Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Regional Tourism Satellite Accounts: A Useful Policy Tool?

Tourism increasingly features in strategic regional policy documents, being considered important to regional economic prospects. Consequently many regions, notably those less prosperous, have expended significant resources in developing tourism attractions, promoting tourism events and supporting tourism-based operations. In this resource context, the difficulties in assessing the economic contribution of this diverse (and often atomised) set of activities are of concern. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and others have suggested Tourism Satellite Accounts (TSAs) as a suitable method of providing consistent economic evaluation of tourism-based activity. Yet the provision of an accurate and reliable set of accounts, which informs policy decisions and resource directions, is far from easy. This paper examines some of the methodological difficulties in constructing a TSA at the regional level and implications for deriving an effective tourism policy.
Managing a health-related crisis: SARS in Singapore

Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is a new and potentially fatal virus, the discovery and spread of which created a tourism crisis in parts of Asia in 2003. Based on an analysis of secondary data, this study deals with the outbreak of the disease in Singapore and shows the adverse impact on international arrivals and domestic leisure activity. Responses by the public and private sectors of the industry to the severe problems faced are assessed, and government is seen to have the especially difficult tasks of managing the spread of the disease and trying to protect and promote tourism at the same time. Insights are provided into good practice during such difficult circumstances, although recovery appears to depend on the progress of any epidemic as much as on the strategies employed.
Cripto‐1 Expression in Glioblastoma Multiforme

Human glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is an aggressive cancer with a very poor prognosis. Cripto‐1 (CR‐1) has a key regulatory role in embryogenesis, while in adult tissue re‐expression of CR‐1 has been correlated to malignant progression in solid cancers of non‐neuronal origin. As CR‐1 expression has yet to be described in cerebral cancer and CR‐1 is regulated by signaling pathways dysregulated in GBM, we aimed to investigate CR‐1 in the context of expression in GBM. The study was performed using enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), Western blotting, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and immunohistochemistry to analyze the blood and tissue from 28 GBM and 4 low‐grade glioma patients. Within the patient cohort, we found high CR‐1 protein levels in blood plasma to significantly correlate with a shorter overall survival. We identified CR‐1 in different areas of GBM tissue, including perivascular tumor cells, and in endothelial cells. Collectively, our data suggest that CR‐1 could be a prognostic biomarker for GBM with the potential of being a therapeutic target.
Soft Pegs, Hard Pegs, and the Role of Commitment

This paper investigates the effect of the institutional commitment to a fixed exchange rate regime on the premium that countries pay on their debt. The hypothesis is that, for a given level of country risk, the higher the credibility of the regime bestowed by the institutional commitment, the lower the interest rate differentials. We examine the response of interest rate differentials to domestic and external shocks for a number of currency boards, de jure pegs and de facto pegs in several different regions, looking for evidence that the increased institutional commitment significantly reduces devaluation expectations and thus interest rate differentials. We find no evidence of differences in the response of interest rate differentials in the face of domestic shocks, but strong evidence of a credibility gain for currency boards in the face of external shocks, especially for adverse shocks.
To Be and Not to Be: The Question of Transborder Civic Activism and Regionalization in Mexico. A Critical Account of Neo-Gramscian Perspectives

Abstract This article analyses how neo-Gramscian IPE and IR traditions look at the transborder agency of civil society actors in the making and re-making of regional orders. In particular, the article identifies key limitations of neo-Gramscian analyses that derive, on one hand, from how agency is understood and, on the other, from an insufficient attention to complex and paradoxical features of transborder collective action. Having as a case study three examples of Mexican TCA opposing market-driven regionalization policies during the 1990s, my empirical observations suggest that diversity and ambivalences of collective transborder action need to be addressed as first order questions. Despite this, neo-Gramscian accounts on transborder forms of collective action have either emphasized that: a) agency is conditioned by powerful structures of the global political economy; or b) that agency is making up these structures. While not rejecting this altogether but attempting to go further, this article advances a critique of both ‘emphases’ on agency and some alternatives.
Chlorpheniramine for motion sickness.

BACKGROUND Motion sickness remains a significant problem for travelers and for those involved in naval, aviation and space operations. Many motion sickness remedies are also sedating, making them undesirable in many settings. METHODS We studied chlorpheniramine as a potential motion sickness treatment. A placebo-controlled, double-blind, dose-ranging trial was performed to establish the most effective dose and the drug's effects on cognition. Eighteen normal, motion sickness susceptible subjects received placebo, low dose (4 mg) or high dose (12 mg) chlorpheniramine 3.5 hours before off-axis vertical rotation. Cognitive testing included a battery of objective and subjective tests performed before drug ingestion, at peak drug effect and following rotation. RESULTS Chlorpheniramine significantly increased the time in the chair compared to placebo at high dose (7.2 minutes to 11.7 minutes) and low dose (7.2 minutes to 10.2 minutes). Chlorpheniramine did not affect performance on objective cognitive tests. Subjects reported significantly more sleepiness and less alertness with high-dose chlorpheniramine, although they could not reliably determine when they had received active drug. CONCLUSION Chlorpheniramine is effective and could be considered for use against motion sickness. Chlorpheniramine also has the potential to be administered transdermally.
Tenure, Unions, and the Relationship between Employer Size and Wages

The unionization rate in a worker's industry and the worker's tenure are interacted with employer size in wage regressions using Current Population Survey data. The results provide insight into the relatively small size-wage relationship in the union sector. Nonunion tenure profiles steepen sharply with establishment size, while union profiles flatten. Also, the effect of industry unionization increases with firm size in the nonunion sector, a pattern indicative of threat effects. A separate analysis of nonunion wages indicates that size-wage relationships are stronger in occupations associated with high monitoring costs.
Antecedents of consumers' time perceptions in a hypermarket retailer

This study examines the effects of five antecedents on consumers' time perceptions in a hypermarket environment. Findings indicate that the actual shopping time spent in the store and planned shopping activities significantly influence consumers' shopping time perceptions, while consumers' waiting time perceptions are driven by both actual checkout waiting time and actual shopping time. The article examines time gaps, i.e. consumers' errors in time estimation, as related to store loyalty intention and finds that past consumer purchases moderate the relationship between both time gaps and store loyalty intention. Managerial implications are discussed in the article.
Law, Finance and Innovation: The Dark Side of Shareholder Protection

Proponents of minority shareholder protection state that national legal institutions protecting small investors boost stock markets and, in turn, the long-term performance of countries. In this paper we empirically challenge this argument. We perform three-stage least squares estimation on a sample of 48 countries during 1993–2006 and find that countries with stronger shareholder protection tend to have larger market capitalisation but also lower innovative activity. We cope with stock market endogeneity and industry heterogeneity, and circumvent omitted variables bias, so that this finding is unlikely to be driven by misspecification problems. The estimation results are interpreted, arguing that stronger shareholder protection may depress rather than encourage the most valuable corporate productions, because it enables small and diversified shareholders to play opportunistic actions against undiversified stockholders, after specific investments are undertaken by the company; innovative activity, largely based on specific investing, is particularly exposed to this problem. Copyright , Oxford University Press.
Public sector deficits and macroeconomic performance

In the 1980s chronic public sector deficits forced countries to undertake fiscal adjustment. The need to face hard choices continues in the 1990s. But the problem is not a simple and easily diagnosed one with an obvious solution. Rather, public sector deficits have had widely differing consequences; high inflation in some countries, low inflation but also low investment and growth in others, and in still others no evident short-term macroeconomic spillovers. This book presents the findings of a World Bank research project designed to shed light on the complex dynamics of public sector deficits. It includes an in-depth examination of eight countries: Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, Morocco, Pakistan, and Zimbabwe. These cases are analyzed within a comprehensive theoretical framework elaborated for the study and in conjunction with cross-country data from a larger set. The book draws the following conclusions. The ways chosen to finance deficits - money creation, debt, or arrears - go far to explain medium-term financial and macroeconomic imbalances, but in the short term these relations are blurred. Deficits tend to be bad for growth; they increase financial and price instability and crowd out private investment. Public saving typically reduces private saving only slightly; increasing public saving is a very effective policy instrument for raising national saving. Fiscal adjustment typically leads to a lower trade deficit and a moredepreciated real exchange rate. Finally, the blame for large, systemic public deficits must be placed not on bad luck but on unwise policy choices - and, conversely, sound fiscal policies can set a country on a path leading to stability and growth.
Natural Occurrence of Secondary Bacterial Symbionts in Aphids from Tunisia, with a Focus on Genus Hyalopterus

Abstract Aphids (Hemiptera: Aphididae) can harbor two types of bacterial symbionts. In addition to the obligate endosymbiont Buchnera aphidicola Munson, Baumann and Kinsey 1991 (Enterobacteriales: Enterobacteriaceae), several facultative symbiotic bacteria, called secondary (S) symbionts, have been identified among many important pest aphid species. To determine interpopulational diversity of S-symbionts, we carried out a survey in a total of 18 populations of six aphid species collected from six localities in Tunisia, by performing a diagnostic polymerase chain reaction analysis of partial 16S–23S rRNA operon sequences. While 61.7% of individuals contained only Buchnera, three S-symbionts were found at different frequencies. Arsenophonus sp. Gherna et al. 1991 (Enterobacteriales: Enterobacteriaceae) was found in all species under study except for Acyrtosiphon pisum (Harris 1776) (Aphidinae: Macrosiphini); Serratia symbiotica Moran et al. 2005 (Enterobacteriales: Enterobacteriaceae) was present in all analyzed individuals of A. pisum but only sporadically in Aphis spiraecola (Patch 1914) (Aphidinae: Aphidini) and Hyalopterus amygdali (Blanchard 1840) (Aphidinae: Aphidini), while Hamiltonella defensa Moran et al. 2005 (Enterobacteriales: Enterobacteriaceae) was found in all analyzed individuals of one population of Aphis gossypii (Glover 1877) (Aphidinae: Aphidini) and sporadically in two populations of Hyalopterus. The lysogenic bacteriophage APSE-1 (A. pisum secondary endosymbiont, type 1) was detected in the three populations infected with H. defensa. This bacteriophage has been associated with moderate protection against braconid parasitoids in pea aphids. The high prevalence of Arsenophonus sp. in our samples is in accordance with previous studies indicating that, among gammaproteobacteria, this genus is one of the most widespread insect facultative symbionts.
Conceptualising Industrial Relations in the ‘Risk Society’

Abstract This paper contrasts the characteristics of different types of modernities, noting the present transition occurring between its simple and reflexive manifestations. It then demonstrates how mainstream industrial relations theories have long been framed by a collectivist ‘risk insurance principle’. In combining these two observations the argument is made that theories built around institutional dependencies that rely on the evidence or assumption of operable risk insurance principles and collective guardianships of workplace well being make less sense in a world of emerging personal narratives of choice and dependency that centre around individuals taking personal responsibility for avoiding or diminishing the risks of their engagement with uncertain labour markets. The discussion concludes by setting out the social and epistemological conditions under which future industrial relations theorising might be framed so as to accommodate these emerging conditions in a manner that is both realistic and relevant.
An Affine Multi-Currency Model with Stochastic Volatility and Stochastic Interest Rates

We introduce a tractable multi-currency model with stochastic volatility and correlated stochastic interest rates that takes into account the smile in the FX market and the evolution of yield curves. The pricing of vanilla options on FX rates can be performed effciently through the FFT methodology thanks to the affinity of the model Our framework is also able to describe many non trivial links between FX rates and interest rates: a second calibration exercise highlights the ability of the model to fit simultaneously FX implied volatilities while being coherent with interest rate products.
A study of language use in secondary school classrooms in the Solomon Islands: Conceptions, practices and proficiencies

i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii TABLE OF CONTENTS vi CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1 1.1 An overview of English medium education in the Solomon Islands . 1 1.2 The issue of English learning in the Solomon Islands 2 1.3 Background context of the Solomon Islands 2 1.4 The present study 3 1.5 Structure of the thesis 5 CHAPTER TWO: LANGUAGE BACKGROUND 7 2.1 Language characteristics of the Solomon Islands 7 2.1.1 Emergence of Pijin in the Solomon Islands 7 2.1.2 Language use by urban and rural children 8 2.1.3 The influence of the church on language use 9 2.2 Language and education in the Solomon Islands 10 2.2.1 Language policy in schools 10 2.3 Education and language policies in the Pacific 13 2.3. 1 The Papua New Guinea context: Language policy 14 2.3. 2 Vanuatu context: Language policy 15 CHAPTER THREE: BILINGUALISM 19 3.
Microbial dynamics of commercial makgeolli depending on the storage temperature.

Market fresh makgeolli was stored at different temperatures of 4°C and 25°C to assess the change of the microbial diversity according to the storage temperature and period. Yeast counts increased until day 3 of storage and decreased thereafter. General and lactic acid bacterial counts continuously increased during storage. The data indicated that the control of growth of microorganisms, particularly general bacteria and lactic acid bacteria (LAB), is essential. Total acid levels started to decrease in the makgeolli stored at 4°C, and increased from day 6 of storage in the makgeolli stored at 25°C. The increase of total acid in the non-refrigerated condition greatly affected the quality of makgeolli. In both the fresh makgeolli samples stored at 4°C and 25°C, yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) and molds (Aspergillus tubingensis, Candida glaebosa, and Aspergillus niger) were noted. Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) band patterns were almost constant regardless of the storage period. As for bacteria, Lactobacillus crustorum, L. brevis, and Microlaena stipoides were found in the makgeolli stored at 4°C, and L. crustorum, Lactobacillus sp. , L. plantarum, L. brevis, L. rhamnosus, and L. similis were found in the makgeolli stored at 25°C. In particular, in the makgeolli stored at 25°C, L. crustorum and L. plantarum presented dark bands and were identified as the primary microorganisms that affected spoilage of fresh makgeolli.
Magnetically Guided 3‐Dimensional Virtual Neuronavigation for Neuroendoscopic Surgery: Technique and Clinical Experience

OBJECTIVE The authors have developed a novel intraoperative neuronavigation with 3-dimensional (3D) virtual images, a 3D virtual navigation system, for neuroendoscopic surgery. The present study describes this technique and clinical experience with the system. METHODS Preoperative imaging data sets were transferred to a personal computer to construct virtual endoscopic views with image segmentation software. An electromagnetic tracker was used to acquire the position and orientation of the tip of the neuroendo-scope. Virtual endoscopic images were interlinked to an electromagnetic tracking system and demonstrated on the navigation display in real time. Accuracy and efficacy of the 3D virtual navigation system were evaluated in a phantom test and on 5 consecutive patients undergoing neuroendoscopic surgery. RESULTS Virtual navigation views were consistent with actual endoscopic views and trajectory in both phantom testing and clinical neuroendoscopic surgery. Anatomic structures that can affect surgical approaches were adequately predicted with the virtual navigation system. The virtual semitransparent view contributed to a clear understanding of spatial relationships between surgical targets and surrounding structures. Surgical procedures in all patients were performed while confirming with virtual navigation. In neurosurgery with a flexible neuroscope, virtual navigation also demonstrated anatomic structures in real time. CONCLUSION The interactive method of intraoperative visualization influenced the decision-making process during surgery and provided useful assistance in identifying safe approaches for neuroendoscopic surgery. The magnetically guided navigation system enabled navigation of surgical targets in both rigid and flexible endoscopic surgeries.
TRANSFORMATIVE COLLEGE CURRICULUM: A RESEARCH-BASED MODEL FOR MEANINGFUL DEGREES OF UNDERSTANDING

Traditionally, institutions of higher education have been hard at work informing students how to be effective professionals and citizens. Frequently, this has taken the form of instructing students in existing occupational skill sets supplemented by general liberal educational conversancy. Yet, in a postmodern, super-connected world in which change is the reliable constant, informative education is of foundational but limited value. Rather than merely teaching more of the same, higher education may add value and meaning by teaching differently—by engaging in transformative education, which employs curricular models that not only inform, but also transform learners. In doing so, faculty design curriculum that scaffolds students in developing critically reflective, perspective-rich, and contextually meaningful global understandings. This study offers a literature-based and empirical research-based transformative learning curriculum model for designed to support higher education faculty and students across disciplines in developing as not only informed, but transformed professionals and global citizens. This transformative learning model for higher education is based on the research of Mezirow (2000), Herbers (1988), Maslow (1971), and Habermas (1984).
Norwegian Internet Shopping Sites: An Application & Extension of the Technology Acceptance Model

Abstract Managers need to understand the role the Internet plays in customer's purchasing patterns and take advantage of this phenomenon. For this study, 292 Norwegians responded to our survey regarding Internet shopping. The purpose of this research was as follows: 1) To apply, examine, and test the technology acceptance model (TAM) in the context of Internet shopping sites; 2) To understand the relationship between the TAM, involvement, and affinity with the computer in the context of Internet shopping sites; and 3) to examine these constructs and relationships in an international environment. While most of our hypotheses were supported, two conflicting results indicate additional research is needed regarding the validation and usefulness of TAM in an international setting.
Relation Extraction via Position-Enhanced Convolutional Neural Network

Recently, deep neural network based methods have been widely used in relation extraction, which is an important task for knowledge base population, question answering and other natural language applications, to learn proper features from entities pairs and other sentence parts to extract relations from text. As a kind of important information, the value of position is always been underestimated, which causes a low weight of position information in various models and finally hurts the performance of relation extraction task. To alleviate this issue, we propose a position-enhanced embedding model based on convolutional neural network. In this model, we split the sentence representation into three parts based on the entity pairs in the sentence, and use three independent convolutional networks to learn features. Furthermore, we concatenate the output from different branches and employ a softmax layer to compute the probability for each relation. Experimental results on wildly used datasets achieve considerable improvements on relation extraction as compared with baselines, which shows that our proposed model can make full use of position information.
Investor overreaction and unobservable portfolios: evidence from an emerging market

We use the system GMM to explore both cross sectional variations and time-series effects within the post-event period for losers and winners portfolios. Some of these effects are not observable, but ignoring them lays the estimation open to bias from concealed heterogeneity amongst companies and periods. Using daily data on a sample of companies which experienced dramatic 1-day price changes, we find strong evidence of price reversal. We also find that unobservable portfolios outperform traditional size portfolios.