Influence of Perceived Value and Personal Values on Consumers Repurchase Intention of Natural Beauty Product

Consumers concern on health and environment has been remarkable increasing recently. With vaguer product status especially on its impact on human body and health, consumers shifted to a more health option in which products that were produced from natural ingredients. Understanding the consumers concern for their health and wellbeing should be the guideline for marketers in strategizing the marketing tactics. Besides the growing emphasis on external appearance, consumers concerned on health and the environment has appeared as a recent consumer drives. This study aims to investigate the consumers perspective in relation to consumers perceived value and personal values when it comes to their decision to repurchase the same brand of natural beauty products. 300 questionnaires were distributed among the users of natural skin care products with 226 were returned and usable. The study findings indicated that functional value contributed the highest with = 0.398 and p = 0.00, followed by environment consciousness, with = 0.293 and p = 0.000 and health consciousness = 0.264 and p = 0.00. Practically, the findings helped marketers to be creative when promoting the beauty products by emphasizing on ecological beauty or product safety to feed into the womens attitude toward natural beauty products. Having a thoughtful mind on the factors that driven the intention of these women consumers will aid in designing a message with better persuasion

Purwarupa Sistem Otomasi Buka Tutup Tirai Berbasis Light Dependent Resistor

AbstrakGorden merupakan tirai yang digunakan untuk menutup sebuah jendela pada malam hari. Membuka dan menutup tirai adalah salah satu kegiatan yang sering dilakukan didalam kehidupan rumah tangga, dan biasa kita sering lupa menutup tirai pada malam hari saat kita tinggal berpergian dari pagi hingga malam.Purwarupa tirai otomatis dirancang dengan menggunakan beberapa komponen yang terdiri dari: roda penggerak yang digerakkan menggunakan motor dc yang dilengkapi dengan driver motor, sensor cahaya menggunakan Light Dependent Resistor, IC RTC (Real Time Clock) DS1307, dan sistem pengendalian menggunakan mikrokontroler ATMega32.Sistem ini berfungsi untuk mengontrol membuka dan menutup tirai. Pada sistem ini, saklar yang digunakan berupa relai. Relai tersebut berfungsi sebagai pembalik polaritas pada motor. Relai diaktifkan berdasarkan besar kecilnya intensitas cahaya yang didapat dari sensor Light Dependent Resistor. Resistansi LDR akan berubah seiring dengan perubahan intensitas cahaya yang mengenainya atau yang ada disekitarnya. Purwarupa ini juga dapat dijalankan  dengan menggunakan pengaturan waktu. Putaran motor dikontrol berdasarkan penerimaan cahaya dari sensor Light Dependent Resistor. Kata kunci— Mikrokontroler, sistem otomasi, light dependent resisitor,sensor cahaya, RTC  Abstract Curtains is a curtain that is used to close a window at night. Opening and closing the curtain is one of the activities that are conducted in domestic life, and usually we often forget to close the curtains at night while we are living traveling from morning till night.Prototype automatic curtains designed by using some of the components comprising: a drive wheel driven using dc motors are equipped with driver motor, light sensor using Light Dependent Resistor, IC RTC (Real Time Clock) DS1307, and control system uses microcontroller ATMega32.This system serves to control the opening and closing the curtains. In this system, which used a relay switch. Relay functions as inverting the polarity of the motor. Relay activated by the size of the light intensity obtained from the sensor Light Dependent Resistor. LDR resistance will change with changes in light intensity about it or around it. This prototype can also be run using the time setting. Motor rotation is controlled by the exposure of the sensor Light Dependent Resistor. Keywords— Microcontroller, automation system, resisitor light dependent, light sensor, RT

Construction waste management: preparedness towards the 4th Industrial Revolution / Jannatun Naemah Ismam, Nurulanis Ahmad @ Mohamed and Nor Azizah Talkis

Construction waste management (CWM) has progressively improved in a few years, especially in the reduction of waste generated on site and less waste disposal to the landfill. However, there are still a few constraints in operating the waste through the 4R’s concept efficiently. The 4th Industrial Revolution has slowly assimilated into stakeholder engagement in many businesses from various perspectives. The CWM is one of the perspectives in the construction industry that needs emergent response to these evolving trends. Intensive literature review has identified several factors that must be considered by construction practitioners in CWM, mainly for achieving the 4th Industrial Revolution. Furthermore, several technologies applied in different developed countries are reviewed, particularly to explore waste management technology through the 4R’s concept (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Remove). This paper has discovered adaptability, the robustness of the technology and accessibility as factors that need to be considered in introducing technology in CWM. The findings give direction to technologists from the public or private organizations in developing proper guidelines of CWM

Individual and team learning in a learning organization: A study of university libraries in Malaysia

This paper partly presents the results of a study being carried out at 12 university libraries in the Klang Valley of Malaysia. The study aims to investigate whether librarians are practising the concepts of a learning organization, and to examine their perceptions on the practices of individual and team learning in their workplace.The results of the study revealed that librarians perceived that there is an existence of learning practices at the individual and team level, but they are not too convinced of the extent to which the practices exist

Corporate governance in Malaysia: The effect on state business relation

The Asian Financial Crisis in 1997 not only introduced the corporate governance term but also drew an attention to the public about the weaknesses of Malaysian corporate governance practice.After 1998, Malaysian government decided to adopt corporate reform that could enhance the quality of good corporate management practice.This reform is clearly stated in the code and rules of corporate governance.The purpose of this research is to study the significance of implementing the code and rules of corporate governance since public already realize the close relationship between business and politics. Three companies were chosen as indicators for this study. As a result, it found that companies, which involve in corporate malpractice but have good relationship with states will always be excluded from the legal corporate action

Synthesis and cntibacterial activity of silver/montmorillonite nanocomposites

Silver nanoparticles (Ag-NPs) were successfully synthesized into the interlayer space of Montmorillonite (MMT) by chemical reduction method. AgNO3 and NaBH4 were used as a silver precursor and reducing agent, respectively. The properties of Ag/MMT nanocomposites were studied as a function of the AgNO3 concentration. The UV-vis spectra of synthesized Ag-NPs showed that the intensity of the maximum wavelength of the plasmon peaks increased with increasing AgNO3 concentration. The crystalline structure of the Ag-NPs and basal spacing of MMT and Ag/MMT were also studied by Powder X-Ray Diffraction (PXRD). The antibacterial activity of Ag-NPs was investigated against gram-negative bacteria (Escherichia coli, Escherichia coli O157:H7 and K. pneumonia) and gram-positive bacterium (Staphylococcus aureus) by disk diffusion method using Muller-Hinton Agar (MHA) at different sizes of Ag-NPs. The smaller Ag-NPs were found to have significantly higher antibacterial activity. These results showed that Ag-NPs can be used as effective growth inhibitors in different biological systems, making them applicable to medical applications such as in surgical devices

The effectiveness of antenatal class towards improvement of knowledge among pregnant women in Hospital Chancellor Tuanku Muhriz (HCTM)

Antenatal knowledge is associated with positive outcome for pregnant women as it provides information to allow them to identify any problems during pregnancy. Studies have underlined the problems of the information overload is possible during an antenatal class, it is unclear to what extend information given during antenatal class are retain by mother, thus the need for this study. Methods: This is a quasi-pre-post experimental study involving 82 participants. Baseline pre and post knowledge on antenatal class was evaluated among respondents using validate questionnaires. T-test was used to determine the relationship between various socio-demographic factors and knowledge of respondents. Results: Chi-square test used to test pre and post knowledge score. There was a significant increase in the difference between before and after antenatal classes run against the knowledge. In addition, the study found no significant difference for participants who are professional and non-professional and level of education. Conclusion: This study concludes that the antenatal classes run in HCTM shows a positive impact in improving maternal care during pregnancy, childbirth and care after birth. It is best to suggest that to increase promotion and information regarding antenatal classes so that pregnant women and couple could attend and get the benefit from the class

Green synthesis of silver/montmorillonite/chitosan bionanocomposites using the UV irradiation method and evaluation of antibacterial activity

In this study, silver nanoparticles (Ag-NPs) were synthesized using a green physical synthetic route into the lamellar space of montmorillonite (MMT)/chitosan (Cts) utilizing the ultraviolet (UV) irradiation reduction method in the absence of any reducing agent or heat treatment. Cts, MMT, and AgNO3 were used as the natural polymeric stabilizer, solid support, and silver precursor, respectively. The properties of Ag/MMT/Cts bionanocomposites (BNCs) were studied as the function of UV irradiation times. UV irradiation disintegrated the Ag-NPs into smaller sizes until a relatively stable size and size distribution were achieved. Meanwhile, the crystalline structure and d-spacing of the MMT interlayer, average size and size distribution, surface morphology, elemental signal peaks, functional groups, and surface plasmon resonance of Ag/MMT/Cts BNCs were determined by powder X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X-ray fluorescence, Fourier transform infrared, and UV-visible spectroscopy. The antibacterial activity of Ag-NPs in MMT/Cts was investigated against Gram-positive bacteria, ie, Staphylococcus aureus and methicillin-resistant S. aureus and Gram-negative bacteria (ie, Escherichia coli) by the disk diffusion method on Muller–Hinton Agar at different sizes of Ag-NPs. All of the synthesized Ag/MMT/Cts BNCs were found to have high antibacterial activity. These results show that Ag/MMT/Cts BNCs can be useful in different biologic research and biomedical applications, such as surgical devices and drug delivery vehicles

The effect of chitosan content to physical and degradation properties of biodegradable urea fertilizer

Chitosan has been widely used in many applications due to its biodegradability and non-toxicity. This article discusses the effect of different chitosan loadings on properties of ureafertilizer which prepared through direct wet mixing process. Absorption and soil degradationtests were performed to measure the amount of water intakes and the life-cycle of the fertilizer.The chemical interaction and thermal properties were analyzed using FTIR and DSC,respectively. It was found that water absorbency and degradation rate increases with chitosanloading, and FTIR confirms the presence of urea in as-produced fertilizers from a unique –NHand amide C=O functional groups