Objective Gender and Age Recognition from Speech Sentences

In this work, an automatic gender and age recognizer from speech is investigated. The relevant features to gender recognition are selected from the first four formant frequencies and twelve MFCCs and feed the SVM classifier. While the relevant features to age has been used with k-NN classifier for the age recognizer model, using MATLAB as a simulation tool. A special selection of robust features is used in this work to improve the results of the gender and age classifiers based on the frequency range that the feature represents. The gender and age classification algorithms are evaluated using 114 (clean and noisy) speech samples uttered in Kurdish language. The model of two classes (adult males and adult females) gender recognition, reached 96% recognition accuracy. While for three categories classification (adult males, adult females, and children), the model achieved 94% recognition accuracy. For the age recognition model, seven groups according to their ages are categorized. The model performance after selecting the relevant features to age achieved 75.3%. For further improvement a de-noising technique is used with the noisy speech signals, followed by selecting the proper features that are affected by the de-noising process and result in 81.44% recognition accuracy

An Analysis of the Effects of School Climate on School Annual Yearly Progress

With increasing pressures to improve student performance, schools are in need of ways to positively affect student achievement. The concept of organizational health, which includes academic emphasis, teacher affiliation, resource support, administrative leadership, and institutional integrity, offers educators an opportunity to gauge the climate of their building and in turn positively affect academic outcomes. Using Hoy and Tarter\u27s (1997) concept of organizational health in elementary schools as a conceptual framework, this study undertook a quantitative approach to examine the relationship between school climate factors and student achievement gains and decreases using Independent t-tests. Quantitative analyis revealed a significant relationship between academic emphasis, teacher affiliation, resource influence, administrative leadership and student achievement gains and decreases with p-value\u3c0.01

The Role of ICTs in Social Movements: The Case of the Honduran National Front Against the 2009 Coup

There is an important academic conversation happening about how social movements adopt, use, and configure Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) for political participation. This dissertation contributes to that conversation by taking a holistic look at ICTs, throughout a social movement\u27s emergence and development, while considering its context, its organizational structures and sense-making processes. I explore the case of the Honduran National Front Against the Coup (NFAC), a relevant case due to its similarities with other movements, like the use of social media, the support from the international community and its geographically dispersed networks; but also, particular in its political and ICT context. Guided by the Contentious Politics Model (CPM) asked an overarching research question: What is the role of Information and Communication Technologies in the emergence and development of the National Front Against the Coup? I also asked three second-level questions: (1) How does the Honduran Resistance Movement relate ICTs to political Opportunity Structures? (2) What role do ICTs play in creating and supporting the movement\u27s organizational structures, and in preparing and carrying out visible movement episodes? (3) How does the NFAC use ICTs to shape its attitudes, identities and competences? I conducted a single embedded exploratory case study guided by the extended case method where I studied the NFAC in a sequence of interconnected time periods called Collective Action Framing Episodes (CAFEs). Data were reconstructive narratives from primary and secondary sources. The movement\u27s use of ICTs for mobilizing social support for their cause can be considered an improvised subversive response to the institutionalized political environment. The movement\u27s regional affiliates formed a loosely coupled extended organization, which allowed the affiliates a degree of autonomy to do their oppositional work while remaining fully aligned with the movement\u27s priorities. ICTs allowed the movement to broadcast its messages across the network to socialize the affiliates and ensure they were all on the same page. This lose confederation, coordinated through ICTs allowed the NFAC to dynamically reconfigure and rearrange its regional affiliates as needed. I found instances of resourcefulness and improvisation, both in the way individual media platforms were used, and in the way these platforms were combined and recombined to move ahead. Thus, the intellectual contribution of this study is twofold: The first one is an expansion of the CPM (Contentious Politics Model). I propose that ICTs don\u27t drive revolutions, but neither are they simply tools. There is a dynamic relation as environmental conditions (OS) like policies, institutions, ICT ownership, media centralization, shape the way social movements configure ICTs, and ICTs configurations by social movements can influence environmental conditions. The same way ICT configurations can be determined by he availability, collaboration and connectedness of civil society organizations within the movement (MS), and their relations can be influenced by ICT configurations. Therefore, by playing a reflexive role in the process of frame creation, ICTs are embedded in every level of the social movement emergence and development. The second contribution is an operative framework and analytical tool to study the interactions between social movements, institutions, and ICTs. The model uses CAFEs (Collective Action Framing Episodes), a composed construct that allows integrating several levels of analysis into one unit of analysis

Connected End Anti-Fuzzy Equitable Dominating Set In Anti-Fuzzy Graphs

In this paper, the notion of connected end anti-fuzzy equitable dominating set of an anti-fuzzy graph is discussed. The connected end anti-fuzzy equitable domination number for some standard graphs are obtained. The relation between anti-fuzzy equitable domination number, end anti-fuzzy equitable domination number and connected end anti-fuzzy equitable domination number are established. Theorems related to these parameters are stated and proved

Color: The Mantra for Marketing

In the present scenario, color is emphasized as the most required component of the market and marketers. The customers are attracted using different colors for the products by the manufacturers. The competition prevailing in the market has made the organizations use several strategies using color. Now days the customers go to the various retail stores and buy the products by seeing the packaging as it creates an effective image of the product in their minds. The marketers have to understand the knowledge of the consumers to select the right color for product. The impact of the visual aspects helps the organizations to pass the information to the consumers. The color can affect the consumer's perception and their buying decision. The brands are also recognized because of the fixed colors of their products which provide them brand equity. Every color has been accepted in different way by the various cultures and the emotions attached to it is also different. Color is opted differently by the two genders. In this research paper how the color is used by different cultures, the sentiments associated are studied. A glance of the impact of the color on the consumer behavior is also studied. Without appropriate selection of color the marketers will not be able to attract the customers

The sunshine vitamin D: ubiquitous source, still so deficient in mother and baby duo

Background: Vitamin D is a fat-soluble vitamin, a sunshine vitamin. Vitamin D deficiency is now recognized as a pandemic. Fetus depends on mother for its need of vitamin D, thus there is growing concern for its impact on neonates. This study was designed to determine the correlation between 25-hydroxyvitamin D (vitamin D3) levels in maternal blood and in cord blood.Methods: A total 50 term pregnant women attending antenatal clinic at SVS medical college, Telangana and their neonates were included in the study. At term after taking written consent, maternal and cord blood vitamin D3 were measured, and values were correlated. Antenatal and neonatal complications were noted, and correlated with vitamin D3 levels.Results: In this study 80% of pregnant women and 88% of neonates were vitamin D3 deficient. Mean maternal blood vitamin D3 was 17.62±10.01 and cord blood vitamin D3 was 12.84±7.68. Maternal blood vitamin D3 correlated positively with cord blood vitamin D3 (r=0.951, p<0.001). Antenatal and neonatal complications were observed, but statistically significant association with vitamin D3 deficiency could not be established.Conclusions: This study has demonstrated a very high prevalence of vitamin D deficiency in apparently healthy, young, pregnant women despite abundant sunlight leading to deficiency in their neonates. To establish strong association between vitamin D3 deficiency and various antenatal and neonatal complications further studies with large subject groups are required

Knowledge, attitude and practices of pregnant women regarding anemia, iron rich diet and iron supplement

Background: Anemia in pregnancy has detrimental effects on maternal and child health and prevalence of anemia during pregnancy is alarmingly high, inspite of the implementation of  the national nutritional anemia prophylaxis programme which provides iron and folic acid which are the essential nutrients lacking in  their diet. The purpose of this study was to assess the knowledge, attitude and practices of pregnant women regarding anemia, Iron rich food and iron supplements and also to assess the impact of these factors and other socio demographic variables on the hemoglobin levels of these vulnerable groups of women.Methods: This is a cross sectional, descriptive institution based study conducted at Sri Manakula Vinayagar medical college hospital, Puducherry, India. Sample size was calculated using formula for single proportion with 5% marginal error and 95% CI and a non-response rate of 10% and was found to be 316. Data collection was carried out using a predesigned, self-administered questionnaire in local language in the antenatal clinic at the time of routine antenatal checkup, from pregnant women who consented to participate in the study. At the same sitting, 1 ml of blood was collected for hemoglobin estimation, analyzed and the result was recorded and disclosed to the patient. The data was entered in SPSS and analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics (Chi square test).  A p value of <0.05 was considered to be statistically significant.Results: Assessment of knowledge revealed that only 39.87% of the participants were aware of and understood the term anemia. 53.8% of the participants accepted that pregnant women were more vulnerable to anemia and 66.1% responded correctly that the fetus will be affected by severe anemia. Only 32.6% gave the correct response that pregnant women should take iron supplementation in spite of taking a healthy diet. Only 44.62% of the participants were aware of their hemoglobin level in the current pregnancy. Knowledge about food rich in iron was poor among the participants. At least 1/5th of the participants have not received educational information regarding anemia from     any source. The overall attitude towards antenatal checkup, healthy diet and the benefits of iron supplementation was generally good among the participants 49.36% of the participants were taking only the usual diet during their pregnancy. 74.36% claimed to have taken iron supplementation regularly whereas 9.8% had not taken iron supplementation. On hemoglobin estimation it was found that 62.97% of the participants were anemic taking 11 grams as the cut off for anemia.  The only significant determinants of hemoglobin levels were regular intake of iron supplements   (p value   0.006) and timing of iron consumption (p value 0.0262).Conclusions: The present study indicated the lack of knowledge regarding anemia, iron rich foods and the importance of iron supplementation during pregnancy. Targeted estimation of hemoglobin levels in adolescent girls and women in reproductive age group, intensive counseling and motivation of pregnant women to consume Iron and folic acid and ensuring adequate supply to them, intensive de-worming, provision of toilet facilities to all households would help in reducing the incidence of anemia in pregnant women

E-learning Research Papers in Web of Science: A Biliometric Analysis

Purpose – The paper aims to explore and identify the trends in E-Learning research at the global level. Design/methodology/approach – The data were collected from the Web of Science database covering the period from 1989- 2018 in order to identify substantial contributions that have been published in the field of E-Learning. A total of 9826 records were retrieved. The data was analyzed to reveal different trends prevailing in E-Learning research including prominent contributing countries, authorship patterns adopted, the degree of collaboration, collaborative index, prominent sources for publication of research, visibility of research in term of citation trends like citations received/citations per paper etc. Findings –The analysis revealed a positive growth in literature. It is clear that USA and UK have contributed to more than half of the research output with PEI of 1.07 and 1.45 respectively. Computers & Education and Journal of Chemical Education were the two most used journals. The study also found out that Bradford’s Law of scattering does not hold good to the journals cited in the three journals Keywords–E-Learning, Bibliometrics, Web of Scienc