Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An Exploration of Meanings of Leisure: A Chinese Perspective

In the West, the awareness of the important role of leisure in people’s lives has grown significantly since World War II. Leisure studies has been an academic field in the United States for the past six decades. The first undergraduate curriculum in recreation was established in the 1940s, and the first graduate program in recreation with M.S. degree was approved in 1953 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Since then, the study of leisure has also developed in Western Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan and mainland China and captured the interest of scholars in various fields including sociology, anthropology, psychology, social psychology, economics, forestry and political science. The field of leisure studies has contributed to a significant growth in knowledge about leisure but the scope of this knowledge remains limited. In particular, few scholars have
Return and Volatility Spillovers Among Asian Stock Markets

The study examines the return and volatility spillover among Asian stock markets in India, Hong Kong, Japan, China, Jakarta, and Korea using a six-variable asymmetric generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity–Baba, Engle, Kraft, and Kroner (GARCH-BEKK) model during February 2, 2007, to February 29, 2010. The author finds evidence of bidirectional return, shock, and volatility spillover among most of the stock markets. The magnitude of volatility linkages is low indicating weak integration of Asian stock markets. The study finds that own volatility spillover is higher than cross-market spillover. The overall persistence of stock market volatility is highest for Japan (0.931) and lowest for China (0.824). The implication of weak integration is that investors will benefit from reduction of diversifiable risk.
Manipulation of Sexual Behavior in Humans by Human Papilloma Virus

Parasites often alter the behavior of their host to facilitate transmission. Sexually transmitted infections in humans may offer an opportunity to explore this area further as the causative agents are under rigorous selection pressure to evolve traits like that of host sexual behavior manipulation. Very recently sexually transmitted pathogens like HIV and Herpes simplex have been speculated to induce similar changes in the human host. HPV which is leading cause of cervical cancers and that of genitals may be the one of the best candidates to study such manipulations in humans. Limited modes of transmission and cultural constraints in orthodox societies where sexuality is still a taboo may put the virus under immense selection pressure to manipulate the host sexual behavior and large number of available mutational variants within the host may actually support the entire process. HPV spreading through Oral sex recently been confirmed as the major culprit for rising Oral Cancer cases in Western World. HPV has been also linked to breast and prostate Cancer. HPV has evolved to infect even neurons as it has been detected in majority of Retinoblastoma cases in India . Infection in brain provides with ample opportunity to manipulate neuronal circuits that may influence sexual behavior. Considering the versatility of HPV to colonize various sites in Human Body and most recently Human Brain I hypothesize that HPV can manipulate sexual behavior in Humans when the chances of transmission are very thin even in the entire lifetime of the host.
A Theoretical Characterization of Curvature Controlled Adhesive Properties of Bio-Inspired Membranes

Some biological systems, such as the tree frog, Litoria caerulea, and the bush-cricket, Tettigonia viridissima, have developed the ability to control adhesion by changing the curvature of their pads. Active control systems of adhesion inspired by these biological models can be very attractive for the development of devices with controllable adhesive properties. In this paper, we present a theory describing the adhesive behavior of an artificial system consisting of an inflatable membrane clamped to a metallic cylinder and filled with air. In such a system, by controlling the internal pressure acting on the membrane, it is possible to modulate the adhesive strength. In particular, an increase of the internal pressure and, hence, the curvature of the membrane, results in a decrease of the pull-off force. Results predicted by the theoretical model are in good agreement with experimental data. The model explains the apparent contradictory results observed for the thick membrane with zero curvature. In fact, in this case, large pull-off forces should be expected, but zero values are measured due to an initial small misalignment between indenter and membrane, which is not possible to control with precision during the experiments. The present model might help to achieve a better understanding of the adhesion behavior of biological systems and of the fingertips that, in a broad sense, may be regarded as shell-like structures.
The impact of morbidity trajectories on identifying high-cost cases: using Taiwan's National Health Insurance as an example.

BACKGROUND Incorporating longitudinal information into risk-adjustment models has been considered important. This study aimed to evaluate how morbidity trajectories impact risk-adjustment models in identifying high-cost cases. METHODS Claims-based risk adjusters, with or without morbidity trajectories derived from 3-year claims from Taiwan's National Insurance System, were used to predict being a prospective high-cost user. A random sample of Taiwanese National Health Insurance enrollees continuously enrolled from 2002 to 2005 (n = 147,892) was the study sample. A logistic regression model was employed. The performance measures, based on the split analysis, included statistical indicators (c-statistics, sensitivity and predictive positive value), proportions of true cases identified by models and medical utilization of predicted cases. RESULTS As the comprehensiveness of risk adjustment models increased, the performance of the models generally increased. The effect of adding trajectories on the model performance decreased as the comprehensiveness of the model increased. Such impact was most apparent in statistical indicators and medical utilization of the predicted groups. CONCLUSIONS In identifying high-cost cases, adding morbidity trajectories might be necessary only for less comprehensive risk adjustment models, and its contributions came from higher c-statistics and increasing medical utilization of predicted groups.
Identifying and Diagnosing Students with Learning Disabilities using ANN and SVM

Due to the implicit characteristics of learning disabilities (LD), the identification or diagnosis of students with learning disabilities has long been a difficult issue. In fact, there is little consensus about what is the best procedure to identify a person with LD. Instead, the procedures are based on empirical findings from scholarly research. This is both true in the United States and Taiwan. However, the situation may be even more difficult in Taiwan. Firstly, the procedure requires a lot of manpower and resources, which is not allowable in Taiwan's current special education system. Secondly, due to the lack of nationally agreed standard, the variations of identifying procedure and the corresponding outcomes among counties are rather significant. In fact, in most counties of Taiwan, the numbers of identified LD students are heavily underestimated. The direct consequence of it is that a lot of potential LD students are not included in special education they are entitled to. To guarantee every potential LD students the right they deserved, the above two issues have to be resolved. In this paper, we try to adopt two well-known artificial intelligence techniques (Artificial Neural Network and Support Vector Machine), which have been applied successfully to solve problems in numerous fields, to the LD identification and diagnosis problem. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first attempt in this field. If proved workable, computer-based artificial intelligence methods will not just relieve the above two problems, but have an additional advantage in eliminating possible human bias. The preliminary results are satisfactory and can be provided as second opinion to the LD evaluation personnel. But it still requires many efforts to make the model more accurate and to make the idea practically feasible, which is what we will be working on.
Research and development (R&D) and development

Lederman and Maloney trace the evolution of research and development (R&D) expenditures along the development process using a new global panel data set. They show that R&D effort measured as a share of GDP rises with development at an increasing rate. The authors examine how four groups of countries from Latin America, Asia, advanced manufacturing exporters, and advanced natural resource-abundant countries fare relative to the predicted development trajectory. Latin America generally underperforms as do some countries in Asia and Europe, but their striking finding is that some-Finland, Israel, the Republic of Korea, and Taiwan (China)-have radically deviated from the predicted trajectory and displayed impressive R&D takeoffs. The authors ask whether these countries overinvest in R&D but find that the high estimates of the social rates of return probably justify this effort. Moreover, the returns to R&D decline with per capita GDP. The authors attempt to explain why rich countries invest more in R&D than poor countries. They conclude that financial depth, protection of intellectual property rights, government capacity to mobilize resources, and the quality of research institutions are the main reasons why R&D efforts rise with the level of development.
Financial Crises and Automotive Industry Development in Southeast Asia

Abstract The automotive industries of Southeast Asia have grown significantly but unevenly. Thailand has outperformed its neighbours in Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines with regard to production and, most notably, export volumes. But the Thai auto industry has not exhibited the level of local (indigenous) technology capacity and input growth seen in South Korea, Taiwan and, increasingly, in China. The 1997–98 and 2008 financial and economic crises generally reinforced pre-existing national automotive strategies, but to different degrees: They strongly accelerated an earlier Thai move to exports whose very success weakened pressures for upgrading; encouraged more moderate automotive liberalisation in Indonesia and, to a lesser extent, in the Philippines; but promoted only minimal changes to Malaysia’s relatively protectionist national car strategy. The fact that the crises served more to reinforce than to reverse existing tendencies reflects a broader set of political economy factors that influence national perceptions of crises severity and alternative responses.
HMOX2 Functions as a Modifier Gene for High‐Altitude Adaptation in Tibetans

Tibetans are well adapted to high‐altitude environments. Among the adaptive traits in Tibetans, the relatively low hemoglobin level is considered a blunted erythropoietic response to hypoxic challenge. Previously, EPAS1 and EGLN1, the major upstream regulators in the hypoxic pathway, were reportedly involved in the hemoglobin regulation in Tibetans. In this study, we report a downstream gene (HMOX2) involved in heme catabolism, which harbors potentially adaptive variants in Tibetans. We first resequenced the entire genomic region (45.6 kb) of HMOX2 in Tibetans, which confirmed the previously suspected signal of positive selection on HMOX2 in Tibetans. Subsequent association analyses of hemoglobin levels in two independent Tibetan populations (a total of 1,250 individuals) showed a male‐specific association between the HMOX2 variants and hemoglobin levels. Tibetan males with the derived C allele at rs4786504:T>C displayed lower hemoglobin level as compared with the T allele carriers. Furthermore, our in vitro experiments indicated that the C allele of rs4786504 could increase the expression of HMOX2, presumably leading to a more efficient breakdown of heme that may help maintain a relatively low hemoglobin level at high altitude. Collectively, we propose that HMOX2 contributes to high‐altitude adaptation in Tibetans by functioning as a modifier in the regulation of hemoglobin metabolism.
New evidence on breaking trend functions in real GDPs from Great China Economic Area

ABSTRACT This article explores the difference in the time series property of economic output for the Great China Economic Area (GCEA) (Mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan). Using the powerful Kim and Perron (2009) unit root test and real GDPs over the period 1992–2014 as the study sample, results indicate the presence of a break for all economies that corresponds to the Asian financial crisis. Additionally, allowing for a break leads to the rejection of the unit root hypothesis for Taiwan only. Important implications are provided. First, considering the presence of a break in testing for nonstationarity is important or false conclusions can be drawn. Second, given the stationarity of GDP found for Taiwan only, investors should look beyond any local economic shocks and focus more on world economy development when investing in Taiwan. By contrast, investors in Mainland China and Hong Kong should pay attention to any shock because it is likely to be persistent. Third, relevant authorities should recognize that any government policy intended to promote long-run economic growth may be ineffective in Taiwan whereas it can be more effective in Mainland China and Hong Kong.
Multiple population structure of the giant mottled eel, Anguilla marmorata

The population structure of the giant mottled eel, Anguilla marmorata, was investigated with mitochondrial and microsatellite DNA analyses using 449 specimens from 13 localities throughout the species range. Control region F‐statistics indicated the North Pacific (Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, Sulawesi), South Pacific (Tahiti, Fiji, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea), eastern Indian Ocean (Sumatra), western Indian Ocean (Réunion, Madagascar), Ambon, and Guam regions were significantly different (ΦST = 0.131–0.698, P < 0.05) while only a few differences were observed between localities within the South Pacific. These regions were roughly clustered in the neighbour‐joining tree, although Ambon individuals were mainly divided into North and South Pacific groups. Analysis with eight microsatellite loci showed almost identical results to those of the control region, except no genetic difference was observed between the western and eastern Indian Ocean (FST = 0.009, P > 0.05). The Bayesian cluster analysis of the microsatellite data detected two genetic groups. One included four North Pacific localities, and the other included eight localities in the South Pacific, Indian Ocean, and Guam, but Ambon individuals were evenly assigned to these two groups. These results showed that A. marmorata has four genetically different populations (North Pacific, South Pacific, Indian Ocean, Guam region). The North Pacific population is fully panmictic whereas the South Pacific and Indian Ocean populations have a metapopulation structure. Interestingly, Guam was suggested to be inhabited by a reproductive population restricted to that region, and the individuals from the North and South Pacific populations co‐exist in Ambon.
Metastatic non-small cell lung cancer: ESMO Clinical Practice Guidelines for diagnosis, treatment and follow-up.

Department of Medical Oncology, Thoracic Group, Gustave-Roussy Villejuif, France; Royal Marsden Hospital, London; Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, Aberdeen University Medical School, Aberdeen, UK; Department of Oncology, University of Turin, San Luigi Hospital, Orbassano, Italy; Thoracic Oncology Service, Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Division of Cancer Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK; Department of Clinical Oncology, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Prince of Wales Hospital, Hong Kong, China; LungenClinic Airway Research Center North (ARCN), German Center for Lung Research, Grosshansdorf, Germany; Department of Thoracic and Vascular Surgery, Antwerp University Hospital and Antwerp University, Antwerp, Belgium; Weill Cornell Medical College, New York, USA; Medical Oncology, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, Lausanne, Switzerland
Stress-related aftermaths to workplace politics: The relationships among politics, job distress, and aggressive behavior in organizations.

Summary In light of the growing theoretical and practical interest on organizational politics, especially its probable impact on work outcomes, two stress-related aftermaths of influence and politics in organizations were examined. On the basis of a model by Ferris, Russ, and Fandt (1989b) the idea was pursued that workplace politics may have a long-range impact on employees’ job distress and aggressive behavior in and around organizations. Three samples (n1 ¼ 155, n2 ¼ 184, n3 ¼ 201) were used to examine direct and indirect/mediating relationships among the research variables. Participants were Israeli employees from the private, public, and third sectors. Findings showed that: (1) job distress was an immediate response to organizational politics across the three types of organization, and (2) job distress proved a possible mediator between organizational politics and aggressive behavior as enacted by the employees themselves. Several theoretical and practical implications of the findings that may extend our knowledge on various stress-related aftermaths of organizational politics are noted. Copyright # 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Vacuum-Assisted Thermal Annealing of CH 3 NH 3 PbI 3 for Highly Stable and E ffi cient Perovskite Solar Cells

Feng Xian Xie, Di Zhang, Huimin Su, Xingang Ren, Kam Sing Wong, Michael Grätzel, and Wallace C. H. Choy* Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Pok Fu Lam Road, Hong Kong, China, Department of Physics, The Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, and Laboratory for Photonics and Interfaces, Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering, School of Basic Sciences, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
Does Culture Matter? A Cross-Cultural Study of Executives’ Choice, Decisiveness, and Risk Adjustment in International Marketing

The authors investigate whether a manager's home culture significantly influences his or her international marketing decisions. They also examine whether the impact of home culture diminishes in an open economy with intense exposure to international markets, giving way to a process of “globalization. ” Decision making in four simulated international marketing situations was studied with executives from the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, and Canada. The findings confirm that home culture has predictable, significant effects on the decision making of the executives from the People's Republic of China and Canada. Chinese executives from Hong Kong were influenced by a combination of Western and Chinese cultural norms.
A cross-cultural study on consumers level of acceptance toward marketing innovativeness

This research applied Hofstede’s five culture dimensions to examine the cross-cultural consumer differences in acceptance of marketing innovativeness. The participants of this study are consumers from various countries; namely, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Macao, Vietnam, Indonesia, Myanmar, and Taiwan. This research was conducted to provide evidence on the relationship between national cultures and consumer’s level of acceptance toward innovative marketing through 446 valid questionnaires. The results of logarithmic regression indicated that consumers from different national cultures varied in their marketing innovativeness. Consumers from the higher power distance and uncertainty avoidance cultures were weaker than lower ones on acceptance of innovative marketing. Marketing innovativeness was stronger in higher individualism, masculinity and long-term orientation than lower ones. Furthermore, this research employs neural network to demonstrate the relationship between national cultures and marketing innovativeness. The managerial implication of this study suggested several strategies that may be helpful to marketers aiming at different cultures. Further research could examine other countries and do a cross-culture investigation on consumer or other pertinent issues. Key words: National culture, marketing innovativeness, innovativeness.
Buddhism in the Modern World

Introduction David L. McMahan Part 1: Buddhism in Its Geographical Contexts 1. Modern Buddhist Conjunctures in Southeast Asia Juliane Schober 2. Buddhism in Modern Sri Lanka Stephen C. Berkwitz 3. Searching for a Place to Sit: Buddhists in Modern Japan Clark Chilson 4. Buddhism in China and Taiwan Gareth Fisher 5. Tibetan and Himalayan Buddhism Sarah Jacoby and Antonio Terrone 6. Modernist Interpretations of Buddhism in Europe Martin Baumann 7. The North American Buddhist Experience Paul David Numrich Part 2: Buddhism and the Challenges of Modernity 8. Buddhist Modernism David L. McMahan 9. Buddhism, Politics, and Nationalism Ian Harris 10. Socially Engaged Buddhism Sallie B. King 11. Buddhist Ethics: A Critique Damien Keown 12. Buddhism and the Powers of the Mind Richard K. Payne 13. Buddhism and Gender Liz Wilson 14. Buddhism and Science: Translating and Re-translating Culture Francisca Cho 15. Buddhism and Globalization Cristina Rocha 16. Buddhism, Media, and Popular Culture Scott A. Mitchell
Exploring Job Satisfaction of IT Workers in Taiwan, Japan, and China: The Role of Employee Demographics, Job Demographics, and Uncertainty Avoidance

The purpose of this study is to explore the drivers of job satisfaction among IT workers in the East Asian context, particularly in Taiwan, Japan, and China. Using data collected from IT workers, decision tree analysis was employed to identify the predictors of job satisfaction. Results indicate that the level of education has no effect on job satisfaction. In Taiwan and Japan, higher uncertainty avoidance results in higher job satisfaction, and more experienced IT workers appear to be less satisfied. As Taiwanese and Japanese IT workers get older, they are likely to hold senior positions, spend more time on the job, and become increasingly dissatisfied with their jobs. The effect of uncertainty avoidance is less clear in China. The job role and industry matter only in China. Thus, management efforts to enhance job satisfaction among IT workers in China may be tailored towards specific industries and job roles.
Luxury brand purchases and the extended self

Purpose – It is generally agreed that marketing campaigns developed for western markets may not be appropriate for consumers living in eastern cultures, particularly with respect to strategies for promoting luxury brands. While consultancy reports and media commentaries show that rising levels of disposable income are driving increasing demand for luxury goods in China and Taiwan, for example, the academic literature offers very few consumer research findings clearly elucidating the different luxury purchasing behaviour of eastern and western consumers. The purpose of this paper is to compare the consumption of luxury products and luxury fashion purchasing habits in Taiwan and the UK, with particular reference to the fashion sector, focusing on a strategically important emerging market segment: young consumers of luxury brands. Design/methodology/approach – To achieve the study’s objectives, questionnaires were administered online in each of the two countries to females aged 18-26 years, who had made more.