The role of acculturation and acculturation fit in finding full employment and career satisfaction : a study of highly skilled Asian migrants to New Zealand : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Psychology at Massey University

The process of cultural change and adjustment within the context of skilled migrants finding employment has been an under researched area. A further shortfall in research is that acculturation and 'acculturation fit' theory, and the concept of career satisfaction have been neglected by psychologists in the context of skilled migrants' finding employment. The present research attempted to fill this gap in research by testing a model based on the theory of acculturation and 'acculturation fit' and the concept of career satisfaction during the process of skilled Asian migrants finding full employment (i.e. proximity to full employment) in New Zealand. Proximity to full employment was hypothesised to partially mediate the relationship between psychological acculturation and career satisfaction, and the relationship between 'acculturation fit' and career satisfaction. Significant differences in mean scores of proximity to full employment and career satisfaction amongst acculturation styles were expected. Postal or electronic questionnaires were completed by 153 skilled Asian migrants and 30 experienced recruitment agents and human resource personnel in New Zealand. Measures included the 'Acculturation' measure (adapted from Mace, 2004), 'Rank Order Acculturation Style' measure (adapted from Mace), 'Guttman scale' for measuring proximity to full employment (adapted from Mace; Tharmaseelan, 2005), 'Under-Over employment' measure of employment status at present (adapted from Tharmaseelan), and the 'Overall Career Satisfaction' measure (adapted from Tharmaseelan). Regression analyses showed that employment status at present partially mediated the relationship between adapting to New Zealand culture and career satisfaction without controlling for the influence of age and duration in New Zealand. New Zealand acculturation directly predicted proximity to full employment. Significant differences in mean proximity to full employment and career satisfaction amongst acculturation styles were found before controlling for 'other' variables. No significant relationships were found when 'acculturation fit' was the independent variable. Limitations included the snowballing and networking sampling techniques utilized, which could explain the reason for obtaining a large proportion of employed Asian migrants. Despite limitations, findings indicated the importance of adapting to New Zealand culture and the major role of employment status at present in predicting career satisfaction of skilled Asian migrants in New Zealand

A Fluorescent Photoinduced Electron Transfer (PET) Sensor for Cations with a Separate PET Channel to Suppress Proton Signals

This thesis presents A-((10-((2-methoxy-4-methylphenoxy)methyl)anthracen-9- yl)methyl)(pyridin-2-yl)-A-((pyridin-2-yl)methyl)methanamine, 1, a photoinduced electron transfer (PET) sensor that acts as a fluorescent ‘Off-On’ switch in the presence of Zn ions and not sensitive to protons

Outlook for the Pharmacy Profession at the Dawn of the Decade 2020s

Pharmacy profession operated at elementary level in Sri Lanka well up to the beginning of the 21 st century. Their training programs were limited to certificate level, with courses of 1-2 years duration. With the introduction of the four-year university degree programs, pharmacy profession now carry the prospects of making good for the lost time. However, they still appear to be professionally somewhat timid hindering the realization of their full potential. There are many encouraging developments which are bound to promote a bright future. The positive, negative and many other areas related to pharmacy profession are discussed.Keywords: Professional organizations, Covid vaccine, Last gate, Pharmacy Counci

RODMRP - resilient on demand multicast routing protocol

ODMRP (On-Demand Multicast Routing Protocol) [6] [8] [2] is a popular multicast protocol for wireless ad hoc networks. The strengths of ODMRP are simplicity, high packet delivery ratio, and non-dependency on a specific unicast protocol. ODMRP floods a route request over the entire network to select a set of forwarding nodes for packet delivery. However, a single forwarding path is vulnerable to node failures, which are common due to the dynamic nature of mobile ad hoc networks. Furthermore, a set of misbehaving or malicious nodes can create network partitions and mount Denial-of-Service (DoS) attacks. This thesis proposes a ODMRP-based wireless multicast protocol named RODMRP that offers more reliable forwarding paths in face of node and network failures. A subset of the nodes that are not on forwarding paths rebroadcast received packets to nodes in their neighborhoods to overcome perceived node failures. This rebroadcasting creates redundant forwarding paths to circumvent failed areas in the network. Each node makes this forwarding decision probabilistically. Our simulation results indicate that RODMRP improves packet delivery ratio with minimal overheads, while retaining the original strengths of ODMRP

Lifetime risk of prostate cancer overdiagnosis in Australia: Quantifying the risk of overdiagnosis associated with prostate cancer screening in Australia using a novel lifetime risk approach

© 2019 Author(s). Objectives To quantify the risk of overdiagnosis associated with prostate cancer screening in Australia using a novel lifetime risk approach. Design Modelling and validation of the lifetime risk method using publicly available population data. Setting Opportunistic screening for prostate cancer in the Australian population. Participants Australian male population (1982-2012). Interventions Prostate-specific antigen testing for prostate cancer screening. Primary and secondary outcome measures Primary: Lifetime risk of overdiagnosis in 2012 (excess lifetime cancer risk adjusted for changing competing mortality); Secondary: Lifetime risk of prostate cancer diagnosis (unadjusted and adjusted for competing mortality); Excess lifetime risk of prostate cancer diagnosis (for all years subsequent to 1982). Results The lifetime risk of being diagnosed with prostate cancer increased from 6.1% in 1982 (1 in 17) to 19.6% in 2012 (1 in 5). Using 2012 competing mortality rates, the lifetime risk in 1982 was 11.5% (95% CI 11.0% to 12.0%). The excess lifetime risk of prostate cancer in 2012 (adjusted for changing competing mortality) was 8.2% (95% CI 7.6% to 8.7%) (1 in 13). This corresponds to 41% of prostate cancers being overdiagnosed. Conclusions Our estimated rate of overdiagnosis is in agreement with estimates using other methods. This method may be used without the need to adjust for lead times. If annual (cross-sectional) data are used, then it may give valid estimates of overdiagnosis once screening has been established long enough for the benefits from the early detection of non-overdiagnosed cancer at a younger age to be realised in older age groups

SWMM5-EA – A Tool For Learning Optimization Of Urban Drainage And Sewerage Systems With Genetic Algorithms

In spite of the developments in the application of evolutionary algorithms in the urban water sector, it is not widely used by practitioners in their day to day work. A reason for this underutilization is the lack of accessible optimization tools. The available limited options, on the one extreme, are characterized by tools for very specific applications (e.g. pipe sizing): While these provide useful optimization applications in specific domains, they are too restrictive in the range of application. The other extreme is to `glue-together’ a general purpose EA library and other required algorithms (e.g. an urban drainage simulation model) using computer programming languages. While this approach provides flexibility to potentially implement any optimization scheme, the computer programming skills demanded from the user make it inaccessible for many. A software tool was developed to help urban water engineers to lean the application of evolutionary computing techniques is presented. A popular urban drainage network modeller is coupled with an evolutionary computing library to create an optimization system driven by an accessible graphical user interface. The system is implemented in Python language using free and open-source tools and is released under a permissive licence. The design approach results in a software-tool that does not sacrifice range of applicability while being user-friendly. The tool was tested out in a number of graduate school classes and found to be effective in helping students internalize the principals of EA and its application in urban drainage/sewerage sector

Factors associated with stress among first-year undergraduate students attending an Australian university

Objective: The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between stress and various socio-demographic, health and behavioural factors among undergraduate students studying in an Australian university. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was carried out among firstyear undergraduate students studying at Griffith University. Participants were recruited from four different academic groups (N=728). The questionnaire used in this study comprised of three sections: socio-demographic information, stress scale and a food frequency questionnaire. K-means Cluster analysis was performed to identify the major dietary patterns and multinomial logistic regression analysis was used to examine the factors associated with stress. Results: Nearly 53% of the students had some degree of stress with 37.4% experiencing moderate to severe levels of stress. The factors most strongly associated with having mild or moderate/ severe stress levels included being in a relationship [OR =1.71, 95% CI (1.02-2.87) and OR=1.61, 95% CI (1.06-2.44)], studying a non-health related degree [OR=1.68, 95% CI (1.03-2.73) and OR=1.51, 95% CI (1.04-2.19)], working ≥ 21 hours per week [OR=2.12, 95% CI (1.02-4.40) and OR=2.21, 95% CI (1.32-3.67)], and engaging in an unhealthy dietary pattern [OR=2.67, 95% CI (1.25-5.72) and OR=2.76, 95% CI (1.47-5.16)]. Being a female [OR=1.84, 95% CI (1.25-2.72)], living in a shared accommodation [OR=0.52, 95% CI (0.27-0.98)], rarely exercising [OR=2.64, 95% CI (1.59-4.39)], having a body mass index (BMI) of 25 or over [OR=2.03, 95% CI (1.36-3.04)], and engaging in a dietary pattern that was low in protein, fruit and vegetables [OR=1.72, 95% CI (1.06-2.77)] were also associated with having moderate/severe stress levels. Conclusion: This study found that more than half of the undergraduate students had some levels of stress. Both mild and moderate/severe levels of stress were associated with sociodemographic characteristics, risky health behaviours and poor dietary patterns. Our findings reinforce the need to promote healthy behaviours among undergraduate university students in order to maintain good mental health.</p