Search results for: social relationships
Commenced in January 2007
Frequency: Monthly
Edition: International
Paper Count: 11210

Search results for: social relationships

10070 'Innovations among People' in Selected Social Economy Enterprises in Poland

Authors: Hanna Kroczak

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In Poland, the system of social and professional reintegration of people at risk of social exclusion is, in fact, based on the activity of social economy enterprises. Playing this significant role these entities have to cope with various problems, related to the necessity of being successful on the open market, location on the peripheral (especially rural) areas or the “socialist heritage” in social and economic relations, which is certainly not favorable for implementing the idea of activation policy. One of the main objectives of the project entitled “Innovation among people. The analysis of the innovations creation and implementation in companies and social economy enterprises operating in Poland”, was to investigate the innovativeness of Polish social economy entities as a possible way for them to be prosperous (the project was funded by the Polish National Science Centre grant on the decision DEC-2013/11/B/HS4/00691). The ethnographic research in this matter was conducted in 2015 in two parts: six three-day studies using participant observation and individual in-depth interview (IDI) techniques (in three social cooperatives and three social integration centres) and two one-month shadowings (in one social cooperative and one social integration centre). Enterprises were selected from various provinces in Poland on the basis of data from previous computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) research, where they declared that innovation management is a central element of their strategy. The ethnographic study revealed that they, indeed, create innovations and the main types of them are social and organisational innovations – but not always and not all the employees are aware of that. Moreover, it turned out that wherever the research was conducted, researchers found some similar opportunities of innovations creating process, like a “charismatic leader”, true passion and commitment not depended on the earned money or building local institutional networks, and similar threats, e.g. under-staffed offices or the great bureaucracy of some institutions. The primary conclusion for the studied entities is that being innovative is not only their challenge and opportunity for well-being at the same time, but even a necessity, something deeply rooted in their specific organisational structures. Explanations and illustrations for the statements above will be presented in the proposed paper.

Keywords: ethnographic research, innovation, Polish social economy, professional reintegration, social economy enterprises, social reintegration

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10069 Corporate Societal Disclosure and Corporate Governance: A By-Contextual Analysis

Authors: Zineb Meniaoui, Fatma Zehri, Kamoussi Halioui

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The amplified awareness of companies towards the social and environmental concerns has nowadays become a challenge for firms around the globe. Our study investigates the effects of corporate governance mechanisms on voluntarily social and environmental information disclosure in Canada and France. The study use the content analysis approach, applied on a total of 245 year-observation for the Canadian sample and 245 year-observation for the French sample from 2005 to 2011. Our results show a significant correlation between the board's independence, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) committee and expertise as well as the audit quality along with the extent of the social and environmental disclosure. The French firms are found disclosing more societal information than Canadian firms, which might be due to the stakeholders' pressure put on French companies to disclose such societal information.

Keywords: Canada, corporate governance, disclosure determinants , France, social and environmental disclosure

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10068 Effect of Parenting Style on Aggression and Empathy in Children Between the Ages of 10-12

Authors: Debangana Mukherjee

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This study delves into the pivotal role of parenting styles in shaping the development of aggression and empathy in children aged 10 to 12. Using a sample of 300 school students, we employed self-assessment questionnaires and scales to investigate correlations between parenting styles—authoritative, authoritarian, permissive, and neglectful—and behavioural traits, focusing on aggression and empathy as primary outcomes. The findings underscore the intricate relationships between parenting styles, aggressive behaviours, and empathetic tendencies. Notably, certain parenting approaches demonstrated strong correlations with specific behavioural outcomes. For instance, authoritarian parenting showed associations with increased aggression and reduced empathy, while authoritative parenting exhibited the opposite trend. These correlations emphasize the potential impact of parenting styles on children's behavioural development during this critical transitional phase. However, this study is limited by its correlational nature, which does not imply causation. The complexities of human behaviour, the limited scope of analysis, and the need for further research into causative relationships and cultural influences call for a nuanced understanding of these dynamics. Moving forward, longitudinal studies, causality investigations, consideration of cultural diversity, and exploration of additional variables could enrich our understanding of the interplay between parenting styles, empathy, and aggression. Validating these findings across diverse populations and refining interventions could pave the way for nurturing healthy behavioural development in children.

Keywords: aggression, correlational nature, empathy, longitudinal studies, parenting style

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10067 A Study of Behaviors in Using Social Networks of Corporate Personnel of Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University

Authors: Wipada Chaiwchan

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This research aims to study behaviors in using social networks of Corporate personnel of Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University. The sample used in the study were two groups: 1) Academic Officer 70 persons and 2) Operation Officer 143 persons were used in this study. The tools in this research consisted of questionnaire which the data were analyzed by using percentage, average (X) and Standard deviation (S.D.) and Independent Sample T-Test to test the difference between the mean values obtained from two independent samples, and One-way anova to analysis of variance, and Multiple comparisons to test that the average pair of different methods by Fisher’s Least Significant Different (LSD). The study result found that the most of corporate personnel have purpose in using social network to information awareness aspect was knowledge and online conference with social media. By using the average more than 3 hours per day in everyday. Using time in working in one day and there are computers connected to the Internet at home, by using the communication in the operational processes. Behaviors using social networks in relation to gender, age, job title, department, and type of personnel. Hypothesis testing, and analysis of variance for the effects of this analysis is divided into three aspects: The use of online social networks, the attitude of the users and the security analysis has found that Corporate Personnel of Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University. Overall and specifically at the high level, and considering each item found all at a high level. By sorting of the social network (X=3.22), The attitude of the users (X= 3.06) and the security (X= 3.11). The overall behaviors using of each side (X=3.11).

Keywords: social network, behaviors, social media, computer information systems

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10066 The Impact of Perspective Taking and Gender Differences on the Encouragement of Social Competence for the Next Generation: The Evidence From Chinese Parents

Authors: Yi Huang

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Background: For the development of children, it is important for parents to encourage children not only on academic competence but also on children’s social competence. In the western cultural context, parents emphasize more heavily on female children’s social-behavioral development. However, whether the conclusion is correct in eastern culture and whether the parent’s gender affects such an emphasis remains unclear. And, more valuably, from the perspective of intervention, except for the nature factors - child’s gender and parent’s gender, it is also worth to probe whether the improvable factors, such as parent’s perspective taking, influence parent’s emphasis on child’s social competence. Aim: This study was aimed to investigate the impact of parent’s gender, child’s gender, and parent’s perspective-taking on parent’s attitudes of encouragement of the child’s social competence under the Chinese cultural context. Method: 461 Chinese parents whose children were in the first year of middle school during the research time participated in this study. Among all participants, there were 155 fathers and 306 mothers. The research adopted the self-report of perspective-taking, which is the sub-scale of the Interpersonal Reactivity Index and the self-report of the encouragement on a child’s social communication, which is the sub-scale of the Chinese version of The Children Rearing Practice Report. In this study, 291 parents reported regarding male children, and 170 parents reported regarding female children. Results: Contrary to the traditional western theory, which usually suggests parent puts more attention on social development and competence to girl the instead of the boy, in the Chinese context, parent emphasizes social competence more on the male child. Analogically, in China, compared to mother, father underscores the child’s social competence more heavily. By constructing the hierarchical regression model, the result indicated that after controlling the variables of the gender of child and the gender of parent, parent’s perspective-taking still explains for the variance of parent’s encouragement on child’s social competence, which means, parent’s perspective-taking predicts parent’s encouragement on child’s social competence after excluding the impact of the gender of parent and child. Conclusion: For Chinese parents, the ability of perspective-taking is beneficial to enhance their awareness of encouraging children’s social competence.

Keywords: parent; child, gender differences, perspective-taking, social development

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10065 Analyzing of Speed Disparity in Mixed Vehicle Technologies on Horizontal Curves

Authors: Tahmina Sultana, Yasser Hassan

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Vehicle technologies rapidly evolving due to their multifaceted advantages. Adapted different vehicle technologies like connectivity and automation on the same roads with conventional vehicles controlled by human drivers may increase speed disparity in mixed vehicle technologies. Identifying relationships between speed distribution measures of different vehicles and road geometry can be an indicator of speed disparity in mixed technologies. Previous studies proved that speed disparity measures and traffic accidents are inextricably related. Horizontal curves from three geographic areas were selected based on relevant criteria, and speed data were collected at the midpoint of the preceding tangent and starting, ending, and middle point of the curve. Multiple linear mixed effect models (LME) were developed using the instantaneous speed measures representing the speed of vehicles at different points of horizontal curves to recognize relationships between speed variance (standard deviation) and road geometry. A simulation-based framework (Monte Carlo) was introduced to check the speed disparity on horizontal curves in mixed vehicle technologies when consideration is given to the interactions among connected vehicles (CVs), autonomous vehicles (AVs), and non-connected vehicles (NCVs) on horizontal curves. The Monte Carlo method was used in the simulation to randomly sample values for the various parameters from their respective distributions. Theresults show that NCVs had higher speed variation than CVs and AVs. In addition, AVs and CVs contributed to reduce speed disparity in the mixed vehicle technologies in any penetration rates.

Keywords: autonomous vehicles, connected vehicles, non-connected vehicles, speed variance

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10064 Relationship between Micro-Level Entrepreneurial Resilience with Job Satisfaction and Family Social Support

Authors: Kristiana Haryanti, Theresia Dwi Hastuti, Agustine Eva Maria Soekesi

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Entrepreneurship is an important topic today that is widely discussed in the business world. The COVID-19 pandemic has devastated all businesses in the world, especially businesses at the micro-level. This study tries to prove the relationship between job satisfaction of micro-level business owners and family social support for their resilience. The respondents of this study amounted to 58 entrepreneurs. The results of this study indicate that there is a relationship between job satisfaction and social support with entrepreneurial resilience in continuing the family business.

Keywords: family business, family social support, job satisfaction, resilience

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10063 A Framework for Chinese Domain-Specific Distant Supervised Named Entity Recognition

Authors: Qin Long, Li Xiaoge

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The Knowledge Graphs have now become a new form of knowledge representation. However, there is no consensus in regard to a plausible and definition of entities and relationships in the domain-specific knowledge graph. Further, in conjunction with several limitations and deficiencies, various domain-specific entities and relationships recognition approaches are far from perfect. Specifically, named entity recognition in Chinese domain is a critical task for the natural language process applications. However, a bottleneck problem with Chinese named entity recognition in new domains is the lack of annotated data. To address this challenge, a domain distant supervised named entity recognition framework is proposed. The framework is divided into two stages: first, the distant supervised corpus is generated based on the entity linking model of graph attention neural network; secondly, the generated corpus is trained as the input of the distant supervised named entity recognition model to train to obtain named entities. The link model is verified in the ccks2019 entity link corpus, and the F1 value is 2% higher than that of the benchmark method. The re-pre-trained BERT language model is added to the benchmark method, and the results show that it is more suitable for distant supervised named entity recognition tasks. Finally, it is applied in the computer field, and the results show that this framework can obtain domain named entities.

Keywords: distant named entity recognition, entity linking, knowledge graph, graph attention neural network

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10062 An Epistemological Approach of the Social Movements Studies in Cali (Colombia) between 2002 and 2016

Authors: Faride Crespo Razeg, Beatriz Eugenia Rivera Pedroza

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While Colombian’s society has changed, the way that Colombian’s civil society participates has changed too. Thus, the social movements as a form of participation should be research to understand as the society structure as the groups’ interactions. In fact, in the last decades, the social movements in Colombia have been transformed in three categories: actors, spaces, and demands. For this reason, it is important to know from what perspectives have been researched this topic, allowing to recognize an epistemological and ontological reflections of it. The goal of this research has been characterizing the social movements of Cali – Colombia between 2002 and 2016. Cali is the southwest largest Colombian city; for this reason, it could be considered as a representative data for the social dynamic of the region. Qualitative methods as documental analysis have been used, in order to know the way that the research on social movements has been done. Thus taking into account this methodological technique, it has been found the goals that are present in most of the studies, which represents what are the main concerns around this topic. Besides, the methodology more used, to understand the way that the data was collected, its problems and its advantages. Finally, the ontological and epistemological reflections are important to understand which have been the theory and conceptual approach of the studies and how its have been contextualized to Cali, taking into account its own history.

Keywords: social movements, civil society, forms of participation, collective actions

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10061 Experiences of Social Participation among Community Elderly with Mild Cognitive Impairment: A Qualitative Research

Authors: Xue Li, Hui Xu

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Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a clinical stage that occurs between normal aging and dementia. Although MCI increases the risk of developing dementia, individuals with MCI may maintain stable cognitive function and even recover to a typical cognitive state. An intervention to prevent or delay the progression to dementia in individuals with MCI may involve promoting social engagement. Social participation is the engagement in socially relevant social exchanges and meaningful activities. Older adults with MCI may encounter restricted cognitive abilities, mood changes, and behavioral difficulties during social participation, influencing their willingness to engage. Therefore, this study aims to employ qualitative research methods to gain an in-depth comprehension of the authentic social participation experiences of older adults with mild cognitive impairment, which will establish a foundation for designing appropriate intervention programs. A phenomenological research was conducted. The study participants were selected using the purposive sampling method in combination with the maximum differentiation sampling strategy. Face-to-face semistructured interviews were conducted among 12 elderly individuals suffering from mild cognitive impairment in a community in Zhengzhou City from May to July 2023. Colaizzi 7-step method was used to analyze the data and extract the theme. The real experience of social participation in older adults with mild cognitive impairment can be summarized into 3 themes: (1) a single social relationship but a strong desire to participate, (2) a dual experience of social participation with both positive and negative aspects, (3) multiple barriers to social participation, including impaired memory capacity, heavy family responsibilities and lack of infrastructure. The study found that elderly individuals with mild cognitive impairment and one social interaction display an increased desire to engage in society. To improve social participation levels and reduce cognitive function decline, healthcare providers should work with relevant government agencies and the community to create a comprehensive social participation system. It is important for healthcare providers to note the social participation status of the elderly with mild cognitive impairment.

Keywords: mild cognitive impairment, the elderly, social participation, qualitative research

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10060 Application of Social Media for Promoting Library and Information Services: A Case Study of Library Science Professionals of India

Authors: Payel Saha

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Social media is playing an important role for dissemination of information in society. In 21st century most people have a smart phone and used different social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp, Skype etc. in day to day life. It is rapidly growing web-based tool for everyone to share thoughts, ideas and knowledge globally using internet. The study highlights the current use of social media tools for promoting library and information services of Library and Information Professionals of India, which are working in Library. The study was conducted during November, 2017. A structured questionnaire was prepared using google docs and shared using different mailing list, sent to individual email IDs and sharing with other social media tools. Only 90 responses received from the different states of India and analyzed via MS-Excel. The data receive from 17 states and 3 union territories of India; however most of the respondents has come from the states Odisha 23, Himachal Pradesh 14 and Assam 10. The results revealed that out 90 respondents 37 Female and 53 male categories and also majority of respondents 71 have come from academic library followed by special library 15, Public library 3 and corporate library 1 respondent. The study indicates that, out of 90 respondent’s majority of 53 of respondents said that their Library have a social media account while 39 of respondents have not their Library social media account. The study also inform that Facebook, YouTube, Google+, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram are using by the LIS professional of India and Facebook 86 was popular social media tool among the other social media tools. Furthermore, respondent reported that they are using social media tools for sharing photos of events and programs of library 72, followed by tips for using different services 64, posting of new arrivals 56, tutorials of database 35 and send brief updates to patrons 32, announcement of library holidays 22. It was also reported by respondents that they are sharing information about scholarships training programs and marketing of library events etc. The study furthermore identify that lack of time is the major problem while using social media with 53 of respondents followed by low speed of internet 35, too many social media tools to learn 17 and some 3 respondents reported that there is no problem while using social media tools. The results also revealed that, majority of the respondents reported that they are using social media tools in daily basis 71 followed by weekly basis 16. It was followed by monthly 1 respondent and other 2 of the respondents. In summary, this study is expected to be useful in further promoting the social media for dissemination of library and information services to the general public.

Keywords: application of social media, India, promoting library services, library professionals

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10059 Transit-Oriented Development as a Tool for Building Social Capital

Authors: Suneet Jagdev

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Rapid urbanization has resulted in informal settlements on the periphery of nearly all big cities in the developing world due to lack of affordable housing options in the city. Residents of these communities have to travel long distances to get to work or search for jobs in these cities, and women, children and elderly people are excluded from urban opportunities. Affordable and safe public transport facilities can help them expand their possibilities. The aim of this research is to identify social capital as another important element of livable cities that can be protected and nurtured through transit-oriented development, as a tool to provide real resources that can help these transit-oriented communities become self-sustainable. Social capital has been referred to the collective value of all social networks and the inclinations that arise from these networks to do things for each other. It is one of the key component responsible to build and maintain democracy. Public spaces, pedestrian amenities and social equity are the other essential part of Transit Oriented Development models that will be analyzed in this research. The data has been collected through the analysis of several case studies, the urban design strategies implemented and their impact on the perception and on the community´s experience, and, finally, how these focused on the social capital. Case studies have been evaluated on several metrics, namely ecological, financial, energy consumption, etc. A questionnaire and other tools were designed to collect data to analyze the research objective and reflect the dimension of social capital. The results of the questionnaire indicated that almost all the participants have a positive attitude towards this dimensions of building a social capital with the aid of transit-oriented development. Statistical data of the identified key motivators against against demographic characteristics have been generated based on the case studies used for the paper. The findings suggested that there is a direct relation between urbanization, transit-oriented developments, and social capital.

Keywords: better opportunities, low-income settlements, social capital, social inclusion, transit oriented development

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10058 Extracellular Enzymes as Promising Soil Health Indicators: Assessing Response to Different Land Uses Using Long-Term Experiments

Authors: Munisath Khandoker, Stephan Haefele, Andy Gregory

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Extracellular enzymes play a key role in soil organic carbon (SOC) decomposition and nutrient cycling and are known indicators for soil health; however, it is not understood how these enzymes respond to different land uses and their relationships to other soil properties have not been extensively reviewed. The relationships among the activities of three soil enzymes: β-glucosaminidase (NAG), phosphomonoesterase (PHO) and β-glucosidase (GLU), were examined. The impact of soil organic amendments, soil types and land management on soil enzyme activities were reviewed, and it was hypothesized that soils with increased SOC have increased enzyme activity. Long-term experiments at Rothamsted Research Woburn and Harpenden sites in the UK were used to evaluate how different management practices affect enzyme activity involved in carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) cycling in the soil. Samples were collected from soils with different organic treatments such as straw, farmyard manure (FYM), compost additions, cover crops and permanent grass cover to assess whether SOC can be linked with increased levels of enzymatic activity and what influence, if any, enzymatic activity has on total C and N in the soil. Investigating the interactions of important enzymes with soil characteristics and SOC can help to better understand the health of soils. Studies on long-term experiments with known histories and large datasets can better help with this. SOC tends to decrease during land use changes from natural ecosystems to agricultural systems; therefore, it is imperative that agricultural lands find ways to increase and/or maintain SOC in the soil.

Keywords: biological soil health indicators, extracellular enzymes, soil health, soil, microbiology

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10057 The Strategy of Teaching Digital Art in Classroom as a Way of Enhancing Pupils’ Artistic Creativity

Authors: Aber Salem Aboalgasm, Rupert Ward

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Teaching art by digital means is a big challenge for the majority of teachers of art and artistic design courses in primary education schools. These courses can clearly identify relationships between art, technology and creativity in the classroom .The aim of this article is to present a modern way of teaching art, using digital tools in the art classroom in order to improve creative ability in pupils aged between 9 and 11 years; it also presents a conceptual model for creativity based on digital art. The model could be useful for pupils interested in learning drawing and using an e-drawing package, and for teachers who are interested in teaching their students modern digital art, and improving children’s creativity. This model is designed to show the strategy of teaching art through technology, in order for children to learn how to be creative. This will also help education providers to make suitable choices about which technological approaches they should choose to teach students and enhance their creative ability. To define the digital art tools that can benefit children develop their technical skills. It is also expected that use of this model will help to develop social interactive qualities that may improve intellectual ability.

Keywords: digital tools, motivation, creative activity, technical skill

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10056 Anatomical Investigation of Superficial Fascia Relationships with the Skin and Underlying Tissue in the Greyhound Rump, Thigh, and Crus

Authors: Oday A. Al-Juhaishi, Sa`ad M. Ismail, Hung-Hsun Yen, Christina M. Murray, Helen M. S. Davies

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The functional anatomy of the fascia in the greyhound is still poorly understood, and incompletely described. The basic knowledge of fascia stems mainly from anatomical, histological and ultrastructural analyses. In this study, twelve specimens of hindlimbs from six fresh greyhound cadavers (3 male, 3 female) were used to examine the topographical relationships of the superficial fascia with the skin and underlying tissue. The first incision was made along the dorsal midline from the level of the thoracolumbar junction caudally to the level of the mid sacrum. The second incision was begun at the level of the first incision and extended along the midline of the lateral aspect of the hindlimb distally, to just proximal to the tarsus, and, the skin margins carefully separated to observe connective tissue links between the skin and superficial fascia, attachment points of the fascia and the relationships of the fascia with blood vessels that supply the skin. A digital camera was used to record the anatomical features as they were revealed. The dissections identified fibrous septa connecting the skin with the superficial fascia and deep fascia in specific areas. The presence of the adipose tissue was found to be very rare within the superficial fascia in these specimens. On the extensor aspects of some joints, a fusion between the superficial fascia and deep fascia was observed. This fusion created a subcutaneous bursa in the following areas: a prepatellar bursa of the stifle, a tarsal bursa caudal to the calcaneus bone, and an ischiatic bursa caudal to the ischiatic tuberosity. The evaluation of blood vessels showed that the perforating vessels passed through fibrous septa in a perpendicular direction to supply the skin, with the largest branch noted in the gluteal area. The attachment points between the superficial fascia and skin were mainly found in the region of the flexor aspect of the joints, such as caudal to the stifle joint. The numerous fibrous septa between the superficial fascia and skin that have been identified in some areas, may create support for the blood vessels that penetrate fascia and into the skin, while allowing for movement between the tissue planes. The subcutaneous bursae between the skin and the superficial fascia where it is fused with the deep fascia may be useful to decrease friction between moving areas. The adhesion points may be related to the integrity and loading of the skin. The attachment points fix the skin and appear to divide the hindlimb into anatomical compartments.

Keywords: attachment points, fibrous septa, greyhound, subcutaneous bursa, superficial fascia

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10055 How to Reconcile Financial Incentives and Pro-Social Motivations of Loan Officers in Microfinance?

Authors: Julie De Pril, Cécile Godfroid

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Nowadays, achieving double bottom line has become a widely recognized objective for microfinance institutions (MFIs). They would like to be financially sustainable or even profitable while continuing to focus on their social mission. In order to rise their financial performance, MFIs tend to grant financial bonuses to loan officers so that they increase their performance and efficiency. However, as argued by motivation crowding theory, monetary rewards may not have only positive effects but can also erode intrinsic motivation. Since MFIs pursue social objectives in addition to their financial ones, their employees’ intrinsic motivations may include the willingness to help others, like in many non-profit organizations. This is called pro-social motivation in the psychology literature. Particularly, this type of motivation should be highly reflected among microfinance loan officers as a part of their role consists in improving clients’ welfare. Therefore, it seems to be crucial for MFIs to find an equilibrium between the efficiency benefits obtained thanks to the granting of financial incentives and the deterioration of social performance that may result from the reduction of the loan officers’ pro-social motivation. This paper attempts to suggest, with a mathematical model, an optimal incentive scheme MFIs could rely on.

Keywords: loan officers, microfinance, prosocial motivation, rewards

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10054 Can Sustainability Help Achieve Social Justice?

Authors: Maryam Davodi-Far

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Although sustainability offers a vision to preserve the earth’s resources while sustaining life on earth, there tends to be injustice and disparity in how resources are allocated across the globe. As such, the question that arises is whom will sustainability benefit? Will the rich grow richer and the poor become worse off? Is there a way to find balance between sustainability and still implement and achieve success with distributive justice theories? One of the facets of justice is distributive justice; the idea of balancing benefits and costs associated with the way in which we disseminate and consume goods. Social justice relies on how the cost and burdens of our resource allocation can be done reasonably and equitably and spread across a number of societies, and within each society spread across diverse groups and communities. In the end, the question is how to interact with the environment and diverse communities of today and of those communities of the future.

Keywords: consumerism, sustainability, sustainable development, social justice, social equity, distributive justice

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10053 Evaluating Social Sustainability in Historical City Center in Turkey: Case Study of Bursa

Authors: Şeyda Akçalı

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This study explores the concept of social sustainability and its characteristics in terms of neighborhood (mahalle) which is a social phenomenon in Turkish urban life. As social sustainability indicators that moving away traditional themes toward multi-dimensional measures, the solutions for urban strategies may be achieved through learning lessons from historical precedents. It considers the inherent values of traditional urban forms contribute to the evolution of the city as well as the social functions of it. The study aims to measure non-tangible issues in order to evaluate social sustainability in historic urban environments and how they could contribute to the current urban planning strategies. The concept of neighborhood (mahalle) refers to a way of living that represents the organization of Turkish social and communal life rather than defining an administrative unit for the city. The distinctive physical and social features of neighborhood illustrate the link between social sustainability and historic urban environment. Instead of having a nostalgic view of past, it identifies both the failures and successes and extract lessons of traditional urban environments and adopt them to modern context. First, the study determines the aspects of social sustainability which are issued as the key themes in the literature. Then, it develops a model by describing the social features of mahalle which show consistency within the social sustainability agenda. The model is used to analyze the performance of traditional housing area in the historical city center of Bursa, Turkey whether it meets the residents’ social needs and contribute collective functioning of the community. Through a questionnaire survey exercised in the historic neighborhoods, the residents are evaluated according to social sustainability criteria of neighborhood. The results derived from the factor analysis indicate that social aspects of neighborhood are social infrastructure, identity, attachment, neighborliness, safety and wellbeing. Qualitative evaluation shows the relationship between key aspects of social sustainability and demographic and socio-economic factors. The outcomes support that inherent values of neighborhood retain its importance for the sustainability of community although there must be some local arrangements for few factors with great attention not to compromise the others. The concept of neighborhood should be considered as a potential tool to support social sustainability in national political agenda and urban policies. The performance of underlying factors in historic urban environment proposes a basis for both examining and improving traditional urban areas and how it may contribute to the overall city.

Keywords: historical city center, mahalle, neighborhood, social sustainability, traditional urban environment, Turkey

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10052 Consumer Reactions to Hospitality Social Robots Across Cultures

Authors: Lisa C. Wan

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To address customers’ safety concerns, more and more hospitality companies are using service robots to provide contactless services. For many companies, the switch from human employees to service robots to lower the contagion risk during and after the pandemic may be permanent. The market size for hospitality service robots is estimated to reach US$3,083 million by 2030, registering a CAGR of 25.5% from 2021 to 2030. While service robots may effectively reduce interpersonal contacts and health risk, it also eliminates the social interactions desired by customers. A recent survey revealed that more than 60% of Americans feel lonely during the pandemic. People who are traveling can also feel isolated when they are at a hotel far away from home. It is therefore important for the hospitality companies to understand whether and how social robots can remedy deprived social connection not only due to a pandemic but also for a trip away from home in the post-pandemic future. This study complements extant hospitality literature regarding service robots by examining how service robots can forge social connections with customers. The service robots we are concerned with are those that can interact and communicate with humans; we broadly refer to them as social robots. We define a social robot as one that is equipped with interaction capabilities – it can either be one that directly interacts with the consumer or one through which the consumer can interact with other humans. Drawing on the theories of mind perception, we propose that service robots can foster social connectedness and increase the perception of social competence of the robot, but these effects will vary across cultures. By applying theories of mind perception and cultural dimension to the hospitality setting, this study shows that service robots that are equipped with social connection function will receive a more favorable evaluation from the consumers and enhance their intention to visit a hotel. The more favorable reaction to social robots is stronger for collectivists (i.e., Asians) than individualists (i.e., Westerners). To our knowledge, this is among the first studies to investigate the impact of culture on consumer reactions to social robots in the hospitality and tourism context. Moreover, this research extends the literature by examining whether people imbue non-human entities (i.e., telepresence social robots) with social competence. Because social robots that foster social connection with humans are still rare in hospitality and tourism, this aspect is an underexplored research area. Our study is the first to propose that, just like their human counterparts that possess relevant social skills, social robots’ interaction capabilities (e.g., telepresence robots) are used to infer social competence. More studies will be conducted to examine consumer reactions to humanoid (vs. non-humanoid) robot in the hospitality settings to generalize our research findings.

Keywords: service robots, COVID-19, social connection, cultures

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10051 Citizens’ Expectations, Motivations, and Evaluation of Participatory Use of Social Media Tools for Civic Engagement in Oman

Authors: Ali S. Al-Aufi, Ibrahim S. Al-Harthi, Yousuf S. AlHinai, Ali H.S. Al-Badi, Zahran S. Al-Salti

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Social media tools have currently been leading a major change in the flow and use of information for different life aspects within people and between people and their governments. They represent powerful channels for direct exchanges of information, ideas, and suggestions for purposes of civic participation. The current study aims at investigating Omani citizens’ perceptions, expectations, and motivations of their uses of social media tools to interact with the government for civic participation. A quantitative methodology was used to collect data through self-administered questionnaires from a random sample of university students and staff drawn from Sultan Qaboos University, considering them as well-informed and typically active users of social media. The literature was comprehensively reviewed to retrieve relevant empirical studies that particularly investigated the use of social media for civic engagement which provided a basis for the construct of the questionnaire; taken into consideration the delineated dimensions of perceptions, expectations, and motivations. The findings of the study offer practical and useful recommendations for governmental units in Oman and similar contexts in the region to inform better and efficient use of social media tools to interact with citizens in issues related to civic engagement; particularly to make best use of these tools for improving services and developing existing and newer initiatives, and hence, encouraging and strengthening citizens’ involvement for civic engagement.

Keywords: social media, social networking sites, web 2.0, civic engagement, civic participation, oman

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10050 The Gypsy Community Facing the Sexual Orientation: An Empirical Approach to the Attitudes of the Gypsy Population of Granada Towards Homosexual Sex-Affective Relationships

Authors: Elena Arquer Cuenca

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The gypsy community has been a mistreated and rejected group since its arrival in the Iberian Peninsula in the 15th century. At present, despite being the largest ethnic minority group in Spain as well as in Europe, the different legal and social initiatives in favour of equality continue to suffer discrimination by the general society. This has fostered a strengthening of the endogroup accompanied by cultural conservatism as a form of self-protection. Despite the current trend of normalization of sexual diversity in modern societies, LGB people continue to suffer discrimination, especially in more traditional environments or communities. This rejection for reasons of sexual orientation within the family or community can hinder the free development of the person and compromise peaceful coexistence. The present work is intended as an approach to the attitudes of the gypsy population towards non-heterosexual sexual orientation. The objective is none other than ‘to know the appreciation that the gypsy population has about homosexual sex-affective relationships, in order to assess whether this has any impact on family and community coexistence’. The following specific objectives are derived from this general objective: ‘To find out whether there is a relationship between the dichotomous Roma gender system and the acceptance/rejection of homosexuality’; ‘to analyse whether sexual orientation has an impact on the coexistence of the Roman family and community’; ‘to analyse whether the historical discrimination suffered by the Roman population favours the maintenance of the patriarchal heterosexual reproductive family’; and lastly ‘to explore whether ICTs have promoted the process of normalisation and/or acceptance of homosexuality within the Roma community’. In order to achieve these objectives, a bibliographical and documentary review has been used, as well as the semi-structured interview technique, in which 4 gypsy people participated (2 women and 2 men of different ages). One of the main findings was the inappropriateness of the use of the homogenising category "Gypsy People" at present, given the great diversity among the Roma communities. Moreover, the difficulty in accepting homosexuality seems to be related to the fact that the heterosexual reproductive family has been the main survival mechanism of Roma communities over centuries. However, it will be concluded that attitudes towards homosexuality will vary depending on the socio-economic and cultural context and factors such as age or professed religion. Three main contributions of this research are: firstly, the inclusion of sexual orientation as a variable to be considered when analysing peaceful coexistence; secondly socio-historical dynamics and structures of inequality have been taken into account when analysing Roma attitudes towards homosexuality; and finally, the processual nature of socio-cultural changes has also been considered.

Keywords: gender, homosexuality, ICTs, peaceful coexistence, Roma community, sexual orientation

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10049 The Relationship between the Use of Social Networks with Executive Functions and Academic Performance in High School Students in Tehran

Authors: Esmail Sadipour

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The use of social networks is increasing day by day in all societies. The purpose of this research was to know the relationship between the use of social networks (Instagram, WhatsApp, and Telegram) with executive functions and academic performance in first-year female high school students. This research was applied in terms of purpose, quantitative in terms of data type, and correlational in terms of technique. The population of this research consisted of all female high school students in the first year of district 2 of Tehran. Using Green's formula, the sample size of 150 people was determined and selected by cluster random method. In this way, from all 17 high schools in district 2 of Tehran, 5 high schools were selected by a simple random method and then one class was selected from each high school, and a total of 155 students were selected. To measure the use of social networks, a researcher-made questionnaire was used, the Barclay test (2012) was used for executive functions, and last semester's GPA was used for academic performance. Pearson's correlation coefficient and multivariate regression were used to analyze the data. The results showed that there is a negative relationship between the amount of use of social networks and self-control, self-motivation and time self-management. In other words, the more the use of social networks, the fewer executive functions of students, self-control, self-motivation, and self-management of their time. Also, with the increase in the use of social networks, the academic performance of students has decreased.

Keywords: social networks, executive function, academic performance, working memory

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10048 The Impacts of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Social Activities and Residential Areas

Authors: Asghar Motea Noparvar

Abstract:

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), which has been characterized as a pandemic since December 2019, is attacking societies in terms of different ways. It means that this is much more than a crisis that is related to human health. It is a human, economic and social crisis. Since December 2019, not only some significant transformations have happened in human life, but also there has been some mental health, daily life activities, and even urban space changes. The purpose of this study is to mention some tangible transformations in society by applying two main restrictions such as “lock down” and “social distancing,” and how people took refuge in their homes and fit every activity there. How this pandemic has been transforming human life and social activities is the main issue of this study. In order to gather the information, review the impacts of COVID-19 on social life by revising the literature and considering the “Risk Society” theory, which is gotten credited by a German sociologist, Ulrich Beck. Additionally, COVID-19 not only had a direct impact on health but also had significant impacts on the economy, education, tourism, the environment, and the construction industry. Therefore, the pandemic caused a disruption in the whole urban system. In this study, the main focused point is the transformation of activities and residential areas. In order to achieve this finding, the literature review is analyzed in the case of COVID-19 and its impacts on social life. To sum up, it can be concluded that a pandemic can change social life along with other transformations that it is able to do.

Keywords: infectious disease, COVID-19, social activities, residential areas, transformation

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10047 Consequential Investigations on the Impact of Zakat Towards the Promotion of Socio-Economic Development in Morocco: A Theoretical Framework

Authors: Mennani Maha, Attak El Houssain

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Under the massive effect of the Covid-19 health crisis, marked by a loss of competitiveness, a slowdown in growth and an accumulation of the repercussions of socio-economic inequalities, a considerable effort must be combined, in Morocco, to put into perspective macro-political, macro-economic and social opportunities. The development of a new economic and social approach is essential in order to respond to the authenticity of the new development model that will be used by the country. The appropriation of strategies of solidarity and social cohesion constitutes a participatory, competitive and inclusive approach to support the functionalities of the economic, social and political system. Therefore, the search for alternative financial resources has become a necessity to achieve the objectives of sustainable socio-economic growth on the one hand; and to promote, on the other hands, the dynamics, of large scale, social investments. The zakat remains a site of the Islamic economy dedicated to stimulating the bases of a collective adhesion of the population on the economic, as well as on the social level, thanks to a fair and equitable distribution of the zakat funds. However, Morocco is one of the few Muslim countries that has not yet had an institution for collecting and distributing this Islamic duty, which makes it difficult to measure the socio-economic impact of zakat. This theoretical document essentially ensures the development of the crucial utility of institutionalizing zakat in order to reinforce the objectives of social solidarity in Morocco in line with the process of conceptualizing a new development model.

Keywords: zakat, socio-economic development, solidarity, social investment

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10046 Social Assistive Robots, Reframing the Human Robotics Interaction Benchmark of Social Success

Authors: Antonio Espingardeiro

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It is likely that robots will cross the boundaries of industry into households over the next decades. With demographic challenges worldwide, the future ageing populations will require the introduction of assistive technologies capable of providing, care, human dignity and quality of life through the aging process. Robotics technology has a high potential for being used in the areas of social and healthcare by promoting a wide range of activities such as entertainment, companionship, supervision or cognitive and physical assistance. However, such close Human Robotics Interactions (HRIs) encompass a rich set of ethical scenarios that need to be addressed before Socially Assistive Robots (SARs) reach the global markets. Such interactions with robots may seem a worthy goal for many technical/financial reasons but inevitably require close attention to the ethical dimensions of such interactions. This article investigates the current HRI benchmark of social success. It revises it according to the ethical principles of beneficence, non-maleficence and justice aligned with social care ethos. An extension of such benchmark is proposed based on an empirical study of HRIs with elderly groups.

Keywords: HRI, SARs, social success, benchmark, elderly care

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10045 The Positive Effects of Social Distancing on Individual Work Outcomes in the Context of COVID-19

Authors: Fan Wei, Tang Yipeng

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The outbreak of COVID-19 in early 2020 has been raging around the world, which has severely affected people's work and life. In today's post-pandemic era, although the pandemic has been effectively controlled, people still need to maintain social distancing at all times to prevent the further spread of the virus. Based on this, social distancing in the context of the pandemic has aroused widespread attention from scholars. At present, most studies exploring the influencing factors of social distancing are studying the negative impact of social distancing on the physical and mental state of special groups from the inter-individual level, and their more focus on the forced complete social distancing during the severe period of the pandemic. Few studies have focused on the impact of social distancing on working groups in the post-pandemic era from the within-individual level. In order to explore this problem, this paper constructs a cross-level moderating model based on resource conservation theory from the perspective of psychological resources. A total of 81 subjects were recruited to fill in the three-stage questionnaires each day for 10 working days, and 661valid questionnaires were finally obtained. Through the empirical tests, the following conclusions were finally obtained: (1) At the within-individual level, daily social distancing is positively correlated with the second day’s recovery, and the individual’s low sociability regulates the relationship between social distancing and recovery. The indirect effect of daily social distancing through recovery has positive relationship employees’ work engagement and work-goal progress only when the individual has low sociability. For individuals with high sociability, none of these paths are significant. (2) At the within-individual level, there is a significant relationship between individual's recovery and work engagement and work-goal progress, indicating that the recovery of resources can produce positive work outcomes. According to the results, this study believes that in the post-pandemic era, social distancing can not only effectively prevent and control the pandemic but also have positive impacts. Employees can use the time and energy originally saved for social activities through social distancing to invest in things that can provide resources and help them recover.

Keywords: social distancing, recovery, work engagement, work goal progress, sociability

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10044 Evaluation of the Effect of IMS on the Social Responsibility in the Oil and Gas Production Companies of National Iranian South Oil Fields Company (NISOC)

Authors: Kamran Taghizadeh

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This study was aimed at evaluating the effect of IMS including occupational health system, environmental management system, and safety and health system on the social responsibility (case study of NISOC`s oil and gas production companies). This study`s objectives include evaluating the IMS situation and its effect on social responsibility in addition of providing appropriate solutions based on the study`s hypotheses as a basis for future. Data collection was carried out by library and field studies as well as a questionnaire. The stratified random method was the sampling method and a sample of 285 employees in addition to the collected data (from the questionnaire) were analyzed by inferential statistics methods using SPSS software. Finally, results of regression and fitted model at a significance level of 5% confirmed all hypotheses meaning that IMS and its items have a significant effect on social responsibility.

Keywords: social responsibility, integrated management, oil and gas production companies, regression

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10043 Entrepreneurial Intention and Social Entrepreneurship among Students in Malaysian Higher Education

Authors: Radin Siti Aishah Radin A Rahman, Norasmah Othman, Zaidatol Akmaliah Lope Pihie, Hariyaty Ab. Wahid

Abstract:

The recent instability in economy was found to be influencing the situation in Malaysia whether directly or indirectly. Taking that into consideration, the government needs to find the best approach to balance its citizen’s socio-economic strata level urgently. Through education platform is among the efforts planned and acted upon for the purpose of balancing the effects of the influence, through the exposure of social entrepreneurial activity towards youth especially those in higher institution level. Armed with knowledge and skills that they gained, with the support by entrepreneurial culture and environment while in campus; indirectly, the students will lean more on making social entrepreneurship as a career option when they graduate. Following the issues of marketability and workability of current graduates that are becoming dire, research involving how far the willingness of student to create social innovation that contribute to the society without focusing solely on personal gain is relevant enough to be conducted. With that, this research is conducted with the purpose of identifying the level of entrepreneurial intention and social entrepreneurship among higher institution students in Malaysia. Stratified random sampling involves 355 undergraduate students from five public universities had been made as research respondents and data were collected through surveys. The data was then analyzed descriptively using min score and standard deviation. The study found that the entrepreneurial intention of higher education students are on moderate level, however it is the contrary for social entrepreneurship activities, where it was shown on a high level. This means that while the students only have moderate level of willingness to be a social entrepreneur, they are very committed to created social innovation through the social entrepreneurship activities conducted. The implication from this study can be contributed towards the higher institution authorities in prediction the tendency of student in becoming social entrepreneurs. Thus, the opportunities and facilities for realizing the courses related to social entrepreneurship must be created expansively so that the vision of creating as many social entrepreneurs as possible can be achieved.

Keywords: entrepreneurial intention, higher education institutions (HEIs), social entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurial activity, gender

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10042 Sustainable Housing and Urban Development: A Study on the Soon-To-Be-Old Population's Impetus to Migrate

Authors: Tristance Kee

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With the unprecedented increase in elderly population globally, it is critical to search for new sustainable housing and urban development alternatives to traditional housing options. This research examines concepts of elderly migration pattern in the context of a high density city in Hong Kong to Mainland China. The research objectives are to: 1) explore the relationships between soon-to-be-old elderly and their intentions to move to Mainland upon retirement and their demographic characteristics; and 2) What are the desired amenities, locational factors and activities that are expected in the soon-to-be-old generation’s retirement housing environment? Primary data was collected through questionnaire survey conducted using random sampling method with respondents aged between 45-64 years old. The face-to-face survey was completed by 500 respondents. The survey was divided into four sections. The first section focused on respondent’s demographic information such as gender, age, education attainment, monthly income, housing tenure type and their visits to Mainland China. The second section focused on their retirement plans in terms of intended retirement age, prospective retirement funding and retirement housing options. The third section focused on the respondent’s attitudes toward retiring in Mainland for housing. It asked about their intentions to migrate retire into Mainland and incentives to retire in Hong Kong. The fourth section focused on respondent’s ideal housing environment including preferred housing amenities, desired living environment and retirement activities. The dependent variable in this study was ‘respondent’s consideration to move to Mainland China upon retirement’. Eight primary independent variables were integrated into the study to identify the correlations between them and retirement migration plan. The independent variables include: gender, age, marital status, monthly income, present housing tenure type, property ownership in Hong Kong, relationship with Mainland and the frequency of visiting Mainland China. In addition to the above independent variables, respondents were asked to indicate their retirement plans (retirement age, funding sources and retirement housing options), incentives to migrate to retire (choices included: property ownership, family relations, cost of living, living environment, medical facilities, government welfare benefits, etc.), perceived ideal retirement life qualities including desired amenities (sports, medical and leisure facilities etc.), desired locational qualities (green open space, convenient transport options and accessibility to urban settings etc.) and desired retirement activities (home-based leisure, elderly friendly sports, cultural activities, child care, social activities, etc.). The finding shows correlations between the used independent variables and consideration to migrate for housing options. The two independent variables indicated a possible correlation were gender and the frequency of visiting Mainland at present. When considering the increasing property prices across the border and strong social relationships, potential retirement migration is a very subjective decision that could vary from person to person. This research adds knowledge to housing research and migration study. Although the research is based in Mainland, most of the characteristics identified including better medical services, government welfare and sound urban amenities are shared qualities for all sustainable urban development and housing strategies.

Keywords: elderly migration, housing alternative, soon-to-be-old, sustainable environment

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10041 The Case for Implementing a Supplier Diversity and Inclusion Program beyond the Ethical Value

Authors: Arnaud Deshais

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The supply chain industry has integrated the need for supplier Diversity and Inclusion (D&I), mostly from an ethical and moral argument. In addition, in some countries, it is also a legal requirement for companies reaching a certain size. As a matter of fact, a lot of successful companies have developed a Corporate Social Responsibility Program that encourages diversity and inclusion in the supply chain, such as building strong relationships with minority owned businesses (women, LGBT, veterans, etc.). Outside ethical and legal perspectives, it is also worth researching the economic and financial benefits of pursuing such efforts. Through surveys of purchasing and supply chain managers in their current roles as well as review of some case studies on supplier based D&I programs, it becomes apparent that a financial return on investment is to be expected as well for companies who make a concerted effort to grow their D&I programs. The study explores the levers to increase shareholder value and business efficiencies. Finally, the research highlights the competitive advantage related to a broad minority based supplier network. The benefits manifest themselves in the areas of competitiveness, innovation, and collaboration. The economic reward ends up being at the forefront of those programs while being an opportunity for organizations to become 'a good citizen'.

Keywords: diversity, inclusion, purchasing, supplier

Procedia PDF Downloads 123