A Framework for Assessing Impact of Brand Personality on Customer Satisfaction: The Moderating Role of Gender and Age

This study develops an empirical examination of brand personalities in cellular phone sector of Pakistan as a predictor of customer satisfaction. The purpose of this research is to develop a framework that how brand personality of cell phone can increase the level of customer satisfaction. This study also aims to test the moderating role of demographic characteristics (Gender and Age) in the relationship between brand personalities and customer satisfaction. A sample of 300 cell phone users from 5 cities of Pakistan is selected .Based on the survey of consumers of cell phones; the authors checked the effect of brand personality on customer satisfaction. Moderation Analysis was used to check the moderation effect of demographic characteristics (Gender and Age) on the relationship between brand personality and customer satisfaction. Results indicated that due to different dimensions of brand personality of cell phones, customer observed massive satisfaction level. So, since customer faced more satisfaction, they signified more intention towards brand. Further, our research also confirmed the moderating role of Customer Age.  This study reveals that when cell phone manufacturing companies invest the human characteristics into their brand so that personality of their brand can develop, their customers can be more loyal towards organization and their level of satisfaction increased. Marketers and Brand Managers must develop marketing and advertisement activities in line with the personality of their cell phone brands. &nbsp

THE IMPLEMENTATION OF CONTEXTAL TEACHING AND LEARNING IN TEACHING WRITING RECOUNT TEXT TO THE EIGHTH GRADE STUDENTS OF SMPN 2 GREGED CIREBON

MUHAMMAD TURMUDZI HAYAT: “THE IMPLEMENTATION OF CONTEXTUAL TEACHING AND LEARNING IN TEACHING WRITING RECOUNT TEXT TO THE EIGHT GRADE STUDENTS OF SMPN 2 GREGED CIREBON”. Writing is producing something in written form so that people can read, perform and used it. It means that in teaching writing the teacher reinforces students to produce something in written form so that people can read it. In producing written well, the students can not do it by themselves, but they should do through a process in teaching and learning. This research is about improving students’ recount text writing by using contextual teaching and learning (CTL) approach. In the process of writing, sometimes the students make mistakes. For example the students are difficult to get ideas in written form. So the teacher thinks to find a good technique to solve the problem. The aims of the research are to know the students ability in writing recount text, to know the aspect of writing methods in implementing contextual teaching and learning and the benefits of using contextual teaching and learning approach. This study used descriptive qualitative research method in answering the research problems. Qualitative research is descriptive in that the researcher is interested in process, meaning and understanding gained through words or utterances. The result of this study, the students showed a good progress in their writing, beside that they could increase their writing ability and they can construct a neat recount text, namely the grammatical improvement from students in writing class. There were some aspects of teaching method in implementing contextual teaching and learning which the writer used, they are: relating, experiencing, applying, cooperating and transferring. Those teaching method were beneficial in implementing contextual teaching and learning to teaching writing recount text, such as: (1) engaging students in the activity, (2) increasing students’ motivation, (3) helping students to construct their recount text writing, (4) helping students to solve their problem, (5) providing ways for students to discuss or interact with their friends, (6) and helping the students to summarize and reflect the lesson

Blocks on Bertie’s Stutter Utterances in The King’s Speech Movie

Abstrak Hambatan, yang merupakan salah satu ciri gangguan bicara khusus yang di alami oleh Bertie atau Raja George ke VI akan di teliti secara mendalam dalam penelitian ini. Penelitian dalam tulisan ini di lakukan dengan menganalisa bunyi-bunyi yang terhambat dalam ucapan-ucapan Bertie yang gagap, lalu, bunyi-bunyi tersebut akan di analisa untuk menemukan alasan mengapa bunyi-bunyi tersebut terhambat. Di samping itu, penelitian ini menggunakan metode penelitian deskriptif kualitatif untuk menganalisa dan menjabarkan data. Data tersebut di dapat dari sebuah film berjudul The King’s Speech dengan menggunakan teknik analisa dokumen. Lantas, data terssebut kemudian diteliti dengan langkah reduksi data, analisa data, dan simpulan. Setelah data tersebut di analisa, hasil dari penelitian ini pun ditemukan. Hasil dari penelitian ini adalah di temukan fakta bahwa Bertie mengalami hambatan pada dua belas bunyi-bunyian, bunyi-bunyi tersebut adalah /p/, /m/, /d/, /n/, /k/, /g/, /dʒ/, /f/, /ð/, /ʃ/, /h/, dan /w/, dan di temukan juga dua alasan mengapa bunyi-bunyi tersebut terhambat dalam ucapan-ucapan Bertie yang gagap. Alasan tersebut adalah penempatan bunyi-bunyi tersebut di dalam kata dan tempat dimana dan cara bagaimana bunyi-bunyi tersebut diucapkan. Kata kunci: ucapan, gagap, hambatan.            Abstract Block, which is one of characteristics of stuttering, that occurred on Bertie or King George VI will be analyzed deeply in this study. The analysis is done by analyzing the speech sounds that got blocked on Bertie’s stutter utterances and then, those speech sounds will be analyzed to find the reasons why those speech sounds got blocked. In addition, this study is using descriptive qualitative method to analyze and describe the data. Moreover, the data in this study is collected from the movie entitled The King’s Speech using analysis document. Then, the collected data is analyzed by data condensation, data analysis, and conclusion. After the analysis was done, the results were found. The results are this study found that Bertie experienced block on twelve speech sounds, those are /p/, /m/, /d/, /n/, /k/, /g/, /dʒ/, /f/, /ð/, /ʃ/, /h/, and /w/, and this study also found two reasons why those speech sounds got blocked on Bertie’s stutter utterances. Those reasons are the placement of those sounds in a word and the place and the way those speech sounds are produced. Keywords: utterances, stuttering, block

Mitigation of environmental hazards of sulfide mineral flotation with an insight into froth stability and flotation performance

Today\u27s major challenges facing the flotation of sulfide minerals involve constant variability in the ore composition; environmental concerns; water scarcity and inefficient plant performance. The present work addresses these challenges faced by the flotation process of complex sulfide ore of Mississippi Valley type with an insight into the froth stability and the flotation performance. The first project in this study was aimed at finding the optimum conditions for the bulk flotation of galena (PbS) and chalcopyrite (CuFeS₂) through Response Surface Methodology (RSM). In the second project, an attempt was made to replace toxic sodium cyanide (NaCN) with the biodegradable chitosan polymer as pyrite depressant. To achieve an optimum flotation performance and froth stability, the third project utilized two types of nanoparticles; silica (SiO₂) and alumina (Al₂O₃) as process aids. The fourth project investigated the impact of water chemistry on the process outcomes in an attempt to replace fresh water with sea water. In the last project, five artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) models were employed to model the flotation performance of the ore which will allow the building of intelligent systems that can be used to predict the process outcomes of polymetallic sulfides. It was concluded that chitosan can be successfully used as a biodegradable depressant. Alumina nanoparticles successfully enhanced both froth stability and flotation performance while silica nanoparticles did not. Seawater had a negative effect on both the froth stability and the grade of lead (Pb) and copper (Cu) but it improved the recoveries of both Pb and Cu minerals. Hybrid Neural Fuzzy Interference System (HyFIS) ML model showed the best accuracy to be adopted for automated sulfide ore flotation process in the future --Abstract, page iii

Strategic initiatives to increase the uptake of rooftop photovoltaic systems

This thesis has focused on the strategies that can be implemented by electricity utilities and private investors in increasing the penetration of rooftop photovoltaic systems (RPVs). Even though the proposals are general and applicable for any locality, the key studies of this research have been focused on the Australian electricity market. First, a detailed review and comparison of all Australian power distribution companies has been carried out in terms of the percentage of the supplied customers and the customer density per kilometre length of their power lines. Following that, the daily electricity supply and the electricity unit charges offered by the active electricity retail companies in the zones of each of these power distribution companies are reviewed and compared. Based on this information, the annual electricity bill of a customer supplied by different power distribution companies and retailers is calculated. Through this study, the national average annual electricity bill has been determined for Australia and the power distribution companies are categorised under four segments of very cheap, cheap, expensive, and very expensive companies. This study has highlighted some of the key challenges faced by power distribution companies in Australia in supplying power through a more localised renewable based generation. Installing an RPV by a household is a big decision, and there are many factors which need to be considered before this decision. It can be highly rewarding in some cases and for others, it may bring a loss in the investment. The main factors which need to be considered are the electricity consumption tariff, electricity consumption pattern, the location of the household and the tariffs offered by the utility in that area. In this thesis, economic incentives of installing a RPV and battery energy storage (BES) are discussed for a household in different states, served by various utilities. A comparison is made to find which states are more suitable in terms of gaining financial benefits from RPVs. A flat rate feed-in tariff is an incentive offered by many utilities to encourage their customers to invest in electricity generation from RPVs. Such a scheme is usually designed by financial techniques that mostly consider the initial capital cost and electricity spot price. However, such an incentive cannot help the utilities to address the technical challenges in networks with large renewable penetration. In this thesis, a dynamic feed-in tariff has been proposed and designed based on the value of electricity, hosting capacity, ambient temperature and time of day. This feed-in tariff will specifically support utilities that experience challenges in the electrification of remote areas or observe excessive stress on their networks at demand peak periods. The proposed feed-in tariff encourages the rural customers to install RPVs while discouraging the urban customers from installing RPVs without BES. Solar leasing is another opportunity to enhance the rapid uptake of RPVs. Even though solar leasing has attracted widespread acceptance in some countries, it has not been successful in being popular in some other places mainly due to lack of awareness of the model and economic viability in relation to outright buying a RPVs. One of the solar leasing models is roof rental in which a company leases the roof of residential premises for installing RPVs and selling the generated electricity to the utility. This thesis has explored an economically viable alternative for roof rental from the perspective of the engaged leasing company. To this end, an economic analysis has been performed to determine the net present value from the roof rental payments and versus different ratings of RPVs, desired interest rate and existing feed-in tariff. Furthermore, a BES can play an important role in realising maximum benefit from RPVs. However, the cost of a BES is comparatively high, and the BES of individual households may not be optimally utilised during a significant portion of the year as there may not be enough generation from RPVs during winter to charge the BES to its full capacity. Community solar on the other hand, if optimally designed, can give the opportunity to use a BES to its maximum capacity. Such systems can benefit many of the remote and rural communities, that are usually supplied by diesel generators, or long traditional distribution lines, which in addition to being expensive often don’t provide the reliability at desired level. These systems can also benefit most of the urban areas since the unmanaged penetration of RPVs has resulted in the undesired duck curve profile in the network. To this end, this thesis has proposed and validated the appropriate design criteria for community solar projects with an aim to improve the network duck curve profile, enable peak-shaving and increase the self-sufficiency of the community