Various Types Of Barriers Research Articles

Attitudes, barriers, and practices toward research and publication among medical students at the University of Damascus, Syria.

Introduction:Research is crucial for health-care delivery. However, medical students may not participate in research during their training, which might negatively affect their understanding of the importance of research and their future ability to conduct research projects. This is more prominent in developing countries. We aim to assess the attitudes of a sample of Syrian medical students toward research and suggest plausible solutions to reduce their self-reported barriers.Methods:A cross-sectional study was conducted using a self-administered, pretested questionnaire.Results:Three hundred and twenty-three responses were included. Most students demonstrated positive attitudes toward research. However, most of the responses indicated that they did not receive any training in academic writing or research and therefore did not have the opportunity to participate in formal research projects or scholarly writing. Students reported various types of barriers that challenged their progress in the field of research. Students who reported being encouraged by their professors to participate in research and writing/publishing scientific papers or reported receiving training about these activities were more likely to participate in research projects or writing scientific articles.Conclusion:Students have positive attitudes toward research and publication while they reported poor education, limited participation, and presence of many barriers that impede their participation in such activities.

Numerical study of reduction in ground vibrations by using barriers

Reduction in traffic-induced ground vibrations by the use of barriers is investigated. The traffic load characteristics were measured for motorway traffic. The effects of parameters on various types of barriers were examined by the use of a finite element model that was calibrated to green-field measurements. The model involved a layered soil and bedrock. The depth of a trench and the elastic modulus of a solid back-fill material were found to be the most important parameters to consider. In investigation of the effects of infiltration of water into an open trench, a coupled finite element formulation of the water and the soil was applied. Infiltration of water was found to decrease the achieved reduction. At long distances from the vibration source, of around 500m and longer, amplification in vibration level can be seen when a trench has been installed. It was also found, at long distances, that the motion of the ground surface follows the motion of the bedrock.

Exploring support for the unconquerable barriers in information seeking

ABSTRACTIndividuals are often faced with various types of barriers and failures when they look for information. They sometimes fail to locate their desired information after trying or even exhausting all of their known sources. Research has mostly focused on the barriers people face on the Web, but experiences with information seeking failures—particularly those that involve offline channels in real life scenarios—are understudied. In an exploratory qualitative study reported here, 63 survey participants and 10 interview participants contributed a total of 230 examples of information seeking failures and various supportive measures that would/might have prevented those failures. Their narrations not only offer rich pictures of what went wrong in information seeking episodes, but also further our understanding of the types of support that may improve the outcomes of individuals' information seeking.

Entrepreneurial Barriers Faced by Disabled in India

India has witnessed high economic growth rates in the past two decades and there has been a remarkable increase in the per capita income. But unfortunately many sections of the Indian population still remain economically deprived. Disabled persons though constitute a small part of the Indian population but their relative numbers are growing. Disabled lag behind in terms of education and employment which results in poverty. For equitable distribution of wealth and prosperity among all sections of population inclusive growth is necessary. The challenge is therefore not only to achieve higher economic growth rates but also to focus on economic inclusion so that all sections of the society are able to take advantage of opportunities. Promoting entrepreneurship among the disabled is a way to achieve faster and better economic integration. This paper highlights the barriers faced by entrepreneurs with disabilities. Also the paper tries to find out if these barriers are different than those faced by other entrepreneurs. Finally this paper highlights what steps can be taken to prevail over the various types of barriers being faced by disabled entrepreneurs.

MASTERING EFFECTIVE BUSINESS COMMUNICATION WRITING SKILLS BY FUTURE INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS PROFESSIONALS

The article under consideration is related to the problem of mastering writing skills by future international relations professionals. The problem is that for the last ten years its performance has declined in comparison with other foreign сommunication skills at all key stages. In our investigation, the history of teaching-of-writing approaches over the last 50 years was characterised by five phases, some elements of which have been and continue to be concurrent in the best practice. Modern review has differentiated six types of every-day writing, important in real life business intercourse: personal writing, public writing, creative writing, social writing, study writing, institutional writing. From a pedagogical point of view, techniques for improving writing will include practice in writing by the very teachers who are teaching it. Dialogic teaching is identified as an important element in improving the quality of interaction and thought on the part of students in the class. Also various types of barriers to effective writing communication were cosidered as a first step in improving communication style in future international relations professionals. Empirical teaching methods as well as creative context were outlined in the survey

Impediments to customer integration into the innovation process: A case study in the telecommunications industry

Summary Customer integration is an integral element of the innovation process today. Yet, despite the potential for integrating external knowledge into new product development (NPD) processes, companies often fail to benefit sufficiently from customer integration. Research attributes this failure to restricted absorptive capacity, intellectual property concerns, or the “not-invented-here” syndrome but has not yet shown in which different phases of NPD which barriers dominate. To contribute to the discussion on impediments and barriers to customer integration, this authors presents a case study that examines customer integration into different stages of the NPD on the basis on three complementary learning strategies, namely explorative learning, transformative learning, and exploitative learning. The results of the case study can help to sensitise managers for impediments to customer integration throughout their NPD and innovation processes and to overcome typical various types of barriers.

An exploration of knowledge, attitudes and behaviours of young multiethnic Muslim-majority society in Malaysia in relation to reproductive and premarital sexual practices

BackgroundThe increasing trend of premarital sexual experience and unintended pregnancies in Malaysia warrants sustained and serious attention. The sensitivities of sex-related issues in a Muslim-majority country create various types of barriers to sexual and reproductive health information, support and practices. This study aims to gain understanding of knowledge, attitudes and behaviours of young women in Malaysia concerning reproductive, contraception and premarital sexual practices.MethodsA cross-sectional study was performed, using an anonymous self-administered questionnaire carried out among 1695 female university students in a public university in Malaysia.ResultsRespondents had low scores for knowledge of reproduction and pregnancy (median=4, of maximum score 10), contraceptive uses (median=6, of maximum score 16) and contraceptive availability (median=3, of maximum score 13). The majority of women surveyed do not have liberal values in relation to premarital sexual behaviour (median=37, of maximum 40); higher scores on this scale corresponded to opposing premarital sex. The multivariate analyses showed that ethnic group was the strongest correlate of knowledge and attitude scores; being of Malay Muslim ethnicity was associated significantly with lower knowledge scores and premarital sex permissiveness. Other significant correlates were year of study, maternal occupational groups, level of religious faith, dating status and urban–rural localities. Level of premarital sex permissiveness was inversely correlated with reproduction and pregnancy knowledge score, and contraceptive knowledge scores.ConclusionReproductive health knowledge and attitudes were intricately linked to religious values and cultural norms differences surrounding sexual issues.

Barriers to healthy eating among Norwegian-Pakistani women participating in a culturally adapted intervention

To explore barriers to healthy dietary changes experienced by Pakistani immigrant women participating in a culturally adapted intervention, and whether these barriers were associated with intentions to change dietary behaviours. Participants were randomly assigned to control and intervention group. The 7-month intervention consisted of six educational group sessions on diet and physical activity, based on knowledge about Pakistani lifestyle and focusing on blood glucose control. Data on barriers for and intentions to healthy dietary changes were collected through an interview with help of a questionnaire. The article is based on data from follow-up assessments in the intervention group, comprising 82 women, aged 28-62 years, without a history of type 2 diabetes. The most important barriers to healthy dietary changes were preferences of children and other family members and perceived expectations during social gatherings. The perceived pressure from other family members was especially strong when the women were trying to change to more vegetables, lentils, and fish and to use less oil in food preparation. The barriers were inversely related to intentions to change. The women encountered various types of barriers when trying to change to healthier food habits, the most prominent being those related to the social dimensions of food consumption, as well as to awareness of the amount of oil used for cooking.

An innovation management approach for renewable energy deployment—the case of solar photovoltaic (PV) technology

In the discussion of renewable energy deployment, one key concern is the various types of barriers that renewable energy needs to overcome before it can make its way into the mainstream. These barriers increasingly shift from the technical to the economic and institutional. The most general types of barriers are due to technological ‘lock-out’ or to carbon ‘lock-in’ [ Unruh, G., 2000. Understanding carbon lock-in. Energy Policy 28(12), 817–830 (Elsevier)]. These barriers necessitate the development of a strategic approach to deploy or introduce renewable energy technology. Existing energy policy has mostly relied upon financial subsidies, market-based instruments such as renewable portfolio standards, and production tax credits to stimulate the installation and use of equipment to generate electricity from renewable sources. These strategies target mostly system-level decisions of end users. The purpose of this paper is to present an innovation perspective on the renewable energy deployment process by introducing the innovation value-added chain (IVC) framework. The analytical objective of IVC is to evaluate the impact of a new innovation on the various stakeholders and players in the development and deployment processes. A deployment or innovation strategy that causes minimal disruption, enhances existing competencies, or expedites new learning by the players has a higher chance to succeed. We draw upon two sets of system integration costs data for grid-connected distributed photovoltaic (PV) systems in Japan and the United States and demonstrate conspicuously different dynamic learning behaviors. These two deployment models can be understood in terms of how the IVCs are organized and how PV system integration projects are performed in the field. In addition, IVC-based findings can inform the targeted application of conventional financial subsidies for learning investment not only at the PV system level, but also at the (localized) system integration level. This would involve other stakeholders, thus suggesting new energy policy space. We highlight some future research directions using the IVC framework.

Barriers to energy efficiency: A comparison across the German commercial and services sector

Based on a large sample for the German commercial and services sector, this paper econometrically assesses the relevance of various types of barriers to energy efficiency at the sectoral level and across fifteen sub-sectors. The results at the level of entire sectors suggest that the lack of information about energy consumption patterns and about energy efficiency measures, lack of staff time, priority setting within organizations, and – in particular – the investor/user dilemma are all relevant barriers. Allowing for sector-specific differences in the relevance of these individual barriers yields a more heterogeneous picture. The numbers and types of relevant barriers vary across sub-sectors, and the majority of sub-sectors are subject to relatively few barriers. The statistically most significant barriers are found for the sub-sector of public administrations. These findings are robust, independent of whether the definition of an organization's energy efficiency performance includes only measures that have actually been realized or also those that are being planned. For planned projects, however, organizations appear to underestimate internal priority setting as a barrier to energy efficiency.

Barriers to Entry

A debate among economists over how to define barriers to entry began nearly 50 years ago and has never been resolved. This is somewhat surprising, given how important entry barriers are to so many facets of competition policy, such as market concentration, merger analysis and the abuse of dominance. The Competition Committee addressed the ways in which various competition agencies have chosen to define the term, as well as the reasons why many agencies have chosen not to define it at all. In fact, a majority of agencies do not believe that good competition policy requires a precise definition of barriers to entry. Instead, they focus on how various types of barriers affect the likelihood, timing, and extent of entry, and how to go about the difficult task of assessing entry conditions. The roundtable discussion therefore delved into those subjects, as well, and examined a number of illustrative competition law cases. This document (of 316 pages) comprises the proceedings of a roundtable on barriers to entry held by the OECD's Competition Committee in October 2005. It consists of an executive summary and background paper by the Secretariat, as well as 24 delegation submissions and a summary of the oral discussion.

Are Barriers to Service and Parental Preference Match for Service Related to Urban Child Mental Health Service Use?

The authors sought to examine how parental preference match for service and various types of barriers to service relate to involvement in urban child mental health care. A single-group longitudinal design was used to examine whether service use at an outpatient child mental health clinic was related to parents receiving the type of service they reported wanting for their child at intake and various types of barriers to service. Families who received the service parents reported wanting for their child attended on average 2 treatment sessions more, whereas barriers were unrelated to service use. Considering parent preference for child mental health service may be an effective strategy in increasing service involvement in urban child mental health care.

Continuous thin barriers for low-resistance spin-dependent tunnel junctions

The occurrence of pinholes in thin barrier low-resistance junctions degrades the TMR signal and increases the coupling field between pinned and free layers. The tunnel junction coupling field (Hf), junction resistance and TMR signal dependence on the barrier thickness was studied for various types of barriers (HfOx,HfAlOx,ZrAlOx,AlOx). Micromagnetic simulation was employed to simulate the coupling field versus pinhole density. From the coupling field results, HfOx makes the thinnest continuous barriers, followed by doped HfAlOx and ZrAlOx, and then AlOx. HfAlOx and ZrAlOx offer the best compromise between low resistance (1–5 Ω μm2) and reasonable TMR (12%–14%). Pure HfOx can be made with R×A products of 0.4 Ω μm2 but the TMR does not exceed 5.5%.

Chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes, follow gaze direction geometrically

Two experiments on chimpanzee gaze following are reported. In the first, chimpanzee subjects watched as a human experimenter looked around various types of barriers. The subjects looked around each of the barriers more when the human had done so than in a control condition (in which the human looked in another direction). In the second experiment, chimpanzees watched as a human looked towards the back of their cage. As they turned to follow the human's gaze a distractor object was presented. The chimpanzees looked at the distractor while still following the human's gaze to the back of the cage. These two experiments effectively disconfirm the low-level model of chimpanzee gaze following in which it is claimed that upon seeing another animate being's gaze direction chimpanzees simply turn in that direction and look around for something interesting. Rather, they support the hypothesis that chimpanzees follow the gaze direction of other animate beings geometrically to specific locations, in much the same way as human infants. The degree to which chimpanzees have a mentalistic interpretation of the gaze and/or visual experience of others is still an open question.

Introduction of ramp-type technology in HTS quasiparticle injection devices

Injection of quasiparticles with an energy larger than the superconducting gap into a superconducting strip results in breaking of Cooper-pairs and hence the suppression of the superconducting properties. Experiments using planar injection devices made of HTS materials with various barrier materials showed current gains varying from 2 up to 15 at 77 K. By changing the junction size and therefore the superconducting volume the current gain could be increased. A further reduction of the junction volume is very difficult using the planar device geometry. However, by applying the ramp-type technology it is possible to reduce the junction volume by at least one order of magnitude and a further increase in current gain is expected. Another advantage of this technology is the formation of in-situ barriers and electrodes and hence a better control of the junction characteristics should be possible, also the compatibility with the processes involved making RSFQ devices can be interesting for later applications. We have fabricated ramp-type injection devices, using various types of barriers. Characterization of these devices has been performed and the results of these experiments will be presented and discussed.

The time scale of classical diffusion with arbitrary energy barriers

An exact upper bound is established for the longest time scale of classical diffusion in a continuous space x in the presence of an arbitrary external potential energy E( x) and diffusion “constant” D( x). The result characterises, for any initial conditions, the solutions of the partial differential equation ∂W/ ∂t = ∂/ ∂x[− V( x) W+ D( x) ∂W/ ∂x], where V( x) = −[ D( x)/ k B T] ∂E( x)/ ∂x at temperature T. The time scale can be obtained from E( x) and D( x) without determination of the solution for the probability density W( x, t). Examples with various types of barriers in E( x) are considered, together with the classical limit of the Metropolis model of Monte Carlo experiments. The classical limit of the thermal activation law of Arrhenius is established in the low-temperature limit.

The use of barrier parameters for the characterization of electron tunneling conductance curves

This paper deals with barrier parameters calculated from the coefficients of polynomial fits to electron tunneling conductance curves for a large sample of junctions with various types of barriers. Methods of data handling, along with a comparison of the results from two different parameter calculations are shown. Finally, relationships between the barrier parameters and other junction characteristics — particularly RA, the product of junction resistance with area (a simple and extremely useful parameter) — are discussed.

Engineering Guidelines for Highway Noise Shield Design

Federal legislation exists that requires consideration of traffic noise for all Federal Aid Highways. Barriers and liners must be designed primarily as noise reduction structures that must also meet many nonacoustical requirements. In the United States, a few experimental barriers have been installed to date and, although the incidental noise reduction they offer has been measured, not much effort has been made to maximize noise reduction. Several computing programs and nomographs have been developed that provide general siting criteria for barrier placement, but no guidelines exist to achieve the greatest reduction of traffic noise consistent with structural, safety, and esthetic considerations. The comparative merits of various types of barriers are considered and suggestions are offered to improve barrier acoustical performance. Recommendations are suggested to serve as interim guides until more authoritative standards are developed.

Highway Noise and Acoustical Buffer Zones

Highway noise generation could be reduced at the source, but shielding by various types of barriers and protection of the exposed population by adequate zoning can also reduce its impact. The adequacy of solid barriers to attenuate noise is well established. However, the use of vegetative barriers by themselves or in combination with solid barriers may often be advantageous. Vegetation is known to be more effective in reducing noise of high frequency. Characteristics of vegetative barriers which affect noise attenuation are: density, pattern, height, species, undergrowth, ground condition, and location in relation to noise source and receiver. Atmospheric parameters which influence noise propagation are: wind and temperature gradients, wind direction, wind speed, temperature, and humidity. Optimal width of buffer zones depends on source characteristics, e.g., speed, type, propagation path conditions, and land use characteristics.

An Historical Review of the Nation's Efforts to Cope with Rural Poverty

THROUGHOUT the history of this country, one element in American ideology has been a belief in the concept of equality. The specific meaning of the concept has been variously defined. Some people have interpreted it in a spiritual sense as meaning that all men are equally the children of God. Others have viewed it as a juridical concept and have professed the belief that all men should be treated equally by law. Others have given it a growth connotation, commonly expressed in such terminology as All men should have an equal opportunity to develop their inherent capabilities or potentials. Relatively few Americans have embraced the belief that all men should have equal incomes. Regardless of how the concept is defined, it is perfectly clear that neither the founding fathers nor their successors have organized and operated a society in which all men have either equal power, equal status, or equal opportunities. Indeed, the whole history of American life has been filled with all sorts of discriminatory practices. The cynic, the skeptic, the purist can find evidence, today and yesterday, to argue that Americans have never really believed in the idea of equality among men, that both the literature and the liturgy which have long surrounded the concept of equality have been nothing more than a verbal facade behind which have hidden the most glaring inequalities and inequities. Moreoever, any honest reader of American history must admit that there is some truth in this view. But it is a partial truth. At the very same time that the American way of life in many of its social, economic, political, and religious dimensions has condoned and encouraged practices that have created and expanded areas of inequality, it has also spawned, nurtured, and encouraged other activities of an egalitarian nature. Relatively few Americans have been willing to convert Darwin's theory of evolution into an ethical guide to policy by saying that only the strongest and fittest should survive. There have been repeated efforts -by government, by private enterprise, by religious agencies, and by philanthropists, large and small-to aid and assist the lowly and the poor and to throw up various types of barriers to the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a few.