Drivers of Spiritual Tourism: A Destination-Specific Approach

With a rising number of visitors worldwide, spiritual tourism is becoming more relevant than ever before. Spiritual tourism is defined as travel to discover the goal and significance of one’s life, thus, self-experiences are crucial for the transition of a person’s mind, body, and soul. Because of this, both the destination chosen and the inspiration and intention of the tourists involved play central roles. However, existing research on spiritual tourism mainly focuses on classification and motivation and explicitly focuses on the demand side. Given the recent increase of participation in spiritually-focused tourism, it is important to accurately grasp the practical ramifications of the practice as a philosophical discourse on the shift from ‘religious’ to ‘spiritual’ tourism experiences must be discussed from the perspective of supply. Arguably, the current conceptualisations and classifications of spirituality and religiousness need a correction from an ontological perspective. This study, therefore, explores the primary drivers for spiritual tourism in India, where the existing theorisations of spiritual, religious, and secular–spiritual tourism have been challenged. To understand the primary drivers of spiritual tourism in India, a netnographic study has been deployed. This paper explores relevant findings, which suggest the need for contextualisation of destination characteristics for determining visitors’ key motivations. The context here refers to a nation’s background, history, and cultural practices, which determine the boundaries of ideologies, spirituality, and religiosity

What makes inauthenticity dangerous: An explorative study of ethnic cuisine and tourism

This study inspects the dangers of being inauthentic while posing as apostles of authentic, ethnic service providers in tourism. The concept of authenticity was adopted to understand how the commodification of cultural features, especially food, of a multiethnic destination influences the realness of traditional cuisine. The study was conducted in Goa, India, also known as tourist Mecca. The research findings demonstrate that tourism acts as a dominant player in creating a transfigurative replica of tourist\u27s expectations. This makes touristified versions of traditional foods, severely influencing the integrity of regional cuisines. These results are useful in understanding how inauthentic practices challenge the cultural identity of the destination

Instrument development for organisational health

This study establishes the factors influencing Organisational Health (OH), leading to the development of an empirical measurement instrument.Despite the fact that a few firms have understood the significance of measuring health, they mostly do not know precisely what to measure, because of an absence of understanding of what constitutes a set of organisational health dimensions.This study used a mixed method through literature review, expert opinion and a quantitative pilot survey with 123 supervisory staff from a telecommunication company in India. The instrument was further tested for standardisation in Malaysia, Bangladesh and Indonesia.The study identified an OH measurement model consisting three constructs such as Change Capacity, Goal Alignment and Competitive Advantage.There are 29 items which collectively influence the degree of OH in an Organisation. By proposing, creating, and validating a multi-dimensional, operational measure of the organisational health, and by showing its viability in enhancing organisational performance, the present study gives practitioners a handy instrument for assessing the extensiveness of their current OH initiatives.The experts while interacting for the study expressed a uniform opinion regarding the OH constructs and its factors.We believe that developing an objective measurement instrument for organisational health is a significant contribution to the body of knowledge

Quantile Based Relevation Transform and its Properties

Relevation transform introduced by Krakowski (1973) is extensively studied in the literature. In this paper, we present a quantile based definition of the relevation transform and study its properties in the context of lifetime data analysis. We give important special cases of relevation transform in the context of proportional hazards and equilibrium models in terms of quantile function

Anticipatory competence building: Towards a measurement model

Identification of resources that will be a source of competitive advantage is not a simple task for today’s firms, since many of the characteristics attributed to them can only be intuitively perceived. The available competence frameworks capture the competence requirements for a family of clear and present jobs.In a fast moving business world of new products and technology, companies are grappling with the requirement to generate, acquire and internalize newer competence required for future products. This study examines Anticipatory Competence Building (ACB) as an essential moderator between Technology Competence Obsolescence (TCO) and Organisational Health (OH) in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector.In this paper, we argue that ACB can be developed into a measurement model with five distinct dimensions, namely Competence obsolescence, Future competence, Technology research, Market orientation and Competence renewal.The data is consolidated using the Delphi technique with the opinions of experts from diverse fields within Malaysia. The study ratified an ACB model consisting second order constructs with 17 factors which collectively influence the degree of TCO and OH in an Organization.These factors are itemized to convert the model into a survey based instrument of measure.The model gives practitioners a refreshed look at the current competency framework to be wary about the imminent and essential future competencies

Impact of innovation capacity and anticipatory competence on organizational health: A resource based study of Nokia, Motorola and Blackberry

Analysts cite several reasons for the decline of Nokia, Motorola & Blackberry which include wrong product strategy, market mis-alignment, improper customer orientation, untimely investment etc. However, looking at from the Resource-Based View (RBV), the researchers identify few catalytic elements, which arguably augmented an unfavorable situation for these companies to be decimated gradually by the quick and the smart in the marketplace.The study was conducted through the analytical research of the literature available on the three companies.From the RBV perspective, the researchers identify Collective Competence Deficiency (CCD) as a common factor in the companies which resulted in decline of the organizational health.The study acknowledges the role of disruptive technology in making internal competence obsolete faster than the usual in Information and Communication Technology sector. The researchers further explore the moderating role of Innovation Capacity (IC) and Anticipatory Competence Building (ACB), in defining the degree of competence deficiency created by the fast changing technology.Through the case studies of Nokia, Motorola and Blackberry and from the content analysis of literature around technology companies, there emerge the measurement models of IC and ACB.Researchers consolidated 7 dimensions and 21 factors for IC and 6 dimensions and 17 factors for ACB. HRD practitioners and scholars should further explore these relationships, especially in the high tech industry sector where the competition drives out established companies from the marketplace for want of innovation and competence, a right mix of vitamins to maintain theOrganizationalHealth (OH)

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) mediated enhanced anti-candidal activity of ZnS-ZnO nanocomposites with low inhibitory concentrations

Enhanced antifungal activity against the yeast species Candida albicans, Candida tropicalis and Saccharomyces cerevisiae was displayed by ZnS-ZnO nanocomposites prepared by a simple precipitation technique. The antifungal activity was significantly more in the presence of indoor light than under dark conditions and was a clear confirmation of the inhibitory role of reactive oxygen species (ROS) generated in situ by the photocatalytic nanocomposites. The generation of ROS was further evidenced by flow cytometry results and membrane permeabilisation studies. Time kill assay and growth curve analysis indicated diminished antifungal activity under dark conditions due primarily to Zn2+ efflux in solution. © 2015 The Royal Society of Chemistry

Lateralization of mesial temporal lobe epilepsy with chronic ambulatory electrocorticography

OBJECTIVE: Patients with suspected mesial temporal lobe (MTL) epilepsy typically undergo inpatient video-electroencephalography (EEG) monitoring with scalp and/or intracranial electrodes for 1 to 2 weeks to localize and lateralize the seizure focus or foci. Chronic ambulatory electrocorticography (ECoG) in patients with MTL epilepsy may provide additional information about seizure lateralization. This analysis describes data obtained from chronic ambulatory ECoG in patients with suspected bilateral MTL epilepsy in order to assess the time required to determine the seizure lateralization and whether this information could influence treatment decisions. METHODS: Ambulatory ECoG was reviewed in patients with suspected bilateral MTL epilepsy who were among a larger cohort with intractable epilepsy participating in a randomized controlled trial of responsive neurostimulation. Subjects were implanted with bilateral MTL leads and a cranially implanted neurostimulator programmed to detect abnormal interictal and ictal ECoG activity. ECoG data stored by the neurostimulator were reviewed to determine the lateralization of electrographic seizures and the interval of time until independent bilateral MTL electrographic seizures were recorded. RESULTS: Eighty-two subjects were implanted with bilateral MTL leads and followed for 4.7 years on average (median 4.9 years). Independent bilateral MTL electrographic seizures were recorded in 84%. The average time to record bilateral electrographic seizures in the ambulatory setting was 41.6 days (median 13 days, range 0-376 days). Sixteen percent had only unilateral electrographic seizures after an average of 4.6 years of recording. SIGNIFICANCE: About one third of the subjects implanted with bilateral MTL electrodes required >1 month of chronic ambulatory ECoG before the first contralateral MTL electrographic seizure was recorded. Some patients with suspected bilateral MTL seizures had only unilateral electrographic seizures. Chronic ambulatory ECoG in patients with suspected bilateral MTL seizures provides data in a naturalistic setting, may complement data from inpatient video-EEG monitoring, and can contribute to treatment decisions

Nations within a nation: variations in epidemiological transition across the states of India, 1990–2016 in the Global Burden of Disease Study

18% of the world's population lives in India, and many states of India have populations similar to those of large countries. Action to effectively improve population health in India requires availability of reliable and comprehensive state-level estimates of disease burden and risk factors over time. Such comprehensive estimates have not been available so far for all major diseases and risk factors. Thus, we aimed to estimate the disease burden and risk factors in every state of India as part of the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) Study 2016