era, gentrification, social value, daily life, improvement experiment.

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13623 An Interaction Model of Communication Skills and Participation in Social Work among Youth

Authors: Mohd Yusri Ibrahim

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Youth participation in social work is essential in social and community development. Although many studies have been conducted to identify the determinant of youth involvement, few studies were discussed interaction between communication skills and youth participation in volunteerism. This article will discuss a cross-sectional study that was conducted to identify the relationship between communication skills and youth participation in social work. The results were successfully developed an interaction model of communication skills as predictor to participation criteria among youth. Finally, the article was suggested several ways to encourage youth participation in community by developing their communication skill in various stages.

Keywords: youth, participation, communication skill, social work

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13622 Delay Studies in Construction: Synthesis, Critical Evaluation, and the Way Forward

Authors: Abdullah Alsehaimi

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Over decades, there have been many studies of delay in construction, and this type of study continues to be popular in construction management research. A synthesis and critical evaluation of delay studies in developing countries reveals that poor project management is cited as one of the main causes of delay. However, despite such consensus, most of the previous studies fall short in providing clear recommendations demonstrating how project management practice could be improved. Moreover, the majority of recommendations are general and not devoted to solving the difficulties associated with particular delay causes. This paper aims to demonstrate that the root cause of this state of affairs is that typical research into delay tends to be descriptive and explanatory, making it inadequate for solving persistent managerial problems in construction. It is contended that many problems in construction could be mitigated via alternative research approaches, i.e. action and constructive research. Such prescriptive research methods can assist in the development and implementation of innovative tools tackling managerial problems of construction, including that of delay. In so doing, those methods will better connect research and practice, and thus strengthen the relevance of academic construction management.

Keywords: construction delay, action research, constructive research, industrial engineering

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13621 Impact Assessment of Lean Practices on Social Sustainability Indicators: An Approach Using ISM Method

Authors: Aline F. Marcon, Eduardo F. da Silva, Marina Bouzon

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The impact of lean management on environmental sustainability is the research line that receives the most attention from academicians. Therefore, the social dimension of sustainable development has so far received less attention. This paper aims to evaluate the impact of intra-plant lean manufacturing practices on social sustainability indicators extracted from the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) parameters. The method is two-phased, including MCDM approach to uncover the most relevant practices regarding social performance and Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) method to reveal the structural relationship among lean practices. Professionals from the academic and industrial fields answered the questionnaires. From the results of this paper, it is possible to verify that practices such as “Safety Improvement Programs”, “Total Quality Management” and “Cross-functional Workforce” are the ones which have the most positive influence on the set of GRI social indicators.

Keywords: indicators, ISM, lean, social, sustainability

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13620 Social Support and Self-Regulation on Changes in Exercise Behavior Among Infertile Women: A Cross-Sectional Study to Comparison of External and Internal Factors

Authors: Babak Nemat

Abstract:

Background: Exercise behavior (EB) has a significant impact on infertility, but the magnitude of the effect is not easily determined. The aim of the present study was to assess the effect of social support and self-regulation, as external and internal factors, on changes in exercise behavior among infertile women. Methods: For a cross-sectional study conducted in Sanandaj (Iran) in 2023, we recruited infertile women (n=483) from 35 comprehensive healthcare centers by means of convenience sampling. Standardized face-to-face interviews were conducted using established and reliable instruments for the assessment of EB, social support, and self-regulation. Logistic regression models were applied to assess the association between EB, social support and self-regulation. Results: The majority of the participants (56.7%) had secondary infertility, while 70.8% of them did not perform any exercise. Self-regulation and social support were significantly higher in women with secondary infertility than in those with primary infertility (p < 0.01). Self-regulation was significantly lower in women whose height was below 160 centimeters (cm) (p<0.05). Social support was significantly higher among participants aged ≥ 35 years and weighing ≥ 60 kilograms (kg) (p < 0.01). The odds of EB adoption increased with self-regulation and social support (OR=1.05, 95% CI=1.02-1.09, p <0.01), (OR=1.06, 95% CI=1.02-1.11, p <0.01). Conclusion: Social support and self-regulation almost equally influenced EB in infertile women. Designing support and consultation programs can be considered in encouraging infertile women to exercise in future research.

Keywords: social support, regulation, infertility, women

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13619 ECO ROADS: A Solution to the Vehicular Pollution on Roads

Authors: Harshit Garg, Shakshi Gupta

Abstract:

One of the major problems in today’s world is the growing pollution. The cause for all environmental problems is the increasing pollution rate. Looking upon the statistics, one can find out that most of the pollution is caused by the vehicular pollution which is more than 70 % of the total pollution, effecting the environment as well as human health proportionally. One is aware of the fact that vehicles run on roads so why not having the roads which could adsorb that pollution, not only once but a number of times. Every problem has a solution which can be solved by the state of art of technology, that is one can use the innovative ideas and thoughts to make technology as a solution to the problem of vehicular pollution on roads. Solving the problem up to a certain limit/ percentage can be formulated into a new term called ECO ROADS.

Keywords: environment, pollution, roads, sustainibility

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13618 A Framework for University Social Responsibility and Sustainability: The Case of South Valley University, Egypt

Authors: Alaa Tag-Eldin Mohamed

Abstract:

The environmental, cultural, social, and technological changes have led higher education institutes to question their traditional roles. Many declarations and frameworks highlight the importance of fulfilling social responsibility of higher education institutes. The study aims at developing a framework of university social responsibility and sustainability (USR&S) with focus on South Valley University (SVU) as a case study of Egyptian Universities. The study used meetings with 12 vice deans of community services and environmental affairs on social responsibility and environmental issues. The proposed framework integrates social responsibility with strategic management through the establishment and maintenance of the vision, mission, values, goals and management systems; elaboration of policies; provision of actions; evaluation of services and development of social collaboration with stakeholders to meet current and future needs of the community and environment. The framework links between different stakeholders internally and externally using communication and reporting tools. The results show that SVU integrates social responsibility and sustainability in its strategic plans. It has policies and actions however fragmented and lack of appropriate structure and budgeting. The proposed framework could be valuable for researchers and decision makers of the Egyptian Universities. The study proposed recommendations and highlighted building on the results and conducting future research.

Keywords: corporate social responsibility (CSR), south valley university, sustainable university, university social responsibility and sustainability (USR&S)

Procedia PDF Downloads 342
13617 The Prevalence of Postpartum Stress among Jordanian Women

Authors: Khitam Ibrahem Shlash Mohammad

Abstract:

Background: Postnatal depression is a focus of considerable research attention, but little is known about the pattern of stress across this period. Objective: to investigate the prevalence of stress after childbirth for Jordanian women and identify associated risk factors. Method: Design: A descriptive cross-sectional study. Participants were recruited six to eight weeks postpartum, provided personal, social and obstetric information, and completed the stress subscale of Depression Anxiety and Stress Scale (DASS-S), the Maternity Social Support Scale (MSSS), and Perceived Self-Efficacy Scale (PSES). Setting: maternal and child health care clinics in four health care centres in Maan city in Southern Jordan. Participants: Arabic speaking women (n = 324) between the ages of 18 and 45 years, six to eight weeks postpartum, primiparous or multiparous at low risk for obstetric complications. Data collection took place between October 2015 and January 2016. Ethical clearance was obtained prior to data collection. Results: The prevalence of postpartum stress among Jordanian women was 39.8 %. A regression analysis revealed that occupation, low social support, financial problems, difficult marital relationships, difficult relationship with family-in-law, giving birth to a female baby, difficult childbirth, and low self-efficacy were associated with postpartum stress. Conclusions and implications for practice: Jordanian women need support during pregnancy, during and after childbirth. Postpartum emotional support and assessment of symptoms of stress need to be incorporated into routine practice. The opportunity for open discussion along with increased awareness and clarification of common misconceptions about postpartum stress is necessary.

Keywords: prevalence, postpartum, stress, Jordanian women

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13616 Corporate Social Responsibility and Its Impact on Corporate Governance: Comparative Study between Listed Companies on Bucharest and Bombay Stock Exchange

Authors: L. Feleagă, M. Dumitrașcu, N. Feleagă

Abstract:

This article is a research on corporate governance. The aim of the study is to focus a special attention on the importance of corporate social responsibility and corporate governance, which are relevant, indeed necessary, for organizations. In this regard, we analyzed the corporate social responsibility in the context of corporate governance for companies listed on Bucharest and Bombay Stock Exchange. Therefore, we bring into the spotlight some differences between India and Romania linked with the importance ascribed to corporate social responsibility of a company. We presented the results of the demarche and we concluded suggestions regarding further research in this area. The study increases the awareness, identifies and articulates desirable behaviors, which are not intended to be exhaustive.

Keywords: corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, disclosure, listed companies

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