Primary Medium Of Communication Research Articles

Unveiling Effectiveness: A Comparative Exploration of Task-Based Learning and Traditional Lecture Delivery in Teaching Engineering Drawing

Engineering drawing, conventionally referred to as engineering visuals, has served as the primary communication medium for engineers. In the realm of mechanical engineering, this mode of communication is heightened to the extent that it attains the status of a first language within its domain. Within engineering applications, any shortcomings in comprehending these drawings can result in significant expenses. The occurrence of errors in the interpretation of engineering drawings has consistently posed concerns within industries employing engineering professionals. Therefore, an urgent emphasis on enhancing the teaching-learning process within this drafting course is imperative. This article reports an attempt to elevate the graphical communication skills in a class of 2nd semester engineering students with the comparison of previous year data. The findings indicate that the instructional method has the capacity to improve engineering drawing skills, and this approach holds promise for raising proficiency within the span of a single semester of study. During the semester felicitators attempt one practice. Keywords: Graphical communication skills, engineering drawing, out of classroom approach

Digital Architectural Archives – Aesthetic Reading

My aim in this paper is to examine the impact of digital technology on the perception and practice of architecture. Online activities leave discernible traces, challenging the traditional ontological view of the subject’s independence from the material world. I will offer an exploration of the Internet’s role as the primary communication medium transforms architectural practice, emphasizing digital archives and distribution. Platforms like Pinterest, ArchDaily, and Instagram have transformed how architectural practices are shared and consumed, cultivating a new culture of multimodal communication. Within this context, I will discuss how digital technologies have profoundly altered perceptions of materiality, space, and information. I will explore how architects and artists now operate within an interconnected network of social, economic, and technological forces, moving away from traditional media to embrace digital fragmentation. This shift impacts how architectural objects are perceived, from complete forms to fragmented digital representations that are accessible to a global audience.

THE IMPACT OF USING ENGLISH AS A MEDIUM OF INSTRUCTION IN INDIAN SECONDARY SCHOOLS

Language is the primary medium of communication and expression of thoughts and ideas. In India, there are two official languages- Hindi and English. English has been occupying a dominant position since independence. There have been serious attempts to integrate English language in the school curriculum since 1980s. In the schools of Andhra Pradesh, English is taught either as a first language or second language. The present study intends to find the status of teaching English language in the secondary schools of Visakhapatnam District (Andhra Pradesh) where the schools with three different boards, ICSE, CBSE and Secondary Schools are chosen. The sample consisted of 50 teachers and 50 students from a total of 25 schools. A survey method and observation inventory was used for collection of data. The conclusion is that English language teachers need to abreast themselves with the latest developments in the context of language teaching. The co-operation from the school, teachers, parents and students yield fruitful results in improving the status of English language teaching.

Multitask and Transfer Learning Approach for Joint Classification and Severity Estimation of Dysphonia.

Despite speech being the primary communication medium, it carries valuable information about a speaker's health, emotions, and identity. Various conditions can affect the vocal organs, leading to speech difficulties. Extensive research has been conducted by voice clinicians and academia in speech analysis. Previous approaches primarily focused on one particular task, such as differentiating between normal and dysphonic speech, classifying different voice disorders, or estimating the severity of voice disorders. This study proposes an approach that combines transfer learning and multitask learning (MTL) to simultaneously perform dysphonia classification and severity estimation. Both tasks use a shared representation; network is learned from these shared features. We employed five computer vision models and changed their architecture to support multitask learning. Additionally, we conducted binary 'healthy vs. dysphonia' and multiclass 'healthy vs. organic and functional dysphonia' classification using multitask learning, with the speaker's sex as an auxiliary task. The proposed method achieved improved performance across all classification metrics compared to single-task learning (STL), which only performs classification or severity estimation. Specifically, the model achieved F1 scores of 93% and 90% in MTL and STL, respectively. Moreover, we observed considerable improvements in both classification tasks by evaluating beta values associated with the weight assigned to the sex-predicting auxiliary task. MTL achieved an accuracy of 77% compared to the STL score of 73.2%. However, the performance of severity estimation in MTL was comparable to STL. Our goal is to improve how voice pathologists and clinicians understand patients' conditions, make it easier to track their progress, and enhance the monitoring of vocal quality and treatment procedures. Clinical and Translational Impact Statement: By integrating both classification and severity estimation of dysphonia using multitask learning, we aim to enable clinicians to gain a better understanding of the patient's situation, effectively monitor their progress and voice quality.

On-site communication measures as a tool in outdoor recreation management: a systematic map

BackgroundCommunication is a central tool used to manage the balance between outdoor recreation and environmental protection in natural areas. Several studies have evaluated different communication measures in case studies, but rarely are these measures compared across contexts. We review the literature guided by the question: what is the scope of evidence of on-site communication to change human behavior towards a more sustainable direction in outdoor recreation? Taking natural areas as our starting point, we map research-based distribution and abundance of communication measures, with emphasis on their outcomes and study design.MethodsThe target population for our mapping review are outdoor recreationists and nature-based tourists who visit natural or near-natural settings. We examined studies that have crafted written, oral and visual intervention measures to change behavior by using persuasion, education and information rather than legal restrictions or bans. Examples of challenges addressed with communication measures include proper waste disposal, using designated trails, minimizing wear and tear at campsites, avoid disturbing wildlife, and encouraging appropriate and safe behavior. We did not restrict our search geographically. We searched publication databases for peer-reviewed published articles (WoS, Scopus) and forward and backward citation chasing. To identify grey literature we used the database IRMA and internet searches in Google Scholar supplemented with specialist searches. Inclusion criteria and related search terms were based on PICO and included population (P: people participating in outdoor recreation in natural settings), terms that denoted intervention (I: on-site communication measures in situ vs. C: no communication measures) and terms that denoted outcome (O: changed behavior). We screened first by title and abstract and finally full text. For each article selected for full-text screening, metadata was extracted on key variables of interest such as behavior category, context, targeted population, study design and outcomes.Review findingsOverall, we identified 54 studies that were assessed in the review. Our review documents growing academic interest looking at actual behavior change in outdoor recreation. Theory is often subsidiary to attempted behavioral change via communication and different situational aspects, such as targeted visitor populations and environmental context, as well as psychological factors remain underexplored in the literature. The primary communication medium in the reviewed papers is passive use of signs. Awareness raising is the dominant communication mode, but other modes such as emotions, identity, and social norms are common. The geographic distribution of the studies is highly skewed to the United States.ConclusionsThe amassed studies have an uneven focus on different settings and mediums used to change behavior. Research could benefit from investigating different contexts and the state of the natural environment before and after interventions. We advocate for casting a wider disciplinary net and interest in qualitative investigations to produce data-rich studies of where and how sustainable behavior is encouraged and eventually achieved. Collectively, different disciplinary perspectives are required to understand the aspects that contribute to sustainable, and sustained, behavior change. It is important to distinguish what aspects of behavior change could be generalized across settings, and which purely contextual aspects drive behavior change.

Multi-cue temporal modeling for skeleton-based sign language recognition.

Sign languages are visual languages used as the primary communication medium for the Deaf community. The signs comprise manual and non-manual articulators such as hand shapes, upper body movement, and facial expressions. Sign Language Recognition (SLR) aims to learn spatial and temporal representations from the videos of the signs. Most SLR studies focus on manual features often extracted from the shape of the dominant hand or the entire frame. However, facial expressions combined with hand and body gestures may also play a significant role in discriminating the context represented in the sign videos. In this study, we propose an isolated SLR framework based on Spatial-Temporal Graph Convolutional Networks (ST-GCNs) and Multi-Cue Long Short-Term Memorys (MC-LSTMs) to exploit multi-articulatory (e.g., body, hands, and face) information for recognizing sign glosses. We train an ST-GCN model for learning representations from the upper body and hands. Meanwhile, spatial embeddings of hand shape and facial expression cues are extracted from Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) pre-trained on large-scale hand and facial expression datasets. Thus, the proposed framework coupling ST-GCNs with MC-LSTMs for multi-articulatory temporal modeling can provide insights into the contribution of each visual Sign Language (SL) cue to recognition performance. To evaluate the proposed framework, we conducted extensive analyzes on two Turkish SL benchmark datasets with different linguistic properties, BosphorusSign22k and AUTSL. While we obtained comparable recognition performance with the skeleton-based state-of-the-art, we observe that incorporating multiple visual SL cues improves the recognition performance, especially in certain sign classes where multi-cue information is vital. The code is available at: https://github.com/ogulcanozdemir/multicue-slr.

Deep Learning-based Bangla Sign Language Detection with an Edge Device

Sign language, often referred to as silent conversation, serves as a visual gesture-based primary communication medium for hearing-impaired individuals. People unable to speak or hear communicate with themselves and general persons with static and dynamic sign languages. To ensure that people who are deaf and unable to talk do not feel excluded from this fast-paced world, it is even more crucial that sign language is incorporated into our culture and that a cost-effective and straightforward method of detecting it be developed. With this goal in mind, an automatic Bangla sign language (BSL) detection system has been developed in this work using deep learning approaches and a Jetson Nano edge device. The deep learning models have been trained with Okkhornama, an open-source database and a custom author-curated dataset of 49 categories and 3,760 images have been used to validate these techniques. These images are preprocessed by auto-orienting and resizing into 416 × 416 pixels in the Roboflow framework. Next, we implemented Detectron2, EfficientDet-D0 with TensorFlow and the PyTorch-built YOLOv7 models. Jetson Nano, a portable and sufficiently dynamic NVIDIA microprocessor, is also utilized in this project to generate an object detection model and infer it from test images in real-time. The Dectectron2 model performed best concerning detection accuracy, with a mAP@.5 of 94.915 and an AP of 54.814. The YOLOv7 model achieved mAP@.5 accuracies in detecting various classes from 85 percent to 97 percent and mAP@.5-.95 from 41 percent to 53 percent. Finally, the YOLOv7 Tiny approach has been used in the Jetson Nano edge device for real-time Bangla sign language detection because of its lowest total training time and frame rate. The proposed system is expected to provide an effective solution for Bangladeshi people suffering from hearing disabilities and the inability to speak in a simple and affordable approach.

Net-Force for Email Tracing

Phone: +233244087207 ABSTRACT Email is a widely used communication channel between businesses and individuals. Its importance has increased a lot nowadays, and the majority of the businesses prefer email as their primary communication medium to contact other businesses. Billions of emails are exchanged between businesses on a daily basis, and it is essential to note that most of them also contain spam or viruses. It is estimated that in Africa over 1 billion people use mail for their various communications. Malicious actors have also observed the lucrative advantages associated with mail communications on unsuspecting victims. They are able to reach masses and this has played a major role in the recent trend of romance scammers syndicate. The egregious impact of these cyber offenses offered the need to introduce tools to help investigate the mail communications and reveal actions of malicious actors in cyber space, this will also assist Africa in decreasing its cybercrime rate especially among home users with no or limited cyber safety knowledge. The legal implications of using NET-Force for email tracing to reveal actions of malicious actors will be assessed in this document. Keywords: Cyber Offenses, Cybeyspace, Net-Force Suite, E-mails, legal implications, Africa BOOK Chapter ǀ Research Nexus in IT, Law, Cyber Security & Forensics. Open Access. Distributed Free Citation: Nana Kwame Kwakye (2022): Net-Force for Email Tracing Book Chapter Series on Research Nexus in IT, Law, Cyber Security & Forensics. Pp 273-278 www.isteams.net/ITlawbookchapter2022. dx.doi.org/10.22624/AIMS/CRP-BK3-P44

An Efficient Two-Stream Network for Isolated Sign Language Recognition Using Accumulative Video Motion

Sign language is the primary communication medium for persons with hearing impairments. This language depends mainly on hand articulations accompanied by nonmanual gestures. Recently, there has been a growing interest in sign language recognition. In this paper, we propose a trainable deep learning network for isolated sign language recognition, which can effectively capture the spatiotemporal information using a small number of signs’ frames. We propose a hierarchical sign learning module that comprises three networks: dynamic motion network (DMN), accumulative motion network (AMN), and sign recognition network (SRN). Additionally, we propose a technique to extract key postures for handling the variations in the sign samples performed by different signers. The DMN stream uses these key postures to learn the spatiotemporal information pertaining to the signs. We also propose a novel technique to represent the statical and dynamic information of sign gestures into a single frame. This approach preserves the spatial and temporal information of the sign by fusing the sign’s key postures in the forward and backward directions to generate an accumulative video motion frame. This frame was used as an input to the AMN stream, and the extracted features were fused with the DMN features to be fed into the SRN for the learning and classification of signs. The proposed approach is efficient for isolated sign language recognition, especially for recognizing static signs. We evaluated this approach on the KArSL-190 and KArSL-502 Arabic sign language datasets, and the obtained results on KArSL-190 outperformed other techniques by 15% in the signer-independent mode. Additionally, the proposed approach outperformed the state-of-the-art techniques on the Argentinian sign language dataset LSA64. The code is available at https://github.com/Hamzah-Luqman/SLR_AMN.

The aftermath of colonialism: Supremacy of English in Indian schools

Over the years, a substantial body of literature has emerged that has discussed the centrality of English language for education in the Indian context in order to facilitate local as well as global preparedness. This paper analyses how English was introduced among Indians during the Colonial regime and the significance of English in present times as a subject of study and as the primary medium of instruction and communication in the context of schooling with special reference to an international school in India. Findings from the study reveal that the school not only places enormous emphasis on learning the language; it also promotes itself as an institution that offers better English language skills as compared to other public/private English medium schools and thereby grooms its students to become fluent in the language in order to face the world at large. This paper thus primarily seeks to understand how and why English, once considered to be a foreign language in India continues to be the lingua-franca of certain privileged sections of the society and how an international school in India continues to enhance the significance of English through its system of schooling.

Após o colonialismo: A Supremacia do inglês nas escolas indianas

Over the years, a substantial body of literature has emerged that has discussed the centrality of English language for education in the Indian context in order to facilitate local as well as global preparedness. This paper analyses how English was introduced among Indians during the Colonial regime and the significance of English in present times as a subject of study and as the primary medium of instruction and communication in the context of schooling with special reference to an international school in India. Findings from the study reveal that the school not only places enormous emphasis on learning the language; it also promotes itself as an institution that offers better English language skills as compared to other public/private English medium schools and thereby grooms its students to become fluent in the language in order to face the world at large. This paper thus primarily seeks to understand how and why English, once considered to be a foreign language in India continues to be the lingua-franca of certain privileged sections of the society and how an international school in India continues to enhance the significance of English through its system of schooling.

Cesta zpátky – domov na pohlednicích 1. světové války

Postcards and posters were the primary medium of visual communication during the World War I. Propaganda used them to incite patriotism in the reader, using various images and visual motives. One of them was the portrayal of home. This article explores how was home depicted on the Central Powers‘ and Entente’s posters and postcards and if there were any differences and/or similarities between them.

Teleconsultation experience with the idiopathic inflammatory myopathies: a prospective observational cohort study during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Teleconsultation has assumed a central role in the management of chronic and disabling rheumatic diseases, such as the idiopathic inflammatory myopathies (IIM), during COVID-19. However, the feasibility, challenges encountered, and outcomes remain largely unexplored. Here, we describe our teleconsultation experience in a prospectively followed cohort of adult and juvenile IIM. 250 IIM enrolled into the MyoCite cohort (2017-ongoing) were offered the option of audio/visual teleconsultation using WhatsApp during the nationwide lockdown. Clinical outcomes (major/minor relapse) and prescription changes were compared between IIM subsets. Socio-demographic and clinico-serological characteristics of those who sought teleconsultation were compared with those who did not. 151 teleconsultations were sought over a 93 day period by 71 (52.2%) of 136 IIM (median age 38 years, F:M 4.5:1). Nearly one-third (38%) consulted on an emergency basis, with voice consultations being the primary medium of communication. Over a quarter (26.8%) reported relapse (15.5% minor, 11.3% major), these being more common in JDM [71.4%, OR 8.9 (1.5–51)] as compared with adult IIM, but similar across various antibody-based IIM subtypes. Patients who relapsed required more consultations [2(2–3) vs 1(1–2), p 0.009]. The demographic and socioeconomic profile of the patients seeking consultation (n = 71) was not different from those who did not (n = 65). Voice-based teleconsultations may be useful to diagnose and manage relapses in IIM during the pandemic. Patient education for meticulous and timely reporting may be improve care, and larger multicentre studies may identify subsets of IIM that require greater care and early tele-triage for effective management of the condition.

Concept of Li-Fi on Smart Communication between Vehicles and Traffic Signals

Communication is an essential thing for any work to be done on desired condition. There are several ways are there to communicate between a person to a machine. Switches are made as primary communication medium to do a specific task by a machine. The advancement of technologies introduced a remote switch for operation. The advancement is still continuing with voice recognition, hand gesture movement and mind reading models. Recently machine to machine communication was introduced to communicate their status between another machine or a system for implementing smart work on its own intelligence. The paper introduces a smart communication between vehicles to traffic signals and vehicle to vehicle using Li-Fi (Light Fidelity) technology for sharing necessary information to the nearby vehicle. The paper also describes the limitations and challenges in the Li-Fi technology for further communication improvement.

How Credible Is Online Physical Activity Advice? The Accuracy of Free Adult Educational Materials

ABSTRACT Purpose The study purpose was to determine the rate that free online educational resources presented at least one message consistent with national physical activity guidelines (PAGs). We also tested if message consistency varied by production source. Methods The Google search engine and lay adult search strategies were used to locate freely available web articles focused on physical activity promotion, written in English, used text as the primary communication medium, and produced by a commercial, government, professional association, or voluntary health agency organization. The 2008 Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans 18 to 64 yr of age were used to appraise the credibility of messages in web articles. Results A sample of 72 web articles published or updated between 2008 and 2018 (M = 2016.34, SD = 2.02) was obtained, all of which presented PAG-related messages. The rate that web articles lacked at least one consistent message ranged from 61.1% to 100% for the 17 PAGs considered. Per the χ 2 goodness-of-fit test, the level of inconsistency was significant for 15 PAGs (P < 0.05). Per the χ 2 test, production source was associated with consistency for five PAGs, all related to aerobic (endurance) physical activity (P ≤ 0.05, V ≥ 0.30); otherwise, the rate of web article inconsistency was similar between production sources (P > 0.05, V = 0.11–0.26). The lowest rate of web article consistency (M ≈ 3%) involved PAGs for adults with sedentary or modestly active lifestyles. Conclusion Knowledge translation of PAGs is low in free resources that are available online, irrespective of production source. Implications of our results to physical activity equity are discussed, and future research recommendations are provided.

A Framework to Guide ICT Solution for Language Barrier in South African Healthcare

In recent years, healthcare service providers have increasingly employed mobile systems in delivering services. However, the nature of the diversities in tribes and languages within many developing countries enhance the difficulty of delivering or receiving the services which are provided by many healthcare organisations. This is so because the English language is the primary medium of communication, although many healthcare recipients are not conversant in English as they cannot speak English fluently or understand it coherently. The objective of the study was to understand the impact which language barrier have on healthcare services. The interpretivist approach was employed. The case study approach was applied. Qualitative data were collected using semi-structured technique. The analysis of the data was guided by two theories, actor network theory and diffusion of innovation. From the findings, a framework was developed, which is intended to guide a solution that can be provided to address the barrier in the South African healthcare environment.

Reaching the Unheard Voices and Hinterlands in the Digital Era: An Assessment of the re-Engineering of Newsgathering in Africa

Historically, Africa is known to be backward in adoption of technology. History has it that Africa trailed behind in the use of new technology for newsgathering. Africa is the 2 nd largest continent after Asia with over 60% of its population living widely dispersed in hinterlands whose insecure terrains, inaccessibility, and distance from cities, make it impossible for journalist and media broadcasts to cover their socio-economic, cultural and political activities. In addition to these factors, scarcity of journalists, costs and conflicts, inability of media industries to train and/or recruit enough journalists, government indifference and pro-urban communication policy made newsgathering in African hinterlands almost impossible. However, the evolution and reign of Internet-based technologies, which enable citizens to contribute to news-making, and information gathering and exchange became a solution. Nevertheless, it is confronted with pro-urban middle class relevance due to epileptic power, poor network, low level of education and technology skills, and lack of formal framework for newsgathering in the hinterlands. This paper, therefore, explores the dynamics of newsgathering in the technologically-driven internet era, with a view to identifying inherent limitations in African hinterlands, and therefrom offers profitable recommendations. Geographically, the study considers African rural communities. Thematically, the paper is an investigation into the acquisition and use new information technologies particularly phones with internet facilities to generate and circulate news from African hinterlands, factors hindering the practice and possible ways of enhancing it. Periodically, the study covers the 21st century i.e. 2000 to date, which has witnessed ICTs massive penetration of the hinterlands and their use as primary medium of communication. In exploring the digitalisation of communication in rural Africa where majority of the population lives without regular or formal connection to organs and channels of governance and events in the entire world, this paper is significant to the extent that it assess and exposes the challenges modernisation is facing in trying to provide solution to the scenario. It explores areas of investments in media and communication in rural Africa, and attempts to provide viable alternatives to the problems hindering internet-mediated-technologies approach to newsgathering in rural Africa. It provides approaches to the democratisation of newsgathering and circulation, which opens up rural Africa to the global community and for participation in e-governance, global dialogue and discussions in every aspect of human development, rights and politics. This paper adopted logical inquiry, survey of literature and expost facto methods of data gathering. Central to these methods, extensive literature review was primarily adopted as data gathering processes. This is because of the wealth of literature, debates and criticism available on the new media, newsgathering, and the African experience particularly the hinterlands. This will explicate new areas of investments in communication technologies and provide valid framework for newsgathering across Africa, which will inevitably advance globalisation into and enhance development in African hinterlands.

Status of English language teaching in secondary level under different school interventions

Language is the primary medium of communication and expression of thoughts and ideas. In India, there are two official languages- Hindi and English. English has-been occupying a dominant position since independence. There have been serious attempts to integrate English language in the school curriculum since 1980s. In the schools of West Bengal, English is taught either as a first language or second language. The present study intends to find the status of teaching English language in the secondary schools of Siliguri (West Bengal) where the schools with three different boards, ICSE, CBSE and state boards are chosen. The sample consisted of 50 teachers and 50 students from a total of 25 schools. A survey method and observation inventory was used for collection of data. The conclusion is that English language teachers need to abreast themselves with the latest developments in the context of language teaching. The co-operation from the school, teachers, parents and students yield fruitful results in improving the status of English language teaching.

Orality, Textuality, and Visuality

The oral lore or oral tradition had for long been the only and primary medium of communication, and of the transmission and preservation of knowledge, folklore, cultural material, and canonical scriptures from one generation to the other. It was a fully-fledged, perfected, and complete artistic literary medium prior to the invention of script. The advent of the technologies of literacy (writing and print), however, changed the existing oral-aural based culture into a highly literate, and document-oriented world. The expansion of new media technologies, offering unlimited privileges, relegated to an even more subordinate position the status of this tradition. This paper discusses the concepts of 'oral culture' and 'oral literature' , and identifies some of the defining features of an oral context or culture in contrast to a literate or print-minded culture. It also characterizes the oral text, and the written text, points out the fortes (strong points) of both modes, and the thought processes and skills involved in each. The concern of the last section is with new media, also referred to as hypermedia, the privileges they offer, and the sweepingly detrimental power it has had over the art of orality. Keywords: Orality, oral culture, literate culture, script, print, new media technology.

Animation of Fingerspelled Words and Number Signs of the Sinhala Sign Language

Sign language is the primary communication medium of the aurally handicapped community. Often, a sign gesture is mapped to a word or a phrase in a spoken language and named as a conversational sign. A fingerspelling sign is a special sign derived to show a single character that matches a character in the alphabet of a given language. This enables the deaf community to express words that do not have a conversational sign, such as a name, using a letter-by-letter technique. Sinhala Sign Language (SSL) uses a phonetic pronunciation mechanism to decode such words due to the presence of one or more modifiers after a consonant. Expressing numbers also have a similar notation, and it is broken down into parts before interpretation in sign gestures. This article presents the variations implemented to make the 3D avatar-based interpreter system look similar to an actual fingerspelled SSL by a human interpreter. To accomplish the task, a phonetic English-based 3D avatar animation system is developed with Blender animation software. The conversion of Sinhala Unicode text to phonetic English and numbers written in digits to sign gestures is done with a Visual Basic.NET (VB.NET) application. The presented application has 61 SSL fingerspelling signs and 40 SSL number signs. It is capable of interpreting any word written using the modern Sinhala alphabet without conversational signs and interprets the numbers that go up to the billions. This is a helpful tool in teaching SSL fingerspelling and number signs of SSL to deaf children.