Archives-April 2012

Studying feelings and emotions that people develop towards places is getting increased attention, while the concept of place attachment lies at the heart of these studies. This concept is sited within the realm of environmental meaning and association. Place attachment usually is described as a connection that occurs between people and their meaningful settings. This paper will review and analyze the existing seminal literature in place attachment as one of the prevailing concepts among place-based researches. Considering dimensions of place attachment has always been beneficial for investigating the factors that influence people-place relationships. Therefore, in this paper first the concept of place attachment and its characteristics will be examined afterward the psychological dimensions of place attachment will be reviewed and finally methods to measure Place attachment will be described.

The study examines the various myths and misconception about HIV/AIDS in Wudil local community kano, Nigeria. Focus Group Discussion (FGD) and questionnaire administrations were undertaken to gather data for the study. It was discovered that the people of the area believed that sharing food and cloth, among other things, with an infected person as well as insect bite can lead to HIV/AIDS infections. The people required enlightenment on the mode of transmission of the disease, the need for knowing one’s status and the means of protecting oneself from being infected with the disease. It was suggested, among other things, that constant counseling on HIV/AIDS should be accorded to the members of the community.

This paper aims to look at the issue of motivation, attitudes and behaviour as well as organization culture role in technology acceptance within the public sector organizations. Studies of technology acceptance and resistance have hinted at the importance of organization culture and the cognitive and physiological states of employees to the performance of organizations. It is argued that the public organizations today face the dilemma of managing technology acceptance. Resistance to technology was an essential factor to be considered in any changes process, since a proper management of resistance is the key for change success or failure. This provide a review and discussion on the relationship between the obstacles exist towards technology acceptance that has been neglected by the management The proposed idea would practically improve the implementation of technology acceptance in public sector organizations and reveal the obstacles exist in implementing organizational change through technology acceptance.

This study sought to assess the adequacy and appropriateness of the contents for the attainment of the NCE Physics curriculum objectives. The study covered 24 Colleges of Education and 60 lecturers. Both descriptive and inferential statistical techniques were used to analyze the data gathered in the study. The results showed that the contents of the NCE Physics curriculum are adequate and appropriate for the attainment of the stated objectives. It was recommended that sufficient courses and periods are allocated to practical lessons and laboratory management adequately.

Nigeran medicinal plants (Acanthospermum hispidum DC, Emilia coccinea (Sims) G. Don and Euphobia heterophylla) were analysed for their chemical composition. Phytochemical screening indicates the presence of saponins (0.22 to 0.37 mg/100g), flavonoids (0.96 to 1.87 mg/100g), alkaloids (1.52 to 1.71 mg/100g), phenols (1.07 to 1.55 mg/100g) and tannins (0.06 to 0.37 mg/100g). The medicinal plants contained ascorbic acid (24.35 to 31.79 mg/100g), riboflavin (0.04 to 0.31 mg/100g), thiamin (0.20 to 0.22 mg/100g) and niacin (0.08 to 0.10 mg/100g). These herbs are good sources of minerals such as Ca, P, K, Mg, Na, Fe and Zn. The plants gave appreciable antimicrobial activities in vitro against both gram-negative and gram-positive microorganisms with the zone of inhibition values ranging between (16.00mm – 32.00mm) and (11.00mm – 22.00mm) respectively. The importance of these chemical constituents is discussed with respect to the role of these herbs in ethnomedicine in Nigeria.

The modern critical analysis of Bose–Einstein and Fermi–Dirac statistics is proposed. Methodological basis of analysis is the unity of formal logic and rational dialectics. It is shown that Bose–Einstein and Fermi–Dirac statistics – as consequence of Bose's erroneous method – contain logical errors. The main error is that Bose–Einstein and Fermi–Dirac distribution functions contain chemical potential. It is proved that chemical potential is identically equal to zero because the concept of chemical potential is contrary to the concept of temperature. There exist the only one correct statistics in statistical physics: Gibbs statistics.

A profitable banking sector is better able to withstand negative shocks and contribute to the stability of the financial system. The importance of bank profitability can be appraised at the micro and macro levels of the economy. At the micro level, profit is determined by bank’s management decisions and policy objectives, while the macroeconomic determinants look at variables that reflect the economic and legal environment where the credit institution operates. Bank profitability, typically measured by the return on assets (ROA) and/or the return on equity (ROE), and/or net interest margin (NIM) is usually expressed as a function of internal and external determinants. These issues engaged the minds of the authors in this paper. Industry related dataset that covers a 10year period of time was used. The regression results indicate that bank-specific characteristics and macroeconomic variables explain up to 97.4% variations in bank profitability when NIM was used as a dependent variable. Summarily, profitability was found to be associated with well-capitalised banks as capital ratio has a positive significant relationship with NIM; bank size has a negative but significant relationship with NIM; Asset composition has a positive but an insignificant relationship with NIM; Liquidity has a negative and insignificant relationship with NIM; all the macroeconomic variables apart from inflation have a negative and insignificant relationship with NIM. Therefore, the study recommends that regulatory authorities should promote policies that will bring about low inflation and stable economic output growth, whereas, bank managements should concentrate more on cost and non-performing loans reduction and asset composition diversification.

The dried calyces of Hibiscus sabdariffa L., have gained importance as local soft drink and medical herb in Ghana. There are speculations it has anti-cancer property, and that the decoction is better than the infusion. In view of these the Total Phenolic and Flavonoid content of both preparations was investigated. The decoction method gave the highest % yield of crude extract (76%) and of total flavonoid content (5887.5?g QE/g) while the infusion method gave the highest TPC value (46.123mg GAE/g). Also higher values of TPC and TFC were obtained from the S. samples compare to the B. samples. All the TFC values obtained from the decoction method were higher than the infusion values. Out of the 8 samples, TPC values of 3 (Kaneshie.S, Madina.S, and Nima.B) of the decoction method were lower than that of infusion. As flavonoids play vital role in scavenging free radicals in organisms, the decoction process can be recommended. Since the differences in the decoction and infusion’s data are not big, both preparations can be used.

The physicochemical parameters of the Nypa fruticans ( Nypa palm) frond and petiole have been determined. The fibre dimensions determined were: fibre length, fibre diameter, cell wall thickness, lumen diameter, slenderness ratio, flexibility ratio and Runkel ratio. Chemical composition determined were lignin contents, cellulose contents and the ash contents. Soluble contents were also determined. Petiole contained more water soluble than the frond but the frond contained more 1% NaOH soluble. The solubles in 1:2 ethanol-benzene were of the same order for both samples. Soda pulps were produced at the pulping temperature of 120oC using 8% and 12% NaOH as cooking liquors at the pulping time of 30 and 60min. The pulps obtained were characterized by determining the pulp yield and residual Klason lignin. Pulp yield and residual Klason lignin decreased with increase in the concentration of the pulping liquor and the cooking time. These results obtained indicate that Nypa fruticans frond and petiole left as waste in Nigeria can be exploited for the production of commercial pulps for several industrial applications.

Entrepreneurship is the professional application of knowledge, skills and competencies and/or of monetizing a new idea, by an individual or a set of people by launching an enterprise. Given the increasing significance and visible impact of Entrepreneurship in wealth-creation and employment-generation, entrepreneurship is considered as critical to India’s growth and development (NKC-2008). This study was undertaken to explore factors that have advanced Entrepreneurship in youth of India. The paper highlights the perception of youth towards entrepreneurship as a career. The paper also points out the realities of gap between students’ learning about entrepreneurship in B-schools and ending up being entrepreneurs.