Search results for: youth competition

Authors: Kylie Henderson

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Adapting mental health interventions is important when providing support to those experiencing difficulties. This analysis aimed to explore and evaluate the effectiveness of various forms of mental health interventions. Literature that has analysed face-to-face (F2F), phone (Telehealth), mobile (mHealth) and online (e-interventions) interferences found all interventions were effective in reducing and treating symptoms of mental health disorders. F2F and Telehealth interventions facilitated greater engagement and client satisfaction. Due to accessibility and privacy, mHealth and e-interventions were the preferred methods of engagement with health services for youth and young adults. Regardless, these interventions still identified several barriers of high dropout, low adherence, and lack of awareness. Additionally, a large proportion of interventions lacked evidence-based foundations. Exploration of interventions that utilise a variety of interfaces, as well as incorporated evidence-based literature and clinician experience, show that they benefit those experiencing mental health difficulties. Applications like YourHealth+ provide a combination of interventions (F2F, mHealth, and e-interventions) to improve the wellbeing of job seekers and employment consults. Individuals that have used the application in conjunction with therapy have reported feeling more empowered and demonstrated improved wellbeing. Practitioners have also described improved confidence in their ability to provide support to clients. Therefore, it can be proposed that utilising a variety of interventions as well as incorporating literature and experience is beneficial to those experiencing mental health difficulties and to health practitioners.

Keywords: face-to-face, e-interventions, mHealth, YourHealth+

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Authors: Sujata Sethi, Pawan Kumar, Sameer Aggarwal

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Depression and anxiety are of significant concern in youth with type 1 diabetes mellitus (T1DM) and these are correlated with glycemic control in multiple ways. The extent of depression and anxiety in children with T1DM remains poorly studied in India. The index study aimed to find the prevalence of depression and anxiety and their correlation with HbA1c (glycated hemoglobin) levels in children with T1DM. Material and methods: This study was a cross-sectional study carried out on a purposive sample of 45 children with T1DM. Depressive symptoms were assessed using Children’s Depression Rating Scale-Revised (CDRS-R) and anxiety symptoms were assessed using Spence Children’s Anxiety Scale (SCAS). Glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) levels of all the participants were recorded. Results: 43 out of 45 children were analyzed as HbA1c status for two was not known. 48.8% were females. Mean age was 12.95+2.04. The average duration of diabetes was 3.63+1.82. Mean CDRS-R score was 41.6+12.25 and mean SCAS score was 33.07+12.29. Mean recording of HbA1c level was 7.90+1.51. 27 (62.8%) out of 43 participants had abnormal scores on CDRS-R and 24 (55.8%) out of 43 had abnormal scores on SCAS. The correlation coefficient between HbA1c levels and the CDRS-R score came out to be 0.57 and between HbA1c and SCAS, it was 0.53. Both correlations were significant with the p-value of < 0.02. Conclusion: Children with T1DM have high co-morbidity of depression and anxiety which is significantly correlated with the HbA1c levels. Thus, it becomes important to screen the patients for depression and anxiety for better outcomes.

Keywords: anxiety, depression, HbA1c, T1DM

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Authors: Jian Yang, Atsushi Yagi

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Tree-grass coexistence system is of great importance for forest ecology. Mathematical models are being proposed to study the dynamics of tree-grass coexistence and the stability of the systems. However, few of the models concentrates on spatial dynamics of the tree-grass coexistence. In this study, we modified an age-structured continuous-space population model for forests, obtaining an age-structured continuous-space population model for the tree-grass competition model. In the model, for thermal competitions, adult trees can out-compete grass, and grass can out-compete seedlings. We mathematically studied the model to make sure tree-grass coexistence solutions exist. Numerical experiments demonstrated that a fraction of area that trees or grass occupies can affect whether the coexistence is stable or not. We also tried regulating the mortality of adult trees with other parameters and the fraction of area trees and grass occupies were fixed; results show that the mortality of adult trees is also a factor affecting the stability of the tree-grass coexistence in this model.

Keywords: population-structured models, stabilities of ecosystems, thermal competitions, tree-grass coexistence systems

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Authors: Kittipong Tissayakorn, Fumio Akagi, Yu Song

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Manufacturers have been exploring innovative strategies to achieve and sustain competitive advantages as they face a new era of intensive global competition. Such strategy is known as Supply Chain Management (SCM), which has gained a tremendous amount of attention from both researchers and practitioners over the last decade. Supply chain management (SCM) is considered as the most popular operating strategy for improving organizational competitiveness in the twenty-first century. It has attracted a lot of attention recently due to its role involving all of the activities in industrial organizations, ranging from raw material procurement to final product delivery to customers. Well-designed supply chain systems can substantially improve efficiency and product quality, and eventually enhance customer satisfaction and profitability. In this paper, a manufacturing engineering perspective on supply chain integration is presented. Research issues discussed include the product and process design for the supply chain, design evaluation of manufacturing in the supply chain, agent-based techniques for supply chain integration, intelligent information for sharing across the supply chain, and a development of standards for product, process, and production data exchange to facilitate electronic commerce. The objective is to provide guidelines and references for manufacturing engineers and researchers interested in supply chain integration.

Keywords: supply chain, supply chain management, supply chain integration, manufacturing industries

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Authors: Tiberiu Socaciu, Tudor Colomeischi, Eugenia Iancu

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Business failure affects in various proportions shareholders, managers, lenders (banks), suppliers, customers, the financial community, government and society as a whole. In the era in which we have telecommunications networks, exists an interdependence of markets, the effect of a failure of a company is relatively instant. To effectively manage risk exposure is thus require sophisticated support systems, supported by analytical tools to measure, monitor, manage and control operational risks that may arise. As we know, bankruptcy is a phenomenon that managers do not want no matter what stage of life is the company they direct / lead. In the analysis made by us, by the nature of economic models that are reviewed (Altman, Conan-Holder etc.), estimating the risk of bankruptcy of a company corresponds to some extent with its own business cycle tracing of the company. Various models for predicting bankruptcy take into account direct / indirect aspects such as market position, company growth trend, competition structure, characteristics and customer retention, organization and distribution, location etc. From the perspective of our research we will now review the economic models known in theory and practice for estimating the risk of bankruptcy; such models are based on indicators drawn from major accounting firms.

Keywords: Anglo-Saxon models, continental models, national models, statistical models

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Authors: Adewale Oladapo, Carolyn A. Afolami

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Agricultural production should be the major financial contributor to the Nigerian economy; however, the petroleum sector had taken the importance attached to this sector. The situation tends to be more worsening unless necessary attention is given to adequate credit supply among food crop farmers. This research analyses the effect of credit use on the technical efficiency of cassava farmers in Ondo State, Nigeria. Primary data were collected from two hundred randomly selected cassava farmers through a multistage sampling procedure in the study area. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics and stochastic frontier analysis (SFA). Findings revealed that 95.0% of the farmers were male while 56.0% had no formal education and were married. The SFA showed that cassava farmer’s efficiency increased with farm size, herbicide and planting material at 5%,10% and 1% respectively but decreased with fertilizer application at 1% level while farmers’ age, education, household size, experience and access to credit increased technical inefficiency at 10%. The study concluded that cassava farmers are technically inefficient in the use of farm resources and recommended that adequate and workable agricultural policy measures that will ensure availability and efficient fertilizer distribution should be put in place to increase efficiency. Furthermore, the government should encourage youth participation in cassava production and ensure improvement in farmer’s access to credit to increase farmer’s technical efficiency.

Keywords: agriculture, access to credit, cassava farmers, technical efficiency

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Authors: Mahmoud Nassar

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This paper was designed for interviews with companies that had implemented Management Accounting Innovations (MAIs) within Jordanian Industrial Sector in full. Each company in this paper was examined as an entity to obtain an understanding of the process of MAIs adoption and implementation as well as the respondents’ opinions and perspectives of each individual company as to what are considered to be the important factors in the company. By firstly using within-case analysis has the potential to aid in-depth views of the issues and their impact on each particular company. Then, cross-case analysis was used to analyse the similarities and differences of the six companies. The study concludes that, the six companies interviewed gradually moved to using MAIs over the last ten years. The length of time required to implement the MAIs varied across the companies. Interviewees revealed several factors from both the demand and supply side that influence implementation of MAIs within the Jordanian industrial companies. Respondents mentioned and emphasised the important effect of the following factors: top management support, education about ABC concept and benefits, training programmes, shortcoming of existing cost system, competition, size of company, professional accounting bodies, management accounting journals, management accounting research and PhD degrees, and cooperation between universities and companies.

Keywords: industrial sector, innovations, Jordan, management accounting

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Authors: Germán Gálvez-García, Marta Lavin, Javiera Peña, Javier Albayay, Claudio Bascour, Jesus Fernandez-Gomez, Alicia Pérez-Gálvez

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We studied the effectiveness of response inhibition in movements with different degrees of motor complexity when they were executed in isolation and alternately. Sixteen participants performed the Stroop task which was used as a measure of response inhibition. Participants responded by lifting the index finger and reaching the screen with the same finger. Both actions were performed separately and alternately in different experimental blocks. Repeated measures ANOVAs were used to compare reaction time, movement time, kinematic errors and Movement errors across conditions (experimental block, movement, and congruency). Delta plots were constructed to perform distributional analyses of response inhibition and accuracy rate. The effectiveness of response inhibition did not show difference when the movements were performed in separated blocks. Nevertheless, it showed differences when they were performed alternately in the same experimental block, being more effective for the lifting action. This could be due to a competition of the available resources during a more complex scenario which also demands to adopt some strategy to avoid errors.

Keywords: response inhibition, motor complexity, Stroop task, delta plots

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Authors: William Brasier, Nicolas Rabin, Celeste Joly

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Japanese knotweed (Fallopia japonica) is very present on the banks of the Rhone, colonizing more and more areas along the river. The Compagnie Nationale du Rhone (C.N.R.), which manages the river, has experimented with several control techniques in recent years. Since 2015, 15 experimental plots have been monitored on the banks of a restored river appendix to measure the effect of three control methods: confinement by felt, repeated mowing and the planting of competing species and/or species with allelopathic power: Viburnum opulus, Rhamnus frangula, Sambucus ebulus and Juglans regia. Each year, the number of stems, the number of elderberry plants, the height of the plants and photographs were collected. After six years of monitoring, the results showed that the density of knotweed stems decreased by 50 to 90% on all plots. The control methods are sustainable and are gradually gaining in efficiency. The establishment of native plants coupled with regular manual maintenance can reduce the development of Japanese knotweed. Continued monitoring over the next few years will determine the kinetics of the total eradication (i.e. 0 stem/plot) of the Japanese knotweed by these methods.

Keywords: fallopia japonica, interspecific plant competition , Rhone river, riparian trees

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Authors: Arth Bohra, Marwa Mahmoud

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In this paper, we utilize computer vision to develop a tool for youth coaches to formulate set-piece tactics for their players. We used the Soccernet database to extract the ResNet features and camera calibration data for over 3000 corner kick across 500 professional matches in the top 6 European leagues (English Premier League, UEFA Champions League, Ligue 1, La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga). Leveraging the provided homography matrix, we construct a feature vector representing the formation of players on these corner kicks. Additionally, labeling the videos manually, we obtained the pass-trajectory of each of the 3000+ corner kicks by segmenting the field into four zones. Next, after determining the localization of the players and ball, we used event data to give the corner kicks a rating on a 1-4 scale. By employing a Convolutional Neural Network, our model managed to predict the success of a corner kick given the formations of players. This suggests that with the right formations, teams can optimize the way they approach corner kicks. By understanding this, we can help coaches formulate set-piece tactics for their own teams in order to maximize the success of their play. The proposed model can be easily extended; our method could be applied to even more game situations, from free kicks to counterattacks. This research project also gives insight into the myriad of possibilities that artificial intelligence possesses in transforming the domain of sports.

Keywords: soccer, corner kicks, AI, computer vision

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Authors: Godwin A. Otogo, Sansanee Wangvoralak, Graham J. Pierce, Lee C. Hastie, Beth Scott

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The squid Loligo forbesii is suspected to be an important species in marine food webs, as it can strongly impact its prey and be impacted upon by predation, competition, fishing and/or climate variability. To quantify these impacts in the food web, the measurement of its trophic position and ecological role within well-studied ecosystems is essential. An Ecopath model was balanced and run for the Moray Firth ecosystem and was used to investigate the significance of this squid’s trophic roles. The network analysis routine included in Ecopath with Ecosim (EwE) was used to estimate trophic interaction, system indicators (health condition and developmental stage) and food web features. Results indicated that within the Moray Firth squid occupy a top trophic position in the food web and also a major prey item for many other species. Results from Omnivory Index (OI) showed that squid is a generalized feeder transferring energy across wide trophic levels and is more important as a predator than that as a prey in the Moray Firth ecosystem. The results highlight the importance of taking squid into account in the management of Europe’s living marine resources.

Keywords: Squid, Loligo forbesii, Ecopath, Moray Firth, Trophic level

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Authors: Madjid Nancy, Rakinaung Natalia, Lumowa Fresy

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Background: Bullying becomes one of the problems that concern the world of education, especially in adolescents, which has a negative impact on learning achievement, psychology, and physical health. The psychological impact is shame, depression, distress, fear, sadness, and anxiety, so that if prolonged leave can lead to depression in the victim. While the impact on physical health in the form of bruises on the hit area, blisters, swelling and in more severe cases will lead to death. Objectives: This study aims to explore the perception of bullying in adolescent students Sekolah Menengah Kejuruan (SMK) Negeri 1 Manado and the people associated with that adolescent students. Methods: This research uses descriptive qualitative research design and using thematic analysis, and supported by Urie Bronfenbrenner Ecological Framework. The data collection that will be used is by in-depth interview. Sampling using purposive sampling and snowball techniques. This research was conducted at SMK Negeri 1 Manado. Result: From the analysis obtained three themes with the categories: 1) the perception of bullying with categories are: Understanding of Bullying and The Impact of Bullying, 2) the originator of bullying with categories are: Fulfillment of Youth Development Tasks and Needs, Peers Influence, and Family Communication; 3) the effort to handle bullying with categories are: the Individual Coping and Teacher Role. Conclusion: This research get three themes, those are perception of bullying, bullying’s originator and the effort of handling bullying.

Keywords: adolscent, students, bullying, perception

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Authors: B. Kodedova, E. Filova, M. Kralovic, E. Amler

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Vitiligo is the most common depigmentation disorder of the skin characterized by loss of melanocyte in the epidermis that leads to white lesions. One of the possible treatments is autologous transplantation of melanocytes. Biodegradable electrospun polymeric nanofibers provide good mechanical properties and could serve as suitable scaffold for epithelial cells cultivation and follow up transplantation. Moreover the microarchitecture of nanofibers mimics the structure of extracellular matrix and its porosity allows nutrients and waste exchange. The aim of this work was to develop biocompatible and biodegradable polymeric scaffolds suitable for autologous melanocytes transplantation. Electrospun polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) nanofibers were modified by cold methane plasma to lower their hydrofility and to achieve better adhesion, proliferation and viability of the murine melanocyte (Melan-a). Cells were seeded on the modified scaffolds and their adhesion, metabolic activity, proliferation and melanin synthesis was evaluated and compared to non-modified scaffolds. Results clearly indicate that cold methane plasma modified PVA nanofibers are suitable for melanocyte cultivation and may be future candidate for vitiligo treatment. Furthermore, the nanofibers can be functionalized with various bioactive substances, for enhancement of the melanocyte proliferation, melanogenesis or healing and regenerative processes. The project was supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports NPU I: LO1309 and by Grant Agency of Charles University (grant No. 1228214).

Keywords: melanocyte, nanofibers, polyvinyl alcohol, plasma modification

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Authors: Nikolaos Georgantzis, Efi Vasileiou

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We present results from experimental price-setting oligopolies in which green firms undertake different levels of energy-saving investments motivated by public subsidies and demand-side advantages. We find that consumers reveal higher willingness to pay for greener sellers’ products. This observation in conjunction to the fact that greener sellers set higher prices is compatible with the use and interpretation of energy-saving behaviour as a differentiation strategy. However, sellers do not exploit the resulting advantage through sufficiently high price-cost margins, because they seem trapped into “run to stay still” competition. Regarding the use of public subsidies to energy-saving sellers we uncover an undesirable crowding-out effect of consumers’ intrinsic tendency to support green manufacturers. Namely, consumers may be less willing to support a green seller whose energy-saving strategy entails a direct financial benefit. Finally, we disentangle two alternative motivations for consumer’s attractions to pro-social firms; first, the self-interested recognition of the firm’s contribution to the public and private welfare and, second, the need to compensate a firm for the cost entailed in each pro-social action. Our results show the prevalence of the former over the latter.

Keywords: corporate social responsibility, energy savings, public good, experiments, vertical differentiation, altruism

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Authors: Amin Banae Babazadeh

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In the contemporary world, NGOs are considered as important tool for motivating the community. So they committed their true mission and the promotion of civic participation and strengthen social identities. Functional characteristics of non-governmental organizations are the element to leverage the centers of political and social development of powerful governments since they are concrete and familiar with the problems of society and the operational strategies which would facilitate this process of mutual trust between the people and organizations. NGOs on the one hand offer reasonable solutions in line with approved organizations as agents to match between the facts and reality of society and on the other hand changes to a tool to have true political, social and economic behavior. However, the NGOs are active in the formulation of national relations and policy formulation in an organized and disciplined based on three main factors, i.e., resources, policies, and institutions. Organizations are not restricted to state administration in centralized system bodies and this process in the democratic system limits the accumulation of desires and expectations and at the end reaches to the desired place. Hence, this research will attempt to emphasis on field research (questionnaire) and according to the development evolution and role of NGOs analyze the effects of this center on youth. Therefore, the hypothesis is that there is a direct relationship between the Enlightenment and the effectiveness of policy towards NGOs and solving social damages.

Keywords: civic participation, community vulnerability, insightful, NGO, urmia

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Authors: Hanady Al-Zagheer

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The purpose of this paper research is to introduce the role of the social media (face book) in growing small and medium enterprises in Jordan, Today’s developments of information technologies are dazzling. Using information technologies results in having advantages in competition, decreasing costs, gaining time, and getting and sharing information. Now it is possible to state that there are different types of usage within the information technologies. Small and medium enterprises have been grown rapidly in recent years and continue to grow. Jordanian females have played a large role in the growth of entrepreneurship and have made an impact on household economics. Virtual storefronts have allowed these women to balance roles assigned by tradition and culture while becoming successful providers. If you have a small business with a limited public relations and advertising budget, Facebook can be a cost effective way to promote your services because opening an account is free. However, this can work against you if you do not maintain the page. A Face book page without frequent updates can destroy your brand value and image. According to a 2009 Computerworld article by Lisa Hoover, having a Facebook page that looks abandoned is worse than having no page at all. You might need to hire someone or pay an employee to update your business’s Facebook page.

Keywords: social media, social media small, medium enterprises, Jordan

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Authors: Franklin Nantui Mabe, Gideon Danso-Abbeam, Dennis Sedem Ehiakpor

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In order for the government of Ghana through the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to motivate farmers to adopt improved agricultural technologies, expand their farms and encourage youth to enter into agricultural production so as to increase crop productivity, “Planting for Food and Jobs” (PFJ) programme was launched in April 2017. The PFJ programme covers five pillars, namely, provision of subsidized and improved seeds; subsidized fertilizer; agricultural extension services; establishment of markets; and e-agriculture. This study assesses the awareness of farmers about the packages of these pillars using the Likert scale, paired t-test and Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient. The study adopted a mixed research design. A semi-structured questionnaire and checklist were used to collect data. The data collection was done using interviews and focus group discussions. The PFJ pillar farmers are much aware is a subsidy on fertilizer followed by a subsidy on improved seeds. Electronic agriculture is a pillar with the lowest level of awareness. There is a strong positive correlation between awareness of fertilizer and seed packages suggestion their complementarities. Lack of information/awareness of the packages of the programme can affect farmers’ participation in all the pillars. Farmers, in particular, should be educated for them to know what they are entitled to in each of the pillars. The programme implementation plan should also be made available to farmers as a guide.

Keywords: awareness, planting for food and jobs, programme, farmers, likert scale

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Authors: Jolien Rijlaarsdam, Charlotte A. M. Cecil, J. Marieke Buil, Pol A. C. Van Lier, Edward D. Barker

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Although there is mounting evidence that the experience of being bullied associates with both internalizing and externalizing symptoms, it is not known yet whether the identified associations are specific to these symptoms or shared between them. The primary focus of this study is to assess the prospective associations of bullying exposure with both general and specific (i.e., internalizing, externalizing) factors of psychopathology. This study included data from 6,210 children participating in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). Child bullying was measured by self-report at ages 8 and 10 years. Child psychopathology symptoms were assessed by parent-interview, using the Development and Well-being Assessment (DAWBA) at ages 7 and 13 years. Bullying exposure is significantly associated with the general psychopathology factor in early adolescence. In particular, chronically victimized youth exposed to multiple forms of bullying (i.e., both overt and relational) showed the highest levels of general psychopathology. Bullying exposure is also associated with both internalizing and externalizing factors from the correlated-factors model. However, the effect estimates for these factors decreased considerably in size and dropped to insignificant for the internalizing factor after extracting the shared variance that belongs to the general factor of psychopathology. In an integrative longitudinal model, higher levels of general psychopathology at age seven are associated with bullying exposure at age eight, which, in turn, is associated with general psychopathology at age 13 through its two-year continuity. Findings suggest that exposure to bullying is a risk factor for a more general vulnerability to psychopathology through mutually influencing relationships.

Keywords: bullying exposure, externalizing, general psychopathology, internalizing, longitudinal

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Authors: Asma Ameur, Dhafer Malouche

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Hotel competitiveness research is an essential phase of the marketing strategy for any hotel. Certainly, knowing the hotels' competitors helps the hotelier to grasp its position in the market and the citizen to make the right choice in picking a hotel. Thus, competitiveness is an important indicator that can be influenced by various factors. In fact, the issue of competitiveness, this ability to cope with competition, remains a difficult and complex concept to define and to exploit. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to make an exploratory study to calculate a competitiveness indicator for hotels. Further on, this paper makes it possible to determine the criteria of direct or indirect effect on the image and the perception of a hotel. The actual research is used to look into the right model for hotel ‘competitiveness. For this reason, we exploit different theoretical contributions in the field of machine learning. Thus, we use some statistical techniques such as the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to reduce the dimensions, as well as other techniques of statistical modeling. This paper presents a survey covering of the techniques and methods in hotel competitiveness research. Furthermore, this study allows us to deduct the significant variables that influence the determination of hotel’s competitors. Lastly, the discussed experiences in this article found that the hotel competitors are influenced by several factors with different rates.

Keywords: competitiveness, e-reputation, hotels' competitors, online hotel’ review, principal component analysis, statistical modeling

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Authors: H. N. Cheung

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Self-compassion encourages one to accept oneself, reduce self-criticism and self-judgment, and see one’s shortcomings and setbacks in a balanced view. Adolescent self-compassion is a crucial protective factor against mental illness. It is, however, affected by gender. Given the scarcity of self-compassion scales for adolescents, the current study evaluates the Self-Compassion Scale for Youth (SCS-Y) in a large cross-cultural sample and investigates how the subscales of SCS-Y relate to the dimensions of depressive symptoms across gender. Through the internet-based Qualtrics, a total of 2881 teenagers aged 12 to 18 years were recruited from Hong Kong (HK), China, and the United Kingdom. A Multiple Indicator Multiple Cause (MIMIC) model was used to evaluate measurement invariance of the SCS-Y, and differential item functioning (DIF) was checked across gender. Upon the establishment of the best model, a multigroup structural equation model (SEM) was built between factors of SCS-Y and Multidimensional depression assessment scale (MDAS) which assesses four dimensions of depressive symptoms (emotional, cognitive, somatic and interpersonal). The SCS-Y was shown to have good reliability and validity. The MIMIC model produced a good model fit for a hypothetical six-factor model (CFI = 0.980; TLI = 0.974; RMSEA = 0.038) and no item was flagged for DIF across gender. A gender difference was observed between SCS-Y factors and depression dimensions. Conclusions: The SCS-Y exhibits good psychometric characteristics, including measurement invariance across gender. The study also highlights the gender difference between self-compassion factors and depression dimensions.

Keywords: self compassion, gender, depression, structural equation modelling, MIMIC model

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Authors: Yasar N. Kavil, Yasser A. Shaban, Radwan K. Al Farawati, Mohamed I. Orif, Shahed U. M. Khanc

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Photocatalytic way of reduction of CO₂ in polluted seawater into chemical fuel, methanol, was successfully gained over Cu/C-co-doped TiO₂ nanoparticles under UV and natural sunlight. A homemade stirred batch annular reactor was used to carry out the photocatalytic reduction experiments. Photocatalysts with various Cu loadings (0, 0.5, 1, 3, 5 and 7 wt.%) were synthesized by the sol-gel procedure and were characterized by XRD, SEM, UV–Vis, FTIR, and XPS. The photocatalytic production of methanol was promoted by the co-doping with C and Cu into TiO₂. This improvement was attributed to the modification of bandgap energy and the hindrance of the charges recombination. The polluted seawater showing the yield depended on its background hydrographic parameters. We assessed two types of polluted seawater system, the observed yield was 2910 and 990 µmol g⁻¹ after 5 h of illumination under UV and natural sunlight respectively in system 1 and the corresponding yield in system 2 was 2250 and 910 µmol g⁻¹ after 5 h of illumination. The production of methanol in the case of oxygen-depleted water was low, this is mainly attributed to the competition of methanogenic bacteria over methanol production. The results indicated that the methanol yield produced by Cu-C/TiO₂ was much higher than those of carbon-modified titanium oxide (C/TiO₂) and Degussa (P25-TiO₂). Under the current experimental condition, the optimum loading was achieved by the doping of 3 wt % of Cu. The highest methanol yield was obtained over 1 g L-1 of 3wt% Cu/C-TiO₂.

Keywords: CO₂ photoreduction, copper, Cu/C-co-doped TiO₂, methanol, seawater

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Authors: Nicanor Garcia Alvarez, Belarmino Adenso-Diaz, Laura Calzada Infante

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In recent years, researchers have shown an interest in modelling maritime traffic as a complex network. In this paper, we propose a bipartite weighted network to model maritime traffic and detect port maritime communities. The bipartite weighted network considers two different types of nodes. The first one represents Spanish ports, while the second one represents the countries with which there is major import/export activity. The flow among both types of nodes is modeled by weighting the volume of product transported. To illustrate the model, the data is segmented by each type of traffic. This will allow fine tuning and the creation of communities for each type of traffic and therefore finding similar ports for a specific type of traffic, which will provide decision-makers with tools to search for alliances or identify their competitors. The traffic with the greatest impact on the Spanish gross domestic product is selected, and the evolution of the communities formed by the most important ports and their differences between 2019 and 2009 will be analyzed. Finally, the set of communities formed by the ports of the Spanish port system will be inspected to determine global similarities between them, analyzing the sum of the membership of the different ports in communities formed for each type of traffic in particular.

Keywords: bipartite networks, competition, infomap, maritime traffic, port communities

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Authors: Umulisa Linda, Andy Cons Matata

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The origin of legal feminism can be attributed to an attempt to provide a safe space for women such as voting, parental, and inheritance rights, among others. It was also a rebellion against male supremacy. However, with the development of technology and especially in the era of the internet, it appears that both legal feminism and the modernism are losing their luster. While these movements had their origin either in the United States of America or western Europe, their impacts have been felt as far as Africa, Asia, and Latin America. In Africa, different countries have different levels of penetration of these movements. This study, therefore, had its focus on how legal feminism and modernism have influenced legal developments in Kenya and Rwanda. The study adopted a qualitative approach with the respondents being asked about their feelings and perceptions on how the two movements had affected legal developments in their countries. In order to gauge the opinion of different categories of people such as the youth, middle-aged and the elderly people as well as being gender-sensitive, the study adopted a purpose method of sampling. The questionnaires and the focus group discussions were employed as the main tools for data gathering. From the questionnaires, the focus group discussions, and the data analysis that followed, the study concluded that both legal feminism and modernity had penetrated the legal systems of both Kenya and Rwanda so deeply. The study further found that the proponents of the two movements were mostly urban based and educated women. The men were generally opposed to the movements.

Keywords: legal development, legal feminsim, modernism, voting, parental and inheritance rights

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Authors: Göksel Şimşek

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Celebrities are admired, appreciated and imitated all over the world. As a natural result of this, today many brands choose to work with celebrities for their advertisements. It can be said that the more the brands include celebrities in their marketing communication strategies, the tougher the competition in this field becomes and they allocate a large portion of their marketing budget to this. Brands invest in celebrities who will represent them in order to build the image they want to create. This study aimed to bring under spotlight the perceptions of Turkish customers regarding the use of celebrities in advertisements and marketing communication and try to understand their possible effects on subsequent purchasing decisions. In addition, consumers’ reactions and perceptions were investigated in the context of the product-celebrity match, to what extent the celebrity conforms to the concept of the advertisement and the celebrity-target audience match. In order to achieve this purpose, a quantitative research was conducted as a case study concerning Mavi Jeans (textile company). Information was obtained through survey. The results from this case study are supported by relevant theories concerning the main subject. The most valuable result would be that instead of creating an advertisement around a celebrity in demand at the time, using a celebrity that fits the concept of the advertisement and feeds the concept rather than replaces it, that is celebrity endorsement, will lead to more striking and positive results.

Keywords: celebrity endorsement, product-celebrity match, advertising, social sciences

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Authors: Hadach Mohamed

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Tourism becomes more and more a source of added value for developing countries. In Morocco, the sector contributes at 20% of national GDP, or the effects of this activity become increasingly harmful. The methodology we followed is qualitative, we analyzed the data according to a process-based approach in two longitudinal period from 2001 to 2009 and a period of real time from 2010 to 2014.Through a process-based longitudinal study we analyzed the effects of tourism on the three components of sustainability: economic, environmental and socio-cultural in Essaouira destination in the south west of Morocco. The objective of this paper is to identify among others, harmful effects of mass tourism on fragile destination in terms of load capacity, promotion of youth employment and respect for indigenous traditions. This study also aims to analyze the impact of tourism on the fragile destination, which depends heavily on this activity; it also seeks to test a series of indicators for sustainable development of sensitive areas. Within results, we found that tourism as an activity is very linked to the international situation, tested sustainable development indicators showed us that tourism is environmentally destructive, job creator and changer modes and lives of indigenous. Between the two periods analyzed, the situation becomes more and more vulnerable and the state intervention is becoming more indispensable. We also found that 70% of the population of the destination does not benefit from the income generated by the destination. This raises questions about the fate of the added value of this activity.

Keywords: economic, environmental and socio-cultural, fragile destination, tourism sustainability

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Authors: Luljeta Gashi, Naser Ramadani, Zana Deva, Dafina Gexha-Bunjaku

Abstract:

The official HIV/AIDS data in Kosovo are based on HIV case reporting from health-care services, the blood transfusion system and Voluntary Counselling and Testing centres. Between 1986 and 2014, are reported 95 HIV and AIDS cases, of which 49 were AIDS, 46 HIV and 40 deaths. The majority (69%) of cases were men, age group 25 to 34 (37%) and route of transmission is: heterosexual (90%), MSM (7%), vertical transmission (2%) and IDU (1%). Based on existing data and the UNAIDS classification system, Kosovo is currently still categorised as having a low-level HIV epidemic. Even though with a low HIV prevalence, Kosovo faces a number of threatening factors, including increased number of drug users, a stigmatized and discriminated MSM community, high percentage of youth among general population (57% of the population under the age of 25), with changing social norms and especially the sexual ones. Methods: Data collection was done using self administered structured questionnaires amongst 249 high school students. Data were analysed using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). Results: The findings revealed that 68% of students know that HIV transmission can be reduced by having sex with only one uninfected partner who has no other partners, 94% know that the risk of getting HIV can be reduced by using a condom every time they have sex, 68% know that a person cannot get HIV from mosquito bites, 81% know that they cannot get HIV by sharing food with someone who is infected and 46% know that a healthy looking person can have HIV. Conclusions: Seventy one percent of high school students correctly identify ways of preventing the sexual transmission of HIV and who reject the major misconceptions about HIV transmission. The findings of the study indicate a need for more health education and promotion.

Keywords: Kosovo, KPAR, HIV, high school

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Authors: Vilasinee Jintalikhitdee, Saowapa Phaithayawat

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The research on “The Way of Life of the Civil Servant Community under the Bureau of the Royal Household” aims to study 1) the way of life of the people who live in the civil servant community in Tha Wasukri, and 2) the model of community administration of civil servants under the Bureau of the Royal Household. This research is conducted qualitatively and quantitatively by collecting data from interviews, focus group discussion, participant and non-participant observation along with the data from the questionnaire based on age groups which include elder group, working age group and youth group. The result of the research shows that the origin of this community is related to the history during the Rama V’s reign. It has been a harbor for the king to boat in any royal ceremonies; this custom is still maintained until today. The status or position of person who serves the king in terms of working is often inherited from the bureau of the Royal Household based on his/her consanguinity and, hence, further receives the rights to live in the Tha Wasukri area. Therefore, this community has some special characteristics demonstrating the way of living influenced by the regulation of the Bureau of the Royal Household such as respecting elders and interdependence in which there is internal social organization with the practice of bureaucracy in going in and out the community. The person who has rights to live here must be friendly to everybody so that this community will be a safe place for lives and property. The administration based on the model of Bangkok for local administration was used as an external structure only, but the way of living still follows the practice of the Bureau of the Royal Household.

Keywords: way of life, community, Tha Wasukri, Bureau of the Royal Household

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Authors: Eylem Koç, Hasan Arda Burhan

Abstract:

Location selection presents a crucial decision problem in today’s business world where strategic decision making processes have critical importance. Thus, location selection has strategic importance for companies in boosting their strength regarding competition, increasing corporate performances and efficiency in addition to lowering production and transportation costs. A right choice in location selection has a direct impact on companies’ commercial success. In this study, a store location selection problem of Carglass Turkey which operates in vehicle glass branch is handled. As this problem includes both tangible and intangible criteria, Analytic Network Process (ANP) was accepted as the main methodology. The model consists of control hierarchy and BOCR subnetworks which include clusters of actors, alternatives and criteria. In accordance with the management’s choices, five different locations were selected. In addition to the literature review, a strict cooperation with the actor group was ensured and maintained while determining the criteria and during whole process. Obtained results were presented to the management as a report and its feasibility was confirmed accordingly.

Keywords: analytic network process (ANP), BOCR, multi-actor decision making, multi-criteria decision making, real-life problem, location selection

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Authors: Atcharawan Phenwansuk

Abstract:

The product design is important to the development of SME towards the global, because it made to the quality product to react the needs of consumers and could reduces cost in the production, making it more profitable. As a results, the business are competition advantage for more marketing. It also enhance image of product and firms to build its own brand products to be acceptable. The product was designed should be shape, size, colorful, and direct of target consumers. This is method to add value products to get popular and effective, because the beauty is first satisfaction which come from main shape and color of the design product, but the product was designed need to hold data and law combination of shape and color between artistic theory and satisfaction of consumers together. The design must consider the safety of life and asset of consumers the most important. From to use of designed products should be to consider the cost savings, convenient distance, transportation, routes (land, water or air) of living space on transport (capacity, volume, width, length of the car, truck and container, etc). The packaging must be can to prevent not damage of the products. If products is more large , maybe to design new packaging, which can easily disassembled for make smaller package such as designing the assembly. Products must be packed in the container for size standard for save costs, as well as the buyer can make transport and assembly of products to fit easily on your own.

Keywords: logistics process , pineapple’s leaves product, product design, satisfaction of consumers

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Authors: Mehrnoosh Askarizadeh

Abstract:

People, process and IT are the most important assets of any organization. Optimal utilization of these resources has been the question of research in business for many decades. The business world have responded by inventing various methodologies that can be used for addressing problems of quality improvement, efficiency of processes, continuous improvement, reduction of waste, automation, strategy alignments etc. Some of these methodologies can be commonly called as Business Process Quality Management methodologies (BPQM). In essence, the first references to the process management can be traced back to Frederick Taylor and scientific management. Time and motion study was addressed to improvement of manufacturing process efficiency. The ideas of scientific management were in use for quite a long period until more advanced quality management techniques were developed in Japan and USA. One of the first prominent methods had been Total Quality Management (TQM) which evolved during 1980’s. About the same time, Six Sigma (SS) originated at Motorola as a separate method. SS spread and evolved; and later joined with ideas of Lean manufacturing to form Lean Six Sigma. In 1990’s due to emerging IT technologies, beginning of globalization, and strengthening of competition, companies recognized the need for better process and quality management. Business Process Management (BPM) emerged as a novel methodology that has taken all this into account and helped to align IT technologies with business processes and quality management. In this article we will study various aspects of above mentioned methods and identified their relations.

Keywords: e-process, quality, TQM, BPM, lean, six sigma, CPI, information technology, management

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