Social Studies

The globalisation of entities has meant that innovative ideas need to be implemented in order for businesses to grow but also to reduce costs thereby affecting the profit margins positively.Technology has advanced to such a degree that it has increased the capability to process more demanding algorithms for both video and audio technologies. This study is intended to enable a deeper insight into the adoption and diffusion patterns of Video Conferencing (VC) technologies within a public sector company, Company X, with a focus on the factors that impact users perceived quality and trust as well as the intended use of this technology. It is for this reason that the focus of the study is to analyse the adoption and diffusion patterns of the new technology of VC in Company X.Data was gathered with the use of both quantitative (questionnaire) and qualitative (interview) with a sample of 180 employees and three middle managers respectively. In addition, observations were conducted over a period of three weeks to triangulate data that was collected. The study established that users adopted and diffused technology to a limited degree.Use of the technology was between 1 to 5 hours each week predominantly for meetings. The participants also mentioned that travel time is saved, hence there was more personal time and also more time gained for the completion of collaboration tasks more quickly. However, some staff preferred the face to face approach during meetings. The majority indicated that using the facility during VC was complicated and at time disruptive due to insufficient training. Based on the results of the primary study and literature, recommendations were formulated for management.

This study tries to investigate why some Persian learners have difficulty in learning certain structures of English language. To answer this question, a general proficiency test was administered to a total of 98 female high school students who were at intermediate level at English language institutes, with the same level and age, out of which 46 participants whose scores ranged from 65-85 out of 100 were chosen as the Intermediate Level. The instruments used in the study consist of a Translation test and participants' PET scores. In order to do this, the translation test administered to the participants included one aspect of grammatical errors which were predicted to be problematic parts of learning. That is, the participants were required to translate 50 Persian sentences into English and then the erroneous parts were determined. A hierarchy of difficulty was developed, to determine the level of difficulty of using English 11 grammatical items namely, using the wrong preposition, infinitive, tense, un-English expressions, incorrect omissions and etc, for Iranian Intermediate participants. After that, the number of errors on each grammatical item in the test was counted. Then by use of descriptive and inferential statistics (Independent Samples T-test, Pearson correlation and Friedmantest) were applied to analyze. The results indicated that L1 grammar negative transfer does affect L2 writing skill (translation in English) among Iranian EFL learners. In conclusion, the study demonstrates that we would probably be able to enhance the L2 writing skill of Iranian EFL learners by drawing the EFL learner's attention to those problematic areas of L2 and so L1 negative transfer would be, to some extent, reduced. In addition, the findings show that L2 teachers, can probably be successful in their teaching and can have successful learners as well.

Slums are the expression of poverty, group inequality and social exclusion (Slums of the World-2003). Slums are distributed throughout the Srinagar city. Clustering was done to study the socio-economic attributes of slums in Srinagar city. These clusters show inequality in social and economic conditions due to marginalized location. The present paper attempts to examine the socio-economic setting of slums in Srinagar city.

This paper examines the causal relationship between energy consumption, economic growth and prices evidence from Pakistan by using the annual time series data from 1980 to 2011. Co-integration, Engle Granger test and Error correction techniques are used to achieve the objective. The empirical results of co-integration test shows that energy consumption and economic growth are cointegrated. In addition, causality test results reveal that there is a short-run and long-run Granger causality running from economic growth to energy consumption for Pakistan. The empirical results of this study provide policy makers a better understanding of energy consumption-economic growth relationship to formulate energy policies in Pakistan. In this study, economic growth cause energy consumption, it suggests that the implementation of energy conservation policies may be implemented with little or no adverse effect on economic growth. Therefore, there is relatively more scope for energy conservation measures as a feasible policy in Pakistan.

The study of test fairness is of crucial importance in the context of standardized high-stakes tests used to make selection decisions at different levels, for different purposes and across different groups of test takers. Fairness must be ensured in every stage of test development: from test design stage through the research stage (Kunnan, 2008). Researchers are particularly concerned about the possibility that standardized high-stakes tests may be used inappropriately to make score-based interpretations and decisions, which may introduce unfair consequences to different groups of test takers. These concerns have increased social and educational demands, subjecting these tests to rigorous validation research. This paper seeks to expand research in the area of test fairness. To this end, an argument-based approach to test fairness, developed by Xi (2010), is adopted to investigate the degree of fairness of standardized high-stakes tests of IELTS based on the inference of Domain definition. This article is derived from a larger study and reports the second phase of that investigation.

This paper has investigated the relationship between the oil prices and the real exchange rate in Iran from 1980-2013. The result of the Johansen cointegration test illustrates a long run equilibrium relationship between the real oil prices and the real exchange rate. This relationship is supported by the Granger Causality test which determines the causal relationship from the oil prices to the Real Exchange Rate. The result of the Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity test (GARCH) suggests persistency of the volatility between the oil prices and the real exchange rate. These findings consider the implications for policy maker to stabilize the fluctuations of the real exchange rate. Therefore, these findings can be beneficial for formulating and implementing economic policies.

The cyber security threat in Pakistan is a rising issue, Because of incompatible cyber security parametrized; it is enhancing more challenges for Pakistan. As Pakistan is quickly expending its resilience on cyberspace, in the similar way it is not securing its digital networks. That’s why the national infrastructure of Pakistan is also losing its strength. Now it has becomes a national security threat for Pakistan so here Pakistan really needs a proper cyber secure mechanism for the protection of her national security.

The purpose of the present paper is to deal with the economic effects of gasoline subsidy on government expenditures in Iran's. To do so, we have used time series data for the period 1971-2004 and concentrated on the ordinary least square (OLS) method to estimate the relevant regression models. The results show that there has been a positive and significance relation between gasoline subsidy and government expenditures during the period under consideration .In order to alleviate the burden of gasoline subsidy on government budget, it is suggested that government emphasize on policies to reduce the gasoline subsidy which is mainly benefited the upper income bracket of the countries and move towards the guided subsidies. Also the economic liberalization and promotion of private sector introduced in Iran 4th economic plan needs more reliable support from all policy makers of the country.

Investing in education is imperative in this knowledge based economy to sustain a competitive edge. As we are aware, the higher education level is a significant factor for a long term economic growth. To ensure students’ are well equipped with the foundation for a higher level, a proper transition from primary right up to tertiary is crucial. In retrospect, poor achievement in higher learning institution has been an invariable issue and has drawn the attention of the higher learning institution, especially in numerical subjects like the College Mathematics. Although research of the higher learning institution places emphasis on classroom intervention to enhance students’ achievement, a study in the phenomenon from the perspective of course setting of the high school level mathematics education as reason behind poor performance in college is also vital. The aim of this study was to investigate the influence of students’ performance in high school Mathematics on students’ academic performance in College Mathematics. The respondents of this study were the students from a private college. This study revealed that performance in high school Mathematics has an association with student’s performance in College Mathematics, while gender and medium of study act as moderators.

The world system is inclined to redistribution of capabilities within the international, state or even the individual levels, especially, in the aftermath of major events that necessarily alter the status quo. Power is fungible especially in the international system, so the US decline as a super power economically can be translated into a decline in other forms of power especially military might. Therefore, the claim that the US is becoming the first among equals becomes more realistic. The World system is witnessing the emergence of powers aiming at rearrangement of the world system into a multipolar framework, it is not possible for the United States to unilaterally exercise the world political decision as in the aftermath of the end of the cold war and the absence of the Soviet Union from the scene. The big powers have high political weight that cannot be ignored, surpassed, especially the "BRICS" group