52 research outputs found
X-efficiency Analysis of Commercial Banks in Pakistan: A Preliminary Investigation
No full textThe emergence of a fast-paced dynamic environment in the business world in general, and in the financial services sector in particular, has highlighted the significance of competition and efficiency. The need for deregulation has become a touchstone of success in fostering both competition and efficiency especially in the economies, which are exposed to structural reforms. In addition to that, intense competition both among domestic and foreign banks, rapid speed of innovations and introduction of new financial instruments, changing consumer’s demands and desire for product augmentation have changed the way a bank conducts business and services its customers. Larger the degree of competition, it is perceived that the firms would become more efficient. However, when the structure of an industry is product of the government regulations, the degree of competition is impaired markedly implying that the efficiency suffers negatively. Banking industry acts as life-blood of modern trade and commerce acting as a bridge to provide a major source of financial intermediation. Thus, appraisal of its efficiency is vital in context of an efficient and competitive financial system. Study of x-efficiency is believed to be important in particular as Berger, et al. (1993) found that x-inefficiencies account for around 20 percent or more of banking costs. Similarly, recent drive among banks towards downsizing, rightsizing and rationalisation of banking costs also implicates for the assessment of x-efficiency analysis of banks. It becomes vital in Pakistani context as there appears to be no study in literature on efficiency or x-efficiency analysis of banks in Pakistan. “A great deal more work is needed on x-efficiency research in banking. Managerial efficiency, the concept of x-efficiency, appears to be a much more important strategic and policy consideration” [Molyneux, et al. (1960), p. 273]. Given
SUICIDE GENE THERAPY OF PROSTATE CANCER : ADENOVIRAL MEDIATED HERPES SIMPLEX VIRUS THYMIDINE KINASE GENE TRANSDUCTIONAND GANCICLOVIR THERAPY
No full textAssessing the impact of regulation on bank cost efficiency
No full textThe author finds that the bank production process was significantly distorted during a period typically associated with heavy industry regulation. As deregulation occurred, banks fully exploited the cost advantages associated with size and reaped significant gains from technological change. Efficiency significantly improved with deregulation.Banks and banking - Costs ; Bank supervision
Varieties as the Starting Point of Second Language Acquisition: Focus on Irish English in Teaching and Learning German
No full textThe subject matter of the present paper is Irish English as the starting point of
teaching and learning German as a second language. This symbiosis of the study of
the varieties of English and the study of second language acquisition (SLA) adds an
aspect to the latter which has been widely neglected. Second language teaching usually
starts with a look at the unfamiliar features in the target language (L2) and then
focuses on their dissimilarities with familiar features in the mother tongue (L1).
Moulton (1968) states:
When a Student sets out to learn a new language, he is willing – intellectually –
to accept the fact that it is different and that he must learn some new and unfamiliar
sounds to speak it properly. At the same time, he is so imprisoned within the
world of his native English that learning these new sounds can be a very formidable
task indeed (Moulton 1968: 2).
With this statement Moulton complies with the common view at the time
which originated in the contrastive analysis hypothesis (Lado 1957). Foreign sounds
were claimed to be difficult to acquire due to their dissimilarity with L1 sounds.
However, as will be discussed in the course of the present paper, this view changed
over time. Flege (1995) postulates that L2 sounds are fitted into L1 categories
through equivalence classifications and that L2 sounds which are similar but not
identical with L1 sounds actually pose more difficulties to learners than totally different
ones (Flege 1995: 239; Siegel 2010: 141). Irish English and Irish as the starting
point of the acquisition of German will serve as an example to put these approaches
into a real-life perspective.
Why is Irish English highlighted here? Usually, the subject matter of the process
of SLA are the mother tongue (L1) and the target language (L2), which would
be English and German in this case. Nonetheless, if we take into account that there
are over 350 million native speakers of English in over 40 countries in the world,
we arrive at a wide range of national and even regional dialects with their individual
L1 sound categories. In other words, native speakers from Australia or England
will find the German vocalic realisation of /r/ after vowels rather unproblematic as
this feature exists in their own varieties. Learners from Ireland or the USA, by contrast,
have to overcome their muscular habit of pronouncing a retroflex sound instead.
Another example are the allophones of /l/. People from Ireland sound a nuance
more German by nature as Irish English knows the German-like alveolar /l/
in all positions, whereas English English shows strong velarisation after long vowels
in Scottish and American English show it in all positions.
With these examples the present author aimed to introduce the concept of native
varieties as the starting point of SLA. The coming section will accommodate a
contrastive description of selected phonemes in Irish1, Irish English2 and German.
This will be followed in section 2 by an overview of relevant theoretical approaches
in SLA taking into account the previously listed sound features. The paper will
come full circle in section 3, as these approaches will help us to position the linguistic
framework of Ireland in teaching German as an L2
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