The role of psychological factors in health and illness : the application and future direction of health psychology in Malaysia

This aim of this chapter is to introduce health psychology as a branch of applied psychology in Malaysia. The chapter is divided into the following sections: (1) overview of health psychology; (2) literature review on psychological factors associated with health and illness-related behaviors; (3) health and illness in Malaysia; (4) major landmarks ofhealth psychology in Malaysia; and (5) coronary heart disease among Malaysians referring to a study on the relationship between psychological factors and outcomes. The rationale for addressing coronary heart disease (CHD) is multifold: (i) CHD is the leading mortality factor in Malaysian government hospitals; (ii) the onset and progression ofCHD is influenced by modifiable healthrelated behaviors; and (iii) cardiac rehabilitation programs in Malaysia need to take into account the specific psychological needs of Malaysia

Psychology of learning: an Islamic theory

The objective of this article is to provide an Islamic perspective on the psychology of learning. This is a theoretical study based on reviews of secondary sources on Islamic and conventional psychology. It analyzes four conventional theories namely classical conditioning theory, operant conditioning theory, observational learning theory, and insight learning theory. It is argued that the fundamental elements of these theories go against the Islamic belief system, but certain other elements conform to Islamic beliefs. Referring to ibn Sina and al-Ghazali‟s treatment of many aspects of these theories and reflecting on the practices of the Companions during the time of Prophet Muhammad (SAW), the article argues that the fundamental difference between the conventional theories of psychology of learning and the Islamic theory of psychology of learning is the factor of human soul. In conventional theories, the soul as a factor is completely discounted, while in Islamic theory it is considered to be central

Gender inclusive education in higher education: illusory or a necessity?

Introduction: Malaysia, which achieved its independence in 1957, has undergone incredible socio-economic changes that have brought about wealth to its citizens. The growth and development of the Malaysian economy can largely be attributed to the success of the Malaysian education system which has seen literacy rate increases from 80 per cent for men in 1980 to more than 90 per cent in 2000. Similar increase is also observed in women, albeit slightly lower; from 62 per cent in 1980 to 82 per cent in 2000 (Aminah, 1998). The Malaysian higher education system has also undergone great transfonnations in the last five decades with, to date, a two-fold increase in the number of government universities compared to before the turn of the century

EEG analysis for understanding stress based on affective model basis function

Coping with stress has shown to be able to avoid many complications in medical condition. In this paper we present an alternative method in analyzing and understanding stress using the four basic emotions of happy, calm, sad and fear as our basis function. Electroencephalogram (EEG) signals were captured from the scalp of the brain and measured in responds to various stimuli from the four basic emotions to stimulating stress base on the IAPS emotion stimuli. Features from the EEG signals were extracted using the Kernel Density Estimation (KDE) and classified using the Multilayer Perceptron (MLP), a neural network classifier to obtain accuracy of the subject’s emotion leading to stress. Results have shown the potential of using the basic emotion basis function to visualize the stress perception as an alternative tool for engineers and psychologist. Keywords: Electroencephalography (EEG), Kernel Density Estimation (KDE), Multi-layer Perceptron (MLP), Valance (V), Arousal (A

Analyzing brain activity in understanding cultural and language interaction for depression and anxiety

Human brain has always been considered as a black box and is the source of all emotions. Analyzing cultural and language role through human emotion by looking at the brain activity can thus help us understand depression and stress better. This paper focuses on understanding and analyzing undergraduate students’ emotions with different background and culture after completing their semester final examination. Brain wave signals were captured using EEG device and analyzed through proposing an affective computation model. EEG signal was collected from 8 healthy subjects from different states of Malaysia with different dialects where each subject was emotionally induced with audio and video emotion stimuli using the International Affective Pictures and System (IAPS). Features were extracted from the captured EEG signals using Kernel Density Estimation (KDE), which was then categorized into four basic emotions of happy, calm, sad and fear using the Multi-layer Perceptron (MLP). Results of the study show potential of using such analysis in understanding stress, anxiety and depression

Temporal modeling of head movement during facial expression via dual pivot tracking system: a case of disgust

Temporal modeling od facial expression is very important in various fields which include expression recognition, realism in computer animation and behavioral study in psychological field. While various researches are currently being done to capture the movement of facial features for its temporal property, not much is being said about the head movement during the facial expression process. The absence of head movement description can lead to incomplete expression description especially in the case of disgust where head movement can be a vital element for its depiction. Therefore, this paper proposes a method to track the movement of the head by using a dual pivot head tracking system (DPHT). In proving its usefulness, the tracking system will then be applied to track the movement of subjects depicting disgust. A simple statistical two-tailed analysis and visual rendering comparison will be made with a system that uses only a single pivot to illustrate the practicality of using DPHT. Results show that better depictions of expression can be implementad if the movement of the head is incorporated

Kajian penilaian kempen media cara hidup sihat 2007

Amalan cara hidup yang tidak sihat oleh kebanyakan penduduk di Malaysia telah menyumbang kepada penyakit-penyakit kronik dan ini menyebabkan jumlah kematian meningkat. menyedari hakikat ini, pada tahun 2007, Kementerian Kesihatan Malaysia telah mengambil inisiatif untuk mengadakan Kempen Cara Hidup Sihat bagi menyedarkan rakyat Malaysia tentang pentingnya senaman, pemakanan sihat dan seimbang, menangani stres secara berkesan, dan penolakan alkohol. kempen-kempen ini juga bertujuan untuk mengubah cara hidup masyarakat agar lebih sihat

3D based head movement tracking for incorporation in facial expression system

Head movement tracking is a necessary system in our attempt to establish the positioning of the head in an instance of the time. In computer graphics, head positioning sequence must be done in a proper manner so that the rendering will appear realistic. The head role becomes more important when a facial expression is being depicted. As a true facial expression must be accompanied with some motion of the head, rendering the facial expression without any proper description regarding head movement will make the head less realistic. This paper proposed a dual-pivot 3D-based head movement tracking system (DPHT) that enables modeler to capture the movement of the head. By having two pivots in the system, the movement of the neck can be modeled together with the yaw, roll and pitch of the head. This movement of the neck is an integral part of the facial expression depiction as can be attested by someone who 'pulls' his neck in manifestation of disgust. The results in this paper show that having a dual-pivot tracking system, head positioning can be better established hence producing more realistic head movement model