Factors influencing customer satisfaction and loyalty to internationally branded clothes

Satisfaction is important as the principle purpose of a business is to create satisfied customers that will consequently lead to higher profitability in the future. Therefore, it is crucial for marketers to focus on creating and retaining customer loyalty in a business. Besides, customer satisfaction and loyalty are being highlighted due to growing interests and practices in customer relationship management. Thus, this study seeks to examine the factors affecting customer satisfaction with regard to the purchase of imported apparel, and to determine the relationship between customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. A questionnaire was constructed and data were collected from 100 buyers of imported apparel in Malaysia. Results indicated that customer satisfaction is positively affected by brand credibility, perceived quality, and perceived value. This finding implies that a higher customer satisfaction leads to higher levels of customer retention and loyalty towards a specific brand. In conclusion, understanding such factors will help marketers of internationally branded apparel to operate their businesses effectively

Efficient nonlocal-means denoising using the SVD

Nonlocal-means (NL-means) is an image denoising method that replaces each pixel by a weighted average of all the pixels in the image. Unfortunately, the method requires the computation of the weighting terms for all possible pairs of pixels, making it computationally expensive. Some short-cuts assign a weight of zero to any pixel pairs whose neighbourhood averages are too dissimliar. In this paper, we propose an alternative strategy that uses the SVD to more efficiently eliminate pixel pairs that are dissimilar. Experiments comparing this method against other NL-means speed-up strategies show that its refined discrimination between similar and dissimilar pixel neighbourhoods significantly improves the denoising effect. Index Terms — nonlocal-means, denoising, SVD 1

Use of Chinese Characters and Drawing as Aids in Teaching Young Children to Read English

Family Relations and Child Developmen

Exceptional Outgroup Stereotypes and White Racial Inequality Attitudes toward Asian Americans

Stereotypes of outgroups help create social identificational boundaries for ingroups. When the ingroup is dominant, members employ individualist sentiments to justify their status. In this study, we build on advances in social psychological research that account for multiple outgroup stereotypes. We argue the Asian American model minority stereotype is analogous to the “cold but competent” position of perceptions toward Asians in Fiske’s stereotype content model. Asian Americans are perceived to be exceptional to other minority groups, and we hypothesize that perceived competence is associated with individualist sentiments directed at Blacks and Latinos. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Freshmen, we find support for our hypotheses but find that perceived coldness has no relationship to individualist sentiments. We discuss the implications and directions for further research

Application of Fungi as Meat Alternatives in Industry: Mini Review

Human consumption has outpaced meat production and manufacturing due to the rising human population and limited land for livestock agriculture. Meat consumption can have negative effects on human health, but meat production can negatively affect the environment by causing global warming and water pollution. Hence, this study produces the idea of using fungus as an alternative to replacing meat. Fungus is an ideal choice as a meat replacement because it has high nutritional content and a fast growth rate. The main objective of this review was to assess the nutritional potential of nine fungal species namely Fusarium venenatum, Neurospora intermedia, Tuber sp., Xerocomus badius, Ganoderma lucidum, Pleurotuseryngii, Agaricus bisporus, Pleurotus sajor-caju and Lentinula edodes and to determine which species is the best candidate for meat replacement. The nutritional values, toxicity, and growth rate of each fungus were assessed. Comparative data analysis suggests that F. venenatum, N. intermedia, P. eryngii, A. bisporus, P. sajor-caju, and L. edodes are found suitable for producing fungi-based meat

Pediatric osteomyelitis due to rare tropical multi-drug resistance (MDR) organisms: a treatment quandary

Osteomyelits due to concurrent multi-drug resistance organisms is difficult to treat for any surgeon and infectious disease physician. An eleven-year-old boy presenting with an open fracture of the left radius and ulna after a fall in a stagnant wet field. Despite prophylactic antibiotics and surgical intervention, the open wound was infected, and Chromobacterium violaceum as well as Klebsiella pneumoniae were isolated. He was treated with six weeks of parenteral cefepime and amikacin and was discharged upon clinical improvement. Unfortunately, chronic osteomyelitis set in with persistent sinus drainage. He then underwent a second procedure for debridement of the wound and Burkholderia pseudomallei was isolated. Parenteral antibiotic therapy was initiated progressing with a marked improvement. However, the long course of antibiotics had exhausted the patient and his family, leading to a premature interruption of the parenteral antibiotic. Despite the suboptimal antibiotic course, there were no signs of relapsed osteomyelitis during subsequent review. The timely surgical intervention with appropriate sampling for subsequent microorganism isolation guided the suitability of the treatment line

Kelestarian penanaman kelapa sawit dalam kalangan pekebun kecil di Sri Aman, Malaysia

Kajian ini meneliti indikator kelestarian penanaman kelapa sawit dalam kalangan pekebun kecil di Sri Aman, Sarawak dan peranan pihak Lembaga Minyak Sawit Malaysia (MPOB) dan pihak bertanggungjawab yang lain dalam membantu pekebun kecil untuk memupuk amalan pertanian lestari. Pengkaji telah memilih pendekatan penyelidikan secara kuantitatif yang menggunakan pendekatan kaedah soal selidik. 50 orang responden yang terdiri daripada pekebun kecil sawit telah dipilih secara rawak sebagai subjek kajian. Borang soal selidik telah diggunakan untuk mendapat maklumat dan dipersembah secara deskriptif. Berdasarkan hasil kajian, bagi indikator kelestarian ekonomi, kebanyakan pekebun kecil sawit di kawasan kajian tidak mencapai kelestarian secara keseluruhan. Pendapatan yang diperolehi oleh pekebun kecil sawit tidak melepasi pendapatan miskin tegar yang telah ditentukan oleh kerajaan dengan menggunakan Pengukuran Garis Kemiskinan (PGK). Manakala kelestarian sosial pula, kajian mendapati bahawa keseluruhan pekebun kecil sawit telah mencapai tahap kelestarian yang amat memperangsangkan. Malangnya, pekebun kecil sawit di kawasan kajian tidak mencapai aspek kelestarian persekitaran. Pekebun kecil sawit di sini tidak semestinya menggunakan amalan pertanian yang baik dan kurang mementingkan penjagaan alam sekitar dalam proses penanaman kelapa sawit. Dari segi peranan MPOB dan pihak bertanggungjawab yang lain pula dilihat tidak begitu komited atau berusaha dalam menyalurkan maklumat serta bantuan kepada pekebun kecil sawit berhubung dengan pertanian lestari. Namun begitu, pekebun kecil sawit mempunyai inisiatif sendiri bagi memastikan aktiviti pertanian yang dilakukan tidak memberi kesan yang kronik kepada alam sekitar. Pendek kata, pihak-pihak bertanggungjawab semestinya mengambil strategi yang drastik agar mampu memastikan pembangunan kelestarian sawit dan sekali gus mencapai matlamat yang telah ditetapkan

Novel Characteristics of Valveless Pumping

This study investigates the occurrence of valveless pumping in a fluidfilled system consisting of two open tanks connected by an elastic tube. We show that directional flow can be achieved by introducing a periodic pinching applied at an asymmetrical location along the tube, and that the flow direction depends on the pumping frequency. We propose a relation between wave propagation velocity, tube length, and resonance frequencies associated with shifts in the pumping direction using numerical simulations. The eigenfrequencies of the system are estimated from the linearized system, and we show that these eigenfrequencies constitute the resonance frequencies and the horizontal slope frequencies of the system; 'horizontal slope frequency' being a new concept. A simple model is suggested, explaining the effect of the gravity driven part of the oscillation observed in response to the tank and tube diameter changes. Results are partly compared with experimental findings.Art. no. 22450