Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Estimating Policy Positions of Political Actors Across Countries and Time

Numerous empirical studies in comparative and international politics use estimates of policy positions of parties and political elites to analyse how preferences shape outcomes of political decision-making processes. In the past decade, data availability and methodological advances have fostered the shift from a static, cross-sectional view on positions and ideologies to a dynamic, longitudinal perspective on changing preferences and political change. A large part of the ongoing debate on what kind of data can be used for longitudinal analysis revolves around the pros and cons of using fully computerized content analysis of political texts as compared to the yardstick dataset in comparative government, the ‘Comparative Manifesto Project’ (CMP) data of hand-coded party manifestos. While a large part of this discussion is methodological, we know little how the different methods compare empirically. This is what we do in this paper. We compare estimates of parties’ policy positions from CMP with positions derived from Wordscores for 13 Western European countries in the time period between 1980 and 2010. Our analysis shows that by and large, the CMP and the Wordscores approach produce similar estimates of parties’ positions on a general left-right dimension. Yet, the degree of congruence differs considerably over countries and also varies with the type of party and party manifesto the estimate is based on. We examine outliers from the overall pattern and discuss possible reasons for them.
Plant defenses and population fluctuations of forest defoliators : mechanism-based scenarios

Among the factors contributing to defoliator population fluctuations the possible role of plant defenses depends on how defenses (secondary compounds, primary compounds, and defense cascades) are assumed to function. Delayed inducible production of secondary compounds does not seem to explain cyclic fluctuations in population density. Instead, properties of general plant defense cascades, especially of the octadecanoid pathway, suggest new potential mechanisms. Insect damage, and sunspot-related high ultraviolet radiation (UV-B), trigger the octadecanoid pathway. In birch it also contributes to defoliator immunocompetence. Therefore, the low rate of parasitism in the increase phase of an outbreak has potential connections to inducible plant defense. The octadecanoid pathway is also involved in the production of volatile plant compounds, known to modify defenses of other plants and the behavior of parasitoids. Accordingly, the octadecanoid pathway and other plant defense cascades suggest unappreciated plant-mediated connections between the environment, defoliator performance, parasitism, and spatial expansion of outbreaks.
Using Rainfall Excess for Supplemental Irrigation of Vertisols in India

The rainfall in India is variable in intensity, duration and distribution. High-intensity storms often result in large amounts of rainfall excess (runoff), particularly in soils such as the Vertisols where infiltration rates are low. Runoff causes large amounts of soil erosion annually, resulting in the degradation of the crop production potential of the soil resource. Proper management of the Vertisols results in many benefits. A system of graded broadbeds and furrows has been developed at ICRISAT which improves surface drainage in the monsoon season (facilitating rainy season cropping), allows runoff to occur at non-erosive velocities and permits it to be collected in storage facilities. The broadbed-andfurrow system also facilitates reapplying the water to the crops during stress periods.
The role of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi in N 2 0 and N 2 emissions

N 2 0 is a potent greenhouse gas with a great global warming potential and which is released by agricultural soils. The ecological processes that regulate its emission from soil are still poorly understood. In the present study, we hypothesized that the presence of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF), which belong to the fungal phylum of the Glomeromycota and which form a symbiosis with the majority of land plants species, can reduce N 2 0 emissions and enhance N 2 emissions by influencing denitrification in the soil. The denitrification process and it`s interactions with AMF could also be governed by the carbon supply and the nitrogen supply in the soil. To test the effect of AMF on N 2 0 emissions and the mechanisms associated, we conducted a greenhouse experiment in using two different microcosms planted with either non-mycorrhizal tomato mutants or its mycorrhizal progenitor wild-type. To manipulate the carbon and nitrogen availability in the soil, we used a shading treatment with a high and a low light supply, and a fertilization treatment with a high and a low nutrient supply. We did not find clear significant effect of AMF on N 2 0 and N 2 gas emissions and could not propose new mechanistic pathways of the factors that could influence this process. Our results suggest further investigations and ameliorations of the methods.
The Practice of Nursing Process and Associated Factors Among Nurses Working in Public Hospitals of Harari People National Regional State, Eastern Ethiopia: A Cross Sectional Study

Background: The nursing process is the framework for providing professional and quality nursing care. The practice of nursing process in part of Africa has not reached the standard that is set by the profession’s regulatory body. The factors that influence nursing process practice need to be understood. The study aim to assess the practice of nursing process and associated factors among nurses working in public hospitals of Harari region. Method: Institutional based cross-sectional study was conducted from March – April 2015. Self-administered and structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 174 nurses. The data was entered using Epinfo version 7 then exported into SPSS version 20. In addition to descriptive statistics both bivariate and multivariate logistic regression model was fitted to identify possible factors associated with nursing process practice. Statistical significance was declared with AOR at 95% confidence interval (CI) and P-value of < 0.05. Result:- A total of 174 nurses were enrolled in the study making response rate of 98.3%. Almost half of respondents 85 (48.9%) were practiced nursing process. Negligent working environment (AOR: 0.30, [95% CI: (0.104 – 0.882)], nurses working on patient problem and seeing the outcome (AOR: 2.4, [95% CI: (1.101 – 5.181)], low access of training (AOR: 0.39, [95%CI: (0.19 – 0.79)], early discharge of patient (AOR= 2.59, [95% CI: (1.29 – 5.19)], and lack of knowledge (AOR= 0.036, [95% CI: (0.004 – 0.290)] were significantly associated with practice of nursing process. Conclusion: The practice of nursing process in the two facilities studied was suboptimal. Negligent working environment, working on patient problem and seeing the outcome, low access of training, early discharge of patient and low level of knowledge about nursing process were associated with nursing process practice. Nurses’ patient care knowledge in nursing process practice need to be evaluated and monitored periodically in order to provide on service training. Keywords: Nursing process, practice, Nurse, Knowledge, Attitude, Hospital, Ethiopia
Assessing the Relative Importance of Competitive Priorities that Influence Consumers' Choices in Mobile Phone Services

Mobile telecommunication usage is a necessity to assure that someone is connected and accessible in a network. This study focuses on the elements that influence the customer’s choice in mobile services, namely the cost/price, quality, time/delivery, flexibility, service and innovation. The objective of this study is to examine the significant importance of competitive priorities of elements that influence consumers’ choices in mobile phone services and further to rank all the elements based on the level of importance from the consumers’ points of view. The study focuses on mobile users in Melaka, Malaysia and data gathering is mechanized by a questionnaire. Data has been analyzed descriptively and further correlated and regressed. The analysis found that competitive priority elements as ranked according to priority are quality, cost, flexibility, time, service and innovation. This findings is useful for telecommunication providers towards improvement of service, as well as to achieve customers’ satisfaction.
A MATCH METHOD BASED ON LATENT SEMANTIC ANALYSIS FOR EARTHQUAKE HAZARD EMERGENCY PLAN

The structure of the emergency plan on earthquake is complex, and it’s difficult for decision maker to make a decision in a short time. To solve the problem, this paper presents a match method based on Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA). After the word segmentation preprocessing of emergency plan, we carry out keywords extraction according to the part-of-speech and the frequency of words. Then through LSA, we map the documents and query information to the semantic space, and calculate the correlation of documents and queries by the relation between vectors. The experiments results indicate that the LSA can improve the accuracy of emergency plan retrieval efficiently.
Configuration Transitions of Free Circular DNA System Induced by Nicks

Nicks have important functions in the biological functions of DNA-mediated systems. However, the configuration transitions of DNA molecules induced by the presence of nicks have not been quantitatively investigated. This study aims to analyze the configuration transitions of free circular DNA system induced by nicks. Using atomic force microscopy, two configuration states were observed in the free circular DNA system with different nick numbers. To understand the transmission of torsional energy among DNA base pairs, we defined the effective length and nicking angle. In the free DNA system, a torsional energy of 233 bp can be completely released by nicks. Based on the experimental and quantitative results, we propose a physical mechanism to explain the configuration transitions of the free circular DNA system induced by nicks. This study and the presented method are very useful in understanding the physical mechanism of nicks in DNA-mediated systems.
Enhancing the English-Language Oral Skills of International Students through Drama

Ten non-English-speaking-background students of Bond University were observed to identify the effects of drama on oral English. Over a period of twelve weeks (two hours per week), elements of their oral English communication were measured. The weeks were divided into four lots of three weeks each, with the first three weeks made up entirely of communicative non-drama-based (CNDB) lessons, weeks four to six comprising only communicative drama-based (CDB) methodology, weeks seven to nine reverting to CNDB methodology, and the final three weeks being made up of CDB strategies again. The hypothesis of this study was that all the participants would show improvement once CDB methodology was introduced and that, by the end of Week 12, their mean-scores would be higher than when they were first observed. The first part of the hypothesis was disproved for a majority of the participants, while the second part revealed positive findings for all ten.
Strichartz estimates for Schrödinger equations with variable coefficients and unbounded potentials

The present paper is concerned with Schr\"odinger equations with variable coefficients and unbounded electromagnetic potentials, where the kinetic energy part is a long-range perturbation of the flat Laplacian and the electric (resp. magnetic) potential can grow subquadratically (resp. sublinearly) at spatial infinity. We prove sharp (local-in-time) Strichartz estimates, outside a large compact ball centered at origin, for any admissible pair including the endpoint. Under the nontrapping condition on the Hamilton flow generated by the kinetic energy, global-in-space estimates are also studied. Finally, under the nontrapping condition, we prove Strichartz estimates with an arbitrarily small derivative loss without asymptotic flatness on the coefficients.
Main food sources of carotenoids, according to the purpose and degree of processing, for beneficiaries of the 'Bolsa Família' in Brazil

The intake of carotenoids is associated with antioxidant properties and some of these substances have activity of pro-vitamin A. This study aimed to estimate the intake of carotenoids (average values) by the Brazilian population focusing on beneficiaries of the ‘Bolsa Familia’ Program and identify the dietary sources, according to the purpose and degree of processing and the inclusion of food additives. The database used is the personal food consumption module of the Household Budget Survey of 2008-2009, conducted by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. The content of carotenoids in foods was obtained primarily from a National data source. Food products were classified into three categories: 1) fresh and minimally processed foods; 2) processed foods (containing food additives, except for flavoring and coloring agents); and 3) highly processed foods (containing flavoring and coloring agents). Insufficient intakes were identified for the conditional cash transfer program beneficiaries (3,547.1 µg). Fresh and minimally processed foods supplied between 48.6% (for girls) and 65.7% (for male adults) of pro-vitamin carotenoids. Processed foods were sources of between 55.5% and 57.0% of lutein + zeaxanthin for elderly and between 58.0% and 67.8% of lycopene for adults. Highly processed foods contributed to less than 5.0% of total carotenoids.
AGONISTIC BEHAVIOUR AND DEVELOPMENT OF TERRITORIALITY DURING ONTOGENY OF THE SEA ANEMONE DWELLING CRAB ALLOPETROLISTHES SPINIFRONS ( H . MILNE EDWARDS , 1837 ) ( DECAPODA : ANOMURA : PORCELLANIDAE )

Allopetrolisthes spinifrons is an ectosymbiotic crab of the sea anemone Phymactis clematis. As a consequence of low host abundance, these represent a scarce and limited resource for the crab. Additionally, the relatively small size of the sea anemone host suggests that few symbiotic crabs can cohabit on one host individual, forcing crabs to adopt a territorial behaviour. In order to examine the potential presence and ontogenetic development of territoriality, the agonistic behaviour between crabs of various ontogenetic stages (adults, juveniles, and recruits) was studied in the laboratory. Laboratory experiments demonstrated that adult or juvenile crabs aggressively defended their sea anemone hosts against adult or juvenile intruders, respectively, but both adult and juvenile crabs tolerated recruits. Adult crabs behaved indifferently towards juvenile crabs, sometimes tolerating them, sometimes expelling them. Recruits never showed agonistic behaviour among themselves. The agonistic interactions observed in the laboratory and the uniform population distribution pattern on sea anemones recently described for A. spinifrons indicate that this species exhibits territorial behaviour, which develops during ontogeny. Territoriality in this species and other symbiotic decapods may function as a density-dependent mechanism of population regulation, being mediated by the availability of hosts. Resource monopolisation behaviours may be common among other symbiotic and free-living marine invertebrates inhabiting discrete habitats that represent a limiting resource.
A descriptive study of the self-concept of prenatal African American mothers with HIV/AIDS in Georgia and its impact on maternal-fetal attachment

SOCIAL WORK WILLIAMS, SONYA L. B.S. Vanderbilt University, 1991 A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY OF THE SELF-CONCEPT OF PRENATAL AFRICAN AMERICAN MOTHERS WITH HIV/AIDS IN GEORGIA AND ITS IMPACT ON MATERNAL-FETAL ATTACHMENT Advisor: Amos Ajo, Ph.D. Thesis dated: May, 1995 The overall objective of this study was to explore a significant effect of a prevalent social disease imposed on a vulnerable population, African Americans. The disease is known as HIV/AIDS and its effect on prenatal women is explored. The purpose of the research was to direct focus to the self—concept of seropositive and nonseropositive HIV/AIDS prenatal African American women, by addressing whether or not the mother’s self—concept impacted the maternal—fetal attachment. The researcher resorted to three statistical procedures to analyze data from this descriptive study: (a) the t-Test for Independent, (b) the Pearson Moment Correlation, and (c) Descriptive statistics. The study findings showed a significantly positive relationship between self—concept and maternal—fetal attachment in both groups. There was also a significant difference in the overall levels of maternal—fetal attachment and self-concept in both groups, concluding that self concept does indeed significantly impact on the
SLIPS OF THE EARS: STUDY ON VOWEL PERCEPTION IN INDONESIAN LEARNERS OF ENGLISH

Slips of the ears leads to speakers’ misperception and misunderstanding. It hints at communication failure between the speaker and the listener. Yet, linguists have not conducted full investigation on this matter. This research is designed to identify vowel sounds misperceived by Indonesian learners of English. Moreover, it examines the bearing of context and the causes of slips of the ears among those learners. A Questionaire and listening tests were used for data collection. The questionaire was employed to explore the respondents’ personal information. Analysis of the data commence with the identification of vowel sounds that are misperceived by the respondents. It guides the research to find the mean and percentage of listening test with and without context. The research provides strong evidence that context has a positive influence on learners’ comprehension of words. Accordingly, the research comes to the point that the causes of slips of the ear are interlingual and extralingual factors.
The Effects of the Minimum Wage on Employment and Wages

The effect of the minimum wage on labor market outcomes is controversial. There are several studies for developed countries with mixed results, but there is a lack of evidence for developing countries. We have access to a panel of workers from the unemployment insurance system in Chile, which allow us to study the effect of four consecutive increases in minimum wages using administrative data. We use several definitions of treatment and control groups, finding consistently a small and positive effect of the minimum wage on formal wages, and non-significant effects on formal employment.
Environmental Concern has to do with the Stated Purchase Behavior of Green Products at Retail

Does environmental concern influence declared retail purchasing of green products? Current analysis evaluates the influence of environmental concern in people´s retail buying behavior of green products. A survey with 811 consumers from Brazil was undertaken on their perception as individuals and the manner they perceive people in society. Results obtained by current analysis show that consumers do not demonstrate a direct relationship between environmental concern and declared retail purchase of green products. The above reinforces the model by Bagozzi (1981) who explains behavior has intent rather than attitude as a precedent. The same behavior may be perceived when subjects place their perception above the behavior of people in society.
Equilibrium, Kinetic and Thermodynamics Studies of Adsorption of Aniline Blue from Aqueous Media Using Steam-Activated Carbon Prepared from Delonix regia Pod

The adsorption capacity of steam activated carbon prepared from Delonix regia pods SADRC for adsorption of Aniline Blue (AB) from aqueous solution was investigated under various experimental conditions. Batch study was conducted to assess the potential of the activated carbon for the removal of Aniline Blue from aqueous solution. Activated carbon prepared from Delonix regia pods was characterized using Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) and Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) Spectrophotometry before and after adsorption. The FTIR, spectra of SADRC pod before and after Aniline Blue adsorption were compared to study the impact of the Aniline Blue on the activated carbon developed from the Delonix regia pod. The stretching vibration band at 2169.54 cm-1 may be due to strong CN, while the stretching vibration band at around 1580 - 1650 cm-1 may be due to C=C stretching vibration. The bands around 1350 and 426.49 cm-1 are due to C-N and –SO3H group, respectively; this further suggests that some functional groups may be present on the surface of the carbon due to the low temperature of carbonization (300°C) of the adsorbent. Equilibrium isotherm studies were carried out by varying the following four parameters: initial concentration of Aniline Blue dye solution, solution pH and adsorbent dose. The equilibrium data obtained were more fitted to Langmuir than Freundlich isotherm models. The correlation coefficient value (R2) of the pseudo first order kinetics ranged from 0.08 to 0.85 while the R2 of the pseudo second order kinetics ranged from 0.963 to 0.997 at all the temperatures and initial concentrations considered. This suggests that the adsorption kinetics of Aniline Blue onto SADRC can be represented with pseudo second order kinetic model. This study showed that Delonix regia pod could be effectively used as an adsorbent for the removal of Aniline Blue from aqueous solutions over a wide range of concentration and temperature.
The Deceptive and Unwanted Gas Liberalization Process in Russia

This paper argues that this perception of the gas liberalization process in Russia is far too rosy. The analysis of the gas liberalization process in Russia demonstrates that there have been very few changes made in the legislative framework that would favor the opening of the market and the involvement of all independent gas players. We find that many of the gas “reforms” undertaken are still such that favor Gazprom and the Kremlin’s control over the sector. We find that the changes in market share are not an outcome of the gas liberalization process, and that many of the reforms (i.e., liberalization of the export market and more favorable regulatory conditions) only apply to two purportedly “independent” gas companies (Rosneft and Novatek) that are in reality owned by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s close circle of friends.
Advantages and contributions in the balanced scorecard implementation

Purpose: In this paper we aim to identify and analyse a set of advantages and contributions derived from the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) implementation. Design/methodology/approach: In order to answer the research question, we have carried out a qualitative research based on the exclusively bibliographical review of theoretical / conceptual and empirical works previously done on the subject (systematic review of the literature). Findings: The results allow us to conclude that the BSC is more than a simple performance evaluation system, to become a true strategic management tool able to clarify and translate the mission and organizational strategy, making possible the communication process, the strategic alignment and the organizational learning. Originality/value: The study presents a contribution to the current state of knowledge, since the identification of the advantages and contributions in the BSC introduction and implementation can facilitate its adoption and development in the organizations that intend to implement this tool. In addition, a theoretical basis is provided for subsequent research, evidencing the breadth of research on the topic studied.