Search results for: social movement theory

Authors: A. Camões, M. Ferreira Dias, M. Amorim

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In recent years, the social economy is increasingly seen as a viable means to address social problems. Social enterprises, as well as public projects and initiatives targeted to meet social purposes, offer organizational models that assume heterogeneity, flexibility and adaptability to the ‘real world and real problems’. Despite the growing popularity of social initiatives, decision makers still face a paucity in what concerns the available models and tools to adequately assess its sustainability, and its impacts, notably the nature of its contribution to economic growth. This study was carried out at the local level, by analyzing the social impact initiatives and projects promoted by the Municipality of Albergaria-a-Velha (Câmara Municipal de Albergaria-a-Velha -CMA), a municipality of 25,000 inhabitants in the central region of Portugal. This work focuses on the challenges related to the qualifications and employability of citizens, which stands out as one of the key concerns in the Portuguese economy, particularly expressive in the context of small-scale cities and inland territories. The study offers a characterization of the Municipality, its socio-economic structure and challenges, followed by an exploratory analysis of multiple sourced data, collected from the CMA's documental sources as well as from privileged informants. The purpose is to conduct detailed analysis of the CMA's social projects, aimed at characterizing its potential impact for the model of qualifications and employability of the citizens of the Municipality. The study encompasses a discussion of the socio-economic profile of the municipality, notably its asymmetries, the analysis of the social projects and initiatives, as well as of data derived from inquiry actors involved in the implementation of the social projects and its beneficiaries. Finally, the results obtained with the Better Life Index will be included. This study makes it possible to ascertain if what is implicit in the literature goes to the encounter of what one experiences in reality.

Keywords: measurement, municipalities, social economy, social impact

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Authors: Manik Konch

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Actions are generally evaluated from moral point of view. Either the action is praised or condemned, but in all cases it involves the agent who performs it. The agent is held morally responsible for bringing out an action. This paper is an attempt to explore the Aristotle’s notion of action and its relation with moral development in response to modern philosophical moral psychology. Particularly, the distinction between voluntary, involuntary, and non-voluntary action in the Nicomachean Ethics with some basic problems from the perspective of moral psychology: the role of choice, moral responsibility, desire, and akrasia for an action. How to do a morally right action? Is there any role of virtue, character to do a moral action? These problems are analyzed and interpreted in order to show that the Aristotelian theory of action significantly contributes to the philosophical study of moral psychology. In this connection, the paper juxtaposes Aristotle’s theory of action with response from David Charles, John R. Searle’s, and Alfred Mele theorization of action in the mechanism of human moral behaviours. To achieve this addressed problem, we consider, how the recent moral philosophical moral psychology research can shed light on Aristotle's ethics by focusing on theory of action. In this connection, we argue that the desire is the only responsible for the akratic action. According to Aristotle, desire is primary source of action and it is the starting point of action and also the endpoint of an action. Therefore we are trying to see how desire can make a person incontinent and motivate to do such irrational actions. Is there any causes which we can say such actions are right or wrong? To measure an action we have need to see the consequences such act. Thus, we discuss the relationship between akrasia and action from the perspective of contemporary moral psychologists and philosophers whose are currently working on it.

Keywords: action, desire, moral psychology, Aristotle

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Authors: Khalid Yousuf Ahmed

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At the beginning of growth period, East Asian countries achieved impressive economic growth for the decades. They transformed from agricultural economy toward industrialization and contributed to dynamic structural transformation. The achievements were driven by government-led development policies that implemented effective innovation policy to boost technological capability of local firms. Recently, most Sub-Saharan African have been showing sustainable growth. Exceptionally, Ethiopia has been recording double-digit growth for a decade. Hence, Ethiopia has claimed to follow the footstep of East Asia development model. The study is going to examine whether Ethiopia can replicate innovation and economic growth model of East Asia by using Japan, Taiwan, South Korea and China as a case to illustrate their model of growth. This research will be based on empirical data gathering and extended theory of national innovation system and economic growth theory. Moreover, the methodology is based on Knowledge Assessment Methodology (KAM) and also employing cross-countries regression analysis. The results explained that there is a significant relationship between innovation indicators and economic growth in East Asian countries while the relationship is non-existing for Ethiopia except implementing similar policies and achieving similar growth trend. Therefore, Ethiopia needs to introduce inclusive policies that give priority to improving human capital and invest on the knowledge-based economy to replicate East Asian Model.

Keywords: economic growth, FDI, endogenous growth theory, East Asia model

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Authors: Shabnam Dadparvar, Laijin Shen

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After a period of conflict between Russia and the West, new signs of confrontation between the United States and China are observed. China, as the most populous country in the world with a high rate of economic growth, neither stands the hegemonic power of the United States nor has the intention of direct confrontation with it. By raising the costs of the United States’ leadership at the international level, China seeks to find a better status without direct confrontation with the US. Meanwhile, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), as a soft balancing strategy against the hegemony of the United States is used as a tool to reach this goal. The authors by using a descriptive-analytical method try to explain the policies of China and the United States on Shanghai Cooperation Organization as well as confrontation between these two countries within the framework of 'balance of soft power theory'.

Keywords: balance of soft power, Central Asia, Shanghai cooperation organization, terrorism

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Authors: Araceli Martínez Ortiz

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An educational research effort is analyzed using systems theory to document the power of collective impact when addressing multiple factors contributing towards the retention of students majoring in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) academic programs. This research promotes understanding on how networked communities may work effectively toward a shared vision and mutually aligned activities that result in sustained, large scale change. The actions of a team of researchers in their third year of collaboration are presented to describe a model that positively aligns work efforts resulting in greater total gains. The goals of the multiple programs managed by the funded program team are to: 1) expand the number of students who choose to study a STEM field of study; 2) promote student collaborative learning; 3) support faculty understanding of the funds of knowledge of diverse students and 4) establish innovative and robust STEM education research that will lead to the development of nationally replicable, scalable models for broadening participation in STEM. The impacts of this research effort are measured through quantitative statistical analysis of the changes in second-year STEM undergraduate student retention rates and representation rates of women, Hispanics and African American STEM majors.

Keywords: collaborative impact, diversity, student retention, systems theory, STEM education

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Authors: Venkata Ravi Kumar Veluru

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Indian traditional neighborhoods are socially active and sometimes intrusive communities, which are losing their qualities due to western influences, undermining the traditional Indian values by blind adaptation of western neighborhood concepts since the scale is not suitable to the Indian context. This paper aims to understand the qualities of Indian traditional neighborhoods by evaluating a traditional neighborhood of Jaipur, comparing it with a modern planned neighborhood of Chandigarh, designed by a foreign planner, in the neighborhood concept of the western world, to find out the special qualities of traditional Indian neighborhoods as compared to western concepts in terms of social spaces, by way of physical observation of selected neighborhoods and residents structured questionnaire survey. The combined analysis found that social spaces are abundantly available in traditional neighborhoods, which are missing in modern neighborhoods, which are the main qualities where interactions happen, aiming towards the formation of social capital. The qualities of traditional neighborhoods have to be considered while designing new neighborhoods in India.

Keywords: Indian neighborhoods, modern neighborhoods, neighborhood planning, social spaces, traditional neighborhoods

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Authors: Katerina Koliou, Scott Parr, Evangelos Kaisar

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The surface transportation of freight is particularly vulnerable to storm and hurricane disasters, while at the same time, it is the primary transportation mode for delivering medical supplies, fuel, water, and other essential goods. To better plan for commercial vehicles during an evacuation, it is necessary to understand how these vehicles travel during an evacuation and determine if this travel is different from the general public. The research investigation used Florida's statewide continuous-count station traffic volumes, where then compared between years, to identify locations where traffic was moving differently during the evacuation. The data was then used to identify days on which traffic was significantly different between years. While the literature on auto-based evacuations is extensive, the consideration of freight travel is lacking. To better plan for commercial vehicles during an evacuation, it is necessary to understand how these vehicles travel during an evacuation and determine if this travel is different from the general public. The goal of this research was to investigate the movement of vehicles by classification, with an emphasis on freight during two major evacuation events: hurricanes Irma (2017) and Michael (2018). The methodology of the research was divided into three phases: data collection and management, spatial analysis, and temporal comparisons. Data collection and management obtained continuous-co station data from the state of Florida for both 2017 and 2018 by vehicle classification. The data was then processed into a manageable format. The second phase used geographic information systems (GIS) to display where and when traffic varied across the state. The third and final phase was a quantitative investigation into which vehicle classifications were statistically different and on which dates statewide. This phase used a two-sample, two-tailed t-test to compare sensor volume by classification on similar days between years. Overall, increases in freight movement between years prevented a more precise paired analysis. This research sought to identify where and when different classes of vehicles were traveling leading up to hurricane landfall and post-storm reentry. Of the more significant findings, the research results showed that commercial-use vehicles may have underutilized rest areas during the evacuation, or perhaps these rest areas were closed. This may suggest that truckers are driving longer distances and possibly longer hours before hurricanes. Another significant finding of this research was that changes in traffic patterns for commercial-use vehicles occurred earlier and lasted longer than changes for personal-use vehicles. This finding suggests that commercial vehicles are perhaps evacuating in a fashion different from personal use vehicles. This paper may serve as the foundation for future research into commercial travel during evacuations and explore additional factors that may influence freight movements during evacuations.

Keywords: evacuation, freight, travel time, evacuation

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Authors: Marine Kobalava, Eter Narimanishvili, Nino Grigolaia

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The paper analyzes the contemporary problems of public relations in Georgia. The approaches to public attitudes towards the relationship with the population of the country are studied on a global scale, the importance of forming the concept of public relations in Georgia in terms of globalization is justified. The basic components of public relations are characterized by the RACE system, namely analyzing research, action, communication, evaluation. The main challenges of public relations are identified in the research process; taking into consideration the scope of globalization, the influence of social, economic, and political changes in Georgia on PR development are identified. The article discusses the public relations as the strategic management function that facilitates communication with the society, recognition of public interests, and their prediction. In addition, the feminization of the sector is considered to be the most important achievement of public relations in the modern world. The conclusion is that the feminization indicator of the field is an unconditional increase in the employment rates of women. In the paper, the problems of globalization and public relations in the industrial countries are studied, the directions of improvement of public relations with the background of peculiarities of different countries and globalization process are proposed. Public relations under globalization are assessed in accordance with the theory of benefits and requirements, and the requirements are classified according to informational, self-identification, integration, social interaction, and other types of signs. In the article, conclusions on the current challenges of public relations in Georgia are made, and the recommendations for their solution, taking into consideration globalization processes in the world, are proposed.

Keywords: public relations, globalization, RACE system, public relationship concept, feminization

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Authors: J. Miranda, D. Chavarría-Barrientos, M. Ramírez-Cadena, M. E. Macías, P. Ponce, J. Noguez, R. Pérez-Rodríguez, P. K. Wright, A. Molina

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Higher education methods need to evolve because the new generations of students are learning in different ways. One way is by adopting emergent technologies, new learning methods and promoting the maker movement. As a result, Tecnologico de Monterrey is developing Open Innovation Laboratories as an immediate response to educational challenges of the world. This paper presents an Open Innovation Laboratory for Rapid Realization of Sensing, Smart and Sustainable Products (S³ Products). The Open Innovation Laboratory is composed of a set of specific resources where students and teachers use them to provide solutions to current problems of priority sectors through the development of a new generation of products. This new generation of products considers the concepts Sensing, Smart, and Sustainable. The Open Innovation Laboratory has been implemented in different courses in the context of New Product Development (NPD) and Integrated Manufacturing Systems (IMS) at Tecnologico de Monterrey. The implementation consists of adapting this Open Innovation Laboratory within the course’s syllabus in combination with the implementation of specific methodologies for product development, learning methods (Active Learning and Blended Learning using Massive Open Online Courses MOOCs) and rapid product realization platforms. Using the concepts proposed it is possible to demonstrate that students can propose innovative and sustainable products, and demonstrate how the learning process could be improved using technological resources applied in the higher educational sector. Finally, examples of innovative S³ products developed at Tecnologico de Monterrey are presented.

Keywords: active learning, blended learning, maker movement, new product development, open innovation laboratory

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Authors: Sabrina Jafralie

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This proposed chapter explains how civic religious literacy is a means to promote social justice in Canada. It will first present the specific conception of global citizenship education that will undergird the discussion in the chapter. Then, it will offer a conception of civic religious literacy that explains how it promotes social justice as a form of global citizenship education. To illustrate this point, I will list specific examples of social and political inequities in Canada, such as hate crime statistics from 2013-2018 across the country and in specific provinces and cities. I will also highlight different types of discrimination, such as that towards religious minorities, Indigenous peoples, and those that conflate race and religion, and other intersections of identity that civic religious literacy can address. To conclude this initial section of the chapter, I will cite international studies that discuss religious literacy as a means to promote characteristics and aims of global citizenship education.

Keywords: Civic Literacy, Pedagogy, Quebec, Social Justice

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Authors: Deniz Peksen

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This thesis aims to predict trend movement of closing price of stock and to maximize portfolio by utilizing the predictions. In this context, the study aims to define a stock portfolio strategy from models created by using Logistic Regression, Gradient Boosting and Random Forest. Recently, predicting the trend of stock price has gained a significance role in making buy and sell decisions and generating returns with investment strategies formed by machine learning basis decisions. There are plenty of studies in the literature on the prediction of stock prices in capital markets using machine learning methods but most of them focus on closing prices instead of the direction of price trend. Our study differs from literature in terms of target definition. Ours is a classification problem which is focusing on the market trend in next 20 trading days. To predict trend direction, fourteen years of data were used for training. Following three years were used for validation. Finally, last three years were used for testing. Training data are between 2002-06-18 and 2016-12-30 Validation data are between 2017-01-02 and 2019-12-31 Testing data are between 2020-01-02 and 2022-03-17 We determine Hold Stock Portfolio, Best Stock Portfolio and USD-TRY Exchange rate as benchmarks which we should outperform. We compared our machine learning basis portfolio return on test data with return of Hold Stock Portfolio, Best Stock Portfolio and USD-TRY Exchange rate. We assessed our model performance with the help of roc-auc score and lift charts. We use logistic regression, Gradient Boosting and Random Forest with grid search approach to fine-tune hyper-parameters. As a result of the empirical study, the existence of uptrend and downtrend of five stocks could not be predicted by the models. When we use these predictions to define buy and sell decisions in order to generate model-based-portfolio, model-based-portfolio fails in test dataset. It was found that Model-based buy and sell decisions generated a stock portfolio strategy whose returns can not outperform non-model portfolio strategies on test dataset. We found that any effort for predicting the trend which is formulated on stock price is a challenge. We found same results as Random Walk Theory claims which says that stock price or price changes are unpredictable. Our model iterations failed on test dataset. Although, we built up several good models on validation dataset, we failed on test dataset. We implemented Random Forest, Gradient Boosting and Logistic Regression. We discovered that complex models did not provide advantage or additional performance while comparing them with Logistic Regression. More complexity did not lead us to reach better performance. Using a complex model is not an answer to figure out the stock-related prediction problem. Our approach was to predict the trend instead of the price. This approach converted our problem into classification. However, this label approach does not lead us to solve the stock prediction problem and deny or refute the accuracy of the Random Walk Theory for the stock price.

Keywords: stock prediction, portfolio optimization, data science, machine learning

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Authors: Rezeda Khairutdinova, Chulpan Gromova, Dina Birman

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The paper presents results of an exploratory study of teachers’ social attitudes toward ethnic and religious diversity, and variables influencing such attitudes. The study was conducted in Russia and is focused on school teachers, given their special role in culturally diverse modern societies. Using the social distance scale (adapted from Bogardus, 1926), we sampled 355 school teachers from two Russian regions known for their high cultural diversity: Moscow and Moscow region, Kazan and Republic of Tatarstan, and measured teacher attitudes toward large religious and ethnic groups (including migrants). The findings showed that teachers hold mostly tolerant attitudes with respect to members belonging to culturally and religiously diverse groups. The social distance between respondents and native residents of their region was minimal. Social distance was larger with respect to such ethnic groups as migrants from the Caucasian and Central Asian countries. The analysis of perception of different religious groups also showed positive attitudes toward these groups and readiness to interact with them. Teacher attitudes were not related to their age or ethnicity. The findings indicated that there was a significant correlation between social distance and the region of residence on the one hand, and between social distance and the degree of social interaction on the other. The results of this study will be used to develop a large-scale study to contribute to a better understanding of teacher attitudes toward immigrant students in public schools.

Keywords: attitudes of teachers, cultural diversity, migrants, social distance

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Authors: Y. H. Wang, C. C. Hsieh

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Good service design can increase organization revenue and consumer satisfaction while reducing labor and time costs. The problems facing consumers in the original serve model for eyewear and optical industry includes the following issues: 1. Insufficient information on eyewear products 2. Passively dependent on recommendations, insufficient selection 3. Incomplete records on progression of vision conditions 4. Lack of complete customer records. This study investigates the case of Kobayashi Optical, applying the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ) to develop innovative solutions for eyewear and optical industry. Analysis results raise the following conclusions and management implications: In order to provide customers with improved professional information and recommendations, Kobayashi Optical is suggested to establish customer purchasing records. Overall service efficiency can be enhanced by applying data mining techniques to analyze past consumer preferences and purchase histories. Furthermore, Kobayashi Optical should continue to develop a 3D virtual trial service which can allow customers for easy browsing of different frame styles and colors. This 3D virtual trial service will save customer waiting times in during peak service times at stores.

Keywords: theory of inventive problem solving (TRIZ), service design, augmented reality (AR), eyewear and optical industry

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Authors: Felsy J. Sandi

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There is a potential of growth in the spa industry due to the influx of domestic and international tourist coming to Sabah, Malaysia. It is a good opportunity to venture into this industry for the country’s economic future growth, and therefore, it is essential for this area to be researched. Being one of the fastest growing industries in the world, has led to enormous challenges, which need to be addressed. Malaysia is also riding with this phenomenon. The President of the Malaysian Association of Wellness and Spa stated that the misconception about the Spa industry’s image, especially amongst the elderly is the biggest challenge faced by the industry, as they perceived the spa industry is equivalent to a prostitution center. Therefore, the objective of this study is to explore the issue by analyzing whether image can be added in the theory of planned behavior to better understand the consumer’s intention to visit, in the spa context. The Theory of Planned Behavior by Ajzen, a theory or model in predicting intention, has three constructs; such as Attitude as the first construct, the second construct is Subjective Norm and the third construct is Perceived Behavioral Control. Qualitative research is used as this is an exploratory research. The site of study will be at Jari Jari Spa, located in Kota Kinabalu, the only spa in Sabah that was awarded as the Center of Excellence (CoE) by the Ministry of Tourism and Culture in Malaysia. The findings propose to provide useful information to the relevant stakeholders on ways to approach local customers to convince them to visit the spa and for spa marketers to help them develop and design effective marketing strategies. Future investigation should consider more on the perception and loyalty of the local customers.

Keywords: consumer's perception, image, local customer, spa, visit intention

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Authors: Tasneem Firdous Islam, G. D. Kedar

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The aim of this paper is to study the effect of internal heat generation in a transient infinitely long annular cylinder subjected to hygrothermal loadings. The linear dependence theory of moisture and temperature is derived based on Dufour and Soret effect. The meticulous solutions of temperature, moisture, and thermal stresses are procured by using the Hankel transform technique. The influence of the internal heat source on the radial aspect is examined for coupled and uncoupled cases. In the present study, the composite material T300/5208 is considered, and the coupled and uncoupled cases are analyzed. The results obtained are computed numerically and illustrated graphically.

Keywords: temperature, moisture, hygrothermoelasticity, internal heat generation, annular cylinder

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Authors: Peter Unoh Bassey

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The study examined the influence of Costa and McCrae’s Neo-PI Factor and early adolescent’s school social adjustment in Cross River State, Nigeria. The research adopted the causal-comparative design also known as the ex-post facto with about one thousand and eighteen (1,018) students who were randomly selected from one stream of JSS 1 classes in 19 schools out of seventy-three (73) in the study area. Data were collected using two instruments one is the NEO-PI scale, and students school social adjustment questionnaire. Three research questions and three research hypotheses were postulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. The analysis of data was carried out using both the independent t-test statistics and the one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). The analyzed result indicated that the five dimensions had a significant influence on students school social adjustment. A post hoc was equally carried out to show the relative significant difference among the study variables. In view of the above, it was recommended that teachers, parents and educational psychologists should be involved to enhance students the confidence to overcome their social adjustment problem.

Keywords: Costa and McCrae’s NEO-PI Factor, early adolescents, school, social adjustment

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Authors: Arunas Burinskas, Manuela Tvaronavičienė

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Although the new trade theories, unlike the theories of an industrial organisation, see the structure of the market and competition between enterprises through their heterogeneity according to various parameters, they do not pay any particular attention to the analysis of the market structure and its development. In this article, although we relied mainly on models developed by the scholars of new trade theory, we proposed a different approach. In our simulation model, we model market demand according to normal distribution function, while on the supply side (as it is in the new trade theory models), productivity is modeled with the Pareto distribution function. The results of the simulation show that companies with higher productivity (lower marginal costs) do not pass on all the benefits of such economies to buyers. However, even with higher marginal costs, firms can choose to offer higher value-added goods to stay in the market. In general, the structure of the market is formed quickly enough and depends on the skills available to firms.

Keywords: market, structure, simulation, heterogenous firms

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Authors: Tathagatha Khan, Smruti Sourava Mohapatra

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Median openings are provided in raised median of multilane roads to facilitate U-turn movement. The U-turn movement is a highly complex and risky maneuver because U-turning vehicle (minor stream) makes 180° turns at median openings and merge with the approaching through traffic (major stream). A U-turning vehicle requires a suitable gap in the major stream to merge, and during this process, the possibility of merging conflict develops. Therefore, these median openings are potential hot spot of conflict and posses concern pertaining to safety. The traffic at the median openings could be managed efficiently with enhanced safety when the capacity of a traffic facility has been estimated correctly. The capacity of U-turns at median openings is estimated by Harder’s formula, which requires three basic parameters namely critical gap, follow up time and conflict flow rate. The estimation of conflicting flow rate under mixed traffic condition is very much complicated due to absence of lane discipline and discourteous behavior of the drivers. The understanding of placement of major stream vehicles at median opening is very much important for the estimation of conflicting traffic faced by U-turning movement. The placement data of major stream vehicles at different section in 4-lane and 6-lane divided multilane roads were collected. All the test sections were free from the effect of intersection, bus stop, parked vehicles, curvature, pedestrian movements or any other side friction. For the purpose of analysis, all the vehicles were divided into 6 categories such as motorized 2W, autorickshaw (3-W), small car, big car, light commercial vehicle, and heavy vehicle. For the collection of placement data of major stream vehicles, the entire road width was divided into sections of 25 cm each and these were numbered seriatim from the pavement edge (curbside) to the end of the road. The placement major stream vehicle crossing the reference line was recorded by video graphic technique on various weekdays. The collected data for individual category of vehicles at all the test sections were converted into a frequency table with a class interval of 25 cm each and the placement frequency curve. Separate distribution fittings were tried for 4- lane and 6-lane divided roads. The variation of major stream traffic volume on the placement characteristics of major stream vehicles has also been explored. The findings of this study will be helpful to determine the conflict volume at the median openings. So, the present work holds significance in traffic planning, operation and design to alleviate the bottleneck, prospect of collision and delay at median opening in general and at median opening in developing countries in particular.

Keywords: median opening, U-turn, conflicting traffic, placement, mixed traffic

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Authors: Qiong Hu

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From old English to modern English, the gender category has changed from grammatical gender system to natural gender system. The word classes that reflected gender has changed from pronouns, adjectives, and numerals in old English to only pronouns in modern English. In present-day English, the third person singular pronouns are the only paradigm that keeps an intact gender. 'He' and 'they' used as epicene pronouns are one of the two commonest phenomena of gender disagreement (the other being those against the natural gender). Considering the convenience of corpus concordance, epicene pronoun usage is selected in this study in which the anaphors are restricted to possessives (eg. his, their), and the antecedents are restricted to compound indefinite pronouns (eg. someone, somebody). Factors like writing form (eg. someone vs. some one), the semantics of the prefixes (eg. some- vs. any-), and suffixes (eg. -one vs. -body), as well as frequency, are taken into consideration. Statistics indicate that 'their' is increasingly used as the epicene pronoun compared with the decline of 'his' (when both writing forms are considered). This is influenced by social factors such as feminist movement, as well as the semantics and frequency of antecedents. Their (plural) used in anaphoric reference to various indefinite pronouns (singular in form) can also be treated as number variation in third person pronouns, and the trend that 'their' in place of his can also be treated as a change in number category. Among different candidates for the gender-neutral function, 'their' is proven to be the most promising one based on the diachronic data. This does not reject any new competitors in the future which still remains to be seen.

Keywords: language variation and change, epicene pronouns, gender, number

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Authors: Shir Daphna-Tekoah, Nurit Eitan-Gutman, Uri Balla

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Background: Systemic documentation is essential in social work practice. Collaboration between an institution of higher education and social work health care services enabled adaptation of the medical documentation model of SOAP in the field of social work, by creating the ISOAPS model (Introduction, Subjective, Objective, Assessment, Plan, Summary) model. Aims: The article describes the ISOAPS model and its implementation in the field of social work, as a tool for standardization of documentation and the enhancement of multidisciplinary collaboration. Methods: We examined the changes in standardization using a mixed methods study, both before and after implementation of the model. A review of social workers’ documentation was carried out by medical staff and social workers in the Clalit Healthcare Services, the largest provider of public and semi-private health services in Israel. After implementation of the model, semi-structured qualitative interviews were undertaken. Main findings: The percentage of reviewers who evaluated their documentation as correct increased from 46%, prior to implementation, to 61% after implementation. After implementation, 81% of the social workers noted that their documentation had become standardized. The training process prepared them for the change in documentation and most of them (83%) started using the model on a regular basis. The qualitative data indicate that the use of the ISOAPS model creates uniform documentation, improves standards and is important to teach social work students. Conclusions: The ISOAPS model standardizes documentation and promotes communication between social workers and medical staffs. Implications for practice: In the intricate realm of healthcare, efficient documentation systems are pivotal to ensuring coherent interdisciplinary communication and patient care. The ISOAPS model emerges as a quintessential instrument, meticulously tailored to the nuances of social work documentation. While it extends its utility across the broad spectrum of social work, its specificity is most pronounced in the medical domain. This model not only exemplifies rigorous academic and professional standards but also serves as a testament to the potential of contextualized documentation systems in elevating the overall stature of social work within healthcare. Such a strategic documentation tool can not only streamline the intricate processes inherent in medical social work but also underscore the indispensable role that social workers play in the broader healthcare ecosystem.

Keywords: ISOAPS, professional documentation, medial social-work, social work

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Authors: Azlin Suzana Salim

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The 12th Malaysian Plan 2021-2025, issued by the Economic Planning Unit in 2021, outlined one of the six important priorities to support M40 towards equitable society. The Financial Sector Blueprint 2022-2026, released by Bank Negara Malaysia in 2022, further outlined the fifth key thrust focusing on Islamic Social Finance. The purpose of this research is to examine the Legal Framework of bridging Islamic Social Finance to support M40 Income Group in Malaysia. This study adopts a doctrinal legal research method to examine the laws and regulations governing Islamic Social Finance in Malaysia and a qualitative method to examine the Islamic Social Finance Instrument to support the M40 income group. The implication of this study is important to propose the legal framework and bridge the Islamic Social Finance instrument to support the M40 income group in Malaysia. The significance of this study is to realign between priorities of the 12th Malaysian Plan 2021-2025 and the Financial Sector Blueprint 2022-2026.

Keywords: legal framework, Islamic social finance, m40 income group, law and regulation

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Authors: Alexandre Bédard, Caroline Coulombe, Jonathan Harvey

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Envisioning process (EP) in medium enterprises is treated equally in very small enterprises. Building on the concept of social construction, this study aims to explore how envisioning is constructed in a medium enterprise in which stakeholders are involved and how it is influenced. We use a unique case method based on qualitative data collected through 11 interviews representing various members of the organization. Through the discussion of the findings, we were able to confirm the social construction of the EP and to identify three main stakeholders responsible for the construction of the vision, mainly political and social powers, actors of the organization, and financial providers. Moreover, EP is influenced by external factors; in this case, the history of the organization and the value and importance of the art and the culture for Cambodians.

Keywords: envisioning process, social constructivism, medium enterprise, legitimacy

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Authors: Ben D. Atkins

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This study will examine the impact of September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the organizational development of American federal law enforcement through focusing on the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Content analysis of discourse in a federal law enforcement practitioner publication along with official FBI statements will be used to gain a better understanding of FBI organizational changes that have taken place since the events of September 11, 2001. Analysis of content trends in the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin and public discourse of FBI officials from 1999 to 2005 indicate that, in addition to structural changes, the bureau has also undergone a variety of cultural changes. The results offer some support for the institutional theoretical perspective, suggesting that post-9/11 organizational changes such as new mission priorities and the establishment of new branches were partially initiated due to a variety external pressures, which lends support for coercive isomorphism. Furthermore, structural changes are discussed in relation to the attainment and maintenance of organizational legitimacy.

Keywords: institutional theory, organizational theory, law enforcement, public administration

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Authors: Jeroen De Ceuster

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This study is the first empirical analysis of the link between corporate governance and European Union competition law. Although competition law enforcement is often studied through the lens of competition law, we offer an alternative perspective by looking at a number of corporate governance factor at the level of the board of directors. We find that undertakings where the Chief Executive Officer is also chairman of the board are twice as likely to violate European Union competition law. No significant relationship was found between European Union competition law infringements and gender diversity of the board, the size of the board, the percentage of directors appointed after the Chief Executive Officer, the percentage of independent directors, or the presence of corporate social responsibility (CSR) committee. This contribution is based on a 1-1 matched peer study. Our sample includes all ultimate parent companies with a board that have been sanctioned by the European Commission for either anticompetitive agreements or abuse of dominance for the period from 2004 to 2018. These companies were matched to a company with headquarters in the same country, belongs to the same industry group, is active in the European Economic Area, and is the nearest neighbor to the infringing company in terms of revenue. Our final sample includes 121 pairs. As is common with matched peer studies, we use CLR to analyze the differences within these pairs. The only statistically significant independent variable after controlling for size and performance is CEO/Chair duality. The results indicate that companies whose Chief Executive Officer also functions as chairman of the board are twice as likely to infringe European Union competition law. This is in line with the monitoring theory of the board of directors, which states that its primary function is to monitor top management. Since competition law infringements are mostly organized by management and hidden from board directors, the results suggest that a Chief Executive Officer who is also chairman is more likely to be either complicit in the infringement or less critical towards his day-to-day colleagues and thus impedes proper detection by the board of competition law infringements.

Keywords: corporate governance, competition law, board of directors, board independence, ender diversity, corporate social responisbility

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Authors: Zi Wang, Xinlei He, Jianghua Lv, Yuqing Lan

Abstract:

Kernel though widely used, is complicated. Errors caused by some bugs are often costly. Statically, more than half of the mistakes occur in the design phase. Thus, we introduce a modeling method, KMVM (Linux Kernel Modeling and verification Method), based on type theory for proper designation and correct exploitation of the Kernel. In the model, the Kernel is separated into six levels: subsystem, dentry, file, struct, func, and base. Each level is treated as a type. The types are specified in the structure and relationship. At the same time, we use a demanding path to express the function to be implemented. The correctness of the design is verified by recursively checking the type relationship and type existence. The method has been applied to verify the OPEN business of VFS (virtual file system) in Linux Kernel. Also, we have designed and developed a set of security communication mechanisms in the Kernel with verification.

Keywords: formal approach, type theory, Linux Kernel, software program

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Authors: Zidane Abderrezaq

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This paper’s primary objective is to identify the relative importance of various Islamic financial products, in theory and in practice, by examining the financing records of the Bank Islam Malaysia (Berhad) and the Algeria Islamic Bank. Currently, seven available Islamic financing products are considered viable alternatives to interest-based conventional contracts: mudarabah (trust financing), musharakah (equity financing), ijarah (lease financing), murabahah (trade financing), qard al-hassan (welfare loan), bay` bi al-thaman al-ajil (deferred payment financing), and istisna` (progressive payments). Among these financial products, mudarabah and musharakah are the most distinct. Their unique characteristics (at least in theory) make Islamic banks and Islamic financing viable alternatives to the conventional interest-based financial system. The question before us is to determine the extent of mudarabah and musharakah in Islamic financing in practice. The data are as follows: the average mudarabah is 5% of total financing, and the average musharakah is less than 3%. The combined average of mudarabah and musharakah for the two Islamic banks is less than 4% of the total finance and advances. The average qard al-hassan is about 4%, while istisna` does not yet exist in practice. Murabahah is the most popular and dominates all other modes of Islamic financing. The average use of murabahah is over 54%. When the bay` bi al-thaman al-ajil is added to the murabahah, the percentage of total financing is shown to be 82.68%. This paper also explores some possible reasons why these two Islamic banks appear to prefer murabahah to mudarabah and musharakah.

Keywords: Islamic banking, Islamic finance, Islamic banking rofitability, investment banking

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Authors: M. Ali Lotfollahi Yaghin, M. Reza Bagerzadeh Karimi, Ali Rahmani, V. Sadeghi Balkanlou

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Structural engineers have long been trying to develop solutions using the full potential of its composing materials. Therefore, there is no doubt that the structural solution progress is directly related to an increase in materials science knowledge. These efforts in conjunction with up-to-date modern construction techniques have led to an extensive use of composite floors in large span structures. On the other hand, the competitive trends of the world market have long been forcing structural engineers to develop minimum weight and labour cost solutions. A direct consequence of this new design trend is a considerable increase in problems related to unwanted floor vibrations. For this reason, the structural floors systems become vulnerable to excessive vibrations produced by impacts such as human rhythmic activities. The main objective of this paper is to present an analysis methodology for the evaluation of the composite floors human comfort. This procedure takes into account a more realistic loading model developed to incorporate the dynamic effects induced by human walking. The investigated structural models were based on various composite floors, with main spans varying from 5 to 10 m. based on an extensive parametric study the composite floors dynamic response, in terms of peak accelerations, was obtained and compared to the limiting values proposed by several authors and design standards. This strategy was adopted to provide a more realistic evaluation for this type of structure when subjected to vibration due to human walking.

Keywords: vibration, resonance, composite floors, people’s rhythmic movement, dynamic analysis, Abaqus software

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Authors: Saleh Maina

Abstract:

There is an on-going debate among intellectuals and scholars of international relations and world politics over the direction which the world is heading particularly in the current era of globalization. On the one hand are adherents to the convergence thesis which is premised on the assumption that global social order is tending toward universalism which could translate into the possible end of the classical state system and the unification of world societies under a single and common ideological dispensation. The convergence thesis is hinged on the globalization process which is gradually reducing world societies into a 'global village'. On the other hand are intellectuals who hold the view that despite advances made in communication technology which appear to threaten the survival of the classical state system. Invariance, as expressed in the survival of the existing state system and the diverse social traditions in world societies, remain a realistic possibility contrary to the conclusions of the convergence thesis. The invariance thesis has been advanced by scholars like Samuel P. Huntington whose work on clash of civilizations suggests that world peace can only be sustained through the co-habitation of diverse civilizations across the world. The purpose of this paper is to examine both sides of the debate with the aim of making a realistic assessment on where world societies are headed, between convergence and invariance. Using the realist theory of international relations as our theoretical premise the paper argues that while there is sufficient ground to predict the future direction of world societies as headed towards some form of convergence, invariance as expressed in the co-existence of diverse civilizations will for a long time remain a major feature of the international system.

Keywords: convergence, invariance, clash of civilization, classical state system, universalism

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Authors: Okoh Charity N.

Abstract:

This study investigated the predictive power of preschoolers’ involvement in indoor and outdoor learning activities on their social learning skills in Niger state, Nigeria. Two research questions and two null hypotheses guided the study. Correlational research design was employed in the study. The population of the study consisted of 8,568 Nursery III preschoolers across the 549 preschools in the five Local Education Authorities in Niger State. A sample of 390 preschoolers drawn through multistage sampling procedure. Two instruments; Preschoolers’ Learning Activities Rating Scale (PLARS) and Preschoolers’ Social Learning Skills Rating Scale (PSLSRS) developed by the researcher were used for data collection. The reliability coefficients obtained for the PLARS and PSLSRS were 0.83 and 0.82, respectively. Data collected were analyzed using simple linear regression. Results showed that 37% of preschoolers’ social learning skills are predicted by their involvement in indoor learning activities, which is statistically significant (p < 0.05). It also shows that 11% of preschoolers’ social learning skills are predicted by their involvement in outdoor learning activities, which is statistically significant (p < 0.05). Therefore, it was recommended among others, that government and school administrators should employ qualified teachers who will stand as role models for preschoolers’ social skills development and provide indoor and outdoor activities and materials for preschoolers in schools.

Keywords: preschooler, social learning, indoor activities, outdoor activities

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Authors: Navid Zarif Karimi, Hossein Heidary, Giangiacomo Minak, Mehdi Ahmadi

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In this paper analytical model based on the mechanics of oblique cutting, linear elastic fracture mechanics (LEFM) and bending plate theory has been presented to determine the critical feed rate causing delamination in drilling of composite materials. Most of the models in this area used LEFM and bending plate theory; hence, they can only determine the critical thrust force which is an incorporable parameter. In this model by adding cutting oblique mechanics to previous models, critical feed rate has been determined. Also instead of simplification in loading condition, actual thrust force induced by chisel edge and cutting lips on composite plate is modeled.

Keywords: composite material, delamination, drilling, thrust force

Procedia PDF Downloads 515