Search results for: skills and values of social work

Authors: Gabrielle Brand, Christopher Etherton-Beer

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The learning landscape of higher education environment is changing, with an increased focus over the past decade on how educators might begin to cultivate reflective skills in health professions students. In addition, changing professional requirements demand that health professionals are adequately prepared to practice in today’s complex Australian health care systems, including responding to changing demographics of population ageing. To counteract a widespread perception of health professions students’ disinterest in caring for older persons, the authors will report on an exploratory, mixed method research study that used photographs, narrative and small group work to enhance medical and nursing students’ reflective learning experience. An innovative photo-elicitation technique and reflective questioning prompts were used to increase engagement, and challenge students to consider new perspectives (around ageing) by constructing shared storylines in small groups. The qualitative themes revealed how photographs, narratives and small group work created learning spaces for reflection whereby students could safely explore their own personal and professional values, beliefs and perspectives around ageing. By providing the space for reflection, the students reported how they found connection and meaning in their own learning through a process of self-exploration that often challenged their assumptions of both older people and themselves as future health professionals. By integrating cognitive and affective elements into the learning process, this research demonstrates the importance of embedding visual methodologies that enhance reflection and transformative learning. The findings highlight the importance of integrating the arts into predominantly empirically driven health professional curricula and can be used as a catalyst for individual and/or collective reflection which can potentially enhance empathy, insight and understanding of the lived experiences of older patients. Based on these findings, the authors have developed ‘Depth of Field: Exploring Ageing’ an innovative, interprofessional, digital reflective learning resource that uses Prezi Inc. software (storytelling tool that presents ideas on a virtual canvas) to enhance students’ reflective capacity in the higher education environment.

Keywords: narrative, photo-elicitation, reflective learning, qualitative research

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Authors: Vanessa Do, Lauren Smith, Leslie Carver

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It is widely known that individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may exhibit sensitivity to stimuli. Even at a young age, they tend to display stimuli-related discomfort in their behavior during play. Play serves a crucial role in a child’s early years as it helps support healthy brain development, socio-emotional skills, and adaptation to their environment There is research dedicated to studying infant preferences for toys, especially in regard to: gender preferences, the advantages of promoting play, and the caregiver’s role in their child’s play routines. However, there is a disproportionate amount of literature examining how play patterns may differ in children with sensory sensitivity, such as children diagnosed with ASD. Prior literature has studied and found supporting evidence that individuals with ASD have deficits in social communication and have increased presence of repetitive behaviors and/or restricted interests, which also display in early childhood play patterns. This study aims to examine potential differences in toy preference between infants with (FH+) and without (FH-) a familial history of ASD ages 6. 9, and 12 months old. More specifically, this study will address the question, “do FH+ infants tend to play more with toys that require less social engagement compared to FH- infants?” Infants and their caregivers were recruited and asked to engage in a free-play session in their homes that lasted approximately 5 minutes. The sessions were recorded and later coded offline for engagement behaviors categorized by toy; each toy that the infants interacted with was coded as belonging to one of 6 categories: sensory (designed to stimulate one or more senses such as light-up toys or musical toys) , construction (e.g., building blocks, rubber suction cups), vehicles (e.g., toy cars), instructional (require steps to accomplish a goal such as flip phones or books), imaginative (e.g., dolls, stuffed animals), and miscellaneous (toys that do not fit into these categories). Toy engagement was defined as the infant looking and touching the toy (ILT) or looking at the toy while their caregiver was holding it (IL-CT). Results reported include/will include the proportion of time the infant was actively engaged with the toy out of the total usable video time per subject — distractions observed during the session were excluded from analysis. Data collection is still ongoing; however, the prediction is that FH+ infants will have higher engagement with sensory and construction toys as they require the least amount of social effort. Furthermore, FH+ infants will have the least engagement with the imaginative toys as prior literature has supported the claim that individuals with ASD have a decreased likelihood to engage in play that requires pretend play and other social skills. Looking at what toys are more or less engaging to FH+ infants is important as it provides significant contributions to their healthy cognitive, social, and emotional development. As play is one of the first ways for a child to understand the complexities of the larger world, the findings of this study may help guide further research into encouraging play with toys that are more engaging and sensory-sensitive for children with ASD.

Keywords: autism engagement, children’s play, early development, free-play, infants, toy

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Authors: Naamane Remita, Mohammed laïd Mechri, Nouredine Zekri, Smaïl Chihi

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The goal of this study is the estimation real and imaginary components of both electrical impedance and permittivity z', z'' and ε', ε'' respectively, in Ouargla dunes sand at different temperatures and different frequencies, with alternating current (AC) equal to 1 volt, using the impedance spectroscopy (IS). This method is simple and non-destructive. the results can frequently be correlated with a number of physical properties, dielectric properties and the impacts of the composition on the electrical conductivity of solids. The experimental results revealed that the real part of impedance is higher at higher temperature in the lower frequency region and gradually decreases with increasing frequency. As for the high frequencies, all the values of the real part of the impedance were positive. But at low frequency the values of the imaginary part were positive at all temperatures except for 1200 degrees which were negative. As for the medium frequencies, the reactance values were negative at temperatures 25, 400, 200 and 600 degrees, and then became positive at the rest of the temperatures. At high frequencies of the order of MHz, the values of the imaginary part of the electrical impedance were in contrast to what we recorded for the middle frequencies. The results showed that the electrical permittivity decreases with increasing frequency, at low frequency we recorded permittivity values of 10+ 11, and at medium frequencies it was 10+ 07, while at high frequencies it was 10+ 02. The values of the real part of the electrical permittivity were taken large values at the temperatures of 200 and 600 degrees Celsius and at the lowest frequency, while the smallest value for the permittivity was recorded at the temperature of 400 degrees Celsius at the highest frequency. The results showed that there are large values of the imaginary part of the electrical permittivity at the lowest frequency and then it starts decreasing as the latter increases (the higher the frequency the lower the values of the imaginary part of the electrical permittivity). The character of electrical impedance variation indicated an opportunity to realize the polarization of Ouargla dunes sand and acquaintance if this compound consumes or produces energy. It’s also possible to know the satisfactory of equivalent electric circuit, whether it’s miles induction or capacitance.

Keywords: electrical impedance, electrical permittivity, temperature, impedance spectroscopy, dunes sand ouargla

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Authors: Lina Vyas, Stuti Rawat

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The COVID-19 outbreak has forced many employees to extensively adopt remote work or, widely known as work from home (WFH) arrangements. During the last two years, both employers and employees have had the opportunity to be increasingly aware of the benefits and drawbacks of WFH. Likewise, it gained the attention of academics from various schools of thought who have been interested in the future of work practices and work-life balance. Additionally, employees might also have various demands regarding their work practices after the pandemic. This study explores the potential of hybrid ways of working in the post-pandemic period by comparing first-timers who (sometimes or always) worked from home during the pandemic with those who did not, in terms of the aspects of work-life balance, work-life interference, job performance and willingness to work from home after the pandemic. The quantitative research approach was adopted. Data were collected via an online questionnaire from employees working from home in Hong Kong during the pandemic. There were one thousand three hundred and twenty-eight responses, but only 1,235 respondents experienced working from home during the pandemic. The findings reveal that 72.2% never had or hardly experienced work from home prior to the pandemic. There were statistically significant differences between first-timers and non-first-timers in work-life balance and work-life interference. The study also found that first-timers who were always working from home during the pandemic would prefer having longer WFH after the pandemic than those who were sometimes working from home. These results would serve as a basis for policy development, enabling policymakers to design appropriate HR policies and amend them to meet the current context of actual employee needs.

Keywords: hybrid working mode, remote working, work from home, work-life balance, workplace

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Authors: Endalew Fufa Kufi

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Every married person aspires to be a parent regardless of the situation in which s/he lives. Such aspiration meets with reality when the destined parent is able to give adequate supports and services to his/her children, whether the latter are got by birth or through adoption. The adequacy of services parents provide their children is both enriched and tempted by the work on which they involve. On the one hand, parents need to work and earn a living in order to support their family. On the other hand, they must spend most of their time outside home to do the work, which shortens the time and might they spare to care for their children. Where the sufficiency of services parents owe their children could be ascertained by in terms of life skills, physical care and related provisions, the role of working fathers and mothers in providing such supports could be diverse across cultures and work traditions. Hence, this research deals with the investigation of working mothers’ parental practices, challenges they face in providing parental services and the implication for the future progress of the parents and their children. Target of the study will be Arsi University in Oromia Regional State of Ethiopia. Descriptive survey design in holding the research, and data for the research will be collected in the form of experiential self-report from 150 working mothers selected from the entire working women population of Colleges of Agriculture and Environmental Studies and College of Health Sciences through stratified random-sampling. Instruments of data collection will be closed and open-ended questionnaire. Complementary data will also be collected from purposively selected samples through semi-structured interview. Data for the research will be collected through questionnaire first and then through interview. Data analysis will also follow the same procedure. The collected data will systematically be organized and statistically and thematically analyzed in order to come up with indicative findings. The overarching thesis is that, working mothers in the study area bear a lot of responsibilities both at home and at work place which leave them very little time for parenting services. Unless due attention is given to the way they can spare time for their children, they are more likely to be tense between work-life and family care services, which tempt them in different directions.

Keywords: challenges, mothers, practices, university, working

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Authors: Felix Boehnisch, Alexander Lutz

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Based on the number of users and the amount of content posted daily, Facebook is considered the largest social network in the world. This content includes images or text posts from companies but also private persons, which are also commented on by other users. However, it can sometimes be difficult for companies to keep track of all the posts and the reactions to them, especially when there are several posts a day that contain hundreds to thousands of comments. To facilitate this, the following paper deals with the possible applications of sentiment analysis to social media comments in order to be able to support the work in social media marketing. In a first step, post comments were divided into positive and negative by a subjective rating, then the same comments were checked for their polarity value by the two german python libraries TextBlobDE and SentiWS and also grouped into positive, negative, or even neutral. As a control, the subjective classifications were compared with the machine-generated ones by a confusion matrix, and relevant quality criteria were determined. The accuracy of both libraries was not really meaningful, with 60% to 66%. However, many words or sentences were not evaluated at all, so there seems to be room for optimization to possibly get more accurate results. In future studies, the use of these specific German libraries can be optimized to gain better insights by either applying them to stricter cleaned data or by adding a sentiment value to emojis, which have been removed from the comments in advance, as they are not contained in the libraries.

Keywords: Facebook, German libraries, polarity, sentiment analysis, social media comments

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Authors: Budiman Ibnu

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This study investigates about enabling conditions to facilitate social innovation in the energy sector. This is important to support the energy transition in Indonesia. This research provides appropriate project direction, including research (and action) gaps for the energy actors in Indonesia. The actors are allowed to work further with the result of this study to stimulate the energy transition in Indonesia. This report uses systemic change framework which recognizes four drivers of systemic change in a region: 1. transforming political ecologies; 2. configuring green economies; 3. building of adaptive communities; 4. social innovation. These drivers are interconnected, and this report particularly focuses on how social innovation can be supported by other drivers. This study used methods of interview and literature review as the main sources for data collection in this report. There were interviews with eight experts in the related topic which come from different countries which have experienced social innovation in the energy sector. Afterwards, this research reviewed related journal papers from last five years, to check the latest development within the topic, to support the interview result. The result found that the enabling condition can focus on one of the drivers of systemic change, which is building communities by increasing their participation, through several integrated actions. This can be implemented in two types of citizen energy initiatives which are energy cooperatives and sustainable consumption initiatives. This implementation requires study about its related policy and governance support, in order to create complete enabling conditions to facilitate social innovation in the energy transition.

Keywords: enabling condition, social innovation, citizen initiatives, community participation

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Authors: Sue S. Feldman

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As clinical and nursing informatics mature, an area that has gotten a lot of attention is the value capstone projects. Capstones are meant to address authentic and complex domain-specific problems. While capstone projects have not always been essential in graduate clinical and nursing informatics education, employers are wanting to see evidence of the prospective employee's knowledge and skills as an indication of employability. Capstones can be organized in many ways: a single course over a single semester, multiple courses over multiple semesters, as a targeted demonstration of skills, as a synthesis of prior knowledge and skills, mentored by one single person or mentored by various people, submitted as an assignment or presented in front of a panel. Because of the potential for capstones to enhance the educational experience, and as a mechanism for application of knowledge and demonstration of skills, a rigorous capstone can accelerate a graduate's potential in the workforce. In 2016, the capstone at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) could feel the external forces of a maturing Clinical and Nursing Informatics discipline. While the program had a capstone course for many years, it was lacking the depth of knowledge and demonstration of skills being asked for by those hiring in a maturing Informatics field. Since the program is online, all capstones were always in the online environment. While this modality did not change, other contributors to instruction modality changed. Pre-2016, the instruction modality was self-guided. Students checked in with a single instructor, and that instructor monitored progress across all capstones toward a PowerPoint and written paper deliverable. At the time, the enrollment was few, and the maturity had not yet pushed hard enough. By 2017, doubling enrollment and the increased demand of a more rigorously trained workforce led to restructuring the capstone so that graduates would have and retain the skills learned in the capstone process. There were three major changes: the capstone was broken up into a 3-course sequence (meaning it lasted about 10 months instead of 14 weeks), there were many chunks of deliverables, and each faculty had a cadre of about 5 students to advise through the capstone process. Literature suggests that the chunking, breaking up complex projects (i.e., the capstone in one summer) into smaller, more manageable chunks (i.e., chunks of the capstone across 3 semesters), can increase and sustain learning while allowing for increased rigor. By doing this, the teaching responsibility was shared across faculty with each semester course being taught by a different faculty member. This change facilitated delving much deeper in instruction and produced a significantly more rigorous final deliverable. Having students advised across the faculty seemed like the right thing to do. It not only shared the load, but also shared the success of students. Furthermore, it meant that students could be placed with an academic advisor who had expertise in their capstone area, further increasing the rigor of the entire capstone process and project and increasing student knowledge and skills.

Keywords: capstones, clinical informatics, health informatics, informatics

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Authors: E. Erdogan, M. Ulusoy

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In terms of tourism, the concept of sustainability can be defined as preserving and developing natural, historical, cultural, social, and aesthetic values and enabling their permanency. Sustainable tourism aims to preserve natural, historical, cultural, and social resources, also by supporting economic progress protecting economic development and environmental values that emerge as a consequence of tourism activities. Cultural tourism feeds on sustainable cultural treasures inherently and is the most effective touristic activity. Traditional configurations and structural characteristics play an important role in generating cultural tourism in a region. Sustainable cultural tourism is related to trips upon people who embark with the aim of visiting culturally rich regions, learning about and observing fast-disappearing lifestyles and collecting cultural values as memories. With its huge tourism potential, Karadağ is the most significant cultural asset of the Karaman province, possessing unique riches in terms of cultural world history. Host to one of the most important Byzantine cities in Anatolia, Karadağ is like an open-air museum with its unparalleled architectural structures. There is a village named Madenşehir in the plain at the outskirts of Karadağ, near to which are located the “Thousand and One Churches” ruins. The 80-household house is located near the ruins in an area that been declared a 1st degree historic preservation district. stones gathered from local churches were used in the construction of these households. A ministry has assigned a new residential site near the boundaries of the 2nd degree preservation district, and the decision has been made to move the occupants to this area. The most important issue here is to enable locals’ sociocultural and socioeconomic sustainability. It is also important to build these structures in a manner compatible with the historical visual look, ecological system and environmental awareness. Therefore this new site will be planned as touristic area in terms of sustainable cultural tourism and in these new plans, shall fulfill functions oriented toward both tourists and locals. It is very important that this change be sustainable and also support cultural tourism.

Keywords: cultural tourism, new village settlement, socio cultural sustainability, “thousand and one churches” site

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Authors: John Zanetich

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Designing an educational activity that encourages inquiry and collaboration is key to engaging students in meaningful learning. Educational Information and Communications Technology (EICT) plays an important role in facilitating cooperative and collaborative learning in the classroom. The EICT also facilitates students’ learning and development of the critical thinking skills needed to solve real world problems. Projects and activities based on constructivism encourage students to embrace complexity as well as find relevance and joy in their learning. It also enhances the students’ capacity for creative and responsible real-world problem solving. Classroom activities based on constructivism offer students an opportunity to develop the higher–order-thinking skills of defining problems and identifying solutions. Participating in a classroom project is an activity for both acquiring experiential knowledge and applying new knowledge to practical situations. It also provides an opportunity for students to integrate new knowledge into a skill set using reflection. Classroom projects can be developed around a variety of learning objects including social media, knowledge management and learning communities. The construction of meaning through project-based learning is an approach that encourages interaction and problem-solving activities. Projects require active participation, collaboration and interaction to reach the agreed upon outcomes. Projects also serve to externalize the invisible cognitive and social processes taking place in the activity itself and in the student experience. This paper describes a classroom project designed to elicit interactions by helping students to unfreeze existing knowledge, to create new learning experiences, and then refreeze the new knowledge. Since constructivists believe that students construct their own meaning through active engagement and participation as well as interactions with others. knowledge management can be used to guide the exchange of both tacit and explicit knowledge in interpersonal interactions between students and guide the construction of meaning. This paper uses an action research approach to the development of a classroom project and describes the use of technology, social media and the active use of tacit knowledge in the college classroom. In this project, a closed group Facebook page becomes the virtual classroom where interaction is captured and measured using engagement analytics. In the virtual learning community, the principles of knowledge management are used to identify the process and components of the infrastructure of the learning process. The project identifies class member interests and measures student engagement in a learning community by analyzing regular posting on the Facebook page. These posts are used to foster and encourage interactions, reflect a student’s interest and serve as reaction points from which viewers of the post convert the explicit information in the post to implicit knowledge. The data was collected over an academic year and was provided, in part, by the Google analytic reports on Facebook and self-reports of posts by members. The results support the use of active tacit knowledge activities, knowledge management and social media to enhance the student learning experience and help create the knowledge that will be used by students to construct meaning.

Keywords: constructivism, knowledge management, tacit knowledge, social media

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Authors: Mateusz Rak

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Objective: The paper aims to present various sources of competitive advantage which may occur when an enterprise strategically applies its concept of corporate philanthropy. Methodology: The review of the literature and available reports on the research regarding corporate philanthropy. Results: Strategic philanthropy is a positive phenomenon. Unfortunately, enterprises in Poland do not see all positive sides of such activities yet. Three kinds of corporate philanthropy may be described. They are to fulfil a social duty, improve the company reputation and gain a competitive edge. Practical implications: Showing enterprises the advantages of taking philanthropic actions, in particular, a large role of strategic philanthropy in gaining a competitive edge in the market as well as how to avoid negative consequences of corporate philanthropy. The paper presents corporate philanthropy on a few layers: as a CSR element, actions generating values in products, actions improving a corporate image in the market, altruist actions of employees.

Keywords: corporate philanthropy, corporate social responsibility, corporate foundations, CSR

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Authors: Shu-Hsien Liao, Yao-Hsuan Yang

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Social media is a virtual community and online platform that people use to create, share, and exchange opinions/experiences. Internet celebrities are people who become famous on the Internet, increasing their popularity through their social networking or video websites. Social commerce (s-ecommerce) is the combination of social relations and commercial transaction activities. The combination of social media and Internet celebrities is an emerging model for the development of s-ecommerce. With recent advances in system sciences, recommendation systems are gradually moving to develop intentional and behavioral recommendations. This background leads to the research issues regarding digital and social media in enterprises. Thus, this study implements data mining analytics, including clustering analysis and association rules, to investigate Taiwanese users (n=2,102) to investigate social media and Internet celebrities’ preferences to find knowledge profiles/patterns/rules for s-ecommerce intentional and behavioral recommendations.

Keywords: social media, internet celebrity, social commerce (s-ecommerce), data mining analytics, intentional and behavioral recommendations

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Authors: Angie Al Habib, Khalid Al Siyabi

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To measure or asses any government’s efficiency we need to measure the performance of this government in regards to the quality of the service it provides. Using a technological platform in service provision became a trend and a public demand. It is also a public need to make sure these services are aligned to values and to the whole government’s strategy, vision and goals as well. Providing services using technology tools and channels can enhance the internal business process and also help establish many essential values to government services like transparency and excellence, since in order to establish e-services many standards and policies must be put in place to enable the handing over of decision making to a mature system oriented mechanism. There was no doubt that the Sultanate of Oman wanted to enhance its services and move it towards automation and establishes a smart government as well as links its services to life events. Measuring government efficiency is very essential in achieving social security and economic growth, since it can provide a clear dashboard of all projects and improvements. Based on this data we can improve the strategies and align the country goals to them.

Keywords: government, maturity, Oman, performance, service

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Authors: Hasan Al Banna, Nazmus Sakib, Anjan Roy

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From the perspective of the underdeveloped countries such as Bangladesh, health issue can readily be pointed out as the most demanding but the least promoted concern due to lack of initiatives from both government and NGOs. Furthermore an worldwide scenario is that most death and suffering from various pathogenic and non-pathogenic diseases occur due to delay diagnosis, and this happen for the lacking of regular health check-up facility or tradition. In this epistle, an innovative proposal on social business can be introduced to ensure the one-stop medical facility to the door-step of the rural society and create jobs for the educated rural youths to serve their own people. To illustrate the policy, this newly proposed organization will work as a health club which will offer a life-time membership to villagers within a very affordable fee of 250 BDT (2.63 Euro) per month. In this package the members will get the facility of tri-monthly full health check-up by specialist doctors, a health record book and computerized health database for each member and anytime medical consultancy for the members only. We will also organize free medical campaign and workshops on nutrition, sanitation, adulteration, pregnancy-care, child-health etc with the assistance of different sponsors. Among other services that will be provided on payment include emergency ambulance facility in low rents, quality diagnostic lab and 24-hour dispensary facility. Likewise, this policy will involve local educated people by recruiting them after providing intensive courses on nursing and other medical instrumental skills. Henceforth, the engagement of local youth will make the program more acceptable to the rural community. In the later part of this paper, a survey report on Daragram union of Manikganj district, Bangladesh, having population above 25000, will be presented to delineate the scenario how this policy can repay the initial capital expense of BDT 7 million (around 73381 Euro) within 5 years and how I can realistically earn handsome revenue from the first month of business. To recapitulate, this policy is very promising to enlighten the underprivileged community by providing health assurance, and alleviating unemployment besides the investor’s financial profit.

Keywords: create job for the rural people, handsome financial profit, quality health services, underprivileged areas of underdeveloped countries

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Authors: Tuba Bagatarhan, Digdem Muge Siyez

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The aim of this research is to examine the effects of the psycho-education program on problem-solving skills of parents of high school students in the risk group for Internet addiction. A quasi-experimental design based on the pre-test, post-test and follow up test including experimental and control groups was used in the research. The independent variable of the study was the parent psycho-education program on problem-solving skills; the dependent variable was the problem-solving skills of parents. The research was conducted with the parents of 52 tenth-grade students in the risk group for Internet addiction from two high schools and volunteer to participate research on evaluation of the effectiveness of internet addiction prevention psycho-education program within the scope of another study. In this study, as 26 students were in the experimental groups in the first-high school, the parents of these 26 students were asked if they would like to participate in the parent psycho-education program on parental problem-solving skills. The parents were volunteer to participate in parent psycho-education program assigned experimental group (n=13), the other parents assigned control group 1 (n=13) in the first high school. The parents of the 26 students were randomly assigned to the control group 2 (n=13) and control group 3 (n=13) in the second high school. The data of the research was obtained via the problem behavior scale - coping - parents form and demographic questionnaire. Four-session parent psycho-education program to cope with Internet addiction and other problem behaviors in their children was applied to the experimental group. No program was applied to the control group 1, control group 2 and control group 3. In addition, an internet addiction prevention psycho-education program was applied to the children of the parents in experimental group and control group 1 within the scope of another study. In the analysis of the obtained data, two-factor variance analysis for repeated measures on one factor was used. Bonferroni post-hoc test was used to find the source of intergroup difference. According to the findings, the psycho-education program significantly increases parents’ problem-solving abilities, and the increase has continued throughout the follow-up test.

Keywords: internet addiction, parents, prevention, psyho-education

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Authors: Cecilia Teljas

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Many government agencies use social media to supplement their traditional communication channels. Government agencies are typically risk-averse, which makes social media practices problematic. However, this case study of the social media use of the Swedish social insurance agency shows considerable bi-directional communication between the agency and the public. On one hand, the agency’s aims, strategies, ways of working and experiences related to its social media communication practice are analyzed. On the other hand, the communication by both the agency and the public is studied on one of the agency’s Facebook pages. The results showed that it is possible for an agency to provide relevant and accurate information in real-time in social media if identifying and addressing different segments separately. Furthermore, as a result of context adaption this communication was rather informal and the practice can be considered to manifest positive democratic effects due to the increased availability and inclusion.

Keywords: e-government, social media, case study, discourse analysis

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Authors: Vaikunthan Rajaratnam

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Intro: Motor imagery (MI) and mental practice (MP) can be an alternative to acquire mastery of surgical skills. One component of using this technique is the use of a mental script. The aim of this study was to design and develop a mental script for basic micro suturing training for skill acquisition using a low-fidelity rubber glove model and to describe the detailed methodology for this process. Methods: This study was based on a design and development research framework. The mental script was developed with 5 expert surgeons performing a cognitive walkthrough of the repair of a vertical opening in a rubber glove model using 8/0 nylon. This was followed by a hierarchal task analysis. A draft script was created, and face and content validity assessed with a checking-back process. The final script was validated with the recruitment of 28 participants, assessed using the Mental Imagery Questionnaire (MIQ). Results: The creation of the mental script is detailed in the full text. After assessment by the expert panel, the mental script had good face and content validity. The average overall MIQ score was 5.2 ± 1.1, demonstrating the validity of generating mental imagery from the mental script developed in this study for micro suturing in the rubber glove model. Conclusion: The methodological approach described in this study is based on an instructional design framework to teach surgical skills. This MP model is inexpensive and easily accessible, addressing the challenge of reduced opportunities to practice surgical skills. However, while motor skills are important, other non-technical expertise required by the surgeon is not addressed with this model. Thus, this model should act a surgical training augment, but not replace it.

Keywords: mental script, motor imagery, cognitive walkthrough, verbal protocol analysis, hierarchical task analysis

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Authors: Keenoo Bibi Sumera, Alsheikh Mona, Mubarak Jan Beebee Zeba Mahetaab

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Background: Due to the busy schedule of the practicing clinicians at the hospitals, students may not always be attended to, which is to their detriment. The clinicians at the hospitals are also not always acquainted with teaching and/or supervising students on their placements. Additionally, there is a high student-patient ratio. Since they are the prospective clinical doctors under training, they need to reach the competence levels in clinical decision-making skills to be able to serve the healthcare system of the country and to be safe doctors. Aims and Objectives: A reflective portfolio was used to provide a means for students to learn by reflecting on their experiences and obtaining continuous feedback. This practice is an attempt to compensate for the scarcity of lack of resources, that is, clinical placement supervisors and patients. It is also anticipated that it will provide learners with a continuous monitoring and learning gap analysis tool for their clinical skills. Methodology: A hardcopy reflective portfolio was designed and validated. The portfolio incorporated a mini clinical evaluation exercise (mini-CEX), direct observation of procedural skills and reflection sections. Workshops were organized for the stakeholders, that is the management, faculty and students, separately. The rationale of reflection was emphasized. Students were given samples of reflective writing. The portfolio was then implemented amongst the undergraduate medical students of years four, five and six during clinical clerkship. After 16 weeks of implementation of the portfolio, a survey questionnaire was introduced to explore how undergraduate students perceive the educational value of the reflective portfolio and its impact on their deep information processing. Results: The majority of the respondents are in MD Year 5. Out of 52 respondents, 57.7% were doing the internal medicine clinical placement rotation, and 42.3% were in Otorhinolaryngology clinical placement rotation. The respondents believe that the implementation of a reflective portfolio helped them identify their weaknesses, gain professional development in terms of helping them to identify areas where the knowledge is good, increase the learning value if it is used as a formative assessment, try to relate to different courses and in improving their professional skills. However, it is not necessary that the portfolio will improve the self-esteem of respondents or help in developing their critical thinking, The portfolio takes time to complete, and the supervisors are not useful. They had to chase supervisors for feedback. 53.8% of the respondents followed the Gibbs reflective model to write the reflection, whilst the others did not follow any guidelines to write the reflection 48.1% said that the feedback was helpful, 17.3% preferred the use of written feedback, whilst 11.5% preferred oral feedback. Most of them suggested more frequent feedback. 59.6% of respondents found the current portfolio user-friendly, and 28.8% thought it was too bulky. 27.5% have mentioned that for a mobile application. Conclusion: The reflective portfolio, through the reflection of their work and regular feedback from supervisors, has an overall positive impact on the learning process of undergraduate medical students during their clinical clerkship.

Keywords: Portfolio, Reflection, Feedback, Clinical Placement, Undergraduate Medical Education

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Authors: Kelly Jaunzems

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Social media is a powerful instrument of communication, enabling the presentation of information in multiple forms and modes, amplifying the interactions between people, organisations, and stakeholders, and increasing the range of communication channels available. Younger generations are highly engaged with social media and more likely to use this channel than any other to seek information. Given this, it may appear extraordinary that occupational safety and health professionals have yet to seriously engage with social media for communicating safety messages to younger audiences who, in many industries, might be statistically more likely to encounter more workplace harm or injury. Millennials, defined as those born between 1981-2000, have distinctive characteristics that also impact their interaction patterns rendering many traditional occupational safety and health communication channels sub-optimal or near obsolete. Used to immediate responses, 280-character communication, shares, likes, and visual imagery, millennials struggle to take seriously the low-tech, top-down communication channels such as safety noticeboards, toolbox meetings, and passive tick-box online inductions favoured by traditional OSH professionals. This paper draws upon well-established communication findings, which argue that it is important to know a target audience and reach them using their preferred communication pathways, particularly if the aim is to impact attitudes and behaviours. Health practitioners have adopted social media as a communication channel with great success, yet safety practitioners have failed to follow this lead. Using a digital ethnography approach, this paper examines seven organisations’ Facebook posts from two one-month periods one year apart, one in 2018 and one in 2019. Each of the years informs organisation-based case studies. Comparing, contrasting, and drawing upon these case studies, the paper discusses and evaluates the (non) use of social media communication of safety information in terms of user engagement, shareability, and overall appeal. The success of health practitioners’ use of social media provides a compelling template for the implementation of social media into organisations’ safety communication strategies. Highly visible content such as that found on social media allows an organization to become more responsive and engage in two-way conversations with their audience, creating more engaged and participatory conversations around safety. Further, using social media to address younger audiences with a range of tonal qualities (for example, the use of humour) can achieve cut through in a way that grim statistics fail to do. On the basis of 18 months of interviews, filed work, and data analysis, the paper concludes with recommendations for communicating safety information via social media. It proposes exploration of the social media communication formula that, when utilised by safety practitioners, may create an effective social media presence. It is anticipated that such social media use will increase engagement, expand the number of followers and reduce the likelihood and severity of safety-related incidents. The tools offered may provide a path for safety practitioners to reach a disengaged generation of workers to build a cohesive and inclusive conversation around ways to keep people safe at work.

Keywords: social media, workplace safety, communication strategies, young workers

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Authors: Aslina Asnawi, A. Amidah Amrawaty, Nirwana

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This article examines the relationship of local culture on the ability to access finance on beef cattle farmer. The local culture in this study associated with the values held by the farmer community so far and affect the character of farmers both in his personal life and his relationship with the surrounding environment. The data was collected by using interview and questionnaire instrument. Data were analyzed using descriptive analysis and correlation analysis. The result show that local culture identified in this study include: honesty, cleverness, decency, firmness, hard work, and shame. It’s important result that local culture has been associated with the ability to access financing for beef cattle farmers. The higher values are adopted and maintained by farmers will increase their ability to obtain loans from both informal and formal institutions. Strengthening the local culture is important because it affects the character of farmers who became one of the considerations for lenders other than collateral, capacity and capital is precisely the financing constraints for them.

Keywords: access funding, beef cattle farmers, character, local culture

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Authors: Mamoon Mousa Atout

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The industries of construction are in continuous growth not only in Middle East rejoin but almost all over the world. For the last fifteen years, big expansion and increase of different types of projects has been observed. Many infrastructural projects have been developed, high rise buildings, big shopping malls, power sub-stations, roads, bridges, schools, universities and developing many of new cities with full and complete facilities. The growth and enlargement of the mentioned developed projects has been accomplished through many international and local contracting organizations. Senior management of these organizations depend on their qualified and experienced team whom are aware of the implications of project management, construction management, engineering management and resource management during tendering till final completion of the project. This research aims to find out why reasons of principles of construction engineering and management are necessary for contracting firms and their managers. Principles of construction management help contracting organizations to accomplish and deliver projects without delay. This can be maintained by establishing guidelines’ details for updating the adopted system of construction management that they have through qualified and experienced project managers. The research focuses on benefits of other essential skills of projects planning, monitoring and control. Defining roles and responsibilities of contractor project managers during tendering and execution is a part of the investigated factors that will be analyzed. Other skills like optimizing and utilizing the obtainable project resources to deliver the project within time, cost and quality will be also investigated to find out how these factors are affecting the performance of contracting firms, projects managers and projects. The conclusion of the research will help senior management team and the contractors project managers about the benefits of implications and benefits construction management system and its effect upon the performance and knowledge of contract values that they have, and the optimal profit margin of the firm it.

Keywords: construction management, contracting firms, project managers, planning processes, roles and responsibilities

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Authors: Farhan Saeed

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The core objective of this work is to explicate the biochemical and therapeutic properties of aged garlic. For this purpose, two varieties of garlic were obtained from Ayub Agricultural Research Institute (AARI) Faisalabad-Pakistan. Additionally, fresh garlic was converted into aged garlic via fermentation method in the incubator at 70 to 80 % humidity level and 60C0 temperature for one month. Similarly, biochemical and antioxidant properties of fresh and aged garlic were also elucidated. Mean values showed that moisture content was decreased, whereas crude fat, crude protein, crude fiber, crude ash and total carbohydrates were enhanced after fermentation. Additionally, crude protein of fresh and aged garlic was 7.57±0.16 and 5.52±0.12%, respectively, whilst 9.68±0.41 and 8.78±0.29%, respectively, after the fermentation process. In addition, NFE contents were also enhanced up to 39% after the fermentation method. Moreover, Zn, S, Al, K, Fe, Na, Mg, and Cu contents were also increased. Furthermore, Total phenolic contents (TPC) of fresh and aged garlic were 2498.70 & 2188.50mg GAE/kg whilst 3008.59, & 2591.81mg GAE/kg for aged garlic. In conclusion, aged garlic explicated the better biochemical properties, mineral profile and antioxidant properties as compared to fresh garlic.

Keywords: aged garlic, nutritional values, bioactive properties, fermentation

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Authors: Edgard Barki, Tânia Modesto Veludo-de-Oliveira, Felipe Zambaldi

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The social enterprise sector can be characterized as organizations that aim to solve social problems with financial sustainability and using market mechanisms. This sector has shown an increasing interest worldwide. Despite the growth and relevance of the sector, there is still a gap regarding the assessment of the social impact resulting from the initiatives of the organizations in this field. A number of metrics have been designed worldwide to evaluate the impact of social enterprises (e.g., IRIS, GIIRS, BACO), as well as some ad hoc studies that have been carried out, mainly in the microcredit sector, but there is still a gap to be filled in the development of research in social impact evaluation. Therefore, this research seeks to evaluate the social impact of two social enterprises (Terra Nova and Vivenda) in the area of housing in Brazil. To evaluate these impacts and their dimensions, we conducted an exploratory research, through three focus groups, thirty in-depth interviews and a survey with beneficiaries of both organizations. The results allowed us to evaluate how the two organizations were able to create a deep social impact in the populations served. Terra Nova has a more collective perspective, with a clear benefit of social inclusion and improvement of the community’s infrastructure, while Vivenda has a more individualized perspective, improving self-esteem, sociability and family coexistence.

Keywords: Brazil, housing, social enterprise, social impact evaluation

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Authors: Razan Farah, Siham Ballah

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Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and other social media applications have become an integral component of everyone’s social life, particularly among younger generations and adolescences. These social apps have been changing a lot of conceptions and believes in the population by representing public figures and celebrities as role models. The social comparison theory, which says that people self-evaluate based on comparisons with similar others, is commonly used to explore the impact of social media on body image. There is a need to study the influence of those social platforms on the body image as there have been an increase in body dissatisfaction in the recent years. This cross sectional study used a self administered questionnaire on a simple random sample of 133 female medical students of the first year. Finding shows that the response rate was 75%. There was an association between social media usage and noticing how the person look(p value = .022), but no significant association between social media use and body image influence or dissatisfaction was found. This study implies more research under this topic in Sudan as the literature are scarce.

Keywords: body image, body dissatisfaction, social media, adolescences

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Authors: Chukwuebuka Vincent Azuka, Chidimma Peace Odoh

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Changes in agricultural practices and land use influence the storage and release of soil organic carbon and soil structural dynamics. To investigate this in Nsukka, southeastern Nigeria, soil samples were collected at 0-10 cm, 10-20 cm and 20-30 cm from three locations; Ovoko (OV), Obukpa (OB) and University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) and three land use types; cultivated land (CL), forest land (FL) and grassland (GL)). Data were subjected to analysis of variance (ANOVA) using SPSS. Also, correlations between organic carbon stock, structural stability indices and other soil properties were established. The result showed that Ksat was significantly (p < 0.05) influenced by location with mean values of 68 cmhr⁻¹,121.63 cmhr⁻¹, 8.42 cmhr⁻¹ in OV, OB and UNN respectively. The MWD and aggregate stability (AS) were significantly (p < 0.05) influenced by land use and depth. The mean values of MWD are 0.85 (CL), 1.35 (FL) and 1.45 (GL), and 1.66 at 0-10 cm, 1.08 at 10-20 cm and 0.88 mm at 20-30 cm. The mean values of AS are; 27.66% (CL), 46.39% (FL) and 49.81% (GL), and 53.96% at 0-10cm, 40.22% at 10-20cm and 29.57% at 20-30cm. Clay flocculation (CFI) and dispersion indices (CDI) differed significantly (p < 0.05) among the land use. Soil pH differed significantly (p < 0.05) across the land use and locations with mean values ranging from 3.90-6.14. Soil organic carbon (SOC) significantly (p < 0.05) differed across locations and depths. SOC decreases as depth increases depth with mean values of 15.6 gkg⁻¹, 10.1 gkg⁻¹, and 8.6 gkg⁻¹ at 0-10 cm, 10-20 cm, and 20-30 cm respectively. SOC in the three land use was 8.8 g kg-1, 15.2 gkg⁻¹ and 10.4 gkg⁻¹ at CL, FL, and GL respectively. The highest aggregate-associated carbon was recorded in 0.5 mm across the land use and depth except in cultivated land and at 20-30 cm which recorded their highest SOC at 1mm. SOC stock, total nitrogen (TN) and CEC were significantly (p < 0.05) different across the locations with highest values of 23.43 t/ha, 0.07g/kg and 14.27 Cmol/kg respectively recorded in UNN. SOC stock was significantly (p < 0.05) influenced by depth as follows; 0-10>10-20>20-30 cm. TN was low with mean values ranging from 0.03-0.07 across the locations, land use and depths. The mean values of CEC ranged from 9.96-14.27 Cmol kg⁻¹ across the locations and land use. SOC stock showed correlation with silt, coarse sand, N and CEC (r = 0.40*, -0.39*, -0.65** and 0.64** respectively. AS showed correlation with BD, Ksat, pH in water and KCl, and SOC (r = -0.42*, 0.54**, -0.44*, -0.45* and 0.49** respectively. Thus, land use and location play a significant role in sustainable management of soil resources.

Keywords: agricultural practices, structural dynamics, sequestration, soil resources, management

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Authors: Onur Onder, Celal Tanuca, Mahir Ozil, Halil Sen, Alkım Ozkan, Engin Ceylan, Ali Istek, Ozgur Saglam

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White balance adjustment of LCD TVs is an important procedure which has a direct influence on quality perception. Existing methods adjust RGB gain and offset values in different white levels during production. This paper suggests an iterative method in which the gamma is pre-adjusted during the design stage, and only 80% white is adjusted during production by modifying only RGB gain values (offset values are not modified). This method reduces the white balance adjustment time, contributing to the total efficiency of the production. Experiment shows that the adjustment results are well within requirements.

Keywords: color temperature, LCD panel deviation, LCD TV manufacturing, white balance

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Authors: Milica Karadzic, Lidija Jevric, Sanja Podunavac-Kuzmanovic, Strahinja Kovacevic, Anamarija Mandic, Katarina Penov Gasi, Marija Sakac, Aleksandar Okljesa, Andrea Nikolic

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The present paper deals with chromatographic lipophilicity prediction of newly synthesized steroid derivatives. The prediction was achieved using in silico generated molecular descriptors and quantitative structure-retention relationship (QSRR) methodology with the artificial neural networks (ANN) approach. Chromatographic lipophilicity of the investigated compounds was expressed as retention factor value logk. For QSRR modeling, a feedforward back-propagation ANN with gradient descent learning algorithm was applied. Using the novel sum of ranking differences (SRD) method generated ANN models were ranked. The aim was to distinguish the most consistent QSRR model that can be found, and similarity or dissimilarity between the models that could be noticed. In this study, SRD was performed with average values of retention factor value logk as reference values. An excellent correlation between experimentally observed retention factor value logk and values predicted by the ANN was obtained with a correlation coefficient higher than 0.9890. Statistical results show that the established ANN models can be applied for required purpose. This article is based upon work from COST Action (TD1305), supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology).

Keywords: artificial neural networks, liquid chromatography, molecular descriptors, steroids, sum of ranking differences

Procedia PDF Downloads 319

Authors: Jaturong Matidtor, Krisna R. Torrissen, Saengtong Pongjareankit, Sudaporn Tongsiri, Jiraporn Rojtinnakorn

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Low survival rate has being particular problem in nursery of marble goby juvenile. The aim of this study was to investigate effect of garlic extract on protein digestive pancreatic enzymes, trypsin (T) and chymotrypsin (C). The marble goby were reared with commercial feed mixed garlic extract at concentration of 0 (control), 0.3, 0.5, 1.0, 3.0 and 5.0% (w/w) for 6 weeks. Analysis of the digestive enzymes at 2 and 6 weeks was performed. Growth parameters; weight gain (WG), specific growth rate (SGR) and feed efficiency (FE), were identified. For T, C and T/C at 2 weeks, values of T and T/C ratio of 0.3% (w/w) group showed significant difference (p < 0.05) with the highest values of 17685.64± 11981.77 U/mg protein and of 51.64 ± 27.46 U/mg protein, respectively. For C at 2 weeks, 0% (w/w) group showed the highest values of 16191.76± 2225.56 U/mg protein. Whereas value of T, C and T/C ratio at 6 weeks, there was no significant difference (p > 0.05). For growth performance, it significantly increased in all garlic extract fed groups (0.3-5.0%, w/w), both at 2 and 6 weeks. At 2 weeks, values of WG and SGR of 0.5% (w/w) group showed the highest values of 71.51 ± 1.60%, and 3.85 ± 0.07%, respectively. For FE, 0.3% (w/w) group showed the highest value of 60.21 ± 6.51%. At 6 weeks, it illustrated that all growth parameters of 5.0% (w/w) group were the highest values; WG = 35.06 ± 5.66%, SGR = 2.14 ± 0.30%, and FE = 5.86 ± 0.68%. We suggested that garlic extract could be available for protein digestive enzyme and growth enhancement in marble goby nursery with artificial feed. This result will be high benefit for commercial aquaculture of marble goby.

Keywords: marble goby, nursery, garlic extract, digestive enzyme, growth

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Authors: Carly Madge, Melanie Zurba, Ryan Bullock

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The Boreal Forest has experienced some of the most drastic climate change-induced temperature rises in Canada, with average winter temperatures increasing by 3°C since 1948. One of the main concerns of the province of Saskatchewan, and particularly wildfire managers, is the increased risk of wildfires due to climate change. With these concerns in mind Sakaw Askiy Management Inc., a forestry corporation located in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan with operations in the Boreal Forest biome, is developing wildfire risk reduction strategies that are supported by the shareholders of the corporation as well as the stakeholders of the Prince Albert Forest Management Area (which includes citizens, hunters, trappers, cottage owners, and outfitters). In the past, wildfire management strategies implemented through harvesting have been received with skepticism by some community members of Prince Albert. Engagement of the stakeholders of the Prince Albert Management Area through the development of the wildfire risk reduction strategies aims to reduce this skepticism and rebuild some of the trust that has been lost between industry and community. This research project works with the framework of social learning, which is defined as the learning that occurs when individuals come together to form a group with the purpose of understanding environmental challenges and determining appropriate responses to them. The project evaluates the social learning processes that occur through the development of the risk reduction strategies and how the learning has allowed Sakaw to work towards implementing the strategies into their forest harvesting plans. The incorporation of wildfire risk reduction strategies works to increase the adaptive capacity of Sakaw, which in this case refers to the ability to adjust to climate change, moderate potential damages, take advantage of opportunities, and cope with consequences. Using semi-structured interviews and wildfire workshop meetings shareholders and stakeholders shared their knowledge of wildfire, their main wildfire concerns, and changes they would like to see made in the Prince Albert Forest Management Area. Interviews and topics discussed in the workshops were inductively coded for themes related to learning, adaptive capacity, areas of concern, and preferred methods of wildfire risk reduction strategies. Analysis determined that some of the learning that has occurred has resulted through social interactions and the development of networks oriented towards wildfire and wildfire risk reduction strategies. Participants have learned new knowledge and skills regarding wildfire risk reduction. The formation of wildfire networks increases access to information on wildfire and the social capital (trust and strengthened relations) of wildfire personnel. Both factors can be attributed to increases in adaptive capacity. Interview results were shared with the General Manager of Sakaw, where the areas of concern and preferred strategies of wildfire risk reduction will be considered and accounted for in the implementation of new harvesting plans. This research also augments the growing conceptual and empirical evidence of the important role of learning and networks in regional wildfire risk management efforts.

Keywords: adaptive capacity, community-engagement, social learning, wildfire risk reduction

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Authors: Hebert Sihle Ntuli

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Traditional cultural practices mirror or replicate the values and beliefs held by members of the community. Throughout the world, every social grouping has specific traditional practices, some of which are beneficial to all, while others have become harmful to specific group such as women. Like in some African states, these traditional cultural practices are performed in South Africa and are violating women’s rights. Women’s rights are human rights. The South African Constitution is one of the most progressive in the world, and notable includes the Bill of Rights which provides protection of socio-economic and cultural rights. Cultural rights are protected in Section 30 and 31 of the constitution, although such protection is not without limitation. This highly complex interplay and competition between human rights and cultural rights, which are manifested through cultural practices, is the golden thread that traces through this paper. The paper argues that there is conflict and the lack of balance between diverse cultural and legal or constitutional framework which promotes the value of human dignity and equality, especially for women. These practices are reviewed in connection with the South African government laws. This work adopted qualitative research method.

Keywords: cultural practices, conflict, South African constitution, laws

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