The Accountant's Ethical Code of Conduct and Moral Reasoning from an Islamic Environment: Case in Yemen

An ethical code of conduct is developed to guide behaviors of members in or of organizations. Accountants, in this context, are not an exception. The availability of such ethical code of conduct is extremely important for both accountants and users of accounting information. However, currently in Yemen, there is no ethical code of conduct for Yemeni professional accountants. It is also equally important to know how Yemeni professional accountants perceive prescriptively and deliberatively on issues related to the ethical code of conduct. Hence, two phases of study were carried out to tap the issues. The first phase was sought to address the question of what constitutes the ethical code of conduct among Yemeni professional accountants. Data were collected from 386 users of accounting information in Yemen. The study employed interdependency analysis to reveal and confirm the domain of the accountants' ethical code of conduct. Results show that the ethical code of conduct consists of several ethical constructs. The second phase of the study was to know to what extent Yemeni professional accountants behave ethically at work. This is important because Islam emphasizes consistency between thought and action. Data were collected from 138 professional accountants in four main cities of Yemen i.e. Sana'a, Hadhramout, Taiz, and Aden. Results showed that Yemeni professional accountants exhibit higher level of moral reasoning beyond the conventional level. The findings of this study contribute to the body of knowledge by providing an Islamic perspective to the ethical issues which has similarities and differences vis-a-vis the Western perspective

The Accountants Ethics in Yemen

Ethics is important in any job, but it is extremely important in the accounting job. Over the years, researchers have performed numerous studies in the field of ethics in relation to the accounting profession. However, specifically in Yemen, there has been no ethical code of conduct for Yemeni accountants. This study presents the domain of Yemeni accountants' ethics. Data collected by using the questionnaire from 74 Yemeni accountants in trade companies in Sana'a city. And, this study use Interdependency Analysis to reveal the Domain of Ethical Code of Conduct for Yemeni Accountants. Analysis of literature suggested 18 accountants' ethics. The research findings found the most important components of Yemeni accountant's ethics are four components, i.e, two for Deliberative Ethics and two for Prescriptive Ethics. The components of Deliberative Ethics are: Deliberative on Protection of Clients, and Deliberative On Conflict Of Interest. In addition, the components of Prescriptive Ethics are: Prescriptive on Independency, and Prescriptive on Duty

Evaluation of Hydrated Lime Filler in Asphalt Mixtures

Mineral filler is one of important materials and affecting on properties and quality of asphalt mixtures .There are different types of mineral filler depended on cost and quality , the matter encourages us to achieve this study to evaluate hydrated lime filler effects on properties of asphalt mixes related with strength and durability. Conventional asphaltic concrete mixtures with Portland cement and soft sandstone fillers and mixtures modified with hydrated lime were evaluated for their fundamental engineering properties as defined by Marshall properties , index of retained strength , indirect tensile strength , permanent deformation characteristics , and fatigue resistance .A typical dense graded mixture employed in construction of surface course pavement in Iraq in accordance with SCRB specifications was used .The materials used in this study included mineral aggregate materials (coarse and fine sizes) were originally obtained from Najaf Sea quarries and two grades of asphalt cements produced from Daurah refinery which are D47 and D66 . The physical properties , stiffness modulus and chemical composition are evaluated for the recovered asphalt cement from prepared asphalt mixes containing various filler types .The paper results indicated that the addition of hydrated lime as mineral filler improved the permanent deformation characteristics and fatigue life and the use of hydrated lime will decrease the moisture susceptibility of the asphalt mixtures

Hybrid intelligent approach for network intrusion detection

In recent years, computer networks are broadly used, and they have become very complicated. A lot of sensitive information passes through various kinds of computer devices, ranging from minicomputers to servers and mobile devices. These occurring changes have led to draw the conclusion that the number of attacks on important information over the network systems is increasing with every year. Intrusion is the main threat to the network. It is defined as a series of activities aimed for exposing the security of network systems in terms of confidentiality, integrity and availability, as a result; intrusion detection is extremely important as a part of the defense. Hence, there must be substantial improvement in network intrusion detection techniques and systems. Due to the prevailing limitations of finding novel attacks, high false detection, and accuracy in previous intrusion detection approaches, this study has proposed a hybrid intelligent approach for network intrusion detection based on k-means clustering algorithm and support vector machine classification algorithm. The aim of this study is to reduce the rate of false alarm and also to improve the detection rate, comparing with the existing intrusion detection approaches. In the present study, NSL-KDD intrusion dataset has been used for training and testing the proposed approach. In order to improve classification performance, some steps have been taken beforehand. The first one is about unifying the types and filtering the dataset by data transformation. Then, a features selection algorithm is applied to remove irrelevant and noisy features for the purpose of intrusion. Feature selection has decreased the features from 41 to 21 features for intrusion detection and later normalization method is employed to perform and reduce the differences among the data. Clustering is the last step of processing before classification has been performed, using k-means algorithm. Under the purpose of classification, support vector machine have been used. After training and testing the proposed hybrid intelligent approach, the results of performance evaluation have shown that the proposed network intrusion detection has achieved high accuracy and low false detection rate. The accuracy is 96.025 percent and the false alarm is 3.715 percent

Islamic entrepreneurship in the light of maqasid al-shari’ah: a critical review

The objectives of entrepreneurship in Islam are guided by the Maqasid Al-Shariah.However, there is a mismatch between Islamic entrepreneurship objectives and Maqasid Al-Shariah based on available literatures, which have not been critically investigated.This paper presents a critical review of the literature within the Islamic entrepreneurship objectives and Maqasid Al-Shariah framework.The exploratory study adopting content analysis to achieve its aim found that the existing literature covered both the Din and Mu’amalah based objectives of Islamic entrepreneurship.However, there is dearth of literature that integrates the connection between objectives of Islamic entrepreneurship and Maqasid Al-Shari’ah.It is therefore suggested that researchers should conduct more researches to examine the integration of Maqasid Al-Shariah in Islamic entrepreneurship, particularly in respect to decision making in handling entrepreneurship issues

A Proposed Framework on the Relationship between Islamic Microfinance Related Factors and Women Entrepreneurs Business Performance in Nigeria

Microfinance plays a key role in poverty alleviation, employment generation, mitigating rural urban migration, utilization of local resources and raw materials and contributing to the gross domestic product (GDP) of Nigeria. Women, majority of who are poor and engaged in informal micro, small and medium scale businesses are mostly the target of microfinance institutions. However, women entrepreneurs find it difficult to have access to the products and services of the conventional banks due to their stringent lending requirement. The presence of Islamic banking which promotes the profit and loss sharing (PLS) concept increases the awareness among women entrepreneurs to alternative funding sources. Despite availability of financing options, women entrepreneurs are constrained by their reluctance to use interest based microfinance services. This paper aims to provide a proposed framework that examines the impact of Islamic investment and financing contracts (Murabaha financing and Mudharabah savings) and other microfinance related factors (training, social capital and self-esteem) on women entrepreneurs business performance. Religiosity is a new moderating variable within the framework that is hypothesized to enhance business performance of women entrepreneurs. The proposed framework will fill the gap in Islamic banking and finance studies since the area of Islamic microfinance and the moderating effect of religiosity has not been empirically investigated

Islamic Entrepreneurship in the Light of Maqasid Al-Shari’ah: A Critical Review

The objectives of entrepreneurship in Islam are guided by the Maqasid Al-Shariah. However, there is a mismatch between Islamic entrepreneurship objectives and Maqasid Al-Shariah based on available literatures, which have not been critically investigated. This paper presents a critical review of the literature within the Islamic entrepreneurship objectives and Maqasid Al-Shariah framework. The exploratory study adopting content analysis to achieve its aim found that the existing literature covered both the Din and Mu’amalah based objectives of Islamic entrepreneurship. However, there is dearth of literature that integrates the connection between objectives of Islamic entrepreneurship and Maqasid Al-Shari’ah. It is therefore suggested that researchers should conduct more researches to examine the integration of Maqasid Al-Shariah in Islamic entrepreneurship, particularly in respect to decision making in handling entrepreneurship issues

Molecular Localization of Epstein Barr Virus and Rb Tumor Suppressor Gene Expression in Tissues from Prostatic Adenocarcinoma and Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia

Background Epstein- Barr virus (EBV) is a ubiquitous in that infecting more than 90% of adult population worldwide. Recently, EBV has been linked to the development of variety of human malignancies including prostate tissues that range from benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) to prostatic adenocarcinoma (PAC). Somatic point mutations in Rb gene have been detected in prostate cancer and are involved in progression steps of prostate carcinogenesis. Objective: To analyze the distribution and impact of concordant Rb expression and latent EBV infection on a group of prostate adenocarcinoma and benign prostatic hyperplasia. Patients and methods: Seventy- two (72) formalin-fixed, paraffin- embedded  prostatic tissues were obtained in this study; (40) biopsies from prostatic carcinoma and  (20) from benign prostate hyperplasia as well as (12) apparently normal prostatic  autopsies control group. Detection of EBV-EBERs was done by ultra sensitive version of in situ hybridization method where as immunohistochemistry detection system was used to demonstrate the expression of Rb gene. Results: Detection of EBV-EBERs -ISH reactions in tissues with PAC was observed in 19 out of 40 (47.5%), while in the tissues from BPH was detected in 10% (2 out of 20). No EBV-EBERs positive – ISH reaction was detected in healthy prostate tissues in the control group.   The differences between the percentages of EBERs detection in tissues PAC and each of BPH & control groups were statistically highly significant (P value = < 0.0001). Positive Rb immunohistochemical (IHC) reactions were observed in 19 PAC cases (47.5%) and in 2 BPH cases (10%). Conclusions: Our results indicate that the EBV might contribute to the development of subset of prostate tumors. In addition, the significant percentage of expression of possible Rb gene as well as EBV in prostate adenocarcinoma could indicate for an important role of these molecular and viral factors in prostatic carcinogenesis. Key word: EBV; prostate adenocarcinoma, benign prostatic hyperplasia, in situ hybridization

Degree of satisfaction of elderly about the services provided to them in social care houses in White Beds Association

This study aims at identifying the degree of satisfaction of the elderly about the (social, health, entertainment, psychological) services provided to them in social care houses. The sample of the study includes all residents of the White Beds Association for the care of the elderly in Amman. The researcher designed a questionnaire to use in the interviews with the elderly. The questionnaire has four items, and each item includes a group of questions about the service provided to them. The researcher interviewed all the members of the White Beds Association, whose health condition allowed this, (75 elderly people: 44 men and 31 women). The data was analyzed and frequencies and percentages were extracted. The researcher used (Chi-Square) to detect any differences of the sample’s responses. The results showed an average satisfaction about the social services provided to the elderly in social institutions while the results showed a high level of satisfaction about the health and entertainment services provided to them. The researcher recommended the need to improve and develop social, health and entertainment services for the elderly in social institutions and to improve the network of social relations between workers and residents within these institutions, which positively reflects the psychological feeling of the elderly