Work-Life Balance Among Working Married Women: What Social Workers Need to Know

This project explored the way working mothers cope with home, work, family demands as well as self-care. It mainly focused on the balance they have been able to achieve in their lives as working women, wife, and mothers. This study used qualitative research to examine the challenges these women face in their working and personal lives, the support systems they rely on to fulfill their multiple roles, and the strategies and coping skills they utilize to maintain work and family life balance. This study used an interview format with a qualitative method based. In this approach, primarily open-ended questions were used. The major focus was to explore and then compared participants’ responses to those questions. This method was chosen because it allows for a comparison of different experiences of a common topic The challenges discussed by the working women included: (a) work schedule, (b) time constraints and (c) exhaustion. The participants relied on the following support systems to fulfill their multiple roles: (a) husbands, (b) grandparent and family, (c) co-workers, and (d) bosses. Finally, the strategies the working women used to achieve work/family balance included (a) planning, (c) faith, and (d) accepting limitations

Desorption of hydrocarbon chains by association with ionic and nonionic surfactants under flow as a mechanism for enhanced oil recovery

The need to extract oil from wells where it is embedded on the surfaces of rocks has led to the development of new and improved enhanced oil recovery techniques. One of those is the injection of surfactants with water vapor, which promotes desorption of oil that can then be extracted using pumps, as the surfactants encapsulate the oil in foams. However, the mechanisms that lead to the optimal desorption of oil and the best type of surfactants to carry out desorption are not well known yet, which warrants the need to carry out basic research on this topic. In this work, we report non equilibrium dissipative particle dynamics simulations of model surfactants and oil molecules adsorbed on surfaces, with the purpose of studying the efficiency of the surfactants to desorb hydrocarbon chains, that are found adsorbed over flat surfaces. The model surfactants studied correspond to nonionic and cationic surfactants, and the hydrocarbon desorption is studied as a function of surfactant concentration under increasing Poiseuille flow. We obtain various hydrocarbon desorption isotherms for every model of surfactant proposed, under flow. Nonionic surfactants are found to be the most effective to desorb oil and the mechanisms that lead to this phenomenon are presented and discussed.Comment: 10 figures; to appear in Scientific Report

Asymptotic behavior of global entropy solutions for nonstrictly hyperbolic systems with linear damping

In this paper we investigate the large time behavior of the global weak entropy solutions to the symmetric Keyftiz-Kranzer system with linear damping. It is proved that as t tends to infinite the entropy solutions tend to zero in the L p nor

Virtual Reality Gaming as a Tool for Rehabilitation in Physical Therapy

Balance control decreases in the elderly and currently 33 to 50 percent of people over 65 years of age experience a fall each year resulting in ten thousand deaths annually. Many balance‐training programs use expensive equipment and a clinical setting for the training. The need for reliable and low cost tools is essential for fall prevention and rehabilitation of the aging population. Virtual reality gaming is emerging as a solution for this problem. The purpose of the six week study was to determine the effects of virtual reality gaming, specifically the Nintendo Wii Fit Balance Board (WBB), on dynamic balance in older adults that was accomplished using a randomized repeated measures research study which included a control group design utilizing the 8 foot Up and Go (8ft UG), Activities‐specific Balance Confidence Scale (ABC), and Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) before and after 6 weeks of balance training. Forty subjects (female=26; male=14) between the ages of 60 and 95 were voluntarily recruited for the study and were randomly divided into a control group (CG) and a virtual reality group (VRG). The CG received pre‐post testing only while the VRG was assigned to use the WBB under the supervision of a physical therapist; pre‐post testing was completed by two additional physical therapist that were blinded to the randomized groupings. The WBB exercises included lunges, single leg extensions and twist with a warm up and cool down before and after each session. Results of the study revealed a significant increase in confidence with activity and functional movement for the VRG relative to CG (p\u3c. 05). GDS were normal for both groups with no significant difference. The results of this study indicate the Wii Fit virtual reality gaming system improves balance and postural stability in older adults. Improved confidence with functional activities was reported. The sample pool from which the participants were selected is a limiting factor in terms of generalizing the outcomes measures. A second limitation relates to the lack of comparison to any other form of traditional physical therapy balance training program. Further study would address these identified factors

Analyzing the Effects of Source Selection Method, Acquisition Type, and Service Component on Acquisition Outcomes

For years, one of the most hotly contested debates in contracting and acquisition has been the choice of source selection method and the contract-related consequences of that choice. While policy memos encourage contracting officers to ﾓselect the appropriate source selection process ﾅ to match the specific requirement, meet Warfighter needs, and deliver a contracted solution that will provide the required performance levels at the lowest costﾔ (Kendall, 2015, p. 3), stakeholders on both sides of the table have differing views about how the choice of source selection method affects contract outcomes. Anecdotally, from the perspective of the government, lowest priced technically acceptable (LPTA) procedures offer a faster time-to-contract, as the technical acceptability criteria is binary and the evaluation of priceﾗthe most important factor in LPTA source selectionsﾗis objective. Hence, theoretically, the requirement can be put on contract faster, with less likelihood of protest. The sellersﾒ perspective, however, is that the LPTA source selection method stifles innovation, because price is more important than, say, an innovative approach that may ultimately better serve the government (Calisti, 2015). Critics argue that the LPTA method often results in the selection of a contractor that has undercut the cost of the requirement. They argue that the contractor has essentially achieved ﾓbuy-inﾔ by proposing an unreasonably low price that will later have to be adjusted (i.e., increased) via modification in order to fulfill the terms and conditions of the contract. This sort of gamesmanship of the LPTA method has been the argument of federal contractors for many years. Further, opponents of the LPTA method believe the process represents a ﾓrace to the bottomﾔ price-wise, and mockingly dub the outcomes achieved by LPTA contracts as ﾓLousy Project, Tragic Actﾔ (Weckstein & Delgado, 2012). In other words, opponents feel LPTA source selections produce inferior products and services. Proponents suggest this is not the case, and that by providing clear technical acceptability criteria, the government can avoid receiving inferior products and services. On the opposite spectrum of the best value continuum, the tradeoff (TO) source selection method is anecdotally believed to take more time because of the subjective nature of the evaluation and the increased likelihood of protest. Customers and contractors alike seem to prefer this approach, as it allows customers to feel a certain measure of control over selecting the contractor that represents the best value to the governmentﾗthat by ranking the evaluation factors in terms of importance, they have the option of tailoring the evaluation to fully meet their needs. Contractors also seem to prefer this method, as it allows them to provide innovative solutions to government requirements, without the burden of competing mainly based on price. Proponents of the TO method argue that it results in higher quality products and services because contractors are not ﾓsqueezedﾔ on price. Opponents argue that the method does not necessarily produce better contractual outcomes (i.e., better contract performance), particularly given the anecdotal belief that TO acquisitions take longer to put on contract. Choosing which method is appropriate for a given acquisition is clearly established by policy and is not the focus of this research. Instead, we aim to use scientific methods to confirm or deny the anecdotal beliefs associated with each source selection method. We use multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) methods to determine if statistically significant differences in contract outcomes exist based on source selection method. This first-of-kind research uses actual contract file data from the Air Force and Navy to test hypotheses associated with the anecdotal beliefs. Specifically, we examine whether differences exist in Contractor Performance Assessment Reporting System (CPARS) scores and procurement administrative lead time (PALT) based on choice of source selection method (LPTA or TO), while taking into account several different covariates related to the acquisitions. The remainder of this paper proceeds as follows: The Literature Review section provides a detailed review of the contract management process, the best value continuum, and the relationship between contract type and source selection method. Following that is a discussion of the data collection and analysis methodologies, results of the analysis, and finally, a review of practical and managerial implications, as well as limitations and areas for further research.Naval Postgraduate School Acquisition Research Progra