The Role of Guanxi in China’s Foreign Banks: A Review of the Literature

Guanxi has existed in China’s Confucian society formore than two thousand years and at the end of the 1970s whenChina opened its doors to the outside world, guanxi wasinvestigated in great detail. Current literature indicates that noprior studies of guanxi have been investigated in China’s bankingindustry, or in particular, the China’s foreign banks (“CFBs”).This paper provides a theoretical review of the existing literatureon guanxi in general to facilitate development of the researchproblem, gaps, questions and propositions/issues for furtherinvestigation into a study on the role of guanxi in the CFBs

Effect of different distributional assumption of random parameters in the mixed logit model on willingness-to-pay values

Understanding consumers’ willingness-to-pay (WTP) value is vital for rational valuation of consumers’ benefit. Stated preference techniques such as Choice Experiment (CE) have been widely used to account for WTP value and one of the popular model specifications is the Mixed Logit (MXL) model. In the MXL model, it is essential to assume the types of distribution of random parameters. The specification of MXL models with different distributional assumptions of random parameters has been explored by many researchers. Nevertheless, the effect of different distributional assumptions of random parameters on goodness-of-fit, the significance of the coefficients and WTP values has not been studied adequately particularly in the context of Malaysia. In the present work, the analysis is carried out in this regard based on visitors’ preferences for tourist facilities at Tasik Kenyir, Malaysia. A number of MXL models were attempted with different distributional assumptions of random parameters; normal, log-normal, triangular and uniform. The results suggested that, in all MXL models, the goodness-of-fit statistics, the significance of the attribute coefficients and WTP values were quite comparable, except for the log-normal distribution. The methodological implications concern the importance of developing several MXL models with different distributional assumptions as well as the recommendation for policy makers to improve the facilities at the lake

Child Neglect and Its Association With Subsequent Juvenile Drug and Alcohol Offense

This study presents empirical findings about the association between childhood neglect and adolescents’ subsequent involvement with drug and alcohol related offense from a sample of 251 neglected children and their community matched control (N = 502) from a 17-year period longitudinal data set. Findings confirmed that neglected children were at greater risk to be arrested for later juvenile drug and alcohol offenses than non-neglected children. Being male, White and the presence of domestic violence also significantly contributed to elevated risks of being arrested for juvenile drug and alcohol violations for neglected children. Implications for practice and future research are discussed

Comparative study of flavor precursors, volatile compounds and sensory between Malaysian and Ghanaian cocoa beans

The aim of this work was to compare quantitatively the flavor precursor constituents between unroasted Ghanaian and Malaysian cocoa beans. Furthermore, the effect of roasting on the flavor development was also characterized based on the volatile compounds and sensory analysis. Sensory analysis results showed a significant difference (p0.05) between samples. Effects of flavor pre-cursors such as organic acids (citric acid, lactic acid, acetic acid), sugars (glucose, sucrose, fructose), free amino acids (asidic, bases, hydrophobic, polyphenols), and volatile compounds (alcohol, ketones, aldehydes, esters, pyrazine, acetic acid) are presented. Ghanaian cocoa beans were found to be much more acceptable in term of taste and flavors. Importantly, the amount of organic acids found in the beans could be a potential marker, contributed to the overall acceptability level for cocoa beans

Dealing with attributes non-attendance in a discrete choice experiment on valuation of tourist facilities attribute in Kenyir Lake, Malaysia

Accounting for ignored attributes, or attribute non-attendance (ANA), in discrete choice experiment (DCE) is believed to produce more reliable willingness to pay (WTP) estimates. However, there is evidence that respondents who claimed to have ignored some attributes may simply have assigned them lesser importance. To explore this issue in the context of tourism research, a new follow-up question is used to investigate whether the respondents have ignored certain attributes or just assigned the attribute as of lesser importance when responding. Three different mixed logit (MXL) models were estimated and compared. Results generally indicate that some respondents do indeed ignore certain attributes, and some of them put less emphasis on certain attributes when making decisions. Comparison of the different MXL models reveals different WTP estimates, suggesting the importance of considering an appropriate method to deal with ANA

Molecular architecture of the kinetochore-microtubule attachment site is conserved between point and regional centromeres

Point and regional centromeres specify a unique site on each chromosome for kinetochore assembly. The point centromere in budding yeast is a unique 150-bp DNA sequence, which supports a kinetochore with only one microtubule attachment. In contrast, regional centromeres are complex in architecture, can be up to 5 Mb in length, and typically support many kinetochore-microtubule attachments. We used quantitative fluorescence microscopy to count the number of core structural kinetochore protein complexes at the regional centromeres in fission yeast and Candida albicans. We find that the number of CENP-A nucleosomes at these centromeres reflects the number of kinetochore-microtubule attachments instead of their length. The numbers of kinetochore protein complexes per microtubule attachment are nearly identical to the numbers in a budding yeast kinetochore. These findings reveal that kinetochores with multiple microtubule attachments are mainly built by repeating a conserved structural subunit that is equivalent to a single microtubule attachment site

A comparison study between Doane’s and Freedman-Diaconis’ binning rule in characterizing potential water resources availability

One of the primary constraints for development and management of water resources is the spatial and temporal uncertainty of rainfall. This is due to the stability and reliability of water supply is dynamically associated with the spatial and temporal uncertainty of rainfall. However, this spatial and temporal uncertainty can be assessed using the intensity entropy (IE) and apportionment entropy (AE). The main objective of this study is to investigate the implications of the use of Doane's and Freedman-Diaconis' binning rule in characterizing potential water resource availability (PWRA), which the PWRA is assessed via the standardized intensity entropy (IE') against the standardized apportionment entropy (AE') scatter diagram. To pursue the objective of this study, the daily rainfall data recorded ranging from January 2008 to December 2016 at four rainfall monitoring stations located Coastal region of Kuantan District Pahang are analyzed. The analysis results illustrated that the use of Doane's binning rule is more appropriate than Freedman-Diaconis' binning rule. This is due to the resulted PWRA characteristics using Doane's binning rule is relatively consistent with practical climate such that the study region is experiencing poor-in-water zone with less amount and high uncertainty of rainfall during the Southwest Monsoon, while abundant and perennial rainfall during the Northeast Monsoon. Furthermore, the use of Doane's binning rule is more advantages compared to the Freedman-Diaconis' binning rule with the abstraction of computational cost and time

Progressive severe lung injury by zinc oxide nanoparticles; the role of Zn2+ dissolution inside lysosomes

Background: Large production volumes of zinc oxide nanoparticles (ZnONP) might be anticipated to pose risks, of accidental inhalation in occupational and even in consumer settings. Herein, we further investigated the pathological changes induced by ZnONP and their possible mechanism of action.Methods: Two doses of ZnONP (50 and 150 cm(2)/rat) were intratracheally instilled into the lungs of rats with assessments made at 24 h, 1 wk, and 4 wks after instillation to evaluate dose- and time-course responses. Assessments included bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid analysis, histological analysis, transmission electron microscopy, and IgE and IgA measurement in the serum and BAL fluid. To evaluate the mechanism, alternative ZnONP, ZnONP-free bronchoalveolar lavage exudate, and dissolved Zn2+ (92.5 mu g/rat) were also instilled to rats. Acridine orange staining was utilized in macrophages in culture to evaluate the lysosomal membrane destabilization by NP.Results: ZnONP induced eosinophilia, proliferation of airway epithelial cells, goblet cell hyperplasia, and pulmonary fibrosis. Bronchocentric interstitial pulmonary fibrosis at the chronic phase was associated with increased myofibroblast accumulation and transforming growth factor-beta positivity. Serum IgE levels were up-regulated by ZnONP along with the eosinophilia whilst serum IgA levels were down-regulated by ZnONP. ZnONP are rapidly dissolved under acidic conditions (pH 4.5) whilst they remained intact around neutrality (pH 7.4). The instillation of dissolved Zn2+ into rat lungs showed similar pathologies (eg., eosinophilia, bronchocentric interstitial fibrosis) as were elicited by ZnONP. Lysosomal stability was decreased and cell death resulted following treatment of macrophages with ZnONP in vitro.Conclusions: We hypothesise that rapid, pH-dependent dissolution of ZnONP inside of phagosomes is the main cause of ZnONP-induced diverse progressive severe lung injuries