Archives-May 2015

Earnings management is a kind of management which uses accounting techniques to meet the executives needs for earnings; it is a widely debated topic, hence it is worth looking at. Experts and professionals in this area found many approaches to detect the earnings management; within these approaches are the accrual-based models which include the modified Jones model, which currently is a favourite model to many researchers. The issue of earnings management has always been an anxiety for the reliability of published accounting reports. In emerging markets, like India due to their relatively weak legal enforcement capabilities, earnings management issue is more universally practiced. The objective of this study is to investigate whether Indian companies adopting international standards (i.e., International Financial Reporting Standards or IFRS) have higher earnings quality compared to non-adopting companies and are less likely to smooth earnings and engage in earnings management with an improvement of reporting quality. Our results clearly indicate that the firms adopting IFRS are unable to control the earnings management and thereby improve Earnings Quality in emerging market of India.

The aim of the study was to assess the anxiety, social skills and coping skills of underprivileged children. The objective was to undergo transformation for better adaptability with self and environment by integrating thoughts, feelings and behavior through art. These children were in the age of M- 10.6 years, SD-0.5 and education M-15.06 years, SD- 0.45, from a village in Kharagpur, West Bengal, India. Intellectual functioning of these children was below average in vernacular system of education in their area. Gestalt therapy was applied through art and creative activities to reduce anxiety of children and increase their social and coping skills. In the Experimental group 15 boys and girls were exposed to Gestalt therapy for three months thrice a week. The control group was seen once in a week for the same period which also consisted of 15 boys and girls. Pre and post measures were assessed on Paediatric Anxiety Rating Scale, Social Skills Form and Children’s Coping Behaviour Questionnaire for the assessment of their, anxiety, social and coping skills respectively. Parents and teachers were also involved in the process of assessment and evaluation. Intellectual functioning was assessed through Standard Progressive Matrices. Outcome variables of Paediatric Anxiety Rating Scale suggested reduction in their anxiety and increase in verbal pragmatics and social behaviour following diminution of fear and avoidance as per findings on Social Skills Form. Children’s ameliorative coping augmented than destructive coping in their day to day life. The results showed an improvement in the level of severity of anxiety symptoms and coping strategies – problem solving. The severity of anxiety symptoms showed a decrease by 35%.The coping skills – problem solving improved by 25%.

Seats are one of the most important components of automotives. In recent years, customer expectations for automotive comfort are increasing, and the development of seats that cause little fatigue, even for long distance driving, has been required. Automotive manufacturers recognize comfort as one of the major selling point, as it is thought to play an important role for buyers as well. This literature review incorporates previous studies related to automotive seating comfort and discomfort. It summarizes key literature related to seating design and criteria and reviews comfort issues in automotive seating. The aim of this paper is to describe the measurement methods that are used to improve the physiological comfort of automotive driver’s seat. The paper has 3 sections. First, we explain the nature of sitting comfort and discomfort. Secondly, we describe the subjective and objective measurement methods that are used to evaluate the automotive seat. Thirdly, we propose a methodology for the development of comfortable driver’s seats.

Global warming frightens even the baby in the womb. No one wants to be roasted by sunshine or swept off the earth by tsunami arising from extreme weather events. The sights of such events are frightening. Global warming is daily effects of human civilization. There are several controversies surrounding it. Some positive, while others are negative. Negative impacts means gain, while positive impact means loss. We need more negative than positive impacts for a safe world. This paper reviews the subject matter from the point of boon, pandemic or quagmire.

A non-linear cumulative fatigue model was developed for estimating the fatigue life of high strength aluminum alloy 7049 in high cycle fatigue (HCF) and low cycle fatigue (LCF) regimes with different laser surface coatings. These coatings are water laser peening and the black paint laser peening (bPLP). The results of the application the new non-liner model to the experimental data that the proposed model is quite applicable for interaction cumulative fatigue with laser coating. The paper also indicated that the fatigue limit increased by 2.59 due to bpLp while it reduced by 2.3 due to WLP.The new non linear model showed satisfactory prediction for bpLp cumulative fatigue loading.

In recent years, the development of software and hardware technology has enabled the creation of large amount of digital video content. The innovation being done in multimedia streams from last few years necessitates the development of efficient and more effective methodologies for storing information related to video, audio, text etc. Accessing of content based video data requires segmentation of each video stream into its primary blocks. The general objectives are to segment a given video sequence into its constituent shots, and to identify and classify the different shot transitions in the sequence. The video stream consists of a number of shots, each sequence of frames are represented using a single camera. Switching from one frame to another indicates the transition from a shot to the next one. Therefore, the detection of these transitions, known as scene change or shot boundary detection, is the first step in any video-analysis system. A number of proposed techniques for solving the problem of shot boundary detection exist, but the major challenges to them is Detection of gradual transition and the elimination of disturbances caused by illumination change or fast object and camera motion . The reliability of the scene change detection stage is a very significant requirement because it is the initial stage in any video retrieval system. Thus, its performance has a direct impact on the performance of all other stages. On the other hand, efficiency is also crucial due to the voluminous amounts of information found in video streams. In my research paper, a new robust and efficient algorithm capable of detecting transitions in AVI videos is developed.

Lithium sulphate doped urea thiourea crystals were grown by slow evaporation method at 30 °C. The method of growing 1:3:2 UTLS crystals is explained. The structural studies on the grown crystals were carried out by X-ray diffraction analysis. The grown crystals are found to be in orthorhombic structure and the lattice parameters of pure urea thiourea crystal are a =7.657 Å, b = 8.588 Å and c= 5.485 Å. The lattice parameter is distorted due to the incorporation of lithium ion into the lattice sites of the urea thiourea crystal. The functional groups of the grown crystals have been identified by the Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy. Optical transmittance and thermal stability of the materials were carried out by UV-Vis-NIR and TG/DTA analysis. The nonlinear nature of the crystal is confirmed by SHG test.

The aim of this study is to determine the evaluation level of animation in learning and teaching process and the effect of animation on academic achievement among undergraduate students in School of Applied Physics (PPFG), National University of Malaysia (UKM) by using contemporary Prezi.com software. For the purpose of teaching material, 4 animation models was designed which included 4 core subjects of 1st year students; electric and magnet, thermodynamic, wave and mechanics by using Flash 8 software which was then integrated as hypermedia presentation slide by using Prezi.com software. Lecturer and students can easily access the slide by entering the keywords in the searching engines like Google, Yahoo, Bing and ect. The sample of study involves 61 of 1st year students and 20 of 2nd year students at semester 2 academic session 20132014. Collected survey data forms 81 undergraduate students in PPFG, UKM showed an average of 98% interested in using of animation for learning and teaching. On the other hand 38% of them feel hesitate and worry about the implementation and the use of animation. However, 99% of them still believe that the use of animation can improve their academic achievement. This was proven by the results of tests 1 and 2, pre-test and post-test from the workshop organized which showed an increment in mean average of 3.6 to 7.5 and 2.7 to 5.5.

In this study, heavy metals Lead (Pb), Nickel (Ni), Mercury (Hg), Cadmium (Cd) and Selenium(Se) were determined to assess the pollution level of Opa Dam. The water of the dam and the liver, gills and fillet of six Momyrus rume and six Tilapia zilli were analyzed by AAS. The order of the metals in the water and fillets of (M. rume and T. zilli) were Pb>Ni>Se?Cd>Hg, Ni>Pb>Se?Cd?Hg and Ni>Pb>Se>Cd?Hg. Pb, Ni and Hg were higher above the standard permissible level (EPA2002, WHO2003,WPCL 2004 and SON 2007) in Opa Dam water while nickel was outrageous in the fillet above the FAO,1983 and WHO 1985 limit of heavy metals in fish food. Thus, the dam needs periodical monitoring for the safety of the fish consumers and for water usage.

In this work, Khillah extract was examined as green corrosion inhibitor for zinc in 3.5 % NaCl and 16 ppm solution by using weight loss, potentiodynamic polarization, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and electrochemical frequency modulation (EFM) techniques. Results obtained showed that the extract of Khillah functioned as an effective and good inhibitor. The inhibition efficiency was found to increase with increase of extract concentration reaching maximum inhibition efficiency 87.2%. The adsorption of the inhibitor molecules on the zinc metal surface obeyed Langmuir adsorption isotherm. Polarization data indicated that this extract acts as mixed type inhibitor.