Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
How elders evaluate apps: A contribution to the study of smartphones and to the analysis of the usefulness and accessibility of ICTS for older adults

Elders are an important part of this society and a group for which ICTs might provide useful answers to existing problems and needs. However, elders and their interests with regard to ICTs have been largely ignored due to a presupposed missing ability to use, a general disinterest in, and a lack of will to learn about ICT developments. This article wants to contribute to the debate about elders and their abilities to use and interests in ICTs. We analysed how elders in focus groups in Spain use mobile ICT applications, how they experiment with them and why they decide to use or not to use them. In our research, we have used apps as an example for ICTs because apps are considered to be flagships for technological innovation, and because, in contrast to call and messenger functions of mobile phones, the motivation for using apps has to come from the individual that uses them. Findings from 4 focus group discussions with elders from Spain suggest that age does not directly influence the perception of, experience with, and evaluation of newest technological developments. Instead past experiences and social contexts in which the technology is introduced play a role. Our results point at the need to find new formulas for introducing, and teaching ICTs to elders, and underline the need to take elders’ emotions with regard to ICTs into consideration when evaluating elders’ ICT uses.
Private Health Insurance and Hospital Services in Australia

Public subsidy of private hospital services, either directly or through private health insurance, is a controversial policy issue. The Romanow's review of Canadian medical and hospital services rejected suggestions that the use of for-profit private hospitals would help to improve the efficiency of Canadian services. He cited studies of health services in the United States that raised doubts about the benefits of the use of for-profit hospitals in the neighbour country. In view of the similarity of the public funding of medical and hospital care in Australia and Canada and the Canadian stance, it is useful to examine the various impacts of policy thrusts in Australia that promoted the expansion of private health insurance for private hospital use. This paper adds to the findings of a number of analysts concerned with efficiency and equity questions, through the examination of trends in the capacity and use of hospital services in Australia in the ten year period 1997-2007. Further, it provides an analysis of the relative specialisation of public and private hospital services, to assess whether the set of policy measures has been associated with the expansion of the range of services in private hospitals that might substitute for those provided by the public sector.
Can Large Industries Predict the Stock Market?

This paper empirically examines the hypothesis that diffusion of information is not uniform across all sectors of a market. Large industries or industries where trading volume is substantially larger attract attention of a large number of investors who in turn make these industries informationally efficient. Such industries are expected to help in predicting the movements of a stock market. For testing the above hypothesis, the study uses monthly data of 3 industries listed at the Karachi Stock Exchange over the period 2001 to 2008. These include Oil and Gas, Chemical and Cement industries. In separate regressions, current market returns are regressed on the lagged portfolio returns of the given industries and other control variables. The results do not provide any evidence that these industries can predict movements of the stock market. However, there is some evidence that dividend yield can forecast market returns up to two months. The paper contributes to the literature as this is the first-ever study on this topic in Pakistan.
'You're virtually there': Mobile communication practices, locational information sharing and place attachment

Mobility is a fact of contemporary everyday life. Especially, in big metropolises everyday life revolves around a continuous movement, which serve the need of catching up with the fast pace of metropolitan life. Such mobilities can alter our perception of space and time, leading us to think of distances as shrinking and places becoming closer. This leads to material, social and cultural reconfigurations (Baerenholdt and Granas, 2008) and reinforces the question of distance and proximity in maintaining social and familial relationships. Today, face–to–face social interactions are supplemented with what Urry (2007) calls imagined presence. This imagined presence, or “the transport to a virtual place” is ‘affected through the images of places and peoples appearing on, and moving across, multiple print and visual media’. This paper discusses what happens to imagined presence when those images are mobile, geo–tagged and shared within a network. Do mobile and locative media practices enhance our sense of place by triggering a “nostalgic ode to home” and displacing us from the co–present situation? Or, do they foster bonding with places by creating a sense of belonging and by enabling us to carry our existing social relationships wherever we go? In order to answer these questions in this article, the relationships among social production of space, mobility, imagined presence and sense of place (place attachment) are analysed drawing on the findings of two studies conducted in 2011 and 2012, in London.
Effects of Sales Promotion on Purchasing Decision of Customer: A Case Study of Baskin Robbins Ice – Cream Franchise Thailand

iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENT . v LIST OF TABLES . ix LIST OF FIGURES . xi CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION . 1 1.1 Background . 1 1.2 Rationale and Problem Statement . 2 1.3 Objectives of Research . 5 1.4 Scope of Research . 6 1.5 Research Questions . 7 1.6 Hypotheses Formulation . 7 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW . 8 2.1 Related Literature and Previous Studies . 8 2.2 Types of Sales Promotion . 12 2.3 Coupons and Sales Promotion . 14 2.4 Price Discount . 19 2.5 Point of Sale Display and Sales Promotion . 23 2.6 Premium and Sales Promotion . 24 2.7 Free Samples and Sales Promotion. 25 2.8 Effects of Sales Promotion . 27 2.9 Benefits of Sales Promotion . 29
Job Satisfaction in the Healthcare Services in South Africa: Case of MPH

The ultimate goal in the health environment is quality service delivery it is imperative that employees perform optimally and maintain acceptable levels of job satisfaction. The aim of this study was to investigate how job satisfaction of healthcare personnel influence quality service delivery through productivity, work performance, employee loyalty and retention at Mafikeng Provincial Hospital (MPH) in the North-West Province. The study utilized a descriptive method in order to reach its aim and the results reveal that among the determinants of job satisfaction, the availability of sufficient resources to do the work was selected as the major determinant of employee job satisfaction at MPH and at least 56.3% of the MPH workers were not satisfied with sufficient resources available to do their work, which hindered the effectiveness of service delivery. Satisfaction with job done by immediate supervisor was the second determinant of job satisfaction on this aspect the organization is doing very well with 66.0% of the respondents reported satisfaction with their immediate supervisor’s jobs. The findings from the study show that job satisfaction improves productivity and performance, this was evident from majority of respondents (83.5%) who agreed that job satisfaction affects the way they met their target quotas, this makes logic when we look at the response rate of 79.6% of employees who agreed that they spent productive time working on the tasks assigned to them, rather than idling or doing other things which do not benefit the organization. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014. v5n3p94
AN EMPIRICAL STUDY ON ORGANIZATIONAL ACCEPTANCE ACCOUNTING INFORMATION SYSTEMS IN SHARIA BANKING

The purpose of this research is to investigate the correlation of management support and self-efficacy variables, to perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, and behavioral intention to use variables of accounting information systems of Islamic Banking. This study aims to discover the roles of external variables, including management support and self-efficacy variables which influence perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of accounting information systems (AIS) of Islamic Banking. The study was conducted in several Islamic Banking in Malang City, East Java, which consist of Bank Mega Syariah, Bank Syariah Mandiri, Bank Muamalat, Bank Panin Syariah, Bank Jatim Syariah, BTN Syariah, CIMB Niaga Syariah, BRI Syariah, and BNI Syariah. The population of this study are employees who worked and dispersed all over Islamic Banking in Malang City and samples of 135 people as system users were used for data examination. This study emphasized on quantitative approach in data analysis which uses Generalized Structured Component Analysis (GSCA) approach. The result shows that all tested hypotheses have significantly positive correlations, which are: management support on perceived ease of use, management support on perceived usefulness, self-efficacy on perceived ease of use, self-efficacy on perceived usefulness, perceived usefulness on behavioral intention of use of AIS; and perceived ease of use on behavioral intention of use of AIS. Keyword: Management support, self-efficacy, accounting information system, Islamic Banking
Hospitals' Choices and the Institutional Environment: The Role of Community Benefit in the Health Care Sector

1 Chapter 1: Introduction 3 Chapter 2: Exploring the Institutional Values of the Health Care Sector: Hospital Choices Regarding Community Benefit Practices 30 Chapter 3: Community Benefit Practices and Their Relationships to Organizational Performance and Survival 81 Chapter 4: The Prevalence of Community Benefit Participation in the Hospital Market and Its Relationship to Community Health Outcomes 118 Chapter 5: Conclusion and Discussion 148 Appendix A: State Policies 170 Appendix B: Measures 228
Corporate Sale-and-Leaseback Transactions: An Examination of Corporate Incentives, Wealth Effects and Dealer Spreads

There is a limited amount of research dealing with the wealth effects of sale-and-leaseback transactions, but previous research has focused predominantly on the tax effects of these transactions. The results of these studies have often been in conflict with one another. This dissertation shows that tax effects do play a role in determining the wealth effect of sale-and-leasebacks on stockholders, but there exists a framework of finance research that suggests several other factors could play a determining role as well.
Rising Interest Rate Risk at US Banks

Average interest rate risk in the banking system has been increasing since the end of the financial crisis and is almost back to its pre-recession level. But the increase has not occurred uniformly at large and small banks. At big banks, risk, while increasing, hasn’t yet reached its pre-recession high. It’s in small banks where we see a steep rise in interest rate risk. The big banks’ exposure is being driven mainly by their liabilities. At small banks, it is coming from both their assets and liabilities.
Commoditization in Food Retailing: Is Differentiation a Futile Strategy?

This article addresses commoditization in food retailing whereby competition has a tendency to lead to a continuous addition of new but similar products in a category. This often results in products that are more homogeneous and may make it more difficult for firms to gain unique market positions. In light of this development, we ask whether product differentiation is a futile strategy in food products marketing. We also address how consumers perceive and react to the seemingly ever-increasing number of similar products. These questions are explored through insights from relevant literature and a small-scale study of a seemingly highly differentiated category—smoked salmon—sold at the flagship store of an upmarket UK supermarket chain. It was concluded that no product attributes could be described as truly innovative, unique, or difficult to imitate. Implications are highlighted and discussed.
Mitotic Functions of the Ran GTPase Network: the Importance of Being in the Right Place at the Right Time

The Ran GTPase has important roles in nucleocytoplasmic transport, cell cycle progression, nuclear organization and nuclear envelope (NE) assembly. In this review, we discuss emerging evidence that implicate the Ran GTPase system in mitotic control in mammalian cells. Recent work indicates that members of the Ran network control two fundamental aspects of the mammalian mitotic apparatus: (i) centrosome and spindle pole function, and (ii) kinetochore function. It is also emerging that, after NE breakdown, specific Ran network components assemble in local combinations at crucial sites of the mitotic apparatus. In the light of these findings, the original notion that nucleotide-bound forms of the Ran GTPase are distributed along a unique “gradient” in mitotic cells should be re-examined. Available data also suggest that the Ran system is deregulated in certain cellular contexts: this may represent a favoring condition for the onset and propagation of mitotic errors that can predispose cells to become genetically unstable and facilitate neoplastic growth.
Primed phosphorylation of tau at Thr231 by glycogen synthase kinase 3β (GSK3β) plays a critical role in regulating tau's ability to bind and stabilize microtubules

Site‐specific phosphorylation of tau negatively regulates its ability to bind and stabilize microtubule structure. Although tau is a substrate of glycogen synthase kinase 3β (GSK3β), the exact sites on tau that are phosphorylated by this kinase in situ have not yet been established, and the effect of these phosphorylation events on tau–microtubule interactions have not been fully elucidated. GSK3β phosphorylates both primed and unprimed sites on tau, but only primed phosphorylation events significantly decrease the ability of tau to bind microtubules. The focus of the present study is on determining the importance of the GSK3β‐mediated phosphorylation of a specific primed site, Thr231, in regulating tau's function. Pre‐phosphorylation of Ser235 primes tau for phosphorylation by GSK3β at Thr231. Phosphorylation by GSK3β of wild‐type tau or tau with Ser235 mutated to Ala decreases tau–microtubule interactions. However, when Thr231 alone or Thr231 and Ser235 in tau were mutated to Ala, phosphorylation by GSK3β did not decrease the association of tau with the cytoskeleton. Further, T231A tau was still able to efficiently bind microtubules after phosphorylation by GSK3β. Expression of each tau construct alone increased tubulin acetylation, a marker of microtubule stability. However, when cells were cotransfected with wild‐type tau and GSK3β, the level of tubulin acetylation was decreased to vector‐transfected levels. In contrast, coexpression of GSK3β with mutated tau (T231A/S235A) did not significantly decrease the levels of acetylated tubulin. These results strongly indicate that phosphorylation of Thr231 in tau by GSK3β plays a critical role in regulating tau's ability to bind and stabilize microtubules.
Perceived risks as barriers to Internet and e‐commerce usage

Previous research suggests that perceived risk is an important ingredient in the consumer decision‐making process. The purpose of the present study is to investigate what are the perceived barriers to Internet usage and e‐marketing by both users and non‐users. By understanding these potential obstacles, more efficient marketing strategies will become available that will drive Internet use and e‐commerce. A detailed perceived risks map has been developed using a qualitative research paradigm. We suggest a model with the factors affecting the Internet’s perceived risk elements. The factors are demographic traits and usage behavior characteristics. The model is tested against a sample of 465 employed adults.
The Performance Effects of Tangible versus Cash Rewards: The Mediating Role of Categorization

Organizations spend billions of dollars annually on performance-contingent tangible rewards such as vouchers and merchandise, yet prior research reports inconsistent support for the performance benefits of tangible rewards over cash rewards. We conduct two studies to better understand the performance effects of tangible versus cash rewards. The results of an experiment with a real-effort task (Study 1) indicate task performance increases the more participants categorize performance-contingent pay separately from salary. We also find whether participants differentially categorize cash versus tangible rewards separately from salary depends on the framing of compensation components as either additional wage or a bonus. The results of a free-sort task (Study 2) indicate graduate business students are more likely to mentally categorize tangible rewards differently from salary than they do cash rewards. Collectively, our results inform practice on the importance of distinct categorization of rewards when selecting the type of reward to offer employees, and also inform theory by highlighting an important obstacle to testing the relative effectiveness of cash versus tangible rewards using lab experiments.
Choroidal thickness, vascular hyperpermeability, and complement factor H in age-related macular degeneration and polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy.

PURPOSE To investigate the relationship between subfoveal choroidal thickness, choroidal vascular hyperpermeability, and complement factor H (CFH) gene polymorphism in typical age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and polypoidal choroidal vasculopathy (PCV). METHODS Fifty-eight patients with typical AMD and 63 patients with PCV underwent fluorescein angiography, indocyanine green angiography (IA), and spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (OCT) using enhanced depth imaging (EDI). Subfoveal choroidal thickness was measured using EDI-OCT images, and choroidal hyperpermeability was evaluated using late-phase IA images. The major AMD-associated single-nucleotide polymorphisms were genotyped in 86 patients. RESULTS Mean subfoveal choroidal thickness was significantly lower in eyes with typical AMD than that in eyes with PCV (P = 0.025). Subfoveal choroidal thickness was greater in eyes with choroidal hyperpermeability than that in eyes without it in typical AMD (P < 0.001) and PCV (P = 0.020), and in the fellow eyes of typical AMD (P < 0.001) and PCV (P = 0.027). In eyes without choroidal hyperpermeability, the mean subfoveal choroidal thickness was greater in PCV than that in typical AMD (P = 0.001). Choroidal thickness decreased after photodynamic therapy combined with intravitreal ranibizumab in typical AMD (P = 0.016) and PCV (P = 0.036). In eyes with PCV, the I62V polymorphism in the CFH gene contributed to choroidal thickness (P = 0.043). CONCLUSIONS Choroidal thickness is related to the AMD subtypes, choroidal hyperpermeability, and I62V CFH gene polymorphism. In eyes without choroidal hyperpermeability, EDI-OCT is useful as an auxiliary measure for differentiating typical AMD and PCV.
Diversity Management in a Multi-cultural Society: An Exploratory Study of Cultural Diversity and Team Sport in Australia

Abstract A decade of research has indicated that organisations can obtain a significant competitive advantage through the effective management of cultural diversity. This research has fostered the growth of diversity management initiatives across wide range of organizations seeking better business outcomes. However, empirical studies suggest that sports organizations have been slow to embrace diversity management, despite its proven benefits. While sports organisations have established policies to meet equity considerations, the impact of these has been relatively minor. Focussing on one aspect of diversity management, namely cultural diversity, a national survey of team-based community sport organisations was undertaken to investigate the extent to which diversity management was valued and practised at the grassroots level of sport organisations. Data were collected on cultural diversity policies, strategies and practices. Soccer organisations reported the highest levels of cultural diversity representation among players, board members and volunteers, while the lowest levels were reported by netball among participants and softball amongst Board members and volunteers. Softball organisations were therefore the least likely to have cultural diversity policies while basketball organisations reported the highest levels of policy development. In regard to engagement in diversity management practices Australian Rules organisations indicated the highest level and netball the lowest. Recognition of the value of cultural diversity was highest volleyball organisations and cricket indicated the highest commitment to being open and friendly to culturally diverse groups. This research has implications for how diversity can be managed more effectively by sport organisations.
Building the Charity Brand Community

The current article extends the concept of brand community to the charity sector. While the charity sector has begun to embrace the relationship marketing paradigm, brand communities represent a unique form of relationship marketing that can have a significant impact on nonprofits. A conceptual model of brand community development in the charity sector is proposed, and two unique mechanisms by which charity brand communities might develop — the cognitive and experiential‐learning mechanisms — are proposed. Not only do these mechanisms offer unique insights into how brand communities might develop, but they also explain how “sense of community” becomes a dominant influence on supporter loyalty. Research propositions concerning the influence of specific markers of brand community upon charity support behavior, are also presented.
The Role of Owner-Managers' Psychological Ownership in SME Strategic Behaviour

Abstract According to the theory of psychological ownership, the feeling of ownership does not necessitate legal ownership, and may emerge when a person gets to know the target intimately, controls it and invests in it. We focus in this study on owner-managers of small enterprises, and build on the fundamental assumption that psychological ownership and legal business ownership are not mutually exclusive. Our data from 150 Finnish SMEs supports the assumption that these owner-managers may have strong feelings of psychological ownership that influence their ability to manage the firm purely as an economic instrument.
A STAKEHOLDER-THEORY APPROACH TO ENVIRONMENTAL DISCLOSURES BY SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES ( SMES )

The aim of this article is to analyse the reasons that drive Spanish Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to disclose environmental information. The contribution of the present research to the literature on corporate social reporting is threefold: (i) it widens the scope of Stakeholder Theory; (ii) it analyses the environmental reporting disclosures of SMEs; and, for the first time in this field, (iii) it applies Structural Equation Modelling. The results show that stakeholder salience, manager strategic posture and resource availability, though insufficient in themselves, are necessary to explain the environmental performance of SMEs. Moreover, an analysis of the disclosures they make in their annual accounts brings to light the impossibility of gaining insight into the real environmental behaviour of these firms, which raises reasonable doubts over the effectiveness of the relevant environmental reporting regulation in Spain.