Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Inflation and inflation uncertainty: evidence from the Caribbean region

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to extend the literature on the relationship between inflation and inflation uncertainty by examining three Caribbean countries: the Bahamas, Barbados, and Jamaica. Design/methodology/approach - ARMA-GARCH models are used to estimate inflation uncertainty along with Granger-causality tests to infer the relationship between inflation and inflation uncertainty. Findings - The results reveal that both the Bahamas and Jamaica exhibit a high degree of volatility persistence in response to inflationary shocks, while Barbados has a much lower persistence measure. Granger-causality tests indicate that an increase in inflation has been a positive impact on inflation uncertainty for each country. However, an increase in inflation uncertainty yields a decrease in inflation in the case of Jamaica. In summary, the results for the Bahamas and Barbados support the Friedman-Ball hypothesis, whereas the results for Jamaica support Holland's stabilization-motive hypothesis. Research limitations/implications - Future research on inflation and inflation uncertainty can be extended to incorporate possible regime shifts associated with fiscal and monetary policy. Originality/value - The study fills a void in the literature with respect to the inflation-inflation uncertainty nexus for Caribbean countries. The results of the paper may be useful to policymakers in the formulation of fiscal and monetary policy.
The Impact of Segment Reporting Under the IFRS 8 and SFAS 131 Management Approach: A Research Review

This paper evaluates the impact of adopting the management approach for segment reporting. We review studies of the effect of the application of SFAS 131 and IFRS 8 on the number of reported operating segments and items of disclosure, segment reporting gaps and reconciliations, entitywide geographic disclosures, and competitive harm and decision usefulness of segment information. We report on the advantages and disadvantages of the management approach and explore whether the concerns of critics of adopting the management approach in IFRS 8 have been realized. We also identify opportunities for important and policy-relevant research in the area of segment reporting based on IFRS 8.
WHOLE-BODY VIBRATION EXERCISE IMPROVES FUNCTIONAL PARAMETERS IN PATIENTS WITH OSTEOGENESIS IMPERFECTA: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW WITH A SUITABLE APPROACH

Background: Patients with osteogenesis imperfecta (OI) have abnormal bone modelling and resorption. The bone tissue adaptation and responsivity to dynamic and mechanical loading may be of therapeutic use under controlled circumstances. Improvements due to the wholebody vibration (WBV) exercises have been reported in strength, motion, gait, balance, posture and bone density in several osteopenic individuals, as in post-menopausal women or children with disabling conditions, as patients with OI. The aim of this investigation was to systematically analyse the current available literature to determine the effect of WBV exercises on functional parameters of OI patients. Materials and methods: Three reviewers independently accessed bibliographical databases. Searches were performed in the PubMed, Scopus, Science Direct and PEDro databases using keywords related to possible interventions (including WBV) used in the management of patients with osteogenesis imperfecta. Results: Three eligible studies were identified by searches in the analysed databases. Conclusion: It was concluded that WBV exercises could be an important option in the management of OI patients improving the mobility and functional parameters. However, further studies are necessary for establishing suitable protocols for these patients.
Memory deficits and retrieval processes in ALS 1

Subtle neuropsychological deficits have been described in patients affected by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) without dementia. Overall, selective impairment in memory function has been reported, but the source of memory impairment in ALS has yet to be defined. We performed neuropsychological screening in 20 ALS patients. Semantic encoding and post‐encoding cue effects on the retrieval of word lists were investigated in the ALS patients and normal controls. Severity of memory impairment was correlated to cerebral blood perfusion detected by single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT). ALS patients showed moderate impairments in frontal and memory tests. Short‐term memory was normal, while serial position retrieval of word lists with normal recency effect but poor primacy effect showed long‐term memory deficit. ALS patients performed better in cued encoding than in cued post‐encoding recall condition. In the cued post‐encoding condition, the primacy effect in word list recall improved significantly in controls, but not in ALS patients, as compared with both the free recall and cued encoding conditions. SPECT hypoperfusion was observed in frontal and temporal areas in ALS patients. ALS patients showed a long‐term memory deficit which did not improve in cued post‐encoding condition as it does for controls. We hypothesize abnormal retrieval processes related to frontal lobe dysfunction which entails difficulties in generating stable long‐memory traces at encoding.
Competence and Organization: Two Drivers of Innovation

This paper demonstrates the effects of organizational factors and computerization changes on innovation. Indeed, the innovation capacity depends more on a company's organization than on its size. The econometric results show that, when the organizational structure is integrated into a Schumpeter's model with flexibility, reactivity, risk-taking, internal communication and the establishing of a strategy, the significance of the company size decreases by half. Our work underlines the importance of the level of self-sufficiency and the recognition of a researcher's status. In addition, it demonstrates that the mass of knowledge needed is constantly increasing because of constant technological progress, making it indispensable for a company to open up towards the outside world, more particularly through cooperation. Recourse to R&D cooperation provides access to information and to new abilities that can improve the technological capabilities of a firm. It underlines that the condition needed to be able to benefit from the competence of a partner is to have, first of all, agreement to share a stock of complementary and common knowledge, a condition that will boost the performance of partner companies. Connection to the Internet has a greater effect upon innovation capacities than does the simple networking of microcomputers, and can lead to reorganizing work within companies, with the possibility of more intense information sharing. The company would subsequently organize task sharing internally, and as regards the outside world, not on hierarchical bases, but on those of shared interest in a given goal. The greater speed in information transmission would permit an increase in the speed of change in the environment and thereby, a shortening of the deadlines for defining and marketing innovations.
Is there any effect of Ramadan fasting on stroke incidence?

INTRODUCTION Over one billion Muslims fast worldwide during the month of Ramadan. Fasting during Ramadan is a radical change in lifestyle for the period of a lunar month. The objective of this study was to investigate whether Ramadan fasting has any effect on the incidence of stroke and its outcome in a geographically-defined population. METHODS We retrospectively reviewed a 13-year stroke database and studied the data on Muslim patients who were hospitalised with stroke over a 13-year period from January 1991 to December 2003. Patients were divided according to the time of presentation in relation to the month of Ramadan, one month before, during, and one month after Ramadan. The number of hospitalisations for stroke in various time periods was analysed. The age of presentation, gender, cardiovascular risk factor profiles (smoking status, hypertension, hypercholesterolaemia, diabetes mellitus, and pre-existing cardiovascular disease) were analysed. We also studied the trends of in-hospital mortality, morbidity and acute medical care provided. RESULTS Overall, 335 Muslim patients were hospitalised for stroke. Their mean age and standard deviation were 56.99 and 13.9 years, respectively. The number of hospitalisations for stroke was not significantly different in the month of Ramadan (29 cases), when compared to the month before Ramadan (30 cases) and the month after Ramadan (29 cases). Risk factors included for stroke were not significantly different in Ramadan when compared to the month before and after Ramadan. These associated diseases were hypertension, diabetes mellitus, hypercholesterolaemia, acute myocardial infarction, and congestive heart failure. CONCLUSION This study demonstrated that no significant difference was found in the number of hospitalisations for stroke while fasting during the month of Ramadan when compared to the non-fasting months.
Creditor Rights, Enforcement, and Bank Loans

We examine whether differences in legal protection affect the size, maturity, and interest rate spread on loans to borrowers in 48 countries. Results show that banks respond to poor enforceability of contracts by reducing loan amounts, shortening loan maturities, and increasing loan spreads. These effects are both statistically significant and economically large. While stronger creditor rights reduce spreads, they do not seem to matter for loan size and maturity. Overall, we show that variation in enforceability of contracts matters a great deal more to how loans are structured and how they are priced.
Left behind in transition? The well-being of older people in Tajikistan

The break-up of the Soviet Union and the subsequent transition to market-led economies has been accompanied by a decade of economic and social upheaval on an unprecedented scale. In some countries, GDP per capita more than halved during the early 1990s and spending on social services such as health, education and social protection declined even further. There is now a substantial body of literature detailing the impact on the population of the decline in economic and social wellbeing in the new Republics of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) during the 1990s (Alam et al, 2005; Dudwick et al, 2003; Falkingham 2005; World Bank,2000). However, older people have been largely invisible in this literature, particularly in the poorer countries of the CIS in Central Asia and the Caucasus. One of the few studies explicitly focussing on older people in transition economies was carried out by HelpAge International (2002). However, that study was largely confined to Central and Eastern Europe, with case studies in Bosnia, Estonia, Romania, Moldova and Lithuania. There have also been some studies concerning older people in Russia (Tchernina and Tchernin, 2002). More recently, the European Centre for Social Welfare Policy & Research has carried out a study of ‘Poverty of Elderly People in EU25’, which includes the new member states (Zaidi et al, 2006), but there remains no equivalent literature on older people in Central Asia.
Retention Management as a Means of Protecting Tacit Knowledge in an Organisation: A Conceptual Framework for Professional Services Firms

Despite the recent economic downturn, retention management remains one of the most relevant and significant topics in international Human Resource Management (HRM). The most common explanation for such a significance is that excellent retention management has become a major source of competitive advantage in the modern and rapidly globalising business world. Another key reason that is mentioned by a majority of companies is that it just simply costs too much money to replace even one valuable employee. Hence, the main task of retention management is twofold. Besides applying the correct motivation techniques to retain its top talent and maintain a competitive advantage, the organisation also has to reduce the replacement cost and especially its 'soft' component (the cost of losing employees' experience, professional expertise, key customer relationships, etc.) if or when an employee does decide to leave. Most of the academic literature on retention deals with general and unspecific preventive strategies pertaining mainly to industrial companies. This paper concentrates particularly on the retention techniques designed to protect the important tacit knowledge in Professional Services Firms (PSFs), which would help them reduce their overall replacement costs and increase their competitiveness in the marketplace.
Transnational Entrepreneurs and the Emergence of Clusters in Peripheral Regions. The Case of the Diamond Cutting Cluster in Gujarat (India)

This paper argues that through their close-knit community networks transnational entrepreneurs can transfer focused knowledge about external markets and technologies over great geographical distances at low costs. When integrating this external knowledge with the knowledge flows between their peers at a given location, they can shape the preconditions for the emergence of clusters even at places that do not appear to have any industry-specific amenities at all. In general, such patterns of cluster evolution are of particular importance in labour-intensive manufacturing sectors in developing countries or emerging markets which are characterized by low labour costs and a lack of knowledge in production techniques. The empirical part of this paper focuses on the evolution of the diamond cutting cluster in the Indian state of Gujarat which only developed after World War II but today is the world's most important location for diamond manufacturing. The study is based on semi-structured interviews with 120 diamond firm representatives and workers in Mumbai, Surat, New York and Antwerp, as well as on an analysis of immigration files from the Antwerp city archives.
Nested Shallow CNN-Cascade for Face Detection in the Wild

Face detection in the wild is a challenging vision problem due to large variations and unpredictable ambiguities commonly existed in real world images. Whilst introducing powerful but complex models is often computationally inefficient, using hand-crafted features is hence problematic. In this paper, we propose a nested CNN-cascade learning algorithm that adopts shallow neural network architectures that allow efficient and progressive elimination of negative hypothesis from easy to hard via self-learning discriminative representations from coarse to fine scales. The face detection problem is considered as solving three sub-problems: eliminating easy background with a simple but fast model, then localising the face region with a soft-cascade, followed by precise detection and localisation by verifying retained regions with a deeper and stronger model. The face detector is trained on the AFLW dataset following the standard evaluation procedure, and the method is tested on four other public datasets, i.e. FDDB, AFW, CMU-MIT and GENKI. Both quantitative and qualitative results on FDDB and AFW are reported, which show promising performances on detecting faces in unconstrained environment.
Why Stock Markets Crash: Critical Events in Complex Financial Systems

The scientific study of complex systems has transformed a wide range of disciplines in recent years, enabling researchers in both the natural and social sciences to model and predict phenomena as diverse as earthquakes, global warming, demographic patterns, financial crises, and the failure of materials. In this book, Didier Sornette boldly applies his varied experience in these areas to propose a simple, powerful, and general theory of how, why, and when stock markets crash. Most attempts to explain market failures seek to pinpoint triggering mechanisms that occur hours, days, or weeks before the collapse. Sornette proposes a radically different view: the underlying cause can be sought months and even years before the abrupt, catastrophic event in the build-up of cooperative speculation, which often translates into an accelerating rise of the market price, otherwise known as a "bubble. " Anchoring his sophisticated, step-by-step analysis in leading-edge physical and statistical modeling techniques, he unearths remarkable insights and some predictions--among them, that the "end of the growth era" will occur around 2050. Sornette probes major historical precedents, from the decades-long "tulip mania" in the Netherlands that wilted suddenly in 1637 to the South Sea Bubble that ended with the first huge market crash in England in 1720, to the Great Crash of October 1929 and Black Monday in 1987, to cite just a few. He concludes that most explanations other than cooperative self-organization fail to account for the subtle bubbles by which the markets lay the groundwork for catastrophe. Any investor or investment professional who seeks a genuine understanding of looming financial disasters should read this book. Physicists, geologists, biologists, economists, and others will welcome Why Stock Markets Crash as a highly original "scientific tale," as Sornette aptly puts it, of the exciting and sometimes fearsome--but no longer quite so unfathomable--world of stock markets.
Corporate Foreign Exchange Speculation and Integrated Risk Management

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to investigate how non-finance departmental involvement in the management of exchange rate risks impacts the extent of foreign exchange speculation in non-financial firms. Design/methodology/approach - Non-financial firms in a small open economy (Denmark) are surveyed to investigate the extent of foreign exchange speculation and how it is related to the degree of nonfinance departmental involvement in the management of exchange rate risks. The authors employ binary and ordered probit regression analysis. Findings - A positive link is found between the extent to which departments other than the finance department are involved in the management of exchange rate risks; and second, the extent to which the firm is likely to speculate – whether in the form of selective hedging or active speculation – on the foreign exchange market. Practical implications - The findings indicate that the trend towards a more integrated risk management approach in which the finance department is not the only department responsible for risk management may have the (unforeseen) consequence that foreign exchange speculation increases. Originality/value - The paper's findings are important because the link between the extent of foreign exchange speculation and a more integrated risk management approach has not been addressed previously.
Antagonistic effects of floral scent in an insect–plant interaction

In southwestern USA, the jimsonweed Datura wrightii and the nocturnal moth Manduca sexta form a pollinator–plant and herbivore–plant association. Because the floral scent is probably important in mediating this interaction, we investigated the floral volatiles that might attract M. sexta for feeding and oviposition. We found that flower volatiles increase oviposition and include small amounts of both enantiomers of linalool, a common component of the scent of hawkmoth-pollinated flowers. Because (+)-linalool is processed in a female-specific glomerulus in the primary olfactory centre of M. sexta, we hypothesized that the enantiomers of linalool differentially modulate feeding and oviposition. Using a synthetic mixture that mimics the D. wrightii floral scent, we found that the presence of linalool was not necessary to evoke feeding and that mixtures containing (+)- and/or (−)-linalool were equally effective in mediating this behaviour. By contrast, females oviposited more on plants emitting (+)-linalool (alone or in mixtures) over control plants, while plants emitting (−)-linalool (alone or in mixtures) were less preferred than control plants. Together with our previous investigations, these results show that linalool has differential effects in feeding and oviposition through two neural pathways: one that is sexually isomorphic and non-enantioselective, and another that is female-specific and enantioselective.
Managing and resourcing a program of social integration initiatives for international university students: what are the benefits?

There has been much concern in the higher education sector recently about the well-being and the safety of slightly more than 200,000 international students studying in higher education in Australia. In recognition of the economic and socio-cultural value of the international student cohort, as well as the significant challenge and risk of studying away from family and friends in a foreign community, CQUniversity has focused for the last two years on improving social integration for over 5000 international students. These students are studying at CQUniversity metropolitan campuses in Brisbane, Gold Coast, Melbourne and Sydney, which are popular destinations for international students. Initiatives to enhance social integration for these students were achieved in partnership with the local community, staff and other students. This paper reports the results of a survey of 446 CQUniversity international students who have had access to these enhanced opportunities for integration as well as a focus-group discussion with staff and students. Results determine the success of these initiatives from the perspective of students as well as key staff and identify further initiatives considered beneficial to supporting continuing social integration.
Safety hazard of tinted automobile windshields at night.

The effects of tinted optical media, particularly of heat-absorbing automobile windshields, upon visibility distances on the highway at night are analyzed theoretically. The loss percentages in visibility distances caused by replacing clear windshields with tinted ones are calculated as functions of the variables involved, viz., transmittance of the tinted optical medium, isocandle profile of the headlamp, angular size and reflectance of the target. It is found that the loss percentages in visibility distances are further dependent upon the distance of the target itself, with the losses increasing with decreasing distances. Losses in visibility distances caused by commercial brands of tinted windshields amount to between 9 and 15 percent at visibility distances ranging between 1000 and 200 feet. These results agree fairly well with the data of Blackwell and with data obtained experimentally in the field by other authors. The analysis shows further that the losses in visibility distances are greatest for targets so nearly matched to the background that they may be seen even with clear windshields only at short distances. Under these conditions the losses may be as high as 30 to 45 percent. A reconsideration of the 70 percent minimum transmittance requirement for windshields in the American Standard Safety Code Z26.1–1950 is recommended.