A theoretical framework towards understanding of emotional and behavioural difficulties

Children’s emotional and behavioural difficulties are the result of multiple individual, social and contextual factors working in concert. The current paper proposes a theoretical framework to interpret students’ emotional and behavioural difficulties in schools, by taking into consideration teacher–student relationships, students’ social and emotional skills and classroom context. Based on Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological model, according to which process, person and context are the main sources of children’s development, the current paper combines three theoretical approaches: firstly, in terms of process, the systems communication approach referring to teacher–students’ relationships; secondly, in terms of person, the Social and Emotional Learning, which refers to children’s social and emotional competences and skills; and thirdly, in terms of classroom context, the achievement goal theory, with emphasis on mastery classroom goal structure. The derived framework provides a means to capture the dynamic multidimensional process through which emotional and behavioural difficulties arise. This perspective provides educators with a comprehensive theoretical and practical preventative tool for emotional and behavioural difficulties.     

Students' transition into higher education: The role of self-efficacy,regulation strategies,and academic achievements

Transition into higher education (HE) has received increased interest in recent years, since it represents a challenging period for students. The aim of this study was to further understand the associations between self-efficacy, academic achievements, and regulation in first-year university students during their transition into HE. The convenience sample consisted of 374 first-year university students (230 females, 61.5%), aged from 18 to 33 (M = 19.86, SD = 1.51) and recruited from an Italian university. Self-efficacy was assessed using the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire; regulation strategies were assessed with the Inventory of Learning Patterns of Students; and a self-reported grade point average was taken as an indicator of each student's academic performance. Result shows that students' self-efficacy was positively associated with self-regulation and negatively associated with a lack of regulation. Students with higher self-efficacy and self-regulation strategies had better academic performance. Female students performed better in academic activities and adopted more external regulation strategies. The findings represent an opportunity for university institutions to consider the interventions they provide to first-year students in order to facilitate the successful transition from secondary school; they also provide researchers with further knowledge about the effect of self-efficacy, and regulation strategies on students' adjustment to HE.     

At the Intersection of the Digital Divide and the Knowledge Gap: Do Knowledge Domains and Measures Matter?

This study reports on knowledge gain, examined through three separate measures (free recall, comprehension and recognition) among high- and low-education groups who used two types of news media (newspaper vs. online) to consume two kinds of news (public affairs vs. entertainment). Results (n = 123) confirm the knowledge gap and validate concerns about the digital divide. Yet three different knowledge acquisition measures generated dissimilar findings: strong education effects for free recall, strong media format effects for recognition, and strong interaction effects between education and media format for comprehension. The implications of these inconsistencies are considered for measuring knowledge gaps in future research.     

Guiding Principles for Internet Policy: A Comparison of Media Coverage in Four Western Countries

The governance of the Internet on the global level has attracted much attention. In the process the importance of the national context has gotten downplayed. We argue that understanding of the national context is a necessary complement to research on global governance for an understanding of the dynamics of Internet development. We spotlight the importance of the national context by showing that seemingly global principles have varying import and meaning in four countries—the United States, Germany, Finland, and Sweden. We do so via a qualitative content analysis of leading newspapers.     

A new decision to take for cost-sensitive Naïve Bayes classifiers

Practical classification problems often involve some kind of trade-off between the decisions a classifier may take. Indeed, it may be the case that decisions are not equally good or costly; therefore, it is important for the classifier to be able to predict the risk associated with each classification decision. Bayesian decision theory is a fundamental statistical approach to the problem of pattern classification. The objective is to quantify the trade-off between various classification decisions using probability and the costs that accompany such decisions. Within this framework, a loss function measures the rates of the costs and the risk in taking one decision over another.     

Determinants of the Web accessibility of European banks

This paper aims at identifying the factors influencing the implementation of Web accessibility (WA) by European banks. We studied a database made up of 49 European banks whose shares are included in the Dow Jones EURO STOXX® TMI Banks [8300] Index. Regarding the factors for the implementation, we considered three feasible reasons. Firstly, WA adoption can be motivated by operational factors, as WA can aid in increasing operational efficiency. Secondly, we expect large banks to have higher WA levels, as small firms face competitive disadvantages with regard to technology adoption. Lastly, WA can also be understood as a part of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategy, so, the more committed a bank is to CSR, the more prone it will be to implement WA. Our results indicate that neither the operational factors nor the firm size seem to have exerted a significant influence on WA adoption. Regarding CSR commitment, results indicate a significant influence on WA adoption. However, the effect of the influence is contrary to that hypothesized, since more CSR-committed banks have less accessible Web sites. A possible reason for this result is that banks not included in the CSR indexes try to overcome this drawback by engaging in alternative CSR activities such as WA.     

Rapid microfluidic solid-phase extraction system for hyper-methylated DNA enrichment and epigenetic analysis

Genetic sequence and hyper-methylation profile information from the promoter regions of tumor suppressor genes are important for cancer disease investigation. Since hyper-methylated DNA (hm-DNA) is typically present in ultra-low concentrations in biological samples, such as stool, urine, and saliva, sample enrichment and amplification is typically required before detection. We present a rapid microfluidic solid phase extraction (μSPE) system for the capture and elution of low concentrations of hm-DNA (≤1 ng ml⁻¹), based on a protein-DNA capture surface, into small volumes using a passive microfluidic lab-on-a-chip platform. All assay steps have been qualitatively characterized using a real-time surface plasmon resonance (SPR) biosensor, and quantitatively characterized using fluorescence spectroscopy. The hm-DNA capture/elution process requires less than 5 min with an efficiency of 71% using a 25 μl elution volume and 92% efficiency using a 100 μl elution volume.     

面向过程的创新资源集成模式研究

企业作为创新的传统主体一直受到学界和业界的重视和实践,而作为创新动力重要源泉的消费者的作用同样不容忽视,其活跃的思维方式、独特的视角在一定使能技术支持下,在产品创新过程中同样大有作为.如何将传统的企业创新资源与消费者这两种创新资源有机地集成在一起是一个现实的问题.以创新的过程作为切入点,根据创新不同阶段的特征以及对创新能力的需求,探讨了企业、消费者这两种创新资源的能力特征以及参与创新活动的形式.为实现资源的动态整合,提出了一种立体集成模式,从创新活动形式、资源主体以及创新阶段三个维度探讨了面向创新过程的资源集成方式.     

组织人力资本视角下中小企业核心竞争力研究

进入知识经济时代,企业的发展将主要依靠知识和人才,而不是仅仅依靠物质资本,特别是对于中小企业而言,要在激烈的竞争中生存和发展就必须拥有人力资本方面的竞争优势.人力资本从形式上可以分为个体人力资本和组织人力资本.从组织人力资本的角度出发,重点分析了组织人力资本对企业核心力的影响,提出建立以组织人力资本为导向的核心力的对策.