The relationship of upward influence tactics with age, gender and industry: An analysis of Asian perspective

We begin with a review of the upward influence literature and its relationship with human resource decisions of performance ratings, promotability assessments and salary progression. In particular, we examined whether men and women display different influence behavior in diverse settings in Asia, especially in Pakistan. It is well recognized in studies of managerial behavior that a manager’s effectiveness highly depends upon his/her success in dealing with interpersonal relationships. Within the past decade, organizational theory and research have made substantial contributions to our understanding of the upward influence process in organizations. Conspicuously missing from this research literature is information on the relationship between the use of upward influence tactics to gender, Age and type of Industry. Few studies have examined upward influence behavior in the gender context, and even fewer have used Asian samples. Therefore, given the limited study of Asian upward influence behavior and the importance of Asia to the world economy (“War of the Worlds,” 1994), it is important for business people on both sides of the pacific to understand how influence behavior in Asia might converge or diverge with those behaviors in the West. The purpose of this conceptual paper is to look at how the tactics of upward influence adopted by the manager’s play a role in their career advancement and whether gender, type of industry and Age differences exist in the choice of upward influence tactics. A set of potentially testable propositions regarding the relation between use of influence tactics, gender, age and industry is developed and discussed

Electronic Health (e-health) Literacy among Undergraduate University Students

E-health literacy refers to the knowledge of electronic resources and searching techniques that are required to obtain credible health information. E-health literacy can help the general population to search, acquire, appraise, use and interpret health-related information from electronic sources, as well as to be able to apply the gained information to address and solve health-related problems. A large scale cross-sectional survey was conducted to appraise the e-health literacy skills among undergraduate psychology students. The population of the study comprised of undergraduate psychology students enrolled in the public sector universities. A questionnaire was developed by conducting a thorough review of the relevant literature on e-health literacy and assessing the electronic health information seeking behaviour in the participating universities. The collected data was analysed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS-23) and presented in descriptive and inferential statistics. The findings of the study concluded that majority of the respondents had moderate level of e-health literacy skills. The study recommended that the information professionals in the participating universities should play their effective role in promoting the e-health literacy among undergraduate psychology students through offering a structured program, having 02 credit hours, on e-health literacy skills

In my life: memory, self and The Beatles

© 2024 Informa UK Limited. This is the accepted manuscript version of an article which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1080/09658211.2024.2314510In a large-scale study, we asked people for their memories of The Beatles. Over four thousand respondents completed an online questionnaire. The memory could be related to a song, album, event, TV, film, or even a personal encounter. Respondents judged the age at which the event remembered had occurred and rated the memory for vividness, emotional intensity, valence and rehearsal. We found 38% of the memories were classified as “seeing The Beatles live”, 25% “buying Beatles music”, 20% “love of The Beatles” and 17% of the memories were “listening to Beatles songs with other people” – what we refer to as cascading memories. Among the younger respondents (aged 26 and under), 84% of the memories were cascading in nature. The memories dated to what we term the “self-defining period” in autobiographical memory (previously termed “the reminiscence bump”), with a mean age-at-encoding of 13.6 years, which is consistent with other studies of memories associated with music. We propose that these memories reflect the formation of generational identity [Mannheim, K. (1952). The problem of generations. In K. Mannheim (Ed.), Essays on the sociology knowledge (pp. 276–321). Routledge & Keegan Paul].Peer reviewe

Process Model For Information Retrieval Environment For Hearing Impaired

  As the Internet usage has exponential increased and the embedding of multimedia content on the Web, some of the Internet resources still remain inaccessible for disable people with disabilities. Mostly, people who are Hard of Hearing or deaf experience inaccessible Web sites because of a lack of Closed Captioning for multimedia content on the Web, there is no sign language equivalent for the content on the Web, and an unsatisfactory evaluation framework for determining that if a Web page is accessible to the Hearing Impaired society. A number of opportunities for accessing web content are needed to be rectified in order to make the Hearing Impaired community to access the full benefits of the information repository on the Internet. This research paper contributes to resolve few of the Web accessibility problems that are being faced by the Hearing Impaired community. The objectives are to generate an automated Closed Captioning for multimedia content the for Web, to develop a framework for the Hearing Impaired community in order to evaluate Web accessibility. Moreover, to build a social network for the deaf community and to embed sign language equivalent for content available on the Web

Efficacy and pitfalls of digital technologies in healthcare services:A systematic review of two decades

The use of technology in the healthcare sector and its medical practices, from patient record maintenance to diagnostics, has significantly improved the health care emergency management system. At that backdrop, it is crucial to explore the role and challenges of these technologies in the healthcare sector. Therefore, this study provides a systematic review of the literature on technological developments in the healthcare sector and deduces its pros and cons. We curate the published studies from the Web of Science and Scopus databases by using PRISMA 2015 guidelines. After mining the data, we selected only 55 studies for the systematic literature review and bibliometric analysis. The study explores four significant classifications of technological development in healthcare: (a) digital technologies, (b) artificial intelligence, (c) blockchain, and (d) the Internet of Things. The novel contribution of current study indicate that digital technologies have significantly influenced the healthcare services such as the beginning of electronic health record, a new era of digital healthcare, while robotic surgeries and machine learning algorithms may replace practitioners as future technologies. However, a considerable number of studies have criticized these technologies in the health sector based on trust, security, privacy, and accuracy. The study suggests that future studies, on technological development in healthcare services, may take into account these issues for sustainable development of the healthcare sector

MTHFR gene C677T and A1298C polymorphisms and homocysteine levels in primary open angle and primary closed angle glaucoma

Contains fulltext : 79920.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)PURPOSE: To investigate the methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) C677T and A1298C genotypes and plasma concentrations of total homocysteine (tHcy) in Pakistani patients with primary open angle glaucoma (POAG) and primary closed angle glaucoma (PCAG). METHODS: This was a prospective case-control study. A total of 295 patients (173 POAG, 122 PCAG) and 143 age- and sex-matched controls were subdivided into two ethnic groups, Punjabis (Punjab province, central Pakistan) and Pathans (North-West Frontier Province, northern Pakistan). Genotypes of the MTHFR C677T and A1298C polymorphisms were detected by polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP). An enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was used to determine the total serum homocysteine (tHcy) levels. Associations were determined by logistic regression analysis. RESULTS: Frequency distributions of genotypes and combined genotypes as well as homocysteine levels were obtained. The overall distribution of the C677T genotype was found to be significantly associated with PCAG (CC 69%, CT 21%, TT 10%; p=0.001, chi(2)=12.6), but not with POAG (CC 71%, CT 28%, TT 1%; p=0.98, chi(2)=0.02) as compared to the controls (CC 71%, CT 29%, TT 1%). The Pathan cohorts revealed no association with the disease; however, the Punjabis demonstrated a significant association with PCAG (CC 75%, CT 11%, TT 13%; p<0.001, chi(2)=17.2). PCAG in the Punjabi subjects was also significantly associated with the A1298C polymorphism (AA 43%, AC 54%, CC 3%; p<0.001, chi(2)=33.9) as compared to the controls. Combined genotype data showed no association with POAG; however, a significant association with all combined genotypes was observed in the overall PCAG subjects (p<0.05, chi(2)=20.1). This difference was particularly apparent in the TTAA and TTAC combinations that were completely absent in the control groups (p<0.05. chi(2)=49.6). Mean serum tHcy levels were found to be significantly increased in the POAG (15.2+/-1.28 micromol/l, p<0.001) and PCAG (20.8+/-4.8 micromol/l) groups as compared to the controls (10.0+/-0.97 micromol/l). The tHcy levels in the TT and AC genotype were significantly elevated in the PCAG group (67+/-12.39 micromol/l, p<0.001; 23+/-5.94 micromol/l, p=0.027) as compared to the controls. CONCLUSION: The TT and AC genotypes of MTHFR C677T and A1298C polymorphisms and the combined genotype TTAC were associated with PCAG in Punjabi subjects of Pakistani origin and correlated with the high serum tHcy levels seen in these patients

Impact of Capital Structure on the Performance of Textilesector in Pakistan: Examining the Moderating Effect of Liquidity

Purpose: The basic aim of this study is to investigate how capital structure influences the performance of firms from textile sector listed at Pakistan Stock Exchange, taking liquidity of the firms as a moderator. Methodology: Data of 30 listed textile firms is taken from their financial statementsfor a period of ten years from 2007 to 2016.Analysis has been conducted using the Ordinary least square (OLS) regression. Two measures of capital structure (debt ratio and debt-to-equity ratio) have been used to find out its impact on three performance measures (return on assets, return on equity, and earnings per share). Findings: The variable, total debt ratio does not have any significant effect on all the three firm performance measures (return on asset, return on equity and earnings per share). Debt-to-equity ratio variable also does not have a significant impact on two firm performance measures (ROA and ROE). It however has a significant, negative impact on EPS. In case of liquidity as a moderator, it is found that liquidity acts as the significant moderator between the debt ratio and return on assets whereas liquidity factor is significant in case of relation between debt –to-equity variable and two performance variables return on assets and earnings per share.. Practical implications: Practically this study is important from managerial perspective as the appropriate decision for choosing a level of capital structure vis-à-vis total assets and total equity is essential for the better performance of the firms

The association of glutathione S-transferase GSTT1 and GSTM1 gene polymorphism with pseudoexfoliative glaucoma in a Pakistani population

Contains fulltext : 88996.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)PURPOSE: The aim of the present study was to investigate the association of glutathione S-transferase GSTT1 and GSTM1 genotypes with pseudoexfoliative glaucoma (PEXG) in a group of Pakistani patients. METHODS: Multiplex polymerase chain reaction was used to study the GSTT1 and GSTM1 polymorphisms in 165 PEXG patients and 162 unaffected controls. RESULTS: In the current study we describe a significant gender-specific association of GSTT1 and GSTM1 null genotypes with PEXG. The three null genotype combinations (i.e., T1M0, T0M1, and T0M0) were found at significantly higher frequencies in the PEXG patients as compared to the controls (chi(2)=21.82, p0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that there is a significant involvement of the GSTT1 and GSTM1 polymorphisms in female Pakistani patients having PEXG, which suggests a possible gender-specific impairment of detoxification in this group