431 research outputs found
Stewards of Social Justice: conversation with Sana Loue
No full textThis series entitled “Stewards of Social Justice” spotlights faculty, staff and students of Case Western Reserve University who are actively engaged in the advancement of the University-wide Social Justice Institute. Sana Loue, J.D., PhD, M.P.H., M.S.S.A, Professor and Director of the Center for Minority Public Health at Case Western Reserve University, School of Medicine, whose areas of expertise include HIV risk, family violence, mental illness, research ethics and forensic epidemiology and the author or and editor of more than 25 books and more than 75 peer-reviewed manuscripts, discusses how her responsibility interface with the goals and objectives of the Case Western Reserve University Social Justice Institute where she serves as a member of the Leadership Team
Sana Sana: A Latinx Health Magazine
No full textabstract: With the Latinx community anticipated to make up ~30% of the population by 2060, it will be crucial more than ever to mitigate the health disparities preventing them from equitable well-being. From a higher prevalence of obesity to better understanding mental health, there exists a myriad of challenges imposed against the community; however, its largest barrier is American hegemony. This is because their biases have exacerbated the public health system, preventing one from accessing their right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. As a result, intervention goals, most commonly through educational settings, fail to be met. One of the worst results: poor health literacy rates. Without proper health literacy skills, individuals lack the knowledge required to best manage their health. Unfortunately, the Latinx community is reported to have fewer strengths in terms of this; hence, Sana Sana was created. Through this magazine, the project intends to increase general healthy literacy, improve health trajectories, and promote overall well-being amongst Latino adolescents
A risk worth taking: Studying content moderation on social media platforms
No full textWhile social media platforms choose to identify themselves as neutral platforms, there is growing complexity around the ways to analyze their structure, operational dynamics as well as the regulatory frameworks which must accompany. Guest author Sana Ahmad researches the content moderation industry in India
Green synthesized ZnO-Fe2O3-Co3O4 nanocomposite for antioxidant, microbial disinfection and degradation of pollutants from wastewater.
No full textMicrobial resistance, industrial and agricultural wastes are the major concerning problems of today’s world. Herein is a highly efficient incubated ZnO–Fe2O3–Co3O4 nanocomposite derived from Cordia myxa through a green chemistry approach. UV–visible spectroscopy (UV–Vis) was confirmed the peak on 508 and 387 with the
energy bandgap of 2.2eV for I-NC. X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) revealed the diffraction pattern of incubated nanocomposites (I-NC) that ZnO showed hexagonal, while Co3O4 and Fe2O3 showed cubic structure. SEM analyses show the patterns comprising the crystal morphology of flower-ZnO, agglomerated Fe2O3 spongy rhombohedral Co3O4. The results of antibacterial activity show that the I-NC have a greater value of zone of inhibition (ZOI) against bacterial strains than NC, with the highest percentage in this trend P-aeruginosa94%>Saureus91%>K-pneumonia89%>E-coli87%>P-vulgaris81%. The photocatalytic activity data showed that the Methylene Blue, Methyl Orange, Rhodamine-B, P-Nitroaniline, and Cresol Red dyes were degraded in the presence of INC catalysts after sunlight irradiation. The degradation efficiencies of I-NC show the trend Methylene Blue (99.98%) > P-Nitroaniline (99.97%) > Rhodamine-B (99.86%) > Cresol Red (99.80%) > Methyl Orange (99.6%). This study reported that the use of the Cordia myxa for the formulation of incubated nanocomposite could be employed as a novel antibacterial agent to inhibit bacterial growth and biofilm formation and photocatalytic agent
Essays on the adoption of sustainable innovation and sustainable behavior
Get PDFThe overall motivation of this research is to understand the adoption of sustainable innovations and sustainable behavior, with a focus on sustainable mobility-related behaviors.
Contrary to the organizational adoption, research on consumer adoption investigates the determinants of adoption/non-adoption without considering the innovation-decision as a process. Hence, the first chapter aims to explore the existence of distinct stages and identify different determinants of each stage of sustainable innovation adoption. A sustainable technology, namely alternative engine cars (AECs) is selected as an empirical setting. Data is collected through an online survey in two different steps. The results from the first survey (N=110) confirmed the existence of five distinct stages namely knowledge, persuasion, decision, implementation, and confirmation in line with Rogers' (2003) consumer adoption process. Based on these results, further data was collected (N=246) in order to identify different determinants of each of these stages. Different determinants in terms of perceived innovation characteristics of AECs were analyzed using a structural model. The study contributes by confirming the existence of distinct stages and developing a framework which not only determines the direction but also the strength of the relationships between different determinants and adoption stages.
In the second chapter, the author submits that particularly for sustainable innovations, value proposition innovation (VPI) is salient since it is generally assumed that these technologies create value, yet customers fail to appreciate this value. Therefore, the research aims to answer how can a value proposition be innovated and how can VPI increase the attractiveness of sustainable technologies which otherwise are hard to diffuse? The author studied the case of a novel sustainable technology, namely vehicle-to-grid (V2G) and adopted a mixed-method approach building on two focus groups (N=8) and online experts surveys from Dutch sustainable car enthusiasts (N=54). The results suggest that value propositions increase new technologies attractiveness by (re)configuring different bundle of attributes according to values expressed by customer segments. The results suggest that VPI provides a solution to accelerate the diffusion of new technologies suffering from lock-in.
The third chapter argues that a successful shift to sustainable travel modes does not solely depend on regulatory and technology push, as it should rather focus on changing individual behaviors as well. Hence, it is vital to understand the key drivers of such travel mode choices. Although there is a vast literature on the topic, the results are still inconsistent and inconclusive. Hence, the study aims to systematically analyze and synthesize the findings in the literature by examining the predictive capability of psychological and behavioral correlates of both, actual behavior and behavioral intention. A meta-analysis was conducted followed by moderator analyses of 58 primary studies. Results suggest that besides intentions, habits and past use represent the most relevant predictor of behavior, followed by constructs referring to the Theory of Planned Behavior framework. Environmental variables play a relevant role in shaping behavioral intentions but not actual behaviors, signaling a deep intention-behavior gap. The moderator analysis confirm that behaviors’ operationalization and measurement in primary studies causes heterogeneity in outcomes the most, above trip purpose, sample type and year of the study, while location does not appear as a relevant moderator. These results have theoretical as well as practical implications
Sunar Factory: investment opportunity and a financing dilemma
No full textIn May 2018, Jawwad Karim, owner of Sunar Factory, was con sidering purchasing an X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) Gold Testing Machine for his small jewelry store in Saddar, Karachi. Karim would be the first jeweler in the city to use an XRF machine to certify the gold content of the jewelry for his customers and expected to attract a large volume of jewelry buyback transac tions by promoting the same. With the price charged for the testing service and the buy-sell gold price difference earned, Karim believed that the investment presented an opportunity for him to reap high cash flows in the near future. While the idea to purchase the XRF machine seemed attractive, Karim had yet to perform the feasibility analysis to go ahead with the investment. Furthermore, arranging funds for the investment seemed more difficult. Since Karim\u27s ongoing jewelry-making business earned enough income to cover his personal expenses, a major portion of financing would have tc come from an external source. Karim had been exploring the possible sources of financing and had to select the alternative that offered the best combination of benefits and costs
UNEXPECTED QUARTERLY EARNINGS ANNOUNCEMENTS, FIRM SIZE, AND STOCK PRICE REACTION
Get PDFThis study exami nes the stock price react ion to theunexpected quarterly earnings announcements made by listed firmsin Pakistan using the data of 433 announcements made by 264 firmsfor a 2-year period from 2010 to 2011.Empirical results show that theunexpected quarterly earnings announcements do not have anysignificant price reaction in the Pakistani market. Positive andnegative abnormal returns are observed for firms making favorableand unfavorable earning announcements, respectively; but thesereturns are not statistically significant. Moreover, the study finds thatt he pri c e re act i on t o t he une x pe c t e d quart e rl y e arni ngsannouncement is not related to the size of the fir
Investment behavior during COVID pandemic: An evidence from emerging Asian Markets
No full textThis study investigates the investor behavior in Asian emerging markets during the COVID pandemic period and assesses the asymmetric patterns and the influence of global and regional return dynamics on local investor behavior. It uses daily firm-level data from January 2001 to December 2020 for nine Asian emerging countries: China, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, Philippines, Taiwan and Thailand to estimate the impact of extreme price movements, market liquidity and US and Chinese market returns on local return dispersions using a non-linear specification. The findings indicate that rational price behavior prevailed in all markets over the COVID period. Though herding manifested itself occasionally during the low trading volume days in the pandemic period; overall, herd formation was not observed conditioned on domestic or non-domestic factors. Infact, our comparison of pre-COVID and COVID periods shows a significant shift in investment behavior away from herding and in favor of market efficiency for emerging markets of China, India and Korea. The findings on prevalence of rational price behavior are unique and reflective of improved informational environment in Asian emerging markets
Beta stationarity and estimation period: Evidence from Pakistan\u27s equity market
No full textThis study examines the stability of individual stock beta coefficients over time and its link with the length of estimation periods. Using data for 325 stocks from Pakistan for the period 1999 to 2012, I show that beta coefficients are not stable on average but become more stable as the estimation period increases. This suggests that longer estimation periods should be used for predicting future beta coefficients. JEL Classification: G12, G2
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