Search results for: social and emotional teaching

Authors: Sanja Obradovic, Vladimir Stojanovic

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The purpose of this paper is to examine the attitudes of residents toward sustainable tourism development in the Bačko Podunavlje Biosphere Reserve (BPBR) in northwestern Serbia. BPBR is a part of 'the European Amazon', world's first five-country Transboundary UNESCO Biosphere Reserve 'Mura-Drava-Danube'. Sustainable tourism development requires the engagement of local residents. Within the initial stage of tourism development, it is important to address residents' attitudes from the early beginning, thus further involve the local community through all phases of development, which in return will largely influence overall success. Data were collected through in-person (face-to-face) questionnaire. The research also addresses the quality of the sustainable tourism attitude scale (SUS-TAS), perceived as an instrument to measure local communities' attitudes towards sustainable tourism development. SUS-TAS has seven variables, which are named as environmental sustainability, perceived social cost, long-term planning, perceived economic benefit, community center economy, ensuring visitor satisfaction, and maximizing community participation. Data were analyzed using SPSS. Findings indicate that residents have a positive attitude toward the development of sustainable tourism in the BPBR. They also recognized the importance of environmental sustainability and preservation for future generations. The study shows that BPBR has a very good community to support sustainable tourism activities in each area considered.

Keywords: biosphere reserve, local resident's attitude, sustainable tourism attitude scale, SUS-TAS, sustainable tourism

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Authors: Luciano E. Sewaybricker

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Psychology has faced many challenges in order to claim its right to study happiness. Probably the major issue has been to present a clear definition of happiness, which has a long history outside the scientific field and has been used imprecisely in the daily life. Even after years of great improvement, different meanings of happiness still have been seen in academic studies. This scenario allows to question if any definition is consistent enough to sustain the recent findings of the psychological processes behind happiness. Moreover, does it make sense to seek a single definition of happiness? By investigating the history of happiness and the theoretical foundations of Positive Psychology, it can be advocated that it’s proper for happiness to be polysemic. Since Ancient Greece most attempts to outline happiness consists of an appreciation of the "best way to live" and consequently requires a delineation of the most important things in life. Besides this generic definition, it’s hard to find consensus about happiness. In fact, what and how much something will be considered important to happiness depend on social influence. This compels happiness to vary between groups, historical periods, and even for the same person over time. Therefore, the same psychological processes will not necessarily be behind all forms of happiness. Consequently, three assumptions should be considered when studying happiness: it’s intrinsic of happiness to be transitory and socially influenced; happiness refers not only to what is possible in the present, but also to an ideal future; when someone (including a scientist) talks about happiness they describe and prescribe a better way to live. Because any attempt to define happiness will be limited in space and time, it's more suitable to study its variations than its universalities. This may have considerable consequences to political agenda on happiness evaluation and maximization, like Gross National Happiness and utilitarian initiatives. Happiness policies should be understood as an arbitrary choice amongst all kinds of happiness and as prescriptive of what “the best way to live” should be.

Keywords: happiness, politics, positive psychology, well-being

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Authors: Janis E. Campbell

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Most of what is known about complementary, alternative or traditional medicine (CATM) in the United States today is known from either the National Health Interview Survey a cross-sectional survey with a few questions or from small cross-sectional or cohort studies with specific populations. The broad geographical distribution in CATM use or providers is not known. For this project, we used geospatial cluster analysis to determine if there were clusters of CATM provider by county in the US. In this analysis, we used the National Provider Index to determine the geographic distribution of providers in the US. Of the 215,769 CAMT providers 211,603 resided in the contiguous US: Acupuncturist (26,563); Art, Poetry, Music and Dance Therapist (2,752); Chiropractor (89,514); Doula/Midwife (3,535); Exercise (507); Homeopath (380); Massage Therapist (36,540); Mechanotherapist (1,888); Naprapath (146); Naturopath (4,782); Nutrition (42,036); Reflexologist (522); Religious (2,438). ESRI® spatial autocorrelation was used to determine if the geographic location of CATM providers were random or clustered. For global analysis, we used Getis-Ord General G and for Local Indicators of Spatial Associations with an Optimized Hot Spot Analysis using an alpha of 0.05. Overall, CATM providers were clustered with both low and high. With Chiropractors, focusing in the Midwest, religious providers having very small clusters in the central US, and other types of CAMT focused in the northwest and west coast, Colorado and New Mexico, the great lakes areas and Florida. We will discuss some of the implications of this study, including associations with health, economic, social, and political systems.

Keywords: complementary medicine, alternative medicine, geospatial, United States

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Authors: Daniel Chen, Chengyi Li, Naifu Xu, Shangxuan Yang

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Climate change has led to substantial changes in coastal ecosystems, including elevated ocean temperatures, increased acidity, and disrupted marine habitats. These environmental impacts have also resulted in the decline of traditional Indigenous food sources on the coast of British Columbia, including clams and salmon, which have been essential to the diet and cultural practices of the coastal Indigenous communities. This research evaluates and analyzes the costs and benefits of restoring and building clam gardens, an ancestral Indigenous mariculture technique in the Pacific Northwest. Clam gardens, which involve the construction of intertidal rock walls to enhance clam production, have been shown to more than triple clam yields compared to non-walled beaches. This research analyzes the costs and benefits to Indigenous individuals, including factors such as travel, equipment, time, food supply, and cultural engagement; then it discusses the potential of clam gardens as a significant food resource with additional environmental co-benefits, given the prevalence of clam gardens and coastlines in British Columbia. Moreover, the study concludes with policy recommendations to support the restoration and preservation of clam gardens, highlighting their potential to provide sustainable seafood production, environmental co-benefits, and social-environmental educational opportunities for Indigenous communities and the wider public.

Keywords: British Columbia coastline, clam garden, coastal resource management, Indigenous communities

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Authors: Xue Wang, Li-Wei Fan

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The technology innovation has become the driving force of social and economic development and transformation. The guidance and support of public policies is an important condition to promote the realization of technology innovation goals. Policy effectiveness evaluation is instructive in policy learning and adjustment. This paper reviews existing studies and systematically evaluates the effectiveness of policy-driven technological innovation. We used 167 articles from WOS and CNKI databases as samples to clarify the measurement of technological innovation indicators and analyze the classification and application of policy evaluation methods. In general, technology innovation input and technological output are the two main aspects of technological innovation index design, among which technological patents are the focus of research, the number of patents reflects the scale of technological innovation, and the quality of patents reflects the value of innovation from multiple aspects. As for policy evaluation methods, statistical analysis methods are applied to the formulation, selection and evaluation of the after-effect of policies to analyze the effect of policy implementation qualitatively and quantitatively. The bibliometric methods are mainly based on the public policy texts, discriminating the inter-government relationship and the multi-dimensional value of the policy. Decision analysis focuses on the establishment and measurement of the comprehensive evaluation index system of public policy. The economic analysis methods focus on the performance and output of technological innovation to test the policy effect. Finally, this paper puts forward the prospect of the future research direction.

Keywords: technology innovation, index, policy effectiveness, evaluation of policy, bibliometric analysis

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Authors: Ahmed Deen

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The introduction of the mobile devices which were equipped with internet access and a camera, as well as the messaging services, has become a major inspiration for the use of the mobile devices in the growth in the reporting of news. Mobile journalism (MOJO) was a creation of modern technology, especially the use of mobile technology for video journalism purposes. MOJO, thus, is the process by which information is collected and disseminated to society, through the use of mobile technology, and even the use of the tablets. This paper seeks to better understand the ethics of Saudi mobile journalists towards news coverage. Also, this study aims to explore the relationship between minimizing harms and truth-seeking efforts among Saudi mobile journalists. Three main ethics were targeted in this study, which are seek truth and report it, minimize harm, and being accountable. Diffusion of innovation theory applied to reach this study’s goals. The non- probability sampling approach, ‘Snowball Sampling’ was used to target 124 survey participants, an online survey via SurveyMonkey that was distributed through social media platforms as a web link. The code of ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists has applied as a scale in this study. This study found that the relationship between minimizing harm and truth-seeking efforts is significantly moderate among Saudi mobile journalists. Also, it is found that the level journalistic experiences and using smartphones to cover news are weakly and negatively related to the perceptions of mobile journalism among Saudi journalists, while Saudi journalists who use their smartphone to cover the news between 1-3 years, were the majority of participants (55 participants by 51.4%).

Keywords: mobile journalism, Saudi journalism, smartphone, Saudi Arabia

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Authors: Agustinus Bandur, Dyah Budiastuti

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With the rapid development of information and communication technology (ICT) in globalisation era, higher education (HE) internationalisation has become a worldwide phenomenon. However, even though various studies have been widely published in existing literature, the settings of these studies were taken places in developed countries. Accordingly, the major purpose of this article is to explore the current trends of higher education internationalisation programs with particular reference to identify the benefits and challenges confronted by participating staff and students. For these purposes, ethnographic qualitative study with the usage of NVivo 11 software was applied in coding, analyzing, and visualization of non-numeric data gathered from interviews, videos, web contents, social media, and relevant documents. Purposive sampling technique was applied in this study with a total of ten high-ranked accredited government and private universities in Indonesia. On the basis of thematic and cross-case analyses, this study indicates that while Australia has led other countries in dual-degree programs, partner universities from Japan and Korea have the most frequent collaboration on student exchange programs. Meanwhile, most visiting scholars who have collaborated with the universities in this study came from the US, the UK, Japan, Australia, Netherlands, and China. Other European countries such as Germany, French, and Norway have also conducted joint research with Indonesian universities involved in this study. This study suggests that further supports of government policy and grants are required to overcome the challenges as well as strategic leadership and management roles to achieve high impacts of such programs on higher education quality.

Keywords: higher education, internationalisation, challenges, Indonesia

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Authors: Damien P. Fevre, Peter K. Dearden

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Honeybee population sustainability is a critical concern for environmental stability and human food security. The success of a colony relies heavily on the egg-laying capacity of the queen, as it determines the production of thousands of worker bees who, in turn, perform essential functions in foraging and transforming food to make it digestible for the colony. The main sources of nutrition for honeybees are nectar, providing carbohydrates, and pollen, providing protein. This study delves into the impact of the proportion of these macronutrients on the food consumption patterns of nurse bees responsible for feeding the queen and how it affects the characteristics of the eggs produced. Using nutritional geometry, qRT-PCR, and RNA-seq analysis, this study sheds light on the pivotal role of nutrition in influencing gene expression in nurse bees, honeybee queen egg-laying capacity and embryonic development. Interestingly, while nutrition is crucial, the queen's genotype plays an even more significant role in this complex relationship, highlighting the importance of genotype-by-environment interactions. Understanding the interplay between genotype and nutrition is key to optimizing beekeeping management and strategic queen breeding practices. The findings from this study have significant implications for beekeeping practices, emphasizing the need for an appropriate nutrition to support the social nutrition of Apis mellifera. Implementing these insights can lead to improved colony health, increased productivity, and sustainable honeybee conservation efforts.

Keywords: honeybee, egg-laying, nutrition, transcriptomics

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Authors: Denis Nono, Catherine Abbo, Thomas Wenzel

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Introduction: The study explored socio-cultural perspectives of childhood disorders and its implications for health seeking. Emphasis was on exploring local understanding and perceptions and how these ideas affect health seeking. Study aim: To explore the socio-cultural perspectives of neuro-developmental disorders and its implications on health seeking behaviour. Methods: The methods used in this study included key informant interviews conducted with health professionals. Parents of the children aged (6-15 years) with neuro-developmental disorders were recruited from the hospital to participate in focus group discussion, participant observation and individual in-depth interviews. Results: The study found out that stigma extended from children to parents and caregivers who were also shunned by community members. Participants described their children as “a gift from God” others described them as “a test from God”. The communities perceive the disorders as a spiritual infliction and always insisted that the children be taken for Acholi cultural and traditional rituals to cleanse children and they believed that mental illness has spiritual linkages. Conclusion: This study gives unique insights into the perceptions of neuro-developmental disorders and health seeking behavior in Gulu District and neighboring communities. The results showed that communities linked disorders to spiritual affliction, misunderstandings between families, bewitching, and other supernatural forces. Some of the participants highly recommended biomedical approaches to prevention, management and control of the disorders.

Keywords: ethnography, health seeking, neuro-developmental disorders, socio-cultural

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Authors: Chenxu Fang, Qikai Guan

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Riverside public space in mountainous cities has unique scenic resources and humanistic connotations and is an important place indispensable to the activities of urban residents. In recent years, with the continuous development of society and the expansion of the city, the public space along the riverside has been affected to a certain extent. Based on this, this study is based on the concept of health and safety through the study of riverfront space in the local section of Jialing River in Chongqing City; according to the actual use function of riverfront public space, the riverfront public space in mountainous cities is categorized into leisure and recreational riverfront space, ecological conservation waterfront space, and composite function waterfront space. Starting from the health and safety elements affecting the environment in the riverfront public space, the health and safety influencing factors of the riverfront public space are categorized into three major categories, namely, material, non-material, and social, and through the field research and questionnaire collection, combined with the analysis of the Likert scale, the important levels of the health and safety influencing factors of different types of the riverfront public space of the mountainous cities are clarified. We summarize the factors affecting the health and safety of mountainous riverside spaces, map their importance levels to the design of different types of riverside spaces, and put forward three representative paths for the governance of the safety and health of mountainous riverside public space.

Keywords: health and safety, mountain city, riverfront public space, spatial governance, Chongqing Jialing River

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Authors: Jonathan Okewu

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Socio-economic occurrences and developments in any society is usually a thing of concern especially when this is been jeopardised as a result of insecurity of all sorts. There are numerous channels that such issues are brought to the fore for attention. Among this channels are the art media and more precisely the ceramic art media. Renown ceramic artists in Nigeria have taken to the medium of expression (clay) to contribute to succinct issues as it affects the society. This study takes advantage of a unique form of ceramic press moulding termed clay palm press. This uncommon production technique has been developed in this study to interrogate socio-economic insecurity in the form of ceramic art titled; “dancing in bullets and in brokenness”. This work was made possible through a ceramic medium that has been termed “terracotta on canvas”. Extensive studio practice was carried out to generate the terracotta forms for this study. Findings from this study indicates that the medium and mode of execution of the art work shows a unique side of working with clay that negates tactile or three dimensionality of inured ceramic practice. Additionally, the process of clay palm press in this study indicates that it could be therapeutical against medical conditions of muscles of the palm. This is because the process tightens and develops the muscles of the palm further. Dancing in bullets and in brokenness as portrayed through the medium of terracotta on canvas that social and security challenges are not a limiting factor to a resolute Nigerian, despite all, the strong will of Nigerians keeps persisting and overcoming challenges.

Keywords: canvas, dancing in bullets and in brokenness, metaphor, terracotta, palm press

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Authors: Maryam Sadeghi

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Civilization and industrialization are two important factors that make people believe they are just depriving of savagery and brutality. But practical studies show exactly something different. How groups of people behave, when they are put in extreme situations is the very unpleasant truth about the human being in general. Both novels deal with the fragility of human society, no matter the people who are playing a role are children or grown-ups, who by definition should know better. Both novels have got beautiful plots in which no one enforces rules and laws on the characters, so they begin to show their true nature. The present study is undertaken to investigate the process of a journey from lack of humanity to a sort of self-consciousness which happens at the end of both Blindness by Saramago and Lord of the Flies by Golding. In order to get the best result the two novels have been studied precisely and lots of different articles and critical essays have been analyzed, which shows people drift into cruelty and savagery easily but can also drift out of it. In blindness losing sight, and being apart from society in a deserted tropical island in Lord of the Flies causes limitation. Limitation in any form makes people rebel. Although in the process of both novels, any kind of savagery, brutality, filth, and social collapse can be observable and both writers believe that human being has the potential of being animal images, but they both also want to show that the very nature of human being is divine. Children’s weeping at the end Lord of the Flies and Doctor’s remark at the end of Blindness “I don’t think we did go blind, I think we are blind, blind but seeing, blind people who can see but do not see”, show exactly the matter of insight at the end of the novels. The fact that divinity exists in the very nature of human being is the indubitable aim that makes this research truly valuable.

Keywords: brutality, lack of humanity, savagery, Blindness

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Authors: Cinzia Valente

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Over the last few years, national legislators have been forced to deal with social changes that have had important repercussions in family law and children’s law. This growing focus on minors has provoked important reforms, specifically on issues relating to the welfare and protection of children. My presentation focuses on the issue of migrant children in particular I refer to unaccompanied children, or ‘children on the move’, or separate children or any other term defining migrant minors who cross national borders seeking protection or better opportunities. They arrive often illegally, on the European territory without a responsible adult who take care of them. There is a common assumption that migrants are running away from conflicts, poverty and human rights abuse and they arrive in a foreign country hoping a better life; children without persons who takes care of them encounter some difficulties in their integration in the host country. The migration flows recorded in recent decades towards EU countries, and Italy in particular, have imposed an intense pressure to modernize institutions, services and specific legal frameworks, with the aim of responding adequately to the needs of foreign individuals, as well as ensuring a good level of living standards and facilitating integration, especially for migrant children. The object of my paper is the analysis of the Italian rules, practices and services existing in favor of unaccompanied children (foster care, reunification, acquisition of citizenship and other) in comparison with other European legal systems on the same thematic with a comparative method. Highlighting European standards to find common principles for the best solution to children's problems is the conclusive aim of my presentation.

Keywords: Children , Family Law, Migration , Uniform Law

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Authors: Jiang Yuqi

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Aims: The aim is to analyze the facilitators and barriers of family resilience in cancer patients based on the theoretical domain framework, provide a basis for intervention in the family resilience of cancer patients, and identify the progress and enlightenment of existing intervention projects. Methods: NVivo software was used to code the influencing factors using the framework of 14 theoretical domains as primary nodes; secondary nodes were then refined using thematic analysis, and specific influencing factors were aggregated and analyzed for evaluator reliability. Data sources: PubMed, Embase, CINAHL, Web of Science, Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, CNKI, and Wanfang (search dates: from construction to November 2023). Results: A total of 35 papers were included, with 142 coding points across 14 theoretical domains and 38 secondary nodes. The three most relevant theoretical domains are social influences (norms), the environment and resources, and emotions (mood). The factors with the greatest impact were family support, mood, confidence and beliefs, external support, quality of life, economic circumstances, family adaptation, coping styles with illness, and management. Conclusion: The factors influencing family resilience in cancer patients cover most of the theoretical domains in the Theoretical Domains Framework and are cross-cutting, multi-sourced, and complex. Further in-depth exploration of the key factors influencing family resilience is necessary to provide a basis for intervention research.

Keywords: cancer, survivors, family resilience, theoretical domains framework, literature review

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Authors: Khorief Ouissem, Sassi Boudmagh Souad, Mahimoud Aissa

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The health and safety problem in the construction companies has been a major subject of research in Algeria for many years. The latest statistics of the Algerian National Social Security Fund (CNAS) shows that a third of accidents recorded at the national level are originated from construction activities. It is becoming increasingly essential and urgent to investigate and address its causes in order to find measures to overcome the deficiencies in this area. Thus, this paper takes in investigating this problem through a study conducted in the city of Skikda, Algeria. The study was carried out through questionnaire where twenty construction companies were taking into consideration. First, the study identifies the regulations and the laws related to the health and safety in the construction sector in Algeria. Then it goes on to assess and evaluate the implementation of the identified regulations in the companies selected. The result of the assessment indicates that the majority of the construction companies considered do not meet the health and safety standards and regulations. To extract the main causes of the failure of the system to control this industry, the observations and the evaluation were analyzed using the 5M or Ichikawa diagram method. This method is based on identifying the causes of the problem in terms of purpose, the list of potential causes for families. These families often correspond to 5M (Labor, Material, Methods, Middle, and Management). Finally, having identified the primary motives, the present authors propose a list of actions to move towards a more controlled and effective health and safety system for the construction industry.

Keywords: health and safety, construction industry, performance measurement, Algeria

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Authors: Mohammad Rawashdeh, Mark McEntee, Maha Zaitoun, Mostafa Abdelrahman, Patrick Brennan, Haytham Alewaidat, Sarah Lewis, Charbel Saade

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Despite the tremendous advancements that have been generated by Computed Tomography (CT) in the field of diagnosis, concerns have been raised about the potential cancer induction risk from CT because of the exponentially increased use of it in medicine. This study aims at investigating the application and knowledge of practicing radiographers in Jordan about CT radiation. In order to collect the primary data of this study, a questionnaire was designed and distributed by social media using a snow-balling sampling method. The respondents (n=54) have answered 36 questions including the questions about their demographic information, knowledge about Diagnostic Reference Levels (DRLs), CT exposure and adaptation of pediatric patients exposure. The educational level of the respondents was either at a diploma degree (35.2%) or bachelor (64.8%). The results of this study have indicated a good level of general knowledge between radiographers about the relationship between image quality, exposure parameters, and patient dose. The level of knowledge related to DRL was poor where less than 7.4 percent of the sample members were able to give specific values for a number of common anatomical fields, including abdomen, brain, and chest. Overall, Jordanian radiographers need to gain more knowledge about the expected levels of the dose when applying good practice. Additional education on DRL or DRL inclusion in educational programs is highlighted.

Keywords: computed tomography, CT scan, DRLs, exposure parameters, image quality, radiation dose

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Authors: Gargi Ghosh

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Municipal solid waste management (MSWM) is an obligatory function of the local self-government as per the Indian constitution, and this paper gives a glimpse of the system in Indian towns focusing on its present state and use of technology in the system. The paper analyses the MSWM characteristics in 35 towns in the southern state of Karnataka. The lifestyle in these towns was found to be very sustainable with minimal disposal and considerable reuse. Average per capita waste generated in the towns ranged from 300 gm/person to 500 gm/person. The waste collection efficiency varied from 60% to 80%. The waste shows equal share of organic and non-organic waste composition with a low calorific value. Lack of capacity of the municipal body in terms of manpower, assets & knowledge and social consciousness were found to be two major issues in the system. Technical solutions in use in India at present are composting, organic re-reprocessing, bio-methanation, waste to energy etc. The tonnage of waste generated ranged from 8 TPD to 80 TPD. The feasibility of technology has been analysed in the context of the above characteristics. It was found that low calorific value and mixed nature of waste made waste to energy and bio methanation processes unsuitable. Composting – windrow and closed door was found best to treat the bulk of the waste. Organic–re-processors was planned for phase 2 of MSWM program in the towns with effective implementation of segregation at source. GPS and RFID technology was recommended for monitoring the collection process and increasing accountability of the citizens for effective implementation.

Keywords: solid waste management, Indian towns, waste management technology, waste charateristics

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Authors: Nia McRae, Robert Wright, Ghalib Bello

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Introduction: Postpartum depression is a prevalent mood disorder that is detrimental to the mental and physical health of mothers and their newborns. Lead (Pb) is a toxic metal that is associated with hormonal imbalance and mental impairments. The hormone changes that accompany pregnancy and childbirth may be exacerbated by Pb and increase new mothers’ susceptibility to postpartum depression. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the only study that investigates the association between prenatal Pb exposure and postpartum depression. Identifying risk factors can contribute to improved prevention and treatment strategies for postpartum depression. Methods: Data was derived from the Programming Research in Obesity, Growth, Environment and Social Stress (PROGRESS) study which is an ongoing longitudinal birth cohort. Postpartum depression was identified by a score of 13 or above on the 10-Item Edinburg Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) 6-months and 12-months postpartum. Pb was measured in the blood (BPb) in the second and third trimester and in the tibia and patella 1-month postpartum. Quantile regression models were used to assess the relationship between BPb and postpartum depression. Results: BPb in the second trimester was negatively associated with the 80th percentile of depression 6-months postpartum (β: -0.26; 95% CI: -0.51, -0.01). No significant association was found between BPb in the third trimester and depression 6-months postpartum. BPb in the third trimester exhibited an inverse relationship with the 60th percentile (β: -0.23; 95% CI: -0.41, -0.06), 70th percentile (β: -0.31; 95% CI: -0.52, -0.10), and 90th percentile of depression 12-months postpartum (β: -0.36; 95% CI: -0.69, -0.03). There was no significant association between BPb in the second trimester and depression 12-months postpartum. Bone Pb concentrations were not significantly associated with postpartum depression. Conclusion: The negative association between BPb and postpartum depression may support research which demonstrates lead is a nontherapeutic stimulant. Further research is needed to verify these results and identify effect modifiers.

Keywords: depression, lead, postpartum, prenatal

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Authors: Faucal Marie Providence Idufashe, Rafał Katamay

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Background: Cases of foreign students who do not return to their home countries after their graduation have been reported. Over the past years, More and more young Rwandans choose to study in Poland, appreciating the high level of education in Polish universities. However, the majority of them tend to stay there after their studies or move to other nearby countries. Therefore, this study aims at identifying factors contributing to a career choice abroad among Rwandan students in Poland. Methods: This was a cross-sectional, observational, survey-based study and targeted the Rwandan community living in Poland. All the analyses were done in SPSS. A total of 219 respondents completed the online survey within two months from July to September 2022. Results: The prevalence of migration intention among Rwandan student in Poland was estimated at 79.91%. Only religion was statistically significant, whereas other social demographic factors such as age, residence, education, and marital status did not contribute to the decision of a career choice in Poland among respondents, Rwandans in Poland. Furthermore, perceived connection to co-workers, employment company's culture and respect were the significant socio-economic factors contributed to the decision of a career choice in Poland among those studied. The level of income did not contribute. Conclusion: A high proportion expressed migration intention in our study. These intentions were attracted by opportunities in Poland in addition to the welcoming culture. Going forward, we recommend exploring those factors using in-depth interviews for more insights.

Keywords: career, choice, abroad, Poland, students, Rwandan

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Authors: Rita Greco, Giuseppe Carlo Marano

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Chloride induced reinforcement corrosion is widely accepted to be the most frequent mechanism causing premature degradation of reinforced concrete members, whose economic and social consequences are growing up continuously. Prevention of these phenomena has a great importance in structural design, and modern Codes and Standard impose prescriptions concerning design details and concrete mix proportion for structures exposed to different external aggressive conditions, grouped in environmental classes. This paper focuses on reinforced concrete columns load carrying capacity degradation over time due to chloride induced steel pitting corrosion. The structural element is considered to be exposed to marine environment and the effects of corrosion are described by the time degradation of the axial-bending interaction diagram. Because chlorides ingress and consequent pitting corrosion propagation are both time-dependent mechanisms, the study adopts a time-variant predictive approach to evaluate the residual strength of corroded reinforced concrete columns at different lifetimes. Corrosion initiation and propagation process is modelled by taking into account all the parameters, such as external environmental conditions, concrete mix proportion, concrete cover and so on, which influence the time evolution of the corrosion phenomenon and its effects on the residual strength of RC columns.

Keywords: pitting corrosion, strength deterioration, diffusion coefficient, surface chloride concentration, concrete structures, marine environment

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Authors: James Alberto Ortega Morales, Nelson Andrés Martínez Marín

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The bulding industry is one of the most important sectors all around the world in terms of contribution to index like GDP and labor. On the other hand, it is a major contributor to Greenhouse Gases (GHG) and waste generation contributing to global warming. In this sense, it is necessary to establish sustainable practices both from the strategic point of view to the operations point of view as well in all business and industries. Business models don’t scape to this reality attending it´s mediator role between strategy and operations. Business models can turn from the traditional practices searching economic benefits to sustainable bussines models that generate both economic value and value for society and the environment. Recent advances in the analysis of sustainable business models find different classifications that allow finding potential triple bottom line (economic, social and environmental) solutions applicable in every business sector. Into the metioned Advances have been identified, 11 groups and 45 patterns of sustainable business models have been identified; such patterns can be found either in the business models as a whole or found concurrently in their components. This article presents the analysis of a case study, seeking to identify the components and elements that are part of it, using the ECO CANVAS conceptual model. The case study allows showing the concurrent existence of different patterns of business models for sustainability empirically, serving as an example and inspiration for other Latin American companies interested in integrating sustainability into their new and existing business models.

Keywords: sustainable business models, business sustainability, business model patterns, case study, construction industry

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Authors: Behnaz Moradijamei, Michael Higgins

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Identifying community structure is a critical task in analyzing social media data sets often modeled by networks. Statistical models such as the stochastic block model have proven to explain the structure of communities in real-world network data. In this work, we develop a goodness-of-fit test to examine community structure's existence by using a distinguishing property in networks: cyclic structures are more prevalent within communities than across them. To better understand how communities are shaped by the cyclic structure of the network rather than just the number of edges, we introduce a novel method for deciding on the existence of communities. We utilize these structures by using renewal non-backtracking random walk (RNBRW) to the existing goodness-of-fit test. RNBRW is an important variant of random walk in which the walk is prohibited from returning back to a node in exactly two steps and terminates and restarts once it completes a cycle. We investigate the use of RNBRW to improve the performance of existing goodness-of-fit tests for community detection algorithms based on the spectral properties of the adjacency matrix. Our proposed test on community structure is based on the probability distribution of eigenvalues of the normalized retracing probability matrix derived by RNBRW. We attempt to make the best use of asymptotic results on such a distribution when there is no community structure, i.e., asymptotic distribution under the null hypothesis. Moreover, we provide a theoretical foundation for our statistic by obtaining the true mean and a tight lower bound for RNBRW edge weights variance.

Keywords: hypothesis testing, RNBRW, network inference, community structure

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Authors: Maryam Amiri, Ali Rajabzade, Gholam Reza Goudarzi, Reza Heidari

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Growth of technology and environmental changes are so fast and therefore, companies and industries have much tendency to do activities of R&D for active participation in the market and achievement to a competitive advantages. Aviation industry and its subdivisions have high level technology and play a special role in economic and social development of countries. So, in the aviation industry for getting new technologies and competing with other countries aviation industry, there is a requirement for capability in R&D. Considering of appropriate R&D strategy is supportive that day technologies of the world can be achieved. Biofuel technology is one of the newest technologies that has allocated discussion of the world in aviation industry to itself. The purpose of this research has been formulation of R&D strategy of biofuel technology in aviation industry of Iran. After reviewing of the theoretical foundations of the methods and R&D strategies, finally we classified R&D strategies in four main categories as follows: internal R&D, collaboration R&D, out sourcing R&D and in-house R&D. After a review of R&D strategies, a model for formulation of R&D strategy with the aim of developing biofuel technology in aviation industry in Iran was offered. With regard to the requirements and aracteristics of industry and technology in the model, we presented an integrated approach to R&D. Based on the techniques of decision making and analyzing of structured expert opinion, 4 R&D strategies for different scenarios and with the aim of developing biofuel technology in aviation industry in Iran were recommended. In this research, based on the common features of the implementation process of R&D, a logical classification of these methods are presented as R&D strategies. Then, R&D strategies and their characteristics was developed according to the experts. In the end, we introduced a model to consider the role of aviation industry and biofuel technology in R&D strategies. And lastly, for conditions and various scenarios of the aviation industry, we have formulated a specific R&D strategy.

Keywords: aviation industry, biofuel technology, R&D, R&D strategy

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Authors: Dwi Retno Sri Ambarwati

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Recently, the traditional architecture were getting lost, replaced by modern architecture. The existence of many traditional houses often changing the function and change the values in an effort to adjust to the modern lifestyle, whereas the spiritual background of traditional architectural design is very specific and be the basis for consideration in the construction of the building, both in terms of determining the location of the building, the direction toward building, the spatial pattern and organization of space, zoning, hierarchical space, building form, ornamentation, the selection of building materials, and so on. The changes in function and form will transformed the spiritual values contained in it, because the architecture affects human behavior and reflects the culture. The traditional architecture views the architecture as a concept that has different tendencies in terms of orientation, shape, and attitude toward nature that tends to harmony with the social environment and local culture. The concept of the spirit of place made the architecture looks familiar, not arrogant and give a positive value to the surrounding environment. Every culture has a traditional architecture that full of spiritual values, although in the simplest form. Humans can learn about human values and local wisdom through the positive values that contained in traditional architecture, the desire to balance themselves with nature and the environment, not overbearing, strict adherence to the prevailing norms, openness in public life and intimacy family life that form a harmonious in life. The great and the wise value of traditional architecture should be revived in modern architecture that tends to ignore the spiritual values and more concerned with the functional and aesthetic pleasure, by combining the noble values of traditional architecture into modern architecture.

Keywords: architecture, combining noble values, local wisdom, traditional architecture

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Authors: Franziska Köhler-Dauner, Inka Mayer, Lara Hart, Ute Ziegenhain, Jörg M. Fegert

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Preventive isolation and social distancing strategies during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic have confronted families with a variety of different restrictions and stresses. Especially during this stressful time, children need a stable parental home to avoid developmental disorders. Additional risk factors such as maternal childhood abuse and neglect (CM) experiences may influence mothers' psychosomatic health (pG) and children's physical well-being (kW) during times of increased stress. Our aim was to analyse the interaction between maternal CM, maternal pG and children's kW during the pandemic. Mothers from a well-documented birth cohort to study transgenerational transmission of CM, were included in an online 'pandemic' survey assessing maternal pG and children's physical health during the pandemic. Our mediation analysis showed a significant positive association between the extent of maternal CM experiences, mothers' psychosomatic symptoms and their children's kW. Maternal psychosomatic symptoms significantly mediate the interaction between CM and children's kW; the direct effect remains non-significant when maternal psychosomatic symptoms are included as mediators. Maternal CM appears to be a relevant risk factor for maternal pG and children's kW during the pandemic. Maternal CM experiences seem to influence the way parents cope with stressful situations and increase the risk of suffering from depressive symptoms. The latter also affect their children's kW. Our findings underline the importance of carefully assessing the specific situation of families with children and offering individually adapted help to help families survive the pandemic.

Keywords: pandemic, maternal health, child health, abuse, neglect, maternal experiences

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Authors: Gholamhassan Kakha, Mohsen Jami, Daniel Alex Merino Natorce

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Sustainable development refers to the creation of a balance between the development and the environment too; it consists of three key principles namely environment, society and economy. These three parameters are related to each other and the imbalance occurs in each will lead to the disparity of the other parts. Mining is one of the most important tools of the economic growth and social welfare in many countries. Meanwhile, assessment of the environmental impacts has directed to the attention of planners toward the natural environment of the areas surrounded by mines and allowing for monitoring and controlling of the current situation by the designers. In this look upon, a semi-quantitative model using a matrix method is presented for assessing the environmental impacts in the BOOG Granite Mine located in Sistan and Balouchestan, one of the provinces of Iran for determining the effective factors and environmental components. For accomplishing this purpose, the initial data are collected by the experts at the next stage; the effect of the factors affects each environmental component is determined by specifying the qualitative viewpoints. Based on the results, factors including air quality, ecology, human health and safety along with the environmental damages resulted from mining activities in that area. Finally, the results gained from the assessment of the environmental impact are used to evaluate the sustainability by using Philips mathematical model. The results show that the sustainability of this area is weak, so environmental preventive measures are recommended to reduce the environmental damages to its components.

Keywords: sustainable development, environmental impacts' assessment, BOOG granite, Philips mathematical model

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Authors: Sana El Adlani, Yassir Ait Ben Kaddour, Abdelhafid Benksim, Abderraouf Soummani, Mohamed Cherkaoui

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Background: Infertility in all countries of the word is on an increase, it’s why the World Health Organization included an investigation into young people's fertility. In this sense, it’s important to increase efforts to improve the knowledge about fertility for the young population. The aim of this study is to describe the difference between knowledge and attitude of medical and non-medical Moroccan young people. Materials and Methods: 100 medical Moroccan students (group 1) participated in the study, between 18 and 30 years, by a simple random sampling method, during 2020 and using a previously validated questionnaire. The answers were confronted to the result of our same study among 355 non-medical Moroccan young people (group 2) in 2019. Statistical analyses were performed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (version 10). Result: Medical students had a significantly higher level of knowledge about infertility than non-medical young people. However, both groups were aware of the impact of lifestyle on infertility. The knowledge state of the first group about infertility management was higher than the second group. Moreover, all non-medical Moroccan young people believed that it is easier to conceive if the couples had already their first baby, whereas, among medical students, only 53% had confirmed this belief. The results showed that 65% of medical students had proposed to try fertility treatments more than one time if treatment fails. Besides, the first advice of the second group was polygamy and adoption. Conclusion: Following the result of our study, the investigation of young people is the measure to optimize reproductive health. So, it’s crucial that the government increase efforts to improve the knowledge about infertility not only for medical universities but for all scholar programs.

Keywords: attitude, infertility, knowledge, medical, non-medical, young people

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Authors: Shafag Dadashova

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The study discusses relativity of perception and interpretation of power, its interdependence with conformity level of an individual. It describes an autobiography as a form of epiphany. It is suggested that life-writing helps the author analyze the past and define the borders of his personal power and sources of empowerment. As all life-writings deal with behaviors, values, attitudes, relationships and emotions, their investigation requires qualitative methods to understand social norms, gender roles, religion, and their role in empowerment and disempowerment of the author. The study consists of two parts. The first part is theoretical and interrogates the notion of personal power and how writing the own life can bring to conscious empowerment. The second part presents two autobiographies by female authors from two different Muslim cultures who negotiate between the larger nationalist agenda and their own personal concerns. These autobiographies (Tehmina Durrani, Pakistani author ‘My Feudal Lord’, Banine, Azerbaijani writer 'Caucasian days' and 'Parisian days') are the end of their authors’ long silence, their revolt against the conventional norms, their decision to have an agency to confess and protest. These autobiographies are the authors’ attempts to break the established matrix of perceptions, imposed norms, and gain power to build the real picture of their identity. The study sums up with the conclusion that in spite of very similar motifs of female authors to get empowered through self-analysis, different cultures and time create specific subjectivities associated with particular historical events and geographical location.

Keywords: conformity level, empowerment, female autobiography, self-identity

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Authors: O. B. Urhibo, D. Imhonopi, T. George

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The global rate of decline in entrepreneurial activities, and the prevalence in Africa, especially Nigeria, is more worrisome. In recent times, these problems, such as the lack of accessibility and utilization of financial incentives needed to promote entrepreneurial activities, have led to a decrease in entrepreneurial activities. The causes of the decline have been evaluated from a different perspective and have further confirmed the relevance and need for the sustainability of the Fashion industry. With the increasing rate of unemployment and poverty in Nigeria and the literature gap in the social context, this study investigated the patterns of sustainable financial incentives utilisation among fashion design entrepreneurs in Nigeria through a qualitative approach. The Eastern part of Nigeria was considered in this study because of the high rate of market activity for textile and clothing firms. Specifically, Delta state was considered in this study. A purposive sampling technique was used to select key informants consisting of twelve (12) executives of the associations (i.e., Fashion Designer & Exhibitors Association, Delta Fashion Designers, and Fashion Designers Association of Nigeria for the interview sessions. Four themes emanate from the thematic analysis -lack of sufficient collateral, difficulties and duration of loan application processes, unacceptable business proposal/plan, and the absence of audited financial accounts were found to be the patterns of sustainable financial incentives utilisation among fashion design entrepreneurs in Nigeria. The promotion of sustainable patterns and supports has been suggested to reduce the challenges of sustainable financial incentives utilisation among fashion design entrepreneurs.

Keywords: entrepreneurship, fashion design, financial incentives, patterns, sustainability, utilisation

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Authors: Yun-na Wu, Zhen Wang

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Due to the economic downturn and the deterioration of the living environment, the development of residential buildings as high energy consuming building is gradually changing from “extensive” to green building in China. So, the evaluation system of green building is continuously improved, but the current evaluation work has the following problems: (1) There are differences in the cost of the actual investment and the purchasing power of residents, also construction target of green residential building is single and lacks multi-objective performance development. (2) Green building evaluation lacks regional characteristics and cannot reflect the different regional residents demand. (3) In the process of determining the criteria weight, the experts’ judgment matrix is difficult to meet the requirement of consistency. Therefore, to solve those problems, questionnaires which are about the green residential building for Ningxia area are distributed, and the results of questionnaires can feedback the purchasing power of residents and the acceptance of the green building cost. Secondly, combined with the geographical features of Ningxia minority areas, the evaluation criteria system of green residential building is constructed. Finally, using the improved group AHP method and the grey clustering method, the criteria weight is determined, and a real case is evaluated, which is located in Xing Qing district, Ningxia. A conclusion can be obtained that the professional evaluation for this project and good social recognition is basically the same.

Keywords: evaluation, green residential building, grey clustering method, group AHP

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