Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Corporate social responsibility intensity: Shareholders’ value adding or destroying?

Abstract This paper examines whether an intensification of corporate social responsibility activities adds or destroys firms’ value in Nigeria. Fixed effect regression analytic tool was used to analyze the data from a sample of 56 listed firms on Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) between 2009 and 2018. We followed environmental, social and economic responsibility activities rating based on Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) disclosure guidelines and Korean Economic Justice Institutes (KEJI) social responsibility efficient interpolation rating formula in the measure of firms’ social responsibility. The study found that firms that engage in intensive social responsibility yielded positive and insignificant effect on firms’ stock value. This implied that an aggressive social responsibility is not the best approach as it possesses the potential to destroy shareholders’ value. On the other hand, we found evidence that medium social responsibility model significantly affected firms’ financial performance (coefficient = 0.165; p-value >0.05), which suggests that the best social responsibility strategy that significantly increases shareholders’ value is the middle course model. A further test showed that generally environmental, social and economic responsibility activities of firms significantly add to firms’ market value (Coefficients = 0.028; 0.216; 0.037; p-values<0.05). However, the degree of the effect is contingent on the intensity of the activities and governance structures. Governance structure and board diversity explained firms’ efficient CSR strategy that promotes middle course strategies while CSR aggressiveness is explained by unitary model of board leadership. Thus, implementation within an industry average performance adds significantly to investors’ value provided that there is effective corporate governance structure.
Monitoring and modeling of part thickness evolution in vacuum infusion process

The main hurdles in Vacuum Infusion (VI) are the difficulty in achieving complete mold filling and uniform part thickness. This study integrates process monitoring by full field thickness measurements and resin flow modeling that accounts for compaction and permeability characterizations of fabric reinforcements to assess the evolution of part thickness during filling and post-filling stages of VI process. A Structured Light Scanning system is used for full field thickness monitoring in experiments and a Control Volume Finite Element Method solver is implemented to couple resin flow with fabric’s compaction and permeability. Two cases are studied both experimentally and numerically. Evolutions of thickness and pressure validate the developed flow solver, its accuracy in terms of predicting fill times and fill patterns, suitability and limitations of the elastic compaction models for thickness modeling.
The effect of the government bond value on the intermediary function of banks in the capital market of Indonesia

ARTICLE INFO Rosemarie Sutjiati Njotoprajitno, Bram Hadianto and Melvin (2020). The effect of the government bond value on the intermediary function of banks in the capital market of Indonesia. Banks and Bank Systems, 15(3), 199-206. doi:10.21511/bbs.15(3). 2020.17 DOI http://dx.doi. org/10.21511/bbs.15(3). 2020.17 RELEASED ON Wednesday, 07 October 2020 RECEIVED ON Thursday, 14 May 2020 ACCEPTED ON Tuesday, 01 September 2020
USE OF UMBU (SPONDIAS TUBEROSA ARR. CAMARA) PULP FOR PREPARATION OF DIET CEREAL BAR

Umbu is a fruit very appreciated by the Brazilian Northeast people, but these fruits show great perishability. Cereal bars production with fruits addition is interesting because allow the technological use of noble raw materials, besides to reduce umbu post-harvest losses. The aims of this study were the production of diet bars with umbu pulp and to carry out the chemical, physical and sensory characterization of these products. Different gums were studied as binder agents and sucralose and acesulfame-K as sweeteners, in the elaboration of four treatments of diet bars: BUA (Arabic gum), BUC (carrageenan), BUT (tara), BUX (xanthan) and the control treatment BUCT (with glucose syrup and sucrose). The chemical, physical and sensory data were analyzed by ANOVA and Tukey test (p≤0.05). The results revealed that the products presented high contents of protein, dietary fibers, lipids and ash. The BUX treatment reached better acceptance by the consumers related to odor, flavor, texture and overall quality attributes; it revealed higher positive purchase intention (58 %), followed by the BUT treatment (33%). The BUCT, BUC and BUA treatments reached lower acceptance by the consumers due to lower score to overall quality. The use of umbu pulp and gum in the preparation of diet cereal bar showed to be a good alternative to reduce fruit loss and to increase market value of the products that presented potential for consumers in general or with restriction to the use of sucrose.
Increased cerebral FDG‐PET uptake in type 1 diabetes patients with impaired awareness of hypoglycaemia

Approximately 20% of type 1 diabetes (T1D) patients have an impaired awareness of hypoglyceamia (IAH). IAH represents a risk factor for severe and recurrent hypoglycaemic events, which can lead to brain damage. Because no effective treatments are currently available to prevent IAH in this population, characterising the set of brain alterations associated with IAH may reveal novel preclinical diagnostic or therapeutic strategies. Using state‐of‐the art neuroimaging techniques, we compared 18F‐fluorodeoxyglucose‐positron emission tomography (FDG‐PET) uptake at rest between 10 T1D patients with IAH and nine patients with normal awareness of hypoglycaemia (NAH). T1D‐IAH patients showed a pattern of increased FDG‐PET uptake with respect to NAH patients (P < .05 corrected). Topographically, glucose metabolism was increased in the frontal and precuneus regions. Importantly, within the IAH group, this abnormal hypermetabolism correlated with IAH severity. This hypermetabolic state appeared to be unrelated to compensatory mechanisms as a result of reduced grey matter density or a neuroinflammatory state. We observed an abnormal increase in FDG‐uptake in T1D patients with IAH in brain regions strongly related to cognition. Because this hypermetabolic state correlated with IAH severity, its biological characterisation could reveal new preventive or therapeutic strategies. A possible mechanism could be that glucose transport is increased in hypoglycaemia unawareness to compensate for recurrent hypoglycaemia, although this need to be confirmed in further research.
Ascertaining service quality and medical practitioners' sensitivity towards surgical instruments using SERVQUAL

PurposeService quality (SQ) has become an essential and indispensable component in healthcare and many other industries. SQ can deliver guaranteed stakeholder value and consequent consumer delight in the healthcare sector. The purpose of this study is to identify the relationships of various SERVQUAL elements with respect to the SQ of surgical instrument suppliers among surgeons.Design/methodology/approachData were collected from a sample of 112 surgeons working in the USA using the “snowball sampling” technique. A few standardised questionnaires, including SERQUAL, were used to collect the data. R-programming was used to perform structural equation modelling (SEM) analysis on the collected data.FindingsThe research study identified that service delivery factors and the SQ of surgical instruments contribute significantly towards medical practitioner sensitivity in the US healthcare industry. Word of mouth (WOM) did not have any significant impact on the medical practitioners' sensitivity.Originality/valueA review of related literature revealed that studies that examine the surgeon's perspectives of SQ are scarce. Thus, the present study is directed towards this gap in literature. The findings of the study are significant in nature and have made a substantial contribution to management literature.
Fresh and Hardened Properties of Concrete Incorporating Binary Blend of Metakaolin and Ground Granulated Blast Furnace Slag as Supplementary Cementitious Material

The growing demand for cement has created a significant impact on the environment. Cement production requires huge energy consumptions; however, Pakistan is currently facing a severe energy crisis. Researchers are therefore engaged with the introduction of agricultural/industrial waste materials with cementitious properties to reduce not only cement production but also energy consumption, as well as helping protect the environment. This research aims to investigate the influence of binary cementitious material (BCM) on fresh and hardened concrete mixes prepared with metakaolin (MK) and ground granulated blast furnace slag (GGBFS) as a partial replacement of cement. The replacement proportions of BCM used were 0%, 5%, 10%, 15%, and 20% by weight of cement. A total of five mixes were prepared with 1 : 1.5 : 3 mix proportion at 0.54 water-cement ratios. A total of 255 concrete specimens were prepared to investigate the compressive, tensile, and flexural strength of concrete after 7, 28, and 56 days, respectively. It was perceived that the workability of concrete mixes decreased with an increasing percentage of MK and GGBFS. Also, the density and permeability of concrete decreased with an increasing quantity of BCM after 28 days. Conversely, the compressive, tensile, and flexural strength of concrete were enhanced by 12.28%, 9.33%, and 9.93%, respectively, at 10% of BCM after 28 days. The carbonation depth reduced with a rise in content of BCM (up to 10%) and then later improved after 28, 90, and 180 days. Moreover, the effect of chloride attack in concrete is reduced with the inclusion of BCM after 28 and 90 days. Similarly, the drying shrinkage of concrete decreased with an increase in the content of BCM after 40 days.
Surface albedo in different land-use and cover types in Amazon forest region

Albedo is the portion of energy from the Sun that is reflected by the earth's surface, thus being an important variable that controls climate and energy processes on Earth. Surface albedo is directly related to the characteristics of the Earth’s surface materials, making it a useful parameter to evaluate the effects of original soil cover replacement due to human occupation. This study evaluated the changes in the surface albedo values due to the conversion of vegetation to other land uses and to analyze the applicability of the use of albedo in the spatial delimitation of land-use classes in the transitional region between the Cerrado and Amazon biomes. Surface albedo measurements were obtained from processing of Landsat Thematic Mapper data in the Geographic Information System (GIS), and land-use information were collected using Google Earth high-resolution images. The results show that human activities such as the cultivation of crops and burning have contributed substantially to variations in the surface albedo, and that albedo estimates from Landsat imagery have the potential to help in the recognition and delimitation of features of land use and cover.
Does gender diversity matter for risk-taking? Evidence from Italian financial institutions

The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between gender diversity and the risk profile of Italian financial institutions during the period 2013 to 2019. The paper examines whether the presence of top executives has any significant effect on corporate risk-taking. A sample of 160 Italian financial institutions was analyzed and a multivariate regression model was developed considering five risk dimensions to verify the effect of gender diversity. The results suggest that female Chief Executive Officers (CEOs), Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) and Chairmans of the Board of Directors (CHAIRs) are considerably less overconfident and less risky than their male colleagues, thus confirming a negative causation between gender diversity and risk-taking. The findings reveal that financial institutions headed by women are more risk averse since they account upper capital adequacy and equity to assets ratios. As credit risk in female-run financial institutions is no diverse from male-run financial institutions, higher capital adequacy does not come from minor asset quality because it is related to the greater risk aversion of female top managers. Key words: Gender diversity, female directors, female xsass, risk-taking, Italian financial institutions.
The Effective Use of Negative Stems and “All of the Above” in Multiple-Choice Tests in College Courses

Over the past few decades, test-writing experts have converged on a set of best-practice guidelines for constructing multiple-choice (MC) items. Despite broad acceptance, some guidelines are supported by scant or inconsistent empirical evidence. This study focused on two of the most-commonly violated of these guidelines: the use of negatively oriented stems (e.g., those using the qualifiers “not” or “except”) and the use of “all of the above” (AOTA) as a response option. Specifically, I analysed the psychometric qualities of 545 MC items from science courses that I taught at a liberal arts college. In this dataset, items with negatively oriented stems did not differ in difficulty or discriminability from questions with positively oriented stems. Similarly, items with AOTA as a response option did not differ in difficulty or discriminability from those without AOTA as an option. Items that used AOTA as a distractor were significantly more difficult, and slightly more discriminating, than were items that used AOTA as the key. Although they must be written with extra attention to detail, this study suggests that MC items with negative stems or AOTA as a response option can be effectively employed for assessment of content mastery in a classroom setting.
Contextual influence on confidence judgments in human reinforcement learning

The ability to correctly estimate the probability of one’s choices being correct is fundamental to optimally re-evaluate previous choices or to arbitrate between different decision strategies. Experimental evidence nonetheless suggests that this metacognitive process -referred to as a confidence judgment-is susceptible to numerous biases. We investigate the effect of outcome valence (gains or losses) on confidence while participants learned stimulus-outcome associations by trial-and-error. In two experiments, we demonstrate that participants are more confident in their choices when learning to seek gains compared to avoiding losses. Importantly, these differences in confidence were observed despite objectively equal choice difficulty and similar observed performance between those two contexts. Using computational modelling, we show that this bias is driven by the context-value, a dynamically updated estimate of the average expected-value of choice options that has previously been demonstrated to be necessary to explain equal performance in the gain and loss domain. The biasing effect of context-value on confidence, also recently observed in the context of incentivized perceptual decision-making, is therefore domain-general, with likely important functional consequences.
A content analysis of college students’ gaps in knowledge about sexually transmitted infections

Objective: Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) disproportionately affect young people and can result in severe health consequences. Accurate knowledge about STIs can play an important role in STI prevention. Prior quantitative research has found that college students’ knowledge about STIs is insufficient. However, there is a dearth of information regarding their specific STI knowledge deficiencies. This study sought to fill this gap by using a qualitative approach to elucidate gaps in students’ STI knowledge. Design: Qualitative content analysis of responses to an open-ended online survey question. Setting: A large public Midwestern university in the USA. Method: Students (N = 289) watched a web-based STI health education programme covering basic information about Chlamydia, gonorrhoea, human papillomavirus (HPV), herpes and syphilis as a course requirement. Afterwards they answered an open-ended question about what information, if any, was new to them. Themes and sub-themes were identified, exemplar quotes were selected for illustrative purposes, and frequencies were calculated. Results: Ten overarching themes were identified about what students learned: everything/a lot (19.7%), prevention (16.6%), treatment/cures (15.6%), prevalence/statistics (14.9%), nothing/not much (14.2%), symptomatology (12.8%), everything about a specific STI (9.7%), health consequences (6.6%), transmission (5.5%) and testing (2.4%). Participants reported learning about HPV most frequently compared to other STIs. Conclusion: Findings demonstrate critical gaps in college students’ STI knowledge and provide a deeper understanding of specific knowledge deficiencies. Study findings highlight important sexual health content that should be integrated into health education initiatives in academic, community and other settings, and provides recommendations on how to do so.
The Menstrual Disturbances in Endocrine Disorders: A Narrative Review

Context Menstrual cycle is considered the fifth vital sign among women. This study aimed to summarize the menstrual disturbances in different endocrine disorders. Evidence Acquisition In this narrative review, relevant studies (up to December 2019) were searched based on the MeSH keywords diabetes, polycystic ovary syndrome, Cushing’s syndrome, thyroid dysfunction, hyperprolactinemia, menstrual cycle, uterine bleeding, and menstruation. Databases used for searching articles included Google Scholar, Scopus, PubMed, and Web of science for observational, experimental, and review studies. Results Endocrine disorders trigger the onset of menstrual disturbance across the reproductive lifespan of women. Endocrine glands (pituitary, thyroid, pancreas, adrenal, and ovaries) have a functional role in endocrine regulation of the menstrual cycle. According to available evidence, oligomenorrhea (cycles longer than 35 days) is the most common menstrual disturbance among endocrine disorders (thyrotoxicosis, hypothyroidism, polycystic ovary syndrome, Cushing’s syndrome, and diabetes). Complex endocrine pathways play an essential role in a women’s menstrual calendar. Conclusions The menstrual cycle length and amount of bleeding can be indicative of endocrine disorders. Further studies are needed to identify the unknowns about the association between endocrine disorders and the menstrual cycle.
High site fidelity does not equate to population genetic structure for common goldeneye and Barrow's goldeneye in North America

2 20: e026 0 Delineation of population structure provides valuable information for conservation and management of species, as levels of demographic and genetic connectivity not only affect population dynamics but also have important implications for adaptability and resiliency of populations and species. Here, we measure population genetic structure and connectivity across the ranges of two sister species of sea ducks: Barrow’s goldeneye Bucephala islandica and common goldeneye B. clangula. We use two different marker types: 7–8 nuclear microsatellite loci assayed across 229 samples and 3678 double digest restriction-site associated DNA sequencing (ddRAD-seq) loci assayed across 61 samples. First, both datasets found no evidence of genetic structure within common or Barrow’s goldeneye, including between North American and European samples of common goldeneye. These results are in contrast with previous mitochondrial DNA, band recovery and telemetry data which suggest that goldeneyes are structured across their range. We posit that the discordance between autosomal genetic markers and other data types suggests that males, possibly subadult males, may be maintaining genetic connectivity across each species’ respective ranges. Next, although mate choice consequences resulting from inter-specific brood parasitism was hypothesized to cause some level of gene flow between goldeneye species, we only identified a single F1 hybrid with no further evidence of contemporary or historical gene flow. Despite ddRAD-seq demographic analyses which recovered an optimum evolutionary model of split-with-migration (i.e. secondary contact), estimates of gene flow were <<1 migrant per generation in both directions. Together, we conclude that either strong ecological barriers or assortative mating are likely playing a role in preventing further backcrossing. Finally, demographic analyses estimated a relatively deep divergence time between Barrow’s goldeneye and common goldeneye of ~1.6 million years before present and suggests that the genomes of both species have been under similar evolutionary constraints.
Leaf-litter stoichiometry and microbial phosphatase activity, respiration, and decomposition as phosphorus enrichment endpoints: A laboratory experiment

Deciduous-forested streams are often fueled by terrestrial litter detritus and have some of the lowest scores for biological condition in the United States (US). Detrital endpoints may be more predictive of nutrient stress than traditional algal endpoints in these ecosystems, but no standard detrital endpoints have been adopted by US assessment and regulatory agencies. Functional relationships between detrital measures and nutrient concentrations, and their dynamics across time, are needed to help guide detrital-endpoint and nutrient-criteria development for forested detrital-based streams. We conducted a 210-d laboratory mesocosm experiment in which we exposed maple and oak leaf disks to a dissolved inorganic phosphorus (DIP; as Na2PO4) gradient to examine the effects of time, litter type, and P enrichment on litter decay rates, microbial respiration rates, P:carbon (C) stoichiometry, and alkaline phosphatase activity (APA). Litter P∶C tended to monotonically increase and saturate over time, whereas litter microbial respiration and APA were dynamic over time. We found Michaelis–Menten (M–M) functional relationships between litter P∶C, decay rates, mean microbial respiration rates, mean inverse APA, microbial respiration:APA, and DIP concentrations. We assessed the relative sensitivity of detrital response variables to nutrient enrichment by examining the nutrient effect size (M–M maximum value:mean value in ambient DIP replicates), M–M ½ maximum saturation constants (Ks), and the ratio of effect size:Ks. Sensitivity across response variables depended on the response and litter type and differed among sensitivity metrics, and the relative sensitivity of maple litter compared to oak litter depended on the response variable. Mean microbial respiration rate associated with decomposing litter was most sensitive to nutrient enrichment, but the requirement for multiple collection events reduces its viability as an efficient endpoint measure. Litter stoichiometry and decomposition are good candidates for detrital nutrient endpoints because they are predictable over time, sensitive to P enrichment, and have been linked to aquatic life uses.