ghanaopendata/ghanaian-research-english huggingface dataset:
Do lenders value firm reputation? Evidence from SMEs in Ghana

Our paper examined the effects of firm reputation on access to external funding among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Ghana by controlling for firm specific variables such as firm size, firm performance, leverage and managerial competence. It contributes to our knowledge on how firm reputation, especially organisation identity, assists firms in accessing external funding. We analyzed primary data of 423 SMEs registered in the Accra Metropolis of Ghana using regression analysis. Even though, we documented positive relationship between firm reputation and access to finance, only firm image was significant. This denotes that firm reputation could assist SMEs in accessing external financing if SME managers develop and improve their information and communication practices to highlight tangible evidences of firm success. This could be achieved by keeping proper books of accounts on firm operations, which could reduce lenders’ perception of risk and thus, facilitate easier access to external funding.

Source: UCC
Do mobile family planning clinics facilitate vasectomy use in Nepal?

Background: Nepal has a distinct topography that makes reproductive health and family planning services difficult to access, particularly in remote mountain and hill regions where over a quarter of modern contraceptive users rely exclusively on vasectomy. Study design: A three-level random intercept logistic regression analysis was applied on data from the 2011 Nepal Demographic and Health Survey to investigate the extent of influence of mobile family planning clinics on the odds of a male or a female sterilization, adjusting for relevant characteristics including ecological differences and random effects. The analyses included a sample of 2014 sterilization users, considering responses from currently married women of reproductive ages. Results: The odds of a male sterilization were significantly higher in a mobile clinic than those in a government hospital (odds ratio, 1.65; 95% confidence interval, 1.21–2.25). The effects remained unaltered and statistically significant after adjusting for socio-demographic and clustering effects. Random effects were highly significant, which suggest the extent of heterogeneity in vasectomy use at the community and district levels. The odds of vasectomy use in mobile clinics were significantly higher among couples residing in hill and mountain regions and among those with three or more sons or those with only daughters. Conclusion: Mobile clinics significantly increase the uptake of vasectomy in hard-to-reach areas of Nepal. Reproductive health interventions should consider mobile clinics as an effective strategy to improve access to male-based modern methods and enhance gender equity in family planning. Implications: Family planning interventions in hard-to-reach communities could consider mobile clinic as an effective strategy to promote male-based modern methods. Improving access to vasectomy could substantially reduce unmet need for family planning in countries experiencing rapid fertility transition

Source: UCC
Documentation of Fluid Balance of Patients on Intravenous Therapy in a University Hospital in Ghana

Fluid makes up about 60percent of the total body weight (White, 1998). Thus, maintaining a balanced body fluid is essential and requires that the volume of fluid intake and fluid loss are similar (Diacon & Bell, 2014). The brain, the adrenal glands and the kidneys regulate the body’s fluid balance through a finely balanced mechanism (Tortora & Grabowski, 2002). However, many diseases can potentially disrupt this mechanism that control the intake and output of water and solute (Verbalis, 2003). Inadequate fluid intake or excessive fluid loss may lead to dehydration, which in turn can affect renal and cardiac function as well as electrolyte management (Scales & Pilsworth, 2008). In healthy patients, increased ingestion of fluids of all kinds contributes to maintaining fluid balance, but in some patients, Intravenous (IV) therapy can be a lifesaver.

Source: UCC
Does Culture Play a Role at Work? Examining the Relationships Among Sociocultural Values, Job Satisfaction, and Social Support as a Mediator

Current literature on employees’ work attitudes often fails to examine how employees’ specific sociocultural values influence work attitudes. This study of 211 bank managers examined specifically the cardinal sociocultural values (moral values, religious values, communal values, attitude toward others, and family values) within the Ghanaian society and how they influence job satisfaction. The study further tested the mediating role of social support on the relationship between sociocultural values and job satisfaction. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM)/partial least squares (PLS) to test for the relationships between sociocultural values (as the endogenous variable) and job satisfaction (as the exogenous variable) and the mediating role of social support. Based on the results, it is concluded that there exist a significant positive relationship between sociocultural values and job satisfaction. The strongest relationship observed is between moral values, religious values, and job satisfaction. Social support mediated the sociocultural values and job satisfaction relationships, sometimes fully and sometimes partially, depending on which specific sociocultural value was being examined. Theoretical and practical implications of the proposed research are discussed

Source: UCC
Does incorporation of cowpea-maize residue mixes inﬂuence nitrous oxide emission and mineral nitrogen release in a tropical luvisol?

In the face of climate change, quantiﬁcation of the emission of nitrous oxide from soils in relation to sufﬁcient N availability for crop uptake has assumed much signiﬁcance. This study used the 15N stable isotope technique, under controlled laboratory conditions, to quantify the interactive effect on and relative contributions of the component species toN2O emission and mineral N dynamics in a tropical luvisol incorporated with different rates of cowpea-maize residue mixtures. The results show that increasing the maize residue proportion in the mixture signiﬁcantly decreases N2O emission compared to the sole cowpea incorporation but increases mineral N concentration compared to sole maize residue incorporation. It is concluded that mixing low C:N ratio cowpea residue with high C:N ratio maize residue has potential for N management in tropical legume-cereal intercropping systems with the view to minimizing N2O emission while making N available for crop uptake

Source: UCC
Does previous experience of floods stimulate the adoption of coping strategies? evidence from cross sectional surveys in Nigeria and Tanzania

In sub-Saharan Africa, hydro-meteorological related disasters, such as floods, account for the majority of the total number of natural disasters. Over the past century, floods have affected 38 million people, claimed several lives and caused substantial economic losses in the region. The goal of this paper is to examine how personality disposition, social network, and socio-demographic factors mitigate the complex relationship between stressful life experiences of floods and ocean surges and the adoption of coping strategies among coastal communities in Nigeria and Tanzania. Generalized linear models (GLM) were fitted to cross-sectional survey data on 1003 and 1253 individuals in three contiguous coastal areas in Nigeria and Tanzania, respectively. Marked differences in the type of coping strategies were observed across the two countries. In Tanzania, the zero-order relationships between adoption of coping strategies and age, employment and income disappeared at the multivariate level. Only experience of floods in the past year and social network resources were significant predictors of participants’ adoption of coping strategies, unlike in Nigeria, where a plethora of factors such as experience of ocean surges in the past one year, personality disposition, age, education, experience of flood in the past one year, ethnicity, income, housing quality and employment status were still statistically significant at the multivariate level. Our findings suggest that influence of previous experience on adoption of coping strategies is spatially ubiquitous. Consequently, context-specific policies aimed at encouraging the adoption of flood-related coping strategies in vulnerable locations should be designed based on local needs and orientation

Source: UCC
Does religion motivate gender based violence in indigenous Africa? An investigation into the indigenous religion of the Asante and gender based violence

The paper studies the Asante, an ethnic group in Ghana, to understand their notions on religion, gender and violence with the view of answering the question: Does religion motivate gender based violence in indigenous Africa? It investigates the existence of gendered violence and how it is related to religion. Religion is understood here as a practice and at the same time a worldview – an ideological framework used to interpret, understand and respond to occurrences in the world. Gender, however, is seen as a sociological factor. A careful examination of interviews of ritual specialists, community leaders and sixteen focus group discussions reveals that among the Asante there is 'ritual violence', which is gendered but religion and gender based violence should not always be interpreted from the perspective of power relations of inequality and exploitation of women as feminists theorists often see it. Rather, among the Asante religion pays attention to the protection of women from violence. The ambiguity is that while in one instance religion protects women because of its understanding of femininity, in certain instances it exploits violently femininity for varying purposes. In the same way masculinity is not spared in this exploitation. Thus, sometimes, it is the idea of what constitutes male and female that largely underpins gender-based violence among the Asante but not because of gender inequalities and exploitation

Source: UCC
Does the new alliance for food security and nutrition impose biotechnology on smallholder farmers in Africa?

Almost one in three people who live in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are hungry, higher than anywhere else. This magnitude of food insecurity coupled with slow progress in regional integration, disease and epidemics, poor access to markets, gender disparities, lack of land tenure rights, and governance and institutional shortcomings on the continent have been used to justify a narrative for the inclusion of biotechnology in smallholder agriculture in SSA. The fact, however, suggests that even in the face of these challenges, smallholder farmers in SSA still produce 70% of the food on the continent. We critically examine the introduction of biotechnology in smallholder farming within the context of the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition and public–private partnerships in SSA. We explicitly address the bioethical concerns and implications for technology adoption goals in line with a neoliberal economic model that is encouraging smallholder farmers to adopt biotechnology as a way to secure more food for communities. This paper is not meant to pose a simplistic pro or anti stance on genetically modified (GM) crops or biotechnology, but rather to situate the debate about GM technology within issues of power, control in the global food agriculture systems, and point to the bioethical concerns that affect the lives of smallholder farmers and their families on a daily basis

Source: UCC
Does water saving irrigation improve the quality of fruits and vegetables? Evidence from meta analysis

Water productivity has become a key requirement in sustainable crop production and environmental management. Defcit irrigation (DI) and partial root-zone drying irrigation (PRDI) are two strategies that have been exploited to maximize crop production per unit water, with attendant efect on the quality attributes of harvest index. We employed meta-analysis to synthesize evidence for the relative performance of full irrigation (FI), DI and PRDI for three quality attributes of fruits and vegetables, namely, total soluble solids (TSS), titratable acidity (TA) and pH. Overall, TSS, TA and pH of crops under DI and PRDI do not difer signifcantly. However, TSS in crops under DI and PRDI are signifcantly larger than that of crops under FI. DI and PRDI improve TSS by 4.1 ± 1.8% and 5.0 ± 2.0%, respectively, relative to FI. Crops under the three irrigation techniques do not difer signifcantly in TA and pH. The diferences in TSS of crops are contextual, depending on type of crop, soil texture and irrigation frequency. The efect of water-saving irrigation on the selected crop quality attributes may, therefore, have the add-on efects of crop, system and/or site characteristics. Therefore, in terms of quality attributes, water-saving irrigation techniques are superior to FI when considering improvement in TSS without signifcantly altering TA or pH of fruits and vegetables

Source: UCC
Does whatsapp use by female students ruin their morality? The case of junior high school students in Cape Coast Metropolitan, Ghana.

Many different social media platforms exist today. Some are, but not limited to Facebook, Flicker, Twitter, Instagram, Badoo, Skype, and Whatsapp. Of these applications, research has proven that majority of the world’s population patronize the Whatsapp messenger more than the other apps. Secondly, students are noted to be the main patronisers. Nonetheless, since research has proven that students are the main subscribers to Whatsapp use globally, there is the need to examine the effects associated with its use. In this regard, the question the paper raises is, does Whatsapp use by JHS female students ruin their morality or moral life? The findings of the paper inform its conclusion that the use of Whatsapp by Junior High School female students negatively affects their morality/moral foundations. This is because the paper revealed that about 90% of the Junior High School female students who use Whatsapp mostly exchange pornographic materials, abusive contents and engage in unhealthy acts (e.g. phone sex) with their peers who are online. The consumption of these contents has introduced them to the practice of some social vices of which they were naïve about before their contact with the app

Source: UCC
Domain suppression in the negative differential conductivity region of carbon nanotubes by applied ac electric field

We study theoretically the electron transport properties in achiral carbon nanotubes under the influence of an external electric field E(t) using Boltzmann’s transport equation to derive the current-density. A negative differential conductivity (NDC) is predicted in quasi-static approximation i.e., ωτ << 1, similar to that observed in superlattice. However, a strong enhancement in the current density intensity is observed in NDC of the achiral carbon nanotubes. This is observed at where the constant electric field E0 is equal to the amplitude of the AC electric field E1. The peak of the NDC intensity occurs at very weaker fields than that of superlattice under the same conditions. The peak intensity decreases and shifts to right with the increase in the amplitude of the ac field. This mechanism suppresses the domain formation and therefore could be used in terahertz frequency generation

Source: UCC
Domestic health hazards of the elderly resident in Cape Coast metropolis

This study is a cross-sectional survey conducted in the Cape Coast Metropolis in the Central Region of Ghana in 2013 among 308 adults who were 65 years and above. The main objective was to investigate the domestic health hazards of the elderly with structured interview schedule. The descriptive analysis revealed that 64% of the sample had medium level of awareness on Domestic Health hazard (DHH) and fire source was the leading DHH (63.0%). It was also revealed that the elderly suffered stumbling within the last 12 months (39.6%). Bathroom was also found to be the most harmful location at home among 12.0% of the elderly while 56.8% suggested education as a means to reduce DHH. The inferential statistics revealed that one’s level of education had moderately positive association, with level of awareness of domestic hazards recording (r = 0.311, p < 0.05). There was also a moderately positive significant association (r = 0.426, p < 0.05) between number of hazards and number of accidents suffered. Relevant theories on ageing and accidents were reviewed and these led to the theoretical contributions to knowledge. Both person theory and dominion theory explained why the elderly suffered accidents at home and these have led to policy issues by the government. The study suffers some limitations in its choice of research area, the design, and instrumentation. There were suggestions made on preventing DHH and the accidents through structural home modifications and education on home dangers to the entire family.

Source: UCC
Domestic savings and economic growth in Ghana

This study investigates the relationship between domestic savings and economic growth in Ghana using quarterly time series data from 1983 to 2012. The study adopted the quantitative research design under the positivist philosophy to address the research objectives. Whereas domestic savings was measured by gross domestic savings to GDP ratio, economic growth was measured by real GDP per capita. Employing the Johansen’s Cointegration within the vector autoregressive and vector error correction framework and Granger causality approaches, the results revealed a positive long run relationship between domestic savings and economic growth. The results of the forecast error variance decomposition indicated that the most important variable for economic growth besides its own shock was money supply. The source of least forecast error variance of real GDP per capita is the innovations of consumer price index throughout the short-term, medium-term and long-term horizons. Also, there was unidirectional causality between domestic savings and economic growth. It is therefore recommended that the government should encourage people to save in order to boost investment for increased economic growth.

Source: UCC
Donor aid and private investment: Their interplay with media development

Media development requires substantial funding, and therefore, donors, foreign governments, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and foundations have found a way to play an influential role through their financial support. However, it appears that the donors are also fighting a losing battle considering the rapidly changing political-economic structures of contemporary society spearheaded by the very private sector they enhanced. This study generally presents a systematic review of “foreign aid” to Africa as a base “to explore how donor funders and private investment impact media functions.” The work also sheds light on the extent to which donor support impacted the governance system within the media political economy of Africa. It establishes that donors, who are the very saviors, are also a threat to media freedom because they set the agenda for content, resulting in undue influence on the type of stories that are told. As a result, media development becomes constricted

Source: UCC
Double burden of malnutrition: increasing overweight and obesity and stall underweight trends among Ghanaian women

Background: Overweight and obesity are among the leading causes of mortality globally, and although previously they were mostly prevalent in developed countries, recent scanty evidence suggests that overweight and obesity in developing countries have reached high levels. rends in overweight/obesity (BMI ≥ 25 kg/m2 ) and underweight (BMI < 18 kg/m2 ) from 1993 to 2008 and associated factors were explored among 15 to 49 years old women in Ghana. Methods: Nationally representative data were used from four Demographic and Health Surveys conducted in Ghana in 1993 (n = 4562), 1998 (n = 4843), 2003 (n = 5691) and 2008 (n = 4916). he data were analysed using logistic regression. Results: Over all, underweight increased by 28.57 % (from 10.5 %, 95 % confidence interval (CI) = 9.61–11.39 in 1993 to 7.5 %, 95 % CI = 6.76–8.24 in 2008) and 134.85 % increase in overweight and obesity (from 13.2 %, 95 % CI = 12.22–14.18 in 1993 to 31 %, 95 % CI = 29.71–32.29 in 2008) over the fifteen year period were found. Overweight was much more common in urban women (36.8 %, 95 % CI = 35.78–37.82) compared to rural women (15.6 %, 95 % CI = 14.93–16.27). Women of urban residents were more likely of being overweight (OR = 1.43, 95 % CI = 1.25–1.63) but less likely to be underweight (odds ratio (OR) = 0.33, 95 % CI = 0.30–0.36) compared to those of rural residents. Furthermore, older age, higher education, multi-parity and being rich were associated with overweight/obesity among Ghanaian women. Conclusion: Overweight and obesity are becoming a common phenomenon among Ghanaian women while underweight still remains a problem. Our study demonstrates an emerging double burden of malnutrition among Ghanaian women. Promotion of physical activity and encouraging healthy dietary habits are urgently needed to curtail obesity and overweight trends while underweight among rural women, those without higher education and those with lower wealth index can be improved through poverty reduction measures

Source: UCC
Down regulation of Runx3 is closely related to the decreased Th1-associated factors in patients with gastric carcinoma

Abstract Runt-related transcription factor 3 (Runx3) is a tumor-suppressor gene and lays an important role in immune regulation, whose reduced expression may lay an important role in the development and progression of gastric carcinoma. The aim of this study was to investigate the role ofRunx3 on the levels of transcription factors in patients with gastric carcinoma and analyze the relationship between the expression ofRunx3 and Th1-type cytokines in peripheral loud mononuclear cells (PBMCs). Our results showed that the expression levels ofRunx3,T-bet, and IFN-γ in patients with gastric carcinoma were obviously lower than those in control groups, and there was a positive correlation between the expression ofRunx3 and T-betor IFN-γ in patients (p<0.01). In order to further confirm this result, the Runx3 gene was constructed into IRES2-eGFP and the recombined plasmid was transfected into SGC-7901 cells with liposome in vitro, the results obtained from the reverse transcription PCR indicated that the mRNA of Runx3,T-bet, or IFN-γ was significantly upregulated individually in Runx3 gene transfected SGC-7901 cells. It suggested that the Runx3 and Th1-associated factors including T-betand IFN-γ synchronization declines in gastric carcinoma may contribute to the development of cancer

Source: UCC