Women Equity Strive in Society Depicted through Animation Film Characters

The purpose of this research is to identify the female representation depicted in the Disney Renaissance and to investigate why Disney characters struggle to claim their equity as women in their society. The research methods used in this study are classified as qualitative and descriptive. The documentation method and taking notes techniques are used to collect data. The research also employs two method concepts to analyze the collected data, including a gender equity approach analysis and Simone de Beauvoir's second-wave feminism theory. The data consists of linguistic units from various Disney Renaissance stories. The writer discovered three parts in the description of female representations based on data analysis of the female representations depicted in Disney Renaissance: rebel, wise, and adventurous women; confident, intelligent, and repellent of domestication women; and masculine, loyal, and ambitious women. Furthermore, data analysis of Disney characters' struggles in claiming their equality as women in their society reveals that they outperform patriarchal expectations, reject domestication, and practice emancipation by appropriating masculine attributes and roles

A study of how the utilisation of optimal cost management techniques influence medical scheme administrators

Abstract: Within today’s competitive and cost-driven business environment, Medical Scheme Administrators are under tremendous pressure to ensure their operations are at the pinnacle of financial performance, through stable but profitable business structures, whilst achieving maximum return for member’s contributions. The purpose of the study was to identify the factors that affect the optimal cost management practices is to ensure that organisations have a true understanding of costs, so that it can continuously make the right decisions with regards to product mix, price and market. This research uses a qualitative methodology to uncover how the South African Medical Scheme Administrators currently use costing principles. This is achieved through semi-structured interviews with individuals, who are directly responsible for this function within their respective organisation. The study concluded that a conceptual cost management framework, which is made up of a number of key models to assist an organisation, is more frequently used in more mature organisations

A Study Of How The Utilisation Of Optimal Cost Management Techniques Influence Medical Scheme Administrators

Within today’s competitive and cost-driven business environment, Medical Scheme Administrators are under tremendous pressure to ensure their operations are at the pinnacle of financial performance, through stable but profitable business structures, whilst achieving maximum return for member’s contributions. The purpose of the study was to identify the factors that affect the optimal cost management practices is to ensure that organisations have a true understanding of costs, so that it can continuously make the right decisions with regards to product mix, price and market. This research uses a qualitative methodology to uncover how the South African Medical Scheme Administrators currently use costing principles. This is achieved through semi-structured interviews with individuals, who are directly responsible for this function within their respective organisation. The study concluded that a conceptual cost management framework, which is made up of a number of key models to assist an organisation, is more frequently used in more mature organisations.&nbsp

The Effects of Gas Saturation of Electrolytes on the Performance and Durability of Lithium‐Ion Batteries

Traces of species in batteries are known to impact battery performance. The effects of gas species, although often reported in the electrolyte and evolving during operation, have not been systematically studied to date and are therefore barely understood. This study reveals and compares the effects of different gases on the charge-discharge characteristics, cycling stability and impedances of lithium-ion batteries. All investigated gases have been previously reported in lithium-ion batteries and are thus worth investigating: Ar, CO$_{2}$, CO, C$_{2}$H$_{4}$, C$_{2}$H$_{2}$, H$_{2}$, CH$_{4}$ and O$_{2}$. Gas-electrolyte composition has a significant influence on formation, coulombic and energy efficiencies, C-rate capability, and aging. Particularly, CO$_{2}$ and O$_{2}$ showed a higher C-rate capability and a decrease in irreversible capacity loss during the first cycle compared to Ar. Similar discharge capacities and aging behaviors are observed for CO, C$_{2}$H$_{4}$ and CH$_{4}$. Acetylene showed a large decrease in performance and cycle stability. Furthermore, electrochemical impedance spectroscopy revealed that the gases mainly contribute to changes in charge transfer processes, whereas the effects on resistance and solid electrolyte interphase performance were minor. Compared to all other gas–electrolyte mixtures, the use of CO$_{2}$ saturated electrolyte showed a remarkable increase in all performance parameters including lifetime

Elements Matter: New Relationalities in Colonial Modernity

This contribution takes into focus elements as scenes of thought in order to contest our colonial, anthropocentric and extractivist mo-dernity: fires of burning fossil fuels, waves of the open sea, shores as the landscape of islands, clouds in the sky and beyond. We sug-gest that these motifs bear the possibility to examine the problems of our present as well as to develop other, differing and new rela-tionalities

The Hazard Potential of Non-Driving-Related Tasks in Conditionally Automated Driving

Today, humans and machines successfully interact in a multitude of scenarios. Facilitated by advancements in artificial intelligence, increasing driving automation may allow drivers to focus on non-driving-related tasks (NDRTs) during the automated ride. However, conditionally automated driving as a transitional state between human-operated driving and fully automated driving requires drivers to take over control of the vehicle whenever requested. Thus, the productive use of driving time might come at the cost of increased traffic safety risks due to insufficient and insecure human-vehicle interaction. This study aims to explore the take-over performance and risk potential of different NDRTs (auditory task, visual task on regular display, visual task with mixed reality hardware) while driving. Our study indicates the hazard potential of visual vs. auditory distraction and multitasking vs. sequential tasking. Our findings contribute to understanding what influences the acceptance and adoption of automated driving and inform the design of safe vehicle-human take-overs

Mass-selective removal of ions from Paul traps using parametric excitation

We study a method for mass-selective removal of ions from a Paul trap by parametric excitation. This can be achieved by applying an oscillating electric quadrupole field at twice the secular frequency ωsec using pairs of opposing electrodes. While excitation near the resonance with the secular frequency ωsec only leads to a linear increase of the amplitude with excitation duration, parametric excitation near 2ωsec results in an exponential increase of the amplitude. This enables efficient removal of ions from the trap with modest excitation voltages and narrow bandwidth, therefore, substantially reducing the disturbance of ions with other charge-to-mass ratios. We numerically study and compare the mass selectivity of the two methods. In addition, we experimentally show that the barium isotopes with 136 and 137 nucleons can be removed from small ion crystals and ejected out of the trap while keeping 138Ba + ions Doppler cooled, corresponding to a mass selectivity of better than Δ m/ m= 1 / 138. This method can be widely applied to ion trapping experiments without major modifications since it only requires modulating the potential of the ion trap

Physical Activity and Recurrent Pain in Children and Adolescents in Germany—Results from the MoMo Study

Recurrent pain can be a significant disruption in the activities of daily life, and is not only a health problem in adults but also in children and adolescents. This study analyzed the prevalence of recurrent pain in the current sample (n = 1516; 11–17 years (mean$_{age}$ = 14.4 ± 2.0 years); 50.8% female) of a nationwide study in Germany, evaluated the association of participants’ device-based physical activity (PA) with the prevalence of recurrent pain, and assessed whether children and adolescents who reported pain for the last three months accumulated less PA than those who did not. A higher prevalence was found in girls for recurrent headaches (42.2% vs. 28.7%), abdominal pain (28.2% vs. 20.1%), and back pain (26.9% vs. 19.5%). We found higher odds for recurrent headaches in girls (OR = 1.54) and in participants that did not reach at least 60 min of moderate to vigorous PA (MVPA) per day (OR = 2.06). Girls who reported recurrent headaches accumulated 4.7 min less MVPA per day than those without. The prevalence of pain remains at a high level in the German youth and underscores the need for interventions to improve the health situations of children and adolescents