Search results for: Financial decision making
907 A New Scheme for Improving the Quality of Service in Heterogeneous Wireless Network for Data Stream Sending
Authors: Ebadollah Zohrevandi, Rasoul Roustaei, Omid Moradtalab
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In this paper, we first consider the quality of service problems in heterogeneous wireless networks for sending the video data, which their problem of being real-time is pronounced. At last, we present a method for ensuring the end-to-end quality of service at application layer level for adaptable sending of the video data at heterogeneous wireless networks. To do this, mechanism in different layers has been used. We have used the stop mechanism, the adaptation mechanism and the graceful degrade at the application layer, the multi-level congestion feedback mechanism in the network layer and connection cutting off decision mechanism in the link layer. At the end, the presented method and the achieved improvement is simulated and presented in the NS-2 software.Keywords: Congestion, Handoff, Heterogeneous wireless networks, Adaptation mechanism, Stop mechanism, Graceful degrade.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1423906 A New Algorithm for Enhanced Robustness of Copyright Mark
Authors: Harsh Vikram Singh, S. P. Singh, Anand Mohan
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This paper discusses a new heavy tailed distribution based data hiding into discrete cosine transform (DCT) coefficients of image, which provides statistical security as well as robustness against steganalysis attacks. Unlike other data hiding algorithms, the proposed technique does not introduce much effect in the stegoimage-s DCT coefficient probability plots, thus making the presence of hidden data statistically undetectable. In addition the proposed method does not compromise on hiding capacity. When compared to the generic block DCT based data-hiding scheme, our method found more robust against a variety of image manipulating attacks such as filtering, blurring, JPEG compression etc.
Keywords: Information Security, Robust Steganography, Steganalysis, Pareto Probability Distribution function.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1797905 Instructional Design Practitioners in Malaysia: Skills and Issues
Authors: Irfan N. Umar, Yong Su-Lyn
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The purpose of this research is to determine the knowledge and skills possessed by instructional design (ID) practitioners in Malaysia. As ID is a relatively new field in the country and there seems to be an absence of any studies on its community of practice, the main objective of this research is to discover the tasks and activities performed by ID practitioners in educational and corporate organizations as suggested by the International Board of Standards for Training, Performance and Instruction. This includes finding out the ID models applied in the course of their work. This research also attempts to identify the barriers and issues as to why some ID tasks and activities are rarely or never conducted. The methodology employed in this descriptive study was a survey questionnaire sent to 30 instructional designers nationwide. The results showed that majority of the tasks and activities are carried out frequently enough but omissions do occur due to reasons such as it being out of job scope, the decision was already made at a higher level, and the lack of knowledge and skills. Further investigations of a qualitative manner should be conducted to achieve a more in-depth understanding of ID practices in MalaysiaKeywords: instructional design, ID competencies, ID models, IBSTPI
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1863904 Public Participation in Sustainable Urban Planning
Authors: M. P. Amado, C. V. Santos, E. B. Moura, V.G. Silva
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Urban planning, in particular on protected landscape areas, demands an increasing role of public participation within the frame of the efficiency of sustainable planning process. The development of urban planning actions in Protected Landscape areas, as Sintra-Cascais Natural Park, should perform a methodological process that is structured over distinct sequential stages, providing the development of a continuous, interactive, integrated and participative planning. From the start of Malveira da Serra and Janes Plan process, several public participation actions were promoted, in order to involve the local agents, stakeholders and the population in the decision of specific local key issues and define the appropriate priorities within the goals and strategies previously settled. As a result, public participation encouraged an innovative process that guarantees the efficiency of sustainable urban planning and promotes a sustainable new way of living in community.Keywords: Protected landscape areas, Public participation, Sustainable development, Sustainable planning, Urban planning.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2888903 Distinguishing Innocent Murmurs from Murmurs caused by Aortic Stenosis by Recurrence Quantification Analysis
Authors: Christer Ahlstrom, Katja Höglund, Peter Hult, Jens Häggström, Clarence Kvart, Per Ask
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It is sometimes difficult to differentiate between innocent murmurs and pathological murmurs during auscultation. In these difficult cases, an intelligent stethoscope with decision support abilities would be of great value. In this study, using a dog model, phonocardiographic recordings were obtained from 27 boxer dogs with various degrees of aortic stenosis (AS) severity. As a reference for severity assessment, continuous wave Doppler was used. The data were analyzed with recurrence quantification analysis (RQA) with the aim to find features able to distinguish innocent murmurs from murmurs caused by AS. Four out of eight investigated RQA features showed significant differences between innocent murmurs and pathological murmurs. Using a plain linear discriminant analysis classifier, the best pair of features (recurrence rate and entropy) resulted in a sensitivity of 90% and a specificity of 88%. In conclusion, RQA provide valid features which can be used for differentiation between innocent murmurs and murmurs caused by AS.Keywords: Bioacoustics, murmur, phonocardiographic signal, recurrence quantification analysis.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2005902 Digital Narrative as a Change Agent to Teach Reading to Media-Centric Students
Authors: Robert F. Kenny
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Because today-s media centric students have adopted digital as their native form of communication, teachers are having increasingly difficult time motivating reluctant readers to read and write. Our research has shown these text-averse individuals can learn to understand the importance of reading and writing if the instruction is based on digital narratives. While these students are naturally attracted to story, they are better at consuming them than creating them. Therefore, any intervention that utilizes story as its basis needs to include instruction on the elements of story making. This paper presents a series of digitally-based tools to identify potential weaknesses of visually impaired visual learners and to help motivate these and other media-centric students to select and complete books that are assigned to themKeywords: Cognitive tempo, digital narratives, digital Booktalk
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1596901 A Hybrid Machine Learning System for Stock Market Forecasting
Authors: Rohit Choudhry, Kumkum Garg
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In this paper, we propose a hybrid machine learning system based on Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Support Vector Machines (SVM) for stock market prediction. A variety of indicators from the technical analysis field of study are used as input features. We also make use of the correlation between stock prices of different companies to forecast the price of a stock, making use of technical indicators of highly correlated stocks, not only the stock to be predicted. The genetic algorithm is used to select the set of most informative input features from among all the technical indicators. The results show that the hybrid GA-SVM system outperforms the stand alone SVM system.Keywords: Genetic Algorithms, Support Vector Machines, Stock Market Forecasting.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 9318900 Determinants of Capital Structure in Malaysia Electrical and Electronic Sector
Authors: Mazila Md-Yusuf, Fauziah Mohamad Yunus, Nur Zahraatul Lail Md Supaat
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Capital structure is one of the most important financial decisions in corporate financing strategy. It involves the choice of debt and equity level in financing a company-s operations. This study aims to investigate whether the capital structure choice of Malaysian electrical and electronic manufacturing companies that are listed in the Bursa Malaysia can be explained by factors that have been found by most studies as dominant determinants of capital structure (company size, profitability, asset tangibility, liquidity and growth). Using debt ratio as the proxy for capital structure and applying pooled ordinary least square multiple regression estimation, the results showed that on average, Malaysian electrical and electronic manufacturing companies used less debt in funding their business operations. The findings also showed that size and asset tangibility has a significant positive relationship with debt level, while liquidity has a negative significant relationship with leverage.Keywords: Capital structure, capital structure theories, leverage, manufacturing companies.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 5336899 Commercializing Technology Solutions- Moving from Products to Solutions
Authors: Anand Dass, Hiroaki Murakami
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The paper outlines the drivers behind the movement from products to solutions in the Hi-Tech Business-to-Business markets. The paper lists out the challenges in enabling the transformation from products to solutions and also attempts to explore strategic and operational recommendations based on the authors- factual experiences with Japanese Hi-tech manufacturing organizations. Organizations in the Hi-Tech Business-to-Business markets are increasingly being compelled to move to a solutions model from the conventional products model. Despite the added complexity of solutions, successful technology commercialization can be achieved by making prudent choices in defining a relevant solutions model, by backing the solution model through appropriate organizational design, and by overhauling the new product development process and supporting infrastructure.Keywords: Technology commercialization, Solutions, Hi-Tech companies, Japan, Management of technology
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1358898 Geomatics Techniques for Urban Transport Planning
Authors: Hafid Mohamed Amine, Nechniche H.
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The major urban centers are all facing rapid growth is most often associated with spreading urbanization, social status of the car has also changed: it has become a commodity of mass consumption. There are currently about 5 million and 260 cars in Algeria (2008), this number increases every year 200,000 new cars. These phenomena induce a demand for greater mobility and a significant need for transport infrastructure. Faced with these problems and development of the growing use of the automobile, central governments and local authorities in charge of urban transport issues are aware of the need to develop their urban transport systems but often lack opportunities. Urban Transport Plans (PDU) were born in reaction to the "culture of automobile." Their existence in the world the '80s, however, they had little success before laws on air and rational use of energy in 90 years does not alter substantially their content and make mandatory their implementation in cities of over 100,000 inhabitants (Abroad) [1]. The objective of this work is to use the tool and specifically Geomatics techniques as decision support in the organization and management of travel while taking into consideration the influence, which will then translate by National Urban Transport Plan.Keywords: Geomatic, GIS, PDU, planning, transport.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2361897 Critical Analysis of Parking Situation of GEC Circle of Chittagong City, Bangladesh
Authors: Md. Ashraful Islam, Rahat Sharif
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Chittagong is the Commercial Capital of Bangladesh. The study area at GEC in Chittagong is one of the most commercial activity centers of Chittagong. This paper first analyzes the parking demand of the commercial centers, based on the parking survey. Further, it analyzes the relationship between the parking demand of the commercial buildings and the public transport accessibility. The conclusion is that the parking demand rate of the shopping centre and supermarkets decreases with the increasing of the public transport accessibility. This paper also provides the parking demand rate under the different levels of the public transport accessibility and the parking demand model with the accessibility. The conclusions are valuable for the researches on the parking demand and the making of the parking index for the commercial buildings.
Keywords: Parking, accumulation, inventory, demand, supply, occupancy.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1391896 The Application of Active Learning to Develop Creativity in General Education
Authors: Chalermwut Wijit
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This research is conducted in order to 1) study the result of applying “Active Learning” in general education subject to develop creativity 2) explore problems and obstacles in applying Active Learning in general education subject to improve the creativity in 1780 undergraduate students who registered this subject in the first semester 2013. The research is implemented by allocating the students into several groups of 10 -15 students and assigning them to design the activities for society under the four main conditions including 1) require no financial resources 2) practical 3) can be attended by every student 4) must be accomplished within 2 weeks. The researcher evaluated the creativity prior and after the study. Ultimately, the problems and obstacles from creating activity are evaluated from the open-ended questions in the questionnaires. The study result states that overall average scores on students’ ability increased significantly in terms of creativity, analytical ability and the synthesis, the complexity of working plan and team working. It can be inferred from the outcome that active learning is one of the most efficient methods in developing creativity in general education.
Keywords: Creative Thinking, Active Learning, General Education.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2219895 Perceptions of Corporate Social Responsibility Concept in Greece
Authors: Grigoris Giannarakis, Nikolaos Litinas, Ioannis Theotokas
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This study attempts to clarify major perspectives of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in the Greek market related to companies that have sufficient CSR. An empirical analysis was undertaken, based on literature review and previous observations and surveys, in order to provide a general analysis of the CSR concept in Greece. The results of Accountability Rating institution were used in order to identify companies that adopt an integrated social responsibility approach. Companies that responded to the survey are both regional and international and belong to different industrial fields. Some of the main survey results reveal: multiple aspects for the CSR concept, weak consensus as regards the importance of stakeholders and benefits from the CSR implementation, the important role of CSR in the decision procedure and CSR practices concerning social issues that affect mostly company-s competitiveness. Sharing companies- experience could address common social issues through CSR best practices and develop new knowledge.
Keywords: Corporate Social Responsibility, Greece, Kendall's co-efficient of concordance.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2241894 CSOLAP (Continuous Spatial On-Line Analytical Processing)
Authors: Taher Omran Ahmed, Abdullatif Mihdi Buras
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Decision support systems are usually based on multidimensional structures which use the concept of hypercube. Dimensions are the axes on which facts are analyzed and form a space where a fact is located by a set of coordinates at the intersections of members of dimensions. Conventional multidimensional structures deal with discrete facts linked to discrete dimensions. However, when dealing with natural continuous phenomena the discrete representation is not adequate. There is a need to integrate spatiotemporal continuity within multidimensional structures to enable analysis and exploration of continuous field data. Research issues that lead to the integration of spatiotemporal continuity in multidimensional structures are numerous. In this paper, we discuss research issues related to the integration of continuity in multidimensional structures, present briefly a multidimensional model for continuous field data. We also define new aggregation operations. The model and the associated operations and measures are validated by a prototype.Keywords: Continuous Data, Data warehousing, DecisionSupport, SOLAP
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1595893 Does the Polysemic Nature of Energy Security Make it a 'Wicked' Problem?
Authors: Lynne Chester
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Governments around the world are expending considerable time and resources framing strategies and policies to deliver energy security. The term 'energy security' has quietly slipped into the energy lexicon without any meaningful discourse about its meaning or assumptions. An examination of explicit and inferred definitions finds that the concept is inherently slippery because it is polysemic in nature having multiple dimensions and taking on different specificities depending on the country (or continent), timeframe or energy source to which it is applied. But what does this mean for policymakers? Can traditional policy approaches be used to address the problem of energy security or does its- polysemic qualities mean that it should be treated as a 'wicked' problem? To answer this question, the paper assesses energy security against nine commonly cited characteristics of wicked policy problems and finds strong evidence of 'wickedness'.Keywords: Energy security, policy making, wicked problems.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1517892 A Generic Approach to Achieve Optimal Server Consolidation by Using Existing Servers in Virtualized Data Center
Authors: Siyuan Jing, Kun She
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Virtualization-based server consolidation has been proven to be an ideal technique to solve the server sprawl problem by consolidating multiple virtualized servers onto a few physical servers leading to improved resource utilization and return on investment. In this paper, we solve this problem by using existing servers, which are heterogeneous and diversely preferred by IT managers. Five practical consolidation rules are introduced, and a decision model is proposed to optimally allocate source services to physical target servers while maximizing the average resource utilization and preference value. Our model can be regarded as a multi-objective multi-dimension bin-packing (MOMDBP) problem with constraints, which is strongly NP-hard. An improved grouping generic algorithm (GGA) is introduced for the problem. Extensive simulations were performed and the results are given.Keywords: GGA-based Heuristics, Preference, Real-worldConstraints, Resource Utilization, Server Consolidation
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1647891 Robust Numerical Scheme for Pricing American Options under Jump Diffusion Models
Authors: Salah Alrabeei, Mohammad Yousuf
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The goal of option pricing theory is to help the investors to manage their money, enhance returns and control their financial future by theoretically valuing their options. However, most of the option pricing models have no analytical solution. Furthermore, not all the numerical methods are efficient to solve these models because they have nonsmoothing payoffs or discontinuous derivatives at the exercise price. In this paper, we solve the American option under jump diffusion models by using efficient time-dependent numerical methods. several techniques are integrated to reduced the overcome the computational complexity. Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) algorithm is used as a matrix-vector multiplication solver, which reduces the complexity from O(M2) into O(M logM). Partial fraction decomposition technique is applied to rational approximation schemes to overcome the complexity of inverting polynomial of matrices. The proposed method is easy to implement on serial or parallel versions. Numerical results are presented to prove the accuracy and efficiency of the proposed method.Keywords: Integral differential equations, American options, jump–diffusion model, rational approximation.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 561890 Traditional Grocery Stores and Business Management in Bangkok
Authors: Suppara Charoenpoom
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This paper was aimed to survey the level of awareness of traditional grocery stores in Bangkok in these categories: location, service quality, risk, shopping, worthwhile, shopping satisfaction, and future shopping intention. The paper was also aimed to survey factors influencing the decision to shop at traditional grocery stores in Bangkok in the future. The findings revealed that consumers had a high level of awareness of traditional grocery stores in Bangkok. Consumers were aware that the price was higher and it was riskier to buy goods and services at traditional grocery stores but they still had a high level of preference to patronage traditional grocery stores. This was due to the reasons that there was a high level of satisfaction from the factors of the friendliness of the owner, the ability to negotiate the price, the ability to buy on credit, free delivery, and the enjoyment to meet with other customers in the same neighborhood.Keywords: Business Management, Thai Economy, Traditional Grocery Store.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2530889 3D Dynamic Representation System for the Human Head
Authors: Laurenţiu Militeanu, Cristina Gena Dascâlu, D. Cristea
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The human head representations usually are based on the morphological – structural components of a real model. Over the time became more and more necessary to achieve full virtual models that comply very rigorous with the specifications of the human anatomy. Still, making and using a model perfectly fitted with the real anatomy is a difficult task, because it requires large hardware resources and significant times for processing. That is why it is necessary to choose the best compromise solution, which keeps the right balance between the details perfection and the resources consumption, in order to obtain facial animations with real-time rendering. We will present here the way in which we achieved such a 3D system that we intend to use as a base point in order to create facial animations with real-time rendering, used in medicine to find and to identify different types of pathologies.Keywords: 3D models, virtual reality.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1456888 Educational Plan and Program of the Subject Maintenance of Electric Power Equipment
Authors: Rade Ciric, Sasa Mandic
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Students of Higher Education Technical School of Professional Studies in Novi Sad follow the subject ‘Maintenance of Electric Power Equipment’ at the Electrotechnical Department. This paper presents educational plan and program of the subject Maintenance of Electric Power Equipment. The course deals with the problems of preventive and investing maintenance of transformer stations (TS), performing and maintenance of grounding of TS and pillars, as well as tracing and detection the location of the cables failure. There is a special elaborated subject concerning the safe work conditions for the electrician during network maintenance, as well as the basics of making and keeping technical documentation of the equipment.
Keywords: Educational plan and program, electric power equipment, maintenance, technical documentation, safe work.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1370887 Centralized Cooperative Spectrum Sensing with MIMO in the Reporting Network over κ − μ Fading Channel
Authors: S Hariharan, K Chaitanya, P Muthuchidambaranathan
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The IEEE 802.22 working group aims to drive the Digital Video Broadcasting-Terrestrial (DVB-T) bands for data communication to the rural area without interfering the TV broadcast. In this paper, we arrive at a closed-form expression for average detection probability of Fusion center (FC) with multiple antenna over the κ − μ fading channel model. We consider a centralized cooperative multiple antenna network for reporting. The DVB-T samples forwarded by the secondary user (SU) were combined using Maximum ratio combiner at FC, an energy detection is performed to make the decision. The fading effects of the channel degrades the detection probability of the FC, a generalized independent and identically distributed (IID) κ − μ and an additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channel is considered for reporting and sensing respectively. The proposed system performance is verified through simulation results.
Keywords: IEEE 802.22, Cooperative spectrum sensing, Multiple antenna, κ − μ .
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 5454886 Position Awareness Mechanisms for Wireless Sensor Networks
Authors: Seyed Mostafa Torabi
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A Wireless sensor network (WSN) consists of a set of battery-powered nodes, which collaborate to perform sensing tasks in a given environment. Each node in WSN should be capable to act for long periods of time with scrimpy or no external management. One requirement for this independent is: in the presence of adverse positions, the sensor nodes must be capable to configure themselves. Hence, the nodes for determine the existence of unusual events in their surroundings should make use of position awareness mechanisms. This work approaches the problem by considering the possible unusual events as diseases, thus making it possible to diagnose them through their symptoms, namely, their side effects. Considering these awareness mechanisms as a foundation for highlevel monitoring services, this paper also shows how these mechanisms are included in the primal plan of an intrusion detection system.
Keywords: Awareness Mechanism, Intrusion Detection, Independent, Wireless Sensor Network
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1452885 The Association between the Firm Characteristics and Corporate Mandatory Disclosure the Case of Greece
Authors: Despina Galani, Anastasios Alexandridis, Antonios Stavropoulos
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The main thrust of this paper is to assess the level of disclosure in the annual reports of non-financial Greek firms and to empirically investigate the hypothesized impact of several firm characteristics on the extent of mandatory disclosure. A disclosure checklist consisting of 100 mandatory items was developed to assess the level of disclosure in the 2009 annual reports of 43 Greek companies listed at the Athens stock exchange. The association between the level of disclosure and some firm characteristics was examined using multiple linear regression analysis. The study reveals that Greek companies on general have responded adequately to the mandatory disclosure requirements of the regulatory bodies. The findings also indicate that firm size was significant positively associated with the level of disclosure. The remaining variables such as age, profitability, liquidity, and board composition were found to be insignificant in explaining the variation of mandatory disclosures. The outcome of this study is undoubtedly of great concern to the investment community at large to assist in evaluating the extent of mandatory disclosure by Greek firms and explaining the variation of disclosure in light of firm-specific characteristics.
Keywords: Mandatory disclosure, Annual report, Disclosure index
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3980884 Grounded Theory of Consumer Loyalty, a Perspective through Video Game Addiction
Authors: Bassam Shaikh, R. S. A. Jumain
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Game addiction has become an extremely important topic in psychology researchers, particularly in understanding and explaining why individuals become addicted (to video games). In previous studies, effect of online game addiction on social responsibilities, health problems, government action, and the behaviors of individuals to purchase and the causes of making individuals addicted on the video games has been discussed. Extending these concepts in marketing, it could be argued than the phenomenon could enlighten and extending our understanding on consumer loyalty. This study took the Grounded Theory approach, and found that motivation, satisfaction, fulfillments, exploration and achievements to be part of the important elements that builds consumer loyalty.
Keywords: Consumer Loyalty, Video Games Addiction, Video Games, Grounded Theory.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2688883 Discovering the Dimension of Abstractness: Structure-Based Model that Learns New Categories and Categorizes on Different Levels of Abstraction
Authors: Georgi I. Petkov, Ivan I. Vankov, Yolina A. Petrova
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A structure-based model of category learning and categorization at different levels of abstraction is presented. The model compares different structures and expresses their similarity implicitly in the forms of mappings. Based on this similarity, the model can categorize different targets either as members of categories that it already has or creates new categories. The model is novel using two threshold parameters to evaluate the structural correspondence. If the similarity between two structures exceeds the higher threshold, a new sub-ordinate category is created. Vice versa, if the similarity does not exceed the higher threshold but does the lower one, the model creates a new category on higher level of abstraction.
Keywords: Analogy-making, categorization, learning of categories, abstraction, hierarchical structure.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 780882 The Role of Organizational Culture in Facilitating Employee Job Satisfaction in Emerald Group
Authors: Mohamed Haffar, Muhammad Abdul Aziz, Ahmad Ghoneim
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The importance of having a good organizational culture that supports employee job satisfaction has fascinated both the business and academic world because of a tantalizing promise: culture can be fundamental to the enhancement of financial performance. This promise has led to growing interest for both researchers and practitioners in attempting to understand the influence of organizational culture on employees’ satisfaction and organizational performance. Even though the relationship between organizational culture and employee job satisfaction have gained attention in the literature, the majority of studies have been conducted within manufacturing organizations and tend to oversee the impact of culture on employee job satisfaction in a service-based environment. Thus, the main driving force of this study was to explore the role of organizational culture types in facilitating employee job satisfaction at Emerald Publishing Group. Interviews qualitative data analysis indicated that Emerald’s culture dominated by adhocracy and clan culture values. In addition, the findings provided evidence, which demonstrated that group and adhocracy organizational culture types play key roles in facilitating employee job satisfaction in a service-based environment.
Keywords: Employee satisfaction, organizational culture, performance, service based environment.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1494881 Does the Adoption of IFRS Influence Earnings Management towards Small Positive Profits? Evidence from Emerging Markets
Authors: Sawcen Chebaane, Hakim Ben Othman
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This paper investigates the effect of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) adoption on the frequency of earnings managements towards small positive profits. We focus on two emerging markets IFRS adopters: South Africa and Turkey. We tested our logistic regression using appropriate panelestimation techniques over a sample of 330 South African and 210 Turkish firm-year observations over the period 2002-2008. Our results document that mandatory adoption of IFRS is not associated with a reduction in earnings management towards small positive profits in emerging markets. These results contradict most of the previous findings of the studies conducted in developed countries. Based on the legal system factor, we compare the intensity of earnings management between a code law country (Turkey) and a common law country (South Africa) over the pre and post-adoption periods. Our findings show that the frequency of such earnings management practice increases significantly for the code law country.Keywords: Civil law, common law, emerging markets, Mandatory IFRS adoption, small positive profits.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3202880 Analysis of Sonogram Images of Thyroid Gland Based on Wavelet Transform
Authors: M. Bastanfard, B. Jalaeian, S. Jafari
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Sonogram images of normal and lymphocyte thyroid tissues have considerable overlap which makes it difficult to interpret and distinguish. Classification from sonogram images of thyroid gland is tackled in semiautomatic way. While making manual diagnosis from images, some relevant information need not to be recognized by human visual system. Quantitative image analysis could be helpful to manual diagnostic process so far done by physician. Two classes are considered: normal tissue and chronic lymphocyte thyroid (Hashimoto's Thyroid). Data structure is analyzed using K-nearest-neighbors classification. This paper is mentioned that unlike the wavelet sub bands' energy, histograms and Haralick features are not appropriate to distinguish between normal tissue and Hashimoto's thyroid.Keywords: Sonogram, thyroid, Haralick feature, wavelet.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1321879 Corporate Governance Practices and Audit Quality: An Empirical Study of the Listed Companies in Egypt
Authors: Mohamed Moustafa Soliman, Mohamed Abd Elsalam
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Recent financial international scandals around the world have led to a number of investigations into the effectiveness of corporate governance practices and audit quality. Although evidence of corporate governance practices and audit quality exists from developed economies, very scanty studies have been conducted in Egypt where corporate governance is just evolving. Therefore, this study provides evidence on the effectiveness of corporate governance practices and audit quality from a developing country. The data for analysis are gathered from the top 50 most active companies in the Egyptian Stock Exchange, covering the three year period 2007-2009. Logistic regression was used in investigating the questions that were raised in the study. Findings from the study show that board independence; CEO duality and audit committees significantly have relationship with audit quality. The results also, indicate that institutional investor and managerial ownership have no significantly relationship with audit quality. Evidence also exist that size of the company; complexity and business leverage are important factors in audit quality for companies quoted on the Egypt Stock Exchange.
Keywords: Corporate governance, Boards of directors, corporate ownership, Audit Committees, Audit quality, and Egypt.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3924878 A Framework for Evaluating the QoS and Cost of Web Services Based on Its Functional Performance
Authors: M. Mohemmed Sha, T. Manesh, A. Mohamed Mustaq Ahmed
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In this corporate world, the technology of Web services has grown rapidly and its significance for the development of web based applications gradually rises over time. The success of Business to Business integration rely on finding novel partners and their services in a global business environment. However, the selection of the most suitable Web service from the list of services with the identical functionality is more vital. The satisfaction level of the customer and the provider’s reputation of the Web service are primarily depending on the range it reaches the customer’s requirements. In most cases, the customer of the Web service feels that he is spending for the service which is undelivered. This is because the customer always thinks that the real functionality of the web service is not reached. This will lead to change of the service frequently. In this paper, a framework is proposed to evaluate the Quality of Service (QoS) and its cost that makes the optimal correlation between each other. In addition, this research work proposes some management decision against the functional deviancy of the web service that is guaranteed at time of selection.Keywords: Web service, service level agreement, quality of a service, cost of a service, QoS, CoS, SOA, WSLA, WsRF.
Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2185